OK no arguing please, just tell me in simple bullet points why it's good not to wean until 6 months

[tassis]

1. the WHO say so

1. BF is a whole lot less hassle

any others?

jollymum you're welcome to the little treasure between the hours of midnight and 7am - after that she's all mine

I asked my mother and grandmother how it was done before icecube trays and blenders when mine were babies

Soft food would be mashed with a fork to a fine consistency. They used old fashioned hand mincers (turn a handle ones)for harder foods and would chew food for the baby then pop it in their mouths
All done from around 3 months

I rarely pureed food, most were mashed with a fork, you can get it quite fine plus different foods mash to different consistencies and gets baby used to textures

I do have a question though, do you count 6 months from the day they were born? What happens if the baby is late or early? I know my daughter was a month early, and we had to think to the time she should have been born for milestones (adjusted age) What happens if baby is 2 weeks late? Do you use adjusted age or birth age?

The 6 months is just a whereabouts. SOme wait longer. It's about waiting for the right signs rather than a 6 month calendar e'g sitting well unsupported, lost gag reflex, pincer grip ect.

Tassis, eerrm, maybe not. I am an evil mad cow if I don't sleep. My sleep deprivation comes from waiting up for Ds1 (16) although he tells me not to, I can't help it. Also DH has habit of watching DVD's until 2am, coming to bed when I'm out cold and warming his feet/breathing curry breath/attempting a grope. I get my "baby fix" from my work, especially as I have some 6/7 weekers and just love tht baby smell/gerbil noises.

my sil gave her ds chewed up banana - people have been doing that one for years no?

Hatwoman - not sure if you're being ironic but I actually agree with all of those.

and i'll bet by six months your grandmother's children would have been eating finger food by the bucketload, bigbird. not because she had lovingly hand-ground their food for the previous three months and spoon-fed it to them, but because they were developmentally ready.
so with the guidelines at 6 months now you can skip the purees. The research was actually done from 4 months, and it watched to see when children self-fed. they all did so at roughly 6 months, which is also the same as the WHO guidelines so there is a pleasing synchronicity there.
and hatwoman, apart from the Waitrose thing as we are too poor for Waitrose in Jockoland, I really do satisfy all those primal parenting urges when i cook for my dh, myself and my baby together.

Can I ask why you come back at me with an aggressive tone? All I'm doing is asking questions, can the concept not be questioned? I understand alot (and have studied parts) of the way things were and I find everything to do with child rearing fascinating.

I haven't said I disagree with BLW once....I'm just intrigued with the whole concept and can see it is a good topic for me to use in my studies

I ahve acknowledged it is similar to how things are done in the past, I haven't berated anyone. I did voice concern that some parents, who wish to do things differently are treated almost like child abusers. I do believe in parent led parented, in finding out for themselves how to raise their own baby (there are things I used for my children that now have names like rapid return, fade away technique and the one I got most weird comments on was the dummy elf, at the time I was looked onas a weird ) but now these things are mainstream

I personally never fed my child from jars/packets etc but would never condemn someone who did. I also put all my children onto cows milk at 6 months (first 2 it was recommended to do so at 6 months, next two recommended at 12 months), as I didn't like the idea of formula.

I am asking questions as it interests me and wouldn't dream of telling you how to raise your children but I will stick up for parents wanting to raise their children how they see fit

Just as an aside, I won't be advising that we all follow fric's weaning habits, as they have one of the highest infant mortality rates in the world, and therefore who knows what long term damage their weaning habits cause?

fic being Africa with a sticky A key

i don't think i used an aggressive tone at all, bigbird, i was merely responding to your 'here is how my grandmother fed her baby' post and folowing it through beyond 6 months.
the point is developmental readiness for self-feeding seems to come at 6 months. all we are doing is trusting our babies to eat what they need and make the rest up with milk intake. for the record if you google BLW you should find the Gill Rapley info that explains as much as there is that can be explained.

bagbird, i don't think aitch's tone was at all aggressive, she was merely addressing a specific point made by you.

there's no need to be defensive, the op specifically asked for no arguing to break out, lol.