Question about tusks etc

[glastonburyfever]

Ok so here's my question. My little girl of 8 months hasn't taken too well to weaning since starting at 6 months. She won't let me spoon feed her unless it's yogurt and I offer a variety of finger foods but it's very hot and miss

I know that chewing is essential for speech development and getting the mouth muscles working and she does like things like rusks or melty puffs etc so is that ok just to get her muscles working?

I don't need nutrition advice thanks as she's still having milk and I'm giving vitamins also so my question purely is about mouth muscles and will the rusks etc do the trick?

Farley's rusks have sugar and basically no nutritional content. I recommend you avoid. Find a healthier alternative? There's always rice cakes.

Rusks (even the low sugar variety) have more sugar than a digestive biscuit.
They are absolutely crap.
Melty puffs won’t work her jaw muscles because they just melt.
Better off looking into better BLW finger food ideas.

I don't care about the rusk sugar I am asking will they help
With her mouth muscles?

Is your name Betty! Wilma? Not sure letting a baby gnaw on a tusk is that good an idea!!

Be better with a satsuma or something surely? I don't think the melty puffs are that helpful as they melt.

Neither of mine ate food till they were about 10 months - mouth muscles are totally fine. I’m sure she’s got lots of toys to gum and chew?

@2021isalsorubbish yeah plenty toys. How come yours didn't eat until later, were they not interested or u just decided to try later? How old are they now

I avoided rusks due to the sugar, I made lots of homemade snacks for mine, savoury muffins,’homemade oat bars or just veg sticks.

She doesn’t need biscuits. At 8 months she needs to be having proper finger food, toast, strips of raw pepper, cook cartoon batons.

@Thatwentbadly and what if she refuses smart arse,what then?

Wtf, why the need to be so rude when I was giving alternatives.

There really is no need to be rude qhen someone is just trying to help.
Just ignore if you don't like the advice.

By the way if she refuses you try again another day, there are many foods out there to try, you don’t just get two months into weaning and decide they are fussy and give them biscuits instead.

@Thesearmsofmine

By the way if she refuses you try again another day, there are many foods out there to try, you don’t just get two months into weaning and decide they are fussy and give them biscuits instead.

Very true, my third to AGES to eat anything on a spoon. I cried qith frustration many days.

Should say took ages not to ages

Milk is still her main source of nutrition until around 1 so I wouldn't worry too much about that side of things.

It can take them a while to adjust to eating properly and most stuff gets gnawed and thrown around but she will be getting something from her food. Persevere and keep offering up healthy stuff - vegetables, toast, cheese or just finger sized bits of what you're eating until she starts to eat it.

Her muscles will develop naturally from chewing toys, making sounds, gumming stuff etc.

I wish I'd done more veg when my boy was little, he is obsessed with fruit so from experience I'd say stick with savoury stuff!!

8mo is still very little and new to weaning, I honestly wouldn't stress too much about it. While you say you don't want nutrimental advice, but there's no need to be giving rusks. Just keep trying different finger foods - she may just play, suck, bite, throw them, but that's all part of the process and will start engaging her mouth muscles. And teething toys

nutrimental ?? Nutritional, even.

It can take a baby 10-20 times of seeing/trying a food before they eat it. My DS had the odd rusk but they are very sugary.

Other go to snacks were:
Rice cakes with Philadelphia and chia seeds
Bananas
Yogurt just splashed on the tray with raspberries mixed in and let him go wild!

Have you got one of the silicone/net baby feeders? We used to put anything juicy in it, mango, satsumas, strawberries. It’s also great for sweet potato mash, swede etc!

[quote glastonburyfever]@Thatwentbadly and what if she refuses smart arse,what then? [/quote]
Did you mean to be so rude?

[quote glastonburyfever]@Thatwentbadly and what if she refuses smart arse,what then? [/quote]
I have lots of suggestions which may help but I’m not going to choose to give them to someone who is calling me names. Good luck in life with that attitude.

My youngest didn't take well to weaning at all but was fully conversational by 18 months so it didn't affect her speech. Just keep introducing foods again and again. I gave slices of omelette, bread sticks, toast fingers, cooked veg batons, florets of cauli/broccoli etc. I'd keep away from the melting crisps and especially rusks as they just disintegrate, they don't teach chewing (and the sugar content of rusks is high which I'm now scared to mentioned!). If they refused just remove it without fuss and give it again another time, it's often several attempts later they will try. Especially get bitter veg in early as who would want broccoli once they've tasted chocolate?

[quote glastonburyfever]@Thatwentbadly and what if she refuses smart arse,what then? [/quote]
Then say "ok" and try again another day. They don't need to eat loads of food at the moment, its just about trying different things. If you only try rusks and sweet stuff then that's what she will want.

I think what you want to do is broaden the repertoire - so if she’ll accept rusks, would she accept some kind of homemade porridge/oat bar or similar, which is lower in sugar? If she’ll accept a melty puff, is it worth trying her on a breadstick or similar, or a rice cake? I would imagine anything that gets her chewing is a good thing, so I’d probably try to reduce melty puffs.

There’s a cookbook, What Mummy Makes, which has some great ideas for sugar-free snacks for babies (including homemade ginger biscuits, which I’m definitely going to make for me DC2). I’m fairly sure it’s also on Instagram if you use it. But I get it can also be dispiriting to prep stuff which just gets thrown.

For what it’s worth, I have one child who didn’t take well to weaning and was just about eating ok-ish at 8-9 months when he got a tummy bug. He then refused anything I made for over a year and existed on super-smooth Ella’s kitchen pouches. Number 2 eats everything in sight. And I did nothing different!

As long as you’re offering a good range of food, she will get there. But I would focus on what you’re offering, with minimal hassle to yourself (giving her a bit of what you’re having where possible rather than making stuff just for her if it’s getting you down), rather than what she’s taking in.