BLW 11 month old - what next?!

[Tommy]

BLW going really well and am very pleased with the way it's working out. However, I am still breastfeeding at least 5 times a day and think that DS3 is not eating as much food as he should be and relying a bit too much on the breastmilk.

Should I just cut down on feeds? He has one at 6am, mid morning, mid afternoon, bed time and then about 11pm. I'm very happy still feeding him but just not sure if he should be eating more quantity.

Any tips? TIA

what about footering around with the food timings so that he has it when he'd otherwise be due a bf?
you must do exactly as you like, obviously, but the gist is that 'as much as he should be' is 'as much as he's eating' iykwim, but i think it does get stressier, doesn't it, the nearer you get to that magic one year mark? for the record dd ate well enough that i wasn't bothered particularly about amounts, but she still didn't cut back on her milk until 13 months and then ditched loads and upped her food intake accordingly. does that help at all? i'm a bit rubbish, i think, because i ff so it's not like dd could just dive under my jumper. certainly it does seem like it's common for bf babies to take to self-feeding later than ff ones... i can imagine why, having smelled formula.

thanks. I will have a think about timings.

Today for example, I don't think he was feeling that well and I put him in his high chair and he just yelled so I got him out and gave him a feed which settled him but then of course, he didn't eat anything! He does pretty well at tea time and breakfast but lunch he's not really bothered about although he does like a mid morning mummy milk.

Thanks - I will carry on for another wek or two and see what happens

what about ditching the high chair for lunch and picnicking on the floor instead. at around that age dd wouldn't entertain the chair for lunch and preferred her meals standing up while she attended to some serious playing at the coffee table, if you please...

hmm.... that wouldn't really work with our current regime of trying to eat all our meals at the table with DS1 and 2.

Thanks for your help (as always!) will see how it goes and let you know!

my DD (blw of course) only really ate alot of solids from 13 months. 5 bfs a day is quite normal and she didn't decrease her milk intake when solids went up, I was advised by everybody to cut bfs to increase solids (hv, dieticians, mil etc) I ignored them and it worked. I'm actually about to wean off bm as DD now eats at 15 months but there are days where she is poorly and seems to BF all the time.

sounds about right Tapster. Sometimes he does eat really well - particularly if it's pasta on the menu - but other days he doesn't. I don't worry about it per se as he is still feeding so well but I just wondered what "should" (ha ha) happen at the magic year stage.

I will carry on in the same way and see how it goes in a month or two. He might be my 3rd but it's a completely different ball game!

you could all have a picnic?! build a den first, obv.

all sounding bit too much like "fun" now

oh yes, you are right, obviously. [stern]