weaning from baby jars to familyl food?

[katechristie]

DD is 8 months and I started weaning when she grabbed some banana off me one day. I offered a combination of finger food and mashed home-cooked stuff, and then in utter desperation one day when she wasn't taking much, but always seeming hungry, offered her a jar of food, which she wolfed down.

She doesn't do much with breakfast, recently starting to take a few spoons of ready brek or weetabix (maybe chews a bit of fruit / toast if I offer finger food, doesn't do much on that either), but will eat a whole jar of food at lunchtime, followed by some fruit, or yogurt or custard. Her little face lights up when she sees the bowl and spoon coming and she kicks her legs like crazy, so she is actually enjoying being spoon fed, as well as happy to munch on finger food that I offer, but she hardly takes any of the finger food in, so I'm not yet prepared to ditch the mash in favour of just finger food, as I was working on mash meal at lunch, finger food pud, finger food meal at tea, spoon pud. However, she's now gettinng upset at tea time if I don't give her a jar and polishes it off if I do give one.

Now, I'm obviously not against jars per se, or else wouldn't be giving them to her, but I'd much rather she was eating my own food and maybe having just 2-3 jars a week, but she resolutely refuses anything I cook. I've even tried mixing mashed veg in with the jars in the hope of slowly moving her over, but she then refuses to eat it. (yes, at 8 months ).

So, anybody got any suggestions for making the transition to my home cooked food??? - I do cook from scratch most nights, so it seems such a shame that she's not joining in. We have fairly average food I think: bolognese always being a favourite of course, roast dinners, fish pie, shepherds pie, pasta, risotto, casseroles, stews etc.

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anybody?

I have started mixing half home cooked with half jar in the bowl, as ds is liking the jars better too.

Oh heck, that sounds frustrating. I can sympathise as I started off BLW with DS and now still do that as much as I can, but have felt the need to offer him spoon stuff when he's not been doing very well and getting so frustrated.

Have you tried putting some of your stuff into one of the baby jars? DS definitely recognises the Plum Baby packaging .

oh well that's reassuring to know I'm not the only one then, I guess I need to stop stressing about it - in a week of this her sleep has improved no end too, and she seems much happier on it. I think I just thought 2nd time around I'd find the whole weaning thing easier, especially as she seemed keen to grab things herself, but now seems keener to just EAT than feed herself. thanks.

x-posted isitme, I feed from the bowl - it's the bowl she gets excited to see. you've just reminded me of the plum stuff though, so might pick some up in boots tomorrow, thanks, as I'm currently offering hipp and IIRC from DS, the plum stuff is a bit more real looking.

Um,we had this DS would ONLY eat jar food for about 2 weeks. Yuk, We gave him only finger food and it sorted it right out. we put some home cooked soft stuff on spoons which he picks up and spoons in, or just give him home made chicken/fish/steak fingers, meat/veggie balls, crudities, etc. Babies get bored of being fed and need a different kind of stimulation. try finger foods and self feeding.

thanks Louby, but the thing is she actually enjoys being fed and is wolfing the food down, so I'm happy to feed her, I'd just rather have a bit more home cooked stuff in there. She does have a munch on the finger food, but obviously is hungry and just wants to be fed. Whilst I cook from scratch, I don't do things like chicken/fish/steak fingers every night and winter food to me doesn't always lend itself well to finger food.

Could she be teething? DS has been getting his first four top teeth through for what seems like forever now, and I've wondered whether that was causing a surge in interest in the soft stuff.

Louby's suggestion sounds sensible if you can bear it when she's obviously so hungry.

Other things that seem to be getting DS "going" are:

Blueberries - tempts him to practice his pincer grip. All his little friends seem very keen on them too.

Fishfingers (shop bought!) with sweet potato oven chips seems a bit of a fave, although I'm not entirely sure why.

Sausage (in slices) with mashed potato.

Cheese on toast.

Just watch the salt content on these last three.

I use the self-feeding spoons, rather than the feeding ones. DS has always tended to grab them when they get in the vicinity of his mouth, so I just let him take it from there. We've now managed to get him picking pre-loaded ones up from his tray, and now he can keep them the right way up until they're in his mouth (or the rough area).

Yes, I like that the Plum Baby stuff comes in colours other than brown myself .

Oh, and DS has really got into the bitesize shredded wheat for breakfast over the past few weeks, so they might work for your DD.

Agree with hana, although I've only tried DS on a casserole that a friend cooked. The well-cooked braising steak was much easier for DS to make in-roads into than the stir-fried chicken or beef strips that we more usually have at home.

thanks all for the extra posts, yes it might be her teeth causing the interest in soft food, she's got one bottom one through for over a month and has a gorgeous gummy smile as she shows it off, but still waiting for any more. However, I really think it's just hunger - she still plays with the finger food more - crushed her toast and picked it into little balls to chase around the table this morning, then polished off some yogurt. ah well, I suppose I'll just continue offering both mash and finger food for now and try and move the mash more to home cooked, then less mash when we've knocked the jars on the head