I can't be the only one completely baffled by the whole process?!

[SheWillBeLoved]

I have lost count of the amount of weaning information/books I have read, but I still don't get it. She is 6 months by the way.

Her feeding routine is:

8oz feed - 8am
7-8oz feed - 12pm
12.30pm - 2 types of steamed veg/fruit
8oz feed - 3-4pm
8oz feed - 7pm

For the past week, I have been offering her 2 types of steamed fresh veg, mashed together but not pureed, after her 12pm feed. She'll have maybe 2-3 tablespoons before turning her head away at it. Occasionally afterwards, she will lunge at my lunch and chomp on some bagel and a banana for a bit without really eating much of it.

Should I be offering her proper food after or before a milk feed? Also, when can she move onto eating things other than steamed veg and fruit? Any other tips appreciated!

[feeling massively thick emoticon]

TIA

I did all of this with my first child. It was stressful and went on for bloody months.

Second child - determined not to get hung up on meal times, improbable Annabel Carmel recipes (baby chicken Korma, anyone?) and ice cube trays full of mashed swede (who even likes swede?).

Instead, I gave her little bits of whatever we were having from the word go (about 7 months). No stress involved whatsoever and she is way less fussy and just more chilled about food.

I believe the trendies call it Baby Led Weaning.

You will find different advice in different places - don't get too hung up on details, like exactly what she is eating when, or whether to offer before or after milk feeds. Just do what works for you and in a year or two you will find she is eating food.

FWIW I did obsessive pureeing (ice cube trays of swede....) with dd and baby-led-weaning with ds1 and dd has ended up a fabulous eater while ds1 is the fussiest toddler on earth (which is the opposite of what most people will tell you should happen) - which makes me think it probably doesn't make that much difference what you do....

I'll second that. Rely on her telling you when she wants to eat and then just give her whatever's around.
The best thing to remember is that she'll never go hungry as the milk will always be going in still.
PS. I think I used to offer some milk then food as then they seemed to be calmer eating.

Enjoy!

As one poster on here was memorably told by her mother:

"Just give the child some food, FGS."

It will be slow at first - it's a very gradual process, and some children eat more than others at different stages.

I can heartily recommend the Baby Led Weaning book, just look it up on Amazon.

But basically, offer your child anything you're eating with a few simple rules:

• no salt
• as few processed foods as possible (because of added salt)
• nothing they can choke on (i.e. not raw apple, for example, initially)

We started with salt free rice cakes spread with hummus, pasta twirls with pesto, steamed carrots, broccoli, ripe pear segments etc.

Your schedule looks fine, start with one meal and work upwards from there.

The aim is for them to be eating three meals a day by 12 months, so you have lots of time.

As for milk before and after - it depends on the baby. some of them want a full tummy before they'll experiment with new foods. Others won't experiment unless they're hungry. Try it both ways and see which works best.

You'll be fine. It is weird and seems daunting at first, but in a couple of months you'll look back and think blimey, haven't we come a long way.

Bloody hell, I'm making things hard for myself aren't I

So I should just offer her whatever I'm having, when I'm having it, as long as it's suitable, and not get hung up on how much she does or doesn't eat because she is still drinking over 30oz of milk a day?

I think I can handle that! Except for when she stores mounds of soggy bagel on the roof of her mouth and then gags

I loved my ice cube trays of pureed vegetable. I don't know why everyone else finds it a chore. In fact I'm going to do it that way for ds2 just for fun.

I'm with you BadGardener! I'm quite enjoying puree-ing and feeding squishy fruits and veggies! And GuardianBaby seems to like it too! Long live AK and GF!

Also, have asked around (I actually live abroad but have conducted a little straw poll of friends who do have NCT chums etc in the UK) and BLW is not the norm. If you only read Mumsnet (a la me!) you'd think everybody in the entire UK is a BLW and puree-ing etc is a total dying art! Apparently, not though.....it's just Mumsnetters from what I can tell!

Yeah puree is great. I loved it too with my first nipper. However if its doing your head in, better to try something else than string yourself out surely?
And the whole phrase "babyled weaning" is vile anyway. It shoudl just be "I'm feeding my baby".
I have to say in fact that the whole BLW - whats right and whats wrong, I'm doing this, I'm doing that blah blah...is exactly why I rarely use this site.
We beat ourselves up so much and worry so much about what everyone else is doing when in fact we're all doing a damned fine job, however and which way we do it!
Ha ha - now I can dread the hideous replies too ;-)

finecheese

finecheese I'm totally with you.

Just give the baby food whichever way suits them. Ridiculous to expect a tiny baby to pick up peas straight away, so we bashed them up and put them on a spoon. Also yogurt, porridge etc, we used a spoon, but let the DSs take the spoon and put it in their mouth (or not - sometimes in hair, eyebrows etc!)

Things they can pick up, like rice cakes, broccoli, etc, we let them pick up.

Bish bash bosh, as Jamie Oliver says. No need to get knickers in a twist.

2-3 tablespoons sounds GREAT for 6 months, tbh. Both of mine took a while to get going with food, but there was a massive difference between the half-hearted broccoli nibbling at 6 months compared to shoving fistfuls of dahl, porridge or just about anything else into their mouths just a few months later.
Something that I found quite useful during those early weeks of weaning was to 'glue' mashed veg or whatever onto a rice cake with houmous or other soft spread so that they have something big to grip and guide into their mouth.

I was getting a bit hung up about it too with my ds, this thread has put me more at ease. Thank you for starting thread SheWillbeloved, and thanks for all those great replies. I enjoy pureeing too, and found ds prefers them to the jars in supermarket.

So I'll carry on as I started

Cheers

Hoorah for happy, lovely and chilled mothers xxx

With DD I just did the pureeing. With DS I do a mixture (e.g. some pureed/mashed food plus some finger foods). He is 9mo and yesterday had spag bol. Ate the bolognese off a spoon, and then had the pasta as finger food. When he was about 6/7mo he would have a small amount of mashed veg on a spoon and toast as finger food.

I have always found it easiest to feed them about halfway between milk feeds (although it does tie up your day a bit!), so at 6/7mo for example:

7am Milk
8.30 Baby porridge
11am Milk
12.30 Pureed veg plus toast. Mashed banana.
3pm Milk
5pm Mashed veg plus pasta. Rice cakes and yoghurt.
7pm Milk.

FWIW I do think that 'BLW' is a great way to introduce food without stress because there's no need to worry about a feeding routine as such - just fit it into your normal meal times.

But once they've got the idea that food is for eating and that it doesn't just come in smooth purees so they can bite, chew and swallow I don't think it matters if you feed them with a spoon for some meals. (Unless you really want to do die hard BLW in which case that's fine too)

Thanks for the replies everyone

Restocked this evening on things which can be steamed and then left for her to spread in her hair I always wanted to go down the BLW route, despite the strange looks from the family when I told them this in response to them asking "Has she had a Sunday roast yet?".. at 3 months

We'll see how she goes tomorrow. Thankfully she seems more interested in feeding herself than letting me feed her with a spoon!

Read this thread with interest and love the idea of giving my little one Hummous (in 6weeks time when we start weaning) but I thought this would have salt in ? Do you make your own ?

Two words. Gina Ford. I don't agree with her CLB routines one little bit, but her weaning book is fab! I loved pureeing and filling ice cube trays as well, and the whole concept of one cube of this, a couple of that, really appealed to my control freak nature. Seriously though, she introduces all the different food groups in a sensible order and then presents loads of simple recipes for when they get a bit older. I really would recommend it. Even after being on MN for years, I would still choose GF's method above BLW.

Annabel Karmel on the other hand is way too fussy for my liking - that woman has far too much time on her hands!

HaveToWearHeels I make my own - one tin of chickpeas, one clove of garlic, lemon juice, olive oil, black pepper, whizz it all up together.

The Food Standards Agency says babies under 1 should have no more than 1g of salt a day - that's 0.4g of sodium. I found that means they can have some very small amounts of salty things like sausages. Remember bread has salt in it too, so it's worth looking at other carbs like rice cakes, potatoes, especially initially when they're still tiny.

Actually, the FSA's weaning guide is very good - simple and clear. It's here

Double hip hip hooray for even more happy, lovely and chilled mothers who even admit to reading, nay liking, Gina Ford! (shock horror!) I have to say that the GF weaning book also appealed to my inner control freak (but then I like her CLB stuff too!)

I like it when a thread seems to be less judgmental/bossy and more supportive and "go with the flow" ish!

As long as your baby is happy and seems full and you are happy too - do whatever works for you!

Live and let live - there's no right or wrong with this weaning malarkey!

Oooooo - started writing this ages ago and have only just posted. I see TwilightTurtle has replied in between.... My high salt doesn't need to be stated thing wasn't a dig at your post BTW! I had meant it to be part of the "live and let live" but within reason bit of my post!

SheWillBeLoved - that sounds almost exactly what I'm doing with my 6.5m DD! And I have loads of little puree pots hidden in the freezer! .

I've been stressing out as well - should she be eating more, should she be having breakfast and dinner as well as lunch yet, what to do about finger foods?

Do I just put suitable finger foods in front of her? She seems to have no desire to actually put them in her mouth unless I do it for her. She's just had Ella's Kitchen puree and a bit of yoghurt. I tried giving her some bits of steamed broccoli and carrot, which she just mashed up, examined in detail and spread/dropped everywhere!

I was just looking at this thread and asking myself could I tell you my baby's eating routine. Resoundingly it is a no.

I am not sure about baby led weaning mine is more slummy mummy led weaning. Maybe it is because of the breastfeeding, maybe it is because I am really busy and lazy but I have been almost horizontal about it. My boy is now 13 months old and started having food when he was about 6 or 7 months I think. He's had squichy home foods, some from shops, mostly squishy stuff from our plates and now eats anything and in large amounts as well as still being breastfed.

With school routines and all the other stuff going on, as a number 3 he has had the benefit of an incredibly relaxed approach perfected over many years of being really slummy.

I haven't read the whole thread but please please just chuck a bit of what your eating on your babies highchair and eat with him

eat healthy food

enjoy

please relax about it

Dear Shewillbeloved. Yup - agree with all these posts. I got really stressed about weaning and now look back and think what all the fuss was about. I used to religiously make meals from Annabel Karmel and vary the foods etc. Now I just dig out whatever frozen green or orange ice cubes I can find at the bottom of the freezer. If it helps I used the following routine from about 7 months:

7.30am 200 ml milk

8.30am mashed banana and weetabix (or something similar) plus a bit of toast

12pm Lunch - mashed up whatever and yoghurt

2.30pm 200 ml milk

5.30pm Dinner - something else mashed up and fruit

6.30pm 200 ml milk

My advice would be to get your confidence by following the guides to the letter (puree all the food, leave it a few days between new foods blah blah) and within about 3 weeks you will forget all that and just go with the flow because you realise that your baby is not going to develop food allergies because they have inadvertantly eaten a kiwi fruit..........