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Thursday, March 27, 2014

1st Solids and Our Take on Baby Led Weaning

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Weston is 6.5 months now which means
BRING ON THE SOLIDS!

We went with sweet potatoes for his fist big boy meal!

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So far he’s had……..
Baked Sweet Potato, lightly mashed
Avocado Sliced or mashed in the Boon Feeder 
Pear, lightly mashed 
Apple chunks in a Boon Feeder, Or a whole apple to teeth on (monitoring a must)
Baked Acorn Squash chunks with coconut oil 
Banana slices  or popsicle style
Teethed on a cold celery and carrot stick
We’ve also mixed combinations of the above foods after he tried them solo a few times.

At this point he hasn’t met a food he doesn’t like!
I think he’s going to follow in his dad’s foodie footsteps.
I just hope he doesn’t have my massive sweet tooth!

Not only does Kent LOVE food but he gets a huge kick out of watching Weston enjoy food.
Seeing his son love food like he does makes his foodie heart go pitter-patter!

We’re only 2 weeks in so we’ve been playing things on the safe side.
This weekend we’re going to load up on some organic greens and veggies and get a little more adventures with is meals.

 

2014-02-22 05.58.11 1No we didn’t let him eat it!

Our Food Philosophy for Weston:
For the most part we let him feed himself (with his hands, supervised of course). He does great!
He actually prefers to feed himself. Unless we’re running late on meal time. Then he needs a little help to get started. Yes it gets  messy but that’s part of the journey. Weston has no problem scooping up his food with his sweet chubby hands. It’s so cute to watch him in action! Kent’s little foodie in the making!

Our Goals:
We want Weston to have fun experimenting with food, flavor, and textures. 
We’ve chosen not to do purees at this point and try not to over mash things that need to be mashed so they keep some of their texture. Nothing wrong with purees and I’m sure we’ll try some in the future. We just don’t want purees to be the main part of his diet. We want him to work on manipulating his own food, chewing, and getting used to different textures! We hope that he will to grow into an adventurous little eater!

We’ve also decided to say no to baby cereal/grains for the 1st year. After doing some research and per the the recommendation of our pediatrician we’ve decided it was just something want to style clear of at this point. Down the road sure, but not for a while.

There are many opinions about giving babies grains. If you’re interested in more info on why not to include grains in your infant’s early diet do a little online search. You’ll find tons helpful articles on how their bodies do not yet create amylase which is needed to break down grains. It’s not something I want to get into on the blog but if you’re interested in more info it’s out there for ya!

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Our take On Baby Led Weaning Our Formula Fed Baby 
Unfortunately Weston is not exclusively breastfed so the way we’re going about lead weaning differently than others who are exclusively breastfeeding and wanting to keep breast milk the main part of their babies diet. Wish it was different for us but we’re working with what we’ve got! To watch my vlog on our breastfeeding journey click HERE. I loved some of the ideas behind baby led weaning so I pulled a few of the key components that I liked and made them work for us.  
What We’re Doing: 
-Mashing some foods but making sure to keep their texture.
-Preparing fruits and veggies that are 6 month friendly cut into shapes he can feed to himself.  
-Serving his food on the tray of his highchair usually no bowl or spoon for him (at this point).
-We’ve replaced 2 bottle feeds (this is what we’re doing but talk to your pediatrician 1st. Weston was getting too many bottles for a baby his age so our pediatrician recommended we remove 2 and put more focus on solids. This many not be the same for everyone.) with 2 solid food meals a day severed with a little water in a straw sippy cup, this will change to 3 meals at 9 months. 
-Allowing him to explore food and letting him figure it out. He’s actually pretty good at it and is able to eat most of his meal on his own.
I only help if he’s A: Getting frustrated or B:Needing a little coaxing. At this point he prefers to feed himself. Sometimes he gets upset if I try to help.

As he becomes a little more experienced we’ll change things up!
Yes of course we want him to learn how to eat from dishes and use utensils but at this point since it’s all very new we’re not incorporating that just yet.

What’s Different About BLW A Formula Fed Baby: We’re basically doing Baby Led Weaning but since he’s formula fed we agree with our pediatrician that we need to make sure he’s getting some extra nutrition through healthy foods. When he sits down to eat it is about exploring but also I make sure that he’s consuming enough of what we give him to give him to fill his belly with some goodness. For those who do BLW while exclusively breastfeeding they don’t have to be too concerned about the amount they baby eats as they are getting all they need from breast milk. They can play and experiment and if they only take a bite or 2 it’s no big deal.  They also let the baby kind of lead the way making sure to keep breastfeeding the main part of the babies diet. Since he’s formula fed we’re not too worried about him loosing interest in formula. I’m not saying that we’re taking that away by any means but we are not concerned about him loosing interest.


So Many Things to Love About Baby Led Weaning!
It’s awesome when we all get to share a meal together…..at the same time!
Yes it is possible! You don’t have to take turns feeding the baby then eat your own cold meal alone after everyone else is finished . I also love that it empowers them to be adventurous eaters. If you think back many, many years ago they didn’t have pre made baby food pureed ready to go.  That takes a lot of the fun and learning out of the “learning to eat” stage. I also think over simplifying what baby eats plays a part in why we have so many picky eaters today; but that’s just my opinion. Again I’m not against purees! We’ll try them at some point I just don’t want his diet to only be purees. To each their own!

I love that down the road we’ll be able to feed Weston pretty much what we eat (with in reason of course). We have a few different stages to go through to get to that point but the idea of us all sitting down to share meal together sounds wonderful even if that includes a massive mess!

We’ve still learning and trying things out but I will keep you updated with our progress!

And I will leave you with one of my favorite Weston faces……..

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He soooo didn’t get that from me Winking smile 

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Next week I’ll be back with a post full of the things we’ve found useful thus far in our 
Baby Led Weaning journey!

I posted 2 post today! To see our “What We’ve Been Up To” post click HERE

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1 comment:

  1. we just started solids, we've tried a few purees, so far pears and applesauce are the winners, he has not been too thrilled with any veggies, sweet potatoes were ok, (anything green has been an all out revolt!) I am interested in doing BLW or at least transitioning in that direction. With Ford going to daycare 5 days a week, I'm not sure how his teachers would handle that...

    Can't wait to hear your update in a few weeks! :)

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