Is your baby ready for solid food? If so, did you know that you don’t have to spoon feed your baby jarred food or make your own purees? Instead, skip ahead and go straight to finger foods with baby led weaning. This increasingly popular option fosters healthy eating habits by encouraging your baby to take the lead and experiment with different foods on his own terms. Here’s what you need to know about this alternative way to introduce solids. It’s a little bit funny that it’s dubbed “Baby Led Weaning” because you aren’t completely weaning your baby from breast or bottle, you’re just introducing solids in a way that allows your baby to be in control. Instead of “flying” in a spoon full of pureed baby food, you simply offer your baby finger food versions of age appropriate foods. Literally, you set a plate of food in front of your little one and let them explore the textures and tastes on their own terms. If they eat up, great. If they don’t like something, no big deal.
They have the power to decide if they are ready to eat something (and whether they like it) or not. Baby led weaning teaches a baby to chew and to move food from the front of their mouth to the back of their throat. It takes a little more work than just swallowing a puree, so here are the recommendations to determine if your baby is ready to get going with this approach to introducing solids… Obviously, you aren’t just going to grill up a steak and slap it down in front of your baby with baby led weaning. Instead, age appropriate foods should be offered that are soft enough for baby’s gums. Over time, you gradually offer your baby a wider variety of foods, including small pieces of meat or the delicious casserole that the whole family is having for dinner. Suggestions For Baby’s First Foods Cucumber (no need to cook) Please Note: Most vegetables need to be steamed or baked to soften them before cutting or mashing for your little one. None of these fruits need to be cooked in advance, but steaming hard pears and apples will make it easier for baby to actually eat them.
Coughing and gagging can be expected when introducing food in a more solid form, but both responses are completely natural and normal. We all have an inborn gag reflex to let us know when something either doesn’t taste good to us or is too big to go down our throat. When your baby gags, it is protecting them from choking and teaching them that they need to chew or gum their food more. They learn to take smaller bites and properly move food around their little mouth before swallowing. With baby led weaning it is very important to watch your baby closely through the process. Just because they are in control of the feeding, doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be there to assist them and make sure they are safe. Are you starting to think that baby led weaning may be the right choice for your little one’s introduction to solids? Here are some tips & tricks to get you going… To get the complete scoop on baby led weaning, we highly recommend reading the book Baby-Led Weaning by Tracey Murkett and Gill Rapley.
Also, if you have any questions, feel free to ask away in the comments below! For more great food ideas, check out OUR HEALTHIEST TODDLER SNACKS. This post is meant for educational purposes only. It is not intended to replace medical advice from your physician, doctor or health care professional. Please read our terms of use for more information. Photo Credit: Lilac Saloon, The Art of Making a Baby Tags: babies, baby, baby feeding, baby food, baby items, baby lead, baby lead feeding, baby lead weaning, baby products, baby's 1st foods, baby's first foods, BLW, children, daily mom, health, healthy, healthy baby snacks, helpful mom resources, kid's, mom, mom tips, Mommy, mommy tips, motherhood, parenting, solid food, solids, tips Ariel is a recently turned stay-at-home momma of three little ones to her high school sweetheart. When she isn’t busy playing with her young kiddos (or running around frantically), you can find her writing on her personal blog, Dreams To Do.
Ariel is a lover of inspirational words, photography, coffee, reality TV, and of course, her family. You can connect with Ariel on Twitter and Facebook.We’ve written about the basics of baby-led weaning before — what it is, why some people prefer it, and whether or not you should try it with your baby. If you need a good, foundational understanding of those basics, check out this “What is Baby-Led Weaning?” post. Here, we’ll explore 7 steps to get started successfully with baby-led weaning (or BLW). As with anything else in life, planning and preparation is a key part to getting off on the right foot with baby-led weaning. So use our 7 steps below, and start your baby-led weaning journey today! Before you embark on something brand new, it’s a good idea to learn as much as you can about it. Same goes for baby-led weaning. Here are a few resources to help you educate yourself about all things BLW: While it’s possible to start spoon-feeding your baby purees before she’s six months (although it’s not recommended), you really can’t start BLW until the 6 month mark.
It’s generally recommended that you wait to start until your baby is able to sit up unassisted (meaning he doesn’t need to lean against the back of the highchair for support.) Some babies are able to do that at 6 months; many don’t develop that skill until later. If the idea of waiting until your baby’s 6 months or older has you feeling anxious (“But doesn’t he need to eat solid food?”), take heart. Remember that “food is fun before age one!” In other words, for the first year of life, breastmilk and/or formula is your baby’s primary source of nutrition. Food is for practice. As long as your little one is nursing or taking his bottles well, he’s likely getting the nourishment he needs. Yes, that’s a contradiction in terms. 😉 Here’s what we mean… In the beginning, offer one “meal” a day. You don’t want to overwhelm your baby with food right off the bat! And offer the meal between nursings or bottle feedings; this’ll ensure that your baby isn’t so hungry that she quickly becomes frustrated.
Place very little food on your baby’s highchair tray — a few pieces at most. Remember, she’s new to this! Having a few pieces of food will be less distracting and will help her focus on learning to feed herself. In the beginning, offer large pieces of food. That might seem counter-intuitive (“Won’t my baby choke?”), but this is the safest way to start. At 6 or 7 months, your baby won’t have developed his pincer grip and won’t be able to pick up small pieces of food. Instead, you’ll want to give him large chunks of food that he can pick up and gnaw on. Think whole carrots, whole apples, long strips of meat, etc. Later, once his pincer grip is developed, you can move to small pieces of food that he’ll put into his mouth whole. The biggest difference between BLW and traditional methods of starting solids is that BLW puts control in the hands of your baby, right from the beginning. Instead of you feeding your baby, your baby starts off by feeding herself.
A general BLW rule of thumb is that you should never put food into your baby’s mouth for her. You can help guide her hand (filled with food) to her mouth, and you can mime the chewing and swallowing motions you want her to do, but you shouldn’t be the one actually feeding her. Now, just because you’re not feeding him doesn’t mean you should set a few celery stalks on your baby’s highchair tray and then walk away. Remember, one of the goals of BLW is to reinforce that mealtime is a social time. Sit with your baby while he eats (and even better, eat something yourself!) You’ll also want to stick close to watch for gagging and choking. Lots of babies gag in the early stages of BLW, and while this is a normal and safe reaction, you’ll still want to be nearby to ensure that your baby isn’t actually choking. Once your baby has gotten good at hand-feeding himself, start incorporating a spoon into his meals. Offer him a dish of something “spoon-able” (like applesauce or yogurt) and a spoon, and see what he does!
At first, he’ll probably get far more food on himself (and the walls, and the floor) than he’ll get in his mouth. But as long as you give him lots of opportunity practice, you’ll find that he gets better and better at feeding himself with utensils. In case you haven’t come to this conclusion yet, let us offer it here: BLW is a sticky, goopy, drippy, messy process. Food is messy after all; hand it to a novice with no self-feeding experience, and it becomes exponentially messier! But this is okay. It’s part of the learning. Instead of trying to avoid the mess, embrace it. Arm yourself with a high-chair that’s easy to wipe clean. Feed baby in a room that has wipe-able flooring. Consider stripping baby down to his diaper at meal time (if it’s warm enough), or wrapping her in a large, cover-all style bib. What if you could find everything you needed to know about starting your baby on solid foods – when it’s best to start solids, how to introduce solids, complications, food allergies, etc. – in one easy-reference guide? N