Weaning is a whole other ball game. I don’t know about you but I’d just got used to the milk feeds, the sleepless nights and everything else that comes with it. I was hesitant to move to this next step but my babies had other ideas. I could no longer stand by and watch them eyeing up my food with those longing eyes and licking their chops like a hungry puppy. So had to embrace it and move on. Although thinking about it now, they were less messier back then than they are now at 3 and 5. If you expect your little angel to eat with no mess, then you are in for a rough ride and a lot of frustration. Just let it be known that mealtimes can be messy, so being nice and calm you will get through it. Probably most used mealtime equipment are bibs and highchairs. There are many to choose from. Highchairs come in many different forms so it depends on your budget and space. Just make sure they are simple to use and easy to clean. I used the Ikea chair as they are cost effective and very easy to clean.
my seat part even went in the dishwasher. There are so many bibs on the market you can get lost in all the styles and patterns. In the beginning a simple toweling one is good as your bubba will probably be spoon fed by you. But once they want to drive you will require a bit more protection. Whether you want to go with full coverage of a huge smock bib or the more rigid catcher ones you will not avoid all mess and will still need to clean up the floor and their lap. Even better are Mucky Bubba catch all bibs. They look like a normal plastic bib but unlike the rigid ones it is made from a soft material and has a special reusable strip on its pocket to attach to high chairs and tables, creating a barrier between child and table. No mess in their lap or on the floor. So easy to clean up, therefore less stress for you. Suction plates are great as the stick to your table top and won’t be moved easily making it difficult for them to throw it at the walls. Let your toddler hold one set of utensils.
While they feed themselves you have the other one and , you can alternate the spoon instead of trying to wrestle it out of their little fingers. Throwing food is an awesome game that mum really loves, not! If you have one of those, it is best to keep the clean up until the end of the meal to save your sanity. You just have to accept this as it is a normal part of your child’s development, keep calm and be prepared. They will love experimenting and experiencing different textures and tastes. All the squishing, chewing and spitting is all part of it and yes throwing food is fun! It is easy to get frustrated and grumpy with all the mess and all your hard work preparing food being spat out and all over the walls, but stay calm and enjoy the process because it is really awesome stage and you can get some awesome messy pics.Last week we covered baby essentials for the first six months and today we’re going to cover the next six months. A few things will have changed in your peaceful, quiet home…
You will have a baby that screeches on and off a lot, they just love the sound of their own voice once they hit the five/six month mark. They’ll also be moving about, rolling or crawling maybe, trying to sit up or will have mastered sitting up. Either way frustration will be setting in, they’ll be dying to do the next thing and getting cranky and frustrated when they fall over or can’t roll back. So the range of toys and props you have around the house need to change first of all… I had what I call a “Doughnut sit up yoke” for a few months, I think she used it from about five until eight months. It’s actually a play nest… Here is the one I had, she was so happy to just sit there or lie as you can see and it worked a charm until she threw herself out of it one day. Which is where your stationary entertainer or jumperoo come in – you’ll find these on adverts.ie all the time for great prices but if you wanted to buy new Smyths have them reduced at the moment.
We had this one which is a saucer entertainer, she absolutely loved it up until about 12 months. You’ll be weaning so a good hand blender is essential – believe me you don’t want to be mashing all day or trying to get your pear smooth enough by pushing it through a sieve. Good pots for freezing and feeding are really important, I used a few ones, the Tommee Tippee ones that are on offer in Aldi every now and again, the Vital baby ones, some great Tomy ones that I use myself for my breakfast in work. Spoons, I find the Nuby or Ikea ones are brilliant and the Tommee Tippee sippy cups are great! Some weaning tips here On this note a high chair is a new necessity as well, I have three now at the moment – a Stokke Tripp Trapp, an Ikea Antelop and a Summer booster seat. One at home, one in my parents and one in the childminders. You may not know but these are one end of the scale to the other, the Tripp Trapp was a very generous gift from some friends and I love how it looks and it’s functionality but I am not a fan of the lack of a tray on it.
The Ikea one is brilliant, for €20 you really cannot go wrong and it’s so easy to keep clean. The booster seat is great from about 9 months and fits neatly onto a kitchen chair. I’m putting a play pen in at this stage as well, even though to be honest Ruby never liked it and I rarely used it but I know some friends who absolutely loved theirs and kids who loved them too. Teething has kicked in big style, get your hands on Sophie la Giraffe, some calgel (smuggled in from the UK) and there are other tips here and of course our bibs are amazeballs for soaking up the drool and cutting back on the amount of bibs you’ll be washing! At this stage I was using my Connecta alll the time and absolutely loved the flexibility of babywearing especially when doing things like grocery shopping when she was too small to sit in the trolley and too big for lying back in the infant seat. I got mine on koalacubs.ie but as I have mentioned before do join the Babywearing Ireland page on Facebook.