Introducing foods?

[Taedareth]

So, what's the story on introducing other foods besides mama's milk? The rule of thumb on that subject seems to change in the pediatric community pretty regularly. I haven't given Wesley anything because he likes nursing. Well, he's sucked on a fat slice of apple (too big to swallow) and a watered-down lime wedge but that's it. I'm not going to give him any "baby cereal" either because I doubt it's all that nutritious. Probably I'll start with mushed-up yams or avacado or something (time for me to read Super Baby Food, I guess.) But I was just wondering when you ladies plan to introduce other foods. 6 months? 9 months...?

[kofduke]

I'm thinking of introducing some pureed fruits and veggies in the next few weeks...not sure exactly when. I got the Earth's Best jarred first foods from Whole Foods - for some reason making my own intimidates me.

[Geofizz]

Ok, after done this once before with a kid that doesn't eat, I have a different perspective.

We introduced Elliot to foods when he was 3 months old, when he was able to sit up at the dinner table in his high chair. He played with toys while we ate. That's the first introduction.

Elliot definitely knows that food is different from his toys. He's clearly curious. We've let him chew on a green bean a few times, and I've given him bites of sweet potato. He likes the green bean just like he likes a chew toy. He wasn't too thrilled with the sweet potato.

Last night (6 mo 1 week) I ground up some quinoa in a moarter and pestil (sp?!), cooked it with water in the microwave, thinned with breastmilk. He was.... um.... underwhelmed. I don't like the idea of putting food in a baby's mouth when they don't want it, so I let him grab for the spoon and guide it into his mouth. He only did that twice during our meal, and he was done. I'm not sure whether or not to stick with quinoa a few more times or move onto something else.

I really hope that Elliot enjoys food. Karen's diet is boring.

[amis2girls]

I found this intereszting: http://www.borstvoeding.com/voedseli...uidelines.html

[mamanurse]

I read the Super Baby Foods book and am loosely following it. Livi's been picking up table food and putting it into her mouth since around 4 months. I've diligently scooped th food out of her mouth because I didn't want her to have solids before 6 months.

We started sweet potatoes on Tuesday. She loves them. I know when she wants more because she reaches for the food and spoon and helps guide it into her mouth. We're going to give her some avocado today.

I really wanted to wait for the 6 month mark, but she truly seemed ready. She will be 6 months in less than a week, though.

We're also not giving cereal since it's of no real nutritional value.

Good luck on the adventure.

[xkoliex]

I know this isn't popular with most people on MDC, but Tori has been on solids for almost a month now. We started with sweet potatoes and she hated them, green beans, peas, squash, she hates them all.

I gave her applesauce and pears and she LOVES them! She'll eat three containers in one sitting sometimes!

Hates peaches and bananas though. We tried rice cereal and oatmeal and she didn't care for either of them. Today was zucchini and she didn't like that one either.

I gave her an actual green bean when we were at Cracker Barrel on Mothers Day and she chowed on that, but doesn't like the organic baby food kind.

Can she really live on only fruits? And if so, for how long?

[darkpear]

Moira's five months today and I have no plans to start solids soon. We have a fairly strong family history of food allergies. Also, I am lazy and nursing is easy That being said, we will probably start with finger foods, or maybe just wait for her to start grabbing stuff from our plates.

[Steve's Wife]

I know I won't be popular, either, but Julie has been tasting some Earth's Best foods. She loves to eat them! This morning she tried to mooch off my bowl of oatmeal! She's had apples, carrots, and bananas. She's just had a little of each, but she really enjoyed it. She can sit up and her thrust reflex is almost gone. She's just over 5 months. We're not feeding her every day, maybe twice per week, but she is loving it!

[judybean]

I'm with Simone (down to the lazy part! bfing is totally easy! and unless and occasional bit of spitup occurs, there's NO cleanup! and no dishes either ).

Lucy *just* turned five months and I know that right now she's nowhere near ready for 'real' foods. (though really, breastmilk is *the* most real and bestest food ever!). if when she's six months she seems 'ready' then we'll work with something like... squished up avacado or something... With Katherine we didn't buy *any* prepackaged baby food and yes, I'm quite pleased with that. I'm planning on doing the same with Lucy.

Hm... today we are going 30 miles over to the closest hf store... maybe if they have some organic produce or other goodies I'll get some and get to squishing them up and freezing them!

As to how you know your babe is ready? The tongue-thrust reflex is of course a dead giveaway. I'm sure Lucy would totally just push anything else out of her mouth right now, it's just where she's at... so I'm not even thinking about trying.

Plus, I find that by delaying solids, it's always a good way to bring up the benefits of breastmilk and 'extended' (heh... as in longer than a few months) breastfeeding.

I still find it completely amazing that even after having waited until six months to start any solids with Katherine (and having people see that she did turn out fine), people are trying to get Lucy to eat food. I mean, they don't actively put a spoon in her mouth or anything, but make comments on how much she seems to be paying attention to the food during dinner, etc... um yeah... she also pays attention to the remote controlled car, the pepsi can and the scissors when I'm sewing (they're all blue, actually... I think she really likes blue things)... but I'm sure she doesn't want to EAT them all!

(besides.... she gets the best pad thai rice noodles with red curry sauce leftovers -- two hours after I eat it that's way better than anything else right now I'd think. ... ... well, maybe that's just *my* favorite ... doesn't seem to bother her )

[aisraeltax]

i have been tempted to make baby food for E but i am trying to wait until at least 6 months. i am curious about the limes though, as i read a few of you guys have given your babes lime wedges to suck on. is that without the juice? is it in the mesh feeder?

i konw that whatever i do give him, i will only give him one at a time for 2 weeks (i think thats what is recommended) to make sure he doesnt have any allergies to the food. so, ill give him some bananas for 2 weeks and if everythign goes well, avocado, etc. for 2 weeks each.

[mamanurse]

We're making our own baby food and I've found it to be pretty easy so far. I've "made" avocados, bananas, pears, and sweet potatoes. Dd has only had pears, avocados, and sweet potatoes so far. The only thing that is remotely difficult is stewing the pears and cleanup. I just do a big batch at one time and freeze the food in ice cube trays that have clever covers. When it gets hot, I'm tempted to by some organic baby food so I don't have to use my oven to bake squash and sweet potatoes. Also, it would be nice to be able to use those small jars.

[DreamsInDigital]

I've been giving baby Winter a little bit of pureed organic fruits and veggies for about a week now. He was stealing food off my plate at dinner and I would rather give him something he won't choke on. He is clearly ready for it and showing all the readiness signs. About 6 months is the norm, although WIC says cereal at 4 months I'm skipping that because the mega-iron content isn't good for their bowels.

[kindacrunchy]

With ds#1, I waited til he was 6-7 mos to introduce food. i've given D some cereal cause he is sooo interested in eating. i mixit with my milk. he's not overly excited but he does pretty well. when we sit down to eat and i don't give him some he looks at me like "umm, excuse me, where is mine?" next is sweet potatoes. i have been struggling with it but he seems interested. if he wasn't, i wouldn't bother cause bf'ing is way easier.

[kofduke]

Originally Posted by aisraeltax

i have been tempted to make baby food for E but i am trying to wait until at least 6 months. i am curious about the limes though, as i read a few of you guys have given your babes lime wedges to suck on. is that without the juice? is it in the mesh feeder?

i konw that whatever i do give him, i will only give him one at a time for 2 weeks (i think thats what is recommended) to make sure he doesnt have any allergies to the food. so, ill give him some bananas for 2 weeks and if everythign goes well, avocado, etc. for 2 weeks each.

I think 2 weeks is a really long time in between new foods, unless you have a signifi0cant history of food allergies...I was told 3-4 days.

[kgrfcharlton]

Originally Posted by darkpear

Also, I am lazy and nursing is easy

I think I will wait until after 6 months to start, who knows, maybe I will wait until a year.

[Taedareth]

Originally Posted by aisraeltax

i have been tempted to make baby food for E but i am trying to wait until at least 6 months. i am curious about the limes though, as i read a few of you guys have given your babes lime wedges to suck on. is that without the juice? is it in the mesh feeder?

Ummm... well you see, we were visiting family and playing some Phase 10 (it's like Uno) and sipping mixed drinks with lime wedges, when DS got fussy about his gums. So I grabbed a lime out of my drink and gave it to him. But to answer your question, it was a crushed lime wedge that had been soaking in ice cubes and 7up or whatever was in my glass. So it was kinda watered down and not full-strength sour. He mainly liked chewing on the rind. Maybe the coldness (from sitting in ice cubes) soothed his gums.

[hottmama]

We're waiting until 6 mos. and then doing child-led solids- fist sized sticks of soft fruits and veggies, eaten if/when he wants them.

[spiralmg]

I've been thinking about this lately and wondering what I am going to do. With DS we waited until a year before really feeding him - but he was smaller and less advanced than DD is. We of course were pressured by our family to feed him earlier (and tried a number of times but it just didn't seem to work). So, at this point with DS I was no where near solids. But with DD now, I am considering it.

I've read that babies bodies can't really digest cereals until later (does anyone know when?), so I'm thinking maybe bananas? or applesauce? Avocados? I don't know.

With DS we used the Earth's Best Baby food, but I dont think I'm going to use that if I can help it (we will see though!).

Super Baby Foods has so much good info but it is such a poorly put-together book, I find the layout and construction confusing to read.

[kofduke]

So, we tried some of the Earth's Best peas two nights ago. At first he didn't seem to know *quite* what to do with them - but then it just kinda clicked and he really liked it. I'm doing 2 more days of peas, and then will try a fruit.

[MinnieMouse]

I started Ben last Saturday...he will "officially" be 6mo tomorrow. Since I'm back at work I thought that starting on the 3day weekend would be best. (I don't want to introduce a new food in the evening and I would prefer the introduction be done at home rather than daycare.)

With Beth we started at 5mo and it took 1.5mo for her to actually eat ANYTHING (rice cereal, sweet potatoes, oatmeal, bananas, apples, pears, carrots, peas, ...tried all of it). So I decided to wait w/ Ben and to totally skip cereal (for a number of reasons).

Well, it has been a HUGE success. I did about a 1/4" of banana mashed up and mixed w/ some EBM on Saturday morning. I had to make sure that I put it on the back of his tongue so he would swallow it...but he was soooo excited the entire time. The next feeding on Sunday morning I did 1/2" of banana w/ EBM... and I didn't have to worry about where I put the spoon this time...Ben totally got the hang of it!

I've been sending in jars of Tender Harvest or Earth's Best to daycare so I wanted to try the jarred food at home first and he sucked down 3/4 of a jar of banana on Sunday night.

Monday afternoon I gave him jarred sweet potato and he at the entire jar!

All this week he's eaten a jar of banana each morning and a jar of sweet potato in the afternoon at school!! Ben's teachers have each remarked on how excited he is to eat his solid food. He's still drinking 3, 4oz bottles of EBM as well.

Last night we went out to eat to Applebees and I definitely should have brought some food for Ben because he was totally grabbing at our plates...even after I nursed him!

I picked up a bag of organic carrots this week and have a few sweet potatoes so I could try my hand at making some baby food and freezing it. We tried jarred carrots this morning and they were a success as well.

Ben is so cute when he eats...looks like a little bird. Mouth wide open and grunting w/ his arms flapping up and down, all excited.