We’re fast approaching baby W’s first Christmas. I’ve only bought him one present so far (a ‘Lostmyname’ personalised book) but we do have a few things for him to wear…
I picked this up in the Next sale months ago (£5 I think) – a cute little Santa top and hat – perfect for Christmas day itself. I fear the hat will be too small for him – his head is a bit big in proportion to the rest of him 🙂
Santa outfit from Next
My other half bought him this gorgeous reindeer outfit from Mothercare – it feels so cosy and I think he will look adorable in it! Perfect for Christmas Eve or Boxing day?
And a couple of jumpers for the run-up to Christmas – the one on the right is from M & Co (£15 – I was exchanging a gift that was too small) – And my mum bought him the one on the left from Tesco (£8) – it’s a size too big at 9-12 months but Tesco sizes tend to be small so we might be ok 🙂
And this one is a gift from a cousin and it’s made by a company called ‘Santa’s little helpers’. Can’t wait to see him in these with his jeans on 🙂
As we’ve hit the 6 month mark and I start preparing to go back to work, it’s got me thinking about money – I haven’t been totting up how much we’ve spent on baby W as we go so though I’d try and remember it all and probably give myself a heart attack in the process…
Nursery
Cot bed – Mothercare summer oak – £160
Chest of drawers/changing unit – Mothercare Summer Oak – £200
Mattresses – £100 (1 for cot bed, 1 for moses basket)
Bedding – £20? (1 set for cot bed, 1 set for moses basket)
Wall stickers – £40
Lamp – £20
Sleeping
Gro bags – £40
Ewan the dream sheep – £40
Tranquil Turtle sleep aid – £40
Angelcare monitor – £80 (this is one of the worst decisions I made, hardly used it and now W rolls around rendering the sensor mat pointless!)
Nappies – now I reckon on average we got through a box of Pampers every month – we used more at the start when we were changing nappies every half hour, but we now only change his nappy a couple of times during the day and once at night – so I estimate we’ve spent £90 max
Baby wipes – we use Huggies pure wipes and, as with nappies, stock up on boxes during supermarket baby events – I reckon we’ve spent a max of £55 here (that’s assuming 1 box per month when actually I think we’ve used a lot less but hard to remember)
Bepanthen nappy cream – £20ish
Nappy bags – £10ish (again, we use far less of these now but when we do, I prefer the thicker, scented, more expensive ones!)
Breast pads – I have no idea how much I’ve spent on these – £40?
Breast milk storage bags – again no idea – £40?
We now do combination feeding and buy ready-prepared Aptamil milk for the evening feed – I reckon about a tenner a week for the last 3 months, plus a bit more for day feeds when someone else is looking after him – £120 (ouch!!)
Weaning
3x books – £20
Bibs – £4
Highchair – not bought yet but plan to buy the Ikea one at £18
Food – as we’re doing baby-led weaning, we’re not spending any extra on food but I have bought a few other bits ‘n’ bobs e.g. baby rice, baby rice cakes etc – £5
Cutlery set and dinky cup – £10
Teething
Sophie le Giraffe x 2 (we lost 1!) – £34
Then I reckon we spent £30 on Calpol, Nurofen, Anbesol, Bonjela, teething powders and a couple of teething chewy things
John Lewis snowsuit
Clothes
I like to think I’ve saved in this area where others might go mad!
Before baby W arrived we spent about £50 on neutral, newborn babygros etc
0-3 months – we got through purely on gifts and the stuff we bought before he was born (and it was a hot summer so he mostly lived in vests!)
3-6 months – got through on gifts, hand-me-downs from a friend and a £20 haul from an NCT nearly new sale, oh and £40 on Next sleepsuits! And a Halloween outfit for £6!
Photo shoot – we spent about £200 on a newborn photo shoot (I know it’s a lot but we bought all of the digital copies as opposed to just buying a small number!)
Classes – baby massage (£50), tinytalk sign class (£55), 20 x swimming lessons (£200) mother and baby yoga (£96 for 12 lessons)
Thank you cards – (using photos from the shoot) – £50
What we didn’t have to pay for:
Bugaboo cameleon – we bought this second-hand for £350 but our parents kindly bought it for us. Oh that’s just reminded me, I bought my other half a Babybjorn miracle carrier = £70
Moses basket and car seat were kindly lent to us by friends
Last week baby W turned 7 months old eeeek! Before starting this draft I thought not much had changed in the last month but I guess it has….
Weight/health etc
I’ve had him weighed twice in the last month – he now weighs 16lb 8oz – every so slightly under the 25th percentile where he’s been since he was born. He now has 5 teeth! (2 more than the last update!)
He’s had a healthy-ish month apart from a lingering cough/cold that he’s had on and off for a couple of months now. Keeps coming and going (and is at its worst when he’s teething). You’ll be pleased to know that he poos 2 or 3 times a week now instead the once a week explosion he was doing 🙂
Milestones
He’s pretty good at sitting up unaided now.
Still lots of rolling and clambering around but not crawling yet.
He loves standing up (with this hands being held!) and he still loves bouncing whether being held or in his jumperoo!
Feeding and weaning
The biggest change this month has been that we started weaning. You can read our latest update here – it was going quite well until I wrote that update but since then he’s gone off his food a bit… unless it’s a finger of toast… I don’t think he’s ever refused buttery toast!
He still has 4 milk feeds a day – one first thing, one mid-morning, one mid-afternoon and one before bed (about 6.30/7pm) – still combination feeding, mostly breast but a bit of formula too 🙂
Weekly and daily routine
I’m finding our daily routine has been all over the place since we started weaning – as feeding can take an extra hour or two of our day (including prep) so has a knock-on effect on naps etc.
Our weekly routine stayed much the same as what I wrote in our last update but as we enter December, the classes and groups are coming to an end in line with the end of my maternity leave
Sleep
You’ll know that we’ve never had great sleep, well in the last month we definitely turned a corner. We had one night where baby W slept through til 5.45am! And a couple of nights he’s slept through til 4/5.
I was always against ‘sleep training’ as I thought babies will sleep through when they’re ready. However, I was also aware that baby W waking every 2-3 hours was not for hunger, it was just for comfort. Through a mix of mothering instinct, the book ‘no-cry sleep solution’ and emailing Lisa Clegg (blissful baby expert) we tried:
-giving him water instead of milk during the night
-and/or getting him back to sleep through shushing/patting him etc, then leaving him (I often find that he cries more when I’m in the room with him!)
And these have largely worked although teething and coughing get in the way quite a lot 😦
So we’re not quite there, but we’ve definitely turned a corner!
What else we’ve been up to
This month my other half was away a LOT with work, and had a work-related exam. Tough times for us all, as he was busy and stressed and missing spending time with W. And I felt like a single mum for a good few weeks – very tiring!
I had my first weekend away from baby W and survived! (actually really enjoyed it! Read about it here)
Lots of settling in sessions with the childminder, including a full day – these have gone really well, I’ve felt fine leaving him and he’s had a good time over there!
Keeping in touch days with work – I did a couple of these over the last month – was nice to catch up with everyone 🙂
Lots of autumnal walks with baby W and baby W had an underwater photoshoot!
As you know, we recently started weaning and we’re going with a mostly baby-led weaning approach (with some limited spoon feeding). On our journey we bought a really useful book and by chance the author, Julie Clarke, got in touch with me on Twitter and I asked here if she’d be happy to do an interview for the blog… well here it is 🙂
How did you become an expert/interested in baby-led weaning?
This is actually quite an interesting question and my answer may surprise you! Before I had my first baby I had not even heard of BLW. Being a Nutritionist I was determined to plan and eat well before my pregnancy and during my pregnancy but then reality hit me and I found myself craving things I wouldn’t normally eat such as ham and cheese sandwiches and my perfect nutrition went out of the window. I then had the most horrendous labour ending in an emergency (& very distressing) c-section. I then struggled with breast-feeding and bonding with my baby and the vision I had of the perfect pregnancy and delivery left me feeling such a failure. I was then determined not to fail at the weaning stage and wanted to introduce my baby to a good whole food diet. It was by chance that my health visitor asked me if I’d heard of BLW. As mentioned before I had not so she simply said look it up I think it will resonate with you. Well, resonate doesn’t even begin to sum it up, it was like a light bulb moment for me and it has since changed the direction of my career. I love BLW, as a Nutritionist I obviously know what foods a baby needs as well as their nutrition requirements but using a method that encourages a good relationship with food, reduces the risk of being fussy and obesity is absolutely huge. I found that my friends with babies were asking me lots of questions and asking me for recipes and eventually they persuaded me to run a course. I guess becoming an expert in this subject comes from my experiencing with both my children, my knowledge of nutrition and the fact that I have helped 300 or more parents wean their children this way.
I’m guessing that spoon-feeding is the norm, but have you seen growing interest in baby-led weaning? if so, why do you think that is?
BLW is growing in popularity at a rapid rate. It seems to stem from the fact that we used to wean at 4 months when a baby could not feed themselves and purees/spoon feeding was used but move on 6 months and many babies are refusing to be spoon fed. At 6 months the vast majority of babies are more than ready and capable of feeding themselves. They do not want to be spoon fed and this had led many parents down the road of BLW. The method is not new but the phrase is and as more people get to know about it and see the benefits the more the word is spread. You also have people like me who are looking at ways to improve a child’s relationship with food and getting in at the weaning stage is the best possible place to start.
I’ve seen a bit of snobbery among mums who BLW, they can look down on mums who give babies puree, I would have thought they give BLW a bad name – what’s your view on this?
I have seen this myself and I do not have an issue with people spoon feeding or mixed feeding as long as they are doing the right thing for their baby. I do get frustrated when I see a Mum trying to spoon feed a baby who clearly wants to do it them self. I truly believe that if a Mum had all the facts they wouldn’t just spoon feed their baby unless there was really no other way (i.e. due to medical reasons etc). I’m on a lot of BLW groups and it does make me laugh how people can react to someone wanting to mix feed and most of the time it’s the people looking down that actually do not really understand the method. I see people say you are not doing BLW if the baby uses a spoon and only finger foods are allowed, this is completely ridiculous!
One of my friends started their baby on home-made purees, and missed the ‘gag reflex’ window so the baby is now struggling to eat ‘proper food’ – do you think there’s more that can be done to help educate new parents on weaning? If so, how? e.g. should everyone have a compulsory weaning check with their health visitor?
Yes I absolutely 100% agree that all new parents be given some nutrition and weaning education which is why my weaning course (Happy Little Eaters) is a 6 week course covering both nutrition and weaning. The biggest problem with keating this to the health visitors is that 1) there are not enough of them and they do not have the time and 2) they do not have any nutrition training!
And some more practical questions…
Baby W loves omelettes – do I need to limit how many eggs he has in a week?!
Eggs are a great food, packed full of essential fats, protein and nutrients. However, egg is one of the most common foods for babies and young children to be allergic to! There is no limit to amount of eggs you can use and babies are very clever and will only eat what they need.
When giving baby W fish I’m petrified that there will be a bone in it – do you have any tips on this or do I just need to carefully check each morsel?!
I still worry about this myself and my children are now 3 and 5 years. I always tell the fish monger (and this can be at the supermarket) that I’m giving this to young children and I need the fish to be filleted without bones. My local farmers market fish monger gets out a magnifying glass and tweezers to fillet the fish!!! Then even when I’ve cooked it I will go through it carefully before giving it my children.
Jenna from Tinyfootsteps asks: I’d like to know when 3 meals a day should be fully established? Jasmine (nearly 8 months) still only has 2 meals a day but still isn’t overly fussed about food. We are BLW.
Most babies will be having 3 meals a day around 9-10 months so it sounds like your baby is doing just fine. Remember that all babies are different though and when your baby needs 3 meals a day she will eat 3 meals a day!!
Sarah asks: Please ask Julie for meal ideas for dairy and egg allergic children. Particularly along lines of pancake and muffin type recipes. I’m at a real loss as to what to cook.
I often post up recipes on my facebook page and recently added a guide for allergy substitutions. For example you can substitute egg as a binder in recipes with mashed banana. Dairy alternatives are easy because you can use lots of different dairy free milks and spreads etc. Have a look at my page Spring Nutrition.
Hannah from hannahsays asks: Our little boy is 5 months at the beginning of December. We’re being recommended by the health visitor to keep breastfeeding up to six months and then start to wean. He’s starting to get upset at meal times because we all sit down to eat but he doesn’t get any but also if he’s on our laps rather than in his chair he tries to steal food from the plates (it’s happened once or twice on the last week or so).
We bought a high chair last week and so now at meal times we put him in the high chair so he knows “now we eat” but actually it’s not his mealtime. I give him his weaning spoons to play with rather than toys to distinguish further than now is a meal time.
When can we start and what should we start with as there seems to be mixed opinions.
Hannah you need a copy of my book!!! The recommended age for weaning is 6 months but some babies may be ready earlier. Getting him sat up with some spoons and a beaker of water is a great start. You can also give him a raw carrot to play with and gum. As soon as he is showing all of the signs – sitting up unaided, holding head up, showing interest in food then give him something to eat that he can play with and taste. At 6 months anything goes if a baby can pick it up (with the exception of honey, salt and anything processed). The best food to start with is fruit and vegetables. Try giving some steamed veg and see what he does. Do not wean earlier than 5 months though unless advised to do so on medical grounds.
So there we have it, thanks Julie for doing the interview and for some really helpful answers! If you’re interested in more about Julie, I reviewed her book here where you can also buy it, and you can follow her on facebook and Twitter
So you’ll know from our first update that we were taking things relatively slowly, I was happy to just try one meal a day for a while – we were also loosely following the #5stepweaningplan and working up to the final 2 steps of meat/alternative and then 3 meals a day.
But a week ago today, I took baby W to get weighed for the first time in about 6 weeks. At 6 and a half months, he weighed 16lb 3oz – all good but he had slipped every so slightly under the 25th percentile for the first time.
Nothing to worry about, but the health visitor suggested ramping up to 3 meals a day, and giving him some protein (meat/fish/egg) to make sure he didn’t slip down the growth chart any further. She was really happy with our initial approach to baby-led weaning but just wanted him to start actually consuming a bit more of the food instead of just nibbling on it 🙂
So, for a week now we’ve been having 3 meals a day – still very much finger-food led, but I have been spoon-feeding him a bit, when spoon-feeding him I try to guide the spoon towards his mouth and let him guide it in so that he still feels like he’s in control 🙂
Baby-led weaning egg mess!
So here’s some of the foods he’s had:
Finger foods
Carrots
Broccoli
Banana
Cucumber (he loves this – so easy to eat!)
Rice cakes – his favourite food so far, I started with plain ones and also tried Organix apple ones – he loves both!
Potato waffles
Hard-boiled egg
Plain omelette (SO much less messy than the hard-boiled egg!)
Pasta – plain, and with some tomato sauce on it
Avocado – he finds this too slippery to eat so I might just mash it up next time and pop it on a spoon… or on a rice cake?
On a spoon
Flakes of cod mixed with sweet potato mash, and normal mash
Yoghurt – I bought Rachel’s diary yoghurt as a) no added sugar b) they’re made in my hometown (Aberystwyth)
Baby porridge – the only thing he hasn’t really liked so far! We tried it with some puree that Cow&Gate sent us and he definitely preferred it with the puree!
A jar of lamb/sweet potato puree – due to our baby-led approach, I wasn’t going to bother with purees but seeing as we were sent some, I thought we might as well try it – we tried the meaty one to up his protein intake – and he quite liked it!
Weetabix – this is our usual breakfast
We like these Rachel’s yoghurts – no added sugar!
Our learnings so far
Now we’re pretty much past the gagging phase, we’re enjoying it! He puts most of the food in his mouth and I can tell by his weekly poo that he’s definitely swallowing more and more – it’s starting to get more solid – gross!!!!
I think both find finger food more fun – it’s so cute watching him grab something and hold it in his fist while he munches on it – I gave him yoghurt the other day but he still had omelette in his fist which he would NOT let go!
His favourite thing so far has been Rachel’s banana yoghurt – he was kicking his legs in excitement for this one!
Our daily routine is out the window as having 3 meals a day probably takes about 2 hours of day in total (prep/eating/cleaning up)
It’s nice to give him undivided attention for that time – obviously he needs to be supervised while he’s eating so it means proper quality time where I can’t do any chores and I make a point of not checking my phone!
Baby-led weaning: I am NOT letting go of the egg!
Next steps
I need to get better at eating with him – although when I do, I’ve finished mine in 2 mins while he obviously takes ages so I’m not sure if it really matters! (well practised from when he was younger and I had to snaffle my food down!)
Meat! I want to give him meat but it seems so grown-up! Not quite sure if he’s ready for it – might practice with some more textures first??
Water – I’ve kinda given up giving him the doidy cup with every meal, but every now and then I give him some water using it and ‘directing’ it into his mouth
I’ll take him to get weighed next Thursday – hopefully he’s back on the curve 🙂
Before we started weaning, I bought a few books to help us through it as I found all the information online a bit overwhelming! We wanted to try baby-led weaning so we bought a book by Gill Rapley as a lot of peers named her as a guru. In case this route didn’t work, we’d need to try purees so I bought a book by Annabel Karmel who is known as the queen of weaning through puree recipes!
Our books about weaning
While buying these, Amazon also recommended ‘Baby-led weaning, step-by-step’ by Julie Clarke, and this ended up being the most useful book of the lot!
I found Rapley’s book very theoretical – one big, long advert on why you should do baby-led weaning (the most useful bit being lots of quotes from parents who had gone through it). But I’d already decided we wanted to do weaning the baby-led way, so I wanted something more practical on what foods to try and when etc.
This is where Julie Clarke’s baby-led weaning book excels – it’s very practical – full of advice and tips including:
which highchair to buy
which yoghurts to buy that aren’t packed in sugar
what mix of food types you should try and give your baby
an example menu schedule
ideas on which first foods to try
how and when to drop milk feeds
The other big selling point for me is that there’s a real-life case study running all the way through the book – you get to follow baby Rosie’s weaning journey – it’s always useful to hear real-life stories e.g. how they initially missed a few meals due to nap times etc (something we’re trying to work our way around!)
The chapters are split by the age of the baby, but obviously not all babies are the same and they might not follow these months religiously! Like with everything, I tend to read and then do things my own way – so for example, the book recommends starting straight away on 3 meals a day, but we wanted to start with 1 meal a day initially (check out our first weaning update) – so I’d recommend you use this book as a guide to suit you, not a rule book! We’re also doing a bit of spoon-feeding (or guiding the spoon in the right direction) and initially tried a bit of baby-specific food like baby rice – the book recommends against this but isn’t judgemental about it – again, do what suits you!
That’s all I can really say about the book without giving away all the tips! The only thing I would have liked a bit more info on is gagging – it does mention it, but it would be good to know a bit more about what to expect when it happens, I’m not sure exactly what I was after but it was definitely the thing I was most nervous about when starting our weaning journey!
So overall I highly recommend the book, it’s already been really useful and I’m sure it will be over the next few months! It’s very easy-to-follow and understand, and very practical – to buy it, support your local bookstore or click on the Amazon link in the image…
Q&A with the author, Julie Clarke
Co-incidentally, I’ve ended up chatting to the author on Twitter and I will be interviewing her for the blog about all-things-baby-led-weaning! So if you have a question for Julie, please leave it in the comments section below by Dec 1st (2014!) and I’ll give you a mention when the interview goes live early December!
My first NCT haul post is one of the most popular posts on my blog, so I figured you’d love to see what I got on my second visit last weekend…
This time we arrived quite late as we had our underwater photo shoot at the same time, so who knows what bargains we missed out on… but there was still plenty left to choose from, and it was a lot less crowded! Also, as I had baby W with me this time, sleeping in his pram we couldn’t make it upstairs to the books, toys etc 😦
This is my favourite item from the day… a H&M cardigan that he can wear straight away (cost £3)
H&M stars baby boy cardigan
And a hoodie he can wear right away – this is our first piece of clothing from Zara’s baby range 🙂 (cost £1) I should have taken a close-up, but I love the ‘toggle’ button detail 🙂
Zara baby hoodie
And another hoodie, we love turtles so I had to buy this – it’s Marks and Spencer and was only 50p! I love the detail of the lining and the elbows…
M&S Turtle hoodie
As well as hoodies and cardies we need some long-sleeved tops so got these… this one is from Next and I love that it has detail on the back… only 50p!
This one is perfect for Autumn – foxes seem to be ‘in’ at the moment! This was £1 and originally from George at Asda’s.
Fox top from George at Asda
Another long-sleeved top, this time for when he’s a year old – a bit forward-thinking perhaps but it’s a Diesel top so I HAD to buy it!! This cost £2.50 but it originally would have cost about £28 (!!) – I must say the fabric does feel more expensive than any other baby clothes we’ve had thus far – I would never spend that much on 1 item for him so it’s nice to get it at such a good price!
Diesel baby boy long-sleeved top
You can buy baby boy tops for a few quid in the supermarkets, but bottoms are always a bit more expensive so I was chuffed to find him another pair of jeans that he can wear straight away – these are from Mothercare, I love the style and also they’re lined with cotton on the inside so hopefully he will find them warm and comfy 🙂 (Cost: £2)
Mothercare baby boy jeans
And because bottoms are expensive, I found a couple of pairs of cords that will fit him when he starts wearing 9-12 months clothes. They cost £1 each – H&M on the left, Next on the right…
Baby boy cords from H&M and Next
Now the first time I went to a NCT sale, I made the mistake of buying the next size up in the wrong season i.e. a lot of summery clothes that weren’t warm enough to wear by the time he could fit in them! So I tried to be more sensible this time around – I’m sure he will get wear out of all the items above… but I HAD to buy this T-shirt for him which he might not wear now that it’s Winter (although thinking about it, he could wear it over a long-sleeved top :))
I don’t even like the idea of babies wearing clothes with skulls on them BUT I do love photo-print style T-shirts… and it was only 50p (Florence and Fred, Tesco)…
Skull t-shirt from Tesco
So a good few items that he can wear straight away plus a couple for a few months time, all in excellent condition and the grand total was a bargainous £13 – the cost of 1 new outfit from most stores (if you’re lucky!)
So I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again – it is worth checking out NCT sales in your area – much less hassle than ebay and you get to help raise money for the NCT charity in the process 🙂 The next one in Cardiff is scheduled for 7th March 2015.
Thanks for calling by – do let me know what you think and which item is your fave 🙂
I was delighted to be asked to be an ambassador for Cow and Gate’s ‘5 step weaning plan’ and even more chuffed when our box of goodies arrived to go with it!
Cow & Gate goodies!
The ‘5 step weaning plan’ is pretty self-explanatory – it’s a website that helps you wean your baby onto food in 5 easy steps!
Step 1 – first spoonfuls (e.g. baby rice, banana puree)
Step 2 – Introducing breakfast (e.g. porridge)
Step 3 – Introducing variety (e.g. fruit/veg)
Step 4 – Meat/fish/alternatives
Step 5 – Establishing 3 meals a day
5 step weaning plan
I used this on my smartphone and I was very impressed with how good the website looks, and how easy it is – you register with an email address and password and you’re good to go – working through the 5 steps with lots of useful tips and recipes along the way.
My favourite bit has to be the ‘eaticons’ – cartoon faces you use to rate food to remind you whether your baby liked or disliked something – so cute!!
If you’ve been following my blog you’ll know that we’ve already started weaning and that we’re trying the baby-led method which involves giving baby W finger food from day 1 e.g. a piece of banana instead of pureed banana. The ‘5 step weaning plan’ is mostly about purees, but I think you can use it like I do and just use ‘proper’ food instead of purees if that’s what you’re doing?
We also mixed up the steps a bit, so we did steps 1 and 3 together (first tastes/variety), then step 2 (breakfast) then step 5 (3 meals a day) and we still haven’t started step 4 yet (meat/fish although we have given him egg as a protein alternative!)
So however you intend to wean, I think you can use this plan as a really useful guide but personally I wouldn’t stress if you go ‘off-plan’! Use it as a guide not as a rule book 🙂 As well as useful tips and recipes, Cow and Gate also email you money-off vouchers for their baby food so it’s definitely worth signing up – register here 🙂
So overall pros and cons…
Pros:
Really easy to use
Perfect starting point for weaning
Mobile-friendly, lovely-looking website
Lots of tips and recipes – you can either make the food from fresh or buy it in jars!
Money-off vouchers
Cons
Not a con as such, but as I said I tweaked it slightly to suit us – the 5 steps might not suit everyone but Cow & Gate don’t say anywhere that you MUST stick to it rigidly!
Suggestions
Some improvements I would love to see Cow and Gate make are:
the ability to add your own recipes and foods that you’ve tried e.g. baby W loves rice cakes so it would be great to be able to add that as a reminder – it’s easy to forget what you’ve tried!
wouldn’t it be great to turn this into a bit of a community where parents can share their baby’s likes/dislikes and share recipes etc? Now that we’ve started weaning, I notice there’s quite a lot of banter on Twitter about foods to try etc – so I think this website could be a really interactive community for weaning parents
Since our first weaning update, we’ve moved to step 5 (3 meals a day), which I’ll blog about this week including reviewing some of the food that Cow & Gate sent us!
Disclaimer: I wasn’t paid to write this review but I was sent a box of goodies (weaning equipment, food and cuddly cow!) before trying it out
Baby W turned 6 months a week ago, and although I was in no rush (and nor was he really) it was time to start weaning! I think my reluctance was that this signalled the end of an era… the end of a milk-only diet… our baby boy growing up!!
We wanted to give ‘baby-led weaning’ a try but would try purees etc if that didn’t work for any reason.
Preparation for weaning
So a few weeks ago I started sitting baby W in his ‘snug‘ chair on our dining table to sit with me while I ate my breakfast/lunch, to start getting him interested in food. This was a change to our routine as I’d always tended to grab my food when he was having a nap.
I bought a couple of books, a ‘doidy’ cup, a cutlery set and off we went! In good timing we were given some wipe-clean Christmas bibs as a gift!
Some of our weaning kit
Attempt #1 – carrot, avocado, sweet potato
2 weeks ago we had some spare time on a Saturday lunchtime so we decided to try him with some foods – we gave him carrot sticks, avocado strips and some sweet potato mash and put them on his snug tray. And we both just stared at him, willing him to eat the lot! He didn’t like any of it – pulled some faces, gagged and puked!
In hindsight, we made a few mistakes – we weren’t eating at the same time as him (one of the key points of ‘baby-led weaning’), we maybe gave him too much choice and maybe the flavours were a bit too much for him after nearly 6 months of milk!
Oh and we also ‘helped’ guide the food into his month so it wasn’t strictly baby-led! It was still a great experience – while he pulled some really funny faces, me and my other half couldn’t stop laughing! (Bad parents ;))
Attempt #2 – banana and baby rice
Exactly a week later, we placed some banana strips in front of him and prepared some baby rice for him. Baby rice seems to go against the baby-led weaning approach as it’s not something that adults eat, but we just wanted to try him with something plain/bland. We kept putting it on his spoon and watched him get the spoon to his mouth but never in quite the right position! He enjoyed sucking on the banana!
This time daddy was eating banana with him, and mummy was pottering about – so a bit less pressure for him than the first attempt!
Attempt #3 – mango and blueberries
A few days later I was having a healthy breakfast of ready-made pancakes with mango, blueberries and raspberries. I put some fruit on his tray, including squishing the blueberries… and he seemed to enjoy sucking/munching on the blueberries 🙂
Attempt #4 – banana, baby rice and houmous
Another lunchtime, another tray of bananas and baby rice. This time he was more adventurous in trying to eat the banana -twice he gagged up pieces of banana. Good progress but very scary for me watching him gag so much!
I was eating pitta bread and houmous for lunch so he also had a suck on that!
Attempt #5 – carrot and broccoli
Friday was time for (over) cooked carrot sticks and broccoli florets. I read on some baby-led weaning forums that gagging on banana is quite common as it’s so squelchy, whereas carrot and broccoli break up easier. He definitely enjoyed sucking and chewing on the broccoli. He gagged some broccoli up once, but it wasn’t quite as scary this time around!
He somehow ended up with carrot on his shoulder 🙂
‘Deconstructed’ carrots and broccoli
Attempt #6 – more carrots and some trifle!
Yesterday I went for Sunday dinner with my parents, baby W was very excited when the food arrived! I gave him 2 of my baby carrots to munch on, and I’m pretty sure he swallowed them as there was only a tiny bit left when I cleared up afterwards – clever boy! My parents also couldn’t resist spoon-feeding him some cream and custard from their trifle. I don’t really want him to be spoon-fed or to eat too much sweet stuff so lucky he doesn’t see my parents too often otherwise I’ll be having words 🙂
So:
The good bits
Watching him play with, discover and explore food is great fun to watch, already I can see why people advocate baby-led weaning for this alone!
Even though I said I was in no rush, it was encouraging to see him suck and chew on food after just a few attempts, and swallowing food on his 6th attempt seems pretty good to me!
The bad bits
The gagging – not nice to watch and a bit scary. I plan to watch some videos on it to make me feel less guilty! The baby-led weaning books I bought don’t seem to address how to deal with it or what to expect!
Next steps
I’ve just bought some all-over bibs. We still need to buy a highchair (after consulting with other mummy bloggers the faves are Ikea, Stokke, Chicco and Cosatto.) No rush, I think he’ll be fine in his snug for a while… I never leave him unattended in it!
We have carpet in the dining room so I need to buy a plastic sheet or shower curtain to cover the floor!
So we’ll carry on with our version of weaning – lunchtimes only to begin with and maybe some breakfasts. I’m going to make a conscious effort to eat healthier lunches so that we can try and eat the same food eg fish with veg.
I will also keep offering him different flavours and textures… Cucumber is ready in the fridge for him and I think we might try mash this week too.
Also need to start offering him water to drink with it… I imagine this will be fun and messy 🙂
We’ll keep you updated on progress – to stay updated follow me on twitter or bloglovin!
Boy, oh, boy – my baby boy turned 6 months old today! What a milestone! He is turning into a gorgeous, healthy, happy chappy…
Weight/size
I have no idea how much he weighs – it’s been nearly a month since he was last weighed. Assuming he’s still on the 25th percentile, then he should be getting close to 16lbs. He’s small and perfectly formed 🙂 He’s still in 3-6 month old clothes and I think we have a few weeks wear left in them. I’ve just bought my first load of size 4 nappies as the size 3 don’t fit him quite as well anymore.
Milestones
In the last few weeks he’s started rolling around a lot, especially in his cot! I can’t leave him on the sofa or bed any more as he could fall off!
Also during the last few weeks he’s found his feet, so he loves grabbing on to those in the cutest position!
We always feel like he’s had strong legs and at the moment he LOVES bouncing – he loves being in his jumperoo but if he’s being held by anyone he expects them to bounce him!
Today, to celebrate his 6 month birthday, his 3rd tooth is cutting through! So he’s grouchy and clingy today -it’s always tough as he’s usually a happy chappy.
He only poos around once a week these days, and last week that happened at my friend’s house – I think we can safely say he had his first poonami – as I took the nappy off, like a Mr Whippy machine it just kept coming…. and coming! While I cleaned her rug, she carried him upstairs to be hosed down… he left a few deposits en route!!
Sleep
You’ll know from previous updates that baby W doesn’t sleep through the night – so as we were approaching the 6 month mark of poor sleep, something had to give and we started some ‘gentle sleep training’ last week – I will blog about it separately (once we’re sure it’s worked) but we’re off to a good start – the last 2 nights he has dropped all night feeds and only woke once (about 3am). I’ll keep you posted!
Daily routine
To get ready for the sleep training I’ve been doing lots of preparation over the last few weeks, trying to give his day a bit more structure and encourage longer naps, putting him in his cot for day naps etc so roughly our day looks like this:
7-7.30 get up, first feed then play time!
8-9 first nap starts (ideally an hour long)
more play, second feed about 1030
11ish second nap starts (ideally an hour long)
1230 ish try some food, playtime before and after
sometimes he has 2 afternoon naps, sometimes just the one depending on what we’re up to
2.30 ish third feed
6ish bedtime routine begins – bath, sometimes massage, bottle of formula (4th feed of the day) then bed
Weekly routine
It’s been the same for a while now:
Mondays – fortnightly local mother and baby group (Bambino’s)
Tuesdays – TinyTalk in the morning, mother and baby yoga (PureYoga) in the afternoon
Wednesdays – mother and baby group (Jellybabies)
Thursdays and Fridays – free for walks, meeting people etc!
Saturday – swimming lesson in the morning with daddy
Feeding/weaning
You’ll see I mentioned food – we’re slowly starting the weaning process – I’m in no rush and nor is baby W!
We’re going to attempt the baby-led route to begin with – so far we’ve tried it 3 times – he hated sweet potato and avocado, but has enjoyed sucking on banana, baby rice and blueberries! Again, will blog about it separately when I have more to report!
What we’ve been up to
We found a park that we can walk to – it has a duck pond and a heron, and views across to the sea! Nearby there’s also a new coffee shop that’s just opened – so far we’ve had a take-away from there but we need to check it out properly!
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Last week we went to stay with my parents for a few days and had a lovely time in my hometown (Aberystwyth) and a lovely walk around New Quay.
Sunrise from my parents’ house:
For Halloween I dressed him in a skeleton outfit and took him into work for a ‘bring your kids to work’ afternoon. Much fun and many cuddles 🙂
Mummy update
A combination of sleep deprivation and my other half being away a few times with work left me feeling a bit blue a few weeks ago. I think I had one of those ‘who am I’ type crises as my maternity leave is coming to and end, I looked like crap and I’d maybe spent too much time with baby!
It was lovely at the weekend to have a bit of retail therapy, have my eyebrows and hair done, and get dressed up for a fab wedding party! And I had a lovely night in with my sister and her friends a coupled of Saturday nights ago… I’m a lucky girl, it’s just easy to forget when you’re frazzled!
Over the next few weeks I have some keeping in touch days at work and my first weekend away from baby W…. eeeeeeek!
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