My son will be four months old in two weeks. I've been reading about baby led weaning and would like to try it, but I have a few questions!
Is it better to wait until 6 months old?
What did you introduce instead of cereal?
How often do you provide blw meals?
Is it better to buy the book or just the cookbook?
pomelo / 5093 posts
So, the real point of BLW is that you just give your child food - preferably what you're eating. That doesn't really work if you want to start right at 6 months, since nearly no baby is ready to pick up and chew food at that point. If you really want to start at 6 months, you'll likely have to do some purees.
I was very into BLW, and kind of anti-puree. My baby, however, wanted food before 5 months. I started by just letting her play with it - she'd pick up a big orange slice, try sucking on it, and I'd make sure she couldn't actually eat any of it. Then I moved to purees - but I never made them thin. They were always chunky. I started with apple sauce, I think, and went through all the fruits and vegetables quickly. Yogurt, too, was a big hit, and I mixed all the fruits with it. Then I started mixing in pureed oatmeal for different textures and flavor.
Before long I started feeding her little bites of meat and cheese and such, which she loved. Then at about 8 months when she could pick things up and feed herself I moved more and more to just feeding her food. Once she got the hang of it, she rarely tolerated purees, and we don't do them any more.
BLW, to me, is less an exact method and more of an idea that even babies love real food. I really believe that babies don't need or want bland pureed food - they want to eat like adults, but they need a little help not to choke. We've always just given her food off our plates, just smashing things up into a little mush until she could chew. I made sure to put spice and heat in her food from the very start, and as a result, she's far more interested in spicy food than bland.
She's really curious and eager to try new things. She just really likes food, and I feel like I really did a good job with her. I'm a desperately picky eater, so I was really intent on not raising my children the same way. Luckily she doesn't have any of my taste or texture issues.
pomegranate / 3383 posts
Honestly, I don't think any baby is ready for BLW at 4 months as they need to be sitting up independently and have decent eye-hand coordination. If your LO sits well in his highchair, you can put some small chunks of soft fruit or vegetables and let him play but he probably won't get any in his mouth! And if he does he will likely spit it right back out as most babies still have their tongue thrust reflex at that age!
We started with one meal a day of puréed veggies at 5 months but he didn't take to them until 5.5 months (which, coincidentally, is when he started sitting independently). We skipped rice cereal and tried oatmeal and he hated it. Now at 7.5 months we do 3 meals a day and they are a combo of BLW and purees (kid looooves Greek yogurt!).
I recently bought a baby-led weaning cookbook at the recipes weren't anything special so I returned it. Here is a document I found though that may be helpful!
nectarine / 2039 posts
@trusch24: I started before 6 months, not with purees, but mine couldn't hold and coordinate the food eating, so I would hold the pieces of food and let him bring his head to it and gnaw on it. So I didn't really do 'true' baby-led, but I did think it was a nice way to start.
The foods I did first, successfully were banana, avacado, and butternut squash. Here is a pic that kindof shows how I do it:
I just started purees (baby rice cereal) today and in my opinion, it is way easier to feed baby this way than with a spoon!
persimmon / 1135 posts
We started BLW when Linus was just over 6 months old. His first food was steamed courgette. We did one meal a day for the first few days, but quickly ramped up to 2/3. Now at nearly 7.5 mos he's eaten: fresh mozzarella, tomatoes, pear, plum, avocado, banana, toast, crumpet with cream cheese, cheese omelette, hard boiled egg, salmon, carrots, broccoli, sweet potatoes, baby corn, and cucumber. All of that has been in fairly large pieces that he can pick up and get in his mouth. I've also given him yogurt and apple sauce off a spoon. I let him grab it and guide it to his mouth and just sort of hold on to it to prevent it being flung across the room.
We really like it and it's going well so far! I think it makes so much more sense than starting with bland, nutritionally inferior foods. Early on he wasn't actually ingesting that much, but now he gets a surprising amount in. I also think it teaches better relationship to food as he's in control of what he takes in and I'm not forcing it down him.
Here's a picture of his first time eating.
GOLD / papaya / 10166 posts
We waited until 6 months to give acutal food. We gave her some purees up starting at 5 months, but skipped the cereal all together. She really wasn't ready for the food until she was 6 months, and she really didn't start eating it until just recently. (previously, she just played with it before and put it up to her mouth)
We gave her only her night time meal with real food, but sent purees to daycare up until recently (8 months old). Now we send bits of leftovers to daycare, so instead of purees, she gets regular food.
Here's her eating some steamed asparagus.
honeydew / 7968 posts
we started just shy of 6 months. we started with bananas, then avocado. they've had some toast with banana spread on it. and some mushed carrots (they didn't like the whole carrots)... we've also had some rice cereal and some congee. we tried microwaving apples once but i think it's too hard. my girl doesn't have teeth so it's hard to get something more "tough"... i'm thinking i'll try baking it next time to get it really soft.
we've been doing modified blw for about 2 weeks and it's fun! right now, we try to shoot for twice a day. i do think 4 months is too young for blw, but i'm no expert.
good luck!
grapefruit / 4056 posts
We plan to do BLW, but the occasional puree and rice cereal. We have been waiting for all readiness cues to be in place (sits unassisted, interested in food, can bring food to own mouth). All cues were just recently in place, but my DH decided that we should wait for 6 months just to be safe so we are waiting 2 more weeks. We are going to do rice cereal for a few days, then start giving him soft steamed fingers of veggies or soft fruits, with 1 new every couple days, once he is 'good' at those, we will do soft meats (sausage without casing, chicken and beef stewed). Once he is quite adept, I won't do anything special for him anymore.
pomelo / 5093 posts
@tequiero21: My toddler loves baked apples, from about that age. I take the apple, cut in into pieces, sprinkle with cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, whatever tasty spices. You can add butter and sugar too, if you feel like it. Then I put them in a baking pan with some water, and just stick them in the oven on about 350F. I check every 20 minutes or so and add more water if it runs low. They're done when they're mushy, or firmer for an older child. This makes an easy applesauce, or it can be a good but messy thing for a child to self feed.
Then try not to just eat them all yourself.
pomelo / 5093 posts
@MsMini: I always see people listing sitting unassisted as a readiness cue for eating, and I think that's a bit of a misconception. A child needs to be able to sit in a high chair, certainly. But my daughter didn't sit purely unassisted until 7 months, at least, a good two months after she was clearly ready for solids.
The loss of the tongue thrust and desire for solid food usually goes together at about 6 months with sitting, but one does not require another.
grapefruit / 4056 posts
@sarac: The research I did clearly listed sitting unassisted as a readiness cue, not high chair sitting, depending on the design of your high chair, your baby could be strapped in there at 3 months old if they have decent neck control. I had lots of people tell me he "looked ready" since 3 months old, which is clearly too young.
bananas / 9227 posts
@trusch24: I have nothing to add, but our babies are the same age and I'm also curious about BLW. I'll be following this thread 
honeydew / 7968 posts
@sarac: oooh that sounds tasty! i think i'll try that. do you think it'll taste good with none of the spices, butter or sugar? lol.
pomelo / 5093 posts
@tequiero21: Sure, I totally bet that it would. I love a lot of spice, though.
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