LO has been loving purees and mushy stuff, but shows no interest in actually putting food into his own mouth. Curious when your littles started on finger foods and feeding themselves? I've tried just putting stuff in front of him like bananas or grated cheese, but he just mushes everything up in his hands and throws it on the ground! We started solids one month ago at 6 months.
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We did baby led weaning, and only did finger foods, so she started at 6 months. And yes, there is lots of food thrown on the floor, mashed up, etc. It's how they learn and explore. Eventually they eat it!
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She really didn't eat anything until she was over a year besides pouches. She would gag at most foods. It stressed me out and of course she figured it out eventually and now is a pretty good eater.
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Mine fed herself at this age, but also did a lot of mashing food in her hands, smashing it around on the tray, and just generally exploring it. She was doing really well on fine motor skills at that point, and definitely enjoyed practicing picking things up and putting them in her mouth. Gross motor skills like crawling and pulling up were basically on hold for her at that time. I tend to think babies focus on one set of skills at a time - maybe your LO is just into doing something else right now? Don't worry, it'll come!
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@petitenoisette: Thanks, good to know!
@sauerkraut: Interesting theory! He's not crawling yet, just kind of figuring out the sitting and rolling thing still
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I wouldn't worry either; part of the discovery is doing everything but putting food in mouth
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@Goldengirl: I wouldn't Worry! DS started totally get it around 7 months! Baby Mum Mums he loves around 6 months
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@FaithFertility: He is 7 months. Has zero interest in mum mums, just throws them on the floor!
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@Goldengirl: I think that it is still developmental, I would just keep offering, model how to pick up and eat and not worry yet!
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Some foods are easier/harder for them to pick up and feed themselves. It sounds like you are giving them kind of hard foods. The first things my daughter could pick up and feed herself were cheerios and puffs. Those aren't very nutritious, but it was more about practice. Soon after that came watermelon (in very big pieces- she would gnaw on the corners). Very gradually she could start picking up smaller, slipperier foods like fruit, vegetables, pasta, etc.
Something that never worked for my daughter, but might work for you is to give them whole foods, like a whole banana or a whole pickle, and let them bite of chunks. The whole food is big enough to pick up and hold so it's easier. For some reason my daughter never understood to take bites and she would try to put the whole thing in her mouth
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Both my kids were slow to self-feed. DS1 didn't really get it until almost 1 and DS2 didn't want to until 10-ish months? Even now, DS2 gets impatient with self-feeding and wants me to shovel his mush faster.
We just always throw a few neater finger foods down while spoon feeding - cheerios, quartered grapes, peas, etc - and let them play with it. It clicks eventually, don't sweat it.
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@gingerbebe: Thanks! I keep trying, but still all ending up on the floor
I know cheerios are really popular, but how does that work, they won't choke since they're so small?
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J is 7 months and she can Hold the crust of toast and pick up puffs sort of (she gets like 1 in her mouth for every 5 that fall on the floor). Anything slippery gives her trouble so she just smushes those things! I'm keep giving her a couple bites of cut up food after her purees so she can play around with it.
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@Goldengirl: Basically. I prefer to start with Gerber puffs and Mum mums - they have a rice flour base and they melt super quickly in the mouth. I only buy Gerber puffs (or the Happy Baby or Plum ones) because they are easiest to grasp. My kids hated the generic ones (which are heart shaped) because they were harder to pincer. Gerber was their favorite for picking up and I think Plum melted the fastest. Once they are good I switch to Cheerios or a mix. My kids choked on yogurt melts initially so I waited until they were a little bigger like 10 months.
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At 6 months we did small bits of food.
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We also did Baby Led Weaning, so she was eating finger foods starting right at 6 months. We never fed her purees.
I agree with @SteelerGirl: about giving larger pieces of things. It's a little counterintuitive, but it was easier for her to grasp larger chunks (for instance, a big spear of steamed broccoli, and she would just gnaw on the top). She also LOVED strips of filet right away; she didn't actually eat them, but sucked and gummed on them for ages. -
We've done mostly baby-led weaning, with some pouches thrown in for convenience, with all 3 of my LOs...and they have all taken to it at different times.
LO1 started around 5.5m but didn't really start consuming the finger foods until....maybe 6.5m or so? She was really good with fine motor early on, though, so could do a lot of different foods of various sizes.
LO2 started around 5.5m too but had a lot more gagging early on, so we did a bit more purees with her. She was later to take to solids -- after 7m for sure.
LO3 started staring us down and hollering for our food (seriously) at 5m. He is just after 6m and will happily down everything we give him -- literally everything goes straight to his mouth! He doesn't quite have the fine motor for small things/puffs/Cheerios, but we keep trying so that he can work on those skills. He loves mum mums, and loves sucking on any bigger slippery/juicy things that we hold for him. He is still so young that his gag reflex is pretty far forward, so everything has to be either big pieces he can suck on/mush or teeny things. Favorites at the moment are raspberries (usually broken into 3-4 small pieces and sucked off the end of my finger), big florets of broccoli roasted with lemon juice for him to suck on, and graham crackers!
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@KayKay: omg AJ would for die if I have him a Graham cracker lol need to try
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