C is finally ready to start solid foods. I mean "real" foods since she's been having oatmeal cereal since she was 4 months old. About a month ago we tried avocado but the blowouts in her diaper were horrible so we stopped. It may have been the few drops of lemon juice we added to the puree (to prevent the avocado from browning, per the recipe). We don't know. So we stopped with introducing solids, spent almost two weeks clearing up the diaper rash and now we're trying again.
I do have a few questions that I can't seem to find the answer to. Do we keep her on the cereal as we introduce new foods? With the avocado we didn't Now we're introducing banana and we're keeping the cereal. Yesterday we fed her banana alone in the evening, this morning we mixed mashed banana with her cereal. And once she's graduated to solid #2 do we still keep feeding solid #1 (the banana) or do we only feed her one food at a time? I don't mean in the same meal but just in the same day. I think our next food will probably be sweet potato or peas (I am making C's baby food at home). So would we quit the banana and then introduce the sweet potato? Or should we feed the banana at a morning feeding and then sweet potato at an afternoon feeding? Currently C is only getting one solid food feeding per day so I know that eventually we will need to start feeding her solids twice a day. I am really paranoid about upsetting her tummy like last time so I want to make sure I don't do that again. Any advice would be greatly appreciated!
P.S.- For my Irish readers, at what age do you introduce steel cut oatmeal to your baby? C's oatmeal cereal is like mush but we do have steel cut oatmeal that I would love to feed her instead. I thought about cooking some and then blending it but again, I don't want to upset her little tummy.
I do have a few questions that I can't seem to find the answer to. Do we keep her on the cereal as we introduce new foods? With the avocado we didn't Now we're introducing banana and we're keeping the cereal. Yesterday we fed her banana alone in the evening, this morning we mixed mashed banana with her cereal. And once she's graduated to solid #2 do we still keep feeding solid #1 (the banana) or do we only feed her one food at a time? I don't mean in the same meal but just in the same day. I think our next food will probably be sweet potato or peas (I am making C's baby food at home). So would we quit the banana and then introduce the sweet potato? Or should we feed the banana at a morning feeding and then sweet potato at an afternoon feeding? Currently C is only getting one solid food feeding per day so I know that eventually we will need to start feeding her solids twice a day. I am really paranoid about upsetting her tummy like last time so I want to make sure I don't do that again. Any advice would be greatly appreciated!
P.S.- For my Irish readers, at what age do you introduce steel cut oatmeal to your baby? C's oatmeal cereal is like mush but we do have steel cut oatmeal that I would love to feed her instead. I thought about cooking some and then blending it but again, I don't want to upset her little tummy.
I stopped reading blogs for a while - I think the last time I read yours you were potentially getting moved - and missed that you had adopted. Congratulations.
ReplyDeleteI think giving variety but less choice is the way forward and not making a fuss when they don't eat. Although I think the part of their life where you agonise over purees is over very, very quickly - I mean, I did it less than a year ago and it seems an eternity away.
Its also bit difficult when, despite all the mental effort over their first introduction to food, that in a few months they will only eat carbs. I read somewhere that someone is developing a scientific theory about why very young children refuse to eat greens.
I started with the oatmeal mush too. When I moved onto vegetables and fruit I kept the oatmeal at breakfast and a vegetable at dinner. As she started eating more, I started with oatmeal and fruit at breakfast and vegetables for lunch and dinner. I started with the steel cut oatmeal around 15 months, but my little girl (still) doesn't eat big meals so I'm sure some babies may need to move on from the oatmeal puree sooner.
ReplyDeleteOur philosophy is that once a food is introduced without difficulty, that food is considered "safe" and added to baby's diet, with the same kind of rotation that we rotate foods in our adult diets. You have 2 or 3 or 10 or 20 foods to choose from when deciding what to have for any given meal.
ReplyDeleteUsually, we do the oatmeal at breakfast and then oatmeal and a fruit and/or veggie for lunch and dinner.
We added things to her cereal mush at first. She loved applesauce and sweet potatoes mushed in it. We tried bananas but she's just not a big banana fan. We still gave her cereal until she just wasn't interested in it anymore.
ReplyDeleteWe always did the 3-5 day rule for each food. Do the same food for a few days to make sure they have no reaction and then you can do a new food. We introduced one food and then just gave them that 1 food at meal time until we did the next food. I never really made a lot of "combos" like the chicken and peas or beef and carrots.
ReplyDeleteI wasn't anxious to do the 2 or 3 meals a day either just because its so much work! I also made my kids food and it was fun! Just beware- too many bananas can clog a little one up. And if it does, a few spoon fulls of prunes will take care of the problem.
We were never really big cereal people either. The only real reason for them is to get your baby used to eating real solid food. But, if you want to do your steel cut oats, I would throw them in the blender before you cook them... they should be smooth enough that way. :)
(I also read somewhere that babies shouldn't get citrus until 12 months because of the problems you are encountering. I hope it clears up soon!) Sorry for the novel! :)
Our son was on the rice cereal at 1 month old with his milk because of reflux. So when we did the solids we kept the rice cereal. Our doctor had us do 1 week of each food to make sure there were no problems.
ReplyDeleteWe did like 3 or 4 day with only just the new food and then maybe gave him what we knew was ok from before. He had us start with all the veggies first because fruit are so sweet and he said babies tend to not want veggies after fruits.
It worked great for us, the only thing he couldn't do was peaches because of the reflux, he is 18 months old and still have some problems with them.
Good luck
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We started on baby oatmeal at 6 months, then I started giving our son steel cut oats around 7 months. It really depends on your child and how much she gags when she eats. He never ate pureed bananas or avocado, I just mashed them up. I do have a Baby Bullet, but I only used it for about a month to puree apples and green beans. After that I'd cook things super soft and give them to him. I never pureed meat because I think that's disgusting. Chicken can be cooked fairly soft and it kind of falls apart. Also, one thing to think about is if she rejects, say, pureed peas, I wouldn't count out peas altogether. She may like whole peas, so keep trying them. I love peas, but I wouldn't eat mushy peas.
ReplyDeleteFollow your daughter's lead. My son can eat a larger variety of foods than my friend's daughter who is 2 months older than him. She has a thing about consistency that my son never had (she'd get frustrated if the food was too thick).
My doctor said we could basically use anything we wanted as a first food. Most people start with bananas or avocados, but if we felt strongly that chicken should be his first food, then by all means, go for it. We did bananas and it's definitely not affected his love of vegetables. He's 10 months now and last night he had pork chop in a mushroom/garlic cream sauce, roasted sweet potato, and roasted yellow squash (all still in identifiable form). He's a great eater, but I don't think it was anything I did in particular. I think it's just his personality.