We are #weaningwarriors with Vital Baby – 5 Top Tips for weaning

I’m very excited to be working alongside Vital Baby as part of the #weaningwarriors campaign.

#weaningwarriors

If you are a regular reader you will know that we are busy weaning our 9 month old baby girl. I run a fortnightly linky for other bloggers to link up their weaning baby and toddler food posts and recipes. You can find previous posts that have been added by clicking on the Weaning Wednesdays tab. There are some great tips and recipes there.

If you are soon to be or have recently started weaning, it can be a daunting process and Dr Rana Conway has 5 top tips for weaning that may help.

1. Offer your baby a wide range of foods so she gets used to different flavours and textures. Babies naturally like sweet foods to start with, but offer slightly bitter foods too such as spinach, broccoli and green beans. Don’t be surprised if these are rejected at first. Every time you try, the chances of success increase.

2. Let your baby set the pace. ‘Responsive feeding’ is key, so if your baby shows signs that he’s had enough don’t keep trying for one more spoonful. Teething and colds can put a baby off their food and pressure to eat will just cause food battles.

3. Don’t give too much milk, as this is one of the main reasons for babies not taking to solids. Babies under 12 months need 3-4 breast feeds or 500-600ml of formula a day and giving more than this can make them too full for meals.

4. Give your baby plenty of opportunities to handle food. Whether you’re starting with spoon-feeding or baby-led weaning, give some finger foods every day. Steamed vegetables such as carrot sticks or pieces of broccoli and soft fruit like bananas and pears are ideal.

5. Make meal times enjoyable by sitting and eating together whenever possible. If you relax and take your time it will help your baby develop a healthy relationship with food.

How you feed your baby, right from birth is such a contentious subject. It starts with the breast vs bottle debate and turns to the BLW or puree debate. I recently posted about our Mixed weaning approach and why it works for us.

Ava is now 9 months and we are still doing much the same. She enjoys feeding herself but is sometimes very hungry and gets frustrated with the speed in which she can feed herself. We find that after having some mashed food from a spoon she will happily sit and feed herself finger foods. Other mealtimes she will happily feed herself the whole meal. As Ava has multiple allergies feeding her what we are eating is not always possible. I’m going to be doing some posts on the kind of meals that she can manage herself that are safe for her allergies. If you follow me on Instagram I tend to post a lot of them there.

Reading through the tips above I feel that we do them all.

Do you do the tips above?

 

 

6 responses to “We are #weaningwarriors with Vital Baby – 5 Top Tips for weaning”

  1. I’m weaning second time around and I forgot everything!! I’m struggling with savoury stuff at the moment he only wants sweet stuff!! I’m sure he will come round eventually x

  2. Mummy Fever says:

    Great post. I am currently weaning my forth baby and so far he seems the easiest. He eats a big variety of things and finger foods. I am still breast feeding him and he does like his milk but he has cut down as the food has increased. #weaningwednesdays

  3. Emma's Mamma says:

    Great advice! Emma is now 16 months so we’ve been through it all! Definitely agree with this 🙂 Thanks for hosting #weaningwednesdays

  4. great advice here. I’m weaning my second baby (7mo) and for us its so much easier than the first – probably because im ore relaxed #weaningwednesdays

  5. Katie says:

    Lot’s of fantastic advice here although I do disagree with the doctor’s breastfeeding advice. You can’t put a number on the amount of times babies feed, no matter how old they are as sometimes it is just for a drink/comfort etc, you just need to time their solid foods right 🙂 #weaningwednesdays

  6. I agree with your tips here – my fourth is 7 months old and I’ve been baby led weaning it’s going fine he is a great little eater he will try most things, he still loves his mummy milk tho!

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