When my first son, Jack, started solids, I got this book and cookbook on baby-led weaning — I really liked the idea that he could control how much or how little he ate without passively having someone shovel food into his mouth. It’s a great idea in theory, but I sometimes wonder if it contributed to Jack’s love of throwing food on the floor. As we’re starting solids for my second now, this is on my mind — I still really like the idea, but would prefer to skip the food going everywhere… sigh. Ladies, any thoughts that you’d care to share on solids? The book is $8.44 at Amazon. Happy Tuesday! Baby Led Weaning
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POSITA says
We taught our little one the sign for “all done” and that really helped with food throwing.
CHJ says
This is brilliant. Right now, food throwing seems to be his sign for “all done”!
Carrie M says
We’re working on this now with our 9month old – trying to get her to learn the “more” sign and the “all done” sign. Any tips beyond repetition and association?
On solids generally: we’ve been doing a mix of BLW and spoon feeding, though she sometimes fights the spoon now that she has so much fun picking up food and getting it everywhere. Things I’ve given her based on the BLW books that I wouldn’t have thought to otherwise: pickles, pear slices, half a banana, crackers (Ritz are her favorites), spears of zucchini and squash and other veg. I’ve tried a chicken leg, but she ends up with too much food in her mouth and that freaks me out too much.
She’s also learned how to suck from pouches, which is great for feeding on planes or otherwise on the go. She’s not into throwing her food, but does throw her sippy cup. I give her three chances. If she’s throws it a fourth time, then I take it away and don’t give it back. This is a recent thing, so I don’t know how effective this approach will be!
Meg Murry says
She can’t count to 3 – so I would give her ONE fetch and return, then take it away and put it on the table next to you.
The only other thing you can do with more and all done is use it for things other than food. Give her one block, ask if she wants more, then give her another. When you finish a book, sign “all done”
anonmama says
This is genius. I forget that my toddler can’t count and so it’s actually probably confusing that I fetch things after 1 throw, but not after 3. Thanks!
anon eagle says
I was able to teach “more” with blowing bubbles. The baby loved the bubbles and very quickly learned to sign “more” to keep the bubbles coming. 9 months is still very early. You can also try a baby signing time video (amazon). Something about seeing the babies sign was very helpful to my baby.
pockets says
How did you teach to suck out of pouches? I also tried straws but my baby doesn’t really get it.
FVNC says
Not OP obviously, but one day my baby just “got it.” Literally the day before she didn’t know how to suck from a straw sippy cup or from a pouch, and the next day I showed her how (I’d done it before), told her to “suck” and she was able to. She was around 12-13 months. So maybe one day it’ll click for your little one, too!
Carrie M says
I’m not sure I actually taught her to do it, but this is how it came about: She somehow knew how to suck water out of my camelback. One day she reached for mine while I was drinking it, and I let her try it, and it worked. A few days later, I tried putting the pouch in her mouth, but she would just turn her head to the side. Didn’t get it at all. So a couple times a week, I would eat from the pouch, then try again in her mouth. Eventually (on a long plane ride actually), she just started sucking from the pouch. I still need to push the food up for her, and I half hold on to it so that she doesn’t squirt it all over herself. But it’s still faster and easier than trying to spoon feed.
POSITA says
She finally got “all done” around 11 months. We used it all the time, not just for food. All done works for getting out of the highchair, stroller, swing, car seat, bathtub, crib, etc. I think modeling it in different situations helped her catch on.
Meg Murry says
Giving only a few pieces of food on the highchair tray and teaching the sign for “more” helps too. Or until they learn “more” – putting the bowl with more food in sight and giving more when they grunt and gesture toward it :-)
We did a mix of purees and BLW. If you already have a lot of purees made, or if your food isn’t quite baby soft enough, blending the family dinner with an immersion blender and smearing it on toast or crackers also helps for the baby that wants to feed himself and still uses up some of the purees. My kids would eat just about anything if it was smeared on toast.
Heather says
We did BLW with my oldest daughter (almost 3) and just started it with my 6-month-old. I am a huge believer in it. My daughter is an amazing eater now, and it was so nice not to have to prepare something separate for her at mealtime. I have seen some people get splat mats or some kind of washable sheet to go under high chairs to contain messes. We didn’t do that and didn’t really have a huge problem with throwing food.
ANP says
We didn’t know about BLW with our first, but used it with our second. I like to refer to it as “the lazy parent’s guide to feeding your baby.” It gave my husband all kinds of heart attacks (my MIL too) but overall it worked great for us. Didn’t have big issues with food on the floor (any moreso than with our older non-BLW kiddo) but I lilke POSITA’s idea of signing “all done.”
mascot says
I don’t really remember the transition to solids. I think we used the baby oatmeal to thicken some purees. He ate a combination of the pouches and tiny pieces of whatever we were eating. We didn’t have any allergy issues, but we did take the precaution of introducing new foods at daytime meals to keep an eye on him. The jarred/tray meals with meats grossed us out so we avoided those. He’s a pretty good eater now at 4.
One thing that we did early (4-5 months) was to offer a straw sippy cup of water with his meals. It took him a while to get the hang of it and then there was no looking back. Made getting rid of the bottle around 12 months very easy.
We have two furry vacuum cleaners who were more than happy to clean the highchair and floor. He wasn’t much into throwing food.
Anonymama says
Yes, having a dog helped so so much with the mess!
NP says
I am doing BLW with my 8 month old but am struggling with what to send him for lunch to daycare. Any thoughts ?
Elle says
Would be interested on what other people do for this as well. We’re 6.5 months and right now just do solids at home. She goes to an in home daycare so there’s no pressure regarding when/what to serve, but I’m hoping to wait until either her “intake” is more when she eats (right now not a lot gets swallowed) or when she’s at daycare she’s clearly not satisfied or is wanting to eat when the other kids do. I might start sending a sippy at 7 months so she can start practicing that with water. At home we let her practice water with a regular glass. Otherwise…I’m not sure how we’ll proceed. :)
Nonny says
I read the BLW book and liked its general philosophy but when we sent our LO to daycare starting part-time at 7 months, I had to stick with what worked. So we initially sent baby cereal, mashed yam or sweet potato, and other mashed baby food I made (there are great recipes at homemade-baby-food-recipes.com). I tried to send food from a variety of food groups. It clearly wasn’t BLW but I was more interested in making sure my daughter was eating properly. We saved food exploration for meals at home. Now she is 11 months and eats very well on her own.
MomAnon4This says
Probably still drinking a lot of milk at that age.
We’d send cream cheese sandwich, sliced tomato or sliced applies, sometimes another protein, like hummos and crackers. It seemed like a lot – we’d offer, like, 5 or 6 things to our kid for a meal, but we didn’t know what he wanted! Sweet potatoes, now that it’s winter, or boiled potatoes (cold, of course). Babies and kids don’t know what’s supposed to hot and what’s supposed to be cold, so don’t let that limit you. We did a lot of leftover dinner for the kid at daycare.
Carrie M says
I don’t have to send food to daycare (they prepare 3 meals + snack), but my two cents would be: do whatever is easiest! If you can make some food in advance to pack for the next day (or week’s) lunch, great. But if not, then I would send super easy to prep (i.e., no cooking) stuff (like jars, pouches, hummus, yogurt, avocado), and leave the cooked food and other food exploration to dinners / weekends.
If you have time to do a bit more prep, then my go-to would be easy-to-cook stuff (like ground beef/turkey, cut-up chicken, peas, bits of squash, etc.) that will last a couple days in Tupperware in the fridge so that you don’t have to be doing lunch prep cooking every single night.
But I also agree with asking daycare for their ideas, and especially for a report each day on what he liked / disliked and how much he ate, so that you can adjust accordingly.
Elle says
This is timely. We’re 3 weeks in and doing BLW. Right now it’s only at home, usually once a day (dinner during the week). She tends to go to bed between 6:30 and 7:00 so it’s a short window. Would love other peoples thoughts on working full time and making this transition, particularly if also still nursing as we’re trying for our goal of making it to a year.
Meg Murry says
The best advice I got about that was to allow daycare to do the bulk of food feeding, and focus mostly on nursing at home. That way if your pumping output starts to taper off toward the end of the year it isn’t such a big deal. But we were lucky that our daycare provided food (a mix of jarred and homemade purees and then finger food). If you aren’t adamantly opposed to spoon feeding and your daycare is willing to do it, I personally would send jars to school in addition to finger food in a few months. Also, just ask them at daycare – most daycare employees have seen A LOT of babies come through them, so they may have some suggestions for finger foods that you never thought of.
TBK says
I just don’t find any overall theory/method/-ism about parenting to be terribly useful. Maybe it’s fantastic for Baby One, but that doesn’t mean it will work as well for Baby Two. My guys get baby cereal and fruit puree for breakfast (which, yes, I spoon-feed them). Then they get finger foods for lunch. Cheerios or home-made teething biscuits, then shredded cheese or diced meat or beans, then soft fruit in pieces or in a mesh feeder. I think more of the food winds up on the floor (and therefore in the dog — solution to food on the floor, get a dog) than in the babies, but I see it as being more about the muscle practice and hand-eye coordination than eating anyway. And they usually wrap up lunch with a nice, big bottle. Dinner is me spoon-feeding them home-made purees. Baby A is super into purees and being spoon fed. He leans forward and opens his little mouth for each spoonful, then kicks his feet while he swallows. Baby B not so much. He’ll grab the spoon out of my hand and feed himself with it. Or he’ll take two bites from me then shut his mouth tight and turn away his head and fuss until I give him a bottle. He loves, loves, loves bottles. But food, meh. Still, it seems that some people seem to think that purees = bland mush. Which I find weird. Yes, my babies eat purees. But I season them just as I season the food my husband and I eat. A little nutmeg in the apples. Some cumin and cilantro in the black beans. Lemon juice and pepper (and a tiny bit of salt) in their broccoli. Also, even when I’m spoon-feeding them, it doesn’t mean they’re not controlling what they’re eating. Believe me! They are quite clear when they want more and when they are all done. So this is a long way of saying that, sure, finger foods are great. Variety is great. Eating whatever mom and dad is eating is great. But I don’t know if we need to say “baby is ONLY eating this way” and slap a name on what “this way” is and pretend that it’s the best way or certainly the best way for all babies. (Not that I’m saying that’s what Kat or this book is doing. It’s just what a see in a lot of parenting stuff. This wholesale adoption of some “method” and then arguing why it’s the only way to parent. If the kid’s getting fed and is happy and healthy, I’m not sure how much it matters how the food is getting into the baby.)
Nina says
This comes off as very defensive; I don’t think anything in this discussion should have been read as criticism of spoon-feeding and certainly not your methods! Have you been receiving criticism from family members or feeling it from “society” more generally?
Meg Murry says
I don’t think she is being defensive here, however, there are some people and books that are HARD CORE about BLW – as hard core as the breastfeeding vs formula or SAHM vs working moms or attachment parenting vs CIO, I’d say. So I think the overall point here TBK is trying to make is just like “know your office” in the mantra on the main s!te – here it is “you do you” and “know your baby”, and to pick and choose what works from each method for you and your individual baby.
And I agree with others that before BLW was a “thing” it was just our method of “giving your kid table food because we’re too lazy/cheap to spend a bunch of time or money on purees for every meal”
TBK says
I guess I was going off of the comments on Amazon on the book. A lot of them seemed to suggest that spoon feeding purees was: 1) force-feeding your child and 2) conditioning your child to have a bland palate. And that all of that would lead to bad eating habits. Also this part of the post: “he could control how much or how little he ate without passively having someone shovel food into his mouth.” I just think that all of that might be true for this baby or that baby, but that the reality is that each kid is different and what’s a huge success for one might be a total failure for another, parental philosophy be damned.
EB0220 says
Yes, it’s funny how having an actual child can change your perspective. For example, our older daughter slept in our room for 9 months+. Our younger daughter lasted about a week before we moved her to her crib. She’s slept nearly through the night ever since. You just never know!
And, as anecdata, my older daughter hardly ate anything but purees until she was 13-14 months. She’s now a fantastic eater and will try pretty much anything.
Nonny says
Yes, and to be honest, the book kind of comes off that way (re, e.g., force-feeding your child). Although the book contains some good ideas, I did not appreciate that tone.
Like you, we have basically done what worked and I believe that whatever that is for each family is just fine.
ml says
I didn’t find your post defensive to begin with, but after reading the Amazon reviews, I completely understand your phrasing.
Also, please show me this mythical child that passively allows food he doesn’t want to be shoveled into his mouth, because my very scientific sample size of my kids and those of my friends and family doesn’t include one. If a baby doesn’t want the food on the spoon, he won’t open his mouth, and he’ll wave his hands to maximize mess. At that point, I always just figured baby was done eating. I didn’t take it as an idictment of all pureed food ever. Agree, there are lots of right answers for most parenting questions.
Anon says
I’ve babysat that passive kiddo! Although, in fairness, that was our goal. In college I worked with a baby who had been a preemie and was on “failure to thrive” watch. We needed to get as much food into her as possible at every meal. Loading up the baby food with cream, butter, and avocado mash whenever possible only went so far.
This kid was super fascinated by people, so we’d take her to a park, or a crowded restaurant and start shoveling food in her mouth. The more active the people were, the more she’d watch, the more she would ignore whatever we were doing. When it was winter, we turned on the TV (to anything, once she ate a meal to CSPAN) and it worked even better. Totally distracted and she’d eat three times what she would normally.
A kid like that in a big, busy family? Exactly the description in the post.
Though that is one kid out of all the kids I’ve sat for starting when I was twelve all the way through college. So it’s not common.
KJ says
Yep. I give jarred/pouch baby food when it’s convenient (most of the time) and table food when it’s convenient (occasionally). I refuse to stress over this.
In House Lobbyist says
We didn’t read the book but generally took this approach with both of ours. The second baby was more demanding on feeding herself from an early age. We always cooked food for them and either mashed it up or pureed it. My grandmother couldn’t believe I was feeding them real bananas instead of baby food bananas. My MIL insisted on buying the first one organic baby food carrots out of a jar which my son flatly refused to eat. So she just let us do it our way with the second one.
As for throwing food – second the dog comment. Our 15 months has started throwing her food now when she doesn’t want something and we are working on teaching her to place it back on her tray. When she throws it, her high chair gets turned around for about 30 seconds. This hurts her feelings so bad that it only happens a few times a week. This will kill grandparents if you do it in their presence but she is smart enough to figure it out.
As for fingerfoods- here is our ideas. Toasted peanut butter sandwiches (yes we didn’t want until 1 year old to give peanut butter), mini pita sandwiches with different stuffings, diced cheese and meats, pasta salads, stuff tortilla shells cut into thirds, steamed vegetables – peas, lima beans, green beans, and sweet potatoes, etc.
Anonyc says
I must be getting old, but we’ve done jars/pouches–spoon-feeding those (until they grab the pouch)–with all our kids, adding in small bits of food when it seemed like they could handle it, and gradually get them to larger pieces and more self-feeding. Worked well for my first two, and seems great for my third. She seems more into self-feeding than my other two, so we’re moving into that more quickly. I’ve avoided any books on the matter, and just rolled with what will fly with the kiddos. And I’ll be the first to say that the jar/pouch phase is my favorite because it’s so. easy. to just grab a jar and slap it in the lunchbox. The next phase–dicing everything into teeny tiny pieces–is perhaps my least favorite.
As for mess control for non-dog owners, I have two words: splat mat.
EB0220 says
This is timely – I just started solids with my 4 month old. The doctor told me the recommendations have changed so the window is now 4-6 months whenever baby is ready. I started with baby food and she seems to be doing fine with it. I let her grab the spoon and “feed” herself so that when she loses interest I know she’s done. I like the idea of BLW but I need to do some research on it. We didn’t do it at all with my first, and she took a long time to be a good, self-sufficient eater. We were still struggling with everything but baby food when she was 1. Now she’s great but the transition to food and sippy cups was definitely a struggle with her. I hope to avoid that this time around! Thanks for the book recommendation.
ECR says
Our 8 month old eats cheerios, soft fruits, string cheese, broccoli florets, etc. with no problem. My husband is constantly worried about choking, however. Every night he and I debate how big the pieces of food should be. What’s a good rule of thumb on this? Sometimes baby stuffs her mouth with lots of cheese or whatever and then coughs, almost as if she was gagging. This is terribly worrying to my husband. Is it normal? Just wanted to get some feedback from others on this. Thanks!
TAH says
Gagging is totally normal. My son has actually gotten to the point where, if he starts to gag, he’ll reach into his mouth and pull out whatever it is he’s gagging on. This amazed my sister, whose 2 kids are older, and were introduced to solids in the traditional way.
NewMomAnon says
Our pediatrician said to do pea-sized chunks of food. At around 10 months, my kiddo started biting pieces off of crackers, so now we give her bigger pieces (think a wedge of quesadilla or french toast stick) and we haven’t had any problems with that.
mascot says
Gagging is noisy and full of air, which is good. Choking is silent. Babies gag more because they are still practicing how to eat.
TAH says
We’ve done mostly BLW with my just about 1 year old. We do feed him super messy things like yogurt, apple sauce, etc. , but we just put everything else right on his tray. We put a disposable tablecloth under his highchair to catch anything that drops, but he’s usually pretty good about not throwing food around unless he’s finished eating. When he starts, we just take the tray away from him.
Spirograph says
Admittedly, although I’ve heard of BLW, I have been way too lazy to read parenting philosophy books about any of this so I don’t know the specifics. I think we did something similar, though. We followed the pediatrician’s advice on when to start thickening milk with oatmeal/rice cereal, when to start introducing purees and in what order, and when to start with finger foods. But we transitioned to all finger food as quickly as possible because I like to spend dinnertime eating my own food, not spoon-feeding a baby, thankyouverymuch. I think this has everything to do with temperment rather than parenting, but our son (now 1.5) likes most food – even vegetables. He loved being fed with a spoon and sucking on the mesh bags, but refused pouches until just a couple months ago. Ever since he graduated from straight up Gerber carrot puree or whatever, he eats whatever we’re eating for dinner, but he also gets fruit for dessert every night. On the rare occasion he doesn’t like dinner, he just holds out for fruit (but he has to eat one bite of each thing we’re eating first).
I won’t say we’ve avoided food on the floor, but it’s always been easy to tell when he’s finished eating – his first step was to try to hand me a piece of food. If I didn’t take it, that’s when it would start going on the floor or getting smeared all over the high chair tray. It’s just a matter of moving quickly enough to intercept the second step.
Nonny says
I read this book and it was helpful, but mostly because I had no clue what my baby could or could not eat and needed a cheat sheet. But after that initial read, I have barely opened the book. We started with baby cereal and swiftly moved on to things like applesauce, mashed yam, etc. We spent very little time on the puree phase and went to the mashed phase pretty quickly – but then again my LO has been a great eater from day 1. She is now 11 months and will basically eat most things, although she hasn’t quite figured out pasta (I think it’s the texture) and I am not quite ready to give her things like raw carrot sticks, although the hard core BLW folks probably would. When she has finished eating, she “wipes” her tray clean, thereby flinging all leftover food onto the floor, but it sends a very clear “I’m done!” message. Her favourite foods are meat, meat, meat, pineapple and cheese.
Jen says
My kids were never huge eaters but starting around 6 months or so I would start sharing my own food if they were interested. More was useful but neither of them really seemed to get what “all done” meant. I kind of think throwing food happens (at least a little) no matter what. They liked puffs. Can’t really say they liked anything else. Once they were weaned and started really eating we kept on offering variety and they seem to be doing well with that.
OCAssociate says
My issue is that BLW seems to assume that I’m eating meals as healthy as I’d want my baby to eat. I started with purees with my first, because I’d rather give him organic pureed veggies than a bite of the Chipotle my husband grabbed on the way home. At least with purees I could steam and puree batches during the weekend, then freeze for the next couple weeks.
Is this just me? Is everyone else making healthy organic dinners every night?
Anonymama says
I think chipotle is actually organic. And I also think it’s better to err on the side of exposing your kid to a wider variety of tastes/flavors/nutrients rather than feeding them a purely organic completely healthy diet with less variety. And maybe it gives you the push to actually eat a little healthier yourself, which in the long run will make a much bigger difference in your kid’s health than if you only fed them organic vegetable purées when they were babies.
Anonymama says
Sorry, this came off as more obnoxious than I meant to be… It won’t hurt your kid to eat leftovers or frozen purées either. Basically, try to feed them fairly healthy food but don’t stress out too much about ONLY feeding them healthy food.
Anonyc says
Mwahahahahaha making organic dinners! Maybe someday, but certainly not now. Now dinner is after everyone goes to bed and usually consists of yogurt and granola. (I like Chipotle for lunch ;-) )