BLS..What next, some questions

We decided to do BLS with DD2. She is just 6 months and has been going at it herself for about 3 weeks.

So far she has had vegemite fingers, avocado fingers, homemade rusks (teething atm), apple & pear, steamed pumpkin, potato, cauliflower, broccoli and carrot. Amazingly broccoli is her favourite, she hunts it out on her tray.

Anyways I have a few questions. I have tried to get my hand on the Gill Rapley book but I cant find it yet and the library doesnt have it.

1. Where do I go next eg what foods are suitable, do I follow the normal guidelines about what foods are tolerated at what age?

2. If I introduce purees for while I am out and about, will it confuse the issue ie. the swallowing before chewing action? Can I just start on the older jars like 9 months that have lumps?

3. Do I just offer this 'service' at every meal time that we have? She chows down dinner but isn't to fussed the rest of the day.

Thanks in advance for your replies

Offering her the odd mushy foods while your out isnt going to confuse her at all.
Even if she isnt all that interested still offer her breaky and lunch, she's probably a little bit small for 3 full on meals a day atm, but she may suprise you.
Give her anything and everything (within reasin of course!). our DD2 was eating everything we ate by 7 months, keep a close eye on her and if she isnt handeling something well just take it off her and re-offer it in a few weeks once she's practiced a little more.

What about bread/sandwiches while you're out? Or rice cakes?

I just give DD2 whatever we are eating, and it works well. Have done since she was 6 months, so I didn't have the "what next" thing, because she just had whatever we had.. if that makes sense? Like last night, she had scrambled eggs for tea cos we all did. And she had weetbix this morning cos the kids did. And a banana cos we all did... and she's chowing down on some strawberries at the moment cos thats what the other kids are having... LOL

When we go out I make up sangas for all the kids, and some milk arrowroot biscuits, banana etc, easy to eat foods that won't mess up my nappy bag :)

I personally followed some of the guidelines more around allergies than anything else... i did intro things earlier than usual but i did kind of phase them in
some ideas what she may like - fruits like mandarin segments (i take off the pith and make sure no seeds), lightly stweed pear/apple, tinned plums, tinned peach, tinned apricot, feijoa, blueberries, mango, banana, watermelon
cheese
pikelets
crackers - ritz are good, cruskits, carrs cheese melts
salmon patties
salmon steaks (He loved these from the get go)
pasta shapes - even overcook a little
risotto balls
meat balls - huge hit!

Hi,

Your little one can have anything you have. Anything your family eats is fine. Obviously, if there are allergies in your family, keep away from those foods, but otherwise your baby can have anything. There is no need to withold foods until a certain age

Studymum, your little one is only 6 months, so I am not surprised that she is only interested in one meal a day. Milk is, and should be, still her main source of nutrition. If you want to offer her food at each meal it's not a big problem as she won't eat what she doesn't want, but you might find it easier to only offer once or twice a day for now and have less mess. Having her sit with you at mealtimes though is a great idea.

And yes, it is ok to give her purees, or yoghurt, on a spoon sometimes, although you might not find that easier when you're out and about.

Thanks everyone. I guess my mind is still stuck a bit with the pureed progression, cause we followed it with DD1, and introduced foods at certain ages etc.

I used to carry jars with me for when I get stuck out for work etc, otherwise I made all DD1's food. She has a cow milk protein intolerance through my milk, so we won't be introducing any dairy for a long time.

as other PP have mentioned it isn't going to hurt giving DD puree when you are out if that is what you want. I did find I could give DS other things though like sandwhichs cut into fingers or bananas or rockmelon.

I found with DS that he doesn't like puree/mash (although loves custard and youghurt) so those jars weren't an option for me. I found that he would 'taste' lot's (cause I would give him a bit of what I was having when we were out and about) but was only really eating once a day for months and then at about 8/9 mnths would eat twice a day and then a couple of months later started having 3 meals a day.

The others have all given you great advice, but I just wanted to pop in and say broccoli was my DD's fave as a baby too!! In fact, it still is one of her preferred vegies. We often joke that DD will eat anything that's green. While all kids go through stages of testing the boundaries with food, these kinds of vegies were never on DD's disapproval list. Yay!

Sounds like you're doing a fabulous job. Yoghurt was one of our out-and-about meals, I would give DD a spoon as well as me holding one and she was a pro before she turned one.

We did BLS, but she also ate cereals (rice cereal and porridge) and some purees as well (she loved them lol)

But we did introduced eggs later, about 10 months I think (which is still earlier than the 'guidelines' I think) and honey, I either didn't give her or put it on her oats before cooking so that it was cooked (this unfortunately destroys a lot of the benefits of honey in the first place though).

Aside from that, she ate everything - we have no history of allergies to food in our families at all, ever, so she has been eating peanut butter for ever, although I was nervous the first few times giving it to her! lol

So we didn't delay anything for allergy reasons, but for health reasons - the honey, botchulism, the drippy eggs, salmonella, nuts, chocking hazard (and no teeth until 9 months)...

I used to take yoghurt and sandwiches when we were out and about.

HTH :) Sounds like she is going great guns! Oh, Charlotte wasn't in 3 full meals a day until she was well and truly 12 months old, so wouldn't stress on that ;)


PS: I actually think the purees helped her in developing the feeding skills - in that she fed herself with a spoon, and was feeding her self all meals all the time from 8 months, not sure this would have happened if she never used cutlery to eat with...