The Food (for babies) Thread

Emmagk

@babybarlow2014 I just used the hummus we already had in the fridge. We only gave a little spread on a mum mum. If I was going to give any more than that I'd try making it as the store brand has salt in it

Emmagk

Is anyone doing 3 meals a day yet? At the moment we are doing breakfast and dinner but not sure when to start lunch

sparklingdiamond

What counts as a meal per day?  Is it just the number of times they are eating or the amount they are eating?  Sorry if that's a dumb question!

bridetobe9132013

We are doing cereal with fruit when she wakes up in the morning and cereal with veggie in the evening.

deanna1313

I know the dr says he is just eating to learn right now and that he shouldn't be replacing any bottles with baby food yet. I'm not sure when that happens so I will go up to 3 meals when the dr gives me the go ahead.

Also, my LO gets intense with those mum mum rice rusks. He loves them, but pieces break off so easily and it makes me nervous. He seems to do well with it though. He only gagged once. Those gerber wagon wheels dissolve less quickly.

gutsysneakers

Emmagk said:

Is anyone doing 3 meals a day yet? At the moment we are doing breakfast and dinner but not sure when to start lunch

@Emmagk - DD gets oatmeal mixed with some kind of fruit (pumpkin, banana, apples, mango, pears, etc.) in the morning. I always send lunch with to DC - its usually leftovers so for instance today it was pork roast (cut into a strip) and a few steamed baby carrots. She always gets those two meals - dinner is hit or miss. It really depends on her mood and what we are having for dinner. I get home at 6pm with her and we start bedtime at 7pm. If our meal is too salty or she is too grumpy, we skip it. During the weekends, I make sure she is "eating" with us at the table when we eat. Since we are doing BLW, this sometimes means playing with food or trying new textures, flavors, etc. 

ETA: DD still gets the same amount of breast milk at DC and I still nurse her every 2-3 hours on the weekends. 

Emmagk

We had a public health nurse come to a mom's group I go to and she went through the new health Canada guidelines for starting solids. The one point I found really interesting was she said only give smooth purees for the first couple weeks then move on to textures as soon as possible. Also nothing is off limits except honey until 1 year.

BeesKnees181

I scored two bushels of apples for free - they are all processed and in the freezer.  Girls love the applesauce mixed in with their rice cereal.  Today marks 2 weeks of rice cereal.  So, we will start to add in squash at a second meal now.  I also have a bushel of pears waiting to be processed - any tips on peeling pears?  Has anyone had much luck making their own rice cereal?  I tried grinding rice in our Ninja blender and couldn't get the right  "flake" size.  We have 2 boxes of oat cereal on their way; looking forward to trying another grain soon.

bridetobe9132013

How much fruit/veggie do your LO's get at a meal? Right now I am doing 2oz formula with cereal mixed in and 1oz fruit in the morning and the same amount of cereal with 1oz veggie in the evening. I would like to start doing some combos soon but i feel like it would be too much food because I would be mixing 1oz of each food to make 2oz. I hope this makes sense! Should I do 1oz cereal and 2oz food?

deanna1313

@bridetobe9132013‌ I do less cereal and more veggie/fruit. I'm planning on not even adding the cereal to the veggies anymore, but some of the fruit is still so watery.
I guess it depends on how hungry your LO is after eating what you give and if the cereal is needed in it at all.
I don't know how many ounces I give of each since it's homemade.

gutsysneakers

I mostly do BLW, but some food has to be pureed like acorn squash - I don't know oz since I make it at home, but she gets a fair amount.

momthatlifts

Emmagk said:

Is anyone doing 3 meals a day yet? At the moment we are doing breakfast and dinner but not sure when to start lunch

I give her 4 oz. a day. And also oatmeal in the morning. About 3 tsp. Her pedi said she could eat twice a day but didn't give us a specific amount. I just give her whatever amount whenever but no more than 4 ounces

bridetobe9132013

@deanna1313 if you freeze it in ice cube trays, 1 cube is 1oz. Thats how I know

hbird0723

Chevygrrl91 said:

I think DD got a rash from sweet potatoes. She has had them the last two days and I noticed a rash under her chin (not where the sp would have touched). It got worse the second day, and she also has a rash on the back of her neck/head too. I thought sweet potatoes were unlikely to cause allergies?? Dah well, on to apples. We have her 6 mo check up on Monday so we'll see. Also going to talk about BLW because purees are a PITA.

Same here! Only she's had sweet potatoes a lot and all the sudden when she eats them now she gets a rash around her mouth and her left cheek gets all red. I kept thinking it was something else since she's had them before and was fine then she started getting spots on her back and her tummy was upset. It finally clicked that it must be those. I didn't think they'd all the sudden have a reaction after eating them many times before.

deanna1313

@bridetobe9132013‌ yeah. You mentioned that before, but each cube is a lot bigger than a normal ice cube. I even checked the package at bed, bath and beyond and it doesn't say. I think it's not quite a full gerber plastic container. Maybe 2/3 of one. I've been just basing it off of if my LO seems satisfied.

deanna1313

Here are the trays I use. Love them! Wish I knew the ounces, though.

bridetobe9132013

Fill one up with water and then pour it in a bottle to see how many oz it is.

bridetobe9132013

I talked to my pediatrician at DD's 6 month appt today and he said to give her 3 meals a day. Im going to do fruit & cereal in the morning, fruit & veggie without cereal in the afternoon, and veggie & cereal in the evening.

hbird0723

After seeing the hummus posts I let H try some today. She LOVES it. It might of been the fact that she got to feed herself too but she seemed to enjoy the flavor

I accidentally attached her eating a banana as well and I keep hitting delete but it isn't going any where. Sorry! The second one is the hummus

MerryLove

Started solids today...I was looking forward to it all week and it was pretty anticlimactic. Ha. LO didn't want to open his mouth at all and I didn't want to force it, so I just put a pile of puree on his tray and let him play with his baby spoons...avocado EVERYWHERE. He did get some in his mouth and didn't seem too terribly disgusted, so that's a plus.

ns1

DS finally seems to enjoy food. He ate for the first time today without pushing the food out of his mouth or squirming away from the spoon. Yay!

deanna1313

I have no idea why I didn't think of that! I had done a rough estimate in another container and hadn't really thought about it until these posts came up. Might be a good idea to know before his appointment. So funny that I never thought to do that. Haha!

ns1

@BeesKnees181 - we use the milling blade with our baby bullet to grind rice / oatmeal.  I leave it in there for quite a while.  I'm not sure how well a regular blade would work.  If you don't have anything with a milling blade, I've heard a coffee grinder will work well to do the same.  

gutsysneakers

We went out today for lunch. We brought the Phil & Ted's lobster seat with us. We sat her down and I ordered a side of grilled veggies for her. I love that she can eat with us! This may be my favorite phase so far. I also saw and felt two bottom teeth coming in

Deems83

Question, my pediatrician is really adamant about cutting out bottles. DD has 5 a day. 7am 6oz and then cereal and prunes, 10:30 am 6oz snack bottle, 1:30 6oz and baby food either veggie purée or fruit, 5:00 6oz and dinner usually sweet potato and pear or another veggie and fruit then at 6:30 she had a bottle before bed sometimes she drinks all 6 oz sometimes she takes 2oz. He said to be at 4 bottles by 7 months and then cut out a bottle every month so by 1 year no more bottle? Does that sound a little extreme to anyone? Also would love some sample feeding schedules any of you ladies are using. Thanks in advance!

gutsysneakers

I am pretty certain that the majority of their nutrition still comes from bottles at this point. My pedi has said nothing about scaling it back. DD gets about 30 oz of BM a day.

deanna1313

@Deems83‌ seems a little early to start cutting them out from what I've seen. Normally once they are eating food more regularly and not just for fun they start to consume less bottles.maybe one less bottle.
No more bottles at 1 seems to be the normal thing, though.

bridetobe9132013

My pediatrician basically said the same thing. He said to add another meal in the day to cut out a bottle. Here is our schedule:

Cereal with fruit and 4oz bottle
6oz bottle
Fruit and veggie with 4oz bottle
6oz bottle
Cereal with veggie (starting meat soon with this feeding) and 4oz bottle
4-6oz bottle to tide her over until morning

bridetobe9132013

DD eats a ton of food though!

Emmagk

I was under the impression that BM/ formula should be baby's main source of nutrition until around 9ish months. Until that point bottle or boob feedings should not be reduced

lrmrtn

DS tried mashed potatoes yesterday. He didn't love them but found them less offensive than the rice cereal or applesauce.

momthatlifts

Ok I'm sure this as been asked and answered but I'm going for it.. Reflux mamas, how have you little ones been responding to the solids? He reflux has come back but like like before. Usually right after she eats and it doesn't last all day. It's usually after she eats a solid and then has a bottle later. Do you think the acid in the fruit? Also, what could be causing the constipation? She has been on solids for about 3 weeks and she's just now getting very constipated.

gutsysneakers

@Chevygrrl91‌ - I saw that! Soooo cute!

deanna1313

@JKBMA2014‌ he's fine. I don't think the purées have bothered his reflux at all. I think his reflux has slowed down a lot anyway because he only throws up once a day I guess. It is a very little bit, too.
Wish I had advice on the constipation, but his is looser now.

deanna1313

@JKBMA2014‌ what is he eating anything that causes constipation?

momthatlifts

@deanna1313‌ hers was completely gone up until a few days ago. It's not an all day thing like before and she doesn't spit up but she is choking a little after she eats and I can tell she is trying to swallow it back down. I guess the thickness of it keeps it from coming back up. And I honestly couldn't tell you what is causing the constipation. She gets the same food for about two days before I switch but so far she has had everything at least 4 times since starting her on solids. It has also just started up recently

Deems83

Thank you ladies. I think I will continue as we have been doing and let dd decide when food fills her enough to cut out a bottle... Seems like we are pretty similar routine wise to what I have read on here. Thanks ladies!

flockofmoosen3

Tuna cake sounds good. We don't have fish often because my husband hates it but I would definitely feed it to her if we had it.

I shared most table foods from thanksgiving with baby girl and she loved it. She already had some practice eating chicken so turkey was nbd. She did not like the mashed potatoes though. Funny girl.

gutsysneakers

@babybarlow2014 - I've given DD pieces of baked salmon. I haven't made any type of a "cake" yet, but my BLW book has a recipe for it. I'll take a pic and send later tonight. 

deanna1313

Had our 6 month check up today. My dr said 3 meals a day. He should sit and eat when we are eating. He should be getting 16 oz of jar food/homemade per day and now bottles can be reduced and he should be getting 36oz. I'm sure that varies by the child. Now I can't remember if it was 32 or 36.
He also said I can give bananas again at a year old and he probably won't have a reaction again. Yay!