August 2017 Moms
jaclynnn89
member
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STM+ question from a STM
jaclynnn89
member
DD is just about a year old and at the awkward stage where it's time to transition her off of formula. Being pregnant this time around has felt less overwhelming in the sense of symptoms, what to expect with birth and a newborn, but I'm still finding having a soon-to-be toddler challenging. I sometimes feel like I'm not doing enough or making mistakes and should be more prepared or knowledgeable on certain topics. My question is, how did you transition off of formula and make solids a bigger part of your children's diet? She's been on solids since 6 months and I try to give her finger foods in addition to her meals, but DD only has 2 bottom teeth so she still struggles sometimes with chewing certain things. Right now she has 3 bottles, 2 solids meals, and a snack through the day. I feel like I should have a meal plan/menu/better feeding schedule but I'm finding it so daunting and overwhelming, especially because I've been so tired and have major pregnancy brain. I know this is obviously a later stage but when I searched, I found the info to be all over the place and from like 2009. Any help and advice is greatly appreciated!! 
Re: STM+ question from a STM
7:00am: Wake, breakfast, milk
9:30am: Small snacks (puffs, cheerios, etc)
10am: Nap
12pm: Lunch, milk
2:30pm: Small snack
3pm: Nap
6pm: Dinner, milk
7:45pm: Bed
He dropped to one nap a day at around 14/15 months. He also has a sippy cup of water throughout the day that he can drink at his leisure.
The most important thing is to remember that all kids are different, and do what works best for you and your LO. Mine thrives with schedule and routine, but others don't....Follow his lead and see what happens.
Are you a SAHM, or is DD in daycare? My in-laws watch DS during the day, so I can give you what his general day looks like, but it may be different if your LO is in daycare, as they usually have set schedules. DS just turned 16m, but this is the schedule he's had food-wise since we stopped with bottles around 12-13m.
5:30-6am: Wake up time, and milk sippy cup.
6:30-7:30ish- Breakfast. The time is a little up in the air, bc he tends to eat some of whatever we're having in the morning for breakfast, but usually eats the bulk of it once with the in-laws after 7am.
9am- cheerios/ gold fish/ pretzels/ whatever snack
9:30- Nap time!
12pm- Lunch
3pm- Snack
6pm- Dinner
7:30pm- Bed
@jaclyngoldman Having a toddler is challenging, pregnant or not! DS had a lot of problems with food texture and gagging up until 12m, so his food selection was pretty limited for a long time. We tend to stick with some core staples that we know DS will eat no matter what- cheese, cut up grapes, meatballs, mashed potatoes, chicken nuggets, tater tots, etc. I will try new foods, or just give him what we're eating as well, but we'll always have the others on hand if he doesn't eat the new stuff. I read somewhere recently that baby gums are just as hard as teeth, and Rhys has been very sucessfully chewing a lot of these foods without molars (although they did just all come in, allllll at once. That was fun). Even with only two lower teeth, I think your DD should be able to eat most of the softer foods pretty easily, as front teeth are generally for tearing food off, like biting into a piece of bread.
I hope that helps, feel free to PM or tag me here if you have more questions!
DS2: EDD- 09.08.17
I'm lucky enough to be a SAHM right now so I can be pretty flexible with her schedule. We've tried a few times to phase out her late bottle but she is a creature of habit and would still wake up when we didn't, even if she wasnt hungry, or the very few times she did sleep through she woke up at 4/4:30am. She thrives so much on routine so we generally don't veer off of it by much unless it's unavoidable so I'm slowly trying to change to a new one that will work better for solids.
Shes luckily not a picky eater at all, she wants to try everything we have and has never even spit anything out (other than when she was 6 months and learning). She also has embraced her sippy cups which is good. I think it's more me feeling overwhelmed by the transition than her honestly! We currently use an organic formula and here in Australia at 12 months they have you switch to a toddler milk drink so I'm tossing up between that and whole milk. I also have been heavily relying on store bought organic purée/baby food options as we didn't have a food processor or blender that worked with the voltage here for ages so I think that transitioning to making her food is just daunting. I just want to make she has a healthy balanced diet because I'd say we've been relying on the formula for a lot of her nutrients until now.
@pbandjyummies good luck!! It's so exciting to see them grow but I also don't want my baby growing up! Haha
question for you, I've seen online articles that when giving cow's milk it should be in a sippy cup, do you do that? or do you give it to her in a bottle? also, how many many oz of cow's milk do you give her a day?
Edited because it cut me off