So now you've decided to introduce food. Are you doing it correctly? Probably not. I was really interested in Baby Led Weaning when I first started thinking about solids. A lot of the moms in my circle are of the "hippy" variety you might say. So all the chatter around BLW sounded really promising. I like the idea of letting the baby choose their food and eat at their own pace. For us though, it didn't really seem to work. He liked mushing food but not eating food. So I started making some purees. Homemade purees (because clearly I love my child more than someone who buys baby food from the store). For the most part, I like making the purees. It makes me think of food combinations that might be interesting for him and makes me buy a variety of foods. As you can see from the pictures above, I also bought some food packs because they're way easier when on the go. So now at 7 months, Declan eats a variety of foods. Purees, melting biscuits and snacks, and bites of random foods like tater tots (the best moms feed babies tater tots...haha).
On to the food wars. I've gotten comments about everything from using a spoon is force feeding him, and he'll never learn to eat on his own (for purees), to horror stories about choking and not giving the baby enough food (for BLW). It's not that these comments are particularly horrible or nearly as divisive as breastfeeding comments but it's the frequency that's interesting. Unlike breastfeeding, where only a handful of people know I breastfeed (or know my secret hidden desire to supplement with some formula), a wide audience sees me give him bites off my plate or a puree off a spoon. I've never had anyone be rude to me in public while I breastfeed. That is not the case for feeding him solids. Once when he was noshing on a piece of mango I even felt the eyes of judgement upon me even though no one said a word.
