Baby-Led Weaning

Whoops - I've just realised quite how long it's been since my last post, many apologies. I've been very busy, doing stuff to the garden which I've been saving up for a big blog post, but haven't managed to finish, so haven't posted. And now the weather is awful, and we've all come down with a nasty sinusy bug so nothing more is getting done, so I thought I'd better write about something else.

Despite being ill, J-cub seems to have got over his aversion to food which has marred the first 4 months of this year. I've mentioned before that we are doing baby-led weaning (BLW), which essentially involves giving J-cub the food we eat (albeit in a low-salt, sugar-free way which means we have to eat cookies after he goes to bed), the way we eat it (so no purees, no mashed food, no aeroplaning spoons into his mouth). He's been refusing to eat on and off for months, and as this method is baby-led, and as he's still getting enough nutrition from milk, we don't force him to eat. He's been happy to eat some cereal, some toast, all the fruit he can get his hands on, and bucketfuls of yoghurt. But anything else we've really struggled with. He's had the odd day here and there, where he's shovelled down a stir-fry or some lasagne, but on the whole he's been too poorly and too busy to take time out for eating.

Since our 2-week break from nursery over Easter, where he got healthier and happier day by day, he's started eating again. And eating. And EATING. He seems to be making up for all those days when he didn't want to eat, by cramming as much into his mouth at once as he can, and frequently eating adult-sized portions of food, followed by several pieces of fruit and a large bowl of yoghurt.

I think I've done quite well not getting stressed out by his diet, and not having reduced his milk-intake has really helped this. Nursery have been happy to follow my lead here, and have often given him extra bottles of milk at lunchtime when he's refused to eat a single mouthful. We've now cracked that problem, by getting them to agree to feed him at 1pm (when he eats at home) instead of 11.30am (when they serve lunch at nursery). They tried it for the first time on Tuesday, and when he came home his diary read "Beef chilli and rice - ate all" - yay!

I'm sure there'll be plenty of times in the future when he'll live on air, and other times when he'll eat like a horse, but I'm just pleased that now I can start thinking about proper meals again, rather than buying nothing but fruit and large pots of plain yoghurt.

Now, as always, some photos to document his eating over the last few weeks:

Perching on the edge of a collapsible box, munching a ricecake and proudly showing off the size of his stomach

Wolfing down spaghetti bolognaise and yoghurt. Why is there a duck-shaped watering can on his tray, you ask? Because he grabbed it from his vantage point in the trolley in B&Q, and has refused to be parted from it since

Loving his Daddy's knee in the hope that he might get to share some Weetabix. He'd already had his breakfast at this point, but over the last week or so he has had no less than 3 breakfasts - 1) his own, sitting with me at the table, 2) his Daddy's, when Daddy is trying to eat quickly before work and 3) at nursery, when he bats his eyelids and tells them we don't feed him at home

This stance is accompanied by much angst-filled knee-bouncing and wailing, until the spoon goes in his direction

He's also perfected the 'twist', for those times when the spout is at the wrong side of the cup

Pure joy while eating a pear - he also fed me and Jemaine (his giraffe) choice morsels, and chased Tilly around with it for a bit until she escaped onto the chair

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

And nothing to do with food - but I love this photo. I was cuddling him before I left for work and my kisses caused him to go into raptures of giggles. Bless.