[cruelladeville]

Hi

I have started to do rice cereal in the evenings once a day.  Do I do this for a few weeks and then start it at lunchtime as well?

How long do I continue with the cereal before starting pureed veg and then do I still do cereal twice a day and veg as well?  Also, do I introduce one new veg a week?  After how long on veg do I start fruit?

Also, baby hates formula and I would like her to have a bottle a day so that she can start having a bit less boob.  I have tried mixing it with the breastmilk but she is still not so keen.  She won't eat cereal unless it is mixed with breastmilk.  How am I ever going to get her off the boob

Thanks.

 

[aweeze]

Hi bubblegum

I noticed that you hadn't had any replies so thought I'd give it a go although I'm still fairly new to weaning myself!

I fed baby rice for about a week (also evenings) and then moved on to introducing veggies. I started with the root veggies - carrot, butternut squash, sweet potato, then added broccoli, cauli etc and then tried pear, apple, banana , dried apricot etc. To introduce them, I usually combined them with baby rice. Ellis was 23wks and my theory was that with the rice being easily digested, it might help make the veggies more digestible. Don't know if that's right but it made sense to me!

I was very careful to introduce veggies before fruit as I wanted to avoid having a baby that only liked fruits! Unfortunately that theory didn't work! As soon as E tasted Apple, he was sold on sweet stuff! Now I just throw caution to the wind and have become much more relaxed about what E eats. He very easily took to toast fingers for brekkie and he lurves fromage frais!

I think the recommendation is to introduce only 1 new food within a 24hr period so that if there is a reaction, you can easily try and pinpoint what it might be.

I actually introduced brekkie next although E doesn't really seem to want much other than his boob in the mornings! I've tried porridge, weetabix, rusk, packet baby cereals. Lunch has been the last one I introduced as I, like you wanted to get him off the boob and partly onto bottles. He has always taken a bottle of formula when needed but he went on strike! My HV said that at 6 months, they can get quite devious about getting their nice snuggly, warm, soft boob and will refuse other options especially if we give in all the time as we reward their refusal with exactly what they want! So we got around this by my Dad bottle feeding him instead of me. In addition, he fed him in the bouncy chair so that he wasn't in a nursing position. He protested and it was a case of toughing it out but once I'd done it a couple of times myself, I was able to cradle him for his bottle. He now has just morning and night breast feeds and 2 bottle feeds in the day. Not sure how you can get around the formula problem though. Have you tried different brands of formula? Perhaps get some individual cartons and try those?

My HV also advised additional vitamins (A,C & D) if E isn't taking much formula as breast milk doesn't deliver what they need whereas formula has them added.   

I hope some of that is useful. Good luck!

Lou
X

 

[cruelladeville]

Thanks Aweeze, that really helps to make it a bit clearer.  I have resumed the cereal now and yesterday she was going crazy for it so, hopefully, she is now on her way to starting solids. 

Thanks again for the excellent info.