The basic gist is that you wait until baby is at least 6 months old AND can support himself in an upright position. This doesn't mean sitting up unsupported. For us, Locke can sit in a highchair in the most upright position it will go without falling forward. You offer baby large pieces (think chunky french-fry shape) of soft food and just let them go. Baby is always supervised, but you are not putting food in their mouth. This is what our feeding sessions look like: I nurse Locke and then 20-30 minutes later I put him in the highchair and put a large bib on him. Usually I cook something ahead of time and reheat it for him, but part of the beauty of BLW is that baby can eat essentially whatever the family is eating. Anyway, I give Locke a piece of food at a time. Too much food on the tray can overwhelm him. At first I thought this rule was dumb until I experienced first hand my son swiping all his food on the floor because there was too much on the tray. Go figure. Locke typically takes 30-40 minutes to eat. And it's messy. Very messy. That's just part of it. He definitely eats some of the food because the consistency of his poop has changed (hey it's the circle of life), but he doesn't eat very much. One of my favorite things about BLW is how laid back it is. I get Locke all set up and then I putter about the kitchen cleaning up, folding laundry, or cooking. I never worry about how much he eats or doesn't eat because he still gets 100% of his nutrition from breastmilk and everything else is just extra. Once he starts throwing everything on the floor I know he's done and then I get him cleaned up. The dogs take care of the food on the floor and I use a cheap Walmart washrag to clean Locke and the highchair. I wash off the tray and the bib. Seriously it takes like 5 minutes to clean up, not bad at all. The foods we've tried so far are sweet potatoes, acorn squash, carrots, broccoli, banana, toast, apples, pork roast, chicken, noodles, and mashed potatoes. Everyone is afraid of baby choking. As long as you follow the guidelines listed in the book it's really a non-issue. There is quite a bit of gagging involved. Note gagging, not choking. A baby's gag reflex is located in the middle of their mouth, not the back like adults, so it makes sense that they would gag some when they're learning how to move food from the front of their mouth to the back. On a similar note, every parent needs to know infant and child CPR and the Heimlich maneuver. You never know when your kid is going to put something small and dangerous in their mouth so learn how to do it. Ok, now on to the pictures!
Sweet potato
Broccoli (he didn't like it)
Avocado ( a little too slippery)
And a movie!
I've really enjoyed BLW so far even though I haven't given Locke much of the food we normally eat. It's just very easy for me to bake some sweet potatoes and apples along with our normal food. We eat a lot of soup and spicy Italian stuff and I can't see giving that to Locke. At some point he will develop his pincer grasp and be able to pick up small pieces. BLW will be really easy by then and I look forward to him sharing our meals and eating as a family.
