Tag Archives: BLW

How Not to Start Baby-Led Weaning with your Baby

05/19/2016 R.C. Liley 16 Comments

This was originally posted on May 18, 2014. Thankfully, we are long past the baby-led weaning days!

I’m writing this from the comfort of our couch on Saturday night after a long and busy, but mostly good day. Avery is as mobile as she can be without being able to crawl, and she surprises us by sitting right up immediately after we set her down.

Crazy kid, we love her so much, but she can really wear us out! It helps that I’m celebrating World Whiskey Day with my Breckenridge Distillery Bourbon to wind things down though.

So, um, yeah, baby-led weaning (BLW), is not off to a great start for us. I get that this was our first day and first try and blah, blah, but I still got my hopes up ready to watch Avery grasp a green bean and eat it like she does her red plastic bird.

But the exact opposite happened; she refused to even touch the food I set in front of her! Mommy’s water cup? Sure, she’ll grab at and try to put it in her mouth all day! Food you are actually supposed to put in your mouth? Nope, not having it.

What did we do wrong that made her so repulsed by our food offering? I’m not certain, but maybe trying right at her bedtime had something to do with it. What do you think?

Not to mention her usual 2 – 3 hour morning nap only lasted 1 hour; in which she cried some during that hour. A tired baby is a cranky baby as all parents know, and that’s what we had for parts of the day.

I want to sleep, but I also don't!!! — I want to sleep, but I also don’t!!!

Okay, she wasn’t fussy all day, but she had several of her “moments” just to let us know she was tired and not happy. Since she obviously didn’t want to be in her jumper (see picture above), we moved her to her play yard to give her freedom to move around and practice her sitting up skills.

She got right to sitting up, but still cried while doing so. I had several things cooking in the kitchen and Going Mom was hard at work cleaning the living room, so we had to let her cry for a few minutes. Then Kelley turned on the vacuum which always gets Avery to quiet down and look around.

Ahhh, the loud whir of a vacuum never sounded so good. Apparently Avery thought so too; we looked over and she was sound asleep!

We haven’t had to use the consoling power of the vacuum for a while now, and it surprised us to see how passed out she was! Obviously, I had to give it my thumbs up of approval.

Kelley didn’t want to turn off the vacuum while she slept, so now we have a really clean living room! The nap helped, but it wasn’t even 30 minutes, so we weren’t too hopeful for a happy Avery.

We finished our to-do’s and went for a walk with Avery in the Onya Outback where she had a 15 minute power nap. Upon our return, it was just past 7pm and Kelley went to clean up as I put the highchair together. Avery commenced with crying…

30 minutes later (about the time we usually get her to bed), we strapped her in the highchair for the first time and excitedly prepared for our first BLW experience! I don’t think she was too excited though….

I had steamed a bunch of organic baby carrots, green beans, and broccoli earlier, so I pulled a few pieces of each to serve her.

Avery was already in fuss-mode as I brought the veggies to her, and it only increased with each passing second. I at least expected to see her grab at one of the specimen in front of her, but to no avail. She wouldn’t even look at them!

Pretty sure I knew the reason, I told Going Mom it was just her bib making her upset. Simple solution, just remove the bib, right?

Wrong. I gave this the thumbs down of disapproval. Not being one to accept no for an answer, or “no” as expressed by a baby, I tried dangling a green bean in front of her to get her attention.

If a baby can look repulsed, this is the look. Her hands remained idle making sure she didn’t give even the slightest reach to raise our hopes. On the last straw, I attempted to show her how the food is meant for her mouth, but she wasn’t too receptive.

Might as well of been a cigar because she wasn’t having it. At this point, we called our first attempt a failure and gave up. Luckily, our pet box turtle, Tash, was looking for some good food and she happily accepted Avery’s outcast veggies.

I spent a little time playing with Avery before her bath, and then she seemed to cheer up for a while! And she made sure to put everything around her in her mouth; figures. But our time was limited and only our dog, Abby, could keep Avery from letting out another whine.

Dog kisses just make everything better, huh? Unless you’re me, I don’t care for the kisses too much.

So if you’re about to introduce your baby to solids for the first time, don’t do like us and try when it’s their bedtime. Even more so if their naps have been short or even non-existent! At that point, it’s just smart to put it off for one more day and save everyone the stress.

And that’s what we’re doing. As you read this, we will be making our second, and hopefully successful, attempt at introducing Avery to solids. Avery is usually the happiest in the morning, so at least we should see some smiles! As always, I’ll let you know how it goes.

Any tips on how to get your baby interested in grabbing food?

Do you have any first time baby successes or failures to share?

Life, Parenting, Throwback Thursday

One Year Since We Began Baby-Led Weaning #TBT

05/21/2015 R.C. Liley 2 Comments

Can you believe it’s been a year since we first started baby-led weaning with Avery?!

Oh boy was that stressful! Wait a sec, it’s still stressful, if not worse. She hardly touched the stuff at first, so it was only us doing the picking up part. I know, that’s NOT BLW then!

Instead of not knowing what to do with it, she now picks up food, fully aware that it’s meant to be eaten, and throws it instead. In retrospect, I kinda miss the BLW days.

In true Throwback Thursday fashion, I am going back in time to when we first started down this road of having more than just breast milk for Avery’s food. We still have a long way to go, but she’s actually a really good eater compared to some of her peers.

Giving her an assortment of veggies from the get-go has paid off as she happily (usually) eats them all and never cries for some sugary packaged snacks. Because we don’t have those in the house and never will!

Avery still eats plenty of steamed veggies, mostly broccoli, carrots (her current favorite), and cauliflower. For a real treat, it’s banana with NuttZo and she can really put it away! But we’re not talking about now, this is all about then….a year ago.

Maybe I’ll have a post a year from now and we’ll go over Avery’s ability to make a whole banana with lots of NuttZo disappear fast! For now, have a look back to May of 2014 with me and enjoy the posts detailing the start of our baby-led weaning journey.

To kick things off, I started looking into our options and shared my top ten Pinterest picks on Baby-Led Weaning. Avery then had to give her input about Beyond Breast Milk where she tries non-food items…..like my finger.

Things were a bit rough for a while and I cursed how easy things seemed when looking all over Pinterest. Instead of happily picking up the food we put in front of her, Avery just sat there and looked at us. This led me to try putting a piece of food in her mouth to help show her what it’s for. Of course this is not BLW as I already mentioned, which is why I created How Not to Start Baby-Led Weaning With Your Baby.

Time passed and we were seeing little progress. Naturally, I blogged about our BLW Fail but also shared Avery’s first experience with our then pet turtle.

We were beginning to think Avery would never eat solids on her own, and I was convinced that babies are fully aware of yo-yo dieting. But then, it happened, someone made positive progress in the BLW department. Do you know who?

Good job, Avery, it was you!

From there, we’ve been on a crazy roller-coaster ride (such is parenting, huh?) with her eating good some days and throwing it in our faces on other days. But after a 10k race I did on Memorial Day last year, Avery made great progress and even stuffed her face!

She’s come a long way from a year ago, and now she’ll eat the same thing I make for my wife most of the time. Some days she’s picky and others she’ll gobble everything in sight. From the experienced parents, I hear it’s normal and accept it as such…….kinda.

It’s still nerve-racking to have things you spend time cooking just thrown on the floor or given to the dog. Hopefully I’m not alone here. I’m sure it’s easier if you just pick something up at a fast food chain, but that’s something she’ll never be given by us, so I’ll continue to put my care into the meals I make my family and know it’s world’s better than what you’d get at some restaurant.

How did you start your kids off eating solids?

Do you find it hard to watch food you make go by the wayside?

Food, Parenting

“How Canned Baby Food Became King” How do you Feed your Baby?

Link 11/28/2014 R.C. Liley Leave a comment

A neighbor friend of ours shared an online article looking into how the baby food industry came to be. Here’s the link – How Canned Baby Food Became King.

It touches on the fact that there used to not be a Baby Food category, just soft foods that were deemed “okay” for babies as well as the sick and elderly. And introducing solids didn’t occur until 9-12 months of age at which they would be given mainly beef and wheat which were seen as strength-producing foods.

The article goes into detail with an industry expert explaining the origins of the baby food business and how it will remain a strong market as so many parents are willing to sacrifice control over what our kids are fed for extra time/convenience.

As the article states, and I agree, there are many healthy baby food options for parents to feed their babies, but some parents take pride in making their kids’ own food. Going Mom and I are perfectly happy and prideful for making Avery’s food. My awesome wife literally makes the main source of food by breastfeeding, and as the time rolls on, I’ve been able to get more creative in the kitchen.