baby led weaning..

ive done some research on it... and i would like to try it.. shes starting to reject her bottles and baby food.. she wants to be a big girl ( shes 8 months old).. any ideas on how to start this? she has 2 teeth

I really have no idea what I am doing most of the time, but when Lyd started not wanting all the pureed stuff and was ready for "pieces" of things, I just let her at it ... she, of course, took some time to learn to grab things and get them in her mouth, but at around a year I started letting her use a fork and most of the time she does well with it. Now she has just two bottles a day, early morning and before bath & bed, and that's i****er in a sippy cup during the day because she refuses milk in a cup. Weirdo. And, Lyd has very select teeth, as well. So, I steamed the bejeezus out of carrots, broccoli, and other veggies and gave that to her with ground turkey or small pieces of other protiens.
But, as I type this, she's in the middle of a ghandi type hunger strike. Apparently dinner is totally out this week. Ugh.

We had to start our daughter on "real food" when she was about 6-7 months old. Her daddy had to give her Gyro when she was 5 months old and had no teeth! I had never seen a piece of gyro get dehydrated so fast! After that, she got the idea that our food was better and wanted real food. We tried seasoning the baby food but it was not good enough, once she got the first couple teeth, we really watched her and still fed her, but gave her soft stuff first, like mac and cheese and mashed potatoes.

Every doctor seems to have a different idea or opinion on when to start different things, and so do all the online articles. You gotta do what is best for your child and her situation. GL

I know they also have those little net like things that you put the food in and let them break it down by chewing and sucking on it. I never used one, but they may work.

The net things are great, but don't ever use it with a banana! They don't really come clean after that!!! :)

In the daycare (because I don't have any kids of my own yet) most of our kids are on mostly menu or all menu (real food) by 8 months. You can try her formula/breastmilk in a cup if you want, but as they eat more food, they drink less. If you are waiting for her to have more teeth, you'll be waiting for a LONG time! She isn't going to chew with the teeth she has anyway, they gum everything in the back of their mouth. Best ones to start with are soft/canned fruits, steamed veggies, pasta, bread and puffs/cheerios (of course). Gerber makes all kinds of finger foods if you want to spend then extra money on it or you can pretty much give her almost anything you're having and she'll probably love it! Good luck!

My daughter (who is a teen now) did the same thing at 8 months.  She got to where she was only drinking a total of 8-10 ounces a day out of the bottle.  I figured I could do at least that or better out of the cup!  So I got one of those cup with the straws and had her start using that.  It worked!  We never went back.....She was off of the bottle totally at 8 months. 

As far as baby food, we just started with the really soft regular foods, and she loved them!  I remember when we took a trip out of town at 10 months, the only baby food I took along was the 3rd food dinners and that was because I was worried that we would be somewhere they would be serving something she couldn't eat.  She hardly ate any of it! 

She was totally off of baby food by 10 1/2 months, and BTW she didn't have ANY teeth until she was 11 months old!!!!!  Teeth don't matter!!! 

Good luck!!! 

Debbie

Toast and crackers!! best way to start. =) then work up to the famous cheerios, breadsticks/pizza crust helps with teething too...OH gerber has those "first snacks" like puff rice etc, they "dissolve" just as soon as they hit their mouths but it gives them a chance to work with different textures.

Once my kids got a taste of the "real deal" there was no turning back. About that age they would see us eating our "adult food" and if we lifted the food up to our lips to take a bite, they would "yell" at us for a bite too...

someone was saying how their little one wouldnt drink milk from the cup, yep mine too. they were stinkers about it. at least they knew as soon as they did see the bottle it was "NAPPY TIME!!!"

Totally off topic, but when I was 6 months old, my parents gave me a chicken leg. I sucked the meat clean off that thing, and I never looked back! LOL!