How much and how often your 6 months old babies eat?

My twins have been on 3 hours schedules since day 1 (4oz/feeding, 7 feeding/day every 3 hours from 6Am to 12AM). We had Doctor's approval for solid. I have been giving my boy 1 table spoon of rice cereal mixed with breast milk/day. I gave him some carrot last week. but then we pooped out carrot next day. I not sure if his system is ready for other food beside cereal. I havent started my girl on solid yet. They havent been eating well lately due to teething. I am thinking to change their schedules from 3 hours to 4 hours, (5 oz/feeding and 6 times/day). I dont know if it will make them eat better or not. What should I do? Should I add more solid. My friend told me cook bunch of veggies with meat then get the soup mix with cereal for them. So they can get more calories that way. What do you think?

 

I would definitely do a four hour feeding schedule - unless they are really small, they don't need to be eating every 3 hours anymore.

When you say you gave him carrots - how much did you give him?

When you say he pooped out carrots, I assume you just mean his poop was more orange, which is normal and doesn't necessarily mean he's not ready - if it causes him stomach pain or extra gas, that might mean he's not ready. We have to be very careful with our LO's. Every time we give them something new, even a tablespoon or less, they have extra gas for about two days and then they adjust. He may just need a few days to get used to something new.

We started rice cereal several days before our boys were 6 months and started carrots a week later. You could wait a few more weeks - we tried rice cereal at 4 months and at 5 months and it led to extra stomach pain, so we waited until 6 months to really start.

 

Do you want them to get more calories because they aren't gaining weight? Or because they aren't sttn? ??? Is your pedi concerned about the number of calories they are consuming?

Trust your instincts and your babies cues. I would feed them as much solids as they will eat. They'll definitely let you know when they don't want more or don't like something (my pedi's advice). Pooping orange after carrots is no big deal. They will poop green after peas! I'm not familiar with the soup mix in the cereal idea. Up to a year, babies get the majority of their calories/nutrition through breastmilk/formula. Solids at 5 or 6 months is really just practice.

There is no harm in trying to get them to stretch out feedings to 4 hours. My guys stage a coordinated revolt if they don't get a bottle every 3 hours during the day, and they are 7.5 months (despite how long they are "supposed" to go at that age.) Every baby is different. If they are developmentally on track, I wouldn't worry too much about a slow down in feeding with teething. My guys seem to go through cycles. Sometimes they eat 6oz in a feeding and sometimes only 3oz no matter how much cajoling I do.

 

At 6 months my girls were taking 5-6 oz bottles every 4 hrs and sleeping through the night. They have always been a bit on the smaller side because they were 7 weeks early. They were eating a couple ounces of puree/cereal 2x day. We started with all the different grains before moving onto things like sweet potato and squash. I often find their poop reflects what they have been eating. I think this is pretty normal. I wouldn't be too worried about how much solids they are eating at this point, it is initially just for practice. Don't worry about increasing the amount, I would just play around with feeding them the different foods and see how it goes. Probably a few tbsp is suffient at first. After a couple months I think we were up to maybe 1/4 c of cereal at a sitting, it seemed to take a long time before they were eating much. Even now at 11 months my girls eat about 4-6 oz at a meal.

 

I transitionned my kids to 4 hours feedings around the same time. First we made it 15-20 min longer and then gradually to 30 min and finally to 4 hour intervals. Don't try and go cold turkey b/c they will have a hard time with that. Imagine, they are used to eating every 3 hours and suddenly no food. IN terms of the progression. We did the cereals first- so rice cereal, not in their milk but from a spoon for 5 days (as much as they would take 1-2 oz). Then barley cereal, oatmeal and then we started with sweet potato and squash. For some reason our kids didn't like carrots the first time they tried it, go figure. Then we went to peas and such. The fruits (apples, pears, prunes, avocados, bananas, mangos etc). came after that b/c we wanted them to taste the veggies first. Listen to your babies cues. My daughter HATES all solids except fruit and oatmeal with cinnamon. That's all she eats. The rest she vomits. I stressed about it but now I just give up, she'll eat when she does. Enjoy the process b/c it's great fun but don't stress and read your babes cues.

 

My girls are right about the same age. We just currently went from 3 hours to 3.5 hours about 3 weeks ago. Took a week of adjusting and in those first couple days somtimes i had to do 3 hours but after bout a week they were good to go. They get 5 bottles a day that are 6 or 6.5 oz of EBM. when they were on 3 hour schedule they got 6 bottles a day of 6oz.
we are doing solids at dinner they get 2 tablespoons of rice mixed with one ounce breast milk and half a jar of a veggie or fruit.
they sleep from last bottle at 830 then bed and they wake up btwn 630 adn 7!

i think you should go from 3 to 3.5 AND then 4 dont jjust add an hour right away. also i think 12 am, needs to be earlier for their last bottle!
try giving them more at each feed and less bottles so they go to bed earlier!

goooooooood luck!

 

I think we transitioned to a 4 hour feeding schedule around that age. We also tried some solids but didn't get into those consistently until they were closer to 9 months old. They weren't really that interested in solids so they'd only get a small amount of cereal mixed with fruit once a day (or not at all). I don't think there's any need to rush solids. Certainly if they are displaying cues that they want solids and eagerly gobble them up when you give them to them, go ahead and start incorporating them into their diet. I would say there's no need to give them more than one-two solid meals a day at that age (and they don't need that much). Plus, introduce foods slowly to make sure there are no allergic reactions. Start simple - you don't need to start with cereal but many do. You can start with avocado or other fruits and then wait a few days after the introduction of each new food before offering another. After they've sampled a variety of fruits/veggies alone then you can start mixing them. I don't recommend going straight to veggies/meat but it's up to you!

 

We had premission for rice cereal like 2 months ago but I stopped doing that due to constipation. Lately because of teething, they are having hard time at feeding and gaining weight. So I started giving solid (doc approved) I wasn't serious about solid until last week.I also just started solid only with my boy first. My girl doesn't have any problem taking her bottles.he has been having rice cereal/octmeal for about a month (on and off) but he cried after solid sometimes like his stomach upsets.I give him some gripe water. Sometimes it doesn't work.do you ladies have any suggestion? Last night I gave him avocado mixed with breast milk, he absolutely loved it and ate a lot. And was happy after that.well see how it goes.thanks ladies!

 

Mine are around 5.5 months and wasn't going to start solids yet, but am thinking maybe I should.
T2 is a bit of a whinger and am thinking that maybe she might be happier with something more to eat than boobie. T1 has been wakinga up at night ALOT and I'm over that!

What's the best time od day to start? I forget - it's been a few years since I've had to do this and not with 2 !

 

A bit of solids might help them be more satisfied. Our doctor said to give them something new no later than 2pm - that way if they have a reaction, it is not at night. I always try to give them whatever is new with their breakfast around 8am - our LO's seem to have a delayed reaction and if I do it at lunch, they tend to have a bit of tummy pain around 10pm (that happens the first day they get anything new....)

 

My kis aren't morning eaters.they take bottles in the morning.so we give them cereal mixed with ebm for lunch. Then cereal and avacado for dinner around 730 then 2 more bottles.

I also give them gripe water after solid so their stomachs don't upset