Solids Help--Need some guidance with introducing solids to babies

In my twin mommy & me class today our teacher talked about starting solids and explained that we should mix one tablespoon of rice cereal with formula (how much?) on the first morning, increase to two tbsp the second day...needless to say I'm completely lost! Are there some sort of guidelines to follow?

 

New guidelines seem to focus more on waiting until 6months to introduce solids, but I know many people here started at 4months and it worked out for them. We decided to wait until 6months, and it was a good experience when we did, as the babies were ready and liked the food. And I just tried to follow the box for what it said to mix cereal with water. At first I just made sure it was really runny, then as they got more use to it I made it more firm.

Good Luck!

 

I don't go by the box i just put water/formula in until the texture looks right to me

 

QUOTE(blended6 @ Oct 24 2008, 01:32 AM) [snapback]1039813[/snapback]
I don't go by the box i just put water/formula in until the texture looks right to me

Me too!

 

A great site is wholesomebabyfood.com. It talks about making your own food but the guidelines work for store-bought jars too.

 

With my older two I followed my mil's advice and avoided the cereal altogether. (She said it always constipated her babies.) Instead I started them (at six months, minimum) on vegetables like sweet potatoes or squash. Then once they were used to those I started fruits, meats, and then cereal a little further along, serving everything mixed together so they never found out what they didn't like.

Whatever you start with, there's no need to follow a precise schedule/amounts. Just make it good and runny for starters, and give the babies as much as they are interested in. The main thing is to give solids immediately after a bottle/breast feeding so that they don't learn to fill up on solids at an age when they still need the milk.

 

Here is a great resource about how to start solids (including many reasons why it's good to wait until 6 mo) - lots of links about what to try when. HTH!

 

Just curious why a "teacher" would be talking about starting solids and not your Ped? That is something that I really talked to my Ped about when to start and why since she knows my kids. But once I started, I did not measure anything. I just went based on consistency-starting very soupy and gradually got thicker. GL!

 

My pediatrician told me at 4 months that we could go ahead and start cereal. Wait a couple weeks and then start Stage 1 foods. By 5 months, they should be eating one meal a day and by 6 months 2 meals a day. I made the cereal really runny at first. One of the girls loves it and the other isn't so interested. She told me to wait a week between starting new foods. I know most people say 4 days. I started putting applesauce in the cereal and they like that. Then, I tried bananas. It gave one of the girls really bad stomach pains all night long. It's sad, because she loved eating it. I think we'll try sweet potatoes next.

 

QUOTE(christie76 @ Oct 24 2008, 09:11 AM) [snapback]1040116[/snapback]
My pediatrician told me at 4 months that we could go ahead and start cereal. Wait a couple weeks and then start Stage 1 foods. By 5 months, they should be eating one meal a day and by 6 months 2 meals a day. I made the cereal really runny at first. One of the girls loves it and the other isn't so interested. She told me to wait a week between starting new foods. I know most people say 4 days. I started putting applesauce in the cereal and they like that. Then, I tried bananas. It gave one of the girls really bad stomach pains all night long. It's sad, because she loved eating it. I think we'll try sweet potatoes next.

Ditto all of this even up to the bananas but we did cereal at 5 months and then each week after that, we added a new stage 1 food! Here are my notes...
5 months 1 week
They eat 1-2 tablespoons of oatmeal cereal after their morning bottle.


5 months 2 weeks
Started sweet potatoes in the morning.


5 months 3 weeks
This week we are doing squash and cereal in the morning and sweet potatoes and cereal around 5:00 before their last bottle

5 months 4 weeks
Introduced fruits this week. We started with apples. They like it.

 

Our pediatrician advised to start solids at 4 months (a big surprise to us, because we thought it did not happen until 6 months) but we started with rice cereal. At first we started with a couple of tablespoons of rice cereal made runny with formula. We increased the tablespoons weekly and would make it a bit thicker. After the first week of cereal, we added a vegetable to another feeding-we cycled through the stage 1 veggies before we added fruits to another feeding. Also we lowered the amount of formula based on how many ounces of solids they would eat.

 

When I started to look at feeding solids EVERYONE and EVERY book said something different...

start with rice.... great it is gentle and less allergy but it is constipating. Foods that constipate are B-bananas, R -rice, A- apples, T- toast. (foods you feed a child with diarrhea) also CARROTS.

often babies don't like the rice cereal but love the mixed cereal.

unless their are allergies in your family I didn't see the point of trying one fruit or veg and waiting for a WEEK !! Heck my child could have cabbage allergy there is no baby food with just cabbage, or just squash, or just strawberries.....

Common allergies are Ibuprofen, Penicillin, Codiene, Latex., milk, peanuts, egg.

I've NEVER met a person with a carrot, or bean, allergy. (I'm an RN)

Look at other cultures I'm sure they don't all start out the same way.

Some say do Veggies first because "fruit is sweet" and then they wont' eat the veggies. If you have tasted the fruit it is often sour and I found the carrots quite sweet.

So I think solids is something YOU decide. Ask your mom ask your friends and then just have fun with it.

Oh I will add foods that are great to prevent constipation.... "p" fruit like PEARS, prunes, peaches, pineapple. Squash is great. Raisins, oats, figs.


just my opinion for what it is worth.....

Heather