When should I add other baby foods?

it is so funny how i get on here to check about this exact thing and someone beat me to it--lol. our girls are 3 1/2 months now, and i started giving the oatmeal cereal about 3 days ago. i have been starting out slowly tho, and gave it to them 1 time each day so far. but since they seem to spit out more than they eat i have been doing this. i get a fair amount of cereal in their mouths and then stick the bottle in there before they can spit it out. they don't choke on the cereal if i do this so i guess they like it. I have only been giving the formula with the cereal so it is familiar to them. i have saved a measuring cup from the powder formula can and use that to measure the cereal. i have been able to get 3 of those little cups in them so far. they are doing really good so far.

when should i add other foods? and how often each day? next appt is coming up so i'll be asking their ped. too. i know that i have started a little early but they are eating sooo much when on a growth spurt and i am giving about 1- 8 oz bottle plus 1/2 of another per baby each feed. so i thought that i'd try the cereal a little early to see how they would do. they have been sleeping a little better.

lots of love!
Meshell

 

if your appt. with your pedi is coming up soon, i would hold off and ask then. i, personally, didn't start solids until 6 months, and it took a good few weeks to a month before we were able to add some veggies and a second meal. they will be pretty messy at first, but if they are pretty much just spitting it out, i think they aren't ready for it. i would just feed formula more often, IMHO. they don't get any nutritino from the cereal anyway- it's purely for learning how to eat and working those muscles of the mouth. all nutrition wil come from BM/formula. i know the growth spurts are tough, but maybe you could just give bottles sooner? (every 2.5 hrs. vs. every 3?)

 

I started solids at 4 months with my son. I would just keep on the cereal for now and wait on other foods. Sounds like they don't quite have the hang of solids yet to start other foods just yet. I waited until my son was not able to push his food out so much before giving other foods. The rule of thumb though is to give a new food and then wait 4-5 days before trying a new one, this is to check for allergies. Best to start with a veggie they say then do fruits. My son hated sweet potatoes at first and we had to retry them about 3 months later and he loved them.

 

I started rice cereal at 5 months and added barley after a couple of weeks but I wasn't comfortable starting any fruits or veggies until 6 months. I don't have a family history of allergies, but Evan has eczema so I wanted to be careful.

 

Your babies are WAY too young for solids at all! The AAP and other major medical organizations recommend waiting til 6 months. And even at 6 months, solids are mainly for practice - almost all their nutrition should be coming from formula and/or breastmilk. Here are a number of reasons why.

If they're hungry & in a growth spurt, they need all their extra nutrition from formula. Cereal will only fill them up and take away room from the formula they need, since they're too young to even really digest it.

So maybe it would work to just feed them more often, like a pp said. If this is a growth spurt, it should pass in a few days to a week.

Good luck!

 

Did your pedi say to start solids already? Ours didn't ok rice cereal until the 4 mo. appt. and said no other solids til 6 mos., at least. I would check with your doc before giving them anything else.

 

My pedi gave me the ok at 4 months. We started cereal and they messed with it a little bit. However i could tell cereal was not for them, we then started Beau on Sweet pot and he LOVED them. Savannah had to wait a bit longer beause we were making sure her tummy was strong enouhg since we had to switch her formula... We would wait 3 days in between (our pedi said 3 days) and then start a new kind... Beau has eaten Sweet Taters, carrots, squash, gren beans, applesauce, pears, peaches and he LOVES it all and eats very well and very neat. In the beginning if we missed a day no big deal, now we feed them twice a day and they still eat all the formula that they ate before we started to feed them. Savannah has eaten all veggies (no greens yet - she gets to gassy) and pears and peaches thus far and loves them so much! Mine have done great with all foods and at the 4 months check up they stated that they could eat anything i wanted to give them at this point but that it was all for practicing well my babies will tell you it is more than practicing it is yummy too. LOL... good luck