After a quick call to the pediatrician last week, we got the okay to start introducing solid food to Claire-bear. We decided to try giving her solid food right from the start; essentially it’s baby self-feeding. Opposed to spoon feeding something like rice cereal, where she learns to swallow first, she’ll be getting mushy broccoli stems and steamed carrots and things of that nature so she will actually learn to chew first and swallow second.
There’s no data suggesting either method is more effective than one another, so our pediatrician was on board for our “Baby-led weaning,” adventure. While I tried a few puree’s with spoons Emerson just wasn’t digging it, so it led us to giving her a banana sliced in stick form. She loved it! She would put it her mouth, mash it around, and spit it back out.
We tried broccoli next, and that was an even bigger hit! She was able to keep some florets in her mouth, and she just kept going back for more. The next morning she sucked on some toast strips and made a sour face when trying scrambled eggs, (I don’t blame ya kid, Mommy doesn’t like eggs either!)
Over the past week she has really enjoyed exploring food on her own. I’m hoping it leads to an adventurous eater. Only time will tell. And if in a week she isn’t digging the whole, here’s a piece of food do what you will with it, then we can fall back to cereal.