For those who have done tradition weaning and BLW..

[iiTTCii]

I've just bought a baby led weaning book and I think I'm gonna give it a go. For those who have done both.. Which one did you prefer and why.

 

[GracieGoo]

I tweed my son at 18 weeks.. and did blw with my daughter at 6 months. I cannot even put into words the difference in their eating, blw has been the most amazing and interesting learning curve. I am so proud of my daughter, she eats everything! and I honestly mean everything, she is amazing. When twing I spent every weekend batch cooking and freezing food, it was hard to gradually build up lumps with ds he refused forever, I was so scared of choking. With dd I have absolute faith she can move things around her mouth, she will put anything into her mouth, she is amazing.... Well worth it for me, I love that she decides everything, it is all of her call... she can now dip a spoon into a yogurt and feed herself... a bit messy yes - but seriously she is just 9.5 months old!!!

 

[felix555]

I started off TW and then within about 3 weeks (i think it was) went to BLW.

I like both for different reasons.

I like TW because there isn't so much mess involved and meals are so easy to prepare (i always just put whatever veggies I am making in a colander on top of a pot of boiling water and mash after)

I like BLW because we can all sit down together and have dinner and he feeds himself while we have our dinner (obviously keeping a close eye on him though)

There are other thing too like with TW he'd generally like most purees I give him but with BLW it's a bit hit and miss I have to try a lot of different things to find something he likes.

I don't have a preference really and I do a bit of both.

 

[AP]

Loved BLW, TW was just soul destroying in our case.

 

[jd83]

The nice thing about TW is there really isn't any mess. THe bad thing about it is transitioning. DS1 was very hard to transition to regular foods, took until he was about 15 months old to get him off purees. He just flat out refused anything other than purees before that point, aside from puff snacks.

The nice thing about BLW is there really is not transition to have to deal with. They are eating regular foods right from the get go, learning to chew and move food around in their mouth. I didn't start BLW with DS2 right away, I did do TW at first. But he decided he wanted regular foods around 8-9 months, so we only did TW for a few months. The con with BLW is it is very messy. When they are that little when you start, they pretty much have to use hands because learning how to use utensils properly doesn't come until later. THey get covered in what they are eating, and so does the table and floor. I love that I didn't have to fix something different for him than everyone else, but the messes are awful. To this day still. He just destroys his area with his food.

 

[iiTTCii]

I've already bought a few mess mats for the floor and we have laminate flooring throughout so can just wipe everything up.
Did you have any particular recipe books?

 

[felix555]

I've already bought a few mess mats for the floor and we have laminate flooring throughout so can just wipe everything up.
Did you have any particular recipe books?

I bought a load of cheap argos shower curtains and lay those out, it's a little but like preparing for a murder scene.

I never had any recipe books, I think they are unnecessary. just go to the market / shop and buy whatever is fresh

 

[minties]

Thomas was TW'd and Sophie was BLW'd. To be totally honest, by 10 months they both had the same eating habits and both ate as well as eachother. But between 6 and 10 months Sophie was easier.

 

[Wiggler]

I've done both and BLW is much easier, more fun and I really enjoyed it.

 

[MindUtopia]

I've already bought a few mess mats for the floor and we have laminate flooring throughout so can just wipe everything up.
Did you have any particular recipe books?

I've only done BLW, so can't really offer a comparison but BLW is great! And the mess does get less. It was messy up to about 9 months, but the past few weeks there's been less dropping and more eating. And like you say, if you have hard floors, it's easy to just wipe up. The kitchen floor just gets a good wipe 3 times a day, which isn't a bad thing!

As for books, I really liked the River Cottage Baby and Toddler Cookbook. It's normal food, so you can eat it too. And really one you get past the first month or two and baby is developing better hand/grip skills, you can pretty much cook anything so any good cookbook will have ideas. For things that aren't as easy to pick up (soups, risotto, sauce from curries, etc.), I put on toast or rice cakes. So anything can work if you get creative.

Also, found this website has lots of good ideas: https://littlegrazers.com/

 

[iiTTCii]

I've already bought a few mess mats for the floor and we have laminate flooring throughout so can just wipe everything up.
Did you have any particular recipe books?

I've only done BLW, so can't really offer a comparison but BLW is great! And the mess does get less. It was messy up to about 9 months, but the past few weeks there's been less dropping and more eating. And like you say, if you have hard floors, it's easy to just wipe up. The kitchen floor just gets a good wipe 3 times a day, which isn't a bad thing!

As for books, I really liked the River Cottage Baby and Toddler Cookbook. It's normal food, so you can eat it too. And really one you get past the first month or two and baby is developing better hand/grip skills, you can pretty much cook anything so any good cookbook will have ideas. For things that aren't as easy to pick up (soups, risotto, sauce from curries, etc.), I put on toast or rice cakes. So anything can work if you get creative.

Also, found this website has lots of good ideas: https://littlegrazers.com/

The website is great! Thanks.

 

[summer rain]

I've done BLW with two and TW with two so far, with TW you will get the mess as they will have to have finger foods at some point and I found my TW'ed kids messed with the finger foods more, had to bin the two highchairs I had with them lol. This time we plan to do BLW again, we have a massive woven floor mat so will probably not even bother with the highchair just sit LO on it (we all eat as a family sat on it as well) xx

 

[Iveneverseen]

I did both with my first and third babies. my second baby was on puree's till she was over a year, even when I tried to give her lumps, finger foods ect she would not have it. hence why she was on purees so long, she would not touch lumps till she was over a year old.

My first and third babies were very different. they would have purees (I couldn't do solely blw at such a young age as they wouldn't be eating much) and have finger foods also. and they were/are much better eater and worked for us.

my second even now at nearly 7 is picky.

 

[StellaBella24]

I am just findind out about BLW and hoping to start around Xmas when LO will be 6months.

I get the idea of finger food etc fine. But the cutlery thing is baffling me. Can i never spoon feed my baby? I dont mean puree stuff, i mean spoon feeding them mince or mash or cerial or yoghurts.

Would this hold her back if i did this with certain foods?

 

[Dragonfly]

blw for sure.

 

[jd83]

I am just findind out about BLW and hoping to start around Xmas when LO will be 6months.

I get the idea of finger food etc fine. But the cutlery thing is baffling me. Can i never spoon feed my baby? I dont mean puree stuff, i mean spoon feeding them mince or mash or cerial or yoghurts.

Would this hold her back if i did this with certain foods?

I still spoon feed certain things, as DS2 hasn't figured out spoons well enough yet to do yogurts, etc. I let him work at trying to use them with his meal, but if its oatmeal, or yogurt, I don't bother with letting him try yet because he just makes too much of a mess. Once he has it figured out more I will let him do it more.

 

[baileybubs]

I am just findind out about BLW and hoping to start around Xmas when LO will be 6months.

I get the idea of finger food etc fine. But the cutlery thing is baffling me. Can i never spoon feed my baby? I dont mean puree stuff, i mean spoon feeding them mince or mash or cerial or yoghurts.

Would this hold her back if i did this with certain foods?

I have done BLW with my dd, we have tried on the odd occasion some jar purées (for when she is being looked after by MIL) but she didn't like them so they are still in the cupboard. I still spoon feed her stuff like yoghurt, creamed porridge, thick soups etc and give her a go at using the spoon but she's usually too interested in chewing the spoon at the mo lol! I don't think it does any harm if you spoon feed some stuff, but it's only really liquidy things I spoon feed. I even give her mash, mince (in the form of bolognese) straight on the high chair tray and just let her pick it up. It's very very messy and she's still at the stage of not getting more than half of it in her mouth but it's great as she picks up what she wants, plus her grasping skills have improved so much!
Tonight she had new potatoes, carrots, broccoli and tuna flakes and it's so great watching her eat, she always chooses broccoli first!
For me I will do BLW with all my children if it's possible in future as it's so much fun, and she can eat what I eat too so I only have to prepare one meal. I tend to eat tea after she goes to bed though so her tea is usually what I had for tea the previous night.

 

[MindUtopia]

I am just findind out about BLW and hoping to start around Xmas when LO will be 6months.

I get the idea of finger food etc fine. But the cutlery thing is baffling me. Can i never spoon feed my baby? I dont mean puree stuff, i mean spoon feeding them mince or mash or cerial or yoghurts.

Would this hold her back if i did this with certain foods?

You certainly can spoon feed certain things if they are smooth enough (it's actually probably more of a choking hazard to try to spoon feed mince than to just let them feed themselves), but things like yogurt or porridge are easier if they'll accept a spoon. My daughter won't really let me feed her. She'll accept a couple small tastes, but then just pushes the spoon away. If I put it on toast (like with soup or mince), she'll feed herself.

I've started making her fruit and yogurt smoothies because she won't accept me offering her a spoon with yogurt on it. I just put a bit of pureed fruit in a cup with an equal amount of natural yogurt and a splash of milk to make it more liquidy. Then give her a normal drinking straw. I have to hold the cup, but she'll take the straw herself and drink her smoothie through the straw. She'll drink probably about 150 ml of smoothie this way. If I tried to spoon feed her, she'd maybe have 2 little spoonfuls and that's all. She loves doing it herself! So you can find creative ways to help them eat things in ways they like.

For things like cereal, I just put it on her try if it's soft enough to eat dry, or like weetabix, soften in a bit of milk first and she'll pick up the whole thing and eat it.

 

[Fliss]

Nathan *wanted* food at 18 weeks so we did the puree thing.

He was a little slower to grasp spoon feeding but we just followed the guidelines - fruit and vegetables only no wheat/gluten (so the 4-grain porridges with amaranth etc were fab) until 6 months, then adding in dairy and meat/poultry/fish from 6 months - which upped the texture anyway. We added spices and herbs to the meat.

Then lumpy from 8 months and 'mashed' from 10 - and because we were doing it ourselves the textures were much coarser than jars anyway - couldn't persuade him that 10 month+ jars were food and not slop LOL.

I loved TW because it worked for him x

Added finger foods from 7 months and he's now gobbling anything and everything ;-)