Applesauce and Bananas

Even though Callan is almost 6 months old, he has been on an all milk diet as we have been waiting to introduce solids to him.  When he's awake during dinnertime, we sit him with a toy in his high chair and he'll sit and watch us eat (and play with his toy). Recently he has been taking an increased interest in our food, watching us while we eat and drink and opening his mouth like a baby bird. We've been waiting to introduce solids until he's ready to feed himself and plan on skipping the puree food step. This method is called Baby Led Weaning (or BLW for short) or Baby Led Solids (BLS) and is based on a paper written by Gill Rapley. BLW/BLS just means letting your child feed themselves from the start and waiting until they are developmentally capable to feed and eat food. By waiting, it allows the intestines and stomach to fully develop and encourages babies to listen to their own cues about when they are ready to eat and how much. The thinking behind BLW over traditional puree food feeding, is that you don't need to trick the baby into swallowing before they're ready and it teaches the child to chew and move the food around in their mouths until they are ready to swallow. If they aren't ready to swallow, they will just spit the food back out. Gagging at this point is actually good as it will prevent chocking later on. 

Anyway, we've been waiting to do this with Callan. This is a milestone we've been eagerly awaiting since both Huge and I enjoy eating.  We're intrigued to find out if Callan will also be an adventurous eater and what his palate will be. We were planning on waiting until he hit 6 months, but he seemed ready and we figured 5 1/2 months was close enough. We started with some applesauce (I know that's technically pureed, but he self feeds and that is the natural state of that food so I don't think it's cheating) and bananas. We're starting slow, but Callan did so well that I have a feeling it's going to be quite the culinary adventure with him.

The videos are a little boring and don't mind the commentary (we obviously were not prepared or paying attention as you'll also notice that he's not wearing a bib in either video taken on 2 different days), but this is one milestone worth capturing and I'm sure there will be more to come.

Don't tell Huge, but the next "crunchy granola" plan of mine is to skip the sippy cup...