Bye-Bye Purees! Hello, Finger Foods.

Over the past several months, probably since baby B was 3 or 4 months old, I was reading heavily into Baby Led Weaning (BLW) and was anxious to try it with my guy. We decided to give it a shot, seeing majority of the things I read on it resulted in positive outcomes, but every attempted bite he would take... mama couldn't deal. I just couldn't wrap my head around the fact - regardless of how much I read - how a baby with no teeth could chomp up an entire thing of broccoli, or carrots, or MEAT. You get the point.

So, I decided to do things my way and make up a combination of pureed foods + chunkier bites for him to get used to different textures. I'd dice up some banana, avocado and/or cheese, something I knew he'd be able to chomp without choking, and mix it with some of his pureed stuff. At first he'd shoot me funky faces like, "What the heck is this lumpy stuff you're feeding me, woman?" But, I felt like this way worked best for me us.

Our BLW try! Most of this food ended up on the floor, anyways.

His daily meals would consist of:
Breakfast - Oatmeal + Banana/Apple chunky puree
Lunch - Avocado + Sweet Potato or Squash chunky puree
Snack - Yogurt + puffs
Dinner - Earth's Best Stage 3 Dinners (Veggie Beef Pilaf was a favorite of his) + diced cheese

I'd shoot to always have something on his tray for him to experiment with; learning how to pick food up and put it in his mouth. Cheese cubes, bananas, and puffs are some of his faves.

When my guy was about 8-1/2 months old, I felt that would be a great opportunity to try transitioning him to finger foods! Starting slowly with dinners, this is how our first week went:

Day 1 looked a little something like this: shredded cheese, broccoli, carrots, and a rice/chicken/cheese/carrot/cauliflower mixture I made previously, which was chilled and rolled into small bite-sized balls (easier for him to pick up that way).

At first he wasn't totally sure that all this food was meant for eating. For the first few bites, I'd have to put a piece on my hand and hold it out in front of him, in which he'd pick it up off my hand and into his mouth. He quickly got the idea and went to town!

Here's the aftermath. Surprisingly, majority of it he ate! I still gave him some jarred baby food because I knew the amount on his tray wouldn't quite fill him up.

Day 2 was a total bust. Someone was battling another visit from the teething monster, and wasn't in any mood to deal with feeding himself. One jar of his favorite veggie beef pilaf and a bottle for my hurting little guy, then he called it a night.

Day 3's menu consisted of salmon, potatoes, and avocado. In order to make this ready for B's dinner time (which is about an hour before we eat), the hubs just separated a little bit of our dinner from the night before. Everything was pretty much cooked the same as ours, except no salt or butter was added. So, all I had to do was cut an avocado and lightly heat up the potatoes and salmon.

He wasn't as interested in feeding himself as he was the first night, so I basically fed it to him, and he pretty much ate everything.

Being the pasta lover that I am, I was overly excited for Day 4's dinner! We made organic whole-wheat spiral pasta with organic tomato sauce and lean ground turkey. Added a side of cheese and broccoli, and little man enjoyed every bit of it! Again, I had to help him with the feeding part... but he thoroughly enjoyed smearing the pasta everywhere, as well as eating it.

Pasta nights totally require a bath. Pasta. Was. Everywhere (horrible picture quality - doesn't do justice, trust me). But that's all part of the fun... for him. :)

Day 5 he had sliced sauteed chicken (which I ended up cutting into smaller, bite sized pieces), green-beans, and puffs. This was his first time having green-beans and he really seemed to love them.

Day 6 & 7 mornings, the hubs scrambled up some plain eggs, while I cut up an avocado. We served that with a side of cheese and some yogurt drops. I was a tiny bit nervous because of the egg allergy thing, but so far, so good - no allergy. Hopefully he won't mind that it's back to oatmeal & fruit during the week. :)

It's been about two weeks since we started this transition and I can say that I'm really loving this stage; getting to experiment different tastes/foods with my guy is so much fun. So far, he's been such a wonderful, non-picky eater. Over the weekend, baby B had his first Mexican feast (bite-sized beef fajita, cheese, beans, rice, tortilla, and by accident, a lime) and backyard burgers (ground burger meat, cheese, and tomato).

I did a lot of searching before starting the transition to get some good age appropriate dinner ideas, but everything I found was either too extravagant preparation-wise (come'on, we're both working parents here!) or included crazy ingredients (as much as I'd love for my guy to have a fancy dinner, we need to use what we have), so I really hope this helps anyone that might be in the same boat as I was.