Our Journey with Baby Led Weaning

Baby Led Weaning (BLW) is essentially introducing foods to your baby once they display signs of readiness and letting them feed themselves from the beginning. That means you can skip purées and spoon feeding entirely, if you choose to do so!

At the core, it's thought to help reduce pickiness and encourage your little one to be independent and in full control of what or how much they eat. For a more detailed list of benefits and other resources, this page was a helpful resource we consistently referenced throughout our BLW journey!

Dave and I are both foodies to the core. We didn't know about BLW when we first had Zoey but learned about it through the amazing world of IG! After doing lots of research about this method of introducing solids, it just felt like the right fit for us. We wanted to start Zoey's love for food early and have her experience how exciting different textures and flavors were from day one!

Professionals tell you that you can begin introducing solids to your baby when they display signs of readiness. These include your baby's ability to sit up comfortably with holding their own head up and seeming eager to try foods.

We knew Zoey was ready because she started reaching for our bowls or plates and watching us more intently right around 6 months. She had also already mastered sitting up and holding her head up really well! There are a number of others signs we had to wait for, but these are the two I remember most.

The whole BLW process was not easy. It made a royal mess every time - on Zoey, on the high chair, on the floors, on anything that was in close proximity to her. I got frustrated when she wouldn't touch food sometimes, I felt defeated when she'd instead pick it up and toss it directly on the floor... by the handful. It was annoying when I spent so much time preparing a meal I was so excited to feed her thinking she'd love it and she'd do just about anything other than even give it a taste. We wanted to give up, a lot.

It seemed like months and months and months before Zoey really interacted with her food and truly ate it. We did a lot of reading up on this type of behavior and it sounded like this was all normal and part of the process.

I was SO SO nervous any time we would introduce an allergen. I made it a rule that we would only introduce one allergen at a time and only introduced them on a weekend when we were around and able to monitor her closely for a few hours afterwards.

We discovered that Zoey had a severe egg and dairy allergy within maybe 20 minutes of introducing her to each. She broke out with crazy hives all over her mouth and body - pretty much anywhere the food touched. We were so fortunate that there weren't any other reactions impacting her breathing, but it was scary. Immediately called her pediatrician and were instructed to administer a dose of child's Benadryl based on her specific symptoms she experienced. Thankfully that combined with lots of love and hugs and positive thoughts helped that rash within a couple of hours.

Thankfully, she seems to tolerate all other foods really well so far but know that sometimes these things can change.

We decided to find a specialized pediatric allergist to help us navigate her allergies in hopes that she will grow out of them. It's likely, but not guaranteed. She now has an epi pen that we carry with us at all times, along with keeping Benadryl easily accessible, too.

The number one food avoidance rule: do not feed your baby honey before they are 1 year old. Honey should not be consumed in any form - including as an ingredient in processed foods because it can lead to infant botulism. That's a scary term for something I don't fully understand, other than knowing it's not good and can cause serious harm. There's probably a long list of others which fluctuates based on your source.

We didn't add a ton of extra salt into Zoey's diet, but cooked with a little here and there. Do your research and figure out what the best choices are for your family.

Some other fun foods we explored early on included:

• Ground meat either in sliced burgers or meatballs, until she mastered the pincer grasp and could grab smaller pieces.
• Well done steak cut into long, thick strips
• Chicken in a drumstick or cut into long, thick strips
• Salmon in long strips
• Shrimp thinly sliced lengthwise
• Sautéed or steamed bell peppers
• Sautéed or steamed broccoli
• Baked sweet potato
• Smashed blueberries
• Pasta in any shape

This site helped us visualize how foods should be prepared for each month in their early years. I wouldn't be surprised if I visited that page daily, if not 3-4x a day.

The whole idea behind BLW is introducing your baby to different textures from day 1 - essentially, they eat what you'd eat! Experts say just because a baby doesn't have teeth, they can still chew so foods don't need to be totally mushy. We offered steamed veggies a lot, but also foods like ground meat or thinly sliced cucumbers.

We also focused on introducing Zoey to a variety of spices early on. Each time we'd introduce a new food, we offered without any spices initially so she could learn the natural flavor. The next time we made it, we'd add a new spice or combo of spices. We only really avoided anything she was allergic to or anything spicy (except that one time I accidentally made her cauliflower that was way too spicy that she ended up crying out in pain... queue the mom guilt!)

I was super paranoid about offering Zoey the right cut or size of certain foods. This website was a huge resource for us and provided great visuals and detailed information about how foods should be cut for different ages.

Some general rules - grapes should be quartered, anything round like blueberries should be smashed first.

Looking back, we should have reduced the amount of breastmilk we were giving her much earlier. This part was the hardest for us to adjust to. Because she wasn't eating a lot (or anything at times), we would compensate by keeping up with her full bottle schedule.

We continued doing our research based on whatever we were experiencing and really started wondering how people survived parenthood without constant information easily accessible to them in seconds... We experimented with feeding her right before a bottle or first thing in the morning, thinking she might be extra hungry and therefore more interested. This usually backfired because she didn't yet understand that real food would actually help satiate her just as much as breastmilk did, so she would sit there so frustrated and hungry and protest eating until we gave her a bottle instead.

It felt like a vicious cycle.

After speaking with her pediatrician on several occasions, we reduced her total ounces significantly. This is when we saw a total shift in her interest in food.

This didn't happen until much later after we introduced Zoey to solids. We were worried when she was 10 -11 months old because she was still eating just a very little, even though she slowly nibbled or ate some smaller "meals" here and there. I remember thinking that she was never going to eat and it felt like I was just the worst mom ever that I could not get this to click.

Just like everything as a new mama, it was another milestone to navigate with our own trial and error while exploring unfamiliar territory.

Choosing the Right High Chair

You'll need a high chair with a footrest so your baby can sit comfortably with support and stability to reduce the risk of choking. We chose a high chair that had a few bells and whistles and seemed great in theory, but I won't even share it because I absolutely do not recommend it.

In hindsight, a high chair like this one would have been well worth the investment as it's said to grow with your child and tons of parents for BLW are constantly talking about how much they love it. It doesn't have a ton of material to get food stuck in between cushions or other crevices because BLW will create a MESS no matter what. The less there is to clean or the less places there are for food to get stuck in will make all the difference!

The Setup

In addition to the high chair, we added a handful of other "essentials" throughout our BLW journey.

We love bibs like these because they're so easy to wash by hand or pop into the dishwasher. They're a great food catcher too, because lots won't make it into their mouths at first - and maybe even for awhile!

We started out with these utensils, then graduated Zoey to this set once her grasp was better. We introduced utensils overall a little later, but looking back, it would have been fun to place them on her tray earlier just for a little extra exposure.

We started out with this suction plate but after she started eating more, we graduated to these plates and these bowls instead which she's been using ever since. Based on some things we read, there were some associations with plates that had dividers and pickier eating, so we opted to choose an open concept instead later on.

This tiny cup helped us introduce her to the concept of an open concept early on. Sure, there were lots of spills, but that's all part of the process.

I have a love/hate relationship with this splat mat. It sometimes feels like just another thing to clean and not fully necessary, but I do love that you can just pick it up and bring it over to the sink to empty, and then pop it into the washing machine for a better scrub.

I really had fun with this crinkle cutter which made some foods easier to grip because of the texture. I used it for avocados, apples and cucumbers to name a few!