How to Start Solid Foods with Your Baby

Boy, am I glad I blogged with Jackson. I had totally forgotten how to introduce solid foods with a baby. Every baby is different, but Abigail has been eating 32 ozs of formula daily and still has not seemed satisfied (32 ozs of milk is the max a baby can have and 24 ozs should be the minimum) She is a very hungry girl and was smacking her lips when we ate so Monday I tried oatmeal cereal with her (about 2 weeks before she turns 4 months old). I know it is going to take her a couple of weeks to figure out how to swallow. However, she did real well and opened her mouth wide and I think she might have even swallowed a little bit of it. Here are my suggestions when starting solid foods:

• If your baby struggles with constipation at all get the oatmeal version of rice cereal. Abigail struggles with it every now and then but nothing like Jackson. So, we choose to do the oatmeal cereal with her as well
• mix it with 2-4 tablespoons of formula and 1 tablespoon of cereal (that way he does not get choked)
• Also, offer the cereal during normal feeding time after they have eaten about half of the bottle or a little more than half way through the bottle. I have found if you introduce it before the have gotten at least some of their milk, they will be real upset about it.
  
• Before you start fruits or vegetables offer you baby Rice Cereal or Oatmeal Cereal (if they struggle with constipation) for 2 weeks three times a day. Baby Wise recommends this but the doctor says you do not have to do it. It takes a while for them to figure out how to swallow. At first, they will only take half of the fruit or vegetable (make sure you buy 1st food not 2nd or 3rd).
• Eventually Baby Wise II says:

  Breakfast (8am): cereal and fruits----Lunch (12pm) Vegetables and fruits----- Dinner (4pm) cereal, vegetables and fruits-----then one last bottle at 8pm. That would be my perfect schedule in a perfect world----haha!

With Abigail I am going to offer her cereal 1 or 2 times a day at least until she turns 4 months old. You are really suppose to wait to your baby is 4 months old to start food and definitely by 6 months old. If your baby seems satisfied by your milk then there is no rush. However, if your baby struggles with constipation, I would recommend starting right around 4 months old at least just with the cereal. We will probably not start the squash and pears for another month or so, but I will keep you updated.

I do not recommend putting cereal in a baby's bottle because they cannot tell they are full until it is too late. This could cause severe stomach aches (a screaming baby), vomiting, or your baby being overweight. I know different doctors have different opinions about this though.

Let me know if you have any more advice on starting solid foods. I am always learning!

Update on the Wallace’s Big Move!

Ok, so it is crazy to move into a new house! A new house does not have a hirby kirby, blinds, etc. Last week we did not have A/C for 2 nights. Normally that would be fine, but for some reason it was like 90 here in Columbia. This week I feel like I can deal with anything because we have A/C. Whenever I have a hard week, I am just so much for thankful for things! Last week also was difficult because it is hard to keep a safe environment for a toddler with 100 boxes and random pictures everywhere. But this week is going great and I am loving getting organized and having a great new house (with this beautiful fence). Pray that I have time to unpack boxes this week. I think we had like 100 boxes and we have only gotten to like 30 of them. This week is crazy for Charlie because the Fall Festival is Sunday and I think there is going to be like 2,000 people there. Jackson is going to be a cow (Jake’s first Halloween outfit) and Charlie and I are going to be matching cowboy and cowgirl outfits that we got at Halloween Express store. We went to a costume Birthday party and that is the cow pants he is going to where for the Fall Festival in the pictures above.

Jackson is a lot happier right now since he is used to whole milk and all this food. He loves to dance (I have to get some video of that), he is growing up so fast! He eats scrambled eggs, cheerios, and a slice of raisin bread (with butter) for breakfast and 6 ozs of milk with some juice…yeah he is drinking out of his cup! For lunch he has squash baby food (stage 3) Yoplait yogurt, some goldfish (juice), and 4 ozs of milk. For snack he has 6 ozs of milk, vanilla pudding, and some crackers. For dinner he usually has either some hamburger or frozen breaded chicken breast or a grill cheese (juice), and 4 ozs of whole milk. Finally right before bed he has a 6 oz bottle of formula. He only has about 4 or 6 ozs of juice a day. Food has been a little hard transition so I thought I would share what worked for Jackson. My goal is by 15 months (December) to have him off formula completely and off bottles…he has had no normalcy since June (the fire) and is very attached to his bottles. It is a slow process with Jackson, he just now is starting to really like his cup. Step 1 for me is to get that last formula bottle gone. Step 2 is for him to drink his milk cold from a cup (just changing 1 feeding to strictly a cup and keeping it that way for 3 days). Step 3 is for him to eat more food in general! IF ANYONE HAS ANY SUGGESTIONS ON HOW TO GET a little toddler to eat more veggies (especially green ones) I am all ears! Jackson is very happy right now but yesterday he was put in the pack in play 5 different times for not listening to me after I said no repeatedly. So that is how Jackson is doing (loving his zebra toy and his little people truck toy).

Today in my devotion I read Luke 6-7 and some of Jesus’ words amaze me more ever time I read them.

Blessed are you who hunger now,
for you will be satisfied.
Blessed are you who weep now,
for you will laugh.
Blessed are you when men hate you,
when they exclude you and insult you
and reject your name as evil, because of the Son of Man.

"Rejoice in that day and leap for joy, because great is your reward in heaven. For that is how their fathers treated the prophets.
24"But woe to you who are rich,
for you have already received your comfort.
25Woe to you who are well fed now,
for you will go hungry.
Woe to you who laugh now,
for you will mourn and weep.
26Woe to you when all men speak well of you,
for that is how their fathers treated the false prophets.

Doesn’t Jesus say that we are blessed if we are hungry and weeping? If this is the case why are we women always complaining and stressing out about things that will not matter in eternity. Why do we always complain about things to each other and never talk about things that matter in eternity such what we are learning in our quiet times.

There is so much more I could comment on and post on about these chapters, but I am not going to here (I think this post is long enough) I just wish I could hide God’s word in my heart more, and be completely focused not on myself, but on eternal things!

Jackson's 4 month doctor visit/Advice on Starting Solids

The 4 month check up went well. He was 15 pounds and 11oz and in the 50 percent in weight and over the 50 in height. His head is in the 25 percent though but it is growing---haha. The doctor said that as far as food goes I can wait till he is 6 months or so. The key is that they need to learn to eat by 1 year because baby/real food is their main source of nutrition by 1 year when they go to whole milk. He did run a temp. after the shots. I do not handle it well when he is sick because he is so helpless. Right now naps are the hardest thing for us and he still is getting bored and wants me to play with him all the time. I am not going to try to be real strict with the whole food thing till 6 months (mainly because Katherine always told me 5 months was the easiest when they eat 4 times a day and if you do not start food). Also, some doctors say their stomachs are not ready until 6 months. When I do offer cereal I mix it with 2-4 tablespoons of formula and 1 tablespoon of cereal (that way he does not get choked)

Eventually Baby Wise II says:

Breakfast (8am): cereal and fruits----Lunch (12pm) Vegetables and fruits----- Dinner (4pm) cereal, vegetables and fruits-----then one last bottle at 8pm. That would be my perfect schedule in a perfect world----haha!

Before you start fruits or vegetables offer you baby Rice Cereal or Oatmeal Cereal (if they struggle with constipation) for 2 weeks three times a day. Baby Wise recommends this but the doctor says you do not have to do it. It takes a while for them to figure out how to swallow. At first, they will only take half of the fruit or vegetable (make sure you buy 1st food not 2nd or 3rd).

I do know that for the first year of their existence they need at least 24 oz of formula a day and no more than 32. Jackson usually likes 27 (to get him through the night) but recently he has been eating 32 every day. I think he is going through a growth spurt. Right now we offer 7 ozs to him at 8:15, 11:15, 2:30, and then 6 ozs at 5:15-:5:30 and then again anywhere from 8:15-8:45. So we are still feeding him 5 times a day but I think he would take 8 ozs 4 times a day. I am just lazy and my platex drop in bottle only holds 7 oz. Recently he has been going to bed at 9:30-10:15 and sleeping till 8 or at the latest 8:30. He still will only sleep 10 hours a night (my doctor said that was wonderful) so we put him to bed later so he will sleep later and I can get a shower!

I have tried cereal for breakfast, lunch and dinner but it is so time consuming---it took like 45 minutes! He still wants to spit it out. He has major constipation problems recently so the doctor said to do oatmeal rice cereal and go ahead and try pears and apple sauce. She said that it did not matter if we started vegetables or fruits that they are all gross and have no good taste. She said to try a new food (it just needs to be a first food---it does not matter if it a fruit or veggie) for 3 or 5 days in a row to make sure he does not have any food allergies. We tried pears today and he gave this terrible face like this taste terrible and spit most of it out. I usually try the food after about 4 or 5 ozs of formula so that way he is not starving but not completely full. That has worked best for me but as you know every baby is different.

As far as naps I know at 6 months it is ideal for them to have just two big naps a day from 1 1/2 to 2 hours---one in the morning and one in the afternoon. So little Sophie is doing great! Before that they say 3 naps (at at least 1 1/2 hours) once they hit like 12 weeks I think The one in the afternoon does not need to be too close to bed time, Our naps are hard right now. He will only sleep for 45 min for the morning nap (probably because he sleep so late) and then he has one at 1 that he usually sleeps for 1 1/2 hour and then another nap at 4 ish for another 45 minutes. After he has been up for like 2 hours or so he gets so tired. We are trying to get read of the last mini nap at 7-7:45 but it is hard because he is so fussy. The first nap of the day he will go into the crib and fall asleep but the rest of the naps I swaddle him and put him in the middle of the bed and he goes to sleep fine.

He is a big grabber now and I am glad I read that Baby Wise II book because I am not letting him play with our phones and stuff because I will not let him play with other people's phone when we go to their house. The book said it is fine to let them play with the remote, your phone, etc but not to punish them when they do that at other people's house because they do not understand. He also plays and rolls around in the pack and play every day because that is a safe place for him. Once he does start crawling I am not going to let him have rule of the entire house he will be limited to certain room----I guess I will get some baby gates. They say that that is just too much freedom to let them crawl around the entire house. He is rolling over on his stomach and yesterday he rolled back over to him back to get to something he wanted but that is the only time he has rolled back over.