What Preston eats at 8 months

I thought I would do an updated post on how Baby Led Weaning (BLW) is going for us at 8 months. Oh yeah, and I guess at some point, I should do Preston's 8 month post!

Always a mess

Anyways, Preston has been eating solid food for over 2 months now and it's always interesting and fun to see what new things he will try (pretty much everything!) Jake was a bit skeptical about giving him whole food, but now that he's seen how well P does with it, he's totally on board and loves it now. I mean, how cool is to go out to a meal with your 8 month old and have them eat exactly what you are eating. Even my parents, who were really, really skeptical about giving him straight table food now eagerly watch him eat an entire tray of pasta with meat sauce and veggies.

For the first month or so of BLW (starting at 6 months), we started off pretty slowly and just gave Preston only veggies and fruits, in big, stick size pieces he could pick up and get in his mouth easily. He picked it up right away - it can take a few weeks before babies actually understand putting the food in their mouth, but Pres was noming on everything right from the beginning.

Beef Stew - his favorite part is the carrots

We did sweet potatoes, broccoli, carrots, butternut squash, banana, pears - all the standard "baby's first foods". We also still did some purees on a loaded spoon because Preston got sort of frustrated with not really swallowing the whole food and has a big appetite - I wanted to make sure he was actually getting some food in his stomach. But he's always fed himself with the spoon - we never spoon feed him.

By 7 months, I could tell he was actually swallowing a lot more food (as evidenced by his diapers!). It was at this point, we started offering him more varied foods and trying new things. We also pretty much stopped purees at this point because he didn't really need them - he does still spoon feed himself oatmeal (regular Quaker oatmeal, not baby oatmeal) and sometimes in a pinch, we will give him a pouch of purees that he also just feeds himself (holding the pouch and sucking).

Thinking about what to eat next

I started meal planning meals that I thought he would like and would be easy for him to eat. Typically I will send leftovers from our dinner the night before as his lunch the next day. He tried plain whole wheat pasta and really liked it, so I started making pasta salad with a ton of blanched veggies (just so they are easier to eat then raw veggies) and a light olive oil dressing and keeping it in the fridge for quick meals/snacks for all of us. I try to also have homemade sweet potato fries (his favorite!) in the fridge so he can snack on those. He also LOVES fruit and eats a sliced banana for breakfast pretty much every morning. I keep those little cups of mandarin oranges or peaches packed in water in the pantry as his "dessert" after a meal.

Waffles for Sunday breakfast

At 7.5 months, he had his first taste of meat. It was a Sunday afternoon and I put a pork shoulder in the crockpot to make shredded pork BBQ while we were watching football. We were all eating together so I decided to see how he liked the BBQ. Well he LOVED it - the shredded meat was easy for him to eat and obviously it was a bit sweet from the BBQ sauce. I was a bit worried on how he would be able to handle digesting it, but he had no issues at all with it. So we kept offering him meat and started with shredded meats since he did well with them and it was easy for him to swallow. I made chicken enchiladas and kept out some of the shredded chicken before adding the spices and he loved it too. From there, we did pot roast, chicken parmesan, chili (not super spicy), tacos, lasagna, etc.

The biggest thing I watch for is sodium because I know his little body can't handle too much. Doing baby led weaning has actually made us eat healthier because I'm more cognizant about making sure we're eating more veggies, less processed foods, organic meat, etc. I also like having a variety so he tries new things and learns new flavors/textures. His pincher grasp has really developed and he can pick up puffs, peas and other small items and get them right in this mouth.

I never thought that Pres would be such an adventurous eater at 8 months old. There's really nothing he won't try and he seems to like pretty much everything we've given him. I made vegan sweet potato, black bean and quinoa chili for dinner last night and he devoured an entire bowl of it. His teachers at daycare joke when we drop him off in the mornings over what sort of food he'll be eating that day. I know there will be phases when all he wants to eat is macaroni and cheese and chicken nuggets, but for now, I'm loving my healthy eating 8 month old!