so many questions..so confused and worried :s

[Krissy18]

I am stressing bigtime about my almost 9 month old DS eatting habits. He is STILL mostly on jarred foods and purees i make but i would so like him to try other finger foods and foods with more texture.
I have tried strips of cheese and mum mums so far as finger foods. he likes the mum mums and i use them as practice food but the cheese just breaks in his little hand. how do we fix this?
I have a few questions and I was hoping to get a least a short answer on them..
1) do i give juice? whats the benefit and how much shoudl i give?
2) cheerios..should i introduce? i heard of putting them in yogurt to soften them up a bit..
3) tommorow we are trying yogurt for the first time however the tub seems too big for him. can i keep for two days if i transfer to another container?
4) i keep hearing abuot giving toast? toast fingers? what are these?
5) what fruits can i give as finger foods? grapes? pear?
6) what crackers can i give

keep in mind he has NO teeth.

we have tried pastina as well, but he doesnt seem to like texture..im really stressed over this and i could use some help...

[daybyday]

sorry, just trying to answer quick...but STOP stressing...if he's eating and gaining...GREAT..but I do agree, time to get him on some more "table" style foods....

1) I personally do not feel juice is necessary...FRUIT is, water in a sippy along with it! If you do choose to start juice, I would portion 1/10...meaning 9 parts water, 1 part juice.

2) Cheerios should be fine. I would put give them dry on the highchair. It's also a great tool for learning dexterity.

3) Are you talking the individual servings of yoghurt? I would open one and put a couple tbsp's in another bowl. Save the rest covered for the next day.

4) Toast fingers...Toast a slice of bread, slice long ways. I personally preferred to cube.

5) ANY fruit that you have checked for allergies you can give him. I preferred to cube roughly the size of a pea. Grapes are a choking hazard, so if you choose to give them I would quarter them in slivers. (stay away from "round")

6) Crackers are a tough one, a lot of preservatives in them. Any baby style cracker or whole wheat, again just watching size.

You mentioned the cheese. I would cube hard cheese *cheddar, mozzarella and serve them on the train along with cheerios.

He can try regular pasta cooked soft, placed on his tray, we found penne, cut in half and rotini really successful.

Babies gums are rocked hard, and stronger than they look. My dd was on table meats with only two teeth...

Just watch the sizes and allow him to explore the food with his mouth. Use the appropriate language with him too, such as, chew babe, chew. If you find he's struggling with a piece, encourage him to cough, sweep his mouth if necessary, but DO NOT panic....he's watching you...Encourage him as he munches!

Good luck, again DO NOT stress....

HTH's! (sorry was typing fast...)

Marie

[momtonb&ab]

marie's advice is fantastic on all points.  i can't think of much more to say, just to remind you to go gently on yourself!   i too stressed so much about foods, but it will all come in time........go easy on yourself!  he is happy and healthy and gaining, the rest will follow.   don't be afraid to try new things, but don't get discouraged if it isn't an instant hit.  it often takes many offerings to even see the cherrios go into the mouth    hang in there, you are doing a GREAT job!

[Krissy18]

Thank you SO MUCH! Will update on how it goes!

[daybyday]

you are very welcome...hope it goes well!

[jess, lukeys_mom]

I second Marie's excellent advice!  And just wanted to add that you can pretty much continue to do what you're doing, but then add more and more finger foods. If I were you I would try to put a finger food on the tray for each lunch and dinner - and don't stress if/when he doesn't pick it up. He will get there in his own time - just keep providing him with the opportunity.

You will be quite surprised at how much your lo will be able to chew with his gums.  At his age the best finger food for us were rice cakes, Luke loved them, just plain and dry. also small chunks of banana were really good. And he loved/still loves peas and corn as a finger food. I would just smush them up with a fork a tiny bit to make them less round.

Before he had teeth, cucumber sticks were great too, he just gummed them and sucked. with teeth then we had to cut them in small cubes.

[Krissy18]

thanks alot!

i did some peaches this morning and he really liked it..he didnt pick them up but i put them in his hand and he knew what to do with them!

he chewed them right up!

regarding the rice cakes..arent they a little too hard to chew? i was thinking the same about the cheerios actually?

[daybyday]

no no....a LO's gums are much harder than people think....He will gum them, and they will get soggy...

[Krissy18]

great..i will get some then..so plain rice cakes and cheerios?
do the rice cakes have salt? i hope not..and the cheerios..can i get the multigrain ones?

[daybyday]

some rice cakes do, some don't, just check ingredients. As for multigrain cheerios. Has he had all his grains? the other thing, I can't quite remember, and I don't have any in the house to double check...but I think the Multigrain have honey in them. Which they say is an allergen food...I (personally) would stick the reg. oat cheerios...there's a touch of sugar, but nothing too concerning.

If he's had wheat, puffed wheat is great too.

[Krissy18]

he has had wheat..i will just get the reg cheerios..i like them too!
all this excites me so sorry for all the q's
so the yogurt i can keep for two days..i will just spoon out what i think he will eat and then put the rest in a container for tommorow..hopefully he likes it, we are trying today for the first time, i bought something called Yobaby?

what else hmmmmmm..oh yes..the bottles..his naps are all over the place now cause of long A times so i dropped it down at 3 7oz bottles. how does this routine look timing wise

730 7 oz
830/9 breakfast
1230/1 lunch
2/230 7 oz
330 snack..just added this in , is it necessary?
530/6 dinner
8pm 7oz
820/30 sleep till tommorow! (and dont think of waking up at 5 lol)!

[daybyday]

I'm not sure about Yobaby, I've heard others have given it. I always gave plain Balkan style yoghurt (6% fat) and could mix fruit in as necessary....

"Ideally" you want a 12 hour day....that can be tweaked if necessary....His milk is still more important than solids.

Something like

7:30 wake, bottle
8:30 breakfast
11:30 bottle
12:30 Lunch
3ish bottle/snack (like cheerios or something)
5ish Dinner
7:00 Bottle
7:30 bed

That would be my "aim"...I didn't bottle feed, so I'm not sure...might want to post on the bottle feeding board...but I *think* 24 oz is about milk intake...so maybe 6oz bottles? ack, now I'm out of my element! LOL

[jess, lukeys_mom]

The 24oz is pretty right on for his age, at 9 months you still want to make sure he's getting most of his nutrition from milk until he is really established in eating solids. If you want to add in that extra bottle then that works, otherwise you can also offer 8 oz per feed. I breast fed but also gave bottles of ebm and gave 4 milk feeds a day until abut 10.5 mo.

I am not in the US but when we went to visit ILs there they bought Luke Yobaby and it had sugar. Tiny amounts of sugar don't bother me much but I would rather Luke does not develop a sweet tooth from added sugar and instead gets his sweet tastes from fruits, which he still does, so this was a big thing for me. We also gave the plain yersions of everything such as yogurt (full fat).

Also one more suggestion of a great food to try out is avocado mashed with a fork. You can try hard-boiled egg yolks (not the whites) too. Both have a little bit of texture and are good baby foods.

Don't mind the questions...I can talk about food all day... and nice that you are getting excited about it. It really is fun to watch your lo start to experiment with food.

[momtonb&ab]

we buy a yogourt called Little Ones made with full fat milk.   No sugar added and they love it but we alternate with plain just so they get used to the stuff without fruit added.  and I agree with Jess about the avocado, my guys loved it spread on toast!  At 9 months I also offered scrambled eggs (no allergy concerns here) and that was a huge hit for them! 

we used regular cheerios, they had the fewest ingredients!  Baby MumMum's were a huge hit and i think they really helped little gums with teeth. 

also, soft small bites of brocolli, and little bits of soft carrott, all awesome choices and fun to touch!

[Krissy18]

we do 3 7 oz bottles a day because he was leaving at least 2oz from the 1130 bottle and other midday bottle so i dropped it to three and he doesnt seem to mind..he is 21 pounds, big for his age so no concern with weight gain..we will see at his next appt i guess..but i think he is ok with the three bottles..it wasnt really working out timewise anyway cause he was getting one at 730, then since his long A time he would get on after his nap which would be at 1230, then wasnt hungry for lunch and lunch got pushed to like 130/2, then has a cat nap from 430-5 and was getting another bottle at 5, then dinner at 6 and another bottle at 8, everything was too squished so i figured since he was leaving the few oz's in the bottles anyway that i would just make them 7oz instead of 6 and give him three instead of 4 ..it spaces out nicer.

anyway..i bought the cheerios..we will try tommorow..im wondering if i should soften with up in the yogurt a bit?