Obviously, other concerns have already been addressed. To answer your question about WHEN, time-wise, to offer solids... it really depends on what works best for you and your LO. You may have to experiment with timing for a while, as you probably did with nap & activity lengths, etc.
Some parents offer solids
with a bottle feeding - they'll feed about half the bottle, then do solids, then the rest of the bottle. That's fine, if you don't notice a drop in milk intake and your LO will let you stop halfway through a bottle. (Our DS won't even let us
burp him, halfway through a bottle! LOL)
Some parents offer solids about an hour after the bottle. If your LO shows an interest in eating that soon after a bottle, that would probably work well. (Our darling, spirited LO is never hungry at this time.) You'll know your LO doesn't have enough appetite to eat at that time, if she is too distracted to eat.
We started solids at 4 mo, with our ped's blessing. Our DS was almost 17 lbs (gained 10 lbs since birth), eating well & showing an interest in our foods. It's frequently recommended to add a morning feeding first. That way, when you start a new food, if there's an allergic reaction, it'll be during the day (instead of keeping you up at night). We started with a mid-morning solids feed (our DS isn't as hungry in the a.m.) and, once we'd done that for a while, we added a dinnertime solids feed (so Dad could feed him after work). We always give new foods at the earliest solids feeding, and once he's had the new food for 2-3 days, we start rotating it into any of the solids feeds.
What's worked best for us is feeding solids about an hour before milk - but that obviously wouldn't fit with your routine. You might try offering solids about 7:30am or 11:30am, and see how that goes. Also check out the solids FAQ:
https://babywhispererforums.com/index.php?board=94.0What questions did you have about "how" to do it?
- LisaW
