The first smile.  The first time he made eye contact. When he chuckled.  When he rolled over.  His first unassisted nap.  These are some of the milestones I have heard about over and over again since becoming a Mom.  I have loved each and every one of these milestones, except the unassisted nap.  Maybe because we’re still working on that one.  But my favorite milestone so far has been introducing solid foods.  Why?  Because his facial expressions as he tastes each new flavor absolutely charming, endearing and hilarious.  When I ask other Moms why they don’t talk about how fun this stage is I often get a similar answer: “It is so stressful and confusing to know what to do!”  Ugh! This bums me out because this is such a fun milestone, but I get it.  When I reviewed the options with my pediatrician on how to introduce solid food there was so much to think about.  To help, I’ve put together a list of the tips that helped us keep things relaxed and fun during dinner time.

Make sure your little one is ready for solid foods ( 1):  How do you know if your baby is ready to start solid foods?  First I made sure that Beckham fit all of the criteria on the “Introducing solids” checklist on BabyCenter. Then, I made a point to discuss my options with his pediatrician at his four month appointment.  She gave us the green light and we started solids shortly afterwards.

Start small. Start slow. ( 2):  Your pediatrician might tell you that depending on your child’s age, breastmilk or formula should still be the primary source of calories for your little one.  Therefore, introducing solid foods is more for getting familiar with new flavors, testing for allergies, and introducing textures.  Start slow.  We started by serving him one teaspoon of solid food per day and then gradually added another teaspoon each week.

Introduce one new food each week ( 3):  Our pediatrician told us to serve him one new food per week so that we could start to rule out any allergies.  She even recommended that we serve him common allergens such as peanuts and eggs as new research suggests that introducing these early actually decreases the chance of developing a longer-term allergy.

Keep it fun ( 4): When I was a baby, the common “first food” was rice cereal.  Today, many pediatricians are saying that it really doesn’t matter what you feed them as long as it is soft, safe and nutritious.  This could include oats, yogurt, lentils, vegetables or fruit.

Be seasonal (5):  Once you have ruled out any allergies, you can start having fun with mixing different flavors.  Many food companies even have fun fall flavors with apple, pumpkins and cranberries fin it.  Yum!  Each week we like to introduce a new complexity of flavors and textures –  keeping is seasonal, of course.  Teaching my baby why food is one of the greatest pleasures of life has been oh-so-fun!

What advice do you have for new Moms starting their baby on solid foods?