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What an exciting time, your baby is just about ready to try their first foods! Before you begin, make sure you have these baby led weaning essentials on hand first.
Now, this article isn’t to convince you to feed your baby solids the baby led weaning way. It’s to help you gather all the essential items needed to feed your baby no matter which route you decide is best.
Let’s face it, weaning babies from milk to solids is a big step. It’s kind of scary too (especially if you’re a first-time parent).
So, what items will you really need to wean your baby? Let’s find out!
Baby Weaning Essentials When Starting Solids
1) Baby Led Weaning Course
Should you decide to feed your baby the baby led weaning way, this online course is my top essential.
Taking a baby led weaning course will help set you and your baby up for success.
The course I took was Infant Feeding: the Baby-led Way by Feeding Littles.
I had looked into other courses available and to be frank I actually was set to get another until I saw the price tag. And I’m pleased I ended up getting the Feeding Littles course instead.
The Infant Feeding: the Baby-led Way is 100% self-paced & covers a ton of ground around the subject, but my personal favorites were:
- How to prevent choking hazards & keep your baby safe while BLW
- Food & Meal Ideas to offer baby
- All about allergenic foods and nutrition
- How to incorporate BLW and Milk Feedings together
Because I love their course so much, I reached out to them to see if they’d be willing to offer a discount for you guys and they did!
If you’d like to get started learning how to begin baby led weaning, simply enroll in their Infant Feeding: the Baby-led Way –> HERE and apply code: FITMOMMYSTRONG at checkout for $10 off your purchase!
You can also snag their Feeding Littles: Toddlers course using the same code (FITMOMMYSTRONG) to save $10 off that purchase as well!
Now that you’re on your way to understanding the solid foundation behind how to incorporate baby led weaning, let’s jump into the other essential items you’ll need!
2) Sturdy High Chair
When it comes to feeding solids, it’s crucial to ensure you have a sturdy high chair for your little one.
You want your baby’s high chair to be supportive and stable, but more importantly, promote a healthy sitting dynamic (this can help prevent choking by the way).
This means a high chair with a supportive footrest, supportive seat base, and tray that sits just in front of baby (if it comes with a tray).
Other bonus features would be things like a removable tray, something that’s compact for small spaces, an aesthetically nice chair to look at, something that’s easy to wipe down and clean — but remember most important is stability.
That being said, there’s no doubt there are a TON of high chair options out there. So, here are my choices:
- If pricing is of no concern, I highly suggest the Stokke Tripp Trapp High Chair. It is one of the most versatile high chairs featuring a 5 point harness and a very easy-to-clean seat! It’s no surprise it’s one of the most recommended highchairs around.
- If you need a more budget-friendly and somewhat compact high-chair, the Stokke Clikk High Chair is the one for you! Plus, if you like to travel, this chair is travel-friendly!
3) Baby Food Maker/Cooker
Making your own baby food is probably one of the easiest things to do. It might seem a little intimidating at first, but with the right tools and accessories, it’s easy as pie!
I know, I know, why would anyone want to make their own baby food when grocery stores are literally LOADED with jars of baby food? Well, when you make your own baby food, you know EXACTLY what’s inside of it!
That’s where a baby food cooker like this one comes in extra handy!
If you’re baby led weaning, simply place your fresh veggies into the steamer side and let it cook.
If you’re starting with purees, put those fresh fruits and veggies in the blender side and puree away!
This particular baby food maker can also defrost and warm up baby’s food (and it doubles as a bottle warmer too!).
4) Silicone Suction Baby Plate
You’re 100% able to use any plate you’d like, but I highly suggest the EZPZ First Foods Set.
This little set comes in handy because the plate has a non-slip design where it practically suctions onto almost ANY surface it’s on.
This means less mess for parents to clean and easier for baby to explore and navigate when their food stays in place.
If you don’t want the full set, you can also grab one of the mini-mats instead.
This ended up being my favorite mat out of all the ones we had and I loved that you could just roll it up & stash it easily in the diaper bag when we’re on the go!
5) Long Sleeve Baby Bibs
Listen, baby led weaning or puree feeding is MESSY.
I went through so many different baby bibs, mess after mess until one day, I came across these lifesavers.
Trust me when I tell you that food will get everywhere. Thankfully these bibs made the mess much easier to clean up.
What I particularly liked was that the actual body part of the bib has a little food pocket so that whenever food falls onto the bib, it doesn’t just slide off onto the floor, it slides into the little pocket.
Don’t make more work cleaning up an inevitable mess, grab one of these long sleeve bibs instead!
6) Open cup for baby
Using a small open cup, like this cute little tiny cup is an excellent way to help baby begin learning the first steps to drinking from an open cup!
I began using the tiny cup with my son when he was able to comprehend the idea behind grabbing things and bringing them to his mouth — that way he’d be able to grab the cup and bring it to his mouth.
Plus, learning to drink from an open cup at an earlier age helps support baby with their oral and speech development.
Try out the tiny cup for yourself (they come in a variety of cute colors too — we used the grey ones!).
7) Baby Led Weaning Utensils
Giving baby the opportunity to explore with tiny utensils for those tiny curious hands-only helps their sensory and motor skills develop further, so don’t forget to offer it to them.
I’ve tried a few different brands with my first and these are the 3 I really liked the most:
- NumNum Pre-Spoon GOOtensils (100% recommend when baby isn’t coordinated and needs help learning the concept of using a utensil)
8) Water Wipes
Alright, you can totally get away with simply using a washcloth and some warm water here.
However, I love the idea of having a set of baby wipes available because baby led weaning is messy work.
Although it’s important to allow baby to explore and have fun with their foods, you also want to be able to clean up nearby messes when food lands on the floor, nearby furniture, or even on baby’s head!
I personally found that water wipes work phenomenally well for wiping up, but again — a washcloth and water work well too!
There you have it. 7 Baby Led Weaning essentials every parent should have!
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