Forum : Mums

hi amy.
you start on one meal - but when i say meal, it is literally a few tea spoonfuls to begin with. after a while, when she is comfortable with it, then you can introduce a second and third meal. you can then increase the portion sizes. you will want her to be on 3 meals a day by the time she is about 7 months old. it isnt a race, so let her adjust to things in her own time but let her be your guide. get a wide variety of foods and let her milk intake decrease naturally as she wants more solid food. definitely wise to make your own - jars are fine for convenience if you are out and about etc, but home made is much better. my eldest was home made food weaned and now at 4yrs old is not fussy at all. both my sister's kids were only given jarred food at are the fussiest eaters i've ever met (they are 6 and nearly 5 years old|).
the only thing she should drink is water or formula. baby juices are fine occassionally, but water or formula are best.
she still needs 17-20oz of milk a day. her milk intake will drop as she takes more solid food - that is fine and that is totally normal. by the time my eldest was 8 months old she was having a bottle of milk in the morning, 3 solid meals with puddings after lunch and dinner and then a bottle of milk before bed.
you're a long way off needing to give her snacks! she needs to be on 3 meals a day with pudding and enough milk first. once she is on that and if she is hungry in between meals, then snacks, but you're possibly looking at at least 10 months, possibly a year old before that'll need to happen.

meant to say. i home made all my daughter's meals but i based her portion sizes of a jar suitable for her age. with your baby being 6 months old, base her portion sizes on say, half a 4 month+ jar and see how she goes. you can increase that to a full jar size when she is ready.
it is all very confusing when trying to gauge how much. the best thing is to get her to the recommended amount of milk (17-20oz of milk) and then give her the solid food on top to keep her satisfied.

oh, another thing.

my eldest used to have a solid meal, and then a bottle afterwards. as she started taking less and less out of the bottles during the day, i then replaced the bottle with a pudding until she was only having a bottle in the morning and one at night.

Thanks for the great advice, things are much clearer now. just a few more questions, when i have made the foods can i freeze them and how long for, also how do i defrost the food, do i take it out of the freezer the day before or do i defrost in microwave