Baby food necessary or just for “fun”?

Question

My baby is 6 months (literally just turned 6 months) and everyone has been on my ass to feed him food. I exclusively breast feed. I was thinking of starting him now. I want to do a bit of BLW and purées. 
My question is, is it necessary? Meaning should I make sure he is actually eating the food? Or is it all for fun to see what he likes/doesn’t like? How often should I be giving him food? I know one new food a week, but should I give breakfast lunch and dinner or? Should I miss a milk feeding and give him food instead? And If it’s not necessary when does it become necessary? 
Sorry for all the questions, I’m a first time mama! Everyone’s been driving me nuts with all of this.

Answer

Food before 1 is just for fun . Not necessary

Answer

Baby food is actually necessary...it helps tune motor skills in their mouth. The "just for fun" is a myth..
If you do BLW youre not supposed to mix it with purees...its one or the other.
When i started ny daughter on purees i started with just breakfast..then moved to breakfast & lunch...then added dinner by 7 months..by 9 or 10 months she was eating all table food.

Answer

I tried purée for my baby when she was about 6 months, but she didn’t take to it. We started baby led weaning around 8 months and she responded better to that. She just ate what we ate in age appropriate bites and if we were eating something she couldn’t, I’d just make her something easy like veggies. They don’t need food as a milk replacement until they get to about a year. Don’t let anyone pressure you into feeding your baby if you don’t feel like they are ready. Just hitting an age milestone isn’t enough. They have to be sitting up well, good head support, etc.

Answer

Baby good is not necessary. I give my 6 month old her normal bottle and then after we do a little bit of food once a day. It’s not meant to substitute the milk they get. Babies don’t need anything besides milk for the first year

Answer

Definitely don’t skip on milk until 1!

Answer

Like others are saying not necessary. Food before one just for fun . We tried baby food and our son hated it we didn't try soft foods until probably 7-8 months. And it was just to get different tastes .

Answer

I have 4 kids. For one,  it just took them longer to get used to it and then they took well to it (more like 7 or 8 months). For another, they were never really into purees and started solids straight to soft table foods around 8 or 9 months, so never really had purees. 3 of my kids never liked the cereals so we did sweet potatoes or pears etc with no cereal. So you can definitely customize feeding according to your baby. Keep trying here and there, but no pushing. I would not reduce breastfeeding just to try to get them to eat purees.

Answer

I started at 4 months just once a day with purees. I think by 6 months I did purees twice a day and included yogurt. At 8 months I started giving him very small pieces of real food like pancakesand just kept working his way up from there.

Answer

Mama of three here! You seriously don’t ‘need’ to. I held it off longer with each child I had, mostly because they weren’t too interested until 8mos or so. Every child is different! If you LO still seems hungry, maybe try some cereal and add in a purée fruit. But if all is well with growth and happiness. Don’t need to push it yet. 😉

Baby food necessary or just for “fun”?

Let’s Glow

Glow is here for you on your path to pregnancy

25+ million

4.8 stars

20+

Getting Pregnant

Pregnancy

1st Year (Baby & You)

Baby Products