A week of Weaning

Well, seven days ago we decided to have a bash at getting Joseph to swallow some white mush.
It actually went quite well, he was eager for the food, leaning forwards and opening his mouth for the spoon. Most of it was actually swallowed, although a fair proportion did end up smeared around his face. He had a baby rice goatee.
Every evening since we have been trying to persuade him to take a little baby rice and the results have been a little mixed, but good on the whole. Some days he has spat more out than swallowed and today he worked out that attempting to chatter through a mouthful of rice was actually quite fun. This morning I offered him his first breakfast of baby rice and he was a little confused, but did take some in the end. We're going to have a week of a little in the morning and a little in the evening. If all goes reasonably well I shall be introducing lunch which wont be rice, but some vegetable purée I made up and froze yesterday. So far we have a batch of swede and potato and some carrot and sweet potato. When it had cooled down and I was about to put it in the freezer, I gave him some of the swede mix. He took it, but refused to swallow. It went round and round in his mouth, eventually depositing itself on his bib in little yellowy blobs. When it comes to the real thing, I'm going to wet it down with a lot of formula milk, might stand more chance that way. I think I also might get him a plastic poncho to wear and a matching one for myself when he inevitably ends up throwing it at me. I've already had to pick dried baby rice out of my hair, not a fun experience!