Baby-lead Weaning, or "BLW" for short, is a method of feeding in which an infant feeds him or herself. There is no spoon feeding of baby cereals or purees involved. Baby is offered appropriately sized pieces of whatever the rest of the family is eating (within reason) and is allowed to touch, taste, smell, and play with "real" solid foods from the very beginning.
The thinking behind it is that with BLW, baby will learn to chew and move food around the mouth before swallowing, whereas with purees, the food is sucked off a spoon to the back of the mouth and then swallowed. Baby quickly learns how to manage different sizes, shapes, and textures of food by being given the opportunity to choose which foods they're going to eat. They also learn which individual foods they do or don't like, which is harder when several different foods are blended together in a puree. Baby's fine motor skills also develop quickly when given the opportunity to handle food and feed themselves.
Originally Mike and I had planned to make our own baby purees, but then I recently learned about BLW. The method makes sense to me, so I told Mike and it and we decided to try it. I bought the book Baby Led Weaning by Gill Rapley, which goes into great detail about the benefits, foods to avoid, and how to help your baby learn to love food! I also quickly found the BLW Facebook group and an online forum where there are hundreds of moms talking about their experiences with this method.
To some this may seem like a new way of doing things, but what was done before blenders were invented, and before commercial baby foods were available? Babies probably fed themselves! Join me as I document our journey with BLW; I will try to include lots of pictures and video of Brandon learning all about food!
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