[MLBW]

Hi.

My son is 9 months old. We also started trying to feed him solids at 5 months old. We started with pureed pears because one book recommended it. He wasn't a fan. In fact, he just kept pushing anything put in his mouth out so we went slow and gave him a couple-week break. My experience is that it is best to start feeding a baby when they start to show interest in what mommy and daddy are eating.

So, next we did an organic brown rice cereal mixed with hot water--started with a tablespoon. He ate that for a few weeks. At the same time I started pureeing apples and he really liked those. His favorite was the rice cereal mixed with pureed apples. Before long he could easily eat 4 or 5 tablespoons of that at two feedings--one in the morning around 10 am and another in the mid-afternoon.

Now our son is eating jarred baby foods and some of mommy and daddy's food, mushed up or broken into small pieces. He is starting to self-feed with some foods.

It's funny: The foods we thought our son would definitely like, like peaches, he totally detested and the stranger things we let him try (curried dahl with jalenenos, thai hot sauce, raspberries, lemons...) he really liked! Now he is starting to get a taste for tomato pasta! Today he had his first helping of yoghurt with strawberries blended into it--it was sorta like baby ice cream for him!

Some people have allergy concerns with their children and so they are really careful to keep anything associated with gluten or dairy out of their child's diet for quite some time.

My husband is Chinese. I'm Caucasian. Both of our families are 100% allergy free so we haven't been as concerned. Our son did have a little reaction to some green beans we fed him so we just sorta nixed that from his diet.

Have fun with the feedings!