Baby Bean & Mum

What a mess! We're still learning, next time I think we'll do it on a wipeable surface, like in the kitchen, but we wanted baby bean to eat with us as being Sunday that meant eating in the lounge in front of Antiques Roadshow!

Messy stuff but she seemed to like it! Typical to text book, she held it by the bushy bit and chewed the stalk!

mmmmm, sugar free and baby friendly! I came across this on the BLW forum and thought i'd better practice (!) for when baby bean can have some, wouldn't be right to give her something i'd never had myself! I've slightly adapted this, you could do so much!

MMMMMMMMMMM YUMMMY!


Ingredients

• 1 Egg
• 2oz Butter
• 4oz SR Flour (i only had plain so added 2 tsp of baking powder)
• 8oz Banana
• Tsp ground cinnamon
• 3oz Dried Fruits, I used cranberries.

In a bowl mix the cinnamon in with the flour and rub in the butter. In a seperate bowl whisk the egg and add the banana and mash together, i tried to use a fork but ended up using the potato masher, much better!
Mix it all together and put in a greased tin or one lined with baking paper. I couldn't find a loaf tin so used the one above... put in the oven, pre-heated to about 170 degrees c for 30 mins. If in a loaf tin i'd up the time by 10 mins to make sure its cooked through, and voila! sugar free goodness, i suppose if you ate half the cake then it would be 1 of your 5 a day! good excuse for another slice!

Good old Marks and Spencer, pre-packaged, prepared and probably flown in on a private jet from Timbuctooo, but hey, why not!
She loved it!

We've been exploring more fruit and veg. I try to offer baby bean something at least once a day. Its not being eaten, just played with, sucked and chewed which is what i was expecting! Cant believe we even got round to taking pictures, go mum!

So here we have CUCUMBER! She has quite sore gums this morning so i thought she could have a couple of sticks of cucumber for breakfast while i had hummous on toast (garlic for breakfast, only on a satdee!).
I'm afraid i'm going to have to put all the pictures up cos they're so funny!

he he he, that last one, the concentration on her face!

...if you could call it a snack! Hopefully its also something I can share with baby bean soon, minus the pesto of course (the salt content in this posh m&s one is through the roof!).


Mmmmm, so, toast a slice of bread (only one, we're being good). Whilst its in the toaster mix 2 eggs in a bowl and pour into a hot baby pan (by baby i mean about 7 inches wide), grab a tomato and the pesto from the fridge and chop as much tomato as you like, spread some pesto on the toast, pile on the chopped toms and then your cooked omelette, and VOILA! Nom Noms....

You could also scramble your eggs, i've been known to boil 2 eggs then decide i want them on my toast as above and peel them, still hot OUCH, poach, add a slice of ham, or bacon... naughty

Baby bean is growing fast and i have been looking into Baby led weaning. Its not a knew fandangled weaning technique, its just that it now has a name. I'm pretty sure it was what my grandparents and great grandparents did with their children. It seems like common sense to me, baby bean has been watching us closely whenever we drink from a cup or glass, whenever we eat and put things to our mouth and she is even trying to grab things from my plate and put in her mouth. It seems as if it is all natural to her, she already feeds herself from my boob so why not with food?

I 've been looking into this and researching as much as i can. I have been reading the only book i can find about it, Baby-led Weaning by Gill Rapley & Tracey Murkett, which has been a great insight into the pros and cons of this method.

There are also some fantastic mums out there who are sharing their experiances on the web, below are a few of the sites i have found extremely useful:

• Babyledweaning.com,  a very helpful site
• My BLW Experiences, a mums blog about her journey
• http://www.yummity.co.uk/Another mums blog
• Baby Centre BLW Group, where you can ask as many questions you need!

We still need to wait a little while till baby bean can sit unaided and upright till she joins us from every meal but for now she has been enjoying sucking on a couple of pieces of fruit whenever i have one myself...