Top tips to prepare for weaning

Before having a baby it might feel like weaning is very far away, but the first few months can pass quickly and weaning is suddenly just around the corner. Here are my three top tips to prepare for weaning:

Sign up for a starting solids course
To prepare for weaning, you can do a weaning course with Vicki at New Baby Company (a company I’ve also since been blogging for) in her lovely home in Wimbledon. I remember doing the course when my daughter was four and a half months old, and it was a great help in getting us set for the challenges ahead. Most new mums choose to do the course when baby is around four to six months old, and Vicki brings out baby gyms and makes it easy for mums to bring their little ones along to the course.

Invest in a steamer/blender
After doing the course, the first step is to buy all the new products needed for this new stage in baby’s life, and if you want to make the weaning phase as easy for yourself as possible, it can be useful to have a steamer/blender. Vicki demonstrated how to use the popular Philips Avent combined steamer/blender as part of the weaning course, and I remember feeling relieved that this made cooking nutritious baby food seem relatively straightforward. I ended up buying the Beaba Babycook Duo, which has two jugs, and was a good option for me since we didn’t have a microwave oven and I used Babycook for defrosting and cooking simultaneously.

Prepare for messy eating
After starting the weaning process, top stain removers can suddenly become an interesting topic of conversation. It’s difficult to avoid baby making a mess in the early days of weaning, but to minimise damage it’s worth buying long-sleeved bibs that are easy to clean, trainer cups that are easy for baby to hold, plastic bowls that can’t break and weaning spoons that are designed for first tastes. Some long-sleeved smocks, such as the ones from BabyBjorn, are long-lasting, as they can be effective for covering children when doing art activities and messy play as they grow older.