We’re sister-in-laws and mummies to two beautiful girls. I married Sophie’s twin brother Ben 3 years ago and we have a 21 month old daughter, Blake Valentine, and Sophie has a beautiful seven month old baby girl called Callie with her husband Josh.

Together, we started our Instagram blog to share our experiences of motherhood and prove that there really is no right or wrong answer – and we’re all just here winging it!

This blog post is dedicated to weaning. I’ll go first…

When I started weaning I felt overwhelmed with the amount of different approaches out there, so I did what I knew – purée. Unfortunately for me, Blake Valentine simply refused to eat off a spoon. I found the first few weeks of weaning extremely stressful because mealtimes would always end in tears (hers, not mine haha!) and I ended up feeling disheartened because I’d spend so much time (and money) making these purées only for her to refuse them and cry. Eventually, I had no choice but to offer her finger food and use the baby led weaning approach (BLW). This method means that you introduce complementary foods to a baby’s diet by adding them to their breastmilk or formula. Blake took to it really well but I found I was the issue. I had a fear of her choking and found myself pulling food out of her mouth that she was happily chewing on. I even consulted a weaning specialist (@feedeatspeak) to help me with my anxiety and it was the best money I ever spent! Within a few days both Blake and I were enjoying mealtimes, she was willingly trying anything I offered her and I was so relieved. I trusted she knew what she was doing and yes, she did gag, but she was okay. She is 22 months now and she’s a fantastic eater, she loves trying new foods and I have a toddler cutlery set with a safe knife that she uses to help me prepare food. It’s one of her favourite activities…

T x

Hi! Sophie here… My experience with weaning has been really up and down. I took Talya’s initial approach and used the BLW method to introduce vegetables into Callie’s diet. I was also really apprehensive because I felt uncomfortable watching Callie gag – which is still very often. As a 7 month old baby, she’s still weaning onto solid foods so every day is a completely different day with her. Some days she loves food and the next she won’t even open her mouth unless it’s a fruit puree pouch or Ella’s puffs. It can be extremely irritating because I want her to get all of the goodness and nutrients that breast milk provides and thensome! In recent weeks, I’ve found that changing my own attitude to mealtimes makes it more enjoyable for both of us.

The best advice I can give to anyone who is at their wits end right now is to relax and trust the process, don’t force anything to happen that isn’t natural and things will always get better. As T says, there’s no right or wrong answer – T is a baby sleeping consultant and I’m a qualified life coach so we often find we have different approaches that have similarly effective results! If you feel like you’re on your own, feel free to drop us a DM at @Bondedbybabies or look out for our Instagram Live Q&As to ask us anything at all!

Sx