Arlene Peck (2m 3s):

I was actually a little surprised. I thought he was going to eat more, but he was definitely interested in the food. He was excited about trying to grab things out of the bowl. I think he's still learning how to, you know, grab and put things in his mouth and whatnot.

Katie Ferraro (2m 18s):

Hey there I'm Katie Ferraro Registered Dietitian college nutrition professor and mom of seven specializing in baby led weaning here on the baby led weaning made easy podcast. I help you strip out all of the noise and nonsense about feeding, leading you with the competence and knowledge. You need to give your baby a safe start to solid foods using baby led weaning. Well, Hey guys, and welcome back today. I'm talking to a new baby led weaning mom. Well, she's not a new mom because she actually just had her for the baby, but she's new to baby Led Weaning. My guest today is my real life. In-person friend, Arlene Peck.

Katie Ferraro (2m 58s):

And I'm so excited because I'm with her six month old baby, Jacob, this week, he's just starting solid food. So this is all happening in real time. So I want to give you Arlene's backstory before we jump into the interview. So I'm the oldest of six kids I grew up in and currently live in Poway, California, just outside of San Diego. One of my younger brothers has been best friends with Arlene's husband forever. Like literally since they were born. So when that friend got married to Arlene and I would say they were in my opinion, relatively young or right out of college, but basically the Peck family, they were the first in our friends group to have a baby. So Arlene now has a 13 year old, a twelve-year-old and a nine-year-old. Okay. And then last year she found out she was pregnant with their fourth.

Katie Ferraro (3m 40s):

Can you imagine eight and a half years after Ken got a baby stage she's pregnant. And I remember not really being all that surprised, cause I always was like, Hmm. I wonder if they would have more kids. Cause they started so early. But my first thought, when I found out she was pregnant with like, oh my gosh, I bet she has like, no baby stuff left. Right? Like having to start over from scratch. I know for those of you guys are in the thick of it, like it's a lot. Right. But the thing I was most surprised about was even when, like from the moment she found out she was pregnant, Arlene was so excited about doing baby Led, Weaning. I mean, she kept talking about that and she said like, I didn't know about this with my older kids. And I'd been learning about baby led weaning Katie. And I can't wait to try it out. And like this was before the baby was born. And I know some of you listening are like that anal and organized and like, I totally respect you too.

Katie Ferraro (4m 23s):

But just the level of excitement that Arlene had about doing baby Led Weaning, I was like, we got to capitalize on this. So basically fast forward, Jacob is six months old as of last week, he just started sitting upright. And I guess before I talked about Jacob, I should tell you guys the thing about Arlene's older kids and these are her words, not mine, but our older kids are pretty picky eaters and how they deal with that. And to what level that's, you know, impacted their family dynamic. That's her private information. And we just never want to label our kids or shame them or go around identifying them based on their eating habits. So I do just want to give you guys some context here though, that Arlene is coming to baby Led Weaning for the same reason that a lot of you who have an older child or children, or maybe a picky eating toddler are as well.

Katie Ferraro (5m 10s):

Your interested in the potential for baby led weaning to reduce the severity or the likelihood of picky eating. And you guys will never hear me say that BLW prevents picky eating because it doesn't okay. There is no scientifically proven way to absolutely prevent picky eating. The reality is that the majority of babies who will become toddlers will experience some degree of picky eating. It usually sets in in the second year of life. And we have this real and emerging body of research that supports the notion of diet diversity, meaning that the greater, the number of foods and flavors and tastes and textures that your baby is exposed to the less likely they are to be picky eaters and think about it.

Katie Ferraro (5m 54s):

Traditional spoonfeeding, those babies have usually tried about 10, 15 foods. Only by the time they turn one, if you lose those 10 or 15 foods to picky eating, that becomes an incredibly challenging child to feed, right? But if your baby has, let's say a hundred foods by the time they turn one and you lose 10 or 15 of those foods to picky eating no big deal, you still have 85 or 90 food flats that your baby will eat. So again, baby Led Weaning is not a promise to prevents picky eating, but rather if you can get that diet diversity in, especially early and often, when babies are in what I call the honeymoon feeding phase starts at about six months of age, when they're safe to eat extends till 12, 15, in some cases, even 18 months of age while they're like, and accept a wide variety of foods, you take advantage of that honeymoon feeding phase by really pushing your baby's palate.

Katie Ferraro (6m 43s):

It will pay off in the long run down the road in toddlerhood when yeah, your baby might have some picky eating, but it's not going to be as bad as you would only started with 10 or 15 foods. So that's, Arlene's why for doing baby Led Weaning. And she's going to be doing the a hundred FIRST FOODS approach. I'm going to be working with her and baby Jacob for their first 10 days. The first 10 days are the most crucial. So I hope you guys will follow along on her journey. We'll be sharing this on Instagram @babyledweanteam. If you want to grab my hundred FIRST FOODS list, I give it away to everyone on my free online workshop, which is called baby led weaning for beginners. You can sign up for this week's workshop times at babyledweaning.co, but Arlene is going to share a little bit about her story actually interviewing her right before we start day one with Jacob, just asking you a little bit about how she's feeling and kind of telling her backstory, and then we're going to go and feed baby Jacob, and then we're coming back and I'm interviewing her after to see how it went.

Katie Ferraro (7m 39s):

So just kind of a snapshot of real life, a mom Arlene Peck, my good friend and why she decided to do baby led weaning with her fourth baby after spoonfeeding her first three. All right, well hello, Arlene. Thanks so much for joining me here, actually in the office.

Arlene Peck (7m 55s):

Thank you for letting us come and for the introduction to baby Led Weaning.

Katie Ferraro (7m 58s):

All right. So it has been eight and a half years since you had a baby. Jacob is your fourth baby. Could you give us a little background, share as much as you want to or care to about how you introduce solid foods for your first kids and why you're interested in doing baby led weaning with Jacob.

Arlene Peck (8m 14s):

I was the first one of, kind of our friend group to have kids. And so I didn't really have any other examples of kind of what to look out for. So from the pediatrician, you know, they had said at four to six months, you can introduce the rice cereal. It was very much the pureed, everything, baby food. So only one food per week. And I have three very picky children. So I will actually. So Katie, when you were going through the baby led weaning and I was following you on Instagram, and then obviously just from seeing you, I was like intrigued at what you were doing. And I loved the idea of it.

Arlene Peck (8m 55s):

And so when I found out I was pregnant, I've literally been thinking of this the whole entire time and just really excited for Jacob to be six months so that we could start baby Led Weaning.

Katie Ferraro (9m 5s):

Awesome. And I remember when I found out you were pregnant, was like my first thought was she definitely has given all of her baby stuff away. Like you're going to have to start from scratch, not only physically with stuff, but psychologically. And if you're like a first time, mom again, you're so excited. You are so enthusiastic. And I know we have been talking about Jacob getting ready to start solid foods for so long. So I am so excited and I was just wanting to ask that we're going to start his first food today. We're going to start with avocado, which is a great first food. I'm just curious if there's anything that you're nervous about or just what your thoughts are going into this experience with Jacob for the first time or doing baby led weaning with the first time with any of your kids.

Arlene Peck (9m 44s):

I'm not actually nervous at all. I'm just super excited. So he has been very interested in food for well over a month now. So he watches us eat. He reaches for food, he moves his mouth while we're eating. And so, you know, he's at the point where he can sit up on his own now. So I'm just excited.

Katie Ferraro (10m 3s):

Could you tell us this stats real quick? Like, was he born full term? How much does he weigh now? How many weeks is he? You mentioned he sitting up how's he been fed so far? Just so parents can kind of get an understanding of where you are when you're starting solids with him. So

Arlene Peck (10m 16s):

He was, well, I mean, almost full term. I was induced a week early due to some medical concerns. So he was born six pounds, seven ounces. So he was about six and a half pounds. I don't remember what the percentage was when he was born. It was 10th percentile or something. And his last checkup, he's like, well into the 40th percentile. So he likes to eat and he was breastfed exclusively until about three weeks. And then he was basically sucking me dry. So I had to start supplementing with formula and he's been fed exclusively formula since about three months.

Katie Ferraro (10m 55s):

And could you share a little bit about a schedule right now? Exactly at six months, like real quick, what time does he wake up? How many ounces approximately are you doing bottle wise? And if you know when those are, if you could share that

Arlene Peck (11m 6s):

Usually wakes up right about six o'clock, maybe a little bit before, a little bit after sometimes I can pop the pacifier back in his mouth and he goes back to sleep for a little bit. But usually we'll say about six, he eats about an eight ounce bottle, almost every feeding, I would say sometimes it's seven, but he's eating about every three hours. So if he naps right before that three hour mark, then it's a little after. If he's awake the whole time, then it'll be about two and a half hours before you eat again. But he's eating, I would say on average about every three hours. And so it ends up being a five to six bottles.

Katie Ferraro (11m 40s):

And do you happen to know what the total ounces would be in a day then

Arlene Peck (11m 43s):

Counted it up? Cause I know we had talked about it. So he's he's between about 35 and 38 ounces of milk per day a formula.

Katie Ferraro (11m 51s):

And tell us a little bit about his medical history. Does Jacob have any allergies? Has he had any medical setbacks? Is he on any special formula?

Arlene Peck (11m 57s):

Nope. I just buy formula from Costco because it's the least expensive and he has had no issues

Katie Ferraro (12m 3s):

Medically and I'm really excited to do the a hundred FIRST FOODS with Jacob because when you go to Arlene's house, it is like no other place on the planet. So we live in Southern California, we live just north of San Diego. I live in a town called Poway. She lives in the next town called Ramona. I've known your husband since he was two I'm the oldest of six kids. And our liens husband is one of six kids. And we grew up on the same street. So my brother David is best friends with her husband. So I've known her since they got married, which I thought they were so young and so young when they had kids. And I can't believe you're still having kids like it's so amazing. And her house, they grow a lot of their own food. They are involved in a lot of agriculture. They do a lot of, is it called animal husbandry?

Arlene Peck (12m 46s):

I would say farming. We try to produce as much as we can, but you know, I also work full-time and so does my husband.

Katie Ferraro (12m 52s):

And so, and so Arlene is a teacher and at the time of this recording, it's Christmas break. So everyone just got off of school and she has like, you could not have time this better. She has two weeks off to be at home to start solid foods with Jacob and kind of get them in a routine. So we'll be documenting his first 10 days together. But what's really cool is we're going to try to be feeding foods exclusively that Arlene and her family produce. So what kills me about Arlene's family too, is I know, and she shared a lot about our older kids struggles with picky eating is that she has all of this amazing produce and her kids don't touch like most of it. And I go to her house and I'm like, can I have these snap peas? Could I, so we're going to work that into Jacob's diet and what we're hoping, and you never know how it goes. But a lot of times when a younger child is doing baby led weaning, it helps the older kids be more engaged in trying new foods, especially if we're kind of doing a challenge for them to try a hundred foods, if they can hopefully help, you know, harvest and maybe prepare and even help feed some of the foods to him in many cases that can help expose picky eaters to maybe just trying a few new foods.

Katie Ferraro (13m 50s):

So we might get a secondary benefit from doing baby led weaning as well. So Arlene, thank you so much for sharing this opportunity and his experience with us. And I'm excited to see how day one goes here with Jacob. All right. Well, we just wrapped up day. One of baby led weaning with baby Jacob. We did avocado. We did a thin puree of avocado mixed with formula. We did a chunkier puree of avocado on its own, and then we did solid strips of avocado. And so I'm going to ask Arlene and what she thought of it. Arlene, how do you think today went with Jacob?

Arlene Peck (14m 20s):

I was actually a little surprised. I thought he was going to eat more, but he was definitely interested in the food. He was excited about trying to grab things out of the bowl. I don't know how much actual eating went on, but I think he's still learning how to, you know, grab and put things in his mouth and whatnot. So,

Katie Ferraro (14m 37s):

And what she's describing again, it's kind of hard to describe on a podcast, but everything I saw today was totally typical. He did not eat very much. He was a little bit disinterested at first when we got it on a preloaded spoon and then Arlene was putting the spoon in his hand helping to guide it gently. She put her hand under his hand and guided it to his mouth. He got the hang of it and he was really into the thin puree. It felt like under the chunkier when he kind of wanted nothing to do with. And then what I thought was interesting was with the strips. Do you want to explain how he handled the strips and what he seemed to do better with,

Arlene Peck (15m 6s):

With the strips, he wasn't necessarily grabbing them himself, but when I put it on my hand, he was trying to grab them out of my hand or he was actually just trying to bend over and eat the strips of avocado off my hand.

Katie Ferraro (15m 21s):

As we're recording this, he's trying to eat your hand again, even though you've washed it and there's no food on it. So he's definitely interested in it. And we were just kind of talking about the schedule and he does go to daycare. And do we need to make any changes or drop bottles? No, absolutely not. At the beginning breast milk or formula is still providing the majority of your baby's nutrition at this age and he's learning how to eat. So most babies will need about eight weeks for it to kind of all click. So you might feel like nothing's happening, but every little bit of practice is a step towards progress in your baby. Learning how to self-feed. So Arlene, thank you so much for sharing your first day with us. I'm just also curious, was there any point when he was feeding himself when you were scared or worried at all?

Arlene Peck (15m 59s):

I don't think I was scared or worried. I think just having the larger chunks, like I'm always curious as to whether or not he's going to mash those before he tries to swallow them. But I mean, he did fine and it's not like he was actually eating that many big chunks. So,

Katie Ferraro (16m 15s):

And we didn't see any gags on day one because he wasn't really eating that much, but he was definitely interested in this phone in it's crazy sometimes by day two or day three they'll rip, that's been right out of your hand and just put it in their mouth and then they're getting something in their mouth. They're moving it around. There might be a little bit of gagging. So that tends to be a little nerve wracking for parents. And we'll keep you posted on how it's going, but Arlene, thank you so much for sharing your first day of baby led weaning with baby Jacob with all

Arlene Peck (16m 35s):

Of us. Thank you so much for having me.

Katie Ferraro (16m 38s):

Well, I hope you guys enjoyed that interview with Arlene Peck. She's one of my favorite people. She's so real. She's so incredibly knowledgeable. So she's a science teacher. She has a really big background in agriculture. I learned so much from her. I'm so amazed that she has the capacity to like run a household work full times. She's got this like family farm. They have all of these animals. And I know when I went to her house recently, I took all my kids. Cause if those of you guys who know me, I'm not an animal person. I don't dislike them. I just don't actively like them, but my kids never get animal exposure. So I'm like, let's go to the Peck's house. And they like play with chickens and rabbits and all the other animals that are there, which she grows all this amazing food. And I remember seeing her garden in the middle of summer and there was all these foods and she was like, oh, but my three older kids don't even eat these foods.

Katie Ferraro (17m 18s):

And I was like, oh my gosh, you got basically all this free food that you're spending all this time growing. And she's like, I really, really want at the time she was pregnant this next baby, who's now baby Jacob to eat some of the foods that I'm making. And so that's the hope with baby led weaning with baby Jacob? I think the first day went pretty well. It's real slow at the beginning. You guys, every time I do a 10 day series with babies, I'm always reminded like not a lot happens at the beginning and it doesn't mean you're doing anything wrong. So again, I hope you'll follow along as we track Arlene's babies. First 10 days of baby weaning. We to do that on Instagram at baby Led Weaning team. And if you want to grab that a hundred FIRST FOODS list that we're going to be working 10 days out of it from the list on Instagram, but Arlene's going to be doing all a hundred foods and she's going to do as many of them as she can with foods that she's grown, which is really cool.

Katie Ferraro (18m 6s):

I give the a hundred FIRST FOODS list away to everyone on my free weekly online workshop called baby led weaning for beginners, you can sign up at babyledweaning.co again, that's babyledWeaning.Co to sign up for this week's workshop times and grab your own copy of the a hundred FIRST FOODS list. Even if you can't, I can't grow all the foods or make all the foods on the list, but I can definitely teach you guys how to make those foods safe for baby led weaning. So Arlene, thank you so much for sharing your experience with us and I hope you guys enjoyed that episode. Everything from Arlene's episode will be linked up on the show notes at blwpodcast.com/190. Catch you next time.