Holly Willoughby - Truly Happy Baby ... It Worked for Me - A practical parenting guide from a mum you can trust

There’s never a reason not to wind your baby; it can only do good. That said, if you wind her too often, and she’s getting agitated because she wants to drink, perhaps you don’t have such a windy baby on your hands and winding her once at the end of a feed will be enough. As with everything, once you get to know your baby, how best to wind her will become instinctive.

Little guzzlers Some babies take in too much air as they gulp down their milk, so they will probably stop halfway through, desperate for you to get the air out of their tummy. Babies might also confuse air in their tummy with feeling full and refuse the rest of a feed, meaning that they’re not getting enough to eat, so make sure you give them a thorough winding.

‘Muslins, muslins everywhere, on my shoulders, on my chair, everywhere.’ Ha! Muslins are better than bibs because you can whip them away quickly if your baby has been sick and easily put them over your shoulder or across your lap to protect your clothing. I’d rather wash 20 muslins a day than have to get a newborn – and myself – changed every two seconds!

Winding positions to try …

Sit your baby on your lap, support her chest with the palm of your hand, and cup her chin and neck with your thumb and fingers, whilst patting her back.

Lay your baby on your lap with her head slightly elevated and tap her back to release any wind.

Hold your baby over your shoulder and gently tap her back to release the wind.

Holding your baby face down across your forearm, with her head resting in the crook of your elbow, will put a slight pressure on her tummy and help to release trapped wind.

WEANING

Heat-sensitive spoons You can buy rubber spoons that are gentle on toothless gums and usefully change colour if the food is too hot!

When to wean …

A baby’s digestive system has to be mature enough to take solid food and they have to be sufficiently developed physically (i.e. be able to hold their head up), so the guidelines are to start at six months – everything the baby needs is in breast milk until that age. However, a health professional might recommend early weaning for numerous reasons. As Chester had reflux, I was advised to wean him at about five months. Also if you have a baby who’s permanently hungry and the milk just doesn’t seem to be cutting it any more, starting her on a few solids may help. A sure-fire sign she is ready is if she watches you when you’re eating, following the food’s journey from your plate to your mouth!

Ultimately, it’s up to you when to start weaning. It’s lovely to finally feed your baby proper food and see all that fresh fruit and vegetable goodness going into her. This is definitely one of those situations when you know best. If you think your baby isn’t satisfied by her milk intake alone, then try a little purée. But if you try it at or before six months and your baby rejects everything, perhaps it’s a bit too early. Leave it, and try again a week later. Sometimes if you wean babies around other, older children, it can help them to make sense of what those solids are all about.

Head of the table …

I can’t say enough about investing in a baby chair that pulls up to the table, rather than a standard highchair, so your child feels like part of the dinner party! Babies are like sponges and learn everything from their surroundings, so there’s no substitute for them sitting down to meals with their family to see what you should and shouldn’t do at the dinner table. Rather than you telling them not to tip their bowl all over their head, they’ll soon learn it’s not the done thing if they don’t see anyone else doing it. Children all fidget at the table but letting them move around with food is dangerous – they could fall and choke and it makes more mess too. Sitting them at the table early on is safer and might mean they develop lovely table manners!

What worked for me …

I kicked things off with all of my children by introducing a little baby rice into their diet. I’d come down for breakfast, make up their morning bottle, pour a bit into a bowl with a couple of teaspoons of baby rice, then try feeding it to them on a spoon, interspersed with their milk from the bottle. A bit from the spoon, then a bit from the bottle and so on, just to get them used to this new texture and way of eating. Then I’d do the same at lunchtime with a little whizzed-up vegetable purée. Carrots, sweet potatoes and courgettes are all gentle flavours to start with. I didn’t start them on any meat straight away, but did add fish to the vegetable purées as it’s kinder on the stomach.

This all worked really well for Harry and Belle. They took to it straight away, whereas Chester insisted on doing everything all by himself. He had no interest in taking anything from the spoon I was holding, so I had to give him an extra spoon, which seemed to appease him. Another thing I did differently very early on for Chester was to try a bit of baby-led weaning. This means that you don’t whizz everything up, but instead you steam a bit of carrot or broccoli and, once cooled, give it to your baby to hold, so that she’s in control of holding it and putting it into her mouth. With Chester, most of it would end up on the floor but enough went in that I didn’t worry and he still had milk to accompany every meal, so I wasn’t concerned about him going hungry.

How to whizz! …

If you’re making up little purées, invest in a hand blender so you can cook up a carrot or two at a time and then blend and feed. You don’t need one of those big all-singing, all-dancing blenders for the little portions they need at the puréeing stage. To save time and money, you may want to make up purées in batches to freeze. As they progress and grow older you can stop using the blender altogether and just mash food with a fork, then start cutting it into small bites. As you begin to introduce chunkier food, beware of choking hazards (see my warning).

I tried to introduce lots of foods as quickly as possible. Making three different meals for three different people just isn’t practical so my children, Chester in particular, have always had what we were all eating – just a whizzed-up or mashed version of it in the early stages.

Weaning warning …

If you are giving your baby sticks of vegetables to hold, such as carrots and broccoli, steam them slightly to soften them so they’re easier to bite into and digest, especially given a baby’s limited number of teeth! Cut fruits such as grapes and satsuma segments into very small pieces to reduce the risk of them getting stuck in your baby’s throat. I always peeled apples, too, as the skin can be tough to chew and a choking hazard. I was also told that a banana (before being mashed) is one of the most dangerous choking hazards as there’s nothing to grab hold of if you need to pull it out. It’s the fact that bananas are soft and break off that makes them so dangerous. As soon as your baby starts to crawl or even toddle around – you might have one who’s on her feet before twelve months – don’t let her move about whilst eating.