Along with the excitement that comes with introducing solid foods, may come concerns about whether baby will be allergic to some foods. There is no definite way to tell if baby will be allergic to a specific food, even if there is a family history.
The time from conception until around baby’s 2nd birthday (the first 1,000 days) provides a unique window of opportunity to lay the foundations for lifelong good health.
The first few years of baby’s life are crucial for their developing brain and gut microbiome.
Good nutrition provides essential nutrients for their rapidly growing brain. It also creates a healthy, diverse gut microbiome, both of which are important for long-term brain health.
Inside everyone’s intestinal tract is a world teeming with life. Trillions of microbes, including bacteria, fungi, and viruses, live and function within the gut. This microscopic world is the microbiome - and it’s the key to developing a healthy future.
From the moment your baby is born, their gut starts to become home to trillions of microbes collectively known as their microbiome.
A healthy, diverse microbiome can improve baby’s physical and mental health. The best way to nurture this microscopic family is to make sure baby’s diet includes lots of probiotics.
Finding out you’re pregnant is a moment you’ll never forget! – it marks the start of becoming a mom! You’re going to experience some truly wonderful and remarkable changes, (and if we’re honest a few that aren’t so wonderful too.) But we know that when you look down at your little one for the first time, those tougher moments will simply melt away. Of course, good nutrition has never been more important than when you’re pregnant, but what does that actually entail? What nutrients are needed to support baby’s development, and how do you make sure you’re eating enough to provide baby with everything they need?
Here we’ll guide you step-by-step through each pregnancy trimester, so you know the best foods to eat and when they’re most important.
As parents, we all want to do what's best for our babies, infants, and children. So, it can be more than a little concerning with the news that our family's youngest members could be at risk from the very thing meant to nurture us all – food.
4 months of age signals the start of an exciting window of opportunity, that if taken advantage of has the ability to not only transform your parenting journey (and family mealtimes) going forward, but more importantly, your child’s health and wellness potentials for life. 4 months marks the important opportunity to start ‘Flavour Training’!
In the medical community, there's a clear consensus on when infants should begin complementary feeding: at 6 months old. But despite the AAP, ACOG, AAFP and WHO recommendations being very clear about this timeline, parents often start much earlier.
The primary reason that official guidelines push for this 6 month mark is that very early introduction of complementary foods has been shown to reduce breastfeeding's overall duration. The medical community also holds concerns that introducing solids prior to the age of 6 months could increase the risk of choking and aspiration, lead to diarrhea and poor gut health and contribute to the onset of certain chronic diseases later in life, including diabetes and celiac disease.
So why is there so much confusion over this?
Starting solids poses such a challenge because we’re not only trying to sort through all of the available information and opinions on the topic, but also fit a brand new feeding and food preparation routine into our already busy lives. And, in the hustle to get this done, we often forget the most important element of introducing our children to food: Helping them foster a healthy relationship with food for life.