Feeding Schedule for a Seven Month Old

My kids are 4 and 6 so it has been awhole. It seems like at that age they got 3 meals and 2-3 snacks per day:
breakfast
mid morning snack
lunch
mid afternoon snack
dinner
bedtime snack

Hi D.,
My son is 6 months old. I have him on a feeding/sleeping schedule it is as follows:

6:00 a.m. Wake up - give him 6oz bottle
7:50 a.m. Nap time
9:00 a.m. Wake up - give him 6oz bottle
10:15 a.m. Give him rice cereal
10:45 a.m. Nap time
12:45 p.m. Wake up give him 6oz bottle
2:15 p.m. 1/2 jar baby food
2:45 p.m. Nap time
3:45 Wake up give him 6oz bottle
5:20 1/2 Jar baby food
7:10 give him last 6oz bottle
7:30 Down for the night

So he takes a bottle about every 3hrs, and he is getting 3 feedings of solid foods 3xs a day. I experimented giving him a 8oz bottle a couple of times but he spit it up, that's how I knew I was giving him to much formula. This schedule for me seems to be working. Since I started him on this schedule (about a month now) he sleeps better, he is much happier. My son is my first child and for the first couple of months he was not sleeping, very fussy ect.. after months of taking him to the doctor they finally told me he had acid reflux. So they put him on zantac and in about a week of taking it, it seemed to help him. He has been off the zantac for about 1 month.

For a baby shower gift I recived a book called "BABY 411" by ARI BROWNM M.D. AND DENISE FIELDS let me tell you this book is a life savor. We have been using it since we brought our baby home from the hospital, and we refer to it everytime we have a question about anything it's in there. It gives you guidelines for how much your baby should be eating going by how old the child is and the weight of the child. It's a life savor for all new parents. You should pick it up.

My daughter is also 7 months old. We dont really have a schedule. She averages 6 oz. every 4-5 hours but sometimes she takes that much every 2-3 hours...and then sleeps all night. You just want to make sure that you are feeding her when she is hungry and not just wanting to suck on something like her pacifier. She also eats a little bit of cereal and baby food. But the formulua intake has stayed the same. Hope this helps.

For a seven month old, you should have a feeding schedule that is a daily and regular routine based on the time of day you would conduct feedings for your seven month old. You dont want to starve or overfeed. I started ensuring my seven month old was given a morning, lunch and evening meals (baby food). The inbetween meals of morning and lunch should be something simple and easy (bottle or baby food) and between lunch and evening meals a easy bottle or baby food snack would work. Dont try to make your baby eat inbetween meals but be aware of their needs and feed when they really want to eat something, this will help in eliminating the overestimating factor of "did I overfeed or under feed my child" believe me they will let you know. Take care

I have 1 year old but since he started on baby food, I have had him on a schedule for eating. He eats about every two hours. He did it with baby food and now with adult food, he eats breakfast,then a snack 2 hours later, lunch 2 hours after that, snack in 2 hours, dinner in 2 hours and another snack before bed.

Let me start by saying that there are many options when choosing a feeding schedule. It needs to be a combination of your baby's needs, your schedule, and your goals. I will share my schedule that I've used with all 6 of my kids (ages 11 years-14 months)

My goal was for each child's feeding/hunger schedule to line up with family mealtimes by the time they were 10 months to a year old. It is also my goal to breastfeed for 1 year. Unless there was a problem (ex, I was sick and on medication) they did not receive formula. I only mention this because you may hear that breastfed babies need to eat more often, which I have found to be wrong!

So here was the "schedule". By six months old, each of my babies had both shifted to a 4 hour schedule and started "solid" food (baby or from table). Since most adults eat their meals along with their "drink", they would first nurse, then receive their food, three times a day (like me). They also received another nursing period at bed. As they got older, the "dinner" would shift closer to our family dinner time until they were the same (around 9-10 months). That's it. It looked like this (with maybe an hour shift earlier depending on our schedule):

8am nurse and cereal with fruit
12:00 nurse and lunch (veg with or without meat)
4:00 nurse and dinner (veg with or without meat)
8:00 nurse and bedtime

Our children have had no problem with weight gain, have slept very well, and were some of the happiest babies. A book you can check into for further information on this type of feeding is called either Preparation for Parenting (Christian version) or On Becoming Babywise (secular version). Both are excellent and recommend routines to help establish good eating and sleeping patterns for babies. It covers how to do it both from birth and later in infancy. A great follow-up that talks about establishing table manners early is Preparation for Toddler (again, Christian version) or Babywise II (secular, again).

There are benefits to many different feeding philosophies, check them out to see what works for you. Watch for signs of hunger, irritibility, appropriate weight gain, and sufficient wet/dirty diapers. As long as none of these areas become a problem, feeding is fine.

If your child is a healthy, full term baby then you dont have to set a schedule. Let her tell you shen she is hungry. She will cry to indicate she is hungry. I would not let more than 4-5 hours go by without feeding her, but she will most likely let you know before then. Also, I would not wake her up to feed her. Let her sleep. I did this with both of my children and they are now healthy as a horse. Good luck and RELAX!!!

A.

Don't fret! Your baby will tell you if she is hungry or not. As long as she is in the normal range for babies her age, she will be fine. I have had three boys and I keep my niece whenever I can, and believe you me, they will let you know when they are hungry! If you are worried that she is not getting enough, try placing a bowl of either Cheerio's or Fruit Loops on the coffee table so when she is hungry, she can point to it and then you will know that she is hungry. Babies are so fun at that age! Love her with all you have! Soon, they will be out of the house and all you will have are the memories and pictures!

Try the books Babywise and Babywise II. They should offer lots of help.

Hi. My youngest is 22 Months, but the dr gave us a great rule of thumb when she was born. At the very beginning, he said, feed her every 3 hours - if she's hungry before then, absolutely feed her, but don't let her go longer than 3 hours. This was during the day and then let her sleep as long as she will at night - do NOT wake to feed. She started sleeping through the night fairly early on so it helped on that front. I guess you are feeding babyfood and formula at this point. It seems like the 3 hour rule should still apply. Really, that is what they encourage for all of us really. Several, small meals a day. They do stretch out a little later on, and are able to handle it if you get tied up, on the road, or whatever, and can't feed right on time. Don't worry. At 7 months, a baby won't let you over feed. They know when they are full and even if they want to eat too much, their little body won't hold it - it will come back up. Even the baby food - believe me!
Good luck!!

Trust me go with your motherly instinct and ask you ped they will tell you the medical opioin then reply on you gut and God and you won't go wrong

Well, if you are constantly feeding her and she's not spitting anything up,your probably doing fine. She should be eating little jars of food now and taking a bottle. If she's not fussy, I woulnd't worry about it.

I hope this helps. Good luck

My daughter is now 10 months old, but we have had her on the same feeding schedule since she was 6 months old.

8 AM - 2 tbls of oatmeal mixed with 1/2 jar fruit of choice mixed with formula. After cereal we would feed her the remainder of her bottle, typically around 4 ounces.

11 AM - 1/2 jar of veggie, 1/2 jar of fruit, 6 oz. bottle of formula.

2 PM - 6 oz bottle

5 PM - 1/2 jar of veggie, 1/2 jar of fruit, 6 oz bottle of formula.

8 PM - 2 tbls of cereal mixed with 1/2 jar of fruit mixed with formula. After cereal feed her the remainder of formula.

I know it seems like a lot, but until your daughter is a little bit older you will have to continue to feed her around every three hours. This is my third child and this is the feeding schedule that I used with each of them. They are all healthy and happy. We just recently replaced Zoe's formula with Whole Milk. This is typically done around 9 months. I know that my doctor does a blood test at 9 months to make sure that moving to milk will not deprive the child of any nutrients. 9 months is also the time when you can typically start feeding your child "real" food that is soft. Please contact me if you have any questions. Like I said before, Zoe is just now 10 months and it seems like she is finally starting to slow down on the amount of times I am feeding her, she is starting to go a bit longer between her feedings. Let me know if there is anything else I can help you with. Hope this has helped.

I don't know if this will help you or not. I don't know if this is your first baby or second. But they always say that every baby is different so I let my baby tell me what she wanted. At 7 months, she got a bottle in the morning, at nap time, and then at bedtime. She would alway, always, always take her bottle... so I knew that she at least had that. From day 1, at 6 months she never would touch baby food but when we ate, we would sit her at the table with us in her infant seat. We have always included her in our eating. (Maybe that is the reason she never wanted babyfood.) I was afraid that she wasn't getting what she needed either so I started taking my food and chopping up really fine and she would eat like crazy. So it is safe for me to say that she NEVER ate baby food. She simply wouldn't touch it. Oatmeal with bananas is the only thing that she touched.
As far as a schedule... she would get her bottle in the morning when she woke up. After about an hour of being up, i would offer her either baby oatmeal cereal with bananas or squish up some bananas and offer it to her. If she turned it down that was fine.... I didn't push. She would eat lunch then in about an hour she would get her bottle and go down for a nap, when she woke up I would offer her another kind of fruit. Mid afternoon, I would offer her something else, whether it was fruit or a vegetable. Then we would have dinner and then a bath and a bottle.
The main thing that I didn't do is push. She knows when she is hungry and when she isn't and since she has been 5 months old, she has known what she wants and how to communicate it to me. If she ever got fussy, I always offered her fruit or cereal or some kind of food. If she ate, that was good, if she didn't that was ok. I would try back a little later but most of the time she knew that it was sitting on the table and would point and grunt when she was ready. She still goes through stages. Sometimes it seems that she hasn't eaten anything to amount to anything for days and then sometimes she will eat like crazy for a day or so like she can't be filled up. I always give her vitamins so I know that even if she doesn't eat, she is getting the nutrition that she needs in order to grow and develop properly.
Don't be paranoid. Your baby will go through stages. If you offer it and she doesn't eat then she isn't hungry. She will let you know when she is hungry and you have to be on her time. She won't go hungry. If she is whining or fussy and you don't know why, just offer food. That usually works.
You will be fine. Your baby will be fine. As long as you offer it to her, that is all that you can do. She will let you know when she wants something and you just follow her lead.

My son is now 9 months old and we started this schedule at 3 months he had acid reflux and it was partly caused by me feeding him too much. We went to a specialist that told me to start feeding him 3 ounces every 3 hours with 3 TBSP. of ceral in all the bottles. I know that sounds like alot but it really worked for my son. He also goes to daycare and they keep him on the same schedule. I have learned that baby's LOVE structure. I get him up at 6:30 a.m. I feed him 1 jar of baby food. I take him to daycare and they feed him his 1st bottle of the day at 8:00 (3oz.) with 3 TBSP. of ceral, he eats another jar of food. at 11:00 a.m. and a bottle right after that with only 2 TBSP of ceral since he JUST had food. He eats again at 2p.m. (3 oz. of milk with 3 TBSP of ceral) again the same thing at 5p.m. We don't get home in the eventing until about 6 p.m. i spend about an hour of play time unless he cranky. I feed him a jar of baby food at 7p.m. then a bath for about 20 mins. then a 3 1/2 oz. bottle with 3 TBSP of ceral. He's usually in bed between 7:30 and 8:00. He does not get up in the middle of the night for a bottle. He may wake up a couple of times in the night crying for his passy but i put 6 passy's in his bed with him at night so he can find one himself and put himself back to sleep. I know it seems like i wrote a book but it really worked for my son and i really hope it works for you. Please keep me updated on the progress.

D.,

I have 3 kids myself. A teenager, an 11 year old and now a 5 month old. She should be eating babyfood by now and babies are just like us....they should be eating breakfast, lunch and dinner with a bottle here and there in-between. You really can't feed them too much. If they're hungry, they'll eat. If not, they usually won't. So, I wouldn't worry about it too much. I realize the Dr.'s out there really seem to make a big deal of that but unless you are having weight issues with your child I would just make sure she's eating at least 3 meals a day (maybe more depending on how much she eats at each sitting) and give her a bottle in-between feedings if she seems to need one.

I agree with Dena, if she isn't spitting anything up and isn't fussy...you're doing fine! Mine have survived so far and that's how I did it! :)

K.

I have an 8 mth old boy and he is doing the same thing, but its npt the first time. He seems to be a bottomless pit when he is having a growth spurt. My advice...let her eat as much as she is wanting to eat, as long as it is healthy things she is wanting. I use most feedings with bottles and will supplement with jarred food at lunchtime and dinnertime. If she is like my son, she will stare at your food, make chewing motions with her mouth, or even push her way toward your food if she is wanting more than a bottle and push the food away when she is done.

Feed her when she is hungry. She will cry when she is hungry. I have 2 kids, 3-1/2 and 14 months. In my experience, I fed them every 3 hours when they were babies. If your baby is on solid foods (baby puree), give her the bottle one hour later and then monitor. Chances are you won't overfeed, she will refuse if she is not hungry. Don't overthink it. You're okay.