Tommee Tippee Steri-Bottles - Fuss free, mess free travelling!

I have been sent some steri-bottles from Tommee Tippee to try out. The bottles come sterile and ready to use. You unwrap one bottle, fill it with milk and it is ready to use. Then you just dispose of the bottle afterwards. No washing up, no sterilising, no mess and no fuss.

These seemed such a good idea as having our family spread out, I travel regularly with the boys. And with this gorgeous summer sunshine I am doing a lot of park visits and days out.

It was BoyG's Birthday on Sunday and after his party, his Nanny took him home with her and Grandad to have a mini holiday at her house for a couple of days. DaddyG and I took BabyG and went to collect BoyG on Tuesday. We decided to make a day of it so we arrived at lunch time to surprise the boy and have lunch out in the local garden centre. Once back at Nanny's house it was time for BabyG to have his milk, and this gave us the perfect opportunity to test the sterile bottles.

We got two bottles in the box but you can get larger packs. The teats are wrapped seperatly to the containers, and both are wrapped in a way that means the other bottle stays sterile until you need to use it. I was impressed to find the bottles even had the little cap to keep the teats clean once you have used the bottles.

The only thing that would have been better for us would have been a different teat size. The bottles come with 3+ months size teat but BoyG is 11 months old so he had to work for his milk. This wouldn't stop me buying them in the future though as they are handy to have for a spare for those 'just in case' moments.

Sleeping through the night....

Well it has been 4 nights now and he seems to have cracked it!! With only one awful night since we started!! He has slept two nights in a row now and we have woken up at 7am, before BabyG has woken up!! What a result! I was expecting it to take much longer. Although, I may just be speaking too soon.... We will wait and see but for now, I am a very happy and rested MummyG!! I have been applying some of the advice to BoyG as well, like the pudding later on, and making pudding something like Total Greek Yogurt with mashed banana and weetabix. That seems to work with him as well, as he too has been sleeping much better! Keep up the good work boys!!

Operation Riley sleep through the night

At 9 months old, BabyG is still waking twice in the night for milk. We have finally asked a health visitor for some advice as we need some sleep.

The advice I was given was in two parts. First, feed tea at normal time but not pudding. Wait and give him pudding at 17:45 and give him full fat greek yogurt as this takes longer to digest so will hopefully keep him fuller for longer. Second, and this is the hard bit for me.... No milk in the night, just offer water as it is probably a habit to have milk and not because he is actually hungry.

The first night was brilliant! BabyG did so well and slept all night from 18:45 to 06:15. He grizzled in his sleep a few times but didnt actually need anything like milk etc.

Night 2 has been the opposite. He woke 5 times between 19:00 and 00:00!
He did have a dirty nappy at one point and is teething so that contributed. Its hard because a bottle of milk will settle him quickly and for longer which means I am back in bed quicker, for longer. He did actually drink some water and looked like he did just need a drink. I dont want to give in now and make a bottle or I will have to start all over again.

Apologies for any spelling errors but its the middle of the night, I am sleep deprived, and I am writing this on my phone whilst cuddling BabyG who is now asleep so I am going to put him back in his cot and head back to my own bed for another hour!

Night!

MAM Self Sterilising Bottles - Product Review

BabyG has been given some MAM items to review. He has a teether and some self sterilising bottles.

The Twister teether is great as it's easy for small hands to hold, with ring shaped pieces that baby can get their fingers around. The pieces twist round so it's a toy and teether at the same time. Each piece of the teether has a different design on so there's a varied texture for sore gums. Some pieces are harder than others to give extra variation. There is a rattle built into the teether which helps distract from the pain and discomfort of teething.

The MAM Twister teether is for 6+ months. It is BPA free, Phthalate free and PVC free so it is safe for babies. It has been approved by the International Children Medical Research Society.

BabyG loves this teether! He even screeches and smiles when we hold it up in front of him! He has been playing with it and chewing on all the pieces but he does seem to favour the green piece so he must prefer that texture!!

 

He has also been given some bottles to test. These are not just any bottles.... They are self sterilising bottles!! How cool is that?! I travel a lot as I live at least an hours car journey from any of my family so I have to take a steriliser with me and enough bottles for if we go out anywhere. My mum has a travel steriliser at her house for when we visit. When I go there, I have to sterilise 4 or 5 bottles, one at a time. They get so hot in the steriliser it makes my fingers sore when taking them out but I don't want to take the big steriliser as with two boys I have got enough to pack. Well this seems perfect for us!! So does it work? BabyG puts them to the test...

 

My main concerns were:

As they are lots of pieces screwed together, would they leak?
Will BabyG drink from them as the teat is different to what he has been using?
Will it be too fiddly?

These were good. They were so handy for when we were out and about as we could either just take the whole box of formula with us or pick up some ready made milk and we didn't need to worry about how many bottles we took out with us.

The bottles leaked two or three times while we were testing them which was fairly annoying. However we then realised that during sterilisation, the white rubber ring would occasionally lift up which is what caused the leakage. Once I discovered this, I made sure we pushed it firmly in to the base and we didn't experience any leaks after that.

The self sterilising bottles have a couple of extra pieces compared to normal bottles. I thought it would make it fiddly and time consuming but I got used to it very quickly. It's so handy that you can just put one in the microwave to sterilise, especially when you are out for the day. The only problem would be if you didn't have somewhere to wash the bottle.

It does take a little longer to do 3 bottles (5 minutes) than it does to do just one (3 minutes). Plus, when doing bottles in the big steriliser it takes 3 minutes to do them all at once, but if it is day time and you're not desperate for a bottle straight away then it doesn't really make a difference as it is only a couple of minutes extra.

We got on really well with these bottles and we will happily keep using them.

I was given these products by MAM to review but you can purchase them from www.mamonlineshop.com or from most babies retailers.

The perfect bottle in less than 2 minutes - Tommee Tippee Perfect Prep

I was invited to the launch of an amazing new product from Tommee Tippee. It was held at the ExCel baby show in London. I travelled up there with my Mum and the two boys by train.

We got there early enough to have a look round the baby show at some of the stands, then we dropped BoyG off at the Fisher Price creche and made our way to the product launch.

It had all been kept very secret so the first we knew about it was at the show. Wow! What an amazing machine!!

The new product is called the Perfect Prep and it is for formula fed babies. It helps make the bottles up and makes them body temperature so that the milk is even more natural like breast milk. It does this in less than 3 minutes!

You put tap water straight into the machine which has a built in filter. You can set the correct bottle size in ounces and put your empty bottle on the stand. The stand can be moved higher or lower depending on how tall the bottle is. So you can use most makes of bottle with it.

Once the bottle is on the stand, you press a button and an initial hot shot will come out at 72*. This is hot enough to kill any bacteria which might be found in the formula powder. The machine will then beep to let you know it is time for the next step.

You then remove the bottle and add the correct amount of formula to the bottle, cover with the bottle cover and shake until the powder has dissolved. Then after removing the bottle cover, place the bottle back on the stand and touch the same button again which will fill up the rest of the water at body temperature. The bottle is ready for baby.

What an amazing concept!! No more waiting for the kettle to boil in the night when baby is crying for their milk! It is a lot faster than boiling the kettle then waiting for the water to cool down. Also, safer than pouring boiling water out at eye level.

The Perfect Prep has several warning alerts built into it, so for example it lets you know when the filter needs changing, or if the machine needs de scaleing.

One of the things I like the most about this product is the lime scale alert. When you use kettle water for making bottles it is so hard to do it without getting at least a tiny bit of lime scale in the water. This product just gives your baby perfect water in the bottle without any lime scale. And when it needs descaleing, the Perfect Prep will tell you!

The Perfect Prep machine is part of the closer to nature range from tommee tippee. As I mentioned before, it has been designed to fit most bottle shapes and sizes. It is available from the first week of May from Amazon and Babies r Us, and costs £99.99. You can also pre order his now from Amazon.

There is a special price this weekend of £66.66 to pre order the Perfect Prep at the baby show.

Below is a discount code so you can also pre order at the baby show price from Amazon.

9DIC8VIU discount code valid until 3/3/13