baby eating – Myriad & Sundry

Brian’s Birthday

June 3, 2014 No Comments

Brian’s birthday seems to consistently have such perfect weather. It’s always right around Memorial Day, and so we tend to celebrate with cookouts with our family and friends!

This year, we went to grandma and poppa’s house, and were surprised to see that his cousin Gabrielle and her son Griffin as well as his Uncle Mike were all there to celebrate with us too!

Griffin gets along so well with younger kids, and played with Jameson almost non-stop while we were there. They played ball and catch and tackle and cars… “boy” things.

Coraline plays ball fine herself too, I should add!

After our rib dinner (so. good.), we went back outside to play. It was beautiful outside!

Aunt Melissa and Gabrielle tried to get Jameson to roll down the backyard hill with them, but he couldn’t be persuaded to let go. He did do a little fake roll for a second but that’s it!

I made Brian’s cake from scratch from the same recipe I made Coraline’s first birthday cake as well, but this time I made it with a peanut butter filling. It was very peanut-buttery, so that was perfect for Brian. It was good, but not my best effort! I had a difficult time getting the filling right (too much peanut butter) and the cake itself was a little… broken.

But, all’s well that tastes well!

For the record, Coraline tasted a bit more of this cake than her own. We’ll turn her into a cake eater yet!

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Growing Up

May 16, 2014 No Comments

This was a huge month of growth in Coraline’s abilities! She is now speaking a few more words, including “baby”, “bye bye” (with a wave as well), “ball”, and “up”. She continues to use the same word for socks and shoes which kind of sounds like “ochx” which still makes me laugh. (Other words she already knows are dada, mama- rarely said, doggie or Sasha, and hi)

She likes to try and put shoes and socks on by holding them up to her feet, which is cute. Aside from waving, other gestures this month include a firm “no” headshake. When asked “where’s Coraline?” she will raise her hand up and pat her head with a big grin!

Coraline has always been affectionate, but it has progressed now where she used to lay her head on a lap or legs, now she is actually giving hugs with her arms. I witnessed a spontaneous hug from her to Jameson last week, which was adorable.

Other gross motor skill updates include standing! Finally! Within a week, she progressed from pulling up to a standing position to pushing a walk behind toy.

Coraline shocked us though when she managed to stand up by herself in the middle of the floor with no assistance! She sat down again right away, but has since managed that feat a couple more times. Remember just the other month she was barely standing at all?!

This month, she also moved up into the new room, the first room for 9-18 month olds. She was held back because of her bottle feeding issues (she loved Ms Colleen!) and since there was space in that room for a good amount of time. We have borrowed clothes from our neighbor, and she is now currently in 18 month shirts, 12 month pants and size 3 shoes. Her feet seem to grow very slowly, haha.

We have begun reading her bedtime stories, though she really likes flipping through the books herself. She also likes to play ball, rolling it back and forth with us.

She even loves being tickled. Another word for the books this month: she likes to say “tickh tickh” which I think means tickle, either when she is being tickled or when she is initiating the tickling.

Coraline also sits on little ride on toys outside now. She mostly goes backward, though she’s learning how to move forward.

Coraline just hates the swing though, baby swing or even on my lap. She is terrified, and will burst into tears just watching me even if she’s not swinging. She also hates… milk in a sippy cup.

She started drinking from a straw, which she really enjoys. She just loves the water. But milk? No dice. We tried cold turkey, but she held out. So we are trying again with yet another sippy this weekend (after already trying the 6 or so types we already have at home).

We have just been so thrilled watching her grow this month. We are also thankful that at her follow up ENT visit, the doctor did not recommend replacing the tube that fell out from her ear early. We are continuing to watch it, and continuing with the chiropractor on occasion, and hoping that all remains well through summer at least.

Such personality! She seems like she’s ready to be added to our family cellphone plan, right?!

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13 Months Old

April 17, 2014 No Comments

After losing quite a bit of weight with her bout of illness at Meemaw and Grandpa’s house, Coraline gained it all back this month. She weighed in at 18 pounds, 5 ounces at the doctor’s office yesterday (back again, of course!). We transitioned her to whole milk, and found that she didn’t really care much about the flavor difference, but definitely still has a temperature preference! It’s a little less convenient for us to manager since with formula we were able to use already warm water and now we have to warm up her milk as we used to.

This was her first taste of whole milk, in a sippy. However, to make it easier on everyone, we transitioned her on the bottle. We’ll do the sippy cup in a couple months; I have a feeling she’s going to be just like Jameson, refusing to drink significant amounts from the sippy until that’s the only option!

We’ve also practiced with the spoon a few times. She likes to guide my own hand, but pretty much plays with the spoon when she’s got full control. She always gets concerned when her food ends up all over her hands!

Coraline’s hair is growing so fast, and recently started to curl! I wonder if she may have gotten some of my hair after all? A mom can hope!

While she still isn’t doing much standing, she is finally starting to show interest in getting on her feet. She still doesn’t pull up, though she will occasionally try now. She almost exclusively will stand only against mommy and daddy when we’re lying on the floor with her. It doesn’t stop her from getting involved in everything we’re doing, though. She loves to be where we are at all times, playing with the things that Jameson is playing with.

She is pretty silly now. Coraline still loves being chased and held nearly upside down (we don’t usually do it all the way so no one tosses their cookies). She loves to lean against things, flinging her arms out and trusting we’ll catch her. Sometime this month she broke through one of her upper 1 year molars, we discovered at the doctor’s office. She may be breaking through more soon, since she has been having some trouble sleeping soundly lately, though thankfully we haven’t had to be up with her.

Now that we’ve experienced some warmer weather (excluding most of this week though, ugh), Coraline loves being outside. She’ll point outside and watch Daddy cooking on the grill. She just started waving this week, though I suppose that will count in her next month update!

We’re all getting anxious for her to start exploring her world on her feet I think, so I try to remember that this phase will seem like it just sped by and enjoy it while I can. She sure is!

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Coraline’s Cake Smash

March 13, 2014 2 Comments

This year, I decided to try and do a “real” photo shoot for Coraline’s first cake. Spoiler alert: she liked it just as much as Jameson, which is to say, they were quite a bit concerned with what was on their fingers.

For Jameson, I went the healthy route and made a cake from baby food. It tasted just like carrot cake, except better (if I do say so myself). I made a relatively healthy cream cheese frosting to go with it, and he wasn’t super impressed and didn’t dig in the way I’ve seen some kids do so. One of the things I’ve seen since his first birthday is the cake smash session, where baby gets a photo shoot all to herself, so I decided to give that a shot.

This time, thinking I would get better results from said baby, I made a traditional yellow cake. I used this 3 egg yellow cake recipe, because I only had 3 eggs on hand. It actually turned out great and very moist but solid enough that I didn’t accidentally carve it up while icing, and I’d make it again in a heartbeat. For the frosting, I realized I needed to get more ingredients regardless, so I went all out with a frosting recipe calling for 3-1/2 pounds of powdered sugar that I actually found on a couple different sites. I’m saving the leftover frosting in the fridge for the cupcakes I’m making for her party on Saturday.

I didn’t know, but for decorating cakes, a “crusting” type of frosting is recommended. I didn’t add all the powdered sugar (I did about 3-1/4), so mine didn’t crust too much and actually stayed just right for what I wanted for Miss Coraline. This frosting is intensely sweet but such a wonderful consistency.

For decorating, I borrowed a friend’s decorating bags from Wilton and her decorating tips. After doing a “base coat” of frosting to help the roses stick, you want the larger star-shaped tip, and you’ll just go around in the circle to make the rose. I wasn’t too worried about making mistakes or leaving gaps, I just made little “daisy” flowers between. I’m no professional, but I think it looks great! Here’s a great tutorial for even more professional looking results.

I even cut a slice out (which I later ate) to show her the insides, and helped her taste the cake itself, but still no dice. She’ll have plenty of opportunities to try it again in the next couple days. This still made for some super cute photos, and I’m really glad I took the time to do it!

Oh, that super duper poofy tutu? I made that, no sewing involved. The hardest part was cutting!

I figured, no sense in paying a lot for something that’s going to get ruined with icing. The ribbon was more expensive than the tulle so if you already have ribbon to use it would’ve been about $2 to make. But, I will say that if you want it to go all the way around you need more than 2 yds of tulle! I wasn’t too worried about not having enough; it reached a little over half way around her waist and I tied the ribbon in the back. Total cost was about $4! If you want to try your hand, check out this tutorial I followed.

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11 Months for Coraline

February 17, 2014 No Comments

This month was harder for little Coraline in terms of sleeping. While she was generally happy during the day, her nights were filled with crying out: Only for a moment or two before she fell back asleep on her own, but none of us liked hearing her cry out in pain for weeks at night, with pain medicine or not.

She finally broke through two more of her top teeth, for a total of 5. (And just days after turning 11 months old, she broke through the last of the swollen set, finally, for a total of 6 teeth). Hence her cute quirky crooked smile here she used while teething!

She spent most of this month teething, with a cold, and then got a yeast and bacteria infected rash under her arm. One of the tubes in her ear came out, unusually early (it was only in about two months). She’s currently on 4 medications, including two ointments, ear drops and oral antibiotics. Ooof! Poor thing.

Coraline figured out crawling within just a week after I recorded her video of the scoot she had been doing. She didn’t go backwards at all, and just straight up started moving forward. Sometimes she puts her feet down in what Brian calls her spider crawl which cracks me up, and rarely she’ll put both feet and hands on the ground with no knees, but straight in the air.

And she’s getting up on her knees! Not pulling up yet. This month, we’ve brought out the stand and play toy, to help her practice standing and pulling up. She loves the jumparoo and both jumps like a maniac and also swings herself back and forth like I never saw Jameson do in it, but she doesn’t do very much standing outside of those supported activities. Coraline has such little feet that I sometimes wonder if that might have something to do with it.

Our babbling has just started becoming more words and imitation. She mostly just says “hi”, and if I can say that aside from the babble of mamama and dadada her first real words have been “dada” and “hi”. We’ve started taking sign language class with her, as we did with Jameson. So far, I’m pretty sure she’s signed “all done” (or just being crazy at the end of meal time).

She’s learned to point with her index finger and I can see her little wheels turning. The other day she held up Jameson’s socks to us, and when I responded “sock”, she put it down on top of her own socks and stared at it.

Coraline has learned how to rock herself back and forth, though she’s still very conservative about it. She rocked herself in the glider during the monthly photos this month.

She’s a 17lb even small fry, just beginning to show preferences in what she’s eating. Yes to fruit, peas, and pasta. No to mashed potatoes, and many vegetables. Meat is hit or miss. She still practices the sippy, but since she doesn’t even take a bottle that well from us very often, we aren’t forcing the sippy issue yet. She’s a good eater like Jameson though in terms of just being able to do it: not a lot of gagging. However, she seems to be more prone to putting fistfuls of food (or anything else) in her mouth, so we have to have a hawk eye on her all the time now. A favorite game is to see who, me or her, can make it to the dog first who is eating her cookie treat and leaving crumbs everywhere.

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9 Months Out

December 18, 2013 2 Comments

This is an odd little milestone to note, but there is something thrilling when you realize your child has now been in this big, wide world longer than they were in your belly!

Coraline started playing peekaboo this month with blankets. She doesn’t really wait for you to shout peekaboo out at her before she already has the blanket up in her fact again, but it’s so fun to watch her. She also loves laughing when everyone else laughs, particularly with Jameson.

She really just seems like the happiest baby to me. She only gets upset when she is ill, tired, or very hungry. Or sometimes when people leave the room; she has definitely noticed that this month!

Coraline has some adorable little quirks, like twirling her little feet around in circles at the ankle when she is sitting. And she does love to sit; she is later than Jameson to be on hands and knees since she is just so content to sit and play with her toys. Jameson was on the move earlier!

But this month she has started adding some movement to the reaching she does when she bends all the way forward almost parallel to the ground. She now scoots herself on her butt slowly, and when she is on her belly, she does scoot herself backwards with her arms. She very rarely still gets on her knees; instead, she puts one foot behind her while the other stays in sitting position, but she is starting to move in her own way!

We did find her in her crib twice last weekend sitting up! So she managed to get herself from belly to sitting up position.

This month she actually seems less inclined to do any standing rather than more; I think that’s because she spends the majority of her time sitting or on her belly. We will need to start propping her up against some furniture on her feet some more for practice.

As I mentioned, she is noticing when people leave the room. To go along with that, we have experienced a little shyness with her the past couple weeks. When she has met someone she doesn’t see as often, like Grandpa, even though they live close, she tucks her head into my neck. It’s also pretty adorable. It’s hard to get her to smile for those new-to-her people as well!

Another big milestone for us this month was the finale of nursing. We had slowly been decreasing our nursing time since she stopped wanting to nurse (or even take a bottle) at night before bed and were just down to the morning time when, one day, she refused. It’s hard to believe this baby, who only wanted to nurse and gave us such trouble early on has finally stopped nursing. I am relishing the freedom, and just like with Jameson, I am happy that she chose herself so that there was no particular day that I had to decide to quit instead.

We have been doing more baby and solid foods, and she loves to eat! With Jameson, we struggled with baby food since he only wanted to feed himself real food; with Coraline, we have not had any issues at all. We also bought a new high chair that is much easier to clean! It’s all plastic and so easy to wipe down. Coraline has discovered how to drop food from the leg holes though and likes to do that when she’s finished eating.

Our final big event this month was health related! On Friday the 13th, exactly 9 months old, Coraline finally got tubes put in her ears. We actually had another rupture to the other ear just last week a couple days prior to her procedure, which was our 4th or 5th time (I may have lost track!) We continued to have ear drums rupture one after another every 10-15 days, though the last one we had a gap of 20-25 days between. The continued ruptures were due to pressure build up, either of just fluid or from infection, and put her hearing at risk.

Coraline did really well. We arrived at 6:30 in the morning and she was done by 9ish and on our way home. She was a little crazy crying when she woke up in recovery but after just about inhaling 7 ounces of formula, she was sucking her thumb and ready to sleep for much of the day. Now, we only have to give her drops in her ears for her infections which is great.

We did have a terrible experience when in came to actually scheduling the surgery, where they didn’t call us with our time the day before as expected, and due to a series of misinformation given by our scheduler, we didn’t call to inquire until they were closed for the day! So after calling 3 different numbers and speaking to 3 or 4 people, an on call doctor finally called our doctor, who wasn’t “sure” but “thought” she was the first appointment. Thankfully, she was. Or we wouldn’t have been happy to wait with a hungry baby!

We have a follow up appointment in a month to test hearing and check on the tubes, but so far, so good!

I love her baby-ness with the little dimples on her finger joints and elbows and the couple rolls on her thighs. I love her darker hair and the eyes that seem to be remaining blue. We love that little two-teeth smile that we’ve enjoyed for longer than we thought we would (though we think she might be starting to teethe again!).

She’s 16 lb, 15 oz of pure joy!

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Coraline at 7 Months

October 18, 2013 No Comments

At 7 months, we think Coraline is about the happiest baby ever. In the mornings, she will talk and talk and smile and loves playing with Jameson (Jameson is sometimes slow about getting ready because he loves playing with her so much; he’s very into “taking noses” from Coraline and putting them back right now). She’s very vocal, I think because she doesn’t have a pacifier, it seems like she is always saying something. Several family members have said the she’s been saying “da da da” in the babbling baby ramblings she does!

She is also very grabby still. This month she really learned how to eat puffs. She’s not making any pincer grasps yet but she has discovered how to get puffs in her mouth pretty effectively despite that. It was really helpful on her very first vacation to have the puffs to occupy her at meals.

After we returned from vacation, we started giving her food in earnest. We started with sweet potatoes and carrots and squash (sweet orange vegetable favorites of course). Over the past couple weeks, she has had enjoyed peas, green beans, corn (with sweet potatoes), and apples. She doesn’t seem to have any preferences now, though if she isn’t hungry she will let you know.

In addition, I had my very first night away from her, and she finally, finally took a full bottle from dad. It marks the beginning of the end of breastfeeding, I know, because my supply is dwindling anyway but it is a relief to know we should be able to feed her bottles without difficulty. We didn’t try the sippy again this month, though we plan on practicing more bottles from myself and dad as well as exploring the sippy more this month.

Coraline got her second tooth this month during vacation. So far, her teething isn’t too bad. There is a lot of drool, and close to the tooth breaking through we have a couple to a few wakeful nights. She gets a little edgy, but not unreasonable. I do hope that how she will teethe through all of them because it doesn’t seem too bad. We seem to have caught a break though, since she’s had a little less drool since breaking through the second tooth.

Sleeping is wonderful. She goes to bed around 7 (and lets you know when its time!). She sleeps through the night regularly. Coraline occasionally calls out crying for just second before falling back asleep; she is still very loud, so this wakes me, but she puts herself right back to sleep most times without trouble. When she does wake up for extended periods, she gets changed and then we sit in the rocking chair with her facing outward watching the mobile until she falls back asleep. She holds on to a little burp cloth while she sucks her thumb and wedges herself in corners of the crib.

Unfortunately, she is like her brother in that she it is difficult to tell when she has an ear infection! This month she got her first (a double), and we didn’t know it until she cried all morning one day in pain because her ear drum was bursting. After it was done, despite the ear infection that was still there, she was happy as a clam. Ear drums burst to relieve pressure, and most heal themselves. Hers did without a problem, and she got very good at taking her medicine.

When she went to the doctor for her ears, she weighed in at 15lb 4oz, a full pound from what she was at 6 months. Since the doctors told us last month that she needed to get some more calories in, we believe we’ve been successful and she’s been putting on weight and looking so healthy and her usual chubbier self. Coraline is just starting to get into up to 9 month clothes in length, but we still mostly wear 6 months clothes and size 2 diapers.

It’s been such a great month, I wish I could hold her tight here and stop her from growing for a minute, pausing in 7 months for a bit.

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First Foods

August 7, 2013 No Comments

Coraline tried her first foods a couple weeks ago. We started with oatmeal, baby cereal single grain of course, as we did with Jameson. With Jameson, who we found had a pretty big span between bowel movements, we wanted the additional fiber in his first foods that comes from oatmeal and brown rice. While Coraline doesn’t have this issue, we wanted to just the same make sure that she didn’t have any bowel troubles as we transitioned into food. We haven’t had any, and she is doing really well.

She gets oatmeal a couple times a week at dinner, and unlike with Jameson, we also brought it to the daycare for the days that she doesn’t eat from the bottle. That way, we can all feel good that she is still getting some food in her system! Thankfully, in the past two weeks, we seem to have overcome that difficulty (at daycare anyway).

Coraline makes a bit of a face every time we feed her, like she has to remember what this is and oh yeah, I have to open my mouth to get it! She does well with all textures now, from thicker to thinner. Most times she does better with it a little thicker so it doesn’t come right back out! We love our little chipmunk; her big cheeks give the impression that she’s storing up all that food in there, though she is adept at swallowing now and rarely if ever gags.

By the end of her first cereal, she was reaching to get that spoon in her mouth herself!

While I know breastfed babies should wait until 6 months before starting food, the issues we have had with her eating at daycare prompted us to start early to no ill effect. She doesn’t have it frequently yet but is getting used to the spoon and textures, a perfect first step before we really begin feeding her food in earnest in a month or so.

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4 Months Happy

July 20, 2013 No Comments

This month, Coraline slept through her first fireworks, enjoyed the company of friends at a kiddie park, and spent time with family for Father’s Day.

Coraline spent this month trying to roll over unsuccessfully. She really seems to enjoy hanging out on her side, chewing on hands or toys but without a lot of motivation to go further. One weekend she was really struggling with effort but when she was unsuccessful, she seemed to have given up and is very content with however we put her. She likes being on her belly much more than Jameson ever did, but like him spends more time on her back batting at toys.

I know it won’t be too long before she really discovers her feet, but I love her on her back using all of her limbs to get at something.

We borrowed a bouncer from friends, even though we already own one. She really seems to like this one better (it tilts her back a bit more and puts more toys in her reach). This is really where she started reach and grabbing, before doing much on her playmat. By the end of her fourth month, she was really starting to try and get things other than her hands in her mouth.

Her chubby cheeks just get me every time. She is however still about average in terms of weight, coming in at 13 pounds, 2 ounces on her 4 month appointment.

She still absolutely prefers breastfeeding to bottle feeding, and in fact recently refused the bottle from any of the teachers other than her regular provider (the head teacher of the room) who had to leave early one day. The doctor suggested that we stop feeding her overnight since we were just perpetuating a habit that would continue until we made it stop… so I did, and saw immediate effect in terms of sleeping, but not in terms of changing eating habits.

This little girl definitely has all our hearts (even Jameson’s!) and we all love seeing her grow big and strong. I’m not, other than the terrible habit of comparing babies, too interested in seeing her roll over. I wouldn’t mind keeping her at this stage for longer, though I already see it disappearing.

Leaving us is the nap-anywhere mentality (even though they were just half hour naps), as well as the content without doing anything. Though that is still there a lot, she enjoys being stimulated with toys in hand or hands in mouth or both. Which is all to the good, except for when toys drop to the floor!

And I leave with this, a picture of Buddha baby. Cracks me up every time!

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Bottlefeeding

July 17, 2013 No Comments

Not pictured: Dr. Browns; purchased or borrowed but not used: MAM and Similac bottles.

These are all the bottles (and nipples of different flows) that we tried with Coraline, except for Dr. Brown’s which I gave to our neighbor who uses them after Coraline refused. It was quite an ~~adventure~~ trial introducing bottle feeding to Coraline.

This was Coraline’s very first bottle, Tommee Tippee, around 3 weeks old, the very same time frame that we did for Jameson. She took it really well, and we all had warm fuzzies that she would have no issues with the bottle. Like Jameson, we opted to try her on the bottle once a week or so until we got closer to me going back to work, so a week went by before we tried her second bottle.

It was all a train wreck from there.

Little Miss Coraline refused her second bottle, screaming. We knew that she could take the bottle, which made it more frustrating than I think we would’ve been if she had refused from the beginning.

We tried a series of different bottles. We tried different positions, different people, and eventually different nipple types and flows. We had moderate success (read: 1/2 ounce after 45 minutes of trying) on the mOmma bottle (the funny looking round one) a few weeks later. However, feedings required extreme patience, complete awake-ness from Coraline (not tired at all), and no extreme hunger. Long term, we didn’t think that would work at daycare, so we continued trying.

The next bottle that seemed to work better for us was the Playtex Nurser, the drop in liners and a latex nipple. We first tried the silicon nipple, because I wanted latex to be a last resort. They don’t hold up as well, and I read how more exposure to latex can lead to an allergy. She actually didn’t seem to mind the nipple, but spent most of the time chomping on it and pushing it out of her mouth. However, any step away from the screaming was success, so I decided to buy more and try the latex nipples which texture seemed to be closer to natural.

Around this time was her 2 month doctor’s appointment, so we were starting to really feel the pressure to get her better with the bottle prior to me going back to work in 4 short weeks. The doctor gave us a sheet of tips and tricks to try with baby. Honestly, this sheet was helpful because all the ideas were in once place, but mostly they were a confirmation of what we had done, which is basically: some babies like this, others like the opposite, so… TRY EVERYTHING. Everything I read online was sound advice and all of it was on the sheet the doctor gave us.

The other reason the sheet was helpful was that I was able to pass it on to our daycare provider because she was not, in fact, ready to drink from bottles well by the time she had to.

The latex nipples were better, but she didn’t seem inclined to suck, so we tried another one of the recommendations on the sheet, which was try a faster flow nipple. She did even better with that (read: 1/2 ounce every time we offered the bottle instead of every once in a while, and down to 20-30 minutes instead of 45 to take it).

And that was where we left it when she had to start school. No more than a 1/2 ounce out of a bottle she didn’t scream at.

Needless to say, I wasn’t feeling very good about it. However, her first day that she already did better than she ever did at home. She did a whole 1 ounce! We got our hopes up that she would quickly figure this out and after a week would be eating like a champ.

However, we continued to have low milk intake day after day, and after a week at daycare, the baby who had been sleeping through the night began waking up (and continued through 4 months old). Our daycare provider decided to try a bottle they had there. She successfully took all the milk out of it! We were all excited until we found out it was a discontinued bottle (Tri-flow Bottles by Munchkin — I contacted them after searching online without success and discovered they had been discontinued for 5 years).

We took note though that she seemed to like the fast flow on it, and I opted to buy one more bottle which is similar, the Playtex VentAire with fast flow nipple.

We were thankful to have a daycare provider willing to clean out the one bottle after each feeding; after some more success that week on the VentAire, we decided to try the Tommee Tippee bottles that we already had so many of, this time in the fast flow nipple. We had success one day! But just one.

Alas, it wasn’t meant to last. Since then, we went back to the VentAire since it is the only one consistently getting reasonable milk intake. However, every Monday is like starting over. 6oz, 7oz, 10-12oz by Wednesday; every week. On the weekends we don’t do much attempts at bottle feeding since she has made it clear that she will not eat then. We had to skip a feeding one day because of her refusal and I had drank some alcohol. We were even at a different house and I was inside while she was out.

I have tried to supplement her with extra feedings in the evening and a “dream feed” before I went to bed, but that started to delay her eating until later in the day at school as well as at home on the weekend; wake ups are continuing even with a 10pm feeding.

Instead, we are planning on weaning her of the extra feeds based on our doctor’s recommendation and get back to our original schedule and eliminate overnight eating entirely. I know she can do it, since she was doing it pre-daycare days. I hope that she moves to eating more from the bottle during the day. I purchased more of the VentAire and we have decided that is the best we’re going to get. I can only hope that eventually she’ll get better at the bottle, or move more quickly to food.

It’s frustrating, knowing that she doesn’t like the bottle as much as she likes me. However, I am grateful that with Coraline eating less from the bottle, it has allowed me to build up a stash of milk that I don’t need to worry about supplying her with food each week.

Interested in some slightly used bottles? Check out my ebay listings (Playtex Nursers already sold): Lot of Tommee Tippee Bottles & Nipples; and Lot of Misc Bottles

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