So, how do we scrap these bottles then?

[clazzat]

we have the snack pot and Caleb lifts one of the little corners where his hand goes in and spills all the contents out!!!

Eloise does this too - we ended up with peas all over the car last week!

Liz - have you tried putting handles on the bottle?  If you have Avent ones then the handles from the sippy cups will work on the bottle as well.  There's also a sort of spout that you can put on the bottle instead of a teat as a sort of transition.

[~*Nicole*~]

You're right, Mashi...and often I can do the "No, you can't have milk, but how bout some juice?" recently she's started saying "how bout, Elmo" back to me...meaning she isn't caring what I'm saying...but she'd like to watch Elmo. NO IDEA how "how bout..." got her thinking TV but it seems to be an association she has!

[*Liz*]

YEY Mashi  great news and good idea about scraping the icky bottles  . Ours are getting icky as well now.

I've been delaying as I've been too tired to get up early ad DH has been making bottles.

Yesterday he had 3oz and today 1oz. That was out of a bottle.

I *really* don't want him to drop the milk as he NEEDS it with his rubbish diet.

At least there really is NO point giving a bottle just to get 1oz of milk into him.

[~*Nicole*~]

Nah...even if he takes a SIP every time he's offered a cup and then throws it...all his sips combined will be more than 1 oz likely!!!!!
Do you have pediasure there? I was using it when Ava was sick and had diarrhea. Says they are for 2 yrs + but I got them for free actually and I don't think they'd cause any real harm a bit early. I know they are used as a supplement or even food replacement when kids can't eat for illness or whatever. They're flavored milk based things with more nutrients/vitamins added, etc. The ones we have were vanilla flavored. I added them to her milk and she did really well with them (I was wanting to encourage her to drink more so she didn't get dehydrated). Might be worth looking into since he has a poor diet anyway and the flavor may entice him to drink more? I mean, they're sweet which is a whole other issue, but that's why I didn't use them straight and mixed them with the milk. She went right back to taking just straight milk.

[Mashi]

I do think that's a good way to look at it Liz -- if he is only taking a few ounces from the bottle then really, why not just let him take that ounce or two from a sippy?  You've got two problems (bottles and low milk intake), tossing the bottles in the bin and giving it to him in a sippy solves one of those problems on the spot without creating another problem!

I added 1/2 ounce of vanilla soy milk to DS's sippy of milk this morning - drank it all.  DH went back to work today so I get to go back to not having to argue and justify my intelligent and informed decisions against his half-brained male thoughts        

You mentioned that he does eat grated cheese, yes?  1 ounce of cheese is the equivalent of close to 8 ounces of milk, when it comes to calcium levels (I think.  I might be wrong.  I should double check that...but I know I'm not too far off).  I know you are looking at calories as well, but maybe if he stops taking milk, you can get some more cheese in there for calcium and an extra piece of toast and fruit to make up the calories?  Keep offering the sippy and even an ounce or two over the day is better than none and it probably WILL go up tiny bits over time.

[*Liz*]

Even chocolate flavoured milk is rejected   . Not that I want him to have - just that I tried once to see if he might!!

Never tried Vanilla though.

I think he is viewing that morning milk thing as a drink now rather than a feed if that makes sense - so it is to do with thirst as to whether he wants it or not.

He will eat 1oz of cheese every now and again.

[Mashi]

Chocolate milk is a no-go here, too.  Just spits it out and throws the cup. I think the vanilla soy goes over well because it tastes like vanilla yogurt.

It makes total sense about viewing the milk as a drink and not as a feed - this is what is happening here as well. And, hard as it is to accept when we are depending on the milk for calories and "food" for LOs who don't eat that much, but the thing is, at this age, milk really should be a drink and not a feed. I think this is one thing that my DH is struggling with - I have managed to shrug it all off and say "if he eats, he eats; if he doesn't, oh well" to both food and milk.  It isn't really helping him to take more of either, but it's at least allowing me to stress about other things instead!!

[~*Nicole*~]

What has he eaten the past couple of days? Just curious. Do you do more of a 3 main meals thing or more snacks throughout the day? I wonder if he'd do better on smaller portions more often. (Isn't that supposed to be more healthy in general?)

[*Liz*]

No idea Nicole  my Mum has fed him. I bet I could take a decent guess though!! It will be cheerios and toast for breakfast, and end the day in a fish finger and potato faces  .

J pretty much has 2 proper meals (breakfast and dinner), then a big pre-nap snack and a small post nap meal, then another afternoon snack as he is too hungry to wait for his dinner as he has been snacking rather than eating meals  . So he really is feeding little and often throughout the day now anyway.

[Mashi]

That is our meal day as well Liz. I didn't think there was anything wrong with it though   

Breakfast - toast and cheerios or pancake and cheerios, bit of fruit
Large snack in the morning - bread roll, cheese, fruit, raisins, yogurt - usually all 4, sometimes not
Snack post nap - rice crackers with spreadable cheese, more fruit zwieback (melba toast?), and a biscuit
Small snack before dinner - maybe some yogurt or raisins, often a biscuit, perhaps some peas or carrots?
Dinner - whatever he will eat - if we have pasta he will eat, if it's not, then he probably only has peas or carrots and some toast and yogurt

I've been happy enough with it lately...probably shouldn't be, but it's easier to accept it than to battle it.

[*Liz*]

Oh no Mashi - I'm perfetly happy with it as well - it is a case of picking your battles isn't it?

Only thing I dislike is if he gets too many snack foods because we are not organised enough )I mean rather than little bits of better foods iyswim), and I dislike the 4.30pm tantrum as he is hungry and inpatient for his tea - which I am in the middle of getting ready!!

[~*Nicole*~]

Liz-I think that sounds like a good amount of food for the moment. At least he is hungry at points during the day! Does your mom prepare the other meals herself or do you have to prepare them for her to give? Thank goodness my mom prepares foods for DD. It's such a time saver. Of course she isn't that picky and since my mom is making herself meals anyway she just gets the same thing my mom is eating generally.

[Mashi]

I dislike the 4.30pm tantrum as he is hungry and inpatient for his tea - which I am in the middle of getting ready!!

We get this as well. Same time every night.  I do my best to have tea ready for 430 but tonight was a case of it being a little late - so gave him a piece of cheese and then he wouldn't eat his tea because he was too busy crying over me saying "no more cheese"   BUT had I given him anything else to eat 10 minutes earlier he'd have said no.

Grrrr.

He's also a little Goldilocks with his bedtime milk - JUUUUST right or he won't drink it. Tonight whinging and moaning that it was too hot and I added 5ml to a 6ounce bottle and it was fine.  Like, REALLY did it make that much difference? Grrr.  I think it's going to be a short time before I just ditch the bottles all together - I'd rather have him on four or five sippies of 2-3 ounces each, with yogurt and cheese as supplemental dairy than keep up with the bottles, kwim?

[*Liz*]

I arrived at my parents today to find my Dad spoon feeding him peas  . Why oh why will he NEVER eat anything like that from me  . And he was eating sausage!! Nice quality ones from the farmers market - apparently he eats it if you take the meat out of the skin.

Mum does give him his food through the day - but really he eats so little of such plain things it is no big deal. So butter some bread, or grate some cheese, or scramble some egg!!

I totally agree about milk throughout the day but I doubt J will go for that. He has refused milk at all other times for quite a while now.

Drank 7oz before bed tonight from the bottle.

Tomorrow am he is getting his new cup  . Yep - another new cup  . We will see.

[~*Nicole*~]

WOW peas and sausage...that's good!

For what it's worth...Ava TOTALLY eats better for my mom than us.