Product Spotlight: Baby Bottles

sammierose464

To go along with our talk on breast pumps last week, let's talk your favorite (or your babe's favorite) bottles.

jengibre_zorro

I will preface this with i had a super easy to feed baby that would drink out of anything but he did best with munchkin latch and comotomo.  I liked the comotomo the best because it was easy to clean, but it didn't fit well in the bottle warmer at daycare (and their labels wouldn't stick to the silicone), so they were annoyed by them and preferred the munchkin latch.  I will also say he was breastfed and had zero issues with nipple confusion/bottle preference with the munchkin latch!

Another perk - they were handing out free latch bottles like hotcakes in all the registry gift boxes when i had him.

ninji15

I have a crap ton of dr browns and they worked well for me last time. I am hoping they work for me this time too so I don't have to buy more. I am super interested in joovy bottles too though.

ETA: I guess that and kiinde. Those were awesome too! But thats only if you are pumping really, might be kind of a pain for formula. You can use them for baby food too though. 

sliztee

Oh, good product spotlight, @sammierose464!

aels12

We used the Philips Avent Natural bottles and my baby took to them fine. They don't have a ton of parts and are easy to clean. He also had no problem with nipple confusion between that and breastfeeding. I never tried any other ones since he did so well with them, so hopefully this baby likes them too!

nasalot188

^^ this exactly. 

KFrob

We also had a babe that would drink out of anything.  Since I EPed we just used the Medela ones.  We had one Avent Natural bottle we got in a freebie bag and really liked that too.  I hated the Dr. Brown.  There's way too many parts.    

Lisa3379

For awhile, it was tough to get DS to take a bottle for whatever reason. We started around 2 weeks because we had to supplement with formula. Anyway, I started out with comotomo and it worked for awhile, but then he started to refuse. Then we went to Dr. Brown, and he still had a rough time, but eventually he got it going. Now was that because of the particular bottle, or some other reason? Who knows. But I do know one thing - the Dr. Brown bottles SUCK to clean. 

sliztee

**Removes Dr. Brown bottles from registry**

ninji15

Those that didn't like Dr Brown did you try the "options" ones? That you don't have to use the extra parts for? I guess thats why I didn't mind them so much. 

hellopartyof5

DS was a major PITA when it came to bottles. When I first went back to work we had to spoon feed him milk. He eventually loved the mam bottles (the nipples look way different than other bottle nipples). DD was not as picky, but loved the born free ones. I actually registered for 1 of like 6 different types of bottles and that was fantastic for us to experiment with. I now hand it over to friends having a hard time so they can figure out which bottle their baby likes best. 

tinattt23

We used comotomo since my Lactation consultant said they were one of her favorites. DS wasn’t really picky. He didn’t use a bottle very often anyways. Kind of pricey but we only had two. Easy to clean. Never leaked. Worked for us. 

mommy2ane

My son would spit everything up when having a bottle, but then we switched to Dr. Browns and it stopped. We still have those bottles and used it with my daughter and will use them with #3. I nursed both kids and neither had an issue switching back and forth between bottles and breast once I returned to work. The Dr. Browns are a pain to clean, but I’d take that over the spit up any day!

Laumb11

We also used the Avent natural bottles and loved them. But DS had no problem taking it so that's the only one we tried. 

tropical1982

I'm putting Dr. Browns on my registry just because no matter what it seems we go through a period where we need them although I hate washing all the pieces. 

We'll nurse during maternity leave and introduce the bottle a few weeks before I return to work.  Last time I pumped I found Playtex bottles where I could pump straight into drop-ins for bottle and not have to wash bottles nightly.  It was ah-mazing for a working mom.  I think they've been discontinued though.

I'll register for a few different bottles to try.

tinattt23

@tropical1982 The Kiddie twist bottles are basically the same system where you pump straight into the bag and pop it in a bottle shell to feed. We bought the whole system and I didn’t like it because I was never able to pump enough to make a full bottle from on boob. So I had to mess with combining bags and it wasn’t just a pain. 

nmadjeski

We got a sample MAM bottle from the hospital with DS and it was the only bottle he would take (same for the pacifier). They never caused a problem with breastfeeding. They do have several pieces to them but that's because they are vented to prevent any air getting in them so it didn't bother us. We plan on using them with this baby as well. 

Also my Lansinoh manual pump fit right on top of the bottles so I could pump directly into them which was convenient.

tropical1982

tinattt23 said:

@tropical1982 The Kiddie twist bottles are basically the same system where you pump straight into the bag and pop it in a bottle shell to feed. We bought the whole system and I didn’t like it because I was never able to pump enough to make a full bottle from on boob. So I had to mess with combining bags and it wasn’t just a pain. 

Oooh, those look pretty cool too.  With my first i did the Medela bottles and had to combine anyway so it'll be an issue with any bottle.  Looking into this and it seems even Tommy Tippee has their own system now too.

sunnyknightsarah

Well I am overwhelmed haha. Noob FTM here and I definitely feel behind in my bottle research haha. Thanks for all the great recommendations, ladies!

SawyerRichardson

@nmadjeski Same with us. DD would only use MAM pacifiers and hated all bottles, but did better with the MAM than anything else.

purplegoldfish2

aels12 said:

We used the Philips Avent Natural bottles and my baby took to them fine. They don't have a ton of parts and are easy to clean. He also had no problem with nipple confusion between that and breastfeeding. I never tried any other ones since he did so well with them, so hopefully this baby likes them too!

We used these in glass. I actually need to get them all back because we loaned them to a couple different friends that were having trouble getting their babies to take bottles so we let them try ours.  Both of those babies also liked them.

kiwi2628

I don;t know if this will need its own spotlight, but I am gonna throw it here since its related: a bottle warmer. Are they necessary? Really? We have a microwave and a very speedy digital thermometer so I am not convinced

Lisa3379

kiwi2628 said:

I don;t know if this will need its own spotlight, but I am gonna throw it here since its related: a bottle warmer. Are they necessary? Really? We have a microwave and a very speedy digital thermometer so I am not convinced

We didn’t need one. We warm ours in an insulated cup filled with water from the instahot. 

tinattt23

@kiwi2628 Microwave isn’t recommender because of hot spots. But running them under hot water works just fine. Or be lazy like me and get your kid used to drinking cold milk early. 

KFrob

We would microwave a cup of water and drop the bottle in for a minute 

kiwi2628

@tinattt23 This may sound dumb, but wouldn't mixing the liquid after heating and then measuring temp dissipate any hot spots?

momoflogan20

I used mam bottles and pacifiers. The premade tiny formula bottles they give you at the hospital have a kinda flat nipple so DS only wanted one like that and mam is flat not circular. They have 4 ounces and 8 ounce bottles and they have pretty pictures on the outside of them. 

momoflogan20

@nmadjeski why do mam babies never want anything else? We have 5 different sample bottles from different brands and he hated them. Ive read from several people that if they like mam they won't take anything other bottle.

tinattt23

@kiwi2628 I kind of always wondered the same thing. I just know it shows up constantly as one of those big no nos. Microwaving plastic always makes me nervous anyways, so I skipped it. We only had to warm up maybe one bottle a day anyways. And around two months old I slowly started warming bottles less and less until he just took them straight out of the fridge. 

nmadjeski

@momoflogan20 I honestly think it's the shape of the nipple. I can't find any similar!

jengibre_zorro

@kiwi2628 - we had one and used it pretty regularly (or more so, my husband used when he would help with middle of the night feeds) for $20 bucks, it was a convenience (we actually kept a cooler bag and the warmer on our dresser). Also, i don't trust my husband to microwave properly and test temps, especially at 3 am 

I am all for trying to push cold milk early, but its tricky because breastmilk is warm so they get used to that, and also some babies are jerks. If you are formula feeding though, i would totally just start out with cold or room temp and skip the whole warming thing.  My cousin did it and it worked very well for her!  

ninji15

@kiwi2628 I used a bottle warmer a lot as an EPer because a lot of my milk was frozen. It helped a lot but you could always microwave water or heat up a pot on the stove. I know some that even use a crock pot full of water. Some babies take formula and other things just fine room temp or even cold.

acdc1109

+1 for munchkin latch bottles.  I actually did some research to decide which would be best for transitioning between breastfeeding and bottle feeding and the munchkin bottles were on the list and cost effective. Luckily I think DS would have used any type of bottle, but I did really like them.  I'm curious about the comotomo and might get a few for this time around.

@kiwi2628 We found that the bottle warmer took too long so we ended up using hot water in a pyrex measuring cup and it worked just fine. When we changed to formula we just used hot water to mix the formula in the bottle so we didn't have to worry about heating it up.

joey2831

My DD was very picky on which bottle she would use.  I breastfed her and when I had start taking her to daycare, she did not want to use any bottle.  Luckily, the daycare got her to use a bottle, but when I was around she would not take a bottle from me or my husband.

I also made the mistake of having only Dr Brown bottles on hand and she hated that bottle. I had to do an emergency trip to Target and buy a bunch of different bottles to see if she would use any bottle because we did not try to give her a bottle until a week before she was supposed to start going to daycare. I would definitely recommend if you are going to breastfeed and have them use a bottle for daycare introduce a bottle as early as you can and get them used to both ways. She ended up using the Nuk bottle. At least when it was time to move onto sippy cups, she had no problem giving up the bottle.

purplegoldfish2

@kiwi2628 It’s because while you may think that you mixed it well enough, if you didn’t, baby could be burned.  I’ve stirred liquids after heating them in the microwave and sometimes it is still uneven (which is super annoying because stirring should have mixed it). Add to it that you’re exhausted and the chances of not mixing well increases.

sliztee

Got one of those magical Mam bottles in my Noobie Box today! Thanks @sammierose464 for the freebie intel!

spartan4life

This is a little off topic, but goes along the lines of the bottle warmer. One of my friends who had a baby in January recommended this for formula feeders. It’s like a Keurig for formula! She tried breastfeeding but didn’t work for her. She said this was so much easier than the bottle warmer because it dispenses the formula at the correct temperature. My plan is to EP but if we end up needing formula I will definitely be getting myself one of these. I know it would be especially helpful for my H.

https://www.target.com/p/baby-brezza-formula-pro-one-step-bottle-maker/-/A-14681624

BrittanyCupcakes

We used Lansinoh mOmma bottles with DD, and had great results. No issues with nipple confusion when we were still nursing, they were easy to clean.

lrlybbert

DD was very hard to bottle feed. We mostly breastfed, but had to switch to more bottle feeding after I had to have surgery when she was 10 months. Her favorite was the Nuby bottles with the big fat nipple. It even had bumps around the nipple that looked like glands.

britvahok

I used the Philips Avent Natural bottles with my boys. I got a free Dr Brown bottle in February as part of a Babies r Us promotion. Unless your baby has reflux issues I wouldn’t recommend them. It was a pain cleaning the extra pieces. I also have the Philips bottle warmer, it does it’s job no complaints. I read that you could also defrost breast milk in it but I purchased after I was done bf. I’ve seen the brezza in local buy/sale groups. In my opinion it’s not worth the $$$.

SweetSweetTooth

I got a free Dr. Brown one in my Target bag... it looks like there is only one extra piece but I didn't take it apart. What makes it difficult to clean? I have a straw cleaner so figured that would make cleaning a breeze.