Feeding Tuesday: Zoli Straw Sippy Cup (OR: Which Sippy Cups and Bottles Are Your Favorites?)
Babies · Gear · Recent Recs
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I was going to feature a bottle for today’s feeding post — we’ve started supplementing a bit so they’re on my mind. I have yet to find a brand that I truly like, though, so I’m punting and posting something we did really like: the ZoLi sippy cup/bottle, which is pretty much what we went to immediately when Jack started drinking regular milk. It’s generally great — it doesn’t leak, is easily held, and as far as I understand it, avoids some of the dental issues sometimes associated with sippy cups. Which bottles or sippy cups are/were your favorites? This one is $12 at Amazon. ZoLi Bot Straw Sippy Cup Blue
(Also great, and a bit more budget friendly: The First Years Take and Toss Straw Cups, 4 for $2.68 as an add-on item at Amazon.)
Here’s another general Q: does your child have the day “off” today from school or daycare? Do you? What arrangements did you make?
Sales of note for 1/16:
(See all of the latest workwear sales at Corporette!)
- Nordstrom – Cashmere on sale; AllSaints, Free People, Nike, Tory Burch, and Vince up to 60%; beauty deals up to 25% off
- AllSaints – now up to 60% off (some of the best leather jackets!)
- Ann Taylor – Up to 40% off your full-price purchase; extra 50% off sale
- Banana Republic Factory – 50% off everything + extra 20% off
- Boden – 15% off new styles with code — readers love this blazer, these dresses, and their double-layer line of tees
- DeMellier – Sale now on, free shipping and returns — includes select options like Montreal, Vancouver, and Venice
- Eloquii – $29 and up select styles; extra 50% off all clearance, plus ELOQUII X kate spade new york collab just dropped
- Everlane – Sale of the year, up to 70% off — reader favorites include their scoop tee, Dream Pant, ReNew Transit backpack, silk blouses and oversized blazers! New markdowns just added
- Hannah Andersson – Up to 30% off all pajamas;
- J.Crew – Up to 40% off select styles; up to 50% off cashmere
- J.Crew Factory – 40-70% off everything
- L.K. Bennett – Archive sale, almost everything 70% off
- M.M.LaFleur – Tag sale for a limited time — jardigans and dresses $200, pants $150, tops $95, T-shirts $50
- Spanx – Lots of workwear on sale, some up to 70% off
- Talbots – Semi-Annual Red Door Sale – 50% off + extra 20% off, sale on sale, plus free shipping on $150+
And — here are some of our latest threadjacks of interest – working mom questions asked by the commenters!
- The concept of “backup care” is so stupid…
- I need tips on managing employees in BigLaw who have to leave for daycare pickup…
- I’m thinking of leaning out to spend more time with my family – how can I find the perfect job for that?
- I’m now a SAHM and my husband needs to step up…
- How can I change my thinking to better recognize some of my husband’s contributions as important, like organizing the shed?
- What are your tips to having a good weekend with kids, especially with little kids? Do you have a set routine or plan?
A prosecutor friend of my ours baked what I suspect are THC cookies and provided them to my husband. Not happy about this junk being in my freezer. I just feel we are too old for this nonsense. How should I handle this?
I posted on the regular page but wanted to post here too.
Holiday Gift Q.
What gifts (and when) do you give to: (1) your child’s day care teachers, (2) your child’s day care director who has literally stood in the middle of your custody dispute, and (3) who am I missing? TIA!
We’re also fans of the Take and Toss, both tops. Bedtime water and grape juice goes in the sippy lid. Smoothies in the straw. The straws from Ikea cut in half fit in the hole perfectly :) We also love them for snacks in the car because they fit so well in the cup holder.
Duralux Picardie tempered glasses for water and juice at the table. The 3 oz size is perfect for toddlers. (8 oz great for preschoolers through adults).
Thermos Funtainers for water when out and about and lunch boxes. Love them! I also like the thermos sippy for hot beverages.
This last weekend we attempted to put two infant car seats (expecting twins) in my 2007 Subaru Legacy and it was laughable. I’m 5’9” and my knees were in the dash, definitely not going to work. I’ll be trading my husband for his truck – 4 door Toyota Tacoma. The Tacoma isn’t ideal either (one seat in the middle, one on passenger side so that the driver’s seat will go back enough to drive comfortably. Anyway, we decided we can tough it out with the truck until they’re around 2 years old and we can turn them around to forward facing since adding a new vehicle to the twins budget is not exactly ideal. We were discussing this with some couple friends of ours who have a 13 month old and they thought we were being ridiculous for thinking we would keep them forward facing until 2 years old. They were like “you can turn them around at 30 lbs or 1 year old” and I said “most of the guidance I read online suggested that it’s MUCH, MUCH safer to keep them rear facing until 2” and they said, well we’re not doing that because it’s a pain. Then I started noticing people’s pictures on FB of their children that are clearly under 2 forward facing in their car seats. So, poll, when did you turn your child to forward facing and why?
We’ve been using the Munchkin latch sippy cup and a Nuk sippy cup – my kiddo likes the soft spouts. She also has a straw sippy cup that I got cheap in the seasonal bin at Target, but she has to suck pretty hard on it so she tends to just throw it on the floor. I’ve been looking at the Munchkin 360 or Avent 360, since those are just like cups but leak-proof.
Also, vent – daycare just texted to say baby has bumps coming up in the diaper area, and they look the same as the last 2 (!!!) times she has had hand foot and mouth. I am starting to think the nanny route might be better than scrambling for emergency childcare every couple months…yikes.
We’ve been trying out different straw and sippy cups for the last month or so. So far, the Munchkin straw cups linked above are the best for her. She also drinks really well out of my Camelback (and it was instinctive for her somehow – I was shocked when I heard her swallowing).
Unrelated question: We are taking a week-long trip later this month that will involve long plane rides (and having to switch planes). We are going to gate check the car seat and an umbrella stroller. We will also check a rolling bag. I am considering the following: my husband will carry on a duffle bag with necessities/some clothes in case our checked bag gets lost; I will carry on a bag with my pump and pump parts; and I will also carry on a diaper bag. Our current diaper bag is small. I’m thinking of getting a larger one (still small enough for under the seat) so that I can fit a small cooler bag with bottles of milk; a couple of pouches/easy snacks; books; lovie; toys; diapers+wipes; change of clothes; blanket. The first plane leg will be a one hour flight; the second one will be 3 hours. Baby will be 9 months.
What do you guys think of this plan? Any recs for a good bag? We’ve flown with her before but now she is crawling and squirming and such a nosy rosy, so I think surviving the 3-hour flight will be all about having enough activities to keep her distracted, and maybe we’ll get lucky and will score some nap time (because flight time of 2d plane is right at normal nap time, and we will have to wake her up early to make the first leg).
Other advice for flying with a child this age? Thank you!!
We introduced a cup of water in a Playtex straw sippy when we started solids (5 months). Once he got better at it, we went to the Munchkin straw cups mentioned above. We used Dr. Browns bottles with their 500 parts so we were delighted when he transitioned off of them around a year. I feel like we’ve used just about everything out there at one point or another. Happy that he can use just a regular straw or open cup now.
We have school today, although the public schools and some privates don’t.
Re: Sippy cups– My 13 month old still only has 2 tiny teeth, and we only ever put milk or water in the cups, so decay is not a pressing issue for us. We use the Playtex Anytime cups and we take the flow restriction thing out. When she’s home with me on weekends, I let her have a plastic cup with a real straw.
She hates/gets frustrated with all the straw ones (she hates biting it for liquid and it’s so dang slow!). We do have ONE of the straw types (different brand but similar to the one featured…and NOT $12) for the car.
I was gifted a complete set of Phillips Avent bottles (so they’re the only ones we’ve tried), and we really like them. They don’t leak and all the parts can just go straight into the dishwasher.
I like the plain basic sippy cups best. After washing all of the parts for the Dr. Brown’s bottles (which I loved in spite of the multiple components), I wanted something simple, and I wanted something that taught my DD about the physics of drinking from a “real” cup, so my preference was for something without a straw-like component. We’ve loved these from Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00BNQEX44/ref=twister_B006FIWJIC. They leak if left upside down and can spill a few drops if turned over and shaken (as toddlers will do), but nothing too bad. They are easy to throw in diaper bags and are so cheap that I never care if we accidentally leave one behind at a restaurant. We used them for both milk and water until DD was about 18 months old and started stealing my and DH’s camelbak bottles. She loved the straw action, so even though I had been avoiding it, we got her two kids’ camelbak bottles to use for water.
The whole ‘day off’ question – I wish there was a general consensus where either everyone has the day off, or no one does. My last company didn’t give us any of the ‘lesser’ holidays off (Veterans’, Columbus, MLK, etc) and it was such a pain trying to figure out the train schedule those days (Sunday schedule, but only on inbound? Trains are all express between 10 and 2? Why can’t I just stay home??). I feel for anyone trying to scramble together childcare on these kind of days.
Just today I totally forgot (I mean, I knew it was Veterans’ day, but forgot some people don’t have to work) and put out all the trash and recycling…. which I will need to haul in and put back out tomorrow.
We use the ZoLi Bot sippies exclusively after having tried nearly every other sippy on the market. It is definitely the best, but it is not without its issues. Anyone who says it is leak proof just hasn’t had it for long enough yet.
We have ZoLis in all different colors and different sizes. They all have the same issues. After much trial and error, here’s our magic formula to reduce the leakage:
– Tighten it just barely enough. If the lid is on too tight, there is too much pressure in the cup and it draws liquid up the straw. If the lid is not tight enough, when your toddler throws it the lid will pop off and you will feel white hot rage. If you practice a few times you’ll start to get the feel for the sweet spot.
– Plain water is the least likely to leak. Mixing any juice in, especially orange juice, seems to cause more liquid to come up the straw and leak.
– Pushing the lid down over the straw makes the leaks worse, since it changes the pressure on the straw. Just leave the lid off.
I used the Tommee Tippee bottles (bfed during the evenings, pumped/bottles while at daycare) and loved them. It did mean that I had to wash two sets of bottles – pumped into the medela bottles since they fit in my cooler, and then transfer to the TT bottles at night. But worth it for a baby that never refused the bottle, thank goodness.
Transitioned to straw sippys, because I’d heard such bad things about “regular” sippys. I used the Munchkin Click Lock Flip Top Straw Sippys, just a few bucks each at Target, and they never spilled. Basically used the method outlined here to teach her the straw, at around 6-7 months. It took maybe 4 weeks until she consistently got it.
http://www.yourkidstable.com/2012/08/how-to-teach-your-baby-or-toddler-to.html
And then started introducing cups (the plastic ones from Ikea) around 10 months. At almost 2 years, I still only use the cups at the table, and use sippys or a contigo bottle when on the go.
I’m a take and toss straw cup fan. Easy, cheap, done.
My kids are all in school today.
Hi ladies! Following up on yesterday’s discussion of “give a sh!t” level. I am expecting our first and can identify with what many of you said about losing motivation or caring less at work as priorities change. Question, though — how does this fit in with your financial picture? This is thinking long-term, but if/when we have a second, our childcare costs will be greater than my take home pay. So at that point, continuing to work is kind of, well, a luxury. Unfortunately I’m in a career (think military-like) where it’s not really possible to take a few years off and then come back; if I want to continue in my career field, I have to stay in it, which likely means paying to work during the daycare years. When I don’t feel ambitious like I once was, it’s hard for me to mentally justify actually paying to come to work. But I have no desire to be a SAHM, either. Anyone else in this situation?