DD2 turning 1 on Thursday - When to start cow's milk?

[Slickbird]

Hey,

My DD2 is turning 1 on Thursday and I can't remember for the life of me when or how to introduce cow's milk? She was breastfed for the first 6months and then onto Formula, but despite having a 7 year old DD, I just can't remember what I did with her!

Any help/advice, greatfully recieved!

Thanks

[whomovedmychocolate]

If she's had formula, she's had cows milk. Suggest you start by mixing formula with cows milk and upping the percentage of cows milk every few days.

Blue (full fat) milk obviously

[Slickbird]

I didn't know that?! I thought they couldn't have cows milk until 1, why would they put it in formula?

But will give that a shot, thanks for advice!

[Seona1973]

formula is made from cows milk but has been modified and has added vitamins and iron to make it suitable for babies. Cows milk isnt suitable till 1 year as the main drink as it lacks these vitamins and iron. When I switched I did it one bottle at a time rather than mixing it e.g. gave the morning feed as cows milk and the bedtime one as formula. I did that for a few days and then swapped the bedtime one to cows milk as well. Neither of my lo's seemed to notice a difference but if they had I would have done the mixing method suggested by the pp.

[whomovedmychocolate]

I'm curious, what did you think it was made of?

They remove the salt and also I think the casein whatever that is. I know they do add extra vitamin D and calcium - which.

As a matter of fact I was raised on evaporated milk (I believe it's known by the brand name 'Carnation' to most of our parents). It's literally boiled off milk to make a sweet syrupy mixture, in a can, bloody horrible. But a lot of parents were advised to feed it in the late 60s/early 70s.

BTW follow on milk is also a total con.

[thisisyesterday]

mmm evaporated milk is lovely. we used to have it on jelly when I was little lol

but, for the OP. I just switched ds1 straight onto cow's milk. he really liked it so it wasn't a problem at all.

but you could do it slower if you wanted, or if dd2 doesn't take to it by using WMMC's method of mixing with the formula to start with

[SmugColditz]

Don't buy any more, finish what you have, and hand it straight over. You will probably find she prefers it as formula tastes a bit gross.

I switched ds2 at 10 months as he just would NOT drink any brand of formula I bought, but would pilfer his brother's milk.

I switched both of mine fully without fiddling with it - do it for the first bottle of the day - they are thirsty and will accept it better

[SmugColditz]

They can have cows milk from 6 months, not 12 months. they cannot have it as a main drink as they need breastmilk (or formula) but they couldn't have water as a main drink either, and that's not harmful either!

Formula is just modified powdered cows milk.

[whomovedmychocolate]

Cows milk is much sweeter than formula so most kids like the switchover apparently.

[SmugColditz]

It's just NICER. Cows milk tastes richer and formula tastes a bit fishy these days (sick)

I love milk

[Slickbird]

Whomove - TBH, I hadn't really thought what it was made from, just made up er...sh*t, I dunno, minerals and stuff. That sounds really bad like I don't care what I put into my baby!!! But I do, or I wouldn't have suffered through bleeding nipple hell et al for the breastfeeding!!

I just found out today that her nursery has been putting in cows milk into her breakfast for a while anyway. You think they would have mentioned it. Oh well, should make the transition easier. I gave her some earlier, mixed, and she horsed it no problems. I think she might take it ok! Thanks for all the advice!

[Slickbird]

I dunno, do you think I could have fitted anymore faces in one post...??