8 month DD feeding every 2 hours. Is this routine ok?

[MUM2ELA]

HI all

My DD is just 8 months old and about a month and a half ago I changed her routine from having milk WITH her meals to giving her milk separately.

This now means she has: 5oz milk at 6.30am, breakfast about 8.30am, 5oz milk at 11am, lunch at 1pm, 5oz milk at 3pm, tea at 5pm(ish) and a 5oz bottle of milk for bed at 7pm.

This means she is feeding every 2 hours!! Is this right? Do you think I should decrease the number of bottles she has, but increase the milk volume so that she is still having her pint of milk a day.

Any thoughts would be happily received!

Hi we were pretty much in the same routine with DS2 (just turned 9 months this week). Like you, it did feel he was always eating or drinking. Over the last month he has more or less readjusted his own routine - started taking so little at 10-10.30 am that after a week we just droppped it altogether. He now has about 7oz at 6 am and then 5oz at about 3pm then 8 oz at 7pm. I wouldn't worry too much since your DD is taking the pint a day, just across more feeds. But if it's bothering you, try reducing or dropping the 10 am feed. I also found it meant DS2 was more hungry for his lunch. HTH

whoops - I meant the 11 am feed. Also meant to say, you might find you need to bring lunch forward, as DS2 now really wants his lunch by noon.

Hi Mum2ela, my dd is 8 months and she has
Bottle at 7am
Breakfast between 8 and 9
Lunch 11.30 to 12 ish with water not milk
Bottle 3pm
Dinner 6pm
Bottle 7 - 7.30pm

She doesn't want her morning bottle any more.
Same as Mo2 really

Hi Mum2ela my dd is 9 months she has really came off her bottles quickly she only has one at bedtime now - she stopped her morning one 3 days ago

7.30 Rice Crispies (still 3oz formula milk)
Toast

9.30 Cow&Gate Savoury Stick/Bread Stick

11.30 Soup/Slice of bread
2 Munch Bunch Fromage Fraise

12.30 - 2.30 Nap

2.30 1 Munch Bunch Fromage Fraise or Toast

5.00 Dinner
2 Munch Bunch Fromage Fraise

6.45 Milk

so dd still eats really every 2 - 3 hours she would just rather have food than milk

sorry meant to say dd gets water with all her meals

This is really interesting, because I am weaning ds (5months) and before I started weaning i was getting criticism because he was still feeding every 3 hours, and then I looked at all the books on weaning and they were suggesting that I should aim for just the sort of routine your dd is on, ie 3 meals + milk in between, which is every 2 hours. When I thought about it, I thought that I like to have something myself every couple of hours (elevenses, afternoon tea and biscuit) so I think it is quite normal!!

My dd is 5 months and we've had to do feeds every 2 hours because to start with if we gave food and milk too close together she would throw everything up (and I mean everything). It means that at the moment we seem to be constantly feeding her but we are slowly bringing the food and milk closer together so (I hope) it should get a bit easier soon

Personally, MY routine is this:
7:30 cereals
10:00 banana and a cup of tea
12:30 lunch
3:00 cereal bar and a drink
5:00 some toast or fruit while giving Ellie her tea
7:30 dinner
drinks of squash all day long

So I really can't see why my DD shouldn't have something every couple of hours too!

Thanks everybody for your thoughts.

I just wanted to make sure that this routine is normal.

I think I might try to cut out her 11am bottle and perhaps she could have a snack then instead (& increase the amount of milk taken at other times), because at the moment I don't have specific snack times, so it fells like I am feeding her rasins (sp?) and bits of cheese all day!!

My ds eats and drinks almost that often and he's 20months now! Breakfast 7amish, 10amish milk and fruit/biscuit, lunch 12.30ish, 3pm milk/juice snack. Supper 6pmish, milk and story before bed at 8pm. Little and often is supposed to be good for you, isn't it? Oh, that doesn't include the grapes and french bread at the supermarket, of course