April 2009 - Chapter 5 - The one where no-one is allowed to feel guilty (except about all the chocolate...)

[Guimauve]

There will be chocolate fines for the guilty!

guim - my family are from London/Ipswich/Ireland, so maybe that's why I say 'scone' most of the time. I also don't really have a local accent (thanks her lucky stars!).

just gonna quickly tell you what i do as regards to the ff.

I boil the water in the morning and fill up all my bottles with just the right amount of water in the morning. Then add the powder as i need it throughout the day. Hence no buggy milk sitting around. But I still have the convienience of the water being ready.

I think the not putting boiled water in the bottles thing is down to the increased risk of BPA going into the water.

I also pre-measure out the powder into special powder pots so that saves even more time. So when bubba needs a feed I just mix the two together and i am ready to go. The water lasts 24 hours so I do one batch a day. Then when the milk is all mixed it can last up to 4 hours when put in the fridge.

It has also not been unknown to cool the water down in a sink of cold water when needed too!

Hope this helps?

i say scone like bone! and i am a saauuuth londoner....

Oh dear i spoke toooooo soon, my very chilled baby hs been up since 4.10am, this has never happened, .
could this be due to the fact that i was on here reving about how good he is? or is this the four mnth growth spurt? he has had two 7oz feeds since then? (wonders)he has never really had any growth spurt before now or i havent noticed is prob fair to say. Wonders how long this will last .

kazkiss i used those little containers at the start tho was told by the HV not to as again the whole rule about the water being above 70 degrees, so i just went to back to the old way of making up 4 feeds in the morning and placing them in the coldest part of the fridge and heat when required, and 1 before bed incase he was up thru the night.

Oh and i'm a Scon lady myself, plain scon with jam then cream, mmmmm,

OOOOpppps think i know why litle Z is up at this crazy time, he is red in the face and pushing like mad, he didnt have a dirty nappy yesterday so that might expain it, Off to give pup a hand.

sorry for the SP and grammer, defo not my best subject and dont proof read either

I thought you had to add the water to the powder above 70C to kill bugs in the powder? Like wot Soups said.

Surprise - Am yo sayin' yo dow lark owa black country accent?
(Hmmm, phonetic accent speling tricky!).
My accent is mostly gone, having been ironed out by 4 years in Bradford and now 7 years in Kent. Though I get a bit Northern when angry, and the Black Country creeps in when I'm home or speaking to my folks!

This is the way i was told by my hv to do it. Oh my gosh such conflicting info! cos how can the water be boiled/cooled if it is over 70c? cos once it has cooled it aint gonna kill the bugs off! and you cant use boiled water either.....

Oh and i have never heated a bottle......

my babies take it at room temp..

ooh just thought of something the nicu said.

That you should not make up the bottle i.e. mix the water and the powder till they are gonna have it cos thats when the bugs multiply.

Hiya Soups - good to meet you I joined myself a month or so ago - everyone on here is utterly insane but quite lovely, and very supportive.

Sounds like the growth spurt to me. Little Millie has suddenly gone from being all wee and petite, to hulking muscly bag of energy in the space of a single week. She slept through last night again, so I hope that's the last of it. Hang on in there, Soups, it will pass.

Deffo jam then cream on a plain 'scon' yum!

See ya - the Minxter awakes.

oooh just read the fsa giudelines and it is really interesing, oh and i was told wrong all this time!!! ooops they are 6months in a couple of days!!.

formula guidelines

Yes kazkiss very conflicting indeed i try not to read about guidelines, just tend to go by my mother, she knows best, altho she is trying to get me to give Z some baby porridge, i think i'l follow Z ques on that one. I also used to give feeds at room temp before i made a batch, now because they are kept in the fridge i have to heat to take the chill away.

HELLO JJ likewise!!!!
i second lovely, insane and from what i've read yes very supportive.
You know i said to DP just last night that he loks sooooo chuby in the last few days, amazings what a day makes to a baby.(and extra feeds).

Z is back in bed goning to get some much needed housework done.

Ta Ta for now.

Regarding making formula we tend to just use water straight from kettle and then cool the bottle under cold water and at night DH makes up the bottle for the morning although it isnt really that necessary anymore as she isnt getting up to 6.30-7 and even then she isnt generally screaming for milk so could wait. If we are going out we make up the bottles before hand as well. To be fair that is what we did with Oscar and it doesnt yet seem to have done him any harm although he did move to cows milk at 8 months as he was refusing formula and he was weaned at 5 months on the advise of HVs so to most MNetters I would imagine I am a terrible mother!!.

Sooooooo annoying to be given completely out-of-date advice by HV (regardless of what actually happens in practice). Suggest you get into Scary Kaz mode and challenge her about it next time you see her.

So the only reasons for cooled water are, we reckon, BPA issues and probably just general safety concerns about pouring boiling water. So using boiling water, BPA free bottles, and common sense will solve everything!

Also wonder how Tommee Tippee et al are now able to justify the ginormous multi-bottle sterilisers, if everyone is only making one bottle at a time?

Yesterday I did a big batch of bulk cooking without salt, in practice for weaning time. I love salt. I may have to hide my salt pig. I hope H likes garlic.

I think the following may simplify feeds:

1. Get your (empty) bottles ready in one go and put them to one side. Also get a jug with a lid ready.

1. Boil the kettle and fill the jug. This will be your day's supply of cooled boiled water.

1. Get one or two of those compartment things for formula and measure out the day's doses.

1. When you want to give a feed, tip a dose of powder into one of the bottles, and add just enough hot water over 70 degrees to dissolve the powder.

1. Top up with some of your cooled boiled water from the jug.

1. Interestingly in France some people just use Evian as it comes.

i'm scared to think of weaning, worried i'll do it wrong. It was so much easier with Ds1 (still at my parents).
Z is back up and feeding again think i'll be weaning sooner than i thought if this keeps up.
R u lot usually up this early?

[shoked] @ Evian

Haha @ Evain,

Morning all, just thought I'd pop in and apologise for not being on the past couple of days. After going out Saturday and having a couple of glasses of wine (and a rather late night) I have been absolutely good for nothing the past 2 days!

The house is a mess and all I've managed to do is make sure Josh is clean and fed and then that has been it.... This going out malarky is definitely not going to happen on a regular basis.... I'm far too much of a lightweight when it comes to needing sleep

I hope you all had a lovely weekend/bank holiday, and didn't feel as sorry for yourselves as I did

Right Z's gran is comming to pick him up at 9.30, i need to get serious mumsnet housework done and washing ironed and put away and some things on ebay for sale. I cant do these things whith Z here i just end up rolling around the floor playing with him, So his gran will ake him out for a long walk in the fresh air, providing the rain stays off.
Wos everyone else plans for today?

Shopping for toddler pants, how exciting is that?

Hi Nelly!
Practise makes perfect
I ahve been out loads a few times and i thank the gods for RESOLVE just powder added to a lil water in a variety of flavours and by 5 mins after waking up i'm as good new, maybe thats why i have done it more often than i thought i would. .

Was it worth it at the time, did you have a good night?

Hmmm. DD1 had a fall on my mum's stone stairs yesterday, just as we were about to leave and then there was a lot of blood coming out of her nose. This morning, more blood but old and brown. Should I be worried?

Nelly - you must have really let your hair down, I suppose the mixing with soft drinks didn't happen after all?

Soups - I'm always up before anyone else, but I am 3 hours ahead of UK

Since I live in a world without HVs, I used a few drops of just-opened bottled evian myself to ease M's recent blockage, it worked better than you'd imagine - euuuuurrrgh. Common sense has to prevail sometimes, the bottle was sealed, and the sodium content isn't high...