best sippy cups

[ajmum]

I'm starting the process of moving my now 10-month-old off bottles completely. She now only gets a morning and evening bottle, but since introducing an Avent magic cup at her afternoon milk she has taken a max of 1oz when she would easily take 4 or 5oz from a bottle. I'm not bothered about the reduced feed in the afternoon but I'm worried that when I introduce the cup in the morning (and eventually the evening), she'll not take anything and she still needs her milk in the morning and evening.

She's had water from the sippy cup with her meals for months and takes an ounce or so of water at most meals. Are there better cups out there that don't require so much sucking? I've also tried giving her normal, no lid cups (we have a doidy cup if you've seen one of those) and she's OK with them for a few sips, but she is now at an age where she wants to do things for herself so I just end up with milk (or water) everywhere!

Any suggestions welcome.

you could try taking the valve out of the cup, much easier to suck through after that.

our dd dropped her milk intake initally with the change from bottle to cup, but after a few months its picked back up again, she has a mix of cups, from a bog std coop one, with no valve that goes everywhere if we don't watch it, to tommee tippee and avent! I've just about tried them all, and they all just seem to get easier for dd the older she gets?! keep persevering, hide milk in everything else you can/cheese with everything and you can usually get the recommended allowance down them!

I tried loads of different ones and the best was the Tommee Tippee 4month+ one. It doesn't have a valve and the lid flips up and down. You can get it in a clear version with a blue lid, which my 13mo dd likes because she can see what she's drinking. Funnily enough, most of my friends have ended up using exactly the same one!

The Avent cups are the best sippy cups IMO. All the other non-spill ones require either really hard sucking or the baby has to bite and suck at the same time (Tommy Tippee). Try using the Avent without the vavles, as Hoxtonchikc suggests, just until your dd gets used to the fact that milk now comes in spouts. You can replace the spouts and let her get on with feeding herself once she gets used to it. Have you bought a whole new Magic Cup or just a new spout? If it's whole Cup, then try fitting the spout and valve to your regular bottle (I presume you have Avent bottles as well), using the ordinary ring as well. It might be more familiar to your dd then.

WOW - thanks for the flood of responses. It's really helpful. I had been wondering if I should take the valve out (at least under 'controlled' conditions as she is at that 'throw everything, drop everything' stage!). She is used to the Avent cups and we've got quite a few so I would like to stick with them.

I'm also going to post asking for opinions on the best travel stroller so if you have any thoughts on that, I'd be grateful. We're thinking about buying the new Quinny Zapp, which folds up really really small (aircraft hold, car footwell small), but it only has one seat position. Should I go for a MacLaren Quest instead - it's main benefit over the Zapp is that it has a number of seat positions. It's also 50 quid cheaper but I like things that look nice so that is (sadly) as important to me as function or cost!

I'm in the U.S., and here everyone uses either Gerber or Playtex sippy cups. I personally like the Playtex non-spill. Good luck.

On strollers, imo, you cannot go wrong with a Maclaren. We've also had Graco, and they are not as sturdy. Maclaren seems to have many different ones to meet your needs. We have the techno.

i was using the avent one with handles (magic cup)..i just recently got one at boots for £2 that ds likes a whole lot better!

My name is hunkermunker and I'm a beakeraholic...

Boots own brand ones are good (green or purple ones) - we have the non-handled one and the one with handles and flippy bit to cover the spout (though that distracts DS (11 months) - he doesn't drink from the cup, just opens and closes the top and grins at me!).

We also have:

a Heinz first beaker (small one with lots of holes in the spout - very fast-flowing, DS has it as a bedtime cup as it's too little to be any good for much else).

a Tommee Tippee suitable from 3 months one (soft spout, more like a bottle).

a Tommee Tippee one with a removable spout thingy (also has a flippy cover for the spout, which DS likes to play with).

a Magic Cup (the smallest size, with handles).

a Tommee Tippee one with an integral flip-up spout - DS drinks best of all out of this one.

I'm interested in seeing if DS can use a straw, so I want to try a different sort. I will also try a Doidy cup and one of the ones that's open, but has a small hole so they drink out of it more like a normal cup.

I think that's it... DH doesn't mind me indulging my addiction to beakers...it stops me buying more pushchairs!

hunkermunker dd drinks really well with a straw. There are drink containers (I think they say 3yrs plus) that have an integral straw and the straw flattens out as a lid slides across the top to seal it. It does leak a bit but dd drinks the most water out of this than any other beaker. She has milk in her avent bottles with green sipper lids. Your ds would probably love a straw too.

I think the best cups are the free flowing variety, I get mine cheap in Ikea. Sippy cups area nightmare!

My DD protested the sippy cup as well. So we gave her a bottle of milk in the morning and just before bed. But, the rest of the day was sippy cup only. That way I knew she was getting her two cups of milk a day. And if she really wanted to go thirsty the rest of the day then so be it. I found that if she really was thirsty she would drink from the sippy cup.

We have just replace the bottle of milk with sippy cups which she wasn't selighted about at first, but after about a week or two she was okay with it. She is fine now. We did this because we are having another baby and we didn't want her to think baby brother had stolen HER bottles.

Perhaps you couls start with removing day time bottles.

Personally, I really thing the very best sippy cups are playtex ones found in the states. I WISH they sold them here.

we like the cup by koto.

HM -- lakeland do a non spill teddy cup that has a straw that goes into drink and atatches to hard straw rhat flips down so it doesn't spill. comes with a spare straw. ds loves it as do i have had it for ages.
just went to find it on website but it is unavailable it is item nuber 5737

After all of your advice (much thanks again), I removed the valve from the Avent cups and went ahead and replaced the morning bottle with a cup. Instant success - no reduction in her milk intake at all, though there is a little bit more milk splattered about the kitchen than before (but just a little). I'm going to go ahead and try to drop the evening bottle next week. I'm also going to buy some Tommee Tippee flip lid cups and get my sister in Canada to send over some Playtex ones.

I've also removed the valve when I give her water and she drinks loads more water than before.