feeding suggestions...and a few questions

Hi ladies -
My twins will be 10 months old and I know their primary nutrition is formula still, but I am thinking ahead in terms of transitioning them to more solids and sippy cups of milk. Right now they do 4 bottles (every four hours) and 3 meals a day and a snack. Unfortunately they don't do a good job with their meals, except for dinner -- they mack that down! Lunch and breakfast are hit and miss. Snacks ALWAYS go well.

So give me some advice -- how and when did you start the transition? I just know when they wake up they freak out for their bottles (they are up anywhere between 6 - 7am) so I can't imagine them being patient for regular breakfast. AND DS does not like anythign that sticks to his fingers -- no nutrigrain bars, no waffles, pancakes, etc. He's our picky eater. He does like yogurt and cheerios

They get bottles at 7, 11, 3:30 and 7:30. I'm thinking the next bottle to go is the 3:30pm bottle -- they take the whole thing, but maybe I should transition them to a snack and sippy for the 3:30pm bottle........

any help on transitioning would be great. I would love to have a full transition by 1 year of age. Also, any ideas for easy meals that are nutritious would be great to hear about as well.

 

Hmmmm, we started table food when they had top and bottom teeth and were starting to chew (about 9 months). We started utensils at about 14 months. When they turned a year and started drinking real milk is when we started dropping bottles and replacing with sippies of water or water/juice.

I know some people are anti-sweeteners, but I've found that sugar free syrups are way less sticky than their real counterparts.

 

I have to agree with Bex, when they started real milk is when we reduced and eventually got rid of bottles to be replaced with sippies. Ours were completely off bottles by 16 months. As for breakfast, mine still love rice/oatmeal cereal. Some people have tried Cheerios barely wet with milk and their kids love it, mine don't like their cheerios wet (go figure). Most kids when they turn one, you will be lucky to get one good meal out of them during the day and the other meals might be more snack-like.
Our day is kind of like this meal wise:
7:30 breakfast: milk sippy, rice or oatmeal with fruit
snack in between-cheerios, fruit, veggies, cereal bar, puffs, yogurt melts, etc.
11:00 am lunch: eggs w/cheese, toast, grilled cheese, pb &j, cheesy bread, fruit & veggie -sippy cup either with water or milk
1:00 pm-snack-sippy with water, yogurt,cereal bar, fruit, etc.
between 4-5pm: dinner is whatever we eat along with a sippy of water.
depending on how hungry they are, they might get a snack before bed, some nights they want a snack, other nights not so much. They get a sippy of milk with carnation instant breakfast before bed.
Good luck!

 

I started the weaning process at 11 months (at ped's okay). We gradually dropped a bottle every 3-7 days. My boys loved whole milk so I had no problem getting them to take it. By the week before they turned 1 they no longer had bottles. They really started eating more and taking more from their sippies after we stopped the day-time bottles. Here is how we stopped:

Prior to stopping they were getting 5 7oz bottles a day @ approx 5:00 or 6:00 (depending on wake-up time), 9:00, 1:00, 5:00 & 8:00 .

April 6: dropped 6:00 am bottle and replaced with milk and breakfast. I give them the milk and cheerios while they wait for the other food to get prepared. We also started doing the last bottle about 30 minutes before bedtime so it was no longer part of the bedtime routine.
April 13: dropped 9:00 am bottle - they were eating so much in the morning (see below)
April 20: dropped 5:00 pm bottle
April 27: dropped the 1:00 pm bottle
April 30th: dropped last bottle


Here is our schedule now:

6:00 breakfast 6 oz milk (yogurt or cottage chz with fruit and cereal (multigrain cheerios, jumbo krispies, etc)
8:30 snack (mini waffles or pancakes, etc - no syrup) and water with a splash of juice
11:00 lunch and 6 oz milk
12-2:30 nap
3:00 snack and water with a splach of juice
6:00 dinner and 6 oz of milk

We are transitioned to straw-cups last week.