Spinoff on water question

The post about giving water to your babies got me thinking...how much water do you let your kids have? Mine have finally gotten the hang of sippy cups (yea!!) and LOVE, and I mean LOVE, water. They are almost 11 months old and I was wondering how much is enough. I don't let them chug it down before meals or anything, they mostly drink it after their naps and I give them sips throughout meals. Is there a limit on how much they should have? I probably should have asked the pedi at the last appt...oops.

Thanks!

 

Mine love water too. I let them drink as much as they want at meals (and they can easily chug down a whole sippy). I don't offer at other times, though, because I don't want to cut into their nursing. I don't know if there's any rule of thumb as to how much is too much...

 

I give about four ounces in a sippy at the first meal of the day. It usually takes my girls two meals to finish that four ounces. If their bottle intake goes down, I cut back a bit on the water.

I think as long as their formula (or nursing) intake isn't going down, you can really give as much water as you want. My girls rarely drink more than four ounces of water a day.

 

Alyssa drank THREE cups (8oz each) at dinner the other night and it didnt affect her appetite at all!! I let them have them after naps and when we wean I am thinking I will give them sippies of water to go down with at naps (bad idea??) Anyway they get them in the car and when they have a snack (10am and 3:30pm) Alyssa always drinks WAY more than Ashley, when they wean I sure hope Ashley takes to drinking more from the cup. I bet she never drinks 8oz a day outta the cup and I bet Alyssa drinks at least 16oz everyday.

 

My boys also love water. They drink water with every meal, and they also drink at least half a sippy full when they wake up from each nap. I take sippies full of water with us every time we're in the car or out shopping and they're a big help when someone is having a meltdown. Our pedi said to offer lots of water because it helps to keep them from getting constipated. So I would think as long as it isn't cutting into their breast milk/formula consumption or solids then it should be fine!

 

When we started water, it was just mostly at meal time. But once it got hot here and they were moving around a lot more, I would have one available to them whenever they wanted a drink. Now, they have access to one all day and it doesn't affect thier milk intake or meals.

I just think how many times I need a drink of water during the day and they probably do too.

 

Mine are still getting the hang of straw cups -- DD does well, while DS likes to goof around, suck up the water, and then spit it out.

But, I offer as much as they want after meals of solids -- right now, only two. They both take in maybe a couple ounces, at most....

 

I guess I don't monitor it. They eat well, love their milk still so I just let them have whatever they want and to be honest, I have no idea how much they drink in a day. Somedays they drink barely any and today, we're already on our third sippy cup full.