Get your minds out of the gutter folks. Nipples for baby bottles… :rolleyes:
With the arrival of our second daughter, we now have two kids who are drinking from bottles. The baby (5 months) and the preschooler (3 years) are both using Philips Avent bottles with silicone nipples. The baby is using a nipple with a small aperture (size 1 or 2) and the older daughter is using a larger aperture (size 4). The different nipples are identical, with only a lightly embossed number written on the side of each nipple to indicate the size. The problem is that this number is very hard to read, especially at 3 in the morning with the nipple partially clouded with steam from the sterilizer. More than once I have mistakenly given the baby the size 4 nipple, resulting in the poor thing choking and spluttering when too much milk comes out (and me receiving the Glare of a Million Vipers from my wife). I am really surprised that Philips didn’t anticipate this and come up with a clearer way of indicating the sizes…
Anyway, I figured I would label them myself, but the problem is that nothing seems to stick to the damn silicone. I have tried many different types of pen, permanent laundry marker, and most recently, oil paints. But everything just wipes straight off. I never realised how slippery silicone was.
So any ideas of how can I mark these nipples so that I can easily tell them apart?
I don’t want to sound bitchy, but maybe take the bottle away from the preschooler. By only having baby appropriate nipples in the house, there’s no chance of confusion.
If you’re not willing to do that, maybe store them in separate areas. You can use the factory markings in the clear light of day to put them away and then just remember the baby ones are in X location and the toddler ones are, you know, [del]in the garbage[/del] wherever you decide to put those.
Option 1: Snip a notch into the very edge of the one of the sizes. Not big enough to impact the seal when the nipple is set into the plastic ring, but you’ll be able to feel even just a little snip as you’re assembling the bottle.
Option 2: Leave the nipple alone, and mark the plastic ring (I would suggest nail polish, it wouldn’t bother me to have dried nail polish on a part of the bottle that isn’t in contact with the baby’s mouth, but whatever works for you). Then, during the day when you are bright and fresh and have good light in the kitchen, pre-assemble the clean nipples and rings so that in the middle of the night, you can grab the nipple and marked ring.
Yeah, I knew I would get some of this. The 3 year old is down to one bottle a day, which she has when she first wakes up in the morning. We got her to give up the evening bottle by saying that bottles are for the baby, but she still wants the morning one.
We do keep them in separate places, but the system tends to break down in the current chaos of our household. And both types of nipple often end up together in the sterilizer or drying rack, depending on how organized we are that day.
Give how hard it was to clean off my old dishwasher, you might try soaking one in tomato juice. If that works anything like the aforementioned plastics, you’ll have an orange one in no time.
(I haven’t tried this, so I’m speculating.)
Instead of cutting notches in the rim, you could poke tiny holes.
Then retitle the thread “Help me pierce my daughter’s nipples”.
Google would love you a long time.
These double entrendres remind me of how easy it is to confuse adult wordliness with childhood innocence.
The other day my 3-year old daughter came to me pointing to her crotch and said “Daddy, I have a hole”.
I groaned to myself and was all set to launch into an awkward description of the difference between little girls and little boys when I looked at her and saw the hole. In her pajamas. :rolleyes:
Do you think the three year old would respond to a sippy cup with a silicone mouth piece like this or this? They will still have the feel of a bottle nipple but are very different from a baby bottle nipple.
Oh. Well, that’s easy then. Throw out all of her bottles except one. Give it to her in the AM. Wash with after lunch dishes or whatever. Immediately assemble. No more mix ups. If you think that might be a problem, let her pick the bottle she gets to keep and make a big “Big Girl” production of tossing the rest out.
Sorry to zombie my own thread, but I just remembered that I never gave a final response to the suggestions.
As it turns out, I didn’t let the oil paint dry long enough and now (after 10 days) it seems that it is sticking fairly well to the touch. Let’s see how it does with actual use and the dishwasher. But even if the paint holds up, I will try the notch thing, since I don’t really like the possibility of my daughter ingesting some of the paint. I looked closely at how the nipple fits with the ring and it does seem that I could make a small notch in the silicone on the very base without compromising the seal. Let’s see.
And thanks for the vote of sympathy miss elizabeth. Raising one child through infancy wasn’t too difficult, but with two now it is a whole different ballgame
My wife is adamant that we are not going to be purchasing any new nipples for a three year old saying he should be off the bottle, yet this is only leading to us using nipples so frayed they spray milk every time you make a bottle.:smack:
Anyway I agree with you, he just can’t give up his morning bottle.
I had this thought, too. It’s not like the 3 year old’s plates, spoons and forks are being sterilized, right? (Not to mention everything else in the house, yard, playground and anything liftable anywhere else you go, all of which are certainly contacting the toddler’s mouth on a regular basis)
