My Weaning Essentials

We've now been weaning Squidge for just over 4 months and in that time we've tried out lots of different products, some of which were great, and some not-so-great.  With that in mind, I thought I'd share with you some of our most used bits and pieces that make up our weaning kit.

Steamer/Mixer

Having a steamer has really transformed how I prepare baby food - before I'd boil it, which boils out all the goodness in vegetables.  The Nutribaby from Babymoov (£99.99*) has 2 levels in the steamer, which from my experience is enough for 2 good meals for your baby (if you fill up the trays pretty well). What I'm trying to get into the habit of doing, is having his food steaming in the night while I'm cooking mine and Daddy's dinner, ready for his feeds the next day.  Once the food is steamed, I tip it into the blender, add a splash of cows milk and pulse the blend a few times (I want texture, not purée). The Nutribaby has loads of settings so you can also warm jars/pouches/bottles, whether room temperature or from the fridge, and even steralise.

Storage jars/pots

I go through almost all of these on a daily basis - each meal I'll put prepared food in different pots, like his main food in one, rice cakes in another, sticks of cucumber or another veg in another etc, so that each feed I could go through 3/4.  All the ones pictured are from Babymoov - the ones on the left (£13.99*) are their silicone ones which collapse when you want to store them (they're collapsed in this picture) - the pop out really easily and the lids click on better than any other tupperware I have (you don't have to squish the lids down).  The tubs on the right (£6.99*) are better (in my opinion) for when you're at home as at least with mine, the lids don't really stay on - so they're fine if you're putting them in the fridge, or don't need lids on them and there's no risk of them being upside down :)

An assortment of spoons

Everyone has their own preference, this is why we have 2 different sets of spoons - the short ones are weaning spoons from Tommee Tippee (£7.99) (the ones designed so babies can feed themselves), the spoon part is shallow and wide (the hubby prefers feeding Squidge with these). The other ones are from Nuby and are my favourite (£3.99) - apart from being lovely colours, they have a really nice deep scoop on them - they fit in his mouth really well and they have rubber handles, so are easy to grip.  The only problem with the Nuby ones is that because the handles are so long, they never stay put in the bowl, they usually end up tipping it over, so something to be aware of.

Feeding bowls

We have 3 bowls for Squidge all together.  The one that's a plate with separate compartments is from OXO*, this is great for offering them finger food or BLW - the plate also has a rubber grip on the bottom to stop is sliding around, and the coloured ring around the edge can clip off too. The other two bowls we have is the orange one from Tommee Tippee (£8.95) we actually, we have 2 of these but there's only 1 in circulation - we also have a Winnie the Pooh one (pale blue, my personal favourite but currently discontinued, so it's appearing in Poundland).  If I give Squidge pouches at home, I tend to squeeze them into one of these bowls so I can give it a good mix.

Free-flow sippee cup

This one we were given by our health visitor at a weaning party they threw (this sounds SO much more exciting than it was, lol).  With the cups that are spill proof, you have to suck really hard to get any water out, and if you're teaching your baby to drink water out of a sippy cup (£2.50), they really won't have the motivation or understanding for it, whereas with a free-flow one they only have to tip it and they'll get water from it.  You can move on to a spill proof one once they get the hang of it and certainly when they're older - but we've had the most success with free-flow ones (in fact, the orange plain Tommee Tippee one is the best we've found, but it's nearly impossible to get the lid off!).

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*Post contains PR samples, I'm also an ambassador for Babymoov - all opinions are 100% honest and my own

Tommee Tippee Closer to nature digital baby monitor review

Back when I was pregnant we knew we needed to get a baby monitor and naturally, I wanted a good one. I'd had my eye on this one, but at £180 it was way out of my price range.  Then at an Asda baby event, they had it on offer for half price, so just £90 - that was a price I was more comfortable with, and the order was placed.  Over 5 months on, I thought I'd share my thoughts with you on it.

It does come with a sensor mat that the baby sleeps on and will detect if they stop breathing.  I felt that I'd be a nervous nellie if I used this, so we decided to put that bit to one side - this we bought for the LCD monitor more than anything.

The system itself is great, it can tell the temperature in the room, and has full on infared night vision - so that in the night when all the lights are off, you can still see how your little baby is doing and if their dummy has popped out etc.  It's a decent sized screen, and you can zoom in and move the image about a little etc.  It also has a 2 way chat - so if your baby has woken up and needs some reassurance, you can press the chat button and talk to them.

Other than the full colour screen seemingly seems to have a pink wash over it, it's pretty good and serves the purpose.  It's also got a decent range on it so I can see him wherever I am in the house.

However, for us, this hasn't been the perfect solution we thought it might be.  For example, when unplugged from the charger, the battery doesn't last that long, it won't last a full day, so every night it needs to be on charge.  There's also been quite a few occassions where he's been crying and the monitor hasn't picked it up until a good 30 seconds after.

The screen is supposed to come on if it detects movement from him, but 90% of the time the only occasions when the monitor comes on is when one of us walks past it, and that's only now and then - normally the monitor only lights up if we make it.

I think for the money this is a very over-priced piece of kit - yes it's great to have the screen and be able to see him, but other brands like Motorolla do similar systems for a lot less money - here ytou're paying for the sensor mat, and as much as I haven't used it myself, I have been told it gives a lot of false positives - but that's just conjecture.

All in all, I wouldn't buy it again, I'd try something else.  I'd definitely go for a video monitor again, but not this one, I think it's really over priced and has a very poor battery :/

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Tommee Tippee electric bottle & food warmer

There are lots of different machines and contraptions that will help when you have a newborn.  So when I was pregnant with Squidge, I did my research to see which gizmo's and gadgets we'd need. All the way through my pregnancy I intended on breastfeeding, so I ruled out the Perfect Prep Machine as that's more for powder formula.  But I did always intend on expressing so that the hubby would be able to feed Squidge from time to time, hence the Tommee Tippee bottle warmer.

It works like a bain-marie - you put some water in there, plug it in, turn it up to 3, put your bottle of formula or breast milk in there and wait a few minutes for body temperature goodness.

I managed to pick it up at a really good price via a Google Ad from John Lewis, instead of it being around £23, I bought it for £17.24 (plus £3 p&p).

For us it's been a godsend, when you're doing night-time feeds and need to warm up a bottle of either breast milk or pre-made formula, it saves so much time and faffing with other options, and didn't cost much money.

The pros

• It's quick to warm up
• Small in size
• Affordable

The cons

• There's no on/off switch - so you have to plug and un-plug it each time

I've been really impressed with the Tommee Tippee brand, we've really bought into it, buying their bottles, sterilizer, baby monitor (review in a few months once we've had a chance to use it), sangenic bin etc and everything has been a good quality, and for the most part, affordable prices too.

Have you used the bottle warmer, and did you find it useful?

Georgina <3
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