baby bottle feeds

[cecil39]

I am apealing to older Mums and grans out there for some advice, why is it now a bad idea to make up a couple of feeds to keep in the fridge for later, also for feeds to be kept for more than two hours eg at night to be warmed when the baby wants it ? i used to take a feed to bed with me along with a flask of hot water so that if the baby woke the feed could be ready in a minute or two, my older grandchildren had bottle warmers and if we took a baby out for the day we took several made up and asked for a jug of hot water in a cafe to warm them, all my children thrived on this way of doing it also all my older grandchildren, but now the younger one is msde to wait for ages for his feed as it has to cool down from boiling, even with iced water it takes ages, poor little soul gets so upset each time.

[anjlegs]

My daughter has just had a baby and has conflicting advice from different midwives. She sterilizes her bottles and then puts in freshly boiled water to the ammount required, the bottles must be used in 24 hours . She adds formula to the bottles as required, she is lucky cos her son takes his feeds at room temperature because this is what he was given by midwives in hospital .

[cathfromsaron]

yes. my grandson never took them very warm. and we used to pre-measure the powder and just showve it in and shake, too!

[Mamyalynne]

They are forever moving the goalposts am afraid.

[cecil39]

thanks for all that folks, i will show this to my daughter-in-law who is a first time mum, at least she will know its not just my (old fashioned) idea to keep bottles in the fridge, and as for making them up with already cooled water, great idea.

[fairycakes69]

I had 2 sets of twins, bottles were made by hubby in the morning before he went to work, left to cool and put in the fridge, can't see the problem, all of my children had bottles done like that. It was what we were told to do by the health visitor, they do have a habit of changing their minds and then changing it back again. I'd go for keeping bottles with cooled boiled water and adding the milk when needed, that way the bottles will not take long to do and everyone is happy.

[numnum]

don't get me started on this one. i looked into this so much when i had my first.

i used to work in a nursery and all bottles were made at home by parents and their packed lunch box would go into the fridge when they arrived and when the baby needed their feed we'd take it out the fridge and warm

when i had my 1st i was totally confused by the new guidlines saying you had to make up one bottle up at a time, you couldn't keep them warm in a bottle warmer or batch make them and put them in the fridge or like some mums would just have them on the top of the fridge and grab one and heat.

i ended up filling 6 bottles up at night for the next day with the amount of water needed. i then add the powder to the room temp water and gave to my 1st child at room temp. no heating, no fuss. i then found out a lot of people do it that way. my daughter has never been ill.

a friend who had a premature baby made her bottles this way after she stopped expressing and took them to the hospital this way and the staff fed this way

my friend saw a tv programme about it and this is how she started making bottles this way. the programme said something about how the hot water way makes it a faster way for bacteria to form so if you keep it at room temp then its not changing in temprature. or something along those lines

i read every guideline possible and in one bit of the World Health Organisations (folk that make all the rules) website for bottle making there was a page saying if you don't have access to boiling water then you could use bottled water. i think if you were doing that you had to check the calcium or sodium levels. i cant remember which

i heard in ireland they went back to the old guidelines of batch making bottles.

[numnum]

i've also heard of people filling the bottles half full the night before with cooled boiled water then when the baby needs a bottle fill the other half with boiling water to take it to the temp your meant to prepare bottles at then add the powder

[Mosaic]

If the feed is prepared in sterile conditions - ditto if bottle is sterile -and ditto if water is sterile - do we think imps can get in and make it all nasty?
Keep everything sterile - sniff it - taste it - if it is OK - use it.
Obviously breast milk is the ultimate safe super baby food but if it is impossbile / insufficient just loo around at the bottle-fed folk all around us who thrived.
Round here, 70 -80 years ago, they weaned their babies on TINNED CONDENSED MILK!!!
It's a buddy miracle anyone is alive in east lancashire but that's what they did!!! Don't try it.

[knowabit]

When i had 9 year old, i used to make the milk up and keep the bottles in the fridge.. 30 seconds in the microwave and we were ready! when the next came along 4 years later, i noticed the milk had different instructions... pour the boiled water in bottles and put milk in when required... as they were not ice cold from the fridge, 15 seconds in the mocrowave was fine!

[sheribee]

Now im confused!! Im 25 weeks pregnant and hoping to breastfeed but will need to use bottles at some point. My first daughter is 12 and my second is 8. For both of them i boiled the ketle, filled 6 sterilised bottles up with the freshly boiled water then added the powdered milk. I then put all 6 bottles, still hot, in the fridge and used them as the babies needed them.
So what am i suppossed to do now? Think everyone is going mad about keeping babies totally sterile!!