Baby Vices

Since Cole is now a toddler, we felt that it was important to get rid of his bottles and pacifier. I am absolutely amazed at how easy this has been. I know for some children it isn't so easy, but Cole doesn't seem to miss his bottle or paci at all and I'm feeling pretty fortunate about how well this is going. I am by no means an expert on taking away the bottle and paci, and am pretty sure it was pure luck, but here is what I did.
Weaning off the bottle:
I decided way back in February to start cutting bottles out gradually. I first introduced the sippy cup with a little water in it. (I recommend the Nuby Soft Spout Sippies because the spout is similar to a bottle nipple). Once Cole got the hang of the sippy, I starting putting his formula in it. I replaced all his bottles of formula with a sippy of formula expect for the 1st feeding of the day and the bedtime feeding. We also switched Cole from the soft spout to a regular sippy cup around this time.

A few weeks later I switched the morning bottle to a sippy as well. At some point we cut back to 3 formula feedings a day (1 with breakfast, 1 with lunch, water with dinner, and 1 at bedtime). I switched Cole to whole milk about 2 weeks before he turned one, which went off without a hitch also.

The day he turned one, we stopped the bedtime feeding all together. He gets his last sippy of milk with dinner and after his bath and story he goes right to bed without liquids. Cole went right to sleep and has since (with the exception of 1 night).

Taking away the paci
I had intended to wait until tomorrow to take Cole's paci away. My reasoning behind tomorrow was Brady's (5 month old I watch) last day was today. Brady takes a paci and I thought it would be too hard to not let Cole have one while Brady sucked away on his. Apparently I was wrong about that! This past weekend we decided to do a trial run. It went well, so I decided not to give it back on Monday. He took Brady's paci a few times these past two days, but only actually got it in his mouth once or twice (quick reacting mommy). He's been napping and riding in the car fine without it.

Tomorrow I will be packing away bottles and pacifiers!