Traveling with Bottles

At first glance, traveling with bottles seems like a no brainer--bring the baby, the bottles and the formula, mix & serve. Unfortunately, it's not quite that easy, but with a little bit of organization, I found that traveling with bottles, whether it be to church on Sunday or away for the weekend is very simple. It's all about having the right equipment.

The first thing you need is this, the formula dispenser.

I got this one and another one just like it at Babies R Us when Bubby was a baby. I now use it for Miss Boo's bottles, and despite my mother's protests that I need a new one (in pink, of course), it still works fine. I like this one because in all the hundreds of times I've used it, it has never once opened in my diaper bag unexpectedly and ruined my day.

Speaking of not having your day ruined, this little baby is another secret to my success.

The disk goes between the bottle and the nipple, under the collar. It's job is to keep the water in the bottle, and it does a fantastic job. Occasionally, I forget to take the disk off when I mix the formula and poor Boo gets no nourishment for a few seconds, but she usually lives :) I also like to replace the disk after the ba-ba's gone so that the little formula dregs don't get all over the inside of the diaper bag. Seriously, this is a very important little piece of equipment. Fortunately, the Dr. Brown's company sells all of the bottle "parts" individually, so if you lose a piece, it's fairly easy and inexpensive to replace.

Feeding my babies room temperature bottles makes traveling easy because I never have to worry about warming bottles on the go. I've seen other mamas warming bottles using hot water in a restaurant or running the bottle under warm water in the restroom. Or if your mom's anything like my mom, just have her hold it in her hands for a few minutes and it will warm right up.

Having two formula dispensers enables me to have six doses of formula with me in a simple, compact way--you know me, I love efficiency :) Six doses usually lasts me for those long days, like Christmas or all day visits to great-grandparents. I also send six doses of formula to the caregiver's each day when I'm working. They've never used more than 3, but I like knowing that if something happened, they have a little extra. Just in case.

Another thing I always send to the caregiver's is this "food bag."

I send 6 bottles and the 2 formula dispensers, and any other food I want the kids to eat that day later (more on moving on to people food later). This is a little more to carry, but I've found that keeping all the food together makes it easy to pack, easy to clean up and easy to keep organized.

So, bottle feeding mamas out there, what are the secrets to your success when it comes to bottle feeding on the go? Leave some comments and let us know :)