Tips on Weanig 12 Month Old off of the Bottle

I have a one year old too. I've been giving him sippy cups with soft nozzels, the Nuby straw sippy, seems to be helping my one year old move on from the bottle. Good luck!

Mom I learned the hard way with my twins who where on the bottle till 18 months. But I learned with my son.

Go cold turkey. Throw all bottles because it will get hard and you will want to just give him a bottle. He won't go hungry, believe me, he'll drink from the sippy cup eventually, I promise. The first day was hard, lots of crying and tantrums, the second day we had a little resistance at first, but manageable, and on the 3rd day, it was "what bottle?"

Start on a Friday, by Monday, the caretaker will have no issues, make sure that the daycare or nanny/babysitter too get rid of their bottles.

Like our pedi told me when my 18 months old were on bottles "Mom, stop holding on, it's only an attachment to them because it's an attachment to you, cold turkey."

Please note, your child might drink less milk, this is okay, most of his nutrients should be coming from meals at 1 year of age.

Let your daughter see you pour the milk from the bottle into a cup or small glass. You give it to her by holding the cup, maybe you can let her see you take a sip also, if you do this and make a big deal of it and seem pleased with the taste out of the cup she may want to have some also.

Hey C.,
I think the dilution method works best.
I have a 12year that I did that with.
A 3yr old who I did the same with. (both boys)
Now I have a 13 month old daughter that I am in the process of weaning. I actually started her on the sippy cup and straw cup several months ago. Just offering and offering and praising and praising. Right now she takes a bottle only for nap time and bedtime. I just stopped breastfeeding her so I am not going to stop those bottles just yet. Poor baby would be traumatized!! LOL. She was used to nursing all night long and now has to settle for one bottle. My plan of action is to give it a couple of weeks for her to settle into our new schedule and then I will start the dilution. I always go straight to the 50% water/milk combo.
Of course offering 100% milk out of the sippy cup. I actually have found several cups with the soft spout that do not spill, so I've never really had issues with that. I will do as I did with my boys. Gradually add more water every 2-3 days until she is drinking nothing but water out of a bottle and milk out of her cups. Then I start to offer water in the cup as well and keep her bottles out of sight. I find that sometimes she wants it just because she see;s it. Good luck!! and know that you are not alone!!!

My daughter did the same thing and it took a really long time to get her to drink milk from a cup. My son, on the other hand, has been drinking milk from a cup since about 9-10 months old. I nursed both of them, so they only had a bottle occasionally until 10 months, but I pretty much just transitioned him straight to a sippy (although he does us e a different sippy for milk than he does for water). I used the Nuby cups with the soft spout on them and he didn't seem to care. He took them immediately. He will be a year old tomorrow and I am just getting ready to start weaning him to a different cup with a harder spout or a straw (the Nuby's leak a lot, so I won't let him walk around with it).

He still gets his milk in the morning, before nap and at bedtime, but he gets it from the cup, not the bottle. This will also be the next transition as I want to put him on more of a "have milk with meals" schedule so that he doesn't have to have that milk right before going to sleep.

Anyway, I guess my advice would be to try the Nuby's first (or some other cup with a soft spout) or something with a straw. What we ended up having to do with my daughter was just let her drink out of a regular cup (with our help). We just poured some into her mouth. It was really messy, but once she realized she liked the milk, she started taking it in a sippy eventually.

Hi C.
I would not try to take her bottle away at 12 months- it is still her "comfort" bottle.......if she is not ready to give it up around 18 months then I would be concerned- she will gradually take her milk from the sippy cup but do not rush her.
good luck and blessings

Hello, my name is C. L. I am also in the League City area. I have three beautiful children with one on the way (so I have a little bit of experience on weaning the bottle). Try putting milk in a cup and have her to try drinking it out of a straw. Try using terms that sounds like she's a big girl. Like "Oh, you don't need that, that's for babies and you're a big girl". I also have a one year old, and it wasn't so easy. I showed him how I drank it with a straw and then he wanted to do the same. Hope I was a little bit of help!!

When our 10 month old threw his bottle out of the car window, we told him it was gone so he drank from a cup from then on. I have heard other moms put the bottles out of sight, help their child search the house for the bottle making a game of it. "Let's look on the coffee table, let's look under the chair, let's look behind the curtain".... and so one. Each time, ask "Is it here?", "No, it's not here." Buy a new cup and say, "Let's see if we can find a new cup just for your milk." Show her her water and juice cup and then show her her brand new milk cup." When there was conviction on my part, my children sensed that and went with it. My five-year old was always ready for an afternoon nap and at the same time, my three year old dawdled, sang in bed, wanted to talk to me. One day I was really tired and wanted to nap myself so I told the three-year-old, "Today, you are going to lie down, close your eyes and go to sleep." He did it! I used the lesson I learned that day on many occasions after that. Best wishes.

With my kids, I just stopped giving them the bottle. I just cleaned them all out of the cabinets and we were done at 13 months. They didn't seem to notice really, but they weren't used to having a bottle before a major transition like naptime. Just naptime. They actually seemed to like the new routine of having their "cup" on the couch after bath/jammies then brushing teeth and getting into bed. I guess maybe it was before, once they got out of the tub, they didn't go back downstairs for the night, but now they got to with the cup. I'm not real sure.

My niece was a little bit more attached. She had to be brought into the idea slower. My sister started with the middle of the day (nap time) bottle first. She'd just give her milk with her lunch, then wouldn't do the bottle with the nap time routine. Then after that was successful, she went for the night-time/bedtime bottle. That also took a couple of weeks. Eventually, she took away the morning bottle and replaced it with the sippy. I'm not sure why she chose that order, but I think the main thing was that the whole routine wasn't changed at once, just one little piece, then another, then another. Good Luck!

We went with the dilution method. Start offering both a sippy and a bottle. Put her normal milk in the sippy, but start diluting the milk in the bottle. We started at 25% water and 75% milk, and then every 2 days would up the dilution. Next was 50/50 and then by the time we got to 75% water, she hated the taste of what was coming out of the bottle and had learned that the sippy had the yummy stuff in it. I'm sure you could speed or slow the process depending on your needs. Since it was her choice to move to the sippy, we didn't have any fighting or tears.

Hello C.!
Leading up to my daughter's first birthday, we matter of factly told her that she was going to be a "big girl" on her birthday. We told her big girls drink from sippy cups and the bottles go away.
We did not make a big deal out of it. We let her pick out the sippy cup she would "get" to use 2 weeks before her birthday, but did not allow her to officially use it. We placed the cup in the kitchen like it was a trophy and let her hold it if she asked.
The night before her birthday, I threw away all of the bottle stuff. The morning of her birthday I asked her if she wanted juice or milk in her sippy cup with breakfast. She chose milk. She acted as though it was no big deal and we did not make a big deal out of it.
She was given other sippy cups as gifts for her birthday and she was then excited to be able to choose which sippy cup she wanted to use at each meal.
We always found that with our daughter, if you just did not make a big deal out of things, and gave her some choices, she did pretty good with change. Give it a try and see how your child does. I bet she will be excited and will do fine. Good luck.

I just kept giving mine the bottle of milk until he seemed ready to give it up. I breastfed the first year, so I weaned him to a bottle of milk at 13 months or so and I weaned him to a sippy cup of milk around 17 months. He did the same, took water and diluted juice from a sippy cup but wanted nothing to do with milk. I decided not to force the issue. Around 16 months I started replacing his afternoon bottle with a cup. The I did morning and afternoon, and the night time bottle was the last to go. It took about a month and I tried to never go back once I took a bottle away. Best wishes, I think if you wait a little longer it might go easier:)

Have you tried any of the suggestions and did they work for you? My son is 13 months and only wants his milk in a bottle. He likes the sippy for juice and water but if I put milk in it he will throw it on the ground.

So far he only likes the soft tip sippies. The straw and hard tip throw him off.