The mad ramblings of one very average woman finding my way through the jungle of parenthood accompanied by The Hubby, The Boy and our Hairy Hounds of Hell!
It’s been a while, and I just haven’t had a lot of time recently to sit down and write much about anything, but I thought I’d post a quick update while I’ve got a moment and tell you what’s going on in the world of Summer Mama, The Hubby, The Boy & The Hairy Hounds of Hell!
Well for a start, I got some lovely new Flip It cups from Nuby UK for The Boy. They’re red with a race car design, which went down well as soon as he saw them, and they’re advertised from 12 months. They have a straw all the way down the length of the cup, a handy flip top to cover and protect the straw which means you can take it out and about with you, it’s specially insulated to keep the liquid inside cold (or warm) as required (though only for a limited time, it isn’t like a proper Thermos flask). The valve on the straw works by opening when the child uses the straw in the correct way, to encourage development for using straws rather than beakers or bottle teats, and so I filled one with water at lunchtime and gave it to The Boy.
As I’ve mentioned before, he is a creature of habit, and he wasn’t too impressed with the change in drinking method: He’s got the hang of tipping up a beaker or bottle to drink from, and he didn’t understand that with this style cup he just needed to suck the straw properly. For some time he was very amused with the way the straw pops up when you flip the top and spent quite a while giggling about that, but when he again tried to drink from it and couldn’t he became frustrated. I demonstrated for him how to work the cup and to be honest it is pretty precise the way you need to do it in order to get a mouthful of drink, but I guess that’s the point. After a few minutes of grumping, smacking his hands on the high chair tray and throwing the lovely red cup onto the floor several times, I handed him his familiar green Sport Sipper and he was content again.
Since then I start with the red cup, or have the red cup in the locality and give it to him when he wants a drink, but he still hasn’t really got the hang of it and prefers to use a normal beaker or his Sport Sipper still. It’s frustrating on one hand because the spout of the Sport Sipper needs replacing (I haven’t got round to ordering them, but I know they’re available on the Nuby UK site so I will do that!) but for now it means there’s no valve in the sipper so the water flows freely, which is annoying when your son likes to flood the tray of the highchair and smack his hands in the resulting puddle! I am sure we will get there eventually with the new cups, it’s just something new to learn, and there is so much else he is learning right now.
The Boy isn’t quite walking yet, but he’s doing well at furniture surfing and is standing up independently with the ability to lean down, pick something up and stand upright again. A couple of times he has done a couple of shuffle steps toward me, but only a couple and he either falls on his bottom when he realises what he’s just done, or else he quickly finds something to hold onto again. He has also discovered a passion for climbing, and will empty the big plastic boxes I use in his room as toy boxes, turn them onto their side and climb! As well as this when he is in the play pen he has discovered he has a Spiderman-like ability to climb up the mesh sides, holding onto the bar across the top and folding at the waist in an effort to escape. Lucky for me the play pen is actually a very solid Huack Baby Centre that I got an amazing deal on, and it is just as well I did as it has proved to be invaluable! (Highly recommended: Review to come soon!)
Although The Boy has been largely unimpressed with my efforts to get him to drink from a different type of cup, he has been very happy with my efforts to get him to eat. For a few weeks we have been struggling to feed a baby who doesn’t want you feeding him anymore, but who just likes to throw food on the floor if you allow him finger food to feed himself. It has been a bit of a nightmare as we’ve been going through so much wasted food as he decides he doesn’t want something after a single bite, so merrily throws the rest of it onto the floor. A while ago I stopped allowing the Hairy Hounds of Hell to roam free while The Boy was eating as dropping tit bits to them was too tempting and as a result our girl dog is now a fat girl dog! The Boy was, however, very impressed when I was sitting with him one lunchtime eating my lunch of scrambled egg on toast, and allowed him to sample some of the scrambled egg from my fork. He was thrilled by this development and as a result I managed to get him to eat two scrambled eggs and half a piece of toast, which was the largest meal I’d got down him in days (it was meant to be my lunch, but as other mums know when your child has shown interest in food after a while of not eating you’ll happily go hungry for them to have something!) Anyway I had overcooked as I was hoping that he’d want to share with me. The following day we went shopping and in Sainsburys I found a cute little cutlery set for a couple of pounds in blue with jungle animals on and brought it: Twenty minutes later in the Store 21 shop on the same retail park I found a plain blue fork and spoon set reduced to 99p, so I brought one of those, too, as I realised that an extra fork and spoon would be handy given The Boys history of throwing things onto the floor!
Back home, at dinnertime, we used the Sainsburys fork for the first time and The Boy ate more dinner than he had done in days. Since then he has not only been happier to eat with his new utensils, but he’s also become even more independent, and after you load the fork or the spoon up he’ll take it from you to feed himself (before clapping as if to congratulate himself for being so clever!) It’s a remarkable turn around and I’m so glad I thought of it. Rather than trying to take him back a step with his feeding and trying to feed him myself again, I should have been trying to encourage him forward as it is obviously what he was after!
The Hubby is taking advantage of having a couple of weeks off work to do some serious DIY. We have been building a collection of items over the last year or so for when we get round to decorating various rooms of the house and we never seem to have the time to do it, so he has been busy already this week shuffling around the kitchen set up and changing the crappy sinks in the utility room and the kitchen for decent ones, with nice new taps too! He’s planning on doing some tiling and some painting as well as having a thorough clear out and clean up of the entire space before he’s considering it finished, and he’s done very well already so far. One thing about The Hubby, he does tend to take his time to start on a project but once he starts he flies through getting it done and he doesn’t like leaving things half finished so I’ll have a new look kitchen by next week which is exciting. We’re not replacing the cupboards, or the worktop, but giving it a facelift which is a cheaper way of making it look better. A while ago The Hubby laid dark laminate floor in the kitchen and his plan is to continue that into the utility room as well, so it all flows nicely and looks good. I don’t know when he’s thinking of doing the hall/stairs and landing, or the spare bedroom, or our bedroom, but we’ll get round to them eventually I’m sure!
Ah well for now I’d better sign off … I’ve got a list of things as long as my arm that I really should be doing instead of sitting here drinking coffee and rambling on! Ho hum!
A couple of updates following on from recent previous posts:
I heard back from Tesco customer service last night. They’ve apologised for the problems I encountered when using their own brand disposable nappies and advised that should I purchase them again and have problems, I should return the remainder of the pack, plus proof of purchase, to my store for a full refund and for them to send the remainder of the pack to their quality team for inspection. In addition to this advice, they’ve also offered to send a £5 Tesco Moneycard for me to spend at my local store which is nice of them – but I won’t be purchasing their own brand nappies! Might see what clothing they have for The Boy!
Also, on Tuesday evening I placed an order with Nuby on their own website for a couple of items. I had an e-mail from them almost immediately with my order confirmation, order number and advisory about stock availability (all items in stock) On Wednesday morning I received a further e-mail saying my order had been dispatched and it arrived yesterday morning (Thursday) by Royal Mail ‘signed for’ delivery service. I am very impressed and will be writing a review for the new products once The Boy and I have used them – we got a 2 pack of the Red Car design Insulated Flip It cup for £5.49. In addition, at the moment (and for the whole of October) Nuby are offering free delivery on your orders to support Breast Cancer Care and the whole website is PINK to show their support. Well worth having a look!
As you may recall from a previous entry, Nuby UK sent me some goodies a while ago to use with The Boy and blog about my findings. The product we’ve used daily ever since is the wonderful One Touch Bottle & Food Warmer, which I would highly recommend to anyone looking for one – at only RRP £15 I think it is a bargain, looks so much more stylish and sleek than the other brand equivalents and the beauty of being able to put the bottle or food in and press the button then being able to wander off and do something else without worrying about it overheating is brilliant. During a visit to my parents a couple of weeks ago I decided against taking it as they have a different brand one at their house and it reminded me just how good the Nuby product is.
The Boy took very well to the Wash Or Toss beakers initially, however he quickly discovered that when he launches them from the highchair tray onto the laminate floor the lids tend to pop off and we end up with a mini flood every time. I started using the Sport Sipper instead and this is much better, while he still throws it onto the floor rather than putting it to one side when he’s had enough to drink, the one-way valve helps prevent it from leaking. It’s also very handy when we go out as it fits nicely into a standard bottle insulator bag so it keeps his water nice and cool on a hot day, which given the recent weather is a must! Also when we go to visit friends with children of around the same age, the lime green Sport Sipper stands out amongst the various beakers that end up everywhere, which makes it easy for me to identify when it’s time to pack up & go home, but also makes it easy for him to see which one is his drink, which saves arguments!
His Teether Tugz Rabbit continues to be a firm favourite – when the replacement rabbit was sent his face lit up when I opened the package, and since then every time we go out it is securely attached to his carseat harness or to the pushchair. The Flip Flop book is a favourite of mine, as I take it everywhere in the car when we’re out and when we go shopping I can attach it to the supermarket trolley to discourage him from biting the metal bars, or the hoop on it means I can put it on the harness in his buggy and it won’t go missing. He goes through stages of wanting to chew a lot with the teething continuing, but even if he isn’t interested in chewing the book has crinkly pages, different textures and brightly coloured pictures to keep him entertained while mummy shops!
The Twisty Bugz teether stays at home and when his teeth are playing up it’s one of the first things I reach for to give him some relief – Not only does the purICE keep it colder for longer after it’s come out of the fridge, but the bright colours and clicky noises keep him happy and when the time does come to put it back in the fridge once it gets too warm to help at all he does get quite upset! We have a set of Icy Bite keys as well which are good, but I think the size of the keys makes it difficult for him to get them where he needs the relief now, toward the back of his mouth – They would have been fabulous to have when his front teeth started coming through though; I had a set of plastic chew keys for him which he always had with him while the front teeth were coming through, and they weren’t even cold ones!
All in all, we’re really thrilled with Nuby products in our household, I hadn’t heard of the brand prior to finding the Teether Tugz Rabbit in our local Tesco store but since finding the website and the Facebook page and increasing our Nuby product selection they impress me more and more each time. For the next baby I am considering purchasing all new bottles as we went for a different brand with The Boy and they’re really showing their age now, with the figures coming off the sides and discolouration despite thorough washing (and sterilising when he was younger) Also they’re so common it seems like everyone has the same ones, and the Nuby ones stand out a bit more and look a bit funkier, which is why I’m thinking I might get them! For the price you pay for Nuby products you get excellent quality, fantastic customer service and a product that looks good and will last, which I have found not to be the case with other, better known brands and their expensive products which fail very quickly and rubbish customer service! Added to this with most of the Nuby products you can purchase additional pieces from the website store, enabling you to ‘refresh’ many of the products when it starts showing signs of wear & tear or in preparation for the next child to use the product. I will definitely be taking advantage of the current free delivery from Nuby and am compiling a list of things I want to get for The Boy, so watch out for more Nuby reviews coming soon!
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I’ve been very quiet on the blogging for a while, and thought I’d just post a little update to say hello, and provide a brief insight to some of what’s been going on the last couple of weeks.
Right now, I don’t have any products that I’m testing, and I don’t have any fabulous new things that I’ve brought for The Boy that I want to tell everyone about (which is how a lot of my product reviews come about). So there’s not a product review as such, but the thing I’d like to mention is customer service.
Now, as a rule, customers don’t need customer services until something goes wrong; It’s an ugly truth, that if we’re happy with a product we don’t tend to contact the company to tell them how happy we are. Instead these poor people who staff customer service departments are left with lots of stroppy phone calls and moody e-mails from customers making complaints about dysfunctional products. The reason I know this so well is because it is the field in which I am based. Despite my many different job titles over the years, I would say that, primarily, every single job I’ve ever done (including starting as a volunteer for the Cats Protection League when I was fourteen) has been customer service based. As such, I am very aware of how relentlessly horrible it can be to have a stream of people ready to give you an ear-bashing about their problem, and vent their anger at you as a representative of the company, regardless of whether or not you’re able or willing to do something to help in a bad situation. Which is why, as a customer, I am more often than not the type of person who will be very careful at how I word a complaint, or how I speak when I’m on the phone, as I’m aware it isn’t this actual persons fault that I have a problem, but at the same time I want them to know all the facts and be able to help me resolving the dilemma. When I receive poor customer service I am the sort of customer I’d hate to deal with myself, but my point is that I’ve already got a faulty product and putting bad customer service on top of that simply is not on. When I receive good customer service, I always say thank you to those involved, and mention it to my friends – which brings me neatly to my point.
If you’ve read my review on the Nuby Teether Tugz Rabbit, you’ll know just how much The Boy adores it. I tied it to his carseat harness using a Toy Tie and it has been his beloved companion on car journeys ever since. I’m a very careful mummy when it comes to considering things like choking hazards (particularly as he is in a rear-facing carseat) so before every journey I checked the rabbit to ensure it was in good order before allowing him to chew on it. He has his four front teeth, top and bottom, and the molars have been trying to make a break through for some time, so he has been desperately chewing on whatever he can, hence it was important to me that I made sure the rabbit was in good order before he started chomping away.
That afternoon, we made a short drive to a friend’s house – she has a son three months younger than The Boy, so it’s nice for us to get together with the boys – we were in the car for about ten minutes in total. When we stopped at a set of traffic lights, The Boy started coughing. I glanced back (despite not being able to see anything of him!) and asked if he was OK. (Even though he can’t talk I find myself continually talking to him as if he understands and will answer). He coughed a bit more then stopped and continued singing (as he does), the lights changed and we continued on our journey. Upon arriving at my friend’s house, when I went to get The Boy out of the carseat, I discovered a chunk of red substance on his lip. I removed it, wondering what it was, and lifted him out of the seat – more of this red substance fell off his clothes and when he opened his mouth to laugh I saw a large piece of it on his tongue. I pulled it out and realised it was a rubbery substance, like the ear ends on the rabbit …
Somehow, he’d managed to bite through the rubbery ends on the red rabbit ear and had been picking bits off with his teeth. I was surprised to say the least, grateful that he hadn’t actually choked on any of the pieces, and wondered how and why this had happened. I removed the rabbit from his carseat harness for the journey home, and decided to photograph the rabbit ear end to send to my contact at Nuby UK who I was in touch with about the product testing I did for them a few weeks ago.
I explained what had happened, apologised if she wasn’t the right person to send my e-mail to and thanked her for sending it on to the relevant team. I added that while the Teether Tugz was six months old and The Boy has been gnawing on it a lot recently, it wasn’t something I expected; though it wouldn’t put me off Nuby products (I love them!) I just wanted to alert them to this in case it should happen again, perhaps to a younger child, which could potentially become a serious choking hazard. I sent the e-mail fairly late in the evening, while The Hubby was putting The Boy to bed, along with a photograph of the damage to the rabbit ear.
The following morning, the customer service department e-mailed me back, apologising profusely for this incident and providing a freepost address that I could send the rabbit back to, along with my e-mail correspondence, and that they would look into the incident etc etc. It was a prompt, good, standard response as far as I could see. I did as they asked, and posted the rabbit on Saturday morning on my way out.
I received another e-mail on Monday evening, this one telling me that they’d received the rabbit and it had been sent to their quality department – they advised me that it would probably be a week before any results were returned, as they would be doing a thorough exam of the rabbit I’d returned, as well as checking a cross section of stock to ensure it was a one-off incident and not something that could happen again. By Thursday morning a replacement Teether Tugz Rabbit arrived in the post (The Boy’s face lit up when he saw it!), along with a couple of discount vouchers to spend at the Nuby UK online store.
While I’m sorry this happened, and I’m grateful that The Boy didn’t choke, I am very impressed with their level of customer service and the fact they have provided me with updates along the way, apparently genuine apologies and their capable handling of the whole incident. Plus replacing the Teether Tugz with no proof of purchase (As it was brought from Tesco the receipt would have ended up in the bin before that week was out – since it was under £5 I didn’t consider keeping it). Their customer service receives a big five out of five stars for me!
My rubbish experience at customer service was last week. I’ve had a dodgy connection on one rear light on my car for a while, and generally if it doesn’t come on a little thump would make it work. Well, one evening after a long day of driving and working, I’d had enough and just wanted to get home, put The Boy to bed and curl up to go to sleep myself. Unfortunately I had to pick The Boy up from my mother in law before I could do that, and she has a happy knack of talking for a very long time about completely pointless things, so I was there for a good hour longer than I needed to be, gradually packing The Boy’s things away and edging with him closer to my car. Once in, I thought I was off, but then of course that rear light didn’t come on and she started flapping about it, and in my foul mood (combined with the start of a headache and the fact that it was past The Boy’s bedtime and it would still be another half hour before I got him home) I leapt from the car and gave the light such a whack that I punched through the plastic lenses and all I had to show for my rear light was a mangled mess of multi coloured plastic, some broken bulbs and sore knuckles. (It didn’t improve my mood!)
Fortunately I found a good seller on E-Bay advertising exactly what I needed for a tenner, with p+p additional depending on type of delivery service required. While I wanted it quickly, I saw no point in paying over the odds for special delivery as I had just over a week before I’d need the light replaced, since until then I’d have no reason to be using the car, especially when it was dark. I patched up the light as well as I could so it didn’t look so bad when I was driving in daytime, and my brake lights and indicator worked fine, so it was only the tail light actually out, and if I wasn’t driving at night then I didn’t need it anyway. I opted for standard delivery service, which I took to being Royal Mail.
The seller has a very high rating and specialises in car parts, and despite the fact I ordered the item late in the evening on Friday, he e-mailed back on Tuesday saying that the systems were off-line for Monday so he’d only just got my order details, so he would send out as priority. There was no mention of a courier delivery service, or anything else. The Boy and I were at home all morning on Wednesday and didn’t receive anything, so we popped out around to visit a friend. We were home again by 5.30, just after The Hubby got home, and we discovered a card from a courier service called Yodel.
The card said that we’d been out at 2.30 when they’d tried to deliver a parcel, and provided a mobile phone number of the courier the parcel was with so that we could phone them direct to arrange re-delivery: The card also provided a standard 0845 number for Yodel’s automated service, and log-in details to make arrangements over the internet. The courier driver had filled in a parcel tracking number and on the card was printed the depot number that the parcel had been dispatched from.
I logged onto the internet site, entered my details including the parcel number and depot number, and I kept getting an ‘Error’ message, for no apparent reason. We looked at the tracking number again and again, changing 7’s to 9’s in case we’d read the figures wrong, but still nothing happened. I phoned the mobile number and got the answerphone, so I left a message explaining we would be out the following day but that I would leave the black (recycling) bin in the front garden of the property and this was a safe place to leave the parcel. I left my phone number – repeated twice – the parcel number, and confirmed the name and address for the delivery, all spoken very clearly in my very best ‘phone’ voice.
The following day I was again home in the morning but had an unavoidable appointment in the afternoon, so I hoped that the courier would return before I went out but they didn’t – so I phoned the mobile number again, leaving instructions to leave the parcel in the black bin, leaving my phone number, confirming the parcel number, and delivery name and address. I raced home from my appointment and found no card, no delivery and, disappointingly, nobody had attempted to phone my mobile. I tried to be optimistic as the courier service could deliver later into the evening, for all I knew, so I phoned the mobile again and left a third message, now stating I was home, confirming all my details again.
When Friday morning came I had a very long day and was up and out by , as was The Hubby. After a very long drive I had a long day of training, with the return journey that afternoon clocking up a total of 200 miles driving for the day, though that didn’t mark the end of the day – I then had to travel home from work, another half hour behind the wheel, and I was anxious to get home and find my parcel had been delivered. I was due to make a very long drive on Saturday morning and without the replacement light for my car, I doubted I was going to make that drive without someone pulling me over – as well as the fact that, strictly speaking, with a broken light my car shouldn’t have been on the road, whether the light was required or not.
I got home and there was no parcel. I phoned the mobile and left another voicemail, explaining that it was urgent that I received the item immediately, and then I tried the 0845 number. After a very long recorded message, I was asked to key in my parcel number, which I did: Then I was asked to key in the depot number, which I did – The recorded voice said the two pieces of information didn’t match, so asked for the details again, and again. After three tries, the recorded voice said I was being transferred to an operator – and then the line went dead. So I phoned back, and the process was repeated, in total three times before I went into meltdown. I looked up this random courier company – Yodel – that I’d never heard of before and was horrified when I found their Facebook page; Not much interaction from Yodel themselves, but story after story of parcels going missing, deliveries never happening, the phone numbers are bogus because nobody ever gets the messages, the automated service cuts you off deliberately, etc etc etc. Frightened now that I wouldn’t receive my replacement light at all, never mind when I needed it, I made contact with the seller. He assured me he’d used Yodel before loads of times and they were fine, ignore the Facebook rumours, and so on.
At that night the doorbell rang. The dogs went crackers and The Hubby went to answer the door (bearing in mind my 13 month old son is at this point asleep upstairs in the room directly over the front hall) A loud man is on the doorstep with a parcel, shouts out The Hubby’s name and presents the parcel with a flourish, as though we should be grateful to receive it in the nick of time. The Hubby is typically understated with his displeasure at the lack of service from this company and simply signs for the parcel and shuts the door.
Luckily the seller was good as his word, the part was in perfect working order and The Hubby fitted it within a few moments. Hence our 100 mile journey on Saturday morning was considerably less stressful because my car was once again road legal and if the police wanted to bother me they wouldn’t find anything out of place. However, the experience and what I found out have completely turned me off ever using Yodel courier service myself and I would warn others the same. I attempted to write an e-mail of complaint to Yodel and was told that the maximum length was 200 characters – have you ever tried to complain using 200 characters? By the time you’ve put in your name, address, phone number, parcel number and depot number – oops you’ve run out of space. I attempted to write more than one complaint to see if I could bypass this issue, but after the first it won’t let you write another, coming up with a message that basically says give us a chance to respond to your complaint before you complain again!!
I’ve still not heard anything back from them – now I’ve got my parcel I don’t really care, either, but it would be nice to have some sort of reply from them, and on the Facebook page there are still loads of disappointed people who have neither their parcel or any kind of contact from Yodel. I hope all those people manage to get their parcel soon, or failing that some kind of compensation for the inconvenience caused by Yodel and their poor organisation. I give Yodel ZERO out of five for customer service!
Since we’re trying to encourage The Boy to drink his formula milk from a beaker instead of a bottle (without much success so far!) I thought we’d give the Nuby Sport Sipper a try to see whether it would help to bridge the gap from bottle to beaker.
RRP £2.69
What They Say:
Step 2: Silicone Training Straw
9 Months +
10 oz / 300 ml
1 Pack
For initial straw drinking
Touch Flo TM Technology which activates as soon as your child puts the spout into their mouth
Soft silicone training straw eases the transition from spout to straw drinking
Encourages natural drinking action and oral development
Sport sipper straw
BPA Free
What I say: I love the shape of this product – specially designed for little hands to hold easily, with two rubbery grips on either side so it doesn’t slip as easily as a plain bottle/beaker might. It doesn’t look like it will hold much, but it takes a massive 10 ounces, which is plenty big enough for his formula feeds. Unfortunately it doesn’t have markings on the side like a bottle does, so I made up the formula in a regular bottle and transferred it into the Sport Sipper. As well as putting one formula feed into the Sport Sipper, I put one in his blue Tommee Tippee beaker (no handles, standard shape, hard beaker spout, he’s always refused formula milk from it but he’ll drink water from it) and one feed in a regular bottle, as he’s used to. I lined them up in the kitchen together. I went to the front room and asked The Boy if he was sleepy as he was lying on his tummy in the play pen with his head on his hands, and we soon established that he was sleepy and wanted some milk & a nap. I took him into the kitchen and stood in front of the three containers of formula. I asked him which one he wanted. Now bearing in mind he’s always had his formula feed from a standard bottle before, and the only time I’ve tried it from a beaker he threw a hissy fit, he straight away smiled and grabbed the lime green Sport Sipper bottle.
I took him upstairs and we went through our usual routine of changing his nappy, pulling the curtains so his room wasn’t too bright, and the two of us settled into the chair for the feed. To begin with, he took it well, and we got about a third of the way through the feed before we had problems. The Boy is a creature of habit already, and it seems while he was hungry enough not to worry about the first bit coming from something different, after that initial success he stopped feeding and wanted to play with the spout instead of drinking from it. His little fingers went down the spout, releasing the valve, causing quite a lot of milk to be spilled around his face and onto the bib, which he thought was hilarious, but I wasn’t quite as entertained by it! I cleaned him up and tried again – this time he grabbed it and held it himself to take a few mouthfuls. Unfortunately again after a moment he stopped drinking and started playing with the top, flicking it and laughing at the noises it made, chewing on it and waving it around. Eventually I grew bored of his game and we were wasting time as well as formula, so I switched to a standard bottle to finish the feed & put him into the cot to nap.
I don’t want to be too disappointed, because I know that The Boy does like the comfort of his bottle, and perhaps I had high expectations that he would immediately swap over to using the Sport Sipper without any fuss, and to be fair despite the messing around he did, he had drunk about half his feed from it which is good for a first time. Added to this the fact that he was happily holding it himself I think this should be viewed as a successful first try of the Sport Sipper.
I’ve washed it up, and I’m going to put water in it so that he can drink from it throughout the course of this afternoon to see whether that helps get him more used to the idea, then if he does seem happier with it by this evening I can put his formula feed in it for him to have before bedtime.
I give the Sport Sipper four out of five, because I think the addition of the measuring markers down the side would be a brilliant idea as I had to make up the feed in a standard bottle and transfer it, which meant more washing up than necessary!
When Nuby asked me if I’d like to test some products to review for them, I was absolutely thrilled: Not only does The Boy have the Teether Tugz Rabbit and the Flip Flop book, but he loves both of them, and we never go out without them! The lovely people at Nuby sent me a list of items they wanted reviewed, and I made a selection of the most useful for The Boy based on his age.
Our parcel arrived yesterday, typically enough the one day in the week we left the house at and the postman came at 9.30! So this morning we popped into town together to the sorting office to collect it.
The parcel contained lots of lovely items, and Nuby had even been thoughtful enough to ensure that they were ‘boy’ styles instead of ‘girl’ styles where appropriate.
I put The Boy upstairs in his cot for his nap, and investigated the parcel further. I was really impressed to discover that the packages contained more than I expected them to – for instance the Wash Or Toss beakers came as a pack of three rather than the single one I was anticipating and the feeding spoons is a generous pack of six. I was thrilled to see the bright colours and funky designs of the products, and knew The Boy would really like them too, so I made sure I opened all the packaging after checking everything over, and gave everything a wash before the first use.
Safely and evenly warms breast milk, formula and baby food
Electric warmer retains vital nutrients, unlike microwave warming
Hassle free One-Touch™ operation
Perfect for busy parents and modern day living
Compact design is ideal for travel Easy as 1-2-3! Add water.....load warmer.....touch to start
The One-Touch™ warmer fits all sizes, shapes and brands of bottles Simple and stylish for the modern kitchen
What I say – This stylish, modern looking unit sits on your kitchen counter looking like any other kitchen accessory: Instead of standing out in bright colours (Our old warmer was an Avent one, white and bright blue, and looked quite out of place in our kitchen, where all our accessories are chrome and black!) This one sits next to the kettle fitting in nicely. I read the instructions and just thought, Hmm, because surely it wouldn’t be as straight-forward as the company makes out, right? How WRONG was I?!? For The Boy’s lunch, I looked at the handy table that comes in the box telling you how much water is needed for the quantity and the starting temperature (and even the type of container it’s in!) and used the little measuring pot to add the water. I popped the top off the jar, put it in the basket with the adaptor ring in place and flicked the switch. It quietly burbled away for a few minutes (it’s quieter than our kettle boiling) and then when the light switched off, the food was ready! I took it out and checked the temperature and it was ever so slightly too hot to feed to him immediately, but once I’d transferred it into the bowl and stirred it ready for feeding, it was perfect temperature. I’ve tried fitting the Tommee Tippee bottles we already have into it, and while it was a struggle to wedge them into our old Avent heater, they go very nicely in the Nuby one, and all different shapes and size beakers, bottles & food containers fit into it nicely. There’s a couple of really clever bits about this that I really like – the first one being the little water measuring pot. With my old warmer, we had to have a little pot to hand that we used to pour the water in, but with this one there is a cleverly designed water pot that slides onto the warmer itself, so it’s hidden and unobtrusive when you don’t need it, but it slides out easily and has the measurements marked on the side (and a flip top) for when you do need it. Such a small idea, but to me it shows that someone really thought about this design – presumably someone who has kids, and has had the experience of the random pot-of-water-on-the-work-top like we have! The second really clever bit I like is the basket design that you put the bottle or food container into for heating – like in a deep fat fryer, where you have the basket for the food and the handle to lift it in and out, this little plastic basket has a little notch for the handle to fit onto when it’s in place in the warmer, and the handle itself is just a small size, but big enough for you to grip it and lift the bottle or food, in the basket, out of the warmer – so no more grabbing at it desperately with steam all over the place, or trying to get it out with a tea-towel wrapped around your hand! It seems like such a basic little item, a bottle and food warmer, but I’ve used two in the past and both had downfalls – This one is absolutely spot on. It turns itself off automatically once the bottle or food is heated, and at this point there is no water left in it (My old warmer would just keep going regardless, and if you wandered off and forgot about it – which I have done in the past – the milk would just get hotter and hotter and the warmer would eventually boil dry, obviously quite dangerous!) I already love this warmer, despite only having used it twice (The Boy had pudding warmed in it after his lunch!) I would give it five out of five, it’s a lovely little item, at at RRP £15 I think very well priced and well worth the money – I would have expected something like that to cost double the money.
The unique removable cradle allows you to comfortably hold the bowl while feeding
The removable divider allows you to feed two foods at once.
Also comes with an air-tight lid; making it perfect for on the go feeding
4m+
BPA free
What I say: The bowl comes apart in two ways; The divider in the centre comes out and so does the bowl from the handle/base section to make it easier for cleaning. I didn’t really expect it to be a million miles away from any other weaning bowl, so I was pleasantly surprised when I found that once again their claims were true! It was much nicer to hold when feeding than a standard bowl (I have arthritis starting in my hands, and find that gripping bowls sometimes causes cramping in my hand which can be painful and uncomfortable and sitting there for as long as it sometimes takes to feed The Boy trying to hold a bowl steady is quite problematic at times). The handle/base section of the bowl really helps this issue, by providing a lovely soft handle to grip while you’re feeding – once again, such a small difference to the standard available, but a difference that really makes a big change for me. The shape of the bowl in the handle/base reminds me of the Genie lamp from Aladdin, and at first I was a bit sceptical about that because I thought it would just mean you couldn’t get as much food into the bowl, but I soon found it was very useful as you could move the food to the shallower end to cool down quicker if needed. I didn’t use it with the divider today as The Boy ate a ready-prepared jar of food so I didn’t need two sections, but I will be using it like that when he has ‘big boy’ dinners with us (I try to do that a few times a week, when The Hubby, The Boy and myself sit down together and eat the same thing for dinner). In addition, the bowl is also suitable for cleaning in the dishwasher, making it ideal for busy parents! It also comes with a lid that fits on airtight, so it’s also suitable to put food in when you go out and you’re safe in the knowledge that it won’t spill out everywhere during your travels – a definite plus point for us, as we’re often out & about and mealtimes away from home can be a nightmare! We’ll put the lid to the test tomorrow, as we’re off to my mum & dad’s holiday home for the day, so we’ll take The Boy’s lunch with us in his new bowl (the Genie bowl I think it should be re-named!) A bit of a side-note and probably not particularly important to a lot of people, but I also really liked the colour of this bowl! At the moment I’ll award it four out of five, but once we’ve tested the divider and the lid this score might change!
Long handle is designed to reach the bottom of taller baby pots
Easy for mum to hold
Perfect for baby's first foods
What I say: Once more, they’re not exaggerating – the pack we received contains 2 green, 2 purple, 1 yellow and 1 blue spoon, each with designs on the handles (swirls and stars) - The designs are actually a slightly different plastic to the rest of the handle, more of a rubbery silicone feel for better grip, which was a brilliant additional touch (once more, thoughtful design for the person feeding the child) I used them to get the food out of the jar, which being a Stage 3 jar is one of the taller ones, and normally I end up with food on my hands, all up the handle of the spoon I use, and also I don’t know about you but it’s difficult to get into all the nooks and crannies of the jar to empty it fully when you’re using a spoon that’s the same height as the jar? Well these spoons did the job perfectly – I didn’t get any on me, while it went up the handle there was still plenty of handle left to hold easily, and thanks to the small spoon itself combined with the long handle I got out every last morsel! When it came to feeding I imagined that the very long handle would make it difficult to control and more hard to feed instead of easier, but it does really help and it is much more comfortable (again, with the beginnings of arthritis it can be problematic for me, but these spoons are fab) The handle is chunky enough for mum (or dad!) to comfortably hold, while the spoon itself is perfect size for little mouths but also deeper than many baby spoons you find, so it actually holds the food rather than it being a balancing act on an almost-flat surface! The bright colours, funky handle pattern and overall success of this design leads me again down the path of being impressed with Nuby, and once again I’ll award this product five out of five. I think Nuby would benefit from doing them in different packs – say a set of neutral colours, a set of girlie colours and a set of boy colours, as The Hubby picked up immediately on the purple/lilac spoons and said, “They’re a bit girlie aren’t they?” but it doesn’t bother me, and The Boy certainly doesn’t care at this age! (Maybe in a year it will be a different story, but right now all he cares about is the food on the spoon, not the colour of the spoon itself!)
Encourages natural drinking action & oral development
BPA FREE
What I say: The Boy doesn’t seem to like drinking from beakers much. I’ve brought several since he was old enough to start trying something other than a bottle – a Safety 1st version (absolute rubbish, with the valve & spout in entirely too close a position to the centre of the lid, meaning you have to have it practically upside down before the child can get any liquid out of it) and several different Tommee Tippee versions. The Boy will drink from the plainest of all the Tommee Tippee beakers I’ve got him, but even then he doesn’t often hold it himself and prefers you to hold it for him: He doesn’t tend to drink a lot during the day, something which worries me, and he still refuses to drink his formula milk from anything other than a bottle. As soon as I saw the beakers I was impressed; They have funky, bright character designs (Mighty Action Crew) and brightly coloured lids. The pack contains three different designs with three different coloured lids, and straight away I liked how they looked. They’re fairly slender, so a good size for his hands to grip, and the lid fits on snugly with a spout that doesn’t leak half as much as other beakers we’ve tried. I filled one of the beakers and placed it on the tray of his high chair and sat there looking at him. First he investigated the design, smiling and laughing, as I admired it too, telling him it was a cool big-boy cup specially for him. Then, without me prompting, he grabbed it with both hands and lifted it to take a drink. I burst into applause, cheering him on for being such a big boy and drinking himself, and from that moment on, all day he has been asking for his drink (he makes a tipping motion with his hand in front of his mouth) and when I put it in front of him, he is quite happy to grab it and take a drink himself, with no assistance from me. In fact, when The Hubby returned home and tried to lift the beaker for The Boy, he became quite annoyed, turning his head away and blowing raspberries, until The Hubby put the beaker down and The Boy quite happily lifted it and drank himself. Without wanting to speak too soon I believe we may be making progress! The designs and bright colours of these beakers are attractive, the beakers themselves are functional and practical and I really like them. The name “Wash or Toss” is based on the fact that they’re only £2.99 for a pack of three, so if you choose to you can wash and re-use time and time again, or if not you can throw them away and replace. I think £2.99 is a bargain price for three of these brilliant beakers, and I will definitely be purchasing some more! They’re not as thick plastic as a lot of beakers, obviously going along with the whole throwing-away aspect of them, and the lids do pop off if they’re dropped from the high chair with force (a simple drop and the lid stays on, but that kind of throw-drop move causes them to pop open, though they haven't exploded open as I'd have expected), but I think for what they are and the price you pay for them it’s a very good product. I’ll be taking the Tommee Tippee beaker with me tomorrow for the journey as it has a folding spout for travelling, which the Wash Or Toss beakers don’t offer, but I’ll definitely be taking one of these with us for use throughout the day. Another brilliant product, these I’d give another five out of five!
RRP £11.49 (Award Winning Teethers Bundle, containing two other items)
What They Say:
Twisty Bugz
6 months +
Multiple textured surfaces
Twists, clicks & rattles
Contains purICE gel, stays cooler longer compared to water
Teething nubs massage tender gums
BPA FREE
What I say: After his lunch, The Boy went to play in the front room for a while and since he was dribbling a lot and shoving all manner of toys into his mouth, I thought it was a good opportunity to try out one of the other Nuby products – The Twisty Bugz Teether. So called because it’s a ball that twists (causing a cracking/popping sound) with four bugs attached. Two of the bugs have wings filled with PurICE Gel, which stays colder for longer than the average teething ring filler (you only put them in the fridge, not the freezer) All of the bugs bobble about from the central ball design, with baby friendly bits for them to touch and chew. This particular product won the Mother & Baby Gold award in 2009 for Best Baby Toy 6-12 months, and it’s easy to see why. While The Boy is now 12 months old, he was kept entertained by the Twisty Bugz thanks to the bright colours and the noise that it makes, and this experience was enhanced for him by the fact that he could chew on it and get satisfaction from doing so (he’s been chewing on just about everything he can find recently and then throwing it and screaming in frustration if it doesn’t help!) The textures, shapes and noise of the Twisty Bugz meant he didn’t immediately throw it out of his play pen, instead he sat there for a while chewing, twisting and babbling to it and I think he was quite impressed. Considering that for your £11.49 you get three teethers I feel this is pretty good – I know you can buy cheap ones at the pound shop, but let’s be fair they’re generally pretty crap and basic (you get what you pay for) and if you break it down the cost for this set works out to be £3.83 per teether which isn’t so bad really, considering I think you’ll get a lot more use out of them than the cheaper versions and they will entertain the child for longer (it isn’t ‘just’ a teether, its got other things going on too!) We haven’t tried the IcyBite Keys yet (also part of this set when purchased) and we didn’t get the Bug-A-Loop, so my rating for the Twisty Bugz as a product without the others is four out of five!
All in all, we’ve had a lovely day testing out our Nuby products so far. We’ve still got other items remaining to try, so we’ll do those another day and I’ll be back with more reviews! I think Nuby are a brand who should be proud of themselves, they deserve to be much bigger in the UK than they currently are and especially with their range of products, their funky designs and their very reasonable prices it surprised me that not more stores stock their products and not more parents are buying direct if that’s the only way. In this day and age we’re all looking for funky, hard-wearing and economically priced products and the Nuby range fits the bill every time – and they’re BPA free. What more could you want? We love Nuby!
