Mother's Milkmate - Review and Giveaway!

I was so excited to have a chance to review the Mother's Milk Mate rack and bottle storage system!

When I got it in the mail, I couldn't wait to try it out to see how it worked for me. I had somewhat of an organizational system with my refrigerated bottles of breast milk, but it was kind of hard for my mom and other caregivers to figure out. Sometimes the fresh bottles would get taken out first, which wasn't a huge deal, but still kind of annoying.

I immediately washed all the bottles in hot, soapy water (I was just giddy about how many there were - the less often I have to wash bottles, the happier I am!) and set them out to dry. I cleared out all my regular bottles and transferred all the milk into the Mother's Milk Mate bottles, put the lids on, and put the rack and bottles in the fridge. I used quite a few bottles, since the Mother's Milk Mate bottles are 4 oz (well, you can squeeze 5 oz in, but they're marked to 4) and my Gerber bottles are (marked to) 5 oz. The size difference wasn't a big deal to me - generally with breast milk, the smaller portions you keep it in the better. It tends to safeguard against waste. Besides, smaller bottles are easier for independent little baby hands to hold themselves.

Let me go back a little bit and talk about the lids. They have two pieces - one fits inside the bottle, preventing spills, and the other is a regular screw on cap. It works soooo well. You'd think with the bottles being sideways and all that there would be a leak from time to time, but I haven't ever had one. Plus, I feel like it kind of "seals" off the milk so it stays a little fresher in the fridge. I really, really like the design of the lids.

Once I had all my milk stored in the rack, it was so easy to just grab the front bottle and know it was the right one. The set does come with little stickers to label the milk with the date, but I didn't bother with them because since E only takes bottles I knew we'd go through all the milk before it spoiled. Those would be very useful if your baby is only taking a bottle every now and then, though! Especially because - and I'm telling you this from experience - your breast milk changes composition throughout the course of the day. You do not want to be feeding your baby morning milk at night. That's the equivalent of your little one downing a shot of espresso right before bed.. and I don't know about you, but that's pretty much my worst nightmare. So those little stickers? Don't only write the date on those. Write the time. Trust me. (And if you're saying - Hey! Then why didn't you label your milk with the time? It's because I put my milk in the fridge in the order that it was pumped, and cycle through it in that order. So I don't need to. Ha. But I learned that lesson the hard way.)

The bottle mouth is the standard size - I was able to use any and all of the standard nipple/ring sets I had on them. I didn't have a problem with that at all. I also pumped directly into the bottles a couple of times - they fit just fine on my Medela pump and on my Lansinoh pump. That's definitely a perk!

Overall, the Mother's Milk Mate system is very convenient. It can even be kept in the freezer, for you moms who just have a few bottles pumped for Dad or whoever to feed once in awhile so you can sleep or go out for a couple of hours every now and then.

The only things that I wish were different are the quantity of the bottles and lids. I'm a master at losing things, so more lids are always a plus in my book. They give you one extra, with that in mind, but for an exclusive pumper who's dragging bottles around everywhere... they just get lost. So I would have appreciated two or three extra. But not a big deal. The set comes with the perfect number of bottles to fill the rack (10), which is a lot of bottles, but I found myself wishing I had the Mother's Milkmate On-The-Go Pack. It's an extra 6 bottles, and that would have allowed me to have a few bottles in the sink and still have the rack pretty much full. As it was, with me constantly taking bottles out, I didn't have enough of the Milkmate bottles clean to keep the rack full. I may just have to purchase it!

Want one for yourself? You can purchase one of your very own here!

If you're feeling lucky though, I have one fabulous Mother's Milkmate storage system to give away!!

Mandatory Entry: Leave a comment telling me what your current milk organization system is like, or if you even have one!

Extra Entries:

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- Tweet the giveaway: " Pump, store, & feed from the same bottle! Win a milk storage system from Mother's Milkmate & @HauteSingleMama! #bfcafe http://bit.ly/9mlYkw  " (You can tweet twice a day, at least one hour apart)

Each worth one entry. Leave me a comment for each thing that you do! Don't forget your extra entries if you RSVP'd - leave comments for those too!


I was given a Mother's Milkmate milk storage system to keep. I was not compensated for this review. All opinions are honest and my own. 

Images from www.mothersmilkmate.com