Thursday, October 21, 2010

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:

- Follow my blog with Google Friend Connect

- Follow me on Twitter 

- 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 

31 comments:

  1. Ryan takes pumped bottles when I'm at work and our current "system" is me trying to put the bottle in the fridge in a line, with the newest at the back.. so that my husband feeds Ryan with the "oldest" at the front. But he often mixes them up (HOW?!) and sometimes that means we waste milk ;( It's tragic. This would help a ton!

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  2. We don't really have a good system, I label them but they're all over the freezer/fridge so you have to search for the right one!

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  3. tweeted

    http://twitter.com/#!/LittleBGCG/status/28369309137

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  4. I pump into bottles, milk is transferred into bags, bags are stored by date in the freezer. Once freezer is full, they are packed into paper ream boxes and transported to my parents house. We trade out oldest box of milk for newest box of milk (newest goes into deep freeze, oldest comes home to be sent to daycare)

    I miss having room for pizza in my freezer. LOL

    omgababy at gmail

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  5. I don't have a system yet - we're expecting our baby in February - but I'm trying to plan ahead. My husband takes issue with plastic bag storage, so that's out. I had never heard of this system, it sounds like it would work well!

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  6. We currently use baby cubes because they freeze in small amounts...but it is a pain how much room they take up!

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  7. I follow your blog with Google Friend Connect!

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  8. I follow your blog via google friend connect

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  9. Follow you on Twitter
    (@cbronsrhodes)

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  10. I use the Medela bags to freeze my milk or pump and use right away. This sounds interesting though. Do you know if they work with BornFree or Avent tops/nipples?

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  11. Tweet!
    http://twitter.com/emilyisland/status/28369919443

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  12. tweet tweet!
    http://twitter.com/#!/cbronsrhodes/status/28369946624

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  13. Following you on Twitter! @lovelimes

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  14. Tweeted!
    http://twitter.com/#!/lovelimes/status/28370314409

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  15. Ooops I lied. I meant I use Lansinoh bags, not Medela. Brain mush at the end of the night...

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  16. Wow, I was just thinking that I needed to find a better storage system before O is born. With J I just used bottles, which made for NO extra bottles!

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  17. Following you on Twitter
    @CrazyToddlerMom

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  18. Tweet: http://twitter.com/CrazyToddlerMom/status/28376654412

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  19. Extra Entry: I have your event button @ giveawayoverload.blogspot.com/ #1

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  20. Extra Entry: I have your event button @ giveawayoverload.blogspot.com #2

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  21. Extra Entry: I have your event button @ giveawayoverload.blogspot.com #3

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  22. Our current system is that the baby drinks everything from the day before and my husband takes extra out of the freezer. I can barely keep up!

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  23. tweet
    http://twitter.com/emilyisland/status/28648341165
    ebickell at hotmail dot com

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