SIGG Bottles

I began researching sippy cups for toddlers when Tie-Dye was under a year old. I kept coming across warnings about plastic and how it can leech chemicals into the water. But every sippy cup in existence seemed to be made of plastic. Then one day I stumbled across SIGG's website and was so excited to see they made children's bottles. They are made of light-weight aluminum, and the inside is coated with an FDA approved water-based lining that is guaranteed not to leech any aluminum. At the time, there weren't a lot of retailers selling these bottles in the U.S. Coincidentally, however, my dad happened to be in Europe at the time, and was going to Switzerland! I e-mailed him and told him about the SIGG bottles. When he came back to the U.S. he brought SIGGs for DH, me, and a cute Winnie the Pooh one for Tie-Dye.

Tie-Dye weaned at 18 months, and it was around that time that he started drinking rice milk, so we found a cute SIGG on Ebay for his milk. By the time Toosht came along it seemed to be a given that each of our kids would have a water SIGG and a milk SIGG. We found Toosht's at Whole Foods Market.

These bottles are great and last a long time IF you take proper care of them, which I admit, I did not. I used a regular bottle brush to clean them, and just recently noticed that the metal on the end of the bottle brush was scratching the inner linings. A whole lot of good that lining will do if it's scratched! I don't feel comfortable having our boys use the scratched bottles. Now I'm on a hunt for the best price for four new bottles, AND a SIGG bottle brush cleaner, made especially for the SIGG line. I think an Ebay store is going to be the best bet again. All in all I'm probably going to pay around $80 for the four bottles and the brush. To me, investments like this are totally worth it. Not only are we getting a quality product that lasts, but we are also protecting the health of our boys by avoiding plastic.

I am aware of a company that makes safe, plastic baby bottles and sippy cups. BornFree cups are made from a safe honey-colored plastic called Polyamide (PA) that is free of Bisphenol-A. Supposedly Babies R Us carries the cups, but I went today and they didn't have them and the woman running that department had never even heard of them. From the look of the cups on the BornFree website, they seem to me like they're more for older babies and young toddlers, and they are very expensive. I might consider trying one out with our third baby (coming this December!) if I can find one at Whole Foods, but my boys are used to their SIGGs and enjoy the fun, colorful scenes on their bottles. They also like the free flow of the drink, as opposed to many sippy cups that have a sort of vacuum on them, forcing the child to suck hard to get anything out. Again, good for babies, but not so good for older toddlers and preschoolers.