22 out of 22 people found this review helpful.
Great Nighttime Bottle Heater: Lets Daddy Help!
Date of Review: Jan 27, 2000
This is like a diaper genie - you either love it or hate it! We loved ours, and like the diaper genie, it was loved due to our sheer laziness. We hated running down to the kitchen at 2 am to grab a bottle from the fridge and heat it up, and the Nighttime Feeder System saved us that trip, night after night.
How it Works
This is a plastic casing, about 8" wide and 12" tall. The front has a spot for a bottle to sit, and the back has a little thermos-type compartment. You put one or two bottles in the back, with an ice pack (included)inbetween them, and it keeps them cool all night. With the Nighttime Feeder system, you can store one or two bottles in a refrigerated compartment, and when needed, you just warm them up by placing them in a separate steam compartment and pressing one button! What's easier than that?
Love it or Hate it
I have some friends who hated theirs. They say it was a waste of money, or they never used it. I found that all of those friends either nursed for an extended period of time (hence, were not heating up bottles at 2 am) or had bedrooms extremely close to the kitchen, so this was not a hassle. We are logistically as far as you can possibly be from the kitchen... getting there is way more work than I need to do at midnight.. and 2 am .. and 4 am... Needless to say we were thrilled to find a way to save that trip each night.
Use of the Nighttime Feeder, and Amy's Patented DADDY HELPS Technique
So we kept this in the master bedroom, right by the bed. (With our second child, it was up on the bathroom counter, just in case the elder child decided to experiment with the steam button. He never did, but I worried). Now I said in the title,"Lets Daddy Help". You're thinking, no way...okay, here is the trick:
1:30 am. Baby cries. Mommy & Daddy wake up & look at each other. Daddy goes down the hall & gets baby (or to the bassinette, if baby's still in your room). While Daddy changes baby, Mommy heats up the bottle in the steamer, and then takes baby and feeds him (her) the bottle. Here's the great part: 4:00 am. Baby cries. Mommy can change the baby, and Daddy can feed him. OR you can just let one parent sleep all the way through one feeding, and the other gets to sleep all the way through the next feeding.
Personally, I wouldn't recommend this. You want Daddy to get up & change the baby. You want to start this while you are nursing... Mommy gets all propped up with pillows while Daddy changes the baby, then Daddy goes back to sleep while Mommy nurses in bed. Guess what? Daddy learns to wake up & get the baby everytime he cries. Seriously. THIS WORKS! I learned this from my sister, it works for me, and for FOUR friends.
Disadvantages - What to Watch for
Okay -- back to the Night time Feeder. So the nighttime feeder will save you wear and tear - which is the big advantage. The only disadvantage is you have to be careful not to overheat the bottles -- just like any technique, you want to check the bottles as they heat to make sure they aren't over heating. After a while, you learn to measure just the right amount of water in to the little front compartment to perfectly heat a 6 oz bottle, for example.
More Features
Other features: The bottle warmer shuts off automatically when it is finished, and the indicator light goes out also. The ice container is refillable as neede, the thermos area lid lifts-off to provide you easy access to one or both bottles, and there is a little nightlight to help you find this in the dark at 4 am (and so you don't trip over it, like I almost did!) Not for use with disposable or glass bottles.
Summary
This is a great product if you have a 2 story home or just want the convenience in heating your bottles. You need to use caution to make sure the bottles are not overheated, and keep it out of the reach of little fingers. If your bedroom is close to the kitchen, you may not find this useful; but if you want to save a long hike to the kitchen to heat up each bottle, this is a wonderful device. I give it four stars for the convenience it provided us with both of our children.
