Whether it is your first time or your nth time being a parent, the behavior of checking and rechecking to ensure that you are doing the right thing for your baby will always be there. Was there a time you researched and even called your child’s pediatrician to know the exact month when babies can drink water? Even levelling up from milk to water caused you excitement!
To answer your question, once your child begins to take solids in their sixth month, they can also start drinking water and other liquids. At nine months old, there are more developments, which we will talk about here. We’ll help you know the best first straw cup for your baby and everything about hydration for 9-month-olds and up!
Development Of A 9-Month-Old Baby
Gone are the days when your child craved only milk! Because of the many developments happening to their minds and bodies, they can now have various foods. Aside from a different taste for nutrition, here are some of the developments of a nine-month-old.
Growing teeth
First, at nine months, the images you will capture of your child may include two bunny teeth. It is an adorable sight, especially when they grin! Your daily routine has an added task of ensuring that these teeth are clean, using an additional everyday must-have from now on—a baby toothbrush!
Starting to chew
With more teeth comes the developed ability to chew. If, from six to nine months, you’d been feeding your baby with purees and mashed food, you can start adding a bit of rice, meat, fish, and various fruits and vegetables to their diet. From suckling, a nine-month-old can now chew better.
Picking up things
At this stage, your child’s holding and picking abilities will also have improved. They can now use their index finger and thumb to grasp, and once they pick up the item, you will notice that the first place the item will land on is their mouth! So, it is important to keep their toys clean.
Sitting upright, crawling, and standing
Work out and burn some calories as you are about to run after an explorer who will crawl and use furniture to practice standing up. It would also be best to baby-proof your house before this stage, ensuring that pointed corners will not cause any accidents in case your baby falls.
All these characteristics will play a role in picking the best straw cup for breastfed babies and babies introduced to different kinds of sippy cups in their six to eight months.
Characteristics Of The Best Straw Cup For Your Baby: 9 Months And Up
When you look for cups for your baby, you’ll be bombarded with a wide variety of options. Here are some sippy cup designs: hard and soft cups, open-top sippy cups, cups with straws, and open cups. With the developments of a nine-month-old, the best baby sippy cup to choose is the one with a straw and the one with the following characteristics:
Cup handle
As mentioned, your child can now utilize the index finger and the thumb to pick things up. Having a straw sippy cup that has a cup handle will help your child’s grasping capability. It would also be easier for them to put the straw in their mouth because the cup will not slip easily in their grip.
You know that at this stage, your child loves to put stuff in their mouth—guide them to sip the straw instead of any other cup parts. With consistent training, you will eventually train your baby to equate drinking water or juice to using the straw.
Built-in, bendy straw cup or weighted straw
Speaking of straws, the best designs to pick are cups with built-in straws that flip out when you open the cup cover, and bends when you close the cup. You can also go for a weighted straw cup—with a type of flexible straw—which allows babies to hold the cup at any angle without spilling.
Built-in silicone straws limit your child’s ability to over insert the straw into their mouth, causing them to gag or even be injured, while a weighted straw will also keep you from cleaning excessive spills.
Spill-proof
Despite your baby’s ability to hold things and sit upright, these capabilities are not yet fully developed, and there will be a chance they will drop the cup or fall while drinking. Keep the content of a cup from spilling by picking a spill-proof design.
To ensure that your child’s attire is not ruined during meal times, always let them wear feeding bibs. Essentially, keep an eye out for your little ones whenever they drink!
Free of harmful chemicals
Like all the other toys and supplies you buy for your child, ensure that the cup you will buy is free from harmful chemicals like lead, bisphenols, phthalates, or formaldehyde. While these chemicals may not always appear in the product information, a sign that may raise a red flag is a strong chemical or plastic smell. When you are giving a straw cup to your child for the first time, make sure to wash the cup thoroughly. If any reactions like allergies appear (especially around your child’s mouth), switch to a different cup from a trusted supplier.
Cute and child-friendly design
Finally, to make all moments with your child fun and unforgettable, pick cup designs that are cute, eye-catching, and child-friendly. If, at the early stages of sippy cup use, you picked cups with bright red, green, orange, yellow, and blue colors, at nine-months-old, you can go for cartoon designs!
At this age, maybe they already have favorite cartoon characters and shows. You can find cup designs with these characters, so your child will always be excited to hold the cup and drink from it. You can match your choice of cartoon character theme for the rest of your child’s things.
Tips To Make Sure Your Child Drinks Enough Liquids
The essence of the classic advice to drink eight glasses of water a day for adults also applies to babies. Your little one should drink 24–36 ounces of liquid in a day, and here are the tips to ensure they are drinking enough.
Create a routine
Mealtimes are obvious moments to drink liquids but make hydration constant by encouraging your child to drink more often. For babies, setting a routine is best for you not to forget, and for your child to get conditioned.
Keep your baby straw cup nearby
Another technique is to always keep the eye-catching straw cup close to your baby, so every time they feel like drinking, their water is just within reach. You can also put it in the same place all the time, so your smart little one will know where to find it.
Offer a variety of drinks
Last and not least, offer different types of drinks aside from water: we recommend juices, smoothies, shakes, and milk. You can also let your child experiment with warm and cold beverages. Just make sure everything you offer is healthy, and watch out for the sugar!
The Benefits Of Keeping Your Child Hydrated
If you have successfully set a drinking routine for your little one, have taught them to drink using a straw cup, and are offering them various healthy drinks, you will notice these health benefits:
- Lack of constipation and urinary problems
- Superb oral health
- An absence of dry mouth and lips
- Better focus and energy
- Overall better digestive health
Picking the correct drinking cup plays a huge role as to whether your child will be able to drink a lot consistently, so make sure to remember our tips above for a healthy and happy baby!
Get Your Baby Cup From Ashtonbee
If you are still looking for a trainer cup, regular cup, spout cup, feeding cups for your baby, or just the best straw cup for baby smoothies, milk, juice, and water, Ashtonbee’s cups may be what you are looking for. We are your baby one-stop-shop!
We intend to provide quality and safe products for your little ones, so rest assured that the cups we have are safe, high quality, and visually pleasing for kids. If you need more baby-safe products, check our product pages for more baby must-haves for feeding, playtime, safety, and other accessories.
