DIY bottle holder

One of the not-so-fun parts of having bottle babies is the 'extra' work that goes into having bottle babies.  The regular feedings and whatnot isn't so fun when you are trying to run a home, a farm and keep some kind of normalcy/routine to your home. 

Beloved is wonderful at helping me with them...when he is home.  He joked with me a few days ago about how he was thinking of putting together a bottle holder for the baby goats.  I smiled, smirked and said wouldn't that be awesome.  Little did I know that just 24 hours later, our goats would be eating from a DIY bottle holder.

 

(as you can see his beautiful assistant was still in her pajamas)

(and yes...those are travel coffee mugs...and yes, they worked great!)

 

Just some old travel mugs, wire, an old weather strip and a piece off of an old plastic dog house that the wind previously destroyed and you have a DIY bottle holder for your bottle babies.  Pretty nifty right? 

The real test was to take place that evening.  Would it hold the bottles?  Would they destroy it after one feeding?  For those that don't know...goats, and I am assuming the same is with cattle, when they nurse off their mother they actually hit the udders, rather hard I might add, with their nose.  This then tells their mother to 'let down' and well you know the rest.  Well, bottle babies do the same thing, mainly because it is instinctual.  They will hit the bottle nipple with their nose when you are trying to feed.  I wasn't sure if the cups would stay still or if the bottles would fall out, but I was anxious to see. 

So that night, after milking, measuring and dividing up the milk we were able to test our new bottle holder...



And as you can see, it worked great!  Not only are they happy but so is this mama! 

This man never ceases to amaze me...I am one lucky hippie farmer wife!  :)