what's the best way to transition from bottle to sippy cup?

Really it all depends on your kid.

You have a head start since you found one he likes. I now own basically one of every single type in multilpe brands - till I finally found the one he would use (a straw one of all things!!!). So that added up to something like $40 in useless sippy cups.

But making the switch - we just switched him. We would use his bottle at night & for naps since the point was to get him to sleep & we didn't want him to be interested in using this new thing then. After a week or so of all daytime bottles being sippy cups (mentally - these are sippy cups to me...they have a lid...so my brain sees it as a bottle!) we switched his evening ones to sippy cups too.

My son ONLY uses a straw one. The concept of lifting a bottle to drink from it is lost on him. We're still trying to get him to use the other ones - but the only time he ever tries lifting the cup is when he has a straw one of course (which obviously doesn't work!). And he's one of those kids who refuses to let you do anything for him...so if I touch his sippy cup he gets pissed!

But you can also try using a few a day and slowly transitioning...if it's a seriously painstaking process, then that might the way to go (one a day - then 2 a day). No one wants to spend 3-4 hours trying to get their kid to drink something!

Give him the sippy any time he will take it. I wouldn't encourage bottle feeding at night.

I had twins and started them on sippy cups at 7 months. I breast fed. They were never given bottles and it worked out great. If you do give a bottle at night, take it away as soon as he is asleep.

My first child was allowed to have a bottle during the night and her teeth rotted from baby bottle syndrom.

The more time he spends with a sippy cup, the better off he will be.

It should be a slow process.

For now, only offer water or diluted juice in his sippy cup with his solids.

After a week of him having his water in a sippy cup, give his afternoon formula (whatever feeding comes after his lunchtime solids) in a sippy cup.

This way he can associate "afternoon" with "sippy cup" then a few weeks later, in addition to the sippy for water and afternoon formula, add another daytime formula feed to his sippy cup.

His nighttime feedings should ideally be given in a bottle. Especially if he's drowsy and falls asleep when drinking.

My sister started her son on a sippy cup that had a soft nipple like spout to sip from. It was very similar to the nipple on a bottle so it made the transition from bottle to sippy cup easy. After a while, she started playing around with other sippy cups that had the more traditional hard spouts to sip from and she found one he liked. She started giving him water and juice in those sippy cup and on his first birthday she just took the bottle away completely. By this point he was very comfortable with drinking from his sippy cup and was drinking cows milk and no longer formula.