Juice

[BentleysBands]

looking for some advice:

dcg 3yrs will ONLY drink apple juice or strawberry milk. i give the kids white milk for meals and juice for snacks...anything in between is water

but this child will NOT drink anything but what i said above..i have talked with mom and her remedy was bringing me a-juice and strawberry nesquick...NOT what i was expecting. i told her that i do NOT give anything but white milk and the juice is a variety. they LOVE the fruitables
sometimes i dont have a-juice so i feel bad she is thirsty.

(please no lectures on not giving juices, blah blah..we DO drink it )

should i just make sure to always have a-juice -- which can be hard to do sometimes

or just give her what she wants and move on? and make sure mom provides those things for dcg?

the old saying that a child will drink when thirsty is not always true. she won't ...period!
and i dont want her getting dehydrated , have problems and it be MY fault.

[QualiTcare]

i wouldn't do it. it's not fair to the other kids. i would offer her water like everyone else and if she didn't take it then OH WELL!

there's no way she could get dehydrated in the short time she's with you. a 9-10 hour day might not seem so short! but for getting dehydrated - it's not long enough.

[SilverSabre25]

I agree to not give in to her. If she is thirsty, she WILL drink. Let mom know that due to licensing regs (if you want to go that route) you can't give strawberry milk and have to offer more than just one kind of juice.

Or, you could try starting with the milk and juice, and gradually add less powder and start watering the juice down more and more, or start mixing the apple juice with other kids of juice very gradually.

[Gurdy]

My own daughter is like this. She is 4 and does NOT like milk. She will drink it if it is strawberry, so I mix a little strawberry in it. Personally, I would do that for the dcg, but have the mom provide the strawberry syrup. For the juice situation, if the mom was willing to provide the apple juice, I would do that too. I would offer her strawberry milk when I was serving the other kids milk and apple juice when serving the other kids juice. Between meals and snacks I would offer only water to her.
I would not let a 3 year old go all day without drinking, shes got to be thirsty, I wouldn't let my own child go all day without drinking so I would not let dcg girl either.

[Lilbutterflie]

How long have you had dcg? My kids and daycare kids used to get mostly milk and juice until I decided about 6 months ago that we were going to transition to milk with breakfast, water the rest of the day; and occasionally (like once a week) a juice for snack as a treat. It took a while, maybe a month, for them to come to drink water BUT it did happen! I did NOT give in to them, and some days they barely drank anything. But now they do really well. It takes time to change habits like that.

[SunflowerMama]

We do just water and milk too. I have sugar free strawberry syrup and sugar free chocolate though so if I do let the kids have strawberry or chocolate milk as a treat I don't feel as guilty.

[countrymom]

I offer juice here too (they love cranberry strawberry juice or v8splash) I only offer white milk. I don't understand why people need to flavor things, whats wrong with plain white milk. I can understand if you give it as a treat but not everyday. I wouldn't give in and I wouldn't say anything to the mother. I have kids here who barely drink anything, and I mean anything and they are not dehydrated (my son is the same way--he was home sick yesterday and I realized he doesn't drink much either) I would leave water in a cup for her so she knows that if she's thirsty she has something to drink.

[MARSTELAC]

I wouldn't give something different than the other children are drinking unless you have a note from the physician. If my dck's saw one having something different, they would all want it. Just my opinion :-)

[QualiTcare]

I offer juice here too (they love cranberry strawberry juice or v8splash) I only offer white milk. I don't understand why people need to flavor things, whats wrong with plain white milk. I can understand if you give it as a treat but not everyday. I wouldn't give in and I wouldn't say anything to the mother. I have kids here who barely drink anything, and I mean anything and they are not dehydrated (my son is the same way--he was home sick yesterday and I realized he doesn't drink much either) I would leave water in a cup for her so she knows that if she's thirsty she has something to drink.

i agree. i wouldn't be happy to know that my child who was well behaved and does as she's told was getting water and white milk while another child was getting strawberry milk and juice as a reward for being a princess to put it nicely.

what kind of message does that send to the other kids? if you don't get what you want, just whine or be stubborn - and then you'll get your way. nothing used to drive me more crazy at school than when a teacher would tell a child they weren't getting a treat or sticker or whatever bc they misbehaved all day (which of course all the other kids witnessed) and then at the end of the day, feel bad for them because they straighten up and get quiet while the treats are being handed out. that sends a message to the other kids that you don't REALLY have to do what you're told and exceptions will be made for you if you don't. JMO.

[BentleysBands]

i'm gonna try just giving her what everyone else has . its been miserable so far she has done nothing but whine everytime i get up and come in to the kitchen. she WONT drink water :confused:

[TGT09]

I serve juice too! *gasp* :-)

My kids get juice with morning snack.
Milk (only white) with lunch
Water with afternoon snack.

No exceptions on what kind of juice etc. I would stick to your guns about this.

[laundrymom]

I wouldnt cave to her, She would get milk for meals and water in between, personally we dont do juice but thats my own issue. . I do choco milk on birthdays,.. if she does get enough,.. she will drink anything,.. she just isnt thirsty enough yet. She isnt going to get dehydrated by missing 10 hours of strawberry milk or apple juice. she will get thirsty,.. and then Mom will rush to her aid and give in,.. and tomorrow you will begin again. Unless you can get mom to be onboard,.. but good luck there. I offer, serve, and move on. If she says she is thirsty, she gets white milk, reserved from whenever earlier that day or water. Never juice. never flavored milk.

[misol]

the old saying that a child will drink when thirsty is not always true. she won't ...period!
and i dont want her getting dehydrated , have problems and it be MY fault.

Oh this old saying is absolutely true - she just isn't thirsty enough yet. I have made the choice to serve milk and water only at my daycare. I have had kids who ONLY drank juice. It may take them a while but they eventually realize that they drink milk or water while here or they will just be thirsty. Some kids simply don't like the taste of plain milk and never will drink it and that's OK but they will eventually drink water if there are no other options.

It's fine if you offer your dcks juice. Since you do, she should only get it when you are serving it to everyone else too. Offer her water and milk in between and if she drinks it she drinks it if she doesn't she doesn't. I agree with QualiTcare in that it is highly unlikely that she will become dehydrated during the short time that she is at your house. Anyway, as soon as she leaves your house you can trust that she gets all the juice and strawberry milk she can stand!

[Unregistered]

If she's truly thirsty, she'll drink what you offer...

[MarinaVanessa]

I had exactly the same problem with my newest DCG. The very first morning she was dropped off she had a cup of juice in her hand and I just asked her to take a drink and give her cup back to her uncle. He looked at me with a little confusion and I just explained that here I offer fruit instead of juice and served milk during meals with only the occasional cup of juice and that all of the kids drank the same thing. He was satisfied with that and hasn't brought her in with juice again.

As for the DCG, well she didn;t like it at all. She wouldn't drink the milk and so I would just serve her a small amount at first (so I wouldn't waste so much) which she would just leave it there and say she was thirsty and ask for juice. I would then just offer her water. She would whine or cry and I would send her to the "crying corner/step". It's the only place in my home where children are allowed to cry. They can cry all they want as long as it's there. Even when my 15mo DCB cries or whines and I ask "Uh oh, are you crying?" he walks himself to the step. As soon as he's done he gets up and plays . After a few days of this she stopped crying for juice. She still doesn't drink the milk usually but now she ASKS for water ::.