Sometimes the last thing you want to do is give your baby a bottle. This is why bottle propping – putting something like a receiving blanket under the bottle to hold it up – is appealing. Hands-free feeding equals more time for Mom. But is this practice safe? This is an issue that elicits strong opinions.

"I am a mom of two, with my youngest being 9 months old," says Robin Kelman of Lafayette Hill, Pa. "I am a proponent of propping up a bottle if need be. As a busy working mom with a toddler and newborn, sometimes I need to feed the baby on the go. I would rather do this than make her cry and wait at a time when she is hungry. If there is something wrong with this, I am anxious to hear the other side."

Kelman stumbled upon bottle propping out of necessity. She was constantly on the go and had to think of something. When she realized she could prop the bottle and her daughter, Madden, could drink it without a problem, she did it a lot more often. "I've propped the bottle in the car, stroller and even at home so I could get ready for work," Kelman says. "As long as the baby was happy, I see nothing wrong with it."

Madden spit up a lot in the first seven months, so Kelman always had a burp cloth or two on her. The burp cloths ended up being used for bottle propping as well. Kelman also used a diaper pack (a soft cover diaper holder) or blanket – really, whatever worked. "I would prop it up so it was at the right feeding angle, and so that air wasn't getting into the nipple," she says. "However I needed to rig it, I did. Madden was happy. I was happy."

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