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Posted by admin in Breastfeeding, General, How to on November 14th, 2013
I just had a lovely customer who has hired a Medela Symphony to express breastmilk at home call and ask how to clean her kit. So I explained it all on the phone and though to myself – I should probably do a factsheet so that other customers can print it out and have a read of it when they want to clean their kits too. So here’s how.
Cleaning your kit properly is very important to maintain the health and hygiene of your milk and to keep baby safe.
When you first get your kit you must clean the kit before you use it. It is sterile but its always safer to give it a good clean first.
Please note – word to the wise here – your kit isn’t dishwasher safe and the dishwasher isn’t clean enough so handwashing is a necessity.
This post is Part 1 of a 6 Part Series written by our Restraint Fitting Team to try and help parents sort through the many products, myths and misinformation that exist around kids and cars.
Trying to work out which one of the many car seats on the market to buy or hire as your babies first restraint product can be confusing. We know you want a quick answer – what’s the safest? The path to making a choice these days is more bewildering than ever, thanks to a raft of product innovations and the recently implemented National child restraint laws introduced in 2010. If you don’t know your locking clip from your top tether, or what a travel system is all about, let us help cut through the confusion.
Children aged between four years and under seven years to use an approved forward facing restraint OR an approved booster seat.
If a car has two or more rows of seats, children under four years cannot travel in the front seat;
Children aged between four and seven years will not be permitted to sit in the front seat unless all other seating positions are already occupied by children under seven years.
Just like seatbelt laws, drivers will be fined and incur demerit points if passengers under seven years of age are not wearing an approved child restraint.
Children under 6 months of age must use a rearward facing child restraint and travel only in the rear row of a motor vehicle. If your vehicle does not have a rear row, this does not apply. However, a rearward facing child restraint cannot be used in the front seat where there is a passenger airbag.
Most parents are keen to move their child into a forward-facing car seat as soon as possible, so parents seeing the switch as a milestone like baby getting first teeth or taking his or her first steps. Understandably, parents think their baby will be happier facing forward and getting a better view of the world. This may be true in some cases but its a huge risk to take. The baby doesn’t understand that they’re much safer facing rearwards in the event of a collision so its up to us as parents to manage that risk for them.
The most dangerous collisions tend to be front on and a child in a forward facing seat will be flung more forcefully forwards. Additionally, the load of the impact on a baby’s body in a forward facing seat will inevitably be concentrated on the harness area (read – on baby’s internal organs), whereas in a rearfacing seat the load of deceleration is spread across the shell of the car seat, so it’s less concentrated and a much lower impact load on baby. Also in a rear facing seat the baby’s head movement will be much less, so the risk of serious injury to their head and neck will be much reduced (this is a particular issue for babies as their heads are larger relative to their bodies than those of older children and adults).
So much research evidence has built up on this from crash testing that Europe is introducing new laws to keep babies rearfacing until 15 months.
We recommend you keep your baby rear-facing as long as possible.
Part 2 to follow next week – how to choose a rear facing restraint?
Try before you buy is really one of the many (and varied) reasons people choose to hire baby
Try before you buy is really one of the many (and varied) reasons people choose to hire baby equipment. As we all know, what Mum and Dad like, it doesn’t necessarily follow that baby will like that too – no matter how shiny, how fashionable or how expensive the product is. Babies just don’t care. The same principles apply with baby’s first bed. Babies have grown and developed in a snug, warm, cocoon like womb for 9 months. Upon arrival babies are probably rather surprised to realise that:
Some babies do sleep “like a baby” but many don’t. Some babies are unsettled and can be difficult to settle and resettle to sleep during the day and night. This experience, of having an unsettled baby who was struggling with colic and sleep, is what spurred Ambrose Hooi to develop the Amby Hammock. Ambrose’s little girl slept wonderfully for the first 4 weeks of her life and then developed what is termed “colic” – that often misunderstood syndrome that results in babies crying inconsolably for hours on end. The Amby Air hammock is a great help for these babies and their parents, with the gentle bouncing and swinging of the Amby spring moving baby in both horizontal and vertical directions, naturally mimicking “the colic dance” movements that the colicky baby wants and needs. You could say the Amby is a baby colic home remedy.
The Amby Baby Hammock Air is also the only baby hammock on the market that can be used up to 12 months of age. It is also larger, safer and has an adjustable incline unlike any other.
Here at Rock-A-Bye Baby we suggest you to hire for a week or two, and if your baby loves the Amby Hammock we can replace it with a brand new hammock delivered to your door – yours to keep – and we’ll pick up the hire one once your new one has arrived and is set up. Hire-Try-Buy is 100% risk free – just hire your Amby, if you love it, we’ll get you a brand new one to keep.
Ambrose says: “Today, many thousands of parents in Australia and Europe have finally come to terms with the fact that for babies, to sleep, grow and feed well, they need a sleeping environment that has at least some ingredients of the maternal womb. The use of Natures Nest by hospitals and child care centres in Australia and Europe is extensive and growing rapidly.”
All restraints made under our tough Australian Standard are very effective in the event of an accident – when they’re used properly. Sadly though, many aren’t. A 2009 Monash University study of almost 2000 car journeys involving children in restraint seats found that children had been incorrectly restrained up to 88 per cent of the time, depending on the restraint type; 88 per cent of forward-facing seats were wrongly installed , followed by infant seats (67 per cent) and booster seats (63 per cent). Now that’s a *lot* of children at risk of serious injury or death.
All parents care and love their children, but just buying a seat, even the most expensive seat on the market, then installing it doesn’t provide adequate protection. Its imperative that you know *how* the seat works and how to use it properly.
Following our tips and knowing your car restraints have been installed correctly and you’re confident in using them is the key to safe travel.
I know I know, the “hire” doesn’t slot in so well phonetically but it makes sense to be a part of that mantra don’t you think?
In the consumer driven world in which we live there is a perception that the number of material things we own, and how much we paid for them, helps us rank highly in the eyes of our peers. And if I’m truthful, maybe it does makes us feel better about ourselves. I know I’m just as guilty as the next person of coveting luxury items (most of which are out of my budget anyway!).
But this idea of needing to possess only the best of everything is what determines our economic and environmental status. The more we consume and spend the greater effect it has on our economy and environment. Whilst spending up big sounds like a good idea for our economy, in actual fact this tends to drive prices higher. This only makes it harder for the average family to buy important items such as furniture and whitegoods.
Imagine a new family, expecting a baby for the first time, wanting the joy of setting up that baby nursery. When furniture and baby essentials, such as car seats, prams and rockers are so highly priced it makes it virtually impossible to afford everything they need all at once. If they are trying to maintain their image by choosing designer labels, it’s just not going to happen.
The solution… Hire it! Hiring equipment means you don’t need to outlay a lot of money to have use of the products you need. There are a massive variety of things that you can hire, or rent, for long or short periods of time. Toy libraries are accessible in most council districts and here are Rock-a-bye-Baby, we offer rental on all essential baby needs.
Babies and children will outgrow stuff pretty quickly and lose interest with play equipment. When they reach this point you simply return the items and hire a different product that’s more suitable to your growing babies needs. So hiring your baby equipment saves you money, time and storage space, especially when you only need to use it for a short time.
It’s kind of like sharing, similar to borrowing a book from the library. When you return your item, it allows others the opportunity to borrow it after you. It’s much better for the environment too. Hiring is a form of recycling. Rather than producing more and more new things to satisfy consumer needs, reusing helps reduce our landfill.
So don’t buy if you don’t have to, hire it… It’s a Win/Win for everyone; a sensible and safe way to help make sure we have a healthy happy planet to pass onto our children and our children’s children.
We often get exciting or interesting customers, sometimes its a visiting celebrity who sadly we can’t ever name, sometimes we have to attend hotels or fabulous mansions for ex-pat families home for the holidays. Lately though we’ve been called to television studios. Our most recent hires have been for the ABC who hired a number of prams and capsules for Season 2 of Redfern Now and just a few days ago we delivered a little van full of goodies including Stokke, Mamas & Papas and Quinny prams to the set of the new series “Wonderland” airing soon on Channel 10.
https://www.tvtonight.com.au/2013/04/ten-announces-wonderland-cast.html
We’re looking forward to having a game of pram-spotting when the shows air!
And it doesn’t get you pregnant!
Your pillow can be your best friend especially if it’s a DreamGenii Pregnancy Support Pillow. These pillows are a wonderful invention by an Australian mum and they take a lot of the pain out of your nighttime sleep during pregnancy.
So many mums tell me that they just can’t get comfortable in bed especially as their pregnancy progresses. The weight of the baby pulls heavily on the lower back and it’s difficult to find a comfy position to sleep in. The DreamGenii pillow helps take away the pain and discomfort. It supports your back, bump and knees without taking up all of the room in the bed. The makers of the pillow say:
“If used from around 20 weeks can help to encourage optimal foetal positioning which can lead to a shorter and less painful labour with less chance of intervention.”
Now that’s worth fighting for!
The best thing about the DreamGenii is that it makes a great feeding pillow once your baby is born. In effect it has two lives – double the value for money. I would have paid a king’s ransom for a good night’s sleep especially in the later stages of pregnancy but with DreamGenii you don’t have to do that. It is only $69.95 for a pillow that will allow you to rest, regain your energy overnight and be ready to cope with the next day and the next….
These pillows sell out quickly because they are such a great product. If you are desperate for a good night’s sleep order yours today through our shop: