Mum Reviews...

KEEP BABY WARM WITH MERINO LAMBSWOOL COT AND PRAM BLANKETS FROM LUXURY LIFESTYLE BRAND SCARLET & ARGENT (Press Release)

Keep baby warm with a Liberty Born cot or pram blanket from luxury new British lifestyle brand Scarlet & Argent.

Woven with luxuriously light and ever so soft merino wool, these truly lovable baby blankets are trimmed with Liberty fabric, adding an extra special touch for that extra special little person in your life.

Bound all round in Liberty printed cotton lawn, the 100% Merino Lambswool blankets are incredibly lightweight and have a soft and warming touch. The ideal baby blanket, it is available in two colours; pink for girls and blue for boys and in two sizes; Cot and Pram. (The Pram blankets cost £90 while the Cot blanket is £105)

PARENTS REST EASY: INNOVATIVE NEW RANGE OF BABY MONITORS LAUNCHED FOR THE HOME, GARDEN AND CAR (Press Release)

Leading CCTV and surveillance vendor Storage Options, has launched an innovative new range of easy-use ‘Baby Cam’ monitors, giving parents much-needed reassurance that their babies or toddlers are safe and secure, whether it’s in the car, the home, or even the garden.

BabyCam Car is a specialist baby back seat monitoring system, developed to help parents avoid the potentially-dangerous need to turn around and check on their children whilst driving – a habit, which according to research,  puts them at a much higher risk of having a car accident.*

Working much like a Sat Nav, parents simply attach a compact wireless camera to the side rear window to get a clear view of their baby and to transmit a high-quality video picture to a display attached to their windscreen. The system is extremely easy to use and comes equipped with a host of useful features including night vision, a built in rechargeable battery with four hour life, as well as versatile window suction mounts. 

Accordion Apparel - New Products Now Available (Press Release)

The new Accordion Apparel products are now available.  Accordion Apparel is a little online company that aims to sell inspired and unique clothes, designs and accessories.   They sell what they enjoy, what they would wear and what they want to look at.  In exchange for your hard earned money they will send you a little bit of love in product form.

Accordion Apparel also help to raise money for Leukaemia CARE and have an exclusive poster & card collection by a range of artists and bands.  All the profits taken from these posters are going straight to the charity so they can continue doing the great work that they do.

The Giraffe Bag

A wonderfully fun, ethically screen-printed, 14oz cotton canvas tote bag.  Designed by Sally Linsdell, this bag is great for a kid’s day out, for the city, for work…anything really. It can pretty much fit in all your worldly goods. Capacity: 19 litres. Dimensions: 43 x 38 x 13cm 

RRP £6.99

Fear of Childbirth Increases Likelihood of C-Section (Press Release)

A new study published in the international journal Acta Obstetricia et Gynecologica Scandinavica (AOGS) reveals that fear of childbirth is a predisposing factor for emergency and elective cesarean sections, even after psychological counseling. This may mean a negative experience that lasts a lifetime among the approximately 3% of women who in this study were estimated to suffer from excessive fear of childbirth.

Led by Professor Gunilla Sydsjo of the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the University Hospital in Linköping, Central Sweden, researchers analyzed the antenatal and delivery records of 353 women who were referred to a unit for psychosocial obstetrics and gynecology because of fear of childbirth, and 579 women without fear of childbirth.

KIT OUT THE KIDS FOR LESS AT YOUR LOCAL NCT NEARLY NEW SALE

The rising cost of living and tough economic climate mean many families are having to tighten their belts. NCT Nearly New Sales are a haven for cash-strapped parents, offering a brilliant alternative to trawling the high street for pricey baby products

Becoming a parent is exciting, but it can be an expensive time too. At NCT Nearly New Sales, expectant and new parents can buy top quality baby and children’s toys, clothes and equipment straight from their loving owners, saving around 70% on what they would set you back brand new.

Meanwhile, local families can clear out their clutter and make some cash at the same time by selling the baby goods they no longer need. Clothes and equipment must be in excellent condition, and most sellers make more than £60. Sellers keep up to 70% of the proceeds while the rest is returned to fund NCT’s vital services and support for parents.

Aaachoo! Most of us will have a cold this winter, but do you know how to treat it?

NHS Choices reveals some of the myths around treating a cold and offers advice on how to

get well quickly

According to NHS Choices, on average an adult can expect to catch a cold between two and four times a year, with more people suffering during the winter months. But do you know how best to treat a cold?

 

Myths about cures for the common cold:

·        Vitamin C – according to NHS Choices, one in three people believe that Vitamin C can help cure a cold. In fact, research has shown that Vitamin C doesn’t prevent or cure a cold.

·        Echinacea – many think that Echinacea can be used to prevent a cold or treat one, but research has shown that there is no proof of this being the case.

·        Over the counter medicines for colds – over the counter medicines do not cure a cold. The usual ingredients are painkillers and decongestants, which only help manage the symptoms.

FAMILY PORTRAITS BY HOTPOINT & STEVE McCURRY

Hotpoint’s European Family Portraits competition: family photos can be submitted until 15 October.

Family Portraits, the highly successful online photo competition promoted by Hotpoint in cooperation with renowned photographer Steve McCurry, is continuing until 15 October and is open to families in the UK, Italy, France, Poland, the Czech Republic, Romania, Russia, Turkey, Netherlands, Spain and Portugal.

“We are very excited about the success of the competition which has highlighted, through the number and quality of entrants, that family is the most important thing we have” says Marco Rota, Brand and Consumer Marketing Director Europe, Indesit Company. “The photographs entered to date provide a fascinating insight into the power and beauty of the family and reveal a cross-section of cultural differences that make us so unique”

Hotpoint’s website (http://family.hotpoint.eu) has received over 3,200 photos from families across Europe, and the accompanying Facebook page has just reached 22,000 fans. Users can get involved in two ways: either by participating in the competition, by submitting their best family snaps, or by browsing entries and voting for their favourite snapshots.

Boob sets the pace – now using more than 80 per cent greener materials

Boob makes clothes for pregnant and nursing women and their little babies. The trade mark stands for a high level of design, function and quality, as well as continuous efforts to produce garments with a minimum impact on the environment. In a very short time, Boob has reached a leading position when it comes to using a high proportion of alternative materials that are more environment-friendly. In just two years, Boob has increased the proportion of greener materials in the total production from 20 to 81 per cent.

Boob started in 1999, based on the idea of making life more comfortable, more beautiful, and less complicated for mothers and their newborn babies. By making clothes that are both stylish and functional, Boob has over and over again demonstrated that mothers don’t have to choose between comfort and design. At the same time, care for people and the environment has been at least as important. Boob wants to create better conditions for mothers and babies not just here and now, but also in the future. For Boob, it’s just as natural to reduce the environmental impact caused by the production of our clothes as it is to make garments that are beautiful to look at and comfortable to wear.

NCT Launches Parenting Iphone App

Okay, so what do you do when you’re out for the day, your baby needs changing, is crying up a storm, and you don’t know where the nearest baby changing rooms are? That’s where the beauty of the NCT’s new iPhone app comes into life.

NCT, the UK ’s largest parenting charity, has just launched the first interactive charity iPhone application for parents, ‘NCT Babychange’. It’s free to download and allows you to locate the nearest baby changing facility in the area, view its star rating, and then rate it for other parents to use.

The app already has over 5000 baby changing sites listed including supermarkets, train stations, shops, restaurants, libraries and local authorities(1) with the capacity to add more. 

Press Release: New online antenatal classes offer alternative to dwindling NHS education

Midwives are under increasing pressure when it comes to delivering antenatal classes to help women understand what to expect in pregnancy, labour, birth and early parenthood.

Budget and time pressures are making it difficult to deliver good antenatal education to all parents-to-be. In some areas there is no longer any NHS provision of antenatal classes, leaving mums-to-be to find out for themselves or pay for expensive private antenatal classes (the NCT course costs around £150).

However, thanks to two midwives with a passion for good antenatal education, and a mum who knows the difference it makes to labour, women everywhere can now access quality antenatal classes delivered by qualified midwives at an affordable price.

Antenatal Online (www.antenatalonline.co.uk) has launched this month and features a variety of online videos which feature subjects including labour, birth, pain relief, relaxation, feeding and bathing. These can be watched over and over again and can be supplemented with one-to-one support from a midwife, the chance to chat online with other parents-to-be and a weekly midwife web chat.