I’ve got something new to share with you – Baby Swap or Shop. Thought up by Carrie Safford when she was on Maternity Leave with her second baby. It’s a brilliant idea and we’re so pleased that they picked us to do their PR going forwards. I’ve asked Carrie to tell you more about them..

Hi I am Carrie, we’re so excited to be working with Liz Weston and Weston Communications as we’ve got lots going on with Baby Swap or Shop and she’s going to help us tell people about it as we go forwards.

How Baby Swap or Shop started: I was on maternity leave with my youngest son; I have two boys but with quite an age gap so there was no handing down, we bought everything brand new, which cost a pretty penny and that’s after nine months of maternity wear that I no longer have use for. Whilst dressing my baby and realising the top I had just washed and ironed ready was now too small I realised that he was outgrowing everything at such a fast rate. I wondered how other growing families manage to keep up with demand; especially in these times of financial hardship. Before any ‘wear and tear’ has a chance, the stuff is not used anymore and I was left with sackfuls of perfectly decent baby clothes that could benefit another baby – after all, we are encouraged to recycle wherever possible!

From small acorns…

So Baby Swap or Shop was born – a free way for people to swap, sell, share and tell each other about their un used, or no longer needed new and used or previously loved items. To test it out, I set up a Facebook page to see what people thought of it. I was astounded at how quickly the fan base grew, there was clearly a need for recycling baby items as well as for bargain hunting for new items, parents and mums to be were joining in droves actively selling, swapping and buying maternity, baby and toddler items and the page became extremely busy; it became a full-time job! A business?!…We listened to our fans and also set up many local area pages. We now have a combined total of over 100,000 fans on Facebook!

Making it easy for parents…

As we embarked on the huge project that putting together the website quickly became, we always asked our customers what they wanted. So in essence the site has truly been designed with them in mind. This was possible due to our huge presence throughout social media, it is so easy to communicate with them en-mass!We used our Facebook experience as a real learning curve, taking on board our fans’ suggestions and gaining feedback. We have also added a Marketplace area for small businesses and work at home parents caring for youngsters to advertise their products and services for a small fee in order to help attract our many parents, I felt it was important to help in these areas as well, especially now I am a work at home mum whilst looking after a very active one year old!

Our national website finally went live in November 2010 and traffic has increased greatly in the few months it has been going – but the work doesn’t stop there though! We are constantly developing the website and have many ideas to help evolve our one-stop shop for parents and mums to be. www.babyswaporshop.co.uk is officially now THE site to visit in order to source anything pre-birth through to toddler stage, products or services! And with both new and nearly new items it well and truly caters for all budgets!

So that’s us and our idea that’s turned into a thriving business. Please check us out at www.babyswaporshop.co.uk and email me at carrie@babyswaporshop.co.uk to tell me what you think of it.

We’ve got a guest blog from one of our own clients today, Dean & Steph from Daddynatal and Bump, Birth & Beyond. They’ve had a brilliant week, going from teaching local classes, to national coverage via a TV appearance. I thought it would be really helpful for other people who have small businesses to hear that opportunities for national coverage are out there, if you’re prepared to work hard and make the most of the opportunities available….. 

While everyone else seems to be winding down for Easter things have never been busier at Bump Birth and Beyond Ltd. It has been a hectic week, but a very positive hectic week!

Our busy week kicked off on Saturday, listening to the first interview Dean had recorded for The Baby Show broadcast on Star Radio. The interview was focused on the role of the dad in pregnancy, and very exciting for us, as it was the first ‘official’ interview Dean had done, and it definitely was a great learning experience.

Then, Sunday saw us officially announce our partnership with Peterborough City Hospital at Peterborough Baby Show. Bump, Birth and Beyond are now running DaddyNatal and Active Birth Classes, on behalf of the hospital, free to parents. How fantastic to have a Head of Midwifery who is so forward thinking, she really is one of the first in the country to recognise that fathers/birth partners have huge antenatal education needs which have never (until now!) been met.

There was an excellent response to the news of the classes, with signups both on the day and since. Both courses are already 10% full, and we are still awaiting the formal press release and for the community midwifery team to start promotion yet!

Sunday also marked the completion of the first part of training for our new Daisy Birthing teacher, Alison. Courses have been so successful that Steph cannot keep up with demand on her own, so we are extremely excited about Alison’s arrival. She will commence teaching in June which will allow us to offer more courses in even more locations.

On Monday and Tuesday evenings, Steph was out teaching her regular Daisy Birthing classes in Peterborough and St Ives. Steph teaches classes to around 40 pregnant ladies a week, as well as managing all the bookings and day-to-day admin of the company. And she looks after our two toddlers full time as well!

Little did we realise what more the week still held in store… At 10pm Wednesday evening, Steph arrived home from yet another Daisy Birthing class to the news that Dean had been invited down the next day onto The Vanessa Show on Channel 5 to talk about fathers at birth. Turns out a producer had heard his interview on The Baby Show website and wanted him there for a discussion segment about birth! How could we refuse…?!

So scrapping all previous arrangements for Thursday, Dean travelled to London to record the show. To say he was nervous would be a major understatement! He was petrified to be doing his first TV appearance only a few days after his very first ever live media interview! But, of course, he was also really excited. The people were brilliant and he had the pleasure of meeting and talking to Pearl Lowe and Christina Hopkinson, as part of the segment on the discussion of fathers at birth. They were lovely and certainly put Dean at ease (although nerves kicked back in once the cameras started rolling!). You can see his appearance here and judge for yourselves how Dean got on at The Vanessa Show.

Feel free to comment as we would love to hear your feedback. It was a long day though – Dean left home at 11.30am, and didn’t get home again until 8.30pm (luckily Thursdays are Steph’s evening off!)

But there was still work to be done… Friday saw us at a meeting at Peterborough Hospital to discuss some of the logistics of our partnership, and then followed by an agreement that we would produce contact and reference packs for the community midwives, so that became our focus on Saturday!

However, the support and excitement of what we are doing, coming direct from the midwives is so refreshing. It really is a pleasure to be working with them all.

And finally, we finished the week on Sunday with one of our Couples Antenatal Workshops in Kettering. Our classes are jointly run between the both of us, to make sure that we cover all the essential points from both the mum and birth partner perspective. It was a really great class – we thoroughly enjoyed it, and then arrived home in time to spend the remainder of the afternoon in the garden with our two children.

So a busy week made busier by some unforeseen media appearances! A great experience though and we look forward to seeing what the next few weeks brings us.

So that was our hectic week how was yours?

It seems like the press have very much highlighted the fact that Mariah Carey has decided to decorate her bump and her tweet about it after going into false labour over the weekend.

To me it seems a great bit of fun to be had – and to be honest has probably helped some of the boredom during those last few weeks of pregnancy.

I decorated my bump, with clothes mind you. But does everyone feel that sense of pride in showing off thier bump? I wore lots of stripey and tight tops to highlight the fact I was growing a little person. I loved the attention I got but I know that others feel completely different.

So if you want to show off your bump feel free to do so below and even if not tell us your thoughts on decorating your baby bump

Marketing Week talks family stuff

This article in Marketing Week made me think today, about how organisations that market to people in pregnancy, the new baby / newborn phase, toddlers and beyond, really need to think a bit more about how they talk to people.

Because the person buying the buggy / travel system / stroller / cot bed is not neccessarily the parents. And marketeers need to think about this a bit more when they talk to people. When we bought our double buggy my parents and my in laws both wanted to check it out. Which I found a bit weird, but as they were paying, I went along with it. And I saw at the Baby Show in London the other week, that they do grandparent tickets, which is a smart move, but I wonder if the could go further, I don’t know how – but I think there’s mileage there.

And if you’re going to be leaving your Precious First Born, Ignored Second Child or Feral Third Child etc with grandparents for any kind of childcare you want to be sure that you are leaving them with kit that they can use – that is functional, light, works in the long term and is going to fit in their car boot as well as yours, surely?

So whose buggy is baby friendly and grandparent friendly? Anyone know of one? Would be interested to hear in something that’s marketed as being easy for everyone to use, including grandparents who are going to influence the purchase of things in one way or another….

So apparently, there’s been a trial of a contraceptive injection that men can have every two months, and it’s worked well in a trial in Ediburgh. This is great news and a a significant advance in the contraceptive market.

But as a woman, I always wanted to know that I was in charge of my contraception, as it would be me that got pregnant and me that had to make decisions regarding keeping or terminating a pregnancy. I wouldn’t ever want to trust that to anyone else…

Maybe I’m looking at this all wrong. Too narrowly. Maybe I should look at it as being a good thing – so that by the time my boys are old enough to be sexually active, it’s something they could have, to help us avoid the issue of them getting someone pregnant. Doesn’t solve the STD issue though, but it’d be progress wouldn’t  it?

What do you think?

Would you be happy with your boyfriend, partner or husband having an injection every two months? Would you want to be there whilst they had it, to make sure it happened? or is that just me?

You know how everyone tells you their birth story on their child’s birthday? Not me, I’m going tell you something different, I’m going to tell you about the things that I’m grateful for surrounding the birth of my first son…

Overnight, four years ago today, I was being induced for the arrival of our first child. At 12 days over, and having requested inducement at 38 weeks, and the pessaries having not worked and having my waters broken not working either, I was *keen* to have my baby, however it happened. In my mind, that meant that I’d forgoe  the hypnobirthing birth I’d practised hard for, and have an epidural if needed.

Sadly, it wasn’t meant to be, as Elliott was breech. That means he was bottom first, rather than head first. The shift manager at the Rosie Maternity Unit in Cambridge was nice enough, when she was brought in by the midwife, and said “Yes. I’ll bet next months salary on that being a bum”…

Four years later, I can thank several people and organisations for  helping my husband and I to keep calm, whilst  people started flapping around us.

1. Selina, my midwife  and Gillian Pett – another local  midwife.
Selina was a smart, savvy midwife whose practical approach made me realise that although I thought I was unique, lots of people actually have babies all the time, and it’s a normal process.

Gillian Pett taught the NHS Antental Classes that we attended. She also took us on our tour of the Maternity Unit. She’s a no nonsense woman, but one who encouraged us to get the births we wanted. If the birthing pools were in use, don’t worry, go and run the bath, and use one of them. Just like you would at home. I loved her. And so did Richard. And when we were in the position of having people rushing  around us, we took  time to  remember what Gillian had said about caesarean sections, and how to make the most of the situation we found ourselves in… To not feel like we needed to make decisions to comply, but to take time to work out what we wanted. And to  make use of the facilities available – water and drugs….

2. Alison Marcus, my NCT Teacher.

I cannot put into words the impact that Alison had on my pregnancy and our early months as parents. If only we’d paid more attention when we covered c sections! Mind you none of us did, because we were all working towards a natural birth. Moving on… Alison taught us an acronym that I can’t remember now but it was all about asking what the options, alternatives, specifically what was happening, questions, time lines available and to ask with a smile. I can’t believe I can’t remember it, I’ll email her and ask. At the time, in labour due to the drip, with people rushing around us, we kept calm. Richard even asked everyone to go out and leave us alone to have  some thinking  time – another thing that Alison told us we could do.  They didn’t like it, but we took that time, and got ourselves together for the upcoming change in plan.

Postnatally, we  found that Alison’s experiences as a mum of four, meant that she’d taught us some important stuff. Like the fact that  it would be normal for Richard to come home and say “Really, you didn’t manage to go and buy milk today?” and that our baby would not be sleeping through the night by three months of age. And that you can do whatever you can to get through the nights and days without thinking that you are failing parents because you don’t do it the same as other people. I don’t know how she actually did that, but they are the things Richard and I remember.  Feeling more confident about becoming parents, that we weren’t on our own and that  the support was there for us. When Alison gave us her phone number at the end of the course, it went straight on our fridge as soon as we got home. Apparently it went on the fridge for the  rest of  our course  mates as well…..

So there we have it. I loved and still do love my NHS Midwives and my NCT antenatal teacher. We are eternally grateful  to them for the care and support they have given us. People are so quick to complain about NHS Midwives, but I can tell you that they do an amazing job with the resources they have. And that I’m privileged to have the opportunity to work with them on the New Baby Guides  and so  chuffed to  be  able to donate money to support staff training and  birthing aids for women in labour….  And as for people who join the NCT being tree hugging hippies, well I can tell you that I don’t know anyone who is a hippy, or hugs trees!! The people we’ve met have been smart, successful, non cliquey and we’re grateful to know them.

If you want to know more about the NCT, find classes in your area or local groups, check out the NCT website. You don’t have to be a member to attend the antenatal classes, or postnatal groups,  so just check them out and have a go. And if you get the chance to go to NHS Antenatal Classes, go to them and make the most of the opportunity….

Beautiful mum and her new baby

On the one hand, I think this story is quite funny, because I don’t know many people who would consciously try to get pregnant again within 6 months of a baby arriving… So there’s lots of “uh huh, not a problem here as we aren’t having sex” lines. But as people who wanted a small ish gap between children, it’s interesting reading to hear that the “risk of complications is higher among women who conceive another child soon after a birth”.

Dr Sarah Brewer has a book out, about pregnancy so I appreciate that she wants to make headlines and get media coverage. She reported that “women who conceive within six months of giving birth face a 60 per cent higher risk of delivering a low-birth-weight baby compared to women whose child was conceived between 18 and 34 months since last giving birth. Furthermore, the risk of premature birth in increased by as much as 40 per cent.”

The comments come after a recent study published in the journal Pediatrics found that children who are born after shorter intervals between pregnancies are at an increased risk of being autistic.

Dr Brewer advised: “In an ideal world, it’s best to recover from the rigours of pregnancy and childbirth. It takes at least nine months to build up nutritional status again, as pregnancy increases your requirements for vitamins A, B1, B2, C, D and folic acid.”

I’ve heard people talk about a window where ‘mother nature’ makes you not want to have sex, because it’s not good for you to be pregnant again quickly. I’ve also heard people talk about ‘mother nature’ kicking back in again when your baby is around 18 months old, as that’s when your body is ready to do it again. So this seemed quite interesting to me.

What do you think of it? What gap do you have between your children? Would you have the same gap again, or longer or shorter?

The original text can be found here:

ALERT: THIS IS A SALES PITCH. IF YOU DON’T WANT TO BENEFIT FROM ACCESSING FAMILIES WITH CHILDREN LOOK AWAY NOW ;)

Young Families Bump, Baby and Toddler Shows are brilliant

I’m so sorry. I’ve been doing that thing again of thinking that everyone has telepathy. Which of course I know we don’t, even though we are all parents extraordinaire…

So I’m now officially telling you that the next Young Families Bump, Baby and Toddler Show will be held on Sunday 27 March 2011, at Watford Leisure Centre. I’m in trouble because I’ve not been telling everyone about it enough… So here goes….

Do you have a business that would benefit from meeting 750 people who are either pregnant, new parents or parents of pre schoolers?
Would you like to meet them in a family friendly environment?
Do you want to be seen as a supporter of your local NHS Maternity Unit and benefit from them promoting attendance at the show as being a good thing?

Well, the Watford Bump, Baby and Toddler Show is the place for you to exhibit at…

The early bird deadline official finished on Friday 14 January, but we’ve had a rush of enquiries this week and some of them ended up in our spam folders, so we are telling everyone about it again, and extending the early bird deadline until next Friday, 21 January 2011. This will give everyone who wants to, opportunity to book at the early bird rate of £150 instead of £175. We’re biased, but we think that our Bump, Baby and Toddler Shows are great. But rather than sell the benefits of exhibiting to you ourselves, we like to let other people do it for us!

In light of our previous “baby show” experiences, your show was fab, your team were on hand if we needed anything and we didn’t feel that anything was too much trouble.  We had a really good day, were extremely pleased with our sales and bookings. Thank you for organising such a great event. Debi Hogston,www.waterbabies.co.uk

“We attend a number of ‘baby shows’ across the South of England but none of them compare to the Young Families events. We have now attended two Young Families events and they are extremely well organised, well advertised and well run. The team behind Young Families are second to none. We will not miss a Young Families event.”  Emma, www.waterbabybirthingpoolhire.co.uk

What does it cost?
Early Bird, single pitch (2x2m), with quarter page colour advert in Show Guide = £150.00

Benefits for Exhibitors at the 2011 Shows.
A quarter page colour advertisement within the Show Guide, at no extra cost.
If you need electricity, contact us and we’ll do our best to help, at no extra cost.
If you need a wall behind you, let us know and if we can arrange this, we will, at no extra cost.
We provide one 2m x 2m pitch, two chairs and a table.

New partnerships
We have teamed up with the Maternity Unit at Watford General Hospital, who will be promoting the Show via their antenatal and outpatients clinics with flyers and posters. This exclusive arrangement for our Show is a significant new promotional vehicle and we will make the most of this opportunity with our design and print offering for it. The Maternity Unit will also be attending on the day with Midwives and their Infant Feeding Co-ordinator hosting a drop in, informal clinic for anyone and everyone who wants to ask questions, get information or find support. It will be a huge draw for pregnant women and their families and we expect a high volume of footfall on the day.

We will donate 100% of the income from the door entry to the Maternity Unit at Watford General Hospital.

We know that you are busy, so we don’t do 20 page booking packs. We enjoy what we do, and it shines through in our attention to detail, from our pre show communications, to providing people to help  you unload on the day of the Show. Our brilliant re booking rate and out of area exhibitors demonstrates that our Shows really are the way to meet your market. We expect at least 750 people on the day, based on footfall at our previous shows, and hope that you will be with us to meet our visitors.

The Watford Young Families Bump, Baby and Toddler Show booking form can be downloaded here. We look forward to receiving your booking shortly

If you have any questions, please call or email as is easiest for you: 01223 501520 | 07515 910231 | liz@westoncommunications.org.uk

PS. The website is now in being updated for the new show and will be live shortly. But please check it out in the meantime, so you can see how we run our other shows.www.youngfamilies.co.uk

A new baby is a wonderful thing. New baby twins are a double blessing and generate disproportionately more interest. #CambridgeMummyFact  Whether you’ve had the birth from hell or a “perfect birth”, (whatever that means to you), your hormones will still play havoc with you and your body in the days, weeks and months afterwards. So I thought it was brilliant to hear Celine Dion saying that she basically didn’t know what had hit her in the first few days and weeks after her twins arrived recently.The UK Press Association has even put something out there about it…

“Dion has revealed she is knackered by her newborn twins, but finds them “an intense joy… I am changing nappies and breastfeeding and that’s something where no one can take my place – it’s tiring but an intense joy.

“I didn’t have these children to not take care of them, [but] to give myself to them 200 – 300 per cent,” she added. Celine – who is also mum to nine-year-old son Rene-Charles – has not had much time for herself.

“In reality, I’ve had almost no time getting a shower and feeding myself. My preoccupation has been eating sensibly,” she admitted. “My only worry has been to be able to open and close [my tops] quickly for breastfeeding. It’s been out of the question to even wear a blouse!”

Since giving birth, the 42-year-old lost her appetite and suffered from mood changes. “Some of the first days after I came home, I was a little outside myself. I had no appetite and that bothered me. My mother remarked that she noticed I had moments of lifelessness, but reassured me that this was entirely normal,” she recalled.

“One moment, tremendous happiness; the next, fatigue sets in, and I cried for no reason, and then that took care of itself. It’s for things like that after having a baby that mothers really need emotional support.”

BRILLIANT. Someone who has lots of help admitting that it’s not all roses and lovely moments in the first days, weeks and months, whether you are becoming a mummy for the first or fifth time…  I wasn’t going to comment on her quotes, until I saw other agencies picking it up and extrapolating from this, that she has post natal depression. Misery and fear sells, for sure, but to me, it just sounds like she’s telling it like it is, as a new mum. PND, what a load of hooey. Not on the basis of these quotes alone….

I don’t for a moment think  this was a plug to selling anything for her. But if it was, she’s succeeded. Why? Because honesty is much more appealing to me. Particularly when I can relate to it… It’s similar to my other post on how I view my clients I suppose. But I tell you something, it’s making me think I want to check Celine Dion out more, so kudos to her for being honest about her new life experiences. In doing  so, she’s bringing a whole new demographic of previously disinterested women into her sphere. A Smart Bird In Every Respect eh?

I’m off to find some Celine on itunes ;) What are your memories of life with your new baby? Those first few days, weeks and months? The high points? The low points? Would love some comments on this.

*image courtesy of www.dailystab.com

Help me with this one please. Who has time to video the arrival of their baby? Which bloke out there is not being subjected to having the pain ‘shared’ with him, at the most special (and painful) moment of the birthing process?

Someone is, because some doctors overseas have started objecting to births being videoed.

Why? To encourage maternal bonding with new babies? To involve men in the birthing process more? Nope. So that the footage can’t be used should anything go wrong with the birth. I know.

For the file, if you are a bloke and reading this, I do not think that your Mrs will want you to be holding anything other than her hand, mopping her brow or doing whatever she damm well tells you to at the point of birth.

I haven’t seen a baby marketing campaign yet where the photo is required to be the moment of birth, or videos of babies arriving. I suppose someone will go and do it now. Yuk.

Did you have photos of yourself giving birth? Literally giving birth? Who wants to see your lady bits at that point? Did you have someone video it? Who? Show me how it’s a good thing, I like being proved wrong….