Breastfeeding in extreme weather… What difference does it make?

Living in the USA, you see every day some sort of extreme weather in some parts or another, from east coast to the west coast.  The most recent one of all is of last few days, the snow near the great lakes in northern New York.  It is devastating for the people involved in these natural disasters.  People trapped in their homes and more dangerously, in cold vehicles up and down the highways for up to 40 hours in some places.

On the other end of the scale, during the summer months there were masses of tornadoes that demolished towns and cities. Leaving destruction of emotional and physical life beyond comprehension. Destroying homes, families and businesses. Yet people still survive in these places. It’s their home. It’s what they know.

Unfortunately, due to climate change, these freak of weather events are becoming the norm, and not in a good way. Extreme weather is reaching the most quiet and calmer corners of the world. Even to the people who are NOT used to these harsh conditions. So why am I writing this blog? What has breastfeeding got to do with this?

I am a proud mother of six beautiful children. All of which I have breastfed for different lengths of time for various reasons. I am currently nursing my youngest, who is now eight months old. As I was watching the weather channel and thinking about all those people trapped in their cars in the snow, literally buried alive under all that snow, it got me thinking about the breastfeeding benefits if you was caught in any extreme conditions.

I am a big breastfeeding advocate, but in no way ever do I think of a formula feeding mother to be any less of a person for her choices to feed her baby. People make choices based on what they know and circumstances in their life and that is okay. I just personally choose to breastfeed. That was the right choice for me. I do believe however that in a serious state of emergency, a mother might have a better chance to save her infant in extreme situations if she was to breastfeed.

Imagine this. You are traveling to be with family for the holiday season and on the highway you are caught in a white-out situation. Before you know it, your car is covered in snow half way up to the windows and you have no way out. You call 911 and you wait for help to arrive. You have this helpless bundle in the car seat who is depending on you for his or her survival. What do you do?

A breastfeeding mom can offer comfort and support through nursing and body warmth will keep baby warm and comfortable. As well as that. The baby will have on tap all the food and nourishment it needs to survive. Mom is a walking incubator for baby with warm, fresh milk available until they get rescued. How is this different to a formula fed child? Yes, a mother might have two or three bottles in the bag, and might even carry a car bottle warmer to heat up the bottles. But what if as these people in the news, trapped for 24, 36 or even 40+ hours? How any bottles is needed then?

Breastfeeding mothers will also provide antibodies for the child to prevent them getting sick in the cold and possibly damp conditions.  Her body will naturally asses the situation and will produce whatever that infant needs to survive.  That will include any milk fats or extra vitamins that may be required in the milk.

I know that so many women choose to feed formula for various of reasons, but if I could encourage even one mother who lives in these areas to “consider” or just even “try” to breastfeed if it is possible for them to do so, in the event of these type of natural disasters to occur, that they are the best possible position to ensure survival. Yes, this is a strong word, survival.  Life or death.  It is like something you see out of a movie or something.  But these type of weather we are currently experiencing is becoming more dramatic and real, and sadly more often.

                   

Can you even possibly imagine what these people are going through right now?  We see so many images of these snow, but does anyone even stop to think of the children here?  And the babies that require emergency supplies?  Do any of us carry an emergency kit in our cars for such an event?  To either help themselves or to help others in distress? I know we should, but sadly, most of us don’t. We all think it will never happen to us and that we will all be ok.

I feel a chill right to my bones to even imagine being trapped in my car with my children in a white-out blizzard, trying to keep everyone alive and warm. Especially if there is an infant involved who does not eat solid food.  What are you to do when you are alone out there in a small confined space of a car? Help is on the way, but it wont be immediate.  You can call or text as much as you want, if it is a white-out situation, no helicopters can come and no one can see where they are going to come by snow-mobiles.  Its a matter of sitting, waiting and praying that you all survive.  I feel strongly about this particular situation, maybe because I am a nursing mother?  The maternal instincts are strong to make sure your babies survive?  I do not know for sure, but it pains me to watch the weather of all these helpless people needing help and people know they are there, but no help can get to them.

We need to normalize breastfeeding and save more lives every day. If you are pregnant or know of someone who is about to have a baby.  Or a mother who just needs support to keep going with her breastfeeding.  Reach out and help them. Encouraging words mean everything. Families mean everything and too many families do not help one and another.  Reach out and help normalize breastfeeding today.

Family heirloom, Welsh Pancake Recipe

I was born on a small island in North Wales, the isle of Anglesey.  There I grew up with the usual traditional Welsh foods thinking nothing of it.  That is until one day I went to school on shrove Tuesday and realized that we did not eat these “pancakes” that they was serving at school.  They was too flat and tasteless to be pancakes.  Every year after that, my mother make pancakes for me to take to school, not that she was not already making tons of them already, but she was good to me like that.  I used to take a whole “batch” (full one mix worth) to school with me and share them around my class mates.  I was remembered every pancake day for years after.

As I was growing older, I also realized that a lot of the foods that I was eating was the old school traditional Welsh foods.  Once again I did not think too much into it because I am Welsh and we lived in Wales.  After leaving home to live my own life, I learned a lot about other people’s eating habits, it was not quite like ours.  That when the total realization hit me that despite many people were born there and was “Welsh” not many was living the Welsh life.  Both my parents and all my grand parents and everyone I ever knew in my family tree went back to the celts. Well I was always told that the pancakes we ate was the real Celtic version and had been passed down from generation to generation in our family for hundreds of years.  After that, I appreciated more of what I had taken for granted all of my life.  We all hear about the Welsh tea cakes and the cawl and so on, yes, they are the stereotypical of the Welsh cuisine.  You do not hear much about the traditional Welsh pancakes, that is until you talk to the old Welsh people.  A lot of the English people came to live in our area as I turned into the teens.  Many traditions was lost and everyone wanted to be in the cities.

I am going to share with you all our REAL WELSH PANCAKE recipe and instructions on how to make them.  The reason is, it is the most oldest and original piece I have from my family, my past and I do not want the real Pancakes to be missed and forgotten by people.

Ingredents

Welsh Pancakes

1 lb Flour (I now use self-raising flour but you can still use all purpose flour and baking soda)

1/2 lb Sugar (granulated)

4 medium eggs

1 pint of milk

1 stick of butter

Now back in my day, we used to make these on the hotplate of the AGA/Rayburn we had in the kitchen which in my opinion, is the best way to cook of all time, but these days a non-stick frying pan on a stove does the same trick.

Instructions

Put the flour, sugar and eggs in bowl and mix as much as you can.  I used to do it all be hand, but now I use an electric hand mixer.  It is tough on the wrists because there is a lot of flour in comparison to the eggs at this point.  Mixing it thoroughly is always important, especially at this early stages.

In another pan, pour in 1/2 of the milk and the stick of butter, warm over a hot stove until the butter has melted.  Once butter is melted, remove from heat and add in the remainder of the cold milk.

Now this is the most crucial part… add the SOME of the milk mixture to the flour mixture and blend in completely and smoothly, add a little more and mix in thoroughly and so on until all milk and flour mixes are totally combined.  By this stage, if the milk has been added gradually and mixed in thoroughly each time, then the final mix should be completely smooth and no lumps at all.  This is the difference in the final taste and quality of the pancake.

Cover mixture and leave in the fridge for an hour (or over night if you want them for breakfast).  Preheat a non-stick frying pan on medium heat. I add a tiny bit of butter for the 1st pancake to get made, after that it is not required.  I use a laydl and put some in the pan.  You wait until you see bubbles appear on the top side of the pancake.  Carefully flip over and cook for less than one minute.

CONGRATULATIONS!  you have made your 1st Welsh pancake…..  One of these mixes should make 30 medium or 40 small pancakes.  Needless to say these do not even touch the sides with my children and I frequently make a batch for breakfast.  Hope you enjoy your Welsh pancakes.

Breastfeeding in extreme weather… What difference does it make?

With all this winter weather, this keeps me thinking.

Custom Embroidery and Gifts

Living in the USA, you see every day some sort of extreme weather in some parts or another, from east coast to the west coast.  The most recent one of all is of last few days, the snow near the great lakes in northern New York.  It is devastating for the people involved in these natural disasters.  People trapped in their homes and more dangerously, in cold vehicles up and down the highways for up to 40 hours in some places.

On the other end of the scale, during the summer months there were masses of tornadoes that demolished towns and cities. Leaving destruction of emotional and physical life beyond comprehension. Destroying homes, families and businesses. Yet people still survive in these places. It’s their home. It’s what they know.

Unfortunately, due to climate change, these freak of weather events are becoming the norm, and not in a good way…

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Are we keeping our children safe UPDATE

Custom Embroidery and Gifts

I recently wrote a blog about keeping our children safe on the streets. I received a great response with people interested in getting teenagers especially to respond to safety measures that we as adults see.   In my spare time, I went ahead to create more items that could be beneficial  to children’s safety.

Children can decide and choose their own designs for the high visibility logo. Prices $3.50

All badges come with their own iron-on adhesive backing so no more sewing!!! Prices from $3 – $4.50

All these items are high visibility products. All work I do to create these items still drives me to do good and save lives. I sell these items via etsy.com but always open to anyone to approach me if they want custom items made for them. Badges and bags, they are all less than $5 each. Affordable to everyone who is interested in applying…

View original post 470 more words

Embroidered high visibility badges

So, it started like this, I wanted to make something for my children to reinforce safety.  I was so extremely passionate about this safety issue that I even started a campaign on this very issue.  Especially targeting teenagers and parents.  I made some high visibility clothing with teenagers very own designs on them, encouraging them to come forward with their own images and to be encouraged to wear these safety clothing.

 For the little ones, I designed some very simple badges or patches as some people like to call them.  The designs themselves was of no great significance, but the special fabric backing that I am using is important.  This is because it is high visibility fabric.  This meant that children everywhere could also bring me simple designs and I would make them for them to put on their school bags, coats or uniforms.  As a matter of fact, they can be applied to almost anything.  The reason for this is because they have a IRON-ON glue backing that it extremely easy to apply and of course means NO-SEWING is required.  This is particularly good for any moms or dads who does not like to sew garments.  These easy iron-on badges can literally be put on anything and it immediately applies with a great strong bond that will last.

Then there was the questions about how it might endure the test of children at play or sports that would tare off this patch.  Well they have tested the test of time.  I decided to make a video of the simplicity of applying the patches and badges and their durability.  This is the only way to show people how easy these badges are.  The best part of all about these patches is the price.  Once you see how easy they are to apply, and their durability, you will certainly think that they must be expensive.  Especially with the knowledge that they are on special high visibility fabric too.  They cost from $3 and upwards because I decided that I would only need to cover the cost of these badges.  I would not see any profits at all on these.  The reason for this is that I could never put a price on a human life, especially that of a child.  Everyone deserves the opportunity for their children to be safe.  This is one the main reasons why I been negotiating with D.O.T. and other big agencies about the use of these badges..

Even to save one life with these badges is worth something.  To save many will be a blessing for everyone concerned.  We deserve to give our children the ability to stay safe on our streets today.

Are we keeping our children safe UPDATE

I recently wrote a blog about keeping our children safe on the streets. I received a great response with people interested in getting teenagers especially to respond to safety measures that we as adults see.   In my spare time, I went ahead to create more items that could be beneficial  to children’s safety.

Children can decide and choose their own designs for the high visibility logo. Prices $3.50

All badges come with their own iron-on adhesive backing so no more sewing!!! Prices from $3 – $4.50

All these items are high visibility products. All work I do to create these items still drives me to do good and save lives. I sell these items via etsy.com but always open to anyone to approach me if they want custom items made for them. Badges and bags, they are all less than $5 each. Affordable to everyone who is interested in applying them to their children’s clothing or accessories like school bags.  All badges comes with an iron – on adhesive backing so that no sewing is required.  These are so important to me because I have three teenagers myself, they go out and I constantly worry about their choices of wearing dark clothing.  They could easily be struck by any vehicle as can any child in the usa. I also offer a service to teens, that they can bring me a hoodie, pants or t-shirts (or I can provide for extra charge) and I will apply the high visibility vinyl to their clothing of their design of their choice, for only $5 per design. This is a very small price to pay to ensure road safety.  This more than just road safety, its about linking with teenagers and allowing them to interact with their own safety and make their own designs.  This is to assist them “LIKING” their clothing to WANT to wear them outside.  This can also be a form of self expression, as long as it means that they are wearing volentry safety wear.

Select your own design or logo. Prices start from $10 – $15 depending on sizes

Teen hoodies and pants can also have high visibility fabric put on it. Prices varies for cost of the clothing

Road safety doesn’t just mean night driving. Soon winter will be over and we will be heading to nice sunny weather once again.  Soon enough will start seeing on the news of more child deaths in hot cars being reported.  I have made several designs of vinyl bumper stickers which is cheap to buy once again, but could be enough to remind people who park at a parking lot or behind another car on the street, that they need to check the car for their children and pets. Everything I make is non-profitable. They only cover the cost of making the item in order to be affordable to everyone.

Remind the driver behind that heat can kill children and pets. Buy on my etsy store for $2.50 per sticker

We are all responsible for what is happening.  We all need to help each other with little reminder notes,  even as bumper stickers to help another parent out now and again.  It also reminds people who think “its OK, I will only be 5 mins” or “I can see them from here” excuses to leave their children in the car while they run errons outside and leaving their children or pets to a potential death trap.  A reminder that only 5 or 10 mins will be enough to cause some serious consequences for the victims.

Lets us all help to make a difference today and help others…. what a great world that would be if we made it better…. starting today.

How to keep children occupied this holiday season (Part 1)

Holiday season is around the corner and every working parent knows how hard it is to keep children busy with plenty to do over any holidays.  It is usually cold outside and wet.  Many children will be so very tempted to sit in front of the video games all day long if they had the opportunity.  Well I encourage crafts with my children because it helps with family bonding, as well keep the brain active and creative while they are not in school.

Holiday season always starts early in our house because of the seasonal gifts that I offer, so as soon as Halloween is out of the way, holiday season pretty much starts. Everyone thinks crafts is so lame, but in reality they are therapeutic to be honest for both adult and child.  Aside that, they can be a little expensive if you have many kids involved in a certain craft.  Well over the years as a mother and a serious craft lover, I have found several crafts ideas for the children that WON’T break the bank.  They are simple crafts and mostly aimed for the holidays, but really, they can be done for any occasion and for any time of the year.

Because there are so many crafts, I have decided to make more than one blog about these crafts so that I have more room to talk about them a bit more.  The two subjects that I am blogging about today is making a snow globe and old traditional English Christmas cracker for the dinner table.

This is one thing that my youngest daughters absolutely love to make at this holiday season.  I purchased a kit from fivebelow.com for $5 and it has two snow globe kits in it. It was a win, win for me because both of my younger daughters wanted to make this one.  All we needed in extra was the water that went inside.

The girls was able to make their own custom inserts because it is molding clay that they used to create their wintry theme.  One daughter decided on the snowman (which is illustrated on the instructions) and the other made a penguin.  It took the girls about an hour in total to make these globes, they had a lot of fun in comparing their talents and creativity, then of course they got to put them in their rooms for their decor.  This was ideal if you had a sleepover and needed an activity or like my girls, enjoy the home crafts stuff.  It was extremely easy to make and did not require any additional items.

We all love making the very old traditional style Christmas cracker for the dinner table.  There are not many places here in the US that actually sells them, but you can never guarantee the safe content inside that’s age appropriate, therefore I do prefer to make our own. I try to encourage children to decorate these themselves although you can get the foiled card for it if you want a fancy finish to a particular occasion because these are very versatile that you can use them at any event really.  I like to make some for thanksgiving as a celebration and same of the holidays and New Year. I sometimes make these for birthday dinner table or anniversary if there are no party. The ones I have made with the children are plain, where they sat and decorated the card themselves, you can also include glitter if you like the sticky stuff, but for this time, we stuck by coloring pencils.  There are many templates out there to print and download, or if you still continue to struggle, I do sell on etsy.com the whole package set, which includes the snap stick that goes inside which makes the snapping sound, paper hat, and joke paper. Everything apart from the little gift you wish to insert inside for your age appropriate receiver.  This is because I have looked EVERYWHERE for all the items in total and struggled to get it all together over here.  But fear not, I have it all sorted and it is extremely affordable, more affordable in fact, than buying them ready made at a store. I buy small inserted gifts from the dollar store to suit the age of my receiver.  You will need glue stick and/or sticky tape, and means of decorating the card (unless you get the fancy foiled card) and some sorts of ribbon to close up each end.

We firstly decorate the whole card, then turned it around to face inside and stuck on the snap stick.  Close up the cracker length-ways using the slots provided or you may use tape/glue.  Close up one side of the cracker with the ribbon and then insert the paper hat, joke and your gift of your choice. Close up the other end of the cracker with another piece of ribbon and I always write a name on the cracker and place it in the Christmas tree until it is required.

When it is dinner time, they get placed next to the cutlery and in between the meal courses, you crack open the cracker with the person sitting next to you to open the hat and wear it, tell the joke and receive your gift.  Its all fun and games really to make light of the dinner festivities.  It is something me and my family have done for all time and it is a tradition that we all love to do.  It is a great ice breaker if you have guests over for your meal, and children young and old love this simple thing.  I will post a “how to” video on this cracker to show how easy it is to make. It is very inexpensive to make, lots of fun for that day and something new to try on the actual day of the event.

Hope you stop by again to read more blogs about keeping your children entertained this holiday season.  There is a crafty world out there, and it need not cost you a fortune.  If you would like more information, feel free to comment here and I will help as much as I can to find what you need.

Are we doing enough to keep our children safe on the streets this winter?

This is on the minds of almost every parent each year whose child goes to school, rides a bike or generally out and about each day, regardless of the weather.  Well this year I have decided to start a campaign to help bring ideas and affordable solutions to parents for this exact problem.  I am a mother of six children and yes, I think about this all the time, especially when three of my children are already “fussy teenagers” who, might I add, do not like to wear anything “boring” or “old fashioned” or even the “un-cool” these days, plus the fact my teenagers like to wear dark clothes when it’s dark.  Therefore getting them to put on safety gear is next to impossible.

So, I sat down this summer on the park, looking at my children at play and watching others while they went about their business and generally getting around.  Everyone is so very different, complex and full of character.  Its awesome.  Although this did not help me narrow down as to how I was going to find a solution to my problem this year, it did however make me realize one thing, that we all have one thing in common, we ALL like to look good.  Doesn’t matter what age, race or color, everyone likes to feel and look good about themselves. OK, this was my base but how to go further?

I decided to think teenagers because if you can please one of them, you can almost please anybody. Seriously. Any parent of a teenager will tell you.  So I looked at my son who likes very much to ride his bike and as boys go, they are rough with their clothes and belongings.  I already do printed promotional items, and I also use this as a craft for my children to encourage learning about possibilities with stuff.  I have also used it as a fund raiser for schools in my past. Anyway, here we were creating these new t-shirts because it was a school break and I needed to continue to work, so I needed something for the kids to do.  My son made a random design for his clothing, and it was mono-color and simple. This was my idea hatching right here…

I stopped all work, it was a “hot off the press” idea moment that I did not want to stop for a second, I was excited with this and needed to get it proof tested right away.  What was it?  REFLECTIVE LOGOS on clothing that children themselves designed. WOW!!! This could be it.  Would my son actually like it? Would he wear it?  There was only one way to find out.

 Well I worked on his design with him and he was extremely eager to see his own design turn into something different than anything else I am currently making.  It was great.  We had a good bonding time creating this new pieces of clothing and it really didn’t take us long to do a proof test.

They came out really well.  I made a hoodie and sweat pants that he likes to wear all the time.  They came out good quality finish product and my son was ecstatic with his little designs, it was relatively quick to make and we could not wait for the sun to go down to test these out. While we was waiting, I noticed how my son wore these almost all day when he went out.  He couldn’t wait to show off to his friends his designs made onto clothing that he wore.  So that was my 1st check off the list, he liked them….

Soon, the sun went down and we was getting ready to go out.  Before we did, I got my son to pose for a mini photo shoot with his bike. We did not ride anywhere, but for the purpose of this experiment, we stood next to the road to see if headlights would reflect off the clothing…. Ohhhh, my word, it certainly did.  I took photos (as seen above image) and as you can see the flash I used reflected off the clothing in same way as a car headlight would shine off of him.  I look front facing, side facing and back facing photos for the purpose of the project.  It was a huge success.  My son was happy to make his own designs, I was happy that he was finally wearing safety clothing of some sorts.

The next day, I called a few people and got my idea accepted by the NY coalition of road safety and pedestrians program.  On which level, I am not sure, but this idea is a success in my eyes and teenagers tested for safety. I could also make sports bags, drawstring bags…. the list is endless and all for the children’s benefit.  If I can save even ONE child by this campaign, then my efforts will not be in vein.  I plan to make all sorts available for children of all ages and for ALL budget because more than anything, being affordable is something very important to me.

So back to my original question, YES, yes I think I have finally exhausted all options to help keep my children safe this winter while they are outside in this dwindling daylight. Yes, I am happy that I can get my teenagers to wear safety clothing. Finally, yes, I think I will make some decals for my baby stroller too.  So how about you? Are you feeling confident that your children are safe and seen this winter?