Last Friday and Saturday, I had the privilege of attending the Connect2mums Mumpreneurs conference and Bio Oil Ausmumpreneur Awards. As well as learning a lot and meeting a lot of great people, there was an unexpected benefit- I got to spend much of two whole days and nights wearing little Lachie. He’s always a pretty cuddly baby and spends a lot of his time in my arms but at the conference, he was stuck to me the whole time. As the baby in a family of 4 kids, he had found his nirvana, he had his mummy all to himself.
I didn’t try and put him down to sleep as I would at home, I didn’t put him down to respond to a 3 year old calling “help, help me mummy!”, I didn’t have to prepare food or go searching under the trampoline for school shoes. I just got to hold him, wear him, feed him and respond to his needs even before he realised he had them. It was lovely! Honestly he wimpered about 3 times during the actual sessions and made a few gurgly noises. Apart from that, he slept and slept, had a bit of crawl about on the floor, fed, looked around and smiled at people and slept some more.
The 2 day conference with a 98% fully breastfed, very slowly crawling 7 month old in tow was made simple with my sling. I chose my pocket sling for the conference because it is so simple to use and doesn’t take up much room in my handbag. I took his stroller too, but he hardly used it.
Here are my 5 reasons why babywearing rocks my socks.
- He sleeps for a looooong time in the sling- He always gets more sleep when we are out and about than when we are home. He still find it comforting to sleep on me and will open his eyes then go back to sleep in his sling. At home, he wakes and cries after 40mins or so and I never get him back to sleep because my 3 year old like s to help. 3 year olds are not good helpers when it come to getting babies to sleep.
- Octopussing (AKA multitasking for mother)- I can breastfeed listen and type notes all at the same time. I often sling him at home if I need to get something done on the computer and he doesn’t want to be put down. He can easily feed to hearts content and usually just falls asleep. Sanity saving on ‘those’ baby challenge days.
- Gives familiarity and security in an unfamiliar situation- As you can imagine, a conference can be noisy and there are lots and lots of new people. Little Lachie was able to take it all in his stride. I like to attribute that to the comfort of my familiar smell, feel and sounds. You don’t get that degree of reassurance from a pram.
- He is easy to settle and get to sleep in a sling- I know not all babies will sleep in a sling but Lachie does it well. Whenever he got restless I popped him in the sling, feed him, rocked him and he was out like a light.
- It helps him to be social- During the sessions, Lachie’s favourite thing to do while he was awake was to look around the room, make eye contact with people and grin at them. He was able to do this because he up at our height. If he was in his pram, all he see would be legs. Faces are so much more interesting than any pram toy I could find to tie to the pram. It’s the same story when we are out and about too. People talk to him more when he is up close to adult head height rather than knee height and he loves that.
Does baby wearing rock your socks? Why? And… what’s your favourite sling? Speaking of favourite slings, the winner of the prestigious 2011 Bio Oil AusMumpreneur of the year award went to Anita of Babes in Arms. This is the lady responsible for bringing slings like the Ergo and Peanut Shell to Australia and is the founder of Australia and New Zealand Baby Wearing Week. She will be joining Koshie on the couch on Sunrise in about 6 hours. What a fabulous opportunity to share the benefits of baby wearing to the mums of Australia 🙂 And what a deserving winner!