Slinging New Year’s Resolutions

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Hands up? Have you made a New Year’s Resolution?  Was it financial, health, educational or technological related? As these are often in lists of the most popular. Or have you made a slinging resolution? 

Many of us will have set ourselves targets for 2017. In the USA approx. 45% of individuals will have made a New Year’s Resolution. This figure in UK is around 32-35%. But roughly only 50% manage to stick to them for the 6 months (8% the year), although around 3/4 of us manage to stick to them for at least a week.

In terms of your New Years Resolution – have you written it down? Told someone what it is? How are you going to ensure you keep it? Sharing them with others apparently can help us to stick to them.

I have set myself the target of selling my personal collection of ring slings as our carrying days are over. So far I have asked Isaac to pick one to keep –  as I want to keep one each for the boys (Silver Waves for Henry, our Dyed Roses Zen for Isaac) – but at the minute this is as far as I have got.  The bag of slings is sitting there looking at me. I want to be successful and have told the sling library users this is my resolution and I am hoping this will assist me in keeping it. My bank balance would certainly appreciate me selling some slings.

So I asked the users of the sling library what their Slinging New Years Resolutions are.  Some like me want to sell our slings as our babies are no longer babies, others want to learn a new skill (e.g learning to wrap or improving their wrapping skills), and others want to try and ‘sling it only’. I have read at least two comments for mums saying the want to “stop buying slings”, and the opposite is true for a couple too. 

Julie’s slinging resolution:

Mine is to give a serious go to using a single pram and a sling for my 19mo and her baby sibling due to arrive next month. I don’t really understand why, but I desperately don’t want a double pram!

In a similar light, Charlotte would like to: “Go out proper hiking with sling, need to work out logistics! Like how to carry the rest of the stuff!”

My favourite are from Madeleine and Lucie (both peer supporters) who want to help enable more people to carry. Babywearing is a lovely sharing community and this is seen by the way people want to help others.

I suppose our slinging resolutions fit pretty well with general New Year’s Resolutions too: spend less/save more, personal development/mastering a new skill and even decluttering. I am here for 1:1 appointments if you want to develop your skills – learn to wrap or master a back carry. Just visit the  consultancy pages of our website to make your booking. 

I can’t though promise to help you destash but maybe if we do it together we might just be successful.

Links and photos 

http://www.statisticbrain.com/new-years-resolution-statistics/

http://www.comresglobal.com/polls/bupa-new-year-resolution-survey/

https://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2015/dec/31/how-long-do-people-keep-their-new-year-resolutions

Stock photos used free of charge from Pixabay under common use licence. The photos of me are mine and copyright belongs to me.

New Year, New blog (well sort of)

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So its January 1st. Happy New Year. Welcome 2017 and welcome to a slight change of name for the NESL blog. We have been using a free WordPress domain for two years. Yesterday I bought us a new .blog address. But, as I want to write about more than just slings and as my own slinging journey is complete – today I worked out which slings I want to list for sale – I have chosen something a little more open. Please welcome slingsandmore.blog our new blogging  home.

I will still be writing about slings, parenting and babywearing education, but I might have a little more flexibility in what I write. I hope you like it. I have also had a play and added an ‘upcoming events’ tab to the blog too. This is linked to our google calendar, so (in theory) should update when I make updates to it.

Happy New Year everyone.

Best Wishes

Rachel

 

Happy New Year

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Wow, 2016 is almost over. Just 3 hours or so to go.

Here is a little slingy celebration of 2016. Thank you to everyone who shared photos this year. But, a special thanks go to those who shared these after I asked for photos yesterday.

For Shelly, 2016 has seen the end of her baby carrying days – just like me:

My last ever slingy cuddle: Bought my first wrap in 2006

10 years, 3 babies And erm…..Lots of slings all now rehomed to new mamass.

I have kept a shortie as a scarf ❤


2016 also saw us collaborate with Which? of which Alex took part – here is Alex’s contribution:

1st time mama learning to carry! My little monkey wasn’t too keen to start with but with the support of Rachel and this fab group we persevered. We were fortunate enough to take part in the Which? trial and review and since then we’ve loved the stretchy and settled on buckles. Best moment has to be my first carry with a happy content baby who slept for over an hour in his carrier (previously he would scream & headbutt me lol) 2017 will hopefully see me grow with confidence and settle on one carrier. 

Thank you Claire for your honesty about parenting:

I love that I can share my positive experience of babywearing even though i do so rarely now and that i can absolutely recommend NESL to any mum to be! Being a mum is simply awesome (and bl##dy hardwork obvs!) Happy New Year.

Maria, a mum of twin 10 year old boys and baby Sofia:
Baby wearing for us has meant little one can fit in with the hectic schedule my two very active 10 year old twins lead. From rugby to football, swimming, tennis or cricket we are always on the go and spectating so Sofia being in a sling has made our lives so much easier. Holidays (the lakes and Greece this year, including a visit to the Acropolis in Athens) were made so much simpler. Looking forward to trying some wrapping in the near future! Here are my favourite pics of 2016

Katie said the following:

I carried my first in an ergo but since my second was born nearly 11 weeks ago we have both fallen in love with baby wearing! I have loved trying out different wraps to see what we like and feel like I have the most incredible bond with him now. Excited for the new year to learn different carries for a woven, particularly back carries and try some more wraps.


Mandi is also a mum of twins. I had the pleasure of a consultation with her in November. One of two in two days.


We discovered baby carrying our girls love it almost as much as we do! And our poor little reflux baby (in my sling on the right) can get some relief and closeness when she’s having a bad time with it and I can still see to her sister as I’m hands free! Loooooving carrying!

Joanne’s twins are older but she has still been tandem carrying when the need arose. This is how she described her 2016 slinging Year:

I learnt to wrap. I also learnt that I’m pretty poor at it and wriggly toddlers aren’t the best to learn on! But at least I’ve tried and I can now say that I truly am a buckles girl and know what I’m talking about! 

My most memorable slingy moment was at Glendale Show in August when both boys were tired and ratty and refusing to take another step whilst crying and whinging. My Dad offered to carry one in the Connecta but he was having none of it – only Mummy would do. So, at 2 1/2 and weighing an absolute tonne, I proved I can still tandem carry them. Just not so much now.

Finally, I suppose it’s my contribution. 2016 has been a funny year. I went back to work and had to change how Library operates because of this. It also saw our amazing exclusive collection with Connecta Baby Carrier and I helped Which? with their parent trials. It also saw probably my last slingy cuddle with Isaac. 


2016 was a great year: 2017 you have a lot to live up to. Let’s see where it takes me and you, as after all I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for you.

End of an era

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I think the day has finally one where we are no longer a family who sling. Last year I wondered if it had been our last slinging Christmas and I think it was. I asked Isaac if he would like a photo in a sling in front of the tree and he said no. 

I carried him off the plane in our preschool Henrys Hogs Connecta after our trip to Lapland but I only managed this as he was asleep. 

He would not have chosen it himself. He is nearly 5. We have had thousands of ‘sling cuddles’ etc but doesn’t stop you hoping there might be just one more. Slings have been a part of my  tool kit for almost 7 years and I am sad that they are stopping.

Here are to the next adventures we have. But instead of being on Mummy’s back they will and hand in hand. Although a more accurate description will be me running after Henry and Isaac as they run at full speed into everything they do. 

My love affair with wraps won’t stop. When I am not carrying other people’s babies, I will make do with my ever increasing ‘wrap scarves’ collection.

2016: A year of changes and new beginnings.

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Firstly may I offer my best wishes from all at NESL to you this festive season. We are now closed for our annual Christmas closure and I am feeling reflective. 2016 has been a year of considerable changes and upheaval. It has seen new beginnings and new adventures but NESL is still a large part of my life: just not the only role I now do.

This time last year we had 103 slings on loan, we had 252 slings and we made 774 hires. This year we  surpassed this once again. In March we introduced our online inventory and check out system on MyTurn. This has made checking out of slings and admin much quicker: it even sends instructions and reminder emails automatically. We now have 612 families signed up with 439 active users. This Christmas we have 137 slings on loan. We now have 372 slings and carriers too (that is an 47% increase on 2015). In MyTurn alone we have made 1448 completed loans (this does include extensions to hirsa). There were also 220 loans completed before we introduced MyTurn.

In terms of social media. I continue to use several platforms. Our Facebook Page now has 3616 likes, our group over 1300. Instagram has over 430 followers and there are 1388 on Twitter. I have written 43 blogs. I have also written guest blogs for Birth and Baby Network, Connecta Baby and Babyfoote. Our biggest achievement was probably our involvement with Which? in assisting and coordinating the NE parent test panel for their sling testing. I believe the results will be out shortly too.

We continue to charge just £8 for 4 weeks hire and have 7 sessions a month. Although this is 1 less than 2015 my return to work meant I had little choice. Thank you for your support with my return to paid employment, I know of has resulted in lots of changes and less flexibility from me. Thank you to Kelly and Madeleine who have been so amazing in running 3 of the sessions. Thank yous also go to Suzie, Kirsty, Emma and Sarah too for their help.

Overall 2016 has been a brilliant year. Unfortunately as we see the end of it we have 3 slings which are overdue and had another AWOL for 8 weeks. Please make sure if you hire a sling that it is returned on time and with all accessories. 2017 will see me needing to fake further action to get carriers back.

I look forward to seeing faces new and old in 2017. Happy Christmas and may you have a peaceful New Year. Let’s see if we can make 2017 even better!