Saturday, August 8, 2009

Dog Days of Summer!

Issued by The National Weather ServiceIndianapolis, IN 4:06 am EDT, Sat., Aug. 8, 2009
... HOT AND HUMID WEATHER RETURNS TO CENTRAL INDIANA...
A WARM FRONT WILL MOVE NORTH ACROSS CENTRAL INDIANA TODAY... ALLOWING HOT AND HUMID AIR TO MOVE INTO THE AREA. HIGH TEMPERATURES TODAY WILL REACH THE UPPER 80S TO LOWER 90S... WITH HIGHS ON SUNDAY REACHING THE LOWER TO MIDDLE 90S. HEAT INDEX VALUES WILL APPROACH 100 DEGREES ON SUNDAY.
WITH THE UNUSUALLY COOL WEATHER EXPERIENCED ACROSS THE AREA THE PAST FEW WEEKS... PEOPLE MAY NOT BE AS USED TO HOT WEATHER AS THEY NORMALLY WOULD BE FOR EARLY AUGUST. THERE IS A POTENTIAL FOR OVEREXERTION AND RESULTING HEAT RELATED ILLNESSES.
IF YOU PLAN TO BE OUTSIDE... DRINK PLENTY OF FLUIDS TO AVOID DEHYDRATION. NEVER LEAVE CHILDREN OR PETS UNATTENDED IN PARKED VEHICLES.

OH JOY!

Friday, August 7, 2009

Will's Birthday Bash

The main reason I went up to visit my parents was to take part in his birthday bash! He turned 60! Here is an amusing video of the cake. You can hear Claire saying "SPOON PLEASE" because she wants to eat some cake! Check it out:


Thursday, August 6, 2009

FAIR TIME!

Well, I haven't posted in awhile! I've been at my parents for a week! On Friday, we went to the Porter County Fair. It was sooo nice compared to the little tiny local fair in this town. It was also about 10 times bigger! They had several more animal barns, which were a lot cleaner, too! (Cleaner as far as fairs go!) We spent at least an hour just walking around looking at the horses, cows, pigs, goats, sheep, various birds, and baby animals. I think Claire's favorite part was seeing all the baby animals. They had kittens and baby chicks and and and...but her favorite were the baby piglets nursing from their mommy. Everyone was taking pictures. If only everyone thought a nursing mommy was so cute! :) Check out the video where she recalls her favorite animal from the fair:


Going Shopping!

Claire loves to go shopping with me! She also loves to "pretend" to go shopping. She is really getting into the imaginative play. She will load up her cart with a baby in the seat, her purse, and usually her sippy, then pretend to "buy" stuff. She will also say "I check out now" which totally cracks me up. Check out this video:


Baby Turtles!

Claire painted for the first time while we visited my sister. There are just too many new things for her to try out! Here she is on Holly's deck saying HI to the little baby garden turtle statues that she had. Check it out:


Run Swim Run!

Mark (Holly's Hubbie) and I (and Claire!) enjoyed watching the race she did while we were in VA Beach. Check out this video of people exiting the water:




About 90% of them tripped and fell! LOL! :)

One Million Campaign

World Breastfeeding Week 2009

Its We the People Who Can Bring Change: Lets ACT NOW!!

World Breastfeeding Week starts on August 1, (1-7 August). The theme is Breastfeeding, A Vital Emergency Response: Are You Ready?

You can find out more download materials and find events at: http://www.worldbreastfeedingweek.org/

UNICEF and WHO have made statements in support of the week, which is coordinated by the World Alliance for Breastfeeding Action.

UNICEF's statement includes: "Around 9 million children under five die every year, largely from preventable causes... According to the Lancet, optimal breastfeeding in the first two years of life, especially exclusive breastfeeding for the first six months, can have the single largest impact on child survival of all preventative interventions, with the potential to prevent 12 to 15% of all under age 5 deaths in the developing world... This year's World Breastfeeding Week provides an opportunity to sensitize policy-makers, donors, implementing partners and the general public to the benefits of breastfeeding, to its particular importance in emergency situations, and to the need to protect and support mothers to breastfeeding during emergencies."

You can find the full UNICEF and WHO statements via links at:
http://boycottnestle.blogspot.com/2009/07/wbw-2009.htm

One country facing an emergency is Malawi, one of the world's poorest countries, where 13% of the populations is infected with HIV.

In conditions of poverty, infants have a better chance of escaping HIV and being protected from other infections if they are exclusively breastfed. Yet in Malawi, Nestlé is promoting its formula with a logo claiming that it 'protects'. Formula is very expensive and those that believe the claim that the formula 'protects' may well use it alongside breastfeeding - mixed feeding is the worst possible scenario for the transmission of the virus.

It is a government requirement that tins have warnings that breastmilk is best for babies, but Nestlé refused to translate these into Chichewa, despite a government request to do so, because of 'cost restraints'. It took a Baby Milk Action campaign that led to Mark Thomas highlighting this irresponsible marketing on UK television, to change Nestlé's minds, and further campaigning to persuade Nestlé to show cup feeding, rather than bottle feeding, in line with government policies. See:
http://www.babymilkaction.org/CEM/compfeb00.html

So campaigning works. Now we need to persuade Nestlé to remove the 'protect' logo from labels in Malawi and elsewhere in the world. You can help by sending a message to Nestlé. You will find the information you need to do so on our July Campaign for Ethical Marketing action sheet, which is now available on our website at: http://www.babymilkaction.org/cem/cemjuly09.html

Also featured on the action sheet is a call on Danone/Milupa to stop using claims for its formula that have been found to be untrue in a ruling last week from the UK Advertising Standards Authority. Although these breach the advertising code's clauses on substantiation, truthfulness and comparisons, the code is voluntary and it remains to be seen whether similar claims will be removed from labels and other promotion stopped. There is also a call for Mead Johnson to stop making untrue claims about its formula.

If politicians fulfilled their responsibility to implement the baby food marketing standards adopted by the World Health Assembly, then public campaigns would not be necessary and there would be progress towards stopping the millions of preventable under-5 deaths.

You can help put pressure on politicians by signing the ONE MILLION CAMPAIGN petition. If you have already signed, visit the campaign website to see what action you can take to encourage friends and colleagues to sign up. See: http://www.onemillioncampaign.org

Action Alert

1. Make an opportunity to call upon companies and your leaders to END ALL KINDS OF PROMTIONS of Baby Foods by 2015.

2. If you would like to submit the One Million Campaign Petition to your Head of the State, please use the opportunity to do so.

At this link http://www.onemillioncampaign.org/press-release1.aspx you can find the Petition letter, and petition submitted to the President of the World Health Assembly in May 2009.

Another link http://www.onemillioncampaign.org/doc/draft-letter.doc provides a draft for you to use to write to your Head of State.


Thanks!

Team ONE MILLION CAMPAIGN- Support Women to Breastfeed

http://www.onemillioncampaign.org

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