first official day

After we slept ourselves out last night, I attended my first pre-conference workshop. I attended "Career Paths in Lactation." I learned a bit about what I would need to do to become an IBCLC. One important piece of information I picked up was that it is going to take me five years to meet the eligibility requirement of 2500 hours of breastfeeding consultancy, I get 500 per year as an LLLL. I thought I could buy some down with more CEs, which I can, but it's a lot, so I don't know if that is feasible.

I ended up leaving the workshop early to go to the exhibit hall. I met Darien from Zolowear and fell in love with the new Hamptons stretch cotton sling. She didn't have any here, so I didn't buy one, but I am going to try to sell my other cotton slings to get one, I think. It's fabulous! I also met Kelley of Kozy Carrier. She had some gorgeous prints too, but I love my Kozy so I'm not trading it in. Darien also had a gorgeous black solarveil sling with a print pocket that I really liked. I wanted to buy it, but Erik thought it was too early to be buying a sling to use next summer with the baby that isn't here yet. Silly Erik.

I went to the Maya Wrap booth to introduce myself to Susan. I found out that they are working on not one, but two Mei Tai like carriers! One will be from the Maya Wrap fabrics and will have wide, unpadded straps which felt very comfortable to me when I tried it on. The other is smaller, and better for a newborn baby. It made partially from a thick cotton, like the Kozy, partially from a stretchy interlock like the MamaBaby (the woman designing it is the same that created the MamamBaby). The other thing Maya had was some new solids. A gorgeous bright orange (that was a mistake, supposed to be red) and bright yellow, a burnt orange and a grass green. I loved them all and was pleased to see more colors. I'm even tempted to replace my plain one for a bright new color! I think I'll sell some of my old slings first, to make sure Erik's head doesn't explode.

So far I am really enjoying the conference. Erik and Niels spent two hours in the playroom. Erik says they have trains, so Niels was in heaven. Speaking of trains, I gave him his Douglas (the Scottish twin engine from Thomas) to go with the Donald that mom had given him a couple of days ago. He was very pleased. He's almost gotten good at holding up three fingers. Happy Birthday, Niels!