Babies and Conferences Hi, At Australian Breastfeeding Conferences children will always be welcome. We run conferences for our volunteers and conferences for health professionals. For the past 10 years I have organised our health professionals conferences and have always attended with my own children - often a baby in a sling and an older sibling to help care for mum and baby. They love a bit of special time away with mum (even if she is a little demented with organising the thing) I always find, too, the supportive and welcoming arms of other breastfeeding counsellors who will doula me and my child for a while. It saddens me though, that at every conference I recieve complaints from people about the noise of babies (and it usually is just the quite noise of young babies - we usually have a place where mothers and noisier babies and toddlers to watch the proceedings from outside the room) One reason I love taking my children to conferences is that I love them being around the sort of people breastfeeding counsellors are - wise, knowledgeable and giving. You don't see enough of that these days. Most of the time I have been breastfeeding, and needed to take the baby. Also, just needed to "share out the child minding duties"- 4 children is a lot to organise sleepovers for. Funny/embarrassing story, though.....Once I took my 3rd baby, Cassie, to a conference when she was about 6 weeks old. She was what is known as a "happy spewer". To keep her quiet I fed her and fed her and fed her and fed her. And when she could feed no more I put her up over my shoulder. There was one man in the auditorium, and he was wearing a dark suit and sitting right behind me. He was drenched in babyspew. I remember he seemsed quite nice about it as I offered nappies to mop himself up - but I was mortified and had to leave. I still haven't really got over that. Barb Glare Australia Breastfeeding Support: Everyone Wins online http://www.lrc.asn.au/2009seminars/index.php *********************************************** Archives: http://community.lsoft.com/archives/LACTNET.html To reach list owners: [log in to unmask] Mail all list management commands to: [log in to unmask] COMMANDS: 1. To temporarily stop your subscription write in the body of an email: set lactnet nomail 2. To start it again: set lactnet mail 3. To unsubscribe: unsubscribe lactnet 4. To get a comprehensive list of rules and directions: get lactnet welcome