First meeting of 2008
Today was the first babywearing meeting of the year, my first time officially running a meeting, and the first Shorewood meeting. I think it all went well and was fun (please comment if you were there and agree or disagree!). I didn’t ever do an official count, and not everybody managed to sign-in, but I think there was between 12-15 moms. Today was a pretty general meeting, we showed off the various types of carriers and then had play-time (aka carrier try-on time).
What I’m really hoping will happen is that we get a good core group of moms together who like babywearing and want to support each other and other new moms who want to learn about babywearing. My vision is this group (at least the Shorewood meetings) will be kind of playgroup-like and that we build a nice fun community! And as the weather gets nicer, perhaps we can venture out for picnics after the meetings. (The Menomonee Falls meetings will probably remain more “class-like” because there is so much going on at the Birth Center on Saturdays.)
Here is the poncho pattern for the DIY babywearing poncho that I showed off today. (I know some of you wanted that.)
We are also just looking for ideas to help build the group. We now have several carriers for our Sling Library, but need to set up policies and things for check out. I was maybe thinking that we should have a small membership fee to use the library (Shorewood meetings are always free, the Menomonee Falls classes have a donation that supports the Birthing Center), and then also require a deposit when a carrier is checked out (returned in full when the carrier is returned). But a membership fee would maybe allow us to get a couple other popular carriers, and could pay for some of the printing and stuff that we do. So, if anybody wants to help us out with that kind of stuff, just email.
Also, do people think it’s a good idea to have special topics at the meetings? We could focus one meeting on back carries, learning new types of carriers, or on DIY (do-it-yourself) carriers, or something like that. Also, I was thinking about opening up the blog and letting all members post their baby-wearing thoughts — probably a topic for next month’s meeting!
I had fun today and I’m excited about the group — I just hope others of you also are excited and that our little babywearing community grows throughout this next year.
Filed by kendra at January 11th, 2008 under General Musings, Meetings