The Snot Sucker???

“Mama, my nose is running.” 3 minutes pass. “Mama, my nose is running again.” 2 minutes pass. “Mama, my nose is running AGAIN.” 30 seconds pass. “Mama, my nose is STILL running – you didn’t wipe it properly!”

Sheesh! This has been my world for the last few days since Bowser picked up the summer cold that’s been passing through the family. Because it’s summer and he has no long sleeves to cuff on he’s devised a new method of either lifting up the body of his T-shirt or pulling out the neck to wipe his nose on. How gross? But as I tell him for the millionth time through gritted teeth to use a tissue, NOT his shirt I have to feel a little sorry for him since he still hasn’t mastered the art of nose blowing. Bowser is 3 ½ and through his recent cold we’ve still been trying to explain how-to. Breathe out of your nose…no, close your mouth. Blow out, no, out of your nose. We get strange sounds, and contorted features, but no action.

I tweeted this – you know what us moms are like: sharing our children’s bodily excretions with the Twitterverse is what we do best. @mamasuperpow Tweeted me back with a recommendation:

@RookieMommy try a NoseFrida Snot Sucker. It looks gross and strange, but it WORKS!!

Now there’s a no-nonsense product name. I had to investigate. And this is what I found.

Until you have a baby with a cold you don’t realize how handy it is to be able to blow your nose. A cold to us* is usually no more than an inconvenience, but when it’s your 6 month old baby that’s congested the whole household suffers. What’s a mom to do when her baby has a cold? Make sure they get plenty of sleep and hydration we’re advised, but when Baby is all bunged up both are harder to accomplish. Baby doesn’t sleep well, and may have trouble breastfeeding or bottle feeding because it’s hard to suck when you need to use your mouth for breathing. Colds are often followed by ear infection as the shortness and angle of the ear canal makes it easy for infection to travel from the nose and throat to the ear. Then you have another week of sleepless nights, fever and general unpleasantness to deal with. So the best thing to do is try and clear the baby’s nose …and since they can’t blow, that means sucking it out – Moms get all the best jobs. But this NoseFrida Snot Sucker might just make this particular job easier.

*When I say ‘us’ I’m talking of the fairer sex of course – we all know in men the common cold morphs into a life threatening case of Man-flu after ½ an hour.

In my conversations with NoseFrida they kindly agreed to give away one of their snot suckers to one (lucky?…I’m not so sure) reader.

To enter simply pop to the NoseFrida site and come back with a fact about NoseFrida and leave it in a comment below.

For bonus entries:

• Let us know you are a liker of The Survival Guide for Rookie Moms on facebook
• Let us know you are a liker of NoseFrida on facebook
• Follow @NoseFrida on Twitter
• Retweet this contest. Be sure to link back to this page and tag @RookieMommy

Be sure to leave a separate comment below for each of your bonus entries.

• Giveaway is open to US and Canadian residents only
• Winner will be picked at random
• Giveaway closes Tuesday July 26th, 2011

Soothe away Congestion with MyPurmist (Giveaway)

Congrats to Amy Brown – the winner of the MyPurmist unit

Cough medicine is not recommended for young children so frantic moms have to find other ways to ease their child’s congestion. Which is why at some point a rookie mom finds herself in a steamy bathroom at 2am trying desperately to stop her little one coughing. Or you could do as I did and buy a humidifier only to find the room dripping with condensation the next morning. We still have the stain on the ceiling as a reminder of the cough of winter 2009.

MyPurMist is a new medical device that is being used by such moms as Jennifer Hudson on their kids because it offers safe and soothing sinus relief …naturally. It uses hospital technology so that the pure warm mist is safe and germ-free, and because it directs the warm mist to the sinuses, throat and other areas where mucus accumulates it is very effective (and much more effective, convenient and safer than a hot shower) to help ease congestion from colds, flu, allergies, and dry air. Because of the special hospital technology, the unit stays cool to the touch and there is no chance of burning. Also, you can adjust the temperature of the mist to ensure the user has a soothing and enjoyable experience. Go to www.mypurmist.com and see the testimonials by moms and pediatricians. (MyPurmist is only recommended for children over the age of 2).

We have a MyPurmist unit and children’s masks (RRP $129) to give away to one reader.

To enter simply leave a comment below telling us why you would like to try MyPurmist.

For bonus entries:

• Tell us you ‘like’ The Survival Guide for Rookie Moms on facebook
• Tell us you ‘like’ MyPurmist on facebook
• Follow @MyPurMist on Twitter
• Retweet this giveaway (can be done once per day)

” Enter to win safe and soothing sinus therapy for your kids from @MyPurMist via @RookieMommy http://wp.me/pC8a1-1Wu “

Be sure to leave a separate comment below for each of your bonus entries.

• Giveaway open to US and Canadian residents only
• Winner will be drawn at random
• Giveaway closes April 17th 2011

Plague and Pestilence

I’m hibernating next winter. Seriously. I really don’t want to experience another 6 months like the last. I’m not talking about the freakishly cold weather we’ve had here in England. (While the winter Olympic organizers were tearing their hair out trying to work out how to truck enough white stuff onto Cypress Mountain for the snowboard cross we were trudging to school in 2 feet of snow, if school was open that was). No, I’m talking about the constant illness that’s plagued our family since September. I’ve never been so pathetically ill. Not in childhood; not in the days when my immune system was compromised by lack of sleep from 4 nights a week pubbing and clubbing. I’ve always been fairly healthy. Until now. Until we moved back to England from Canada. Until my five-year-old started school.

I didn’t log it but I honestly think there have been more days with someone sick than everyone well. It started back in September with me getting chicken pox. Chicken pox? I had them as a child; my kids were both vaccinated when we were in Canada. But my daughter had only been in school about a week when I broke out in spots. This was followed by an endless stream of colds, coughs and flu. No one could shake “The Cough”. My daughter and hub both had it for almost 3 months. The doctor told us that was to be expected from a post viral cough. At Christmas we kindly passed “The Cough” onto my mum and she has only just shaken it off. Then there was the fortnight of Hand, Foot and Mouth – supposedly a childhood illness, but hub also managed to contract that from the kids. Moving into February the dreaded stomach flu hit us. Everyone was well for a grand total of 3 days before my 5-year-old came down with a fever, closely followed by my 2-year-old for whom it escalated into a double ear infection and a non specific illness that lasted 10 days. It all results in me getting so little sleep it’s impossible to tell whether I’m coming down with the latest virus or I’m just sleep deprived. My stomach is in knots from worry and my head heavy and fuzzy from lack of sleep.

Sure, as a child I had the kid illnesses of the day – chicken pox, mumps, German measles and my mum had annual flu – I remember because it was the only time my dad cooked and he once famously served up the most disgusting veg ever – frozen Brussels sprouts. But we never caught her flu and we didn’t have constant coughs and runny noses like my kids do.

I realize there are some unfortunate moms out there with a lot more serious things to deal with than seasonal ailments and I apologize to them for my whining, but I felt the need to vent and ask, “What’s going on?” Is it just a phase the family must work through? “Maybe you’re getting used to the British bugs” suggested our GP when I quizzed her 2 months into “The cough”. Is it because, as one friend put it, we now “share the germs with the masses” since my daughter started school? Is it because the odds are raised; 2 kids = double the kid-germs invading the house = double the time incubating, suffering and recovering from illnesses. If so how the heck does Kate Gosselin cope? How the heck does the Duggar family cope? With 19 children there can’t be a single healthy day in their household.

It doesn’t seem to be just me – look any day in the Twitter mommy feed and all you see are Tweets on puke, poo, snot, coughs, strep…. is the world a sicker place in 2010 than it was in 1970? I find it seriously worrying. It’s like we’re is in the grips of plague and pestilence.

So, who’s joining me for hibernation 2010/11. I’m open to cave mates. Any takers?