By Elita of Blacktating.com; for the Best for Babes Foundation ©2010

This was an amazing week for Best for Babes, as we found out Tuesday that we won a $20,000 donation from Chase, thanks to all of you who voted in the contest on Facebook!  We are so grateful and want to thank you for all you’ve done for the Mother of All Causes.

Thanks to Tanya at the Motherwear Blog for uncovering even more good news in the Health Care Reform bill related to breastfeeding. Apparently buried in those new regulations is the requirement that insurance reimburse for preventive health services, including breastfeeding education & evaluations, both in hospital and outpatient settings. No one is still sure when this all goes into effect or what exactly it means for moms, but we’ll be sure to keep you posted!

Photo courtesy of The Faster Times

Here’s to the adoptive parents who educated their pediatrician on the importance of human milk and the availability of donor milk through milk banks. Dr. Jack Maypole’s excellent article highlights how he was able to write a prescription for breast milk for the family, the history, availability and safety of human milk. The article points out that we only have a handful of milk banks in the US, while Brazil has about 180. We’re getting better, though: the Mother’s Milk Bank of New England opened this week in Massachusetts.

Whoever said one person can’t make a difference never met Amanda Mack! After receiving a “breastfeeding support bag” from a formula company after the birth of her second baby, Amanda decided to contact all of the companies she knew that truly supported nursing moms and asked them to donate products for a real support bag to hand out at her local hospital. With that, the Laramie Breastfeeding Bag project was born! Amanda has been able to provide 125 bags so far. Interested in creating a bag for your local hospital? Check out the Laramie Breastfeeding Bag project’s Facebook page for details how.

As a mom who worked and pumped, I could so relate to the article This Sucks: Breast Pumping at Work. This is the perfect example of how far we still have to come in this country and why family-friendly policies like paid leave, babies at work programs, on-site day care and protection for moms who are pumping at work are so important.

I’d also like to shine the Blog Spotlight on Anne of Dou-la-la this week for her insightful post on the difference between “can’t” and “won’t” when it comes to breastfeeding. We wish that every mom had the support to meet her breastfeeding goals, but we also wish that moms who didn’t choose to breastfeed felt comfortable enough to be honest about their decision, without worrying they’d be judged for their decisions.

And finally, now that summer is here, we want to remind you of the importance of soaking up some sun so you can make adequate levels of Vitamin D for both yourself and your nursling! It’s particularly important to make sure your Vitamin D levels are adequate if you are a woman of color or live in a northern climate where you go months without a lot of sunshine.