Welcome to WordPress. This is your first post. Edit or delete it, then start blogging!

MummyMug congratulates fellow Dutch Mumpreneur Noortje van der Loo with the Baby Innovation Award for most innovative toy, that she won at the major consumer fair for young parents, the “Negenmaandenbeurs”, in Amsterdam last weekend. I met her for the first time at Kind&Jugend in 2008, and know she’s really earned this recognition.

Her well-designed and unique product ; It’s A Clock ; visualises the passing of time in a way that children can relate to. If you put one of the six cards that are delivered with it at the right time of the day; your child will know when it is time to get up, have lunch, snacks and dinner, when to take a bath and when it is bedtime.

It’s a Clock was found by the jury to “familiarize children with the concept of time and daily schedules in an original way. It’s a clock has an attractive design using color and shape. It offers a lot of fun watching the little character moves with the minute hand and second hand and is thus an original and attractive product .”

Noortje herself explains it as follows:

“All children have a need to understand the passing of time and the structure of the day.  Many concepts of time look easy for grown-ups, but are true mind-breakers for children. “How long is an hour?” “When is tomorrow?” “How long until my birthday?”.  Research shows that when children understand time better, they feel more secure and in control.”

But most kids do not learn to tell the time until they are 8 years old, while many of them already master complex tricks of calculus by that age. But children look intuitively at coloured big objects that move fast. On a traditional clock the most important hand – the hour hand – is small, black and it hardly moves. With the innovative design of “It’s a Clock!” children can understand what time it is from the age of 3 because the hour hand is easy to recognize for children, and the cards that help to structure the day.”

Keep up the good work Noortje — what is going to be the next addition to the It’s A Clock product range??

Once again, drinking coffee on board an airline carrier has proven a hazardous business.

This time, no person got injured (luckily!) but nevertheless, there was certainly some havoc: CNN reports today that an United Airlines flight on route from the US to Europe had to divert and make an emergency landing in Canada, after the pilot accidentally spilled a cup of coffee on the navigation instruments.

Let’s hope he did not have too much sugar and milk in that coffee… or it could prove an expensive spill!

Anyone from United Airlines interested in discussing how we can prevent this happening again?

(many thanks to MTB for the tip!!!)

Merry Christmas everyone!

We propose a festive coffee to celebrate the holidays.

You need 2 pears, cane syrup, coffee, ground cardamom and coriander, your favourite liqueur and cream.

Cut the pears into small pieces, cook the pears with the syrup until soft.
Divide into four glasses.
Brew the coffee with the spices.
Pour 2 cl liqueur in each glass, pour the coffee; top with whipped cream, serve and enjoy.

Merry Christmas and a Happy 2011!

Today, we had the opportunity to participate as an exhibitor at the congress ‘In voor Zorg!’ (in Rotterdam, the Netherlands. Big thanks to the organisers! And many thanks to my friend Nienke for helping me out on the stand today.

It was very interesting to present our hot drink safety solution to some of the the 800+ participants, who came by our stand.
And encouraging that professionals from home care organisations and senior homes reacted very positively and definitely saw the use of the Safetea™ mug in the care.

The theme of the congress was innovation and efficiency in the care of elderly and handicapped people. Certainly pertinent, since care services has to deal with the dilemma of double-digit budget cuts, as the government restricts the funding, and growing demand; as the population steadily ages.

Can Safetea™ contribute to innovation and efficiency in the care of elderly and handicapped?

We think we can: Safetea™ makes it possible for elderly people to manage to enjoy tea or coffee without assistance, in all safety.
The time that the nurses would have spent assisting, if the coffee would have been served in an open mug, is thus either saved or freed up for other things — thus potentially contributing to higher efficiency and quality improvement.

Now all we have to do is make good use of all the tips and feedback we got today, and work out how we have to tweak the mug so that it really meets the needs for elderly.
We will do our homework there, and run some tests to get it right. Luckily, several organisations we met today offered the possibility of field testing with their employees and clients — excellent!

Then we will be ready to make our contribution — perhaps not more than a safe cup of coffee, but hopefully with the potential of contributing something to a better care for all.

In the period 2001 — 2006, over 50,000 elderly people sought medical care in hospital emergency departments across the US because of scald injuries. This is reported in a scientific study published on medscape.com.

Worth attention: elderly had a worse prognosis for recovery than younger patients after scald burns because of age-related factors and other medical conditions, and therefore needed more extensive medical treatment to recover.
Two thirds of visits were made by women.
Most (76%) of the scald injuries had occurred at home; and 42% were associated with hot food and 30% with hot water or steam.

As the authors conclude: the findings in this report highlight the need for effective scald-prevention programs targeted to older persons. It seems that also Granny needs a MummyMug™.

At the Northern Irish hospital of Altnagelvin, staff conclude that the number of small children that come in for emergency treatment after trauma in the home is increasing significantly.

For example, they recovered £3.43 that had been swallowed by children under four — an increase of 56p compared to the previous year.

Most kids came in for treatment of bruises and bumps, ingestion of chemicals and medicines and serious head injuries.

But over the last two years, there was also a 50% rise in attendance by children under five as a result of burns and scalds in the home.

The hospital has decided to take action, and will launch a new campaign to raise awareness about children’s safety at home.

Seems some MummyMug™s would be a useful contribution!

Source: BBC Northern Ireland

It’s time: the yearly Kind&Jugend trade fair in Cologne is about to start tomorrow. During 4 busy days, everyone who’s anybody in the baby and toddler outfitting industry will meet, network, make deals and show off their latest inventions.

We’re not an exhibitor this time, but are certainly looking forward to reconnecting with all the fabulous people we’ve met during the participations in 2008 and 2009. So, Cologne, here we come!

RyanAir claims to serve the best tea and coffee at 30,000 feet, and having tried a fair few brews at high altitudes, I’m inclined to agree.

However — also RyanAir has now experienced the hard way what that seemingly innocent and deliscious cuppa can do:

last week, a RyanAir plane en route from the UK to Poland was forced to make an emergency landing after a woman had scalded herself badly on a cup of tea, and needed immediate treatment. She then decided to take the train for the onward journey.

It seems not only parents are in need of a hot drink safety solution — RyanAir; we will come to your rescue: a Safetea™ mug with your logo is on its way.…!

Of course you know about the extraordinary global entrepreneur Sir Richard Branson; who started with two empty hands and who has built a business empire spanning from music to space ships, made billions and succeeded against the odds. And who has nearly 500,000 followers on Twitter — wow!

Someone thought I could use some inspiration from this entrepreneur guru, and gave me a copy of Screw It, Let’s Do It; Branson’s 2007 book. I even got ‘the Expanded Version’ — I guess my friend thought I need to shed all inhibitions and dare to act the Branson way: be big, bold and focus on just doing whatever it is that truly inspires you; believe it can be done and that, if others disagree,  try and try again until you achieve your goal.

It was a fun read. I am of course very respectful of his business achievements, but most impressed by all that he is doing for to common good: fighting HIV/AIDS, war and climate change. That is wealth and enrepreneurship put to good use.

The image that really stayed with me after I put the book down, feeling invigourated,  is one one where Branson tells about what he did on one story night, when he was staying on his private island Necker in the Caribbean. It wasn’t just any old storm — it was the largest hurricane in the last 50 years that was coming his way. Of course he’s built a storm-proof house able to withstand wind speeds of 300 kms/hour. I guess most people would have closed the shutters and ridden out the storm safely behind the closed doors.

But what does Branson do? He decides to experience the storm in the swimming pool. It is a once-in-a-lifetime experience, he reasons, not to be seen from the sidelines and hiding behind closed doors, but to be grabbed, as an unique opportunity to exeprience something unique — something to be LIVED! If nothing else for the sheer intensity of feeling alive. The way he talks about sawying about in the water, completely giving himself over to the forces of nature and with his nose barely over the water, is a great image I think. In his own words, a good illustration of having the passion and initiative to experience the storm — outside, where it really happens — and the stamina and self confidence to survive it.  This, and his relentless focus on people, in and outside of his own pool, is inspiring whatever your focus and goal in life.