"...because everything begins at B.I.R.T.H..."

Spinning Babies Workshop
Friday, Feb 3rd  Houston, TX

Houston's  BIRTH (Bringing Information and Resources To Houston) is hosting Gail from Spinning Babies (spinningbabies.com ) Event!

We're meeting at The Spaghetti Warehouse for an all-day Spinning Babies Workshop --and a great lunch provided by these creative and birth-friendly restaurant owners.

...And that's not all! From 6:30-9, we open the doors and floors for...

Belly Mapping and Painting for 3rd trimester expectant mothers and a birth partner. Pregnant women learn how to find their baby's position and get some tips on what they might do to encourage an Optimal Fetal Position.  The evening cost includes a Belly Mapping Booklet and several women can choose to have a picture of their baby -in their baby's actual position - painted on their bellies with safe, washable face paint. Houston area doulas and birth professionals will have tables with literature available. Photographers will be present and taking pictures.

The day's Spinning Babies registrants have the option of attending Friday night's Belly Mapping session -for free! That's right, the registration for Spinning Babies includes this evening with pregnant women and their partners/birth partners so the class has the option to see how Belly Mapping works interactively.

Spinning Babies participants receive lunch and the cost is the same with our without lunch. Vegetarian options exist, but gluten-free is tricky, we'll try to accommodate if you tell us when you register in the instruction box. Supper is on your own, but we have a table at the restaurant for all who'd like to join us.  You'll want to bring a personal throw-rug, yoga mat, big pillow and/or regular pillows for either workshop! We do things on the floor and there is no carpet here!

The lot costs $5 to park for the day. Parking on the street is not recommended, it costs approximately $1.25 an hour, so please bring $5 for the parking lot.

Workshop, including lunch and Belly Mapping - $130

Belly Mapping ONLY (f6:30pm - 9pm) - $30

Please visit Spinning Babies to submit payment for this amazing and fun event!

BIRTH Board of Resolutions

There are many opportunities during pregnancy, birth, and post-partum recovery period for disagreements or disappointments to arise with your care provider.  BIRTH now has  a resource that can help resolve these complaints. By making use of this resource, you can help improve the care you and others will receive from health care and birth support providers.

The resource is a committee that BIRTH (Bringing Information and Resources To Houston) (see houbirth.org) has formed to hear grievances against Houston area providers of obstetrical and midwifery birth care and provide mediation in an attempt to resolve each complaint to the satisfaction of all involved parties. Use of the committee is voluntary and the committee is comprised of a variety of community members including an obstetrician, attorney, parent, consumers, doula, and midwife whose goals are to find resolutions to grievances in our community.

Message from founder of B.I.R.T.H.:

 "I believe that women are empowered through the pain and joy of childbirth. Birth is a mirror inside a woman, allowing her to see her vastness and her limits as no other experience can.

Birth is a spiritual event for me which I experience as a miracle every time. Over and over, I am involved in situations which seem to be constantly reminded that we are in charge of nothing and that everything happens truly in divine order. The respect in which we treat newborns comes in part from our humility in the face of this divine order and in our service to the great unknowable rhythms of life. This gift is a healthy baby who arrives through unity and self-discovery into a loving world, a baby about whom deliberate, empowering choices have been made from the beginning.

Surely this first knowledge of the world will influence a child's life. To have felt a powerful flow of love, never abating, for those critical first hours and days must give one's character an underpinning of confidence and self-worth. Does not society also benefit? I believe that as more people are born with such harmony and deep sense of value in themselves, so the chances for harmony among people and nations will improve. I believe the work I do contributes to world peace."

Pat Jones, CNM

Founder and President of B.I.R.T.H.