The Carrying On Project

With five military bases in the area, Colorado Springs is a bit of a military city. This means that a great deal of our members come and go, only passing through for several years, before moving on to another base.

Kit Jenkins is one of those people. She left the Colorado Springs babywearing group in summer of 2011 and her family is now stationed in Virginia. She has also since launched The Carrying On Project, an organization that aims to get carriers into the hands of military families who need them.

Such families are faced with obstacles that are unique to the military. Husbands deploy and often miss births; mothers are left caring for their three children on their own, with no family around to help. Sometimes service members come home injured and are physically unable to hold their babies with just their own two hands. Kit having served as a Marine herself, was well aware of these kinds of challenges.

After having her baby, she sought out the local babywearing group and found herself at her first meeting with her seven-week-old daughter. Her husband had been deployed for just under six weeks and she knew she needed to find better ways to function around the house with a newborn. She also wanted to stop lugging around the heavy carseat.

There, at the meeting, she met Billie (of Nappies and More...), who taught her how to use a ringsling and wrap.

"I borrowed that wrap for close to three months, and was AMAZED at how much easier it made everything," Kit said. "We used it to travel back to the east coast, to walk the dog, to grocery shop, to do laundry...everything. At that point I had decided that EVERYONE needed a baby carrier, especially people who are running a household by themselves, like military spouses often are."

The seeds were planted. Kit was in love with babywearing for the way it made life easier, particularly for parents like her who were doing it alone without their spouses for many months at a time.

The Carrying On Project officially came to life around Christmas of 2012.

"I had been tossing the idea around in my head for a while...A friend of my husband's died very suddenly two weeks before Christmas," she said. "One of the big things his dad talked about at the funeral was how my husband's friend was always looking out for military families. He was always trying to make sure, especially when part of rear detachment, that all of the families had what they needed. I wanted to take that spirit and run with it."

The name of her organization, "The Carrying On Project" has two distinct meanings. Babywearing is a way of "carrying" our children and going on with life. "Carry On" is also a military order, one that means "keep doing what you're doing," Kit explained. "It's used service-wide, across all branches, through out all the ranks and jobs."

Kit enlisted the help of a friend: Fellow babywearer Rachel Silvernail, who has a background in graphic design.

"I spearheaded the push to get the website up and running," Rachel said.

According to the website, The Carrying On Project has a specific mission:  "The goal of the Carrying On Project is to help get carriers to the families of our military so that they may better obtain secure attachments with their children, something that deployment and injuries will often interrupt. We seek to assist both the service members and the families left behind in 'Carrying On' while both home and away, to make something that is difficult for the whole family a little bit easier."

With the hard work of Kit and the help of several baby carrier companies as sponsors, The Carrying On Project has been able to donate many carriers to the families who are nominated, including some that stationed overseas.

"We also partner with Operation Homefront for Star Spangled Babies, which is a baby shower thrown for expecting active duty as well wounded warrior and active duty spouses," Kit said. "Our next major event is in VA Beach, where we will be helping 200 families learn how to use donated carriers and talk to them about the benefits of babywearing, especially while a spouse is at training or deployed."

Operation Homefront DC Metro Chapter's March 2013 Star Spangled Baby Shower
(Photo provided  by The Carrying On Project)

So what are some of the other plans The Carrying On Project have in store? They have teamed up with Sustain.able Sprouts to create their own custom Girasol wrap, fittingly named "Warrior's Pride."

According to Kit, the new colorway is meant to "bring awareness to our cause and organization" while also bringing "something patriotic to the market." The wrap, which features the standard American red, white and blue, also has teal in it, that represents PTSD Awareness, as well as the yellow, for the yellow ribbon in support of military troops.

The wrap is currently on preorder through Sustain.able Sprouts, who will donate $10 of each wrap bought to The Carrying On project. That money will then be used to purchase wraps that will be donated to military families.

Also, Obimama, a company that makes wrap conversion carriers, has “offered to do a conversion for us, which we will be auctioning off in the fall to benefit Wounded Warrior Project," Kit said.

To keep an eye out for what other projects the organization has coming up, "like" their Facebook page, The Carrying On Project. To nominate a deserving military family, go to their website, http://www.carryingonproject.org/. 

**This post was written by Paula R.

Meet Billie of "Nappies and More... a Wrapper's Paradise"

Billie poses while wearing her youngest son in a 

wrap-conversion mei tai.

Buying your first woven wrap can be a difficult decision. There so many sizes, blends, and brands and the lingo can be hard to learn! Lucky for those of us in Colorado Springs and Teller County, we have local woven wrap retailer Sybille Irby to help us!

Known mostly by her nickname, Billie is the owner of Nappies and More..., an online baby carrier and cloth diaper store she manages from her home in Woodland Park. While there are several local stores that carry mainstream baby carriers, hers is the only one that sells woven wraps, such as those made by Didymos and KoKaDi. A babywearer herself, she is well equipped to help new babywearers in picking out the perfect woven wrap.

Like many moms, Billie's first wrap was a stretchy wrap, which she started using when her third child was born more than seven years ago.

"Woven wraps scared me at first due to their length and a Moby seemed the easier way to start," she says. "Little did I know how long a Moby [would be]. It looked much easier to wrap and then put the baby in it and we both really liked it (despite the hot weather in Texas)."

While Mobys are great for little ones, sometimes a little more support is needed. That's where woven wraps come in! Over time, her baby grew, like babies do, at which point she started looking at other options.

After her family's move to Germany, her husband, "who could tell that babywearing helped our little girl a lot," bought Billie her first woven at the Didymos store that was close to their new home. She learned a few techniques from the owner's daughter and about a helpful babywearing forum online, Thebabywearer.com.

Her babywearing journey continued. She had an opportunity to take a class at the German ClauWi babywearing school. She also met her friend Becky, who was "talking about opening an online business for wraps and carriers," she says. With a husband away on deployment, Billie offered her help.

In 2009, she and her family moved to Colorado. Billie had enjoyed the work she had done with her friend Becky and considered opening up her own stores.  In October of 2009,  Nappies and More... was born.  

“It was very slow in the beginning, but I was fine with it, due to having young children at home,” she says. “I never planned on having a quick start, [but] rather be there and work my way up and have people know and remember me later on."

While her store was basking in quiet success, it was in the summer of 2012 when Nappies and More... boomed in popularity. The store revealed a new exclusive custom wrap: Merlin, a hemp wrap featuring the KoKaDi "Stars" design in black and purple. Even now, nearly a year later, Merlin and its "fraternal twin" Morgan are still in fairly high demand!

"I wish sometimes for the old times," Billie admits. The store's popularity and success, after all, does mean a lot energy and time dedicated to work. She says she has had to learn to “step away from the computer and business and just enjoy" her family.

Since the release of Merlin, Billie has also teamed up with KoKaDi retailer Nadine of Babyleicht. Nadine designed the turtles that become the wrap Tuga as well as Keiko (the orcas), with Nappies and More... offering the exclusives to stateside customers. 

Billie revealed that she is planning to phase cloth diapers out of her store and focus on selling woven wraps. While the cloth diapers are still listed at her old site (http://www.nappies-and-more.us/), babywearing items have been moved to the store's new website: http://wrappers-paradise.3dcartstores.com/.

Additional Q & A with Billie:

How did you come up with the design for your KoKaDi exclusives Merlin and Morgan?

When I was looking at Merlin and Morgan colors, it was actually the Kokadi owner, who asked me about a black and purple wrap. I knew I wanted a purple wrap, like the purple Melody they had just released, but picked natural as the second color at first (Morgan). Kokadi offered me as a second custom wrap in black and purple and I thought, why not? Little did I know...

What is the best part of being a baby carrier retailer?

Best part is that you get to see a lot of different wraps with no obligation to buy! ;)


*This post was written by Paula R.