Suri Out For A Stroll

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Miss Suri Cruise was seen out for a stroll with her Mom Katie yesterday in Germany. This little monkey has been all over the world lately, flying from Germany last week to NYC and then back so that she can be with her dad, Tom Cruise, who is currently filming a movie.

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UPDATE: No Baby Yet For Duggar Family

I have been receiving many e-mails from readers asking whether or not the Duggar Family from Arkansas has had they baby. I spoke with Michelle Duggar this morning and she has not had the baby yet. There were a few contractions last week, but nothing that showed the baby was ready to arrive.

Jennifer will be delivered at the hospital au natural and like the other children, Michelle is planning to breastfeed.

The Duggars are very excited about their new arrival and hope she will make an appearance in the next few days!

I will keep you updated on any changes.

Related Articles:

The Duggar Family Welcomes Baby Number 17
The Duggar Family Will Soon Have 19 Members
At Home With The Duggar Family

Heaven Rain Is A Ray Of Sunshine

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Actress Brooke Burke and daughter Heaven Rain Charvet arrive at the Summer On The Pier Benefiting “The Rock” Foundation Event over the weekend in Malibu.

PHOTOCREDIT

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States Crack Down on Parents and Caregivers Who Leave Children Alone in Cars

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Well it’s about time that someone actually stepped up and did something about this HUGE problem. There are about 4 or 5 kids a week that are being reported left in hot vehicles for longer than 20 minutes. Some are saved, but a good majority die from extreme temperatures and dehydration.

A Florida mom who faces misdemeanor charges for leaving her 2-month-old son in an idling Pontiac is just the latest example of the nationwide crackdown on parents who leave their kids alone in cars and then face fines — or worse, jail time.

Twelve states have laws specifically prohibiting leaving young children alone in cars, some making it a traffic violation with a penalty of a ticket and a fine, and others — including Florida — making it a misdemeanor, with the possible punishment being a prison sentence as well as a hefty fine.

In the case of the Orlando mother, Whitlene Loussaint, police got involved because the car with the baby boy inside was stolen in the few minutes it took Loussaint to run back into her church to grab an umbrella. The car turned up blocks from the church parking lot where it was taken, with the doors wide open and the baby unhurt.

The Florida children-in-cars law has just been amended to make it a second-degree misdemeanor to leave a youngster under 6 alone in a car for more than 15 minutes or for any amount of time if the car is running. The new regulations went into effect July 1, and if Loussaint is prosecuted, she could face 60 days in jail and a $500 fine.

Ironically, many of the moms and dads who leave their young kids alone in cars aren’t neglectful or abusive parents, according to Kids and Cars founder and president Janette Fennell.

“In most cases, it’s very good parents,” she said. “It tends to be for that person’s convenience — they’re not thinking of the safety of the children. For some reason they think, I’ll just be a minute — and it’s never just a minute.”

In addition to Florida, the other states that have specific children-in-cars laws include Connecticut, California, Illinois, Louisiana, Maryland, Nebraska, Nevada, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Texas and Washington.

Fennell said Kids and Cars is also working on getting a federal bill passed that regulates safety devices on automobiles. The law would mandate that all vehicles have the following three features:

• a standard and wide range of rearview vision when the car is in reverse to prevent children from being backed over;
• a feature on power windows that cause them to automatically reverse if they hit an obstruction, making strangulation of children peering out impossible;
• a brake shift interlock that stops a car from being thrown into “drive” unless someone has a foot on the brake.

Fennell said she thinks each case should be analyzed individually in terms of what sort of punishment is appropriate.

But taking a case-by-case approach can be a problem.

Currently, mothers who leave children alone in the car are treated much more harshly than fathers — with moms being 26 percent more likely to do time than dads and their average sentence being two years longer, according to a study done by The Associated Press.

Related Articles:

Another Mom Leaves baby In Sweltering Car
Mom Blames Great Store Sale for Leaving Child in Hot Car
Mother Gets 30 Days For Leaving Baby Alone

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Chandra Wilson and Kids Do Folgers Commercials

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Chandra Wilson and 2 of her 3 kids Joy, 8 and Michael, 1 filmed a commercial for Folgers coffee. The ads show Chandra going through he morning routine getting the kids ready for the day. I like the natural way that the spots are filmed.

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Race Plays A Role In Neonatal Survival Rate

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Researchers have uncovered ethnic differences in the risk of neonatal mortality and morbidity (disease) in the neonatal intensive care units (NICU). Of grave concern is the noted elevation in mortality rate in the NICU among infants of South Asian (East Indian) origin, which is over three times that of Caucasian infants. It was also found that Aboriginal males and East Asian females had significantly greater odds of survival.

Interestingly, ‘small for gestational age’ was noted as a significant factor only among Caucasian infants, while only ‘gestational age less than 29 weeks’ was found to be a significant risk across all ethnic groups.

“Understanding these differences is important so we can determine what specific areas to target in order to improve health-care delivery and reduce these disparities,” said Dr. Shoo Lee, Scientific Director of iCARE at the University of Alberta.

As the number of premature births in North America has increased over the last 20 years, questions have emerged about how best to care for newborns and their mothers, particularly in immigrant populations where inequalities in health outcomes may already exist.

In the United States, prematurity has been reported as the leading cause of neonatal death among African-American newborns, but the research team has found that neonatal sepsis (infection) was the strongest predictor of mortality among African-American infants, even greater than being born at 28 weeks of age or younger.

“Our results suggest that reducing neonatal infection among African-Americans newborns may help to lower these differences in mortality,” said Lee.

When we found out that our baby was coming early the nurse told us that we wanted our baby to be a girl. They apparently have better survival statistics and fight harder to stay alive….

We ended up making out okay, but you can imagine our fears when we found out that I had just delivered a boy – at 24 weeks.

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