Portable freezers?

I have never heard of a portable "freezer" . Refrigerator, sure. This
looked pretty neat. I saw an ad for it last time I was flying, in the
skymall catalog.

http://www.skymall.com/webapp/skysto...ion=&pid=13220
044&catId=ANY_CAT

It is a portable refrigerator that isn't too heavy. 9 lbs....

What I can tell you is that if you don't have a freezer section, call down
to the front desk and see if you can store your icepacks in their freezer.
I'm sure they probably have one there. that's what I did, when the
refrigerator didn't have a freezer section. I assume that's what you want,
just to re-freeze the icepacks? You don't want to freeze the milk do you?
It would be too hard to keep it frozen on the trip back, I would guess.

Suellen

"Jodie" wrote in message
...
Anybody have any idea if these even exist? I may be away from dd for a
couple of days in early August and I would like to freeze what I pump
while I'm gone. We are looking into getting a room that has a
refrigerator, but I won't know until I get there if there is a freezer
compartment. I checked with a local sporting goods store (camping), but
they didn't know if anyone even makes them.

Any suggestions?

TIA,
Jodie

Yes, I do want to freeze the milk I pump. We will only be about 1.5
hours from home and I can pack the frozen milk in ice in a cooler for
that amount of time (I've done this before and it stayed frozen, but it
needs to be frozen first). DD doesn't take bottles on a regular basis,
so if I can only refrigerate what I pump, I will end up wasting the
majority of it (egads!!). She will make quite a dent in my frozen stash
while I am away from her, and I was hoping to replenish it with what I
pump. Does this make sense?

Thanks, Suellen, for that link. The refrigerator looks really neat,
compact, too. Unfortunately, it won't work for what I need.

Jodie

Jodie wrote:

Yes, I do want to freeze the milk I pump.


Dry ice in a cooler? I know dry ice will keep a
liquid-nitrogen tank cold enough to keep sperm frozen for a
week, but it's a very well-insulated tank. I'd actually do
two coolers -- one completely filled with dry ice, and one
with water frozen in bottles or packs. Milk into cooler
with ice jugs, dry ice on top, replenish as needed. Take
gloves to handle the dry ice.

If it would kill you to dump the milk if the freezing didn't
work, I'd do a dry run with body-temp water substituting for
the ebm.

Alternatively, if by "a couple of days" you mean 3-4, I'd
just refrigerate the milk, pack it in ice for the trip home,
and freeze on arrival.

Phoebe

We won't even be gone a full two days. Will the ebm be okay if I just
refrigerate while we're gone, then freeze it when we get back? I wasn't
sure about that.

Jodie

Yeah, we're driving. I think I will just freeze it when we get home.
Thanks for the link, and the info, Suellen. Just curious, how old was
your nursling when you were first away overnight? If you don't mind
sharing your experiences being away from him/her (sorry, I can't
remember), I would love to hear them. I'm a little nervous about
leaving dd, as I haven't been away from her more than a few hours.
Nervous in the sense that I don't want the separation to effect our
nursing.

Jodie

Hi Jodie,

This is my 3rd child. I've breastfed all three. The oldest, who is 4 1/2 ,
still occasionally nurses (once a week or less), the middle one, who is 2
1/2 nurses a bit (3-4 times a day), and the newborn is 4 months old.

For all 3, I went back to work after 3 months leave. My husband is a SAHD.
With the older 2, I went back to work in an office. With this one, my office
is in my home, so I can take more nurse breaks instead of pumping breaks.

With respect to work trips, alot of times I take the whole crew if I'm going
to be gone for a while, and its drivable. If its a quick trip, then I fly,
and can usually limit it to one night in a hotel. So far, I've been able to
do day trips to Chicago and Minneapolis, or one night trips to other US
midwest cities. And its been maybe 2-3 trips a month.

In my experience, I haven't had a hard time coming back to nursing. The
babies have never favored the bottle over the breast. I've been pretty
lucky. In fact, my second child would tend to really hold out for me, and
would drink hardly anything until he would finally decide he couldn't wait
any longer....And by the way, my children were not small, all over 8 lbs at
birth (8#3oz, 8#15oz, and 8#12oz) They all gained weight quickly and
steadily until they hit about the 1 year mark. I'm not sure what tricks
I've done to be so lucky. We've used the avent bottles and nipples, and
also a newer gerber wide base nipple that can fit on the standard size
bottles. I co-sleep, so when I am home, the baby can nurse freely. I think
that's what #2 did alot.

None of my babies slept through the night (over 5 hours) until they were
well over a year old. In fact, I had to actively wean them from the night
nursings later in both pregnancies, so that I wasn't completely overwhelmed
when the new one arrived.
Now, the older 2 are sleeping through the night. They still like to
snuggle, though. The baby wakes up a few times, not sure when and how
often. I do try to minimize the trips, because it is rather hard on my
husband when I'm gone. The last two trips, he said the baby woke up every 1
1/2 hours to be fed. I'm pretty sure he doesn't wake up that often when I'm
home at night, otherwise I'd be a zombie!

More than likely, you little nursling will pick up right where she left off.
I didn't catch how old she was. She might end up with a slightly different
schedule for a while, when you adjust back, and possibly overcome any slight
undersupply issue from not nursing or pumping enough, but she will likely be
very glad to see you are back. (but I would likely bet you shouldn't have a
noticable dip in supply due to such a short trip. I've never noticed a
problem.)

Suellen, mom to
Gabby (4 1/2)
Bobby (2 1/2)
Marcus (4 months)

"Jodie" wrote in message
...
Yeah, we're driving. I think I will just freeze it when we get home.
Thanks for the link, and the info, Suellen. Just curious, how old was
your nursling when you were first away overnight? If you don't mind
sharing your experiences being away from him/her (sorry, I can't
remember), I would love to hear them. I'm a little nervous about
leaving dd, as I haven't been away from her more than a few hours.
Nervous in the sense that I don't want the separation to effect our
nursing.

Jodie

thank you so much for all tour help and for sharing your experiences. i
really appreciate it.

jodie
sorry, nak, oht

btw, dd is 5 1/2 mo old