Articles - Babies

Babies in Cyberspace:
Great Sites for New and Expecting Mothers
By Kathleen E. Conroy

Suddenly life has turned upside down. With a new baby in the home, regular sleep, regular meals, even regular showers can often be a challenge for new parents. It’s a time when a steady education on parenting is helpful. New moms and dads are wrapped up in an exciting and intense stage of their lives, both physically and emotionally, a time when they are actively seeking knowledge, expert advice and often just sympathetic soul.

What better time to turn to a round the-clock, seven-day-a-week resource—the World Wide Web! Once your baby is napping, grab a cup of herbal tea and point your mouse to these parent-approved Web sites:

The Baby Corner
www.thebabycorner.com – A popular stop, this site features a wealth of information on infants, fertility, pregnancy, dads and moms with up-to-date parenting news, baby name guide, and daily hot topics. Expectant parents will also appreciate a series of calculators for figuring ovulation, due dates, labor and pregnancy weight.

Baby Center
www.babycenter.com – Founded in 1997, Baby Center was one of the first companies to address the needs of pregnant women and new parent online. This is a very thorough and extremely informative site. Look for information pertaining to your week of pregnancy or weekly updates on growth/ development of your baby. The site covers preconception, pregnancy, babies and toddlers, and also has a popular retail arm called The BabyCenter Store.

Baby Zone
www.babyzone.com – BabyZone is an online destination for women who are interested in becoming pregnant, are already pregnant, and are moms. Parents of infants will appreciate this educational site divided into six categories: preconception, pregnancy, parenting, baby zone, community and regions. This comprehensive cyberstop has everything from birth stories to a due date calculator and a listing of safety recalls.

iParenting
www.iParenting.com – iParenting’s mission is to be the premier source and authority on pregnancy and parenting information, interaction, resources and products and their Web site does a nice job of it. This site is a super interactive educational source for new and expectant parents. Look for online classes through iParenting University, including classes on topics such as childbirth, breastfeeding, new baby care and preparing for and caring for twins.

ParentsTalk
www.parents-talk.com – ParentsTalk is an online community for moms and dads of all generations. Parents can get advice from parent experts and seasoned veterans or share their own stories and insights on the parent message boards. Content changes daily with the latest consumer news and features what families are talking about, including fun family activities, expert’s advice on various topics, recipes and travel information

La Leche League International
www.lalecheleague.org – At the official Web site of La Leche League International, visitors will find breastfeeding information from A-Z. Features include:

• FAQs about breastfeeding; breastfeeding articles from New Beginnings, LLLI’s Publication for Mothers
• Breastfeeding and the Law; a chat room; breastfeeding help form
• A database of breastfeeding references
• Information on breastfeeding support in the workplace and information in Spanish or Italian.

KinderStart
www.kinderstart.com – KinderStart is the largest (and most popular) indexed directory and search engine focused on children zero to seven on the Internet. Look for information about parenting, pregnancy, child development, health, education and learning activities.

The mission of the site’s start is to provide parents, grandparents, foster parents and teachers with the most organized, and easiest to use index and search engine available.

Parent Soup
www.parentsoup.com – One of the best parenting sites out there, this award-winning page first appeared in 1996 and has been wowing parents of toddlers, tweens and teens ever since. Look for a development tracker, parent’s problem solver, popular message boards, ask the expert feature, skill builders for all ages, family health resources, and sections on everything from potty training to teen dating.

Childbirth
www.childbirth.org – Pregnant women, expecting couples and new parents will love this collection of FAQs, personal stories, child care information, and articles and links galore. From fetal monitoring, to doulas, to general reproductive health, Childbirth.org delivers comprehensive birth information in an easy-to-navigate site.

Kathleen E. Conroy is associate editor of Charlotte Parent magazine in Charlotte, N.C., and the mother of two young girls.