Blogging Website Celebrates Working Moms

Juggling family, work, a social life and sanity can be tough, but a new family and parenting website that has been gaining momentum over the past few months aims to be a "one-stop-shop" for moms around the state.

CT Working Moms was started in the fall of last year when two friends realized they shared the same frustration with the Internet: there simply wasn't a supportive space to share their parenting tips and frustrations with other mothers.

"A lot of the news websites don’t really give moms a lot of credit," said Danielle Elwood, who joined on to friend Michelle Noehren's 'pet project' back in September 2011. Noehren established the website and invited Elwood to be a blogger once it was up and running.

"There are a lot of women who are working and providing for families and at the same time still being able to give back to the community in the form of this website," Elwood said.

The site now hosts 21 consistent work-mom bloggers and recently won the Hartford Courant's 2012 award for best family/ parenting blog, which Elwood and Noehren say has increased traffic and user participation significantly.

The site is a resource for parents in many ways. "We have information about locating daycare, workplace laws, child development, services for special needs families and so much more," Noehren said.

But that doesn't mean it's all business! There are weekly "Freebie Friday" prize giveaways, a cooking blogger, a spiritual "Magical Monday" specialty column, and constructive discussions amongst the comments sections of op-ed style pieces.

In short, there's something for everyone but it's not just another general, run-of-the-mill parenting blog -- one of CT Working Mom's main draws, according to Elwood.

"Our writers come from every end of the parenting spectrum. We're from all over the whole state and from different backgrounds," she said. "The site itself is a place where we can all meet; We don't want to isolate anyone, this is a safe place for moms," she said.

Among the topics open for discussion on the site are: parenting kids with special needs, formula feeding versus breastfeeding, home births, scheduled Caesarean sections, feminism, private versus public schooling...to name a few.

In addition to diversity, Noehren said readers appreciate content authenticity.

"We don't sugar coat things, we are honest about the positives and negatives about being a working parent. We talk about the good stuff AND the bad stuff. People can relate to us because of that," she said.

Moving forward, Noehren said the site will be adding even more bloggers to further the diversity of the topics discussed. "We'd love to have some moms with teenagers and older children so that we cover their perspective too," she said.

"I really hope to see it continue to expand and to touch moms on a local level and a personal level," Elwood said. "I just really want to see more moms use the resources we are putting forward."

If you are interested in writing for CT Working Moms, contact Michelle Noehren via e-mail: michelle@ctworkingmoms.com.