The Mommy Blog is the brainchild of Mindy, a mother of three living in the San Francisco Bay area. The layout is fun and quirky, with a header featuring a variety of ‘mommy-centric’ quotes and a picture of a playful, laughing woman — presumably Mindy herself. Based on the design, I expected a whimsical look at the life of a mother, with a touch of humor in each post.
I dug into the archives, which go back to late 2002, and found pretty much what I expected — lots of stories and anecdotes about Mindy’s kids, and the experience of bringing up a group of youngsters. The posts are entertaining, ranging from ‘awwww!’ moments about the cute and innocent things the kids are saying to the harried (but often hilarious) pull-out-your-hair moments that mommy Mindy occasionally endures. Taken together, the stories paint a full and eye-opening picture of the ups and downs — but mostly ups — of motherhood, as seen through one witty, upbeat woman’s eyes.
The entries are fairly sparse until the summer of 2003, when the post frequency grows to several each week, and later to multiple posts just about every day. This is also the time when Mindy begins to expand her range of topics a bit more, and write about other areas of her life. The majority of material is still devoted to her ‘kidlets’, but the recent posts provide a more complete picture of the author. And the best news is that Mindy has been downright prolific in 2004, entertaining her readers daily with a variety of tales, snippets and links to other sites.
Mindy’s doing a fantastic job of letting her full personality shine through — it’s fantastic to see how her weblog has grown from a rarely-updated record of the best and worst of her kids’ adventures into a creative outlet, filled with enjoyable and often humorous snippets of her life. Many of the features and ‘extras’ that you’d find on other blogs are here — comments, a search box, a CafePress shop, and various blogrolls — but it’s the writing that really sets this site apart. If you’re interested in reading about motherhood, or you’re just looking for an entertaining read, then you should really enjoy The Mommy Blog. I give the site 4.5 out of 5.The Mommy Blog