Baby Pools Go Online

Our piano teacher was just here, nearly two months to the day she is expecting her first baby. When I asked about her due date, she mentioned that her husband has all his friends and co-workers guessing the baby's actual birth date and other arrival stats on a web site called ExpectNet.

Baby pools are not new, so it makes sense they would go online. ExpectNet is associated with Pregnancy.org, a pregnancy tracking and tips web site. Parents and invited guests can guess the gender, weight, length, and birth date and time of a new baby. The pools are private, and you can lock the game so that no more guesses are entered after a certain date. Of course, there's also a place to put a note about the baby shower date and a link to registries.

That's the free version. For $19.95, you can get email messages when new guesses are posted on the site, have up to four polls (baby names, a likely one), and a private message board where friends can leave notes for the expectant couple.

A quick search turned up another baby pool site, aptly called BabyPool. This one has a baby pool blog that parents and friends can contribute to and a photo album so you can upload family photos and, a site example page suggests, sonogram pictures. You pay for the pool based on the number of participants: up to 10, $9.95; 15, $13.95; 20, $17.95, and $19.95 for unlimited members.

All in good fun. Has anyone tried one of these sites?