Your Baby Today

For Mom-to-Be

CREATIVE WAYS TO ANNOUNCE YOUR PREGNANCY

By Melissa Ramsdell

If you've been trying to conceive, you know how nerve-racking it is to wait for the pregnancy test to come back positive. While you wait, bide the time by thinking of creative ways to break the good news.

Take your spouse to a restaurant that is significant to the two of you -- perhaps where you got engaged or had your first date. To give him a hint, buy a copy of Bill Cosby's book on fatherhood or give him a bib with the saying "I Love Daddy" printed on it. Digging for more ideas? Hang a "baby on board" sign in the car before you take a trip together, or send him an electronic baby card.

In the event you're like most women who spontaneously blurt the news, you can save the creative announcements for friends and family. For example, when Laurie Yarmy, a mom from Michigan, learned she was pregnant with her second child, she disguised the news as a holiday wish list. The list she e-mailed to her parents included such telltale items as diapers, a stroller, and, of course, a bigger house. It took a minute to sink in, Yarmy recalls, but her mom and dad were thrilled. "They called right away," she says.

According to Hilory Wagner, author of And Baby Makes Four: Welcoming a Second Child into the Family (Harper Paperbacks), breaking the news to an older child is a more delicate matter. When Wagner was pregnant with her second child, she used a book as a tool to start the conversation with her two-year-old daughter Sarah. "It's a good way to help them sort out their feelings and let them voice their opinions," she says. Wagner recommends A New Baby in Koko Bear's House (The Book Peddlers) by Vicki Lansky.

After baby is born, you can share the news and development via various Internet services. Julie Rauh, a mom from St. Louis, used Baby Press Conference to introduce her daughter Madeleine to distant uncles and aunts. "She made funny little faces," Rauh says. "She was a star."

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