It's official. Thanks to MotherTalker Lisa in Austin, we have a fun and kid-friendly site for our moms caucus.

Rather than meet at the convention center, we will meet at Phil's Ice House for lunch on 5620 Burnet Road. It has a play structure for the kids and some fabulous ice cream next door. Here are the details:

When: Thursday, July 17
Time: 1:30 p.m.
Where: Phil's Ice House, 5620 Burnet Road, Austin
Who: All are invited!!!

Lisa estimated it would cost around $16.80 to cab it from the convention center. She and a friend have graciously agreed to drive some people over -- although she does not have car seats for babies and toddlers. Also, we can split cab fare. Let's meet in front of the convention center at 1:15 p.m. sharp to figure it out.

I will send out a reminder closer to the date and post a notice on the front door of the caucus site at the convention center.

Thanks all!

While I would love to see paid family leave and all obstacles in the workforce removed for pregnant women, I did agree with Huffington Post's Christine Hassler that it isn't okay for moms-to-be to hide their pregnancies from potential employers. I, too, turned down headhunter calls while I was pregnant for this very reason:

One of the best ways to approach a dilemma like this is to turn the question on yourself. If you were an employer looking to fill a position and the person you hired was going to be out of the office for an extended period of time just a few months after she started the job, wouldn't you want to know? Think about what goes into training a new employee. It takes at least a month to not feel new on the job and successfully acclimate to all of one's delegated responsibilities.

Already six months into your pregnancy, why were you not upfront in the initial interview about your pregnancy? Were you afraid you weren't going to be hired if they knew you were pregnant? Although I can appreciate how that fear may stop you, obviously your employer is going to find out - pregnancy is not something you can hide! Also, have you planned out your post-pregnancy schedule? How long were you thinking of being on leave? Have you arranged for child care after going back to work? If you haven't considered or answered these essential questions, you can't expect to just wing it or have your employer's regulations answer the questions for you.

I'd advise telling your potential employer immediately. You have already gotten off to a bad start with this company by beginning with a lie. And yes, this is a lie by omission. You are putting your employer in a tenuous position by not being upfront with him or her. Once the situation is discovered, he or she will be faced with a difficult business and ethical decision.

While this mom could be in dire straits and need this job, she is not entitled to any family leave since she hasn't been with the company for at least a year. In this case, she hasn't even started working for the company! The omission did nothing for her.

I remember feeling peeved when one analyst firm in New York -- which initially reached out to me -- did not return my phone call when I told the recruiter via voicemail that I was pregnant. But I was also relieved. Who wants to work at a company that is so unfriendly to families?  

Belated Health Story: A Norwegian study found that premature babies were more likely than full-term babies to die in childhood or suffer from health problems as adults, according to CNN. Unlike Norway, low-income mothers in the U.S. do not have access to healthcare and suffer higher rates of premature births. But doctors still recommend that all preemies, even if they appear healthy, tell their doctors they were born early.

Leading Ladies: Just a heads up that we updated the "about us" page to include a more up-to-date photo of your founding MotherTalkers. (From left to right: Erika, Elisa, and Gloria.) Wepa!

What is on your minds?  

UPDATE: Fellow MotherTalker and entrepreneur, Lorrie, has added two new shirts to the MotherTalkers store. She made it a point that these are "real women" sizes. This may be just the perfect outfit for YearlyKos! ;-) -Elisa

CHICAGO, ILL -- While MotherTalkers is my passion and second family, it is also my little home business. I check it at the most obscene hours to make sure there is content and there are no bugs. I have ads on the site and I am always shamelessly passing out MT business cards.

I can assure you, Ari probably hates MotherTalkers as mami is always on the website, weekends included.

After two years of writing and building community, I wanted to know how to take it to the next level: largely build traffic so that I can pay the writers a living wage. That’s the million-dollar question and that’s why I trekked all the way to Chicago for the BlogHer Conference.

I wanted to meet other mommy bloggers and other women, especially those trying to monetize their work. I wanted their ideas. And I haven’t been disappointed.

This year’s conference had 750 women bloggers. The huge grand ballroom of the Navy Pier in Chicago was packed. Thanks to a “speed-dating” meet and greet -- which I would like to incorporate in the YearlyKos MotherTalkers Caucus next week -- I was able to pass out biz cards and increase the contacts in my rolodex.

I attended a helpful session on branding and self-promotion. A common question from the mommy bloggers was how to differentiate their blog from the millions out there. Branding expert Nina Burokas asked two simple questions (Paraphrased): “What is the message of your blog? Who is your audience?”

Having been a journalist all my working life, I am a novice when it comes to marketing and branding myself. Answering those questions proved difficult for me. At the end of the session, I approached her to get her opinion on MT’s tagline: “Rants and Raves on Modern Motherhood.”

“Too broad,” she told me. Hmm. It got me thinking about how to fine-tune that message and whether I want us to become an “expert” in some area, like politics. (We are, after all, the first link on Daily Kos!)