Tumblon.com – the new project from Jonathan Dahl of Hopkins-based web application development shop Slantwise Design – quietly opened it’s doors earlier this month. Unlike other parenting-oriented websites or general-purpose weblog engines, Tumblon focuses on child development milestones as the structure for sharing.
The initial sign-up process is a brief 7 fields. It took me a couple passes to but that was due to an aversion to registration forms longer than 2 fields.
Once in, adding children is quick and easy, just need their name and birth date (for the milestones). By default, 3 age-appropriate milestone are listed for each of the categories; literacy, speech, cogntive, fine motor, gross motor.
Personally, I found the milestones for a toddler easier to identify than those for a weeks-old infant (‘counts to 3’ vs. ‘gurgles with pleasure’). Milestones are checked off by clicking ‘record it’ – which presents the options for writing a milestone-specific ‘story’ or photo.
The milestones are then sent to a publicly accessible, account-specific weblog 
For first-time parents, Tumblon is well on its way to being the best resource for what to expect and when to expect it.
For more information, check out Tumblon.com and my audio interview with Jonathan Dahl