![Twins Rowan and Blake today, with a scan photo of them cuddling in the womb.](/web/20170204222029im_/http://www.essentialbaby.com.au/content/dam/images/g/u/2/z/w/k/image.related.landscape.380x253.gu2zxp.png/1485916431535.jpg)
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![Eviction Notice - we need the cot.](/web/20170204222029im_/http://www.essentialbaby.com.au/content/dam/images/4/9/p/u/u/image.related.wideLandscape.460x259.gmgod7.gmx4zg.png/1467712762767.jpg)
Creative pregnancy announcements
Announcing that you're expecting can be a time to express your creativity, sense of humour and imagination. Check out how other parents and parents-to-be have broken the news to friends and family.
![ford fetus](/web/20170204222029im_/http://www.essentialbaby.com.au/content/dam/images/g/r/2/k/2/4/image.related.wideLandscape.460x259.gmgk6m.gmx4zg.png/1472265441675.jpg)
Funny ultrasound pictures
It's called pareidolia - when the brain makes an image or pattern appear where there isn't really one.
![Controversial spots: To park or not to park in pregnancy?](/web/20170204222029im_/http://www.essentialbaby.com.au/content/dam/images/3/u/6/b/5/image.related.landscape.120x80.1mm7uj.gmx4zg.png/1457046461430.jpg)
![<i></i>](/web/20170204222029im_/http://www.essentialbaby.com.au/content/dam/images/4/4/k/g/9/image.related.landscape.120x80.gk8rat.gmx4zg.png/1469165178214.jpg)
![<i></i>](/web/20170204222029im_/http://www.essentialbaby.com.au/content/dam/images/3/o/x/8/w/image.related.landscape.120x80.12z0pa.gmx4zg.png/1472646069589.jpg)
![Twins Rowan and Blake today, with a scan photo of them cuddling in the womb.](/web/20170204222029im_/http://www.essentialbaby.com.au/content/dam/images/g/u/2/z/w/k/image.related.landscape.120x80.gu2zxp.png/1485916431535.jpg)
Latest
![The park bench dedicated to the Rilkoff twins John and Fred.](/web/20170204222029im_/http://www.essentialbaby.com.au/content/dam/images/g/s/0/9/t/c/image.related.landscape.300x200.gs09u4.png/1476229037585.jpg)
The complicated grief of losing your babies
In the park near our house my partner and I have a bench. We paid to have it put there last year after our twin boys Fred and John died.
![Parenting advice has changed dramatically in the last 100 years.](/web/20170204222029im_/http://www.essentialbaby.com.au/content/dam/images/g/r/y/q/a/j/image.related.landscape.300x200.gryqej.png/1476146018932.jpg)
Terrible parenting advice from the 1920s
Parenting advice has been around forever in some form or other. There's even some in the Bible (mainly used these days to justify beating children, but let's not talk about that). However, it's only in the last 100 years or so that it has become a huge industry.
![The amazing photo of Jessica.](/web/20170204222029im_/http://www.essentialbaby.com.au/content/dam/images/g/r/v/t/5/e/image.related.landscape.300x200.gruhfi.png/1475656118546.jpg)
Rainbow baby celebrated with incredible maternity photoshoot
When Kevin Mahoney organised wife Jessica's maternity photoshoot he hoped to capture not only the beauty of this pregnancy, but also the importance of the six heartbreaking losses which came before it.
![The Stillbirth Foundation-commissioned report found that stillbirths cost the national economy $681.4 million.](/web/20170204222029im_/http://www.essentialbaby.com.au/content/dam/images/g/q/3/v/g/0/image.related.landscape.300x200.grvf2t.png/1475695979936.jpg)
Stillbirth to cost economy $680m by 2020
Embargoed until 06-10-2016
![We long for someone to tell us that what we did was formidable and brave and really hard.](/web/20170204222029im_/http://www.essentialbaby.com.au/content/dam/images/g/r/t/h/5/5/image.related.landscape.300x200.grth0o.png/1475871815154.jpg)
Why we can't stop giving pregnant women advice they don't want
When I fell pregnant with my first child I thought I knew what I didn't know. I knew I couldn't adequately prepare myself for birth or the first delirious months (or years). But I felt satisfied, almost smug, about my awareness of that fact. I understood, to paraphrase Former US Secretary of Defence, Donald Rumsfeld, that there were "known unknowns."
![Cristina Wright, who is eight months pregnant, has welcomed an apology after she was refused use of a staff toilet at a ...](/web/20170204222029im_/http://www.essentialbaby.com.au/content/dam/images/g/r/s/0/6/e/image.related.landscape.300x200.grrto8.png/1475535325049.jpg)
Pregnant woman's toilet refusal leads to manager apology
A heavily pregnant woman who was refused access to a staff toilet at a store in Belconnen said the law should be changed to force retailers to allow vulnerable people to use their toilets.
![<i></i>](/web/20170204222029im_/http://www.essentialbaby.com.au/content/dam/images/g/r/s/b/3/6/image.related.landscape.300x200.grsabj.png/1482310093381.jpg)
I'm pregnant, and I'm terrified I'll never be alone again
Soon there will be a wriggly helpless being, and I will be responsible for keeping it alive.
![There are pros and cons for every different sibling age gap.](/web/20170204222029im_/http://www.essentialbaby.com.au/content/dam/images/g/r/q/v/n/e/image.related.landscape.300x200.grqvge.png/1475130991041.jpg)
Is there an ideal time to have a second child?
My partner and I pretty quickly decided we were all-in on the baby thing and we'd go for another. But when?
![Why – when I've spent the past three years rolling my eyes and saying, "God, no," when people ask if I'm having a third ...](/web/20170204222029im_/http://www.essentialbaby.com.au/content/dam/images/g/r/p/n/f/z/image.related.landscape.300x200.grr0gi.png/1475872048240.jpg)
'I don't want my husband to have his vasectomy'
Neither of them want a third child, so why does Susan Marshall* feel so sad about her husband's planned vasectomy?
![A baby was conceived from an egg containing nuclear DNA from his mother and father, and mitochondrial DNA from an ...](/web/20170204222029im_/http://www.essentialbaby.com.au/content/dam/images/g/r/p/x/s/y/image.related.landscape.300x200.grpxmn.png/1475014563422.jpg)
World first baby born with DNA from three parents
Experts praise world-first event but ethical questions remain.
![My son was our second precious miracle and all that I could ever have hoped for.](/web/20170204222029im_/http://www.essentialbaby.com.au/content/dam/images/g/r/m/k/x/y/image.related.landscape.300x200.grlatu.png/1474581141202.jpg)
Why does everyone assume I wanted a girl?
Why does everyone assume I wanted a girl?
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