Twelve years ago when Jax had her first child, there was barely an internet and there certainly weren’t smartphones. Fast forward a decade and smartphones are all around us – so which Android apps would she recommend for mums?

Having started off with a hand-me-down phone to make me feel more comfortable about leaving my precious baby at the nursery, I’m now a huge fun of the smartphone.

In fact, I’ve been a mummy ambassador with a mobile network and even won a competition to design an app to help mums; it’s called Family Quest and helps you get your family involved in the chores around the house – bit of a brainwave eh?

For myself, I don’t know how I’d get by without my lovely android close to hand. The real boon is staying connected with the online world – I’ve got twicca to manage my twitter stream, wordpress so I can blog on the go, Google maps so I don’t get lost while I’m out and about (who needs a satnav with that plugged in? it’s fab!) and of course Angry Birds to while away the moments waiting for people to take their turn in Words with Friends…

There are apps for everything. There’s even one to remind you to do your pelvic floor exercises after birth – which are of course well worth doing. I use my Google calendar on the phone to keep up with everything I’m supposed to be doing – I call my phone my brain, as it’s certainly better at remembering things than I am!

I was reading something the other day that implies playing games can be very good for you, staving off dementia, so I’m considering looking for a sudoku app. And last night I installed picasso so I could take part in the first twidoodle party on twitter, led by @storyofmum.

Of course, my phone is also a camera for recording all those first moments – though my Tigerboy is shy and doesn’t like to smile if I’m pointing a lens at him.

I don’t know how I got by without the connections I have with the wider world now. I do remember that parenting my first child without family or friends nearby was an incredibly difficult endeavour; it just felt like I was terribly alone, left all day with a small person who did nothing but scream at me. I wonder how different life would have been if we’d had smartphones way back then?

I’d love to hear which Android apps you all can’t live without. Drop me a comment here or find me on twitter, pretty much any time of the day or night…

This week on TalkMum, we’re talking about how technology has changed how we deal with pregnancy and being mums. TalkMum blogger Natalie gives us her top three reasons why she thinks Facebook is great for mums!

When I had my first baby it is true to say that I felt a bit lost. We’d moved out of London and were living out in the sticks, well Berkshire, I’d given up my job in PR and was too late to join any ante-natal classes so finding Facebook was a saving grace for me, and pretty much a life line for a while.

Escape the baby talk

I know it isn’t the same as a chat and coffee but social media does make you feel like you are in the loop and connecting with adults. When you are sleep deprived, have a baby suffering from colic and are drowning in nappies and puree, this can be comforting and brings some sanity to your day.

I was able to chat with my girlfriends about their day at work whilst feeding my little baby and looking at what my sister was up to in Somerset was the next best thing to go doing and seeing her. In short, it was an easy way to link up with new friends as well and start building relationships with new ones.

Share your gorgeous photos

I loved being able to upload images of Eddie onto my page for everyone to look at, and got some great responses. However, I know it isn’t for everyone and some people don’t want their photos online, BUT you can restrict who sees your pages, you only put up what you are happy for others to see and you have to actually accept friend requests so you can be choosy about who sees what.

Keep in touch

I first joined 5 years ago and still today I love Facebook; I find that it is a great way for me to keep in touch with not only my mummy friends but my extended family all over the world, old work mates, fab flat mates, school buddies and friends who live in far-away places that are warmer and less rainy than Blighty.

There is nothing like face to face contact and physical interaction but social media is a great way to keep in touch with friends and family and let them see how beautiful your little ones are, even if they don’t see them day-to-day like you do!

Nowadays, technology is often an important part of pregnancy for the modern mum. So TalkMum blogger Sonia fills us in on the details of how she feels she would cope without technology during pregnancy.

First things first, I have to admit I am a complete IT geek – since leaving university I have made my career in IT and I love my gadgets (iPhone and iPad, laptop and PC). So if you are a technophobe then you are probably going to hate me!

I can’t compare being pregnant with my gadgets and the internet to a pregnancy where it wasn’t available as I haven’t experienced it, but what I can tell you is that it would make me feel miserable.

I absolutely love finding out about my pregnancy, the week by week stages, the videos that are in some apps you can download (for free too) of what the baby looks like and what is going on inside the baby that week.

I use my gadgets to keep video logs of the bumps movements, photos of the bump each week and how it is progressing and not to mention my blog. I update my blog on the go and everywhere I can – having the portability with an iPhone and iPad and the great apps available to you, means that I can do all of these things where ever I am.

When pregnant these gadgets are a great resource as some days you might want to just nip upstairs, tuck yourself in bed with a nice cup of green tea and catch up on your weekly update of baby’s progression – or you might want to write that blog post from the bath when you are having a nice relaxing soak.

I think the answer to my question is no I wouldn’t cope; I want to find out all these wonderful things, I want to read up about my pregnancy, I want to share my pregnancy with the networks I am involved with and most of all I want to have all of these memories with me for the rest of forever – and that wouldn’t be possible if it wasn’t for technology!

Technology has moved on so fast in the last 10 years – from baby books to pregnancy forums, the way we find out about what happens to our bodies has changed a lot! TalkMum blogger Cath looks back at how technology changed the way she dealt with her pregnancies.

When I was pregnant first time round we didn’t have the internet – so all my pregnancy research was done by reading magazines and books. Like many mums, I was fascinated by what was happening to my body and was keen to find out as much as I could about being pregnant.

I borrowed books from friends and the library and read as many pregnancy magazines as I could find from cover to cover. These magazines were with me every step of the way and became my pregnancy, baby and child bible. If I needed advice they were one of the first places I looked. They had pictures to show how my baby was growing week by week and they were full of helpful advice – an amazing resource for a first time mum.

I kept them all and referred back to them when my sons reached the relevant stages. In fact, it was only a couple of years ago when my youngest was 4 that I finally sent them for recycling and I couldn’t help having a quick flick through some of them before they went!

Three years later, when I was pregnant again, I found that things had changed somewhat! At first, I turned to magazines to guide me through my pregnancy but this time, the books were replaced by the Internet. Initially I used the baby magazine websites but I also found other websites that were full of useful pregnancy advice from friendly mums.

Being a mum already I was able to offer support and advice as I was no longer a ‘first timer’.  I really enjoyed being a member of the community and logged on most days to see what everyone was up to.

Now, technology has moved on even more; from apps for your smartphone to keep you up-to-date with your baby’s development, to mummy blogs for sharing the ups and downs of pregnancy, technology and the internet has truly changed the way we can approach pregnancy.

Who knows where technology will take us in the next 10 years – it will certainly be interesting to see! Which pregnancy forums are your favourite?