"Mommy" and neighborhood list serves (Minneapolis, Brooklyn Park: homeowners association, neighborhoods)

[Tarheelappeal]

My husband and I are still contemplating a move to the Minneapolis area as he continues the interview process with Target (north Campus). Where we currently live, there are lots of options for being in communication with neighborhoods and other parents - a region wide list serve called DC urban moms, which has moms and dads, area list serves like "mothers of North Arlington," twin club list serves, etc. Additionally, most neighborhoods have civic associations also have active list serves where people keep informed about projects and issues that are county wide and those that are more local. I've been poking around but have not come upon similar to this, but instead have found mostly "meet-up" lists and homeowners associations managed by developers of neighborhoods.

We've been looking at Maple Grove in particular, but are still very open to other areas in an easy commute to Brooklyn Park that have great schools and easy access to bike paths, etc.

Any recommendations on lists other than the city data site that might be geared specifically toward parents of school aged kids and/or toward potential residents of limited geographical areas?

Thanks in advance. This list is such a great resource and I do so appreciate all the long-timers who take time each day to read, review and respond to the varied inquiries that get posted each day.

[golfgal]

Maple Grove is a good option, also consider the areas in the Mounds View School district, Mounds View, New Brighton, parts of Shoreview, etc.

Don't know any specifics on "mommy" lists but I'm sure they are out there. There are not many HOA around here so but the few I know of do have an internet site with contact info.

If your children are not yet in kindergarten, we do have a fantastic program called Early Childhood Family Education, ECFE. It is available in every school district in the state and is a wonderful way to meet families. If your children are school age, you will have opportunities to meet people through the schools. I do know that "meet up" is a popular way to meet people here as well.

[uptown_urbanist]

I haven't discovered any urban mom equivalent. The meetup groups can be pretty active, though, and the ones that I belonged to had message boards. Can't speak for the suburbs out that way or how it works in a place with developers/subdivision, but in my part of the metro (city of Minneapolis) the neighborhoods have active neighborhood associations and often either run their own email lists and/or have active Facebook pages. It seems like more and more places have been migrating to Facebook, so I'd check there.

[MnMomma]

ECFE is great.

MOMS Club has a Maple Grove chapter: https://sites.google.com/site/momsclubmaplegrove/

MOPS has several groups in the area and there are several Moms of Multiples groups in the Twin Cities.

I don't think any of them have online forums, but you could always contact them with questions. Usually there are Facebook pages for groups of moms, but they are hard to search for if you don't know what they are called--one of the above clubs could point you in the right direction.