Reviewed Jan. 25, 1:15 p.m., Explorer 5.0 (store.yahoo.com/naturalbaby/naturalbaby.html)

a friend of The Cybercritic’s who was intent on raising a child whose lips would never touch sugar and whose skin would never brush against synthetic fibers used to rave about The Natural Baby Catalog, which sells clothes and bedding made of cotton and organic fibers, along with homeopathic health products, wooden toys, and the like.

While it’s easy enough to fall in love with the extensive product line, the Website itself is like the proverbial blind date with a great personality. In short, it’s ugly, particularly the amateurish home page. Although there’s a Natural Baby logo on top, the Kids Stuff logo on the side leads to an identity crisis. In actuality, Kids Stuff is the parent company of Natural Baby and its sister catalogs, Perfectly Safe, Healthy Feet, and Jeannie’s Kids Club, but that’s not explained anywhere I could see.

The navigation is pretty straightforward, at least, as is the search engine. And on the bottom of every page is a link inviting you to subscribe to an e-newsletter. But when you click on a picture to see it enlarged, it takes a lo-o-o-ong time to download. And even then, the detail ain’t great.

Worst of all, the site’s not fun. You’re hard-pressed to find pictures of babies, and while the copy explains why you’re better off buying toys made of organic cloth rather than polyester, it doesn’t make the prospect sound too appealing.

Reviewed Jan. 25, 1:15 p.m., Explorer 5.0 (store.yahoo.com/naturalbaby/naturalbaby.html)

a friend of The Cybercritic’s who was intent on raising a child whose lips would never touch sugar and whose skin would never brush against synthetic fibers used to rave about The Natural Baby Catalog, which sells clothes and bedding made of cotton and organic fibers, along with homeopathic health products, wooden toys, and the like.

While it’s easy enough to fall in love with the extensive product line, the Website itself is like the proverbial blind date with a great personality. In short, it’s ugly, particularly the amateurish home page. Although there’s a Natural Baby logo on top, the Kids Stuff logo on the side leads to an identity crisis. In actuality, Kids Stuff is the parent company of Natural Baby and its sister catalogs, Perfectly Safe, Healthy Feet, and Jeannie’s Kids Club, but that’s not explained anywhere I could see.

The navigation is pretty straightforward, at least, as is the search engine. And on the bottom of every page is a link inviting you to subscribe to an e-newsletter. But when you click on a picture to see it enlarged, it takes a lo-o-o-ong time to download. And even then, the detail ain’t great.

Worst of all, the site’s not fun. You’re hard-pressed to find pictures of babies, and while the copy explains why you’re better off buying toys made of organic cloth rather than polyester, it doesn’t make the prospect sound too appealing.