BabyJourney

A free, self-hosted NICU baby journey tracker for families. Track updates, vitals, milestones, and share progress with loved ones.

Built with: Node.js, Express, EJS, Turso (database), Cloudinary (images)

Setup

1. Deploy to Render

Click the button above. You'll be prompted to fill in environment variables.

2. Create a Turso Database (free)

1. Sign up at turso.tech
2. Create a new database
3. Copy the Database URL and generate an Auth Token

3. Create a Cloudinary Account (free)

1. Sign up at cloudinary.com
2. Copy your Cloud Name, API Key, and API Secret from the dashboard

4. Set Environment Variables

Variable	Description
ADMIN_PASSWORD	Password to access the admin dashboard
VIEWER_PASSWORD	Password for family/friends to view the site
TURSO_DATABASE_URL	Your Turso database URL (libsql://...)
TURSO_AUTH_TOKEN	Your Turso auth token
CLOUDINARY_CLOUD_NAME	Your Cloudinary cloud name
CLOUDINARY_API_KEY	Your Cloudinary API key
CLOUDINARY_API_SECRET	Your Cloudinary API secret
STORAGE_LIMIT_MB	Image storage limit in MB (default: 1024)

Optional:

Variable	Description
VAPID_PUBLIC_KEY	For push notifications (generate with npx web-push generate-vapid-keys)
VAPID_PRIVATE_KEY	For push notifications

5. Custom Domain (optional)

Add a CNAME record pointing to your Render service URL, then add the custom domain in Render settings.

Local Development

git clone https://github.com/chucksupport/BabyJourney.git
cd BabyJourney
npm install
npm run dev

No env vars needed locally — uses a local SQLite file and disk uploads by default.

Features

• Updates with multiple photos
• Vitals tracking with charts
• Milestone tracking (pre-loaded NICU milestones)
• Push notifications
• PWA (installable, works offline)
• Themeable (6 color themes, light/dark)
• 1GB storage limit per instance (configurable)
• JSON backup/export

Made with love by Chuck.Support