Magazine

Messy stack of folded baby blankets and burp cloths on a nursery dresser

The Great Baby Blanket Confusion: What Are Receiving Blankets?

When I was pregnant with my oldest (bless his chaotic, fiercely independent heart), my mom told me I needed at least twenty flannel blankets because babies are fundamentally leaky creatures. Two days later, my mother-in-law handed me a stack of...

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Stressed mom drinking coffee looking at a pile of baby clothes

Was ziehe ich meinem baby an? A very tired mom's clothing guide

It was 3:17 AM, and I was standing in front of the hallway thermostat wearing Dave’s stained Ohio State college hoodie, holding a screaming seven-week-old Maya. The digital display said 71 degrees. I was sweating. Maya was sweating, mostly because...

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Exhausted dad holding baby while scanning diaper QR code on smartphone

Data-Obsessed Dad Review: The Truth About the Pampers Club App

It's 3:14 AM, the ambient temperature in the nursery is exactly 68.5 degrees, and I've a small LED flashlight gripped firmly between my teeth. I'm trying to smooth out a crinkled plastic wrapper from a fresh sleeve of Swaddlers so...

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Jess folding a mountain of baby clothes while drinking lukewarm coffee

A Letter to Past Jess About Finding a Quality Kids Boutique

Dear Jess from last October. I'm currently staring at a giant black trash bag sitting in the hallway that's full of neon, plastic-feeling shirts that somehow shrank three sizes in a single wash, and pants where the knees blew out...

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A desperately tired dad holding two crying twin baby girls

The baby shower gifts exhausted parents actually want

We were sitting in our ground-floor flat in Zone 3, staring at a six-foot-tall synthetic velvet giraffe named Barnaby that my wife's great-aunt Susan had just proudly manhandled through our incredibly narrow hallway. Barnaby didn't do anything. He didn't hold...

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Pregnant woman sitting on a rug looking extremely stressed holding yarn

My very messy, tear-filled attempt at babydecke stricken

It was 3 AM on a Tuesday in November 2016, and I was sitting cross-legged on our hideous, scratchy brown living room rug. I was seven months pregnant with Leo, wearing my husband Dave’s oversized college hoodie, and I was...

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Toddler wearing a neutral organic bodysuit representing nachhaltige mode

Why your baby skin actually needs nachhaltige mode to heal

Don't buy the fifteen-dollar dinosaur onesie multipack from that targeted midnight social media ad. I know it looks like a steal when you're nursing at three in the morning and your impulse control is completely shot. I did exactly this...

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Close up of dense yarn stitches on a safe baby blanket

The Brutal Truth About Heirloom Crochet Baby Blanket Patterns

3 AM in pediatric triage is a specific kind of purgatory. The fluorescent lights hum, everything smells vaguely of bleach, and you're running on stale coffee and adrenaline. I was three years into my nursing career when a frantic grandmother...

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Toddler running in garden wearing sustainable boys apparel and a sun hat

Why the clothing industry is completely wrong about little boys

There's this incredibly persistent, borderline dangerous myth floating around the local playgroups that dressing male children is somehow the easy way out. The working theory goes that while parents of girls are trapped in a complex matrix of tights that...

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