Magazine

A messy baby shower prize table with organic blankets and coffee gift cards

The brutal truth about baby shower prizes your guests actually want

I was thirty-four weeks pregnant, sweating through a maternity dress in a stuffy Chicago living room, watching my auntie aggressively hand out neon pink loofahs to women in their mid-thirties. The air was thick with the smell of catered samosas...

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Wooden play gym and wrapped eco-friendly gifts sitting on a table at a Portland baby shower.

The Truth About Baby Shower Game Prizes: What Guests Truly Want

I was standing in our living room holding exactly forty-two miniature plastic pacifiers threaded onto pastel pink ribbons, staring blankly at my wife. Outside, it was doing that classic Portland drizzle, but inside, our house had been converted into a...

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A pregnant woman laughing on a sofa while avoiding terrible party activities.

Brilliant Baby Shower Game Ideas That Won't Make Guests Flee

I'm sitting on a terribly uncomfortable velvet pouf in a semi-detached house in Richmond, watching my wifeβ€”who's thirty-four weeks pregnant with twins and currently harboring the pelvic stability of a Jenga tower in an earthquakeβ€”pretend she enjoys sniffing a nappy...

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A group of millennial women laughing around a coffee table at a modern baby shower.

Ditching the Cringe: Baby Shower Activities People Actually Like

I was standing in my sister-in-law's cramped kitchen, holding a flimsy plastic spoon, trying to scrape melted, lukewarm Snickers out of a newborn diaper while seven women I barely knew stared at me in absolute silence. The chocolate had congealed...

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An exhausted dad staring at his laughing 11-month-old baby in a soft organic cotton bodysuit

System Specs vs Reality: Surviving Your Comedic 11-Month-Old

It's 2:43 AM, and I'm holding a tiny human who's laughing hysterically at a completely blank wall. I'm staring at my phone's spreadsheet where I track his input/output logs and exact ambient room temperature (68.4 degrees, for the record), trying...

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