Magazine

A minimalist wooden baby play gym set up on a soft living room rug.

Why I Finally Ditched the Neon Plastic Baby Play Gym

It was a Tuesday, roughly 2:15 PM in late October 2017. Maya was exactly fourteen weeks old, and I was wearing a pair of dark grey maternity leggings that I had absolutely no intention of retiring anytime soon. They had...

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A tired dad looking at a laptop while a baby chews on a wooden play gym ring.

Dear Past Marcus: Troubleshooting the Great Baby Mat Matrix

Row 47 of my "Baby Infrastructure" Google Sheet is where my sanity finally encountered a fatal error. It was 2:14 AM. The ambient temperature in the nursery was exactly 71.4 degrees, I had logged 11 wet diapers for the day,...

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A tired dad staring analytically at an organic cotton baby play mat on the floor

Debugging Tummy Time: What You Actually Need From A Baby Mat

There's this deeply embedded cultural myth that to successfully raise a functional human infant, you must provide them with a floor space that looks and sounds exactly like a Las Vegas casino. When Leo was about two months old, I...

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A neutral infant play mat on a living room floor covered in scattered baby toys and an abandoned coffee cup.

Why Most Infant Play Mats Are A Trap (And What Actually Works)

I was on my hands and knees in the middle of my living room, frantically trying to scrub curdled breastmilk out of a felt lion’s mane with a single dry baby wipe, while my three-month-old screamed like I was actively...

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Two babies lying on a high contrast floor area surrounded by wooden toys

Why The Wrong Infant Play Mat Will Ruin Your Tuesday Afternoon

It was 2:14 PM on a particularly bleak, rain-lashed London Tuesday, and a plastic, primary-coloured toucan was aggressively singing a distorted, tinny version of β€˜La Cucaracha’ while swinging precisely three inches above my daughter’s nose. I was sitting on the...

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A messy living room floor with a round waterproof baby mat and wooden toys.

How I Finally Found a Play Activity Mat That Did Not Drive Me Crazy

When I was pregnant with my oldest, Tucker, I swear everybody had a loud opinion on where exactly the baby was supposed to exist when I wasn't holding him. My grandmother told me to just throw a handmade quilt on...

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