Magazine
How I Built a Baby First Aid Kit Without Losing My Damn Mind
It was 3:14 AM on a Tuesday, and my 11-month-old son felt like a tiny, screaming space heater. I was frantically tearing apart our master bathroom cabinet, tossing aside half-empty bottles of adult cough syrup, stale melatonin gummies, and a...
My Bizarre Search for a Baby Firefly Costume and What I Learned
The baby monitor on my secondary display currently reads exactly 68.4 degrees, which is supposedly the good ambient temperature for an eleven-month-old to achieve deep REM sleep, though she's currently doing this weird phantom nursing motion with her mouth that...
From Sterile Nurse to Farm Baby Mama: Why I Let My Kid Eat Dirt
I'm sitting on a slightly damp bench in Lincoln Park watching my fourteen-month-old son actively consume a handful of topsoil. He pauses to chew, looks thoughtfully at a passing golden retriever, and goes back for seconds. A year ago, I'd...
The Day My Toddler Tried To Steal A Baby Emu At The Local Texas Farm
I was knee-deep in East Texas mud, holding my oldest son by the straps of his denim overalls so he wouldnβt launch himself into a wire fence, while a six-foot-tall dinosaur of a bird stared a hole straight through my...
What the Baby Emmanuel Parents Taught Me About Child Safety
I was wearing Mark's ancient grey fraternity t-shirt with the mysterious bleach stain on the collar, sitting on the edge of the cold porcelain bathtub at 2:14 AM. Leo, my youngest, was going through his extremely fun "I only sleep...
Baby I'm Preying On You Tonight: Surviving Sleep Regressions
It was 3:14 AM on a Tuesday, and I was pinned to the squeaky gray glider in our nursery wearing a nursing tank that smelled strongly of sour milk and desperation. My son Leo was exactly four months old, and...
The Weird Baby Oil Diddy Drama Taught Me A Vital Skincare Lesson
I was elbow-deep in the bathtub trying to scrub a week-old, half-peeled Paw Patrol temporary tattoo off my oldest son's shoulder blade when my phone buzzed with the tenth internet joke of the morning. Between packing up fifteen monogrammed burlap...
Is My Child an Alien Baby? A Troubleshooting Log for Past Me
Dear Marcus from exactly six months ago. You're currently standing over the bassinet in the pitch black, holding your phone flashlight cupped in your palm so Sarah doesn't wake up, watching a tiny chest stop rising for what feels like...
The Alex Vesia Baby Update Broke My Brain: A Note To Past Me
It's 2:14 AM here in Portland, the rain is aggressively battering the nursery window, and I'm sitting on the floor staring at a terrifyingly small pile of clothes. Dear Marcus from six months ago: I'm writing you this system log...