Magazine

A tired mother holding a newborn surrounded by practical baby items instead of stuffed animals.

The Brutal Truth About Buying Actually Useful New Baby Gifts

I'm staring at a pair of infant converse sneakers. They're the size of a jalapeΓ±o. They have actual, functional laces. Someone spent real money on these at a baby shower last weekend, and I know exactly where they're going to...

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Exhausted mom in sweatpants holding a baby wearing breathable sleepwear

Why Thick Baby PJs Are Ruining Your Sleep (And What Actually Works)

It was 2:14 AM and I was standing in the hallway wearing those gray Target sweatpants with the bleach stain on the thigh, holding a mug of coffee that had been microwaved so many times it tasted like warm pennies....

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A pile of folded secondhand baby clothes next to a wooden toy

The No-Nonsense Guide to Buying Secondhand Baby Stuff Safely

I was standing in a humid church gymnasium at 7 AM on a Saturday, seven months pregnant with my oldest son, fighting a woman in a denim jumper for a plastic bouncy seat that smelled faintly of sour milk. I...

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Pediatric nurse Priya checking the harness tension on a rear-facing baby car seat

The freezing truth about strapping infants into baby car seats

It's February in Chicago, the wind chill is somewhere around negative twelve, and I'm standing in the concrete wind tunnel of Northwestern Memorial's parking garage at two in the morning. My husband has his phone flashlight clenched between his teeth....

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A bewildered dad staring at a massive list of baby registry items

Surviving the Buy Buy Baby Registry (And Other Twin Tales)

It was a Tuesday evening, somewhere around week nineteen of the twin pregnancy, and I was staring at my iPad with the kind of mounting dread usually reserved for unexpected tax bills. My wife had just handed me the tablet,...

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Exhausted dad holding two baby sleepsuits looking hopelessly confused

The 3AM Zipper Panic and Finding the Perfect Baby Schlafanzug

It's 3:14 in the morning on a Tuesday in late November, and I'm sitting in total darkness on the floor of the nursery trying to match up what feels like forty-seven tiny metal poppers on a sleepsuit while Twin A...

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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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Toddler clothes scattered across a wooden nursery floor

Dear past Priya: The unapologetic guide to kinder kleider

You're currently pinned to the nursery floor. Your toddler is starfish-spread across the rug, screaming because his green pants feel too spicy today. You're sweating through your scrub top, twenty minutes late for your shift at Rush, staring at a...

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A dad holding an 11-month-old baby dressed in layered organic winter clothes.

Debugging Baby Winter Temperature: A Dad’s Layering Logic

We were twenty-two minutes into the deployment phase of leaving the house, standing in our freezing Portland driveway, when the entire system crashed. I had just spent a quarter of an hour wrestling my 11-month-old son into a heavily insulated,...

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