Magazine

Baby sleeping safely in a bare crib without any loose rainbow blankets

Why that rainbow baby blanket stayed completely out of our crib

I was staring at a pile of crumpled tissue paper in my mother-in-law's living room when I finally unwrapped it. It was a rainbow blanket, heavy and soft, knitted by an auntie who knew exactly what my previous year had...

Read more

A tired dad holding a wooden baby rattle while looking at his laptop

Why I Was Completely Wrong About Rasseln FΓΌr Babys As A New Dad

It was Tuesday at roughly 4:12 PM, and my living room looked like a warehouse explosion at a brightly colored plastics factory. I was sitting on the rug holding a neon green plastic hippo. I shook it. It emitted a...

Read more

A worn out baby security blanket with a stuffed rabbit head on a crib mattress

The 3 AM bunny and blanket crisis that broke me

My hands were elbow-deep in a hamper of sour-smelling sleep sacks at three in the morning. The radiator in our Chicago apartment was making that metallic rhythmic clanking sound it always makes when it drops below zero outside. From the...

Read more

Jess holding a bottle of alcohol free baby conditioner while her toddler splashes in the tub

The Big Secret About Baby Conditioner With No Alcohol Labels

I'm currently sitting on a damp bath mat that smells vaguely of mildew, squinting at the tiny print on a plastic bottle while my four-year-old tries to make a pirate beard out of toxic-looking blue bubbles. He is my oldest,...

Read more

A confused dad holding a toddler's anti-allergy duvet while looking at a smart room thermometer.

Debugging infant sniffles: My search for an allergie bettdecke

It's 3:14 AM and I'm watching the infrared feed on the baby monitor like a security guard waiting for a museum heist. The audio feed is just a continuous, wet, whistling sound. My eleven-month-old sounds exactly like our espresso machine...

Read more

A frustrated dad looking at a complicated winter stroller footmuff setup.

Debugging Cold Walks: Fußsack für Kinderwagen Winter Guide

It was forty-two degrees in Portland, the wind was doing that miserable sideways misting thing, and I was sweating profusely while trying to compress what looked like a tiny, furious Michelin Man into a stroller seat designed for a normal...

Read more

A stressed dad holding a folded organic cotton baby duvet in a dimly lit nursery.

Finding a Bettdecke fΓΌr Allergiker When Your Baby Hacks All Night

The timestamp on the baby monitor was exactly 3:14 AM, and the little volume graph was flashing a hostile, aggressive orange. Our eleven-month-old wasn't crying, which almost made it worse. He was just lying there, producing this dry, rhythmic hacking...

Read more

A messy nursery with a spider plant hanging far out of reach from a toddler.

Surviving Nursery Greenery: The Truth About Baby Plants

It was 10:14 AM on a Tuesday, and I was wearing Dave’s oversized college hoodieβ€”the gray one that has had a suspicious, permanent yogurt stain on the left cuff since 2019. My coffee had been reheated in the microwave four...

Read more

Exhausted dad staring at a massive wicker peacock chair in a narrow hallway

Why navigating baby shower chair rentals nearly broke my spirit

It was pouring with rain, naturally, because this is London, and I was wedged firmly between our Victorian front doorframe and a fifty-seven-inch-tall wicker peacock chair. My wife, Sarah, who was approximately eight hundred months pregnant with the twins at...

Read more