The 2 AM Envelope Meltdown and Other Baby Shower Realities
It was exactly 11:43 PM on a Tuesday, and I was sitting on my living room rug wearing my husbandβs stained college sweatpants, aggressively stress-eating cold leftover macaroni and cheese out of a Tupperware container. Spread out around me were...
Debugging Baby Shower Messages: A Clueless Dad's Before and After
It's 11:14 PM, the nursery thermostat is locked exactly at 69.5 degrees because my wife insists that's the good sleep environment, and I'm staring at a blank piece of cardstock. The baby monitor on my desk looks like a paranormal...
The brutal truth about picking baby shower places in the summer
It was ninety-four degrees in the Lincoln Park Conservatory when I realized my sister-in-law had made a terrible mistake. She had booked a corner of the botanical garden for my baby shower because the natural lighting filtering through the glass...
Dear Past Marcus: Please Stop Overcomplicating the Baby Registry
You're currently sweating through your vintage Timbers hoodie, keeping nineteen browser tabs open, hovering your cursor over an "Add to Cart" button for a Bluetooth-enabled diaper pail. I need you to step away from the keyboard. It's me. Future Marcus....
Surviving the pink tulle trap of modern girl baby showers
I was exactly twenty-eight weeks pregnant, sitting on the floor of my Chicago apartment, surrounded by three garbage bags of neon pink tulle. My mother-in-law had just left after proudly declaring my upcoming baby show would be a princess paradise....
Debugging Baby Shower Venues: A Portland Dad's Honest Breakdown
My mother-in-law cornered me by the fridge to say the party absolutely had to happen in a formal tea room with finger sandwiches and little forks. Two hours later, my lead developer sent a Slack message insisting we just host...
How to Pick a Pink Baby Shower Dress Without Losing Your Mind
I was standing in the middle of a Texas roadhouse bathroom in July, six and a half months pregnant with my oldest, trying to peel a blush-pink polyester maxi dress off my damp skin so I could pee for the...
What Is A Baby Shower (And Why I Was Totally Wrong About Them)
I'm currently staring at a spreadsheet I built eleven months ago titled Baby_Shower_V1_Final.xlsx. My original strategy for figuring out what's a baby shower was to treat it like a vendor procurement meeting. I thought we could just email our friends...
What to wear to a baby shower when nothing fits (a survival guide)
Sarah was wedged inside a floral maternity dress that had, seemingly overnight, transformed from breezy summer elegance into a highly restrictive sausage casing. It was mid-July, she was thirty-two weeks pregnant with the twins, and our own baby shower was...