My Humbling Defeat to the Baby Bubble Romper: A Tech Dad's Guide
Tuesday, 2:14 PM. That was the exact timestamp on my smart home logs when I realized trying to wrangle rigid denim onto a screaming eleven-month-old is a foolproof way to break your own spirit. My wife was at a conference,...
A Dad's Guide to Smoking Baby Back Ribs for Tiny Humans
Dear Marcus from exactly six months ago, You're currently standing on the back patio in the Portland drizzle. You have a pair of metal tongs in one hand and your phone in the other, aggressively Googling Traeger recipes. Inside, your...
The Day My Toddler Brought a Wild Baby Hare Into Our Kitchen
I was elbow-deep in cold dishwater trying to scrape dried oatmeal off a plastic bowl when my four-year-old marched through the back screen door with his hands cupped together like he was protecting a fragile treasure. He had that specific,...
Finding a Backyard Rescue: What Do Baby Possums Eat?
My oldest son, Jackson, is a walking cautionary tale for why you should never let a five-year-old play unsupervised near a woodpile. Yesterday, he came marching through the back door holding something gray, hairless, and wriggling in his hands like...
When the Backyard Becomes a Skunk Nursery (And How We Survived)
At exactly 2:14 AM on a Tuesday, I was sitting in the dark, compiling a massive block of legacy code, when I smelled it. It wasn't the usual Portland ambient scent of wet pine needles and artisanal coffee. It smelled...
Baby Blue Bridesmaid Dresses: The Pregnant & Nursing Mom Guide
I was physically trapped inside a chiffon prison. I was seven months pregnant with Leo, sweating profusely in a tiny bridal boutique fitting room that smelled heavily of vanilla aerosol spray, and my husband Dave was standing on the other...
What a Screaming Backyard Wild Bird Taught Me About Motherhood
It was 102 degrees in the shade, the kind of Texas summer afternoon where the air feels like hot soup and you sweat just blinking, and I was up to my elbows in diaper cream when the back screen door...
Does Too Much Light Make the Baby Go Blind? The Honest Truth
Dear Priya of six months ago, You're currently sitting on the edge of the glider in the dark. It's 2 AM. You just took a photo of baby g because his arms were above his head in that weird starfish...
Baby Back vs St Louis Ribs: Surviving The Family BBQ With Toddlers
My brother-in-law's backyard in Naperville smelled like hickory smoke and impending disaster. I was holding a lukewarm paper plate of potato salad while watching my toddler, who was wearing nothing but a diaper, aggressively gnaw on a piece of barbecued...