Magazine

A small black portable breast pump sitting on a bedside table next to a coffee cup.

Dear Past Me: Finding Sanity With the Baby Buddha Breast Pump

Dear Priya from six months ago. You're currently sitting on the cold bathroom tiles at 3 AM. The heavy white plastic box of your standard issue insurance pump is plugged into the wall, trapping you within a three-foot radius of...

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A soft bamboo blanket and organic cotton retro shorts folded on a nursery chair

The tiny tuxedo myth and other hard truths about baby boy gifts

I was sitting at my cousin's baby shower in Naperville last month, watching her unwrap a tiny, stiff tweed blazer. The tags said zero to three months. It had elbow patches. Everyone cooed, but I just stared at it, calculating...

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Mom holding a coffee cup while looking at a baby boutique clothing display.

Dear Past Me: The Real Truth About That Local Baby Boutique

Dear Sarah from exactly six months ago. I'm writing this to you because I know exactly where you're standing right now. You're in the middle of the fluorescent-lit hellscape of a massive big-box store's baby section, and you're sweating profusely...

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A sleep deprived mom holding a glass baby bottle in a dark nursery.

How to Choose a Baby Bottle Warmer Without Losing Your Mind

I distinctly remember standing in my kitchen at 3:14 AM with my oldest kid screaming his lungs out in the other room. I was staring bleary-eyed at a frozen bag of breastmilk, listening to the hum of the refrigerator, and...

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Priya dealing with the baby boomer age range during a nursery visit

My 2 AM Fight About the Baby Boomer Age Range and Safe Sleep

The radiator in our Chicago apartment was hissing that dry, rhythmic sound it only makes in late January. It was two in the morning. I was standing in the doorway of the nursery, rubbing my eyes, watching my mother try...

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Millennial mother holding her toddler while looking at her aging parents in a messy living room

Surviving The Baby Boomer Age With A Toddler In Your House

I brought my aging parents to live with us in Chicago last winter. Don't attempt to merge decades of generational trauma and a teething toddler by just smiling and pretending you've unlimited emotional bandwidth. It was a Tuesday when I...

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Diane Keaton holding a baby in the 1987 movie Baby Boom next to a modern exhausted mom

Why Watching Baby Boom As A Parent Feels Like A Personal Attack

It’s 10:43 PM on a Tuesday, and I'm sitting on the left side of my couch wearing college sweatpants that have a literal hole in the knee and a maternity bra that I haven’t actually needed for two years but...

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Close-up of organic bamboo baby blanket next to a painted nursery wall showing the exact baby blue hex shade.

How to Debug the Exact Baby Blue Color Code for Your Nursery

Three different people gave me completely conflicting advice while I was standing in an empty room holding a dry paint roller. My mother-in-law called to insist I needed to find something she referred to as "stork blue" because it supposedly...

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Messy pile of yarn and a half-finished blanket on a living room rug

The Truth About That Heirloom Crochet Baby Blanket

I was thirty-seven weeks pregnant with my oldest, sweating completely through a gray maternity tank top in the middle of a Texas July, when my grandmother proudly pulled a massive, neon-yellow afghan out of a plastic grocery bag. It had...

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