Magazine

A scattered pile of wooden sorting blocks on a living room rug

My Desperate Search for "Spielzeug fΓΌr 1 JΓ€hrige" (Toys)

Yesterday at 5:14 AM, I staggered into the living room to grab a burp cloth and stepped directly onto a plastic cow that immediately began mooing "Old MacDonald" in a haunting, battery-depleted baritone. My 11-month-old daughter, sitting in her playpen,...

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A wooden toy block and a soft baby blanket on a messy living room floor.

Spielzeug ab 3 Jahren: The Brutally Honest Guide for Parents

There I was, barefoot in my own living room at 6:30 in the morning, stepping squarely on a tiny plastic firefighter hat that came with some massive, overpriced fire truck my oldest got for his third birthday. I’m just gonna...

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A wooden and crochet baby teether resting on a folded organic cotton blanket.

What I Got Wrong About The Humble Baby Teether

It was three in the morning and my daughter's chin looked like a slip-and-slide. She was chewing on my knuckles with the jaw strength of a pitbull, soaking right through her organic baby tee with a volume of saliva that...

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Wooden infant activity arch over an organic mat in a Chicago apartment.

The ugly truth about that neon plastic baby play gym you just bought

I was sitting cross-legged on my living room rug at three in the morning, holding a screwdriver and weeping quietly over a piece of molded plastic that required four D batteries. The box promised it would stimulate my newborn's cognitive...

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Two toddlers wrapped in a colorful leaf pattern bamboo blanket on a grey rug

The Absurd Reality of Dressing Babies in Wood Pulp

When we first decided to investigate the sheer volume of apparel made from bamboo flooding our social media feeds, I received three entirely contradictory pieces of advice within a single Tuesday. My mum, a woman who still quietly believes a...

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A dad trying to put white mineral sunblock on a squirming eleven month old boy at the beach.

A Clueless Dad's Guide to Surviving Sunscreen for Babies This Summer

I'm currently pinning my eleven-month-old son against my chest with my left forearm while my right hand desperately tries to smear a thick, chalky white paste across his nose. He is thrashing like a crocodile in a death roll. He...

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Dad holding a baby girl wrapped in a subtle terracotta rainbow bamboo blanket next to a pram

Surviving the pink tulle avalanche: Practical presents for girls

I was staring at a mountain of aggressively pink tulle that had somehow swallowed our entire living room. It was day four with twin girls, the house smelled vaguely of sour milk and sheer desperation, and the delivery driver had...

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Marcus's 11-month-old baby reaching for a wooden block on the living room floor.

Why I Stopped Trusting the Internet About Early Development Toys

When my son was about four days old, my mother-in-law bought us a plastic command center that flashed strobe lights and yelled the alphabet in a robotic British accent. "He needs cognitive stimulation," she told me with absolute certainty. The...

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Toddler sitting on the floor next to an open cardboard box of Kianao baby products

Exposing the Real Job of a Brand Ambassador in the Baby World

I was sitting on my living room rug at two in the afternoon on a Tuesday, trying to bribe my screaming toddler with a half-eaten graham cracker so he would hold a wooden rattle for exactly three seconds. The natural...

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