Nursing/Postpartum Tuesday: Baby Rattle & Sensory Teether Ball

For those whose spring uniform includes drawstring pants, j crew factory has their spring sale currently. Drawstring linen blend pants half off and down to about $30. They only have 1 color in shorts now.

Any recommendations for a couples counselor in DC/MD/NoVa, and/or online? No major issues, just a confluence of (relatively) minor ones that we’d like to make sure don’t fester.

Any tips for handling a 3 year old regression to acting like a baby? I thought it would be a short phase but it’s been going on for months and it’s driving me absolutely crazy. Even before this phase I feel like she was kind of behind developmentally (she can’t dress herself, eats mostly with her hands, isn’t potty trained, etc) so the pretend helplessness about the things she knows how to do is especially frustrating. Also is it weird that this is happening in the absence of any external factors? The internet says it’s normal for older kids to regress developmentally when there’s a new baby, but there’s no new sibling (or any other obvious source of stress, other than the pandemic, which isn’t new).

how important is a fireplace to you when buying a house? we are considering a house that has one but it is in a downstairs office as opposed to the main room. our realtor made a comment how for resale a fireplace can be important bc people want to decorate for Çhristmas, need a place for santa to come down the chimney, etc. We are Jewish so this never crossed my mind. thoughts?

I need a gut check. I have what I imagine is the opposite problem of a lot of women, and I know I should be grateful but — ugh. My husband never stops. Like never. He is always working or cleaning or doing something productive. Our kids are little (under 3) and we both work full time, so we have so much to do and I get it. But after bedtime, sometimes I just want to watch tv or stare at my phone for an hour. I know it’s not a good use of time, but I’m so darn tired and brain dead by that point. It’s becoming an issue because while he doesn’t say anything most of the time, I know it annoys him and it’s painfully obvious that he thinks I should be doing — something more productive than doing nothing. And meanwhile, I feel bad trying to relax while he’s doing dishes or whatever and am tired of the looks and sighs and general passive aggressiveness.

Weekends are more of the same. We might watch one 30-minute episode of a show together on a Saturday evening but that is literally it.

I’ve tried to take on more or do the dishes instead, etc. but he wants to do them himself (apparently I don’t do them “right” according to his method.) And while I think I do a fairly even share of the work otherwise, 8:30-9:30 is just not my best time for accomplishing anything. So I’m left feeling both lazy and worthless and like I can’t relax, and I am so over it.

Perspective please. I’m a huge whiner, right?

Hm. I am your husband (although I do like my veg time, too!) so this is helpful perspective on what my husband probably feels. Thank you.

What we/I did was make a list of things that “need” to be done for me to relax and not be irate that my husband is vegging while I’m still scurrying around. Basic stuff like kitchen clean, table wiped, cat litter box cleaned, dumping ground by the front door tidied up, and folded laundry put away (by mutual agreement, I do all the folding, husband is in charge of putting away). If all that is done, I will not begrudge DH his veg time, because it’s on me if I want to do elective additional tidying.

Talk to me about daycare and sun protection. Do you sunscreen kiddos beforehand in the morning? We sent a hat but it doesn’t seem from pictures that they ever put hats on.

Can someone talk to my about late talkers? My daughter is 16 months and only says “mama.” But she seems to understand everything – she can follow multistage instructions and I’ll just say something casual that we haven’t worked on and she’ll do whatever it is. (E.g., my mom the other day handed her an empty cup and said “can you put this on the little table in the kitchen?”) and she wandered into the kitchen and put it on the coaster on that little table. She also hasn’t been in daycare due to Covid – my parents have been doing childcare. So I feel like maybe the people she’s around just know what she means when she points at something and grunts and hasn’t had a lot of incentive to talk.

But am I kidding myself? Everyone keeps telling me about how their young toddler is talking up a storm, so I’m starting to wonder if I’m just deluding myself. Ped wasn’t worried at her 15-month appointment – said we’d check in on it at her 18 month.