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I was sad to see longtime maternity brand Japanese Weekend close up shop recently — in part because their Bengaline pencil skirt was THE skirt to get if you wanted a skirt for maternity wear. (Personally I preferred dresses, but that’s just me.) This other skirt from Ripe Maternity is highly rated on Amazon, available in four colors, and comes in sizes XS-XL. Pregnant mamas (and recently pregnant mamas), what was your favorite maternity skirt for work? Ripe Maternity Suzie Pencil Skirt Here’s a plus-size option. Building a maternity wardrobe for work? Check out our page with more suggestions along both classic and trendy/seasonal lines. (L-3)Sales of note for 9.10.24
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- Zappos – 26,000+ women’s sale items! (check out these reader-favorite workwear brands on sale, and some of our favorite kids’ shoe brands on sale)
Kid/Family Sales
- Carter’s – Birthday sale, 40-50% off & extra 20% off select styles
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And — here are some of our latest threadjacks of interest – working mom questions asked by the commenters!
- The concept of “backup care” is so stupid…
- I need tips on managing employees in BigLaw who have to leave for daycare pickup…
- I’m thinking of leaning out to spend more time with my family – how can I find the perfect job for that?
- I’m now a SAHM and my husband needs to step up…
- How can I change my thinking to better recognize some of my husband’s contributions as important, like organizing the shed?
- What are your tips to having a good weekend with kids, especially with little kids? Do you have a set routine or plan?
Anon says
Do most babies really consume the same amount of milk after they start on solids?
Anonymous says
Mine did, but she started solids early (4.5 months) per the doc because she wasn’t gaining well on milk alone. She was on the way low end of milk consumption for her cohort at daycare. As soon as we started solids she gained weight really really well and milk stayed steady.
Around 9mos-1 year I’d say volume of liquids really decreased.
Meg Murry says
Mine wound up wearing far more of the solids than actually eating them for quite a while – so I’d say it wasn’t until they really got the hang of solids and were eating multiple times a day that milk consumption really went down – maybe around 9 months?
Somewhere in the 7-8 month timeframe my youngest stopped chugging down his milk so quickly and sometimes had to be encouraged to finish the final ounce, so we cut bottles back by about 1/2 an oz – but that was about it.
ChiLaw says
I had the same experience as MM. For the first few months (6-9, or so) she just played around with the food and nursed/had bottles pretty much exactly as before. Around 9 months food started to be something that filled her up, and milk became pretty much just supplementary by 12-13 months. She self weaned around 15 months.
anon says
Mine ate solids like a champ beginning right when we started (5.5 mo), and did not cut down on formula at all until about 9 or 10 months. Dropped about 5 oz at that time. Around 13 mo we stopped offering more than 16 oz of milk and it was not an issue.
Lyssa says
Mine just turned one, and I’d say that it wasn’t until the last month or two that her formula intake really decreased. But when it did, it decreased very quickly; over just a few weeks, she went from eating around 30 oz a day to just 10-12.
SoCalAtty says
So far. 15-20 ounces a day at 9.5 months!
PinkKeyboard says
Mine is still drinking 18 to 24 ounces a day at 11.5 months. She eats 3 full meals and 2 snacks a day. Yesterday for example: breakfast = 2 scrambled eggs with spinach, 1 piece toast, 1 cup blueberries snack= string cheese or cheerios lunch=spinach, turkey, and cheese meatballs (3), peas, ww pita (half), nectarine. snack=string cheese or cheerios dinner=2 pork ribs, corn salad (1/2 cup), 1/2 baked potato w/butter and salt, 5-6 strawberries. She’s a bottomless baby pit though…. Daycare told me she ate her entire breakfast (adult sized yogurt, cheerios, entire nectarine and blueberries) and then ate the daycare breakfast (berry pancakes and turkey bacon). She weighs 20 lbs, I have no explanation for how this is physically possible.
Anonymous says
Anybody have an audio-only monitor they’d recommend? I have a video monitor from #1 that is good enough, but doesn’t have enough range that we can bring it outside or to the basement/Rec room of our new house so we want an audio monitor with a big range to bridge the gap.
The reviews are all over the map so was hoping for first hand recs.
Momata says
Philips Avent. We have a big old house (read: heavy construction) and it’s never out of range. We also like the nightlight, two-way talk, and lullabye feature.
Anon says
We have the Angelcare monitor (AC401) and have been really happy with it. Our house is pretty big and we have not had any issues using it with baby on another floor, even when we are on the front or back porch.
lala says
We also have a Phillips Avent one that seems to work well (I have no comparison other). My husband can take it in the yard if LO is napping and it has a temperature monitor that you can set to alarm if it gets too hot in the room.
CLMom says
When do babies like reading books? I can’t get my 7 month old to sit still and read. She’d rather be crawling around and exploring.
CPA Lady says
I know you’re “supposed” to read to your child from the moment she is handed to you in the delivery room, but I didn’t read to my daughter much before the age of 1. She would just grab the book out of my hand and gnaw on it every time I tried to read to her. So I just … didn’t. I probably read to her about 30 times in her first year. But around age 1 she was old enough to focus on the book and look at the pictures. Now we read to her a TON and she loves books. Don’t worry about it. You’ll have plenty of time to read when she’s a little older.
Anonymous says
Yeah, we’ve had ups and downs. I’d say somewhere over a year is when she really started to enjoy them. And now she LOVES her books – they are her favorite toy. I wouldn’t worry at all.
Anonymous says
My seven month old likes them for short amounts of time. And some books more than others. He looooves The Foot Book and recently has started helping me turn the pages which is the cutest thing ever. But, only short books, and just before bed, when he’s calm.
CLMom says
The Foot Book is a good one. But I’m even struggling getting through a 1-10 picture board book.
MomAnon4This says
Yes. Alphabet books are too long until about age 2.
“count” yourself lucky if you can get through 1-5, or a rhyming book (Goodnight Moon, Sandra Boynton books).
At this stage/age, just get the baby comfortable with books are a thing that are fun, and let her/him see you reading something that is not a device (because they don’t know you’re reading on the device).
And, it’s ok if they eat board books. They’re safe (says my favorite children’s librarian)
anon says
I am getting SO TIRED of The Foot Book. It is the only acceptable bedtime story, apparently, and must be read a minimum of three times in one sitting. OMG.
rakma says
A recommendation I got from an early literacy expert was to read to babies while they’re in a high chair or other containment device. Sitting in a lap and reading is something we didn’t really start until DD was probably 1.5.
ChiLaw says
I worried about this with my kiddo, but then around 14 months books became her One True Love. Like we spend entire weekends just reading through her bookshelf, over and over. I can recite so many books by heart. She has favorite pages (anything with an owl or an octopus) and gets so excited when we’re about to get there. Before this phase, I’d try to get her when she was tired, or I would just lie on the floor and read aloud “to myself” to try to get her attention. But I was definitely worrying for nothing, because I can’t imagine a kid loving books more than my gal does, even after her lukewarm start.
Lkl says
I think it is child-specific. Ours liked them from about 5 months on, as much as a 5 month old can like something, but only really started paying attention and wanting multiple books around 9 months. We had done “tummy time on mommy or daddy” after bottles as part of our routine, and when tummy time was no longer a thing (when he started crawling), we subbed in reading time. We also had it as part of the bedtime routine beginning around 5 months (before that, books were TOO EXCITING). But YMMV, because I think it really depends on your kid and his or her interests. Ours was not that interested in moving around until later on.
Anonymous says
Agree that it’s child specific. My first would sit still and read books since like day one; my second (1.5 years) is only now starting to sit still for a whole book. I have found that books with interesting textures help.
SC says
My son was the same way around 7 months — he either completely ignored me and crawled around while I tried to read, or he just chewed on the books. I think it was around 10 months that he started paying attention to short books with one word and a picture on each page, mainly because he liked turning the pages. Gradually, he started liking certain pages (he kisses Big Bird in one of his books). He’s almost 14 months old now, and he likes his books now. We can read 10-15 in a row, but he still won’t pay attention to a single page for more than 2 seconds, so books with just one or two words or extremely short sentences are still best. For books with longer sentences or more of a narrative, we just abbreviate the story or point out one thing on the page.
Frozen Peach says
Sandra Boynton’s books are what changed this for my LO, right around 10 months.
CPA Lady says
Oh POOOOOOOKIE! It’s time for bed now!
SC says
Funny–DS is almost 14 months now, and he hates Sandra Boynton’s books. And Goodnight Moon. I like the Sandra Boynton books though, and I’m desperate for some variety. DH and I had an argument a couple of months ago because my 10th reading of “Elmo Goes to the Zoo” was not enthusiastic.
hoola hoopa says
Of my sample of three kids, only one liked reading books at that age. The other two were much more in the ~15 month zone before they had any interest in books beyond chewing.
They are all, of course, geniuses – so don’t fret too much over the critical importance of early literacy (it is important! But 15 months is still ‘early’!). Keep books around, try different books, etc, but don’t push it, drive yourself mad, or think that you’re doing it wrong.
Recommendations to try: Touch and feel books (try a few), books with flaps (try a few), books with doodahs (finger puppet, holes, moveable parts, etc), poke-a-dot, pop-ups, baby faces, animals, crinkle.
Favorites:
Baby Talk (A Lift-the-Flap Book)
Goodnight, Baby (Ibaby)
Good Morning, Good Night!
Peek-a-Boo What?
In My Nest
Horn to Toes / Moo Baa Lalala
Hand Hand Fingers Thumb
PinkKeyboard says
Mine (11 months) will read books sometimes, we have a lot better luck when she’s tired and with books that suit her interests (animals and food). The Sandra Boynton (sp?) are also big hits. I also throw a few down on the floor with her and she likes to kind of “read” them to herself by babbling and looking at the pictures and then attacking and eating them.
PinkKeyboard says
Also, anything with real pictures in it. We have a farm book with pictures of everything on a farm- HUGE HIT.
Playing hooky? says
So my 3 year old woke up normally, got ready for preschool, had a bowl of cereal, immediately told me she felt sick, and then threw it up. I took the day off and prepared for a day of couch snuggles and puke buckets.
Whelp, it’s 2.5 hours later and she’s totally fine. A little ginger ale and 3 (!) pieces of peanut butter toast have stayed down fine. She tells me she feels great (which she did this AM
Until saying “mama mama I feel sick and bad!” And promptly barfing).
It’s 84 degrees and sunny out. Am i insane for thinking of taking her to the park / beach? She doesn’t seem sick at all. I had the same milk she had in her cereal and feel fine, so I don’t think it’s that. Maybe she just ate too fast?
Day is a wash for work anyway so if we can have an unexpected fun day I’d like to take it…
Anonymous says
Oh my gosh, go for it.
Anon says
I would suggest the beach so there is less of a chance of her directly interacting with other kids (in case she actually does have something), but I would totally take her out. Sometimes kids just randomly puke. My niece does it all the time.
Betty says
Absolutely take advantage of your found time! In my experience, that is how 3 year olds work. I took a day about a month ago when my daughter got car sick on the way to preschool. I thought she may be sick but after nearly having to restrain her just to keep her calm an hour later, I gave up and we played. I would steer clear of anywhere that she could come into close contact with another kid but the beach sounds perfect. Enjoy your time.
Meg Murry says
If she’s normally a napper, you probably don’t want to skip nap in case she really is coming down with something. But if she doesn’t normally nap, or if she usually only takes a short nap, then yeah, I’d go out.
I’d just take your own snacks so you don’t wind up eating greasy pizza or similar while out, and a puke bowl/bucket/bag for the car in case she starts to feel sick again.
But yup, my kids have both had random “puke and rally” incidents.
Relatedly, it took years to put together that my cousin was mildly allergic/intolerant to milk. He generally tolerated it fine (or seemed to be tolerating it fine, never complained of tummy ache, diarrhea etc), but once he got the tiniest tummy bug it made him puke every time – but only milk products. So that’s something to consider.
lala says
Do it! If she gets sick, at least you’ll be outside.
Playing hooky? says
Reporting back in that we had a fantastic day. She doesn’t nap, so that wasn’t an issue. We packed a picnic for the beach (which is also the park) and got ice cream on the way home.
Pretty glad j told daycare “I’m keeping her home because she’s barfing” so I couldn’t just drop her off!!
Batgirl says
This is probably a really basic question, but I’m new to motherhood and pumping and can’t figure out how to make this work. We’re doing a 5-6 hour road trip with our then-six week old next week. I’d like to bring some bottles of pumped breastmilk in the car as an emergency tool in case of freaking out crying. Even apart from the trip, I’d like to know — if you’re used to warming the bottle, how do you give a baby a bottle of refrigerated breastmilk out of the house? And how long can we keep it on ice in a cooler in the car?
mascot says
Could you nurse instead? You’ll need to be stopped regardless so you can burp the baby so it’s not like you can just do a complete bottle feed while moving.
You could always take a thermos of warm water to put the bottle in and take the chill off. Or, this is a good time to get baby used to taking a bottle at any temperature. A friend of mine encouraged me get baby used to drinking bottles straight from the fridge and it was a game changer. We could go from warm boob to cold bottle and anywhere in between without a fuss.
Momata says
I second the advice to try to get your baby to take cold milk — it really saves a step, especially for those times when you’ve delegated feeding to somebody else and the bottle just isn’t as quick as the b@@b.
I think bmilk can sit out for 6 hours. I consider “on ice” to be equivalent to refrigerated – so you should be totally fine for the entirety of your trip.
CLMom says
I did a 6 hour road trip with a 9 week old. Feed/change diaper right before you leave. Try to make it over the half way mark before stopping to feed/change again, which will hopefully mean only one stop on your trip. Baby should sleep most of the time.
I strongly suggest getting baby used to room temp and cold milk. This will prove beneficial at other times, too. Thankfully, mine wasn’t picky about temp so we had the option to use the cooler stash of milk. Also, I pumped while in the passenger seat. You wouldn’t have to warm freshly expressed milk. Do not expect the suction/power to be the same as when it’s plugged into the wall. I am very happy with the Freemie adapters for my Medela pump.
Be prepared to sit in the back seat with baby to hold the bottle.
Sarabeth says
I did this in the backseat with a hand pump. Pumped, then gave baby the freshly pumped milk. I responded well to the pump, so it might not work as well if you need a long time to let down, but it worked well for me.
Anon says
Personally I would BF since that calms my baby down way more than a bottle, which for my kid really only serves the purpose of delivering the milk. Also, I am guessing you will either need to nurse or pump at least once during that trip, and nursing seems like a lot less work. But if you really want to give a bottle, BM can stay at room temperature for 6 hours, so I would just throw the bottles in my diaper bag. I got my baby used to drinking cold milk initially, but daycare warms the bottles so now he refuses cold milk. He will still take room temperature milk, though, so if I want to give him a bottle I just throw it in my purse before we leave the house and it is room temperature by the time he needs to eat.
dc mom says
If you can’t bre@stfeed and just want to pop in a bottle while in the car – I would keep the bottle cold in a cooler and warm them up by having a thermos of hot water. It’s a pain and involves an extra step, but it felt nice to have all my options with me in case of a meltdown. I did this while flying with my baby and it worked well.
Meg Murry says
If you have b-milk in bags, they warm a lot faster than warming in a bottle (and take up less room). I’d put bags of milk in the cooler and pack a clean empty bottle or two in the diaper bag. If you pop the bag of milk in the thermos of hot water it will be ready within a minute or two.
Also, this won’t help while you are in the car, but if you are ever out and about and need to warm a bottle, most restaurants will give you hot water from the coffee machine, or very worst case you can order hot tea with the teabags on the side.
However, be prepared that if baby has truly reached freak out crying stage, they may not be willing to accept anything but nursing. Possibly baby will take a bottle from your driving partner while you stay out of sight, but be prepared to find a safe place to take a break and nurse.
ChiLaw says
A cooler with an ice pack should be totally fine, but I would join the chorus in suggesting you consider feeding baby directly from the tap on the road if that’s possible. We did a two-day road trip with a 3-month baby and we just stopped at rest stops / fast food places every 3 hours or so for diaper changes and nursing. Getting baby to drink cold milk (we did that by just… offering it to her? and she didn’t care?) was such a great thing — makes babysitting and daycare and all of that so much simpler.
SC says
I’ll be the voice of dissent (sortof). Take the pumped breast milk as an emergency tool. I did a road trip with my baby when he was 2 months old, and he needed more than he could get nursing that day. Maybe he was bored or lonely and eating and snuggling was interesting or felt good, or maybe mild dehydration or the less-than-ideal conditions of nursing in the backseat of the car (while stopped) lowered my supply or ability to express. Whatever the reason, we needed the backup milk.
Also, put the milk in a cooler. Yes, it can sit out for 5-6 hours, but 6 hours is about the limit. You may hit traffic, you may need to stop for an unexpectedly long time or stop more than once to nurse/feed, your AC may break, your car may break down. (All these things happened on our 4-5 hour road trip with my 4 month old last year, although the broken AC was the first symptom of the car breaking down. Yes, it was the trip from hell.) Try to get your baby to drink cold milk before you go, for lots of reasons. If it’s not working, you can buy travel bottle warmers with car adapters for under $20.
Anon in NYC says
Agreed – sometimes it’s simply not feasible to nurse a baby on the road for a variety of reasons. You’ll want the pumped milk. We found that keeping it on ice in a cooler definitely kept it cool for a few hours, and it was easy to warm it up (slightly) in our hands.
FTMinFL says
I did an 8-hour road trip with an 8-week-old and did all of the same stressing about logistics. I had a bottle, just in case, but ended up stopping and nursing twice. It made the trip so enjoyable – we all got to get out of the car for a little while and I didn’t have to worry about pumping, cleanup, etc. I highly recommend making things as simple as possible!
MomAnon4This says
My kid liked/loved/was starved for refrigerated milk. No worries. If s/he doesn’t want it, s/he isn’t that hungry. It’ll be fine.
Anonymous says
What age did you wean your kids from bottles? We only use sippy cups during the day but still have a bottle in the morning and at night. I know the pediatrician said to stop at a year (she’s just over a year) but that didn’t seem feasible at the time. Now wondering if we should bite the bullet.
No Judgment says
We still do one bottle of cows milk in the morning and my daughter is 21 months old. I know its bad, but it is the only time she will drink enough liquid to be able to give her her medicine that has to be mixed with 6+ ounces of liquid.
For milk or water with meals and snacks, she uses cups and has from around the time she turned 1.
EB0220 says
I think my oldest had bottles until around 14-15 months. By the end, it was just one bottle of cow’s milk at night. Kiddo #2 never had bottles at home, so she stopped at 1 when she moved to the toddler room.
TBK says
My kids are two and they still get bottles in the morning. My understanding is that it’s walking around with a bottle that’s the problem — that they sip on it and the constant drip of milk on teeth can cause cavities. One of mine is really, really attached to bottles and since they have them for all of 10-15 minutes in the morning, I just can’t see the harm. I figure in another few months they’ll be old enough to use the “big boys like you don’t use bottles. Bottles are for babies” routine to get rid of them altogether. But for now I’m not pushing it.
Anonymous says
Pretty much 12 months on the nose. They were switching over at daycare and it also seemed impossible to give up the nighttime bottle, but our baby adjusted within two days. I couldn’t wait to stop washing bottles so we were motivated to make it work! We just put them away and went cold turkey.
Ms B says
+1, aided largely by daycare. They had been moving to sippy cups for about six weeks before then and then started actively pushing to get rid of all bottles to ease their transition. In retrospect, this really was helpful because OMG the amount of time I saved not having to wash bottles!!
Now if we only could get rid of the sippies . . . although I really do appreciate that they keep the house and car clean . . .
Lkl says
Just before the 12 month checkup. For our baby’s temperament it seemed easier to do all the bottles at once (and bedtime bottle was not one he was particularly interested in, for some reason, maybe because we eat dinner late just before his bedtime). It went fine.
ChiLaw says
At about a year, because I stopped pumping and she only ever had b-milk from a bottle anyway. At 16 months-ish she’s about 50% sippy cup, 50% open cup. It’s messy, but she’s gotta learn at some point!
SC says
At just over a year. We made the switch from formula to milk first, so we were only changing one thing at a time. but as soon as he was used to cow’s milk, we went cold turkey on the bottle . For about a week, DS pushed away the sippy cup and fussed about it, but he made up for the lost calories from milk with food. By the end of the week, he was fine. I don’t think it’s a big deal to wait, but (a) I figured it would be easier when he was younger, and (b) our pediatrician’s wife is a dentist, so our pediatrician is a little conservative about things that are supposed to affect teeth/mouth development.
MomAnon4This says
My 13+ month old only has 1 1/2 teeth – gosh he’s cute.
So we’re using soft-spout sippy cups right now.
Honestly, he’s a 2nd kid – I wouldn’t care so much about stopping bottles at home except that #3 is coming along any day now and I don’t want #2 grabbing #3’s bottle of expressed breastmilk.
hoola hoopa says
I wouldn’t worry about a bedtime/morning bottle since it’s not his only method of drinking (in other words, he’s learned to use a sippy). Sucking on a nipple (or paci) isn’t bad for their teeth alignment until much later (when baby teeth start to get loose), and the bigger concern is tooth decay from dribbling milk from bottles left in sleeping mouths and/or wandering around with a bottle of milk (same for a sippy of milk or juice! keep non-water at the table).
My kids have ranged from 10 months (self-quit!) to 16 months.
Butter says
Related to the discussion on the main site on Thursday or Friday, do you love where you live? If so, why? We love our city and our region but the COL is high and housing is a bit of a nightmare, which has become much more glaringly obvious to us in the wake of having a kid. We talk about moving to some smaller city with a lower COL, but aren’t sure where that mythical city with a good job market actually is. I enjoyed reading about everyone’s perspectives on the main site, but would love to hear from parents where they enjoy raising their kids – or where you wished you were living instead.
Anonymous says
I don’t like to publicize my city because it feels like a million people are already moving here (literally) but Austin, Texas is a great place to raise kids. The housing market has gotten a little crazy, but not bad if you are moving from a place like NYC, LA, or DC. Austin feels family friendly with lots of outdoor activities and a relaxed vibe overall. The traffic is really bad and it can be difficult to find the right job if you are not in tech, but as far as big cities that are good for families, I think this is a good fit. I do wish we were living some place a little smaller/cheaper/slower, but my career sort of demands a larger city. In my fantasies, we move to a Denver suburb and frolic in the mountains. Ha!
MN says
Mythical city is twin cities, MN. 3.6% unemployment, low (but rising slightly) COL, great public schools, great parks, good public transit. Winter weather is balls, but the cities are set up to deal with it so you just bundle up and get on with your day.
If money were no object I would live somewhere warmer and send my kid to private schools, but for people who work for a living, twin cities has a lot going for it.
EB0220 says
Raleigh/Durham/Chapel hill area is my favorite, and I’ve lived in a lot of places. Southern weather but not southern culture, great job market, relatively LCOL, very kid-friendly, lots of well-educated professionals, great schools. Jobs and housing are relatively well-distributed so traffic is not as bad as (say) Austin in my opinion.
EB0220 says
One thing I don’t like about the RTP area is that the airport is small. We’ve lived in hub cities before and air travel is much easier with a major airport.
Spirograph says
I enjoyed that thread. I can’t say I love the DC area. It’s expensive, the traffic is bad, and I cannot abide the summer heat and humidity. I used to think I was type A, but by DC standards I’m not, and the achievement mentality here is exhausting. I do kind of love my neighborhood, though, which has great parks, lots of families, and a small town feel that has surprised me. I also like that all the DC museums and cultural activities are close, and there’s a lot more diversity than where I grew up. DH and I have every intention of moving abroad or somewhere in the US with a lower COL and a slower pace within the next 5-10 years, but the longer we’re here the more it grows on me. And the job market is really unbeatable in our fields…
If we do move, we’ll target places with a better outdoor culture. I like seasons; while DC’s spring and fall are glorious, summer is gross and winter isn’t winter-y enough for winter sports. I would still want to be within an hour or so of an international airport and museums/concerts/professional sports, preferably in a small/medium sized city with some kind of walkable downtown area. (I’m not sure where this exists. Suggestions welcome!)
Anonymous says
Portland, Maine is pretty close to hitting all of your wants. It’s 2 hours from Boston, where you can get professional sports teams and big museums, but it has its own museums and cultural scene. It’s also pretty close to several decent college museums. The airport is the big drawback.
Meg Murry says
We moved back to the area where I grew up not long after we were married (went away for college and a couple of years after that). For me, the main draw is just that “this place is home, these people get me” in a way that no other place has felt, no matter how much I otherwise liked living there. I also have a very large extended family, and I love having my children grow up in the middle of that, and having the built in support structure of that extended family.
One of the key reasons we moved back to my hometown itself instead of a neighboring town/city/suburb was that it’s a very small city (under 10,000 people) with relatively a lot going on and it is fairly walkable/bikeable. My 9 year old has just started being able to bike around town to get to friends houses, school and summer camp, and I love the freedom that gives both him and us.
It was also important to me to at least have the option to use the public schools, and I really hope the middle and high school continue their upward trends they’ve had over the past 10-15 years. We also agree with the overall school district philosophy of not letting test results be the only thing that defines them – some of the neighboring districts are on a race to be the “best” – but do so by emphasizing test practice and tons of homework over allowing kids to have time to explore art, music or other things that they aren’t being tested on.
I think we would have been completely different parents/people if we didn’t have grandparents to lean on – we would have to work a lot more to pay for extra hands, or we would be a lot more stressed.
hoola hoopa says
That sounds great. Good for you! We’ve had serious discussions about moving back to one of our hometowns for all the reasons you say – except that we can’t get jobs there! Too small for our industries :( And since we’re from two different regions and currently live ‘halfway’ between the two, we’d feel like we were choosing sides.
hoola hoopa says
By that I mean choosing between my family or his.
JJ says
I live in the DFW area. I’m not madly in love with it, but I enjoy living here and think it’s a great place to raise a family. I work in a suburb, so we live in a suburb with excellent schools, full of young families, and tons of parks and public services. The cost of living is low, housing is affordable (although the prices are rising) and Dallas/Fort Worth have tons of cultural museums and activities that you wouldn’t expect. Also undervalued is that the airport is American’s hub, so it’s easy and cheap to get a flight to anywhere, and living in the middle of the country means it’s easy to get to either coast.
JJ says
Echoing above, I’ll add that the main reason we live here is because both sets of grandparents live here, as do some extended family. We absolutely lean on them for back-up care and babysitting and to me that is priceless.
missing the city says
So we lived in NYC and just moved almost a year ago to a college town in the South (but not like deep south and not as awesome as somewhere like austin or raleigh/durham/chapel hill, which is/would be the dream if I ever decide to try to leave the university I’m at). While we didn’t have control over where we moved (thanks academic job market), we were starting to feel over NYC, pleased with our fate, and excited to buy a house, pay half as much for daycare, etc. And though we’re starting to get more accustomed to small town life, I miss NYC every day. I would much rather live in a HCOL city crammed in a tiny apartment with the world at our fingertips than where we live. I didn’t appreciate how cosmopolitan everyone was when we lived in the city but now I am surrounded by people who haven’t left the state or say things like “thank god you got out when you did,” which always depressed me because there were so many benefits of raising kids in NYC.
Anyway, TL:DR I didn’t think it would be a huge deal to move from a HCOL city we always had mixed feelings about to a LCOL town but it turns out that it was, even if live is significantly easier to navigate with two kids down here. I actually miss the difficult things, like trying to get kids up four flights of stairs while carrying 4 bags of groceries and soaking wet from the rain you had to walk home through…
Anon in NYC says
I love love love NYC with 1 kid. I’m not sure if we can swing it, financially, with two kids. Between rent + daycare, we’re strapped, and I’m not sure that trying to stay in the 5 boroughs with two kids (moving somewhere less convenient, more suburban, navigating the public school system, etc.) versus just buying something in the NYC suburbs makes sense. But it pains me to think about giving up the city.
If we were to leave NY altogether, we’d probably move to another more urban area (SF makes sense, job-wise, but Austin or Portland both seem like great cities).
Anonymous says
I think you live in my town. You described it so well.
CLMom says
As a southern California native, I do not think I could survive another climate. LA is expensive, but there are so many different areas and neighborhoods that you can find affordable, family-friendly locations with green space and good schools.
Also, there are way more options to take public transit to downtown than most people realize. I loved sleeping on my commuter bus back in the day.
Anon says
Omaha, NE. LCOL, affordable housing, low unemployment, good schools, and plenty of family-friendly activities (currently, the CWS). One of the suburbs (Papillion) has been voted one of the top places to raise a family about a dozen times from various magazines and websites. No international airport though :(
Anon for this says
*waving* Hello from another Omaha working mom! I agree that Omaha is a great place to raise a family.
From Omaha says
Yay! Love Omaha
LateToTheParty says
Late to the party, but another Omaha working mom here!
SC says
New Orleans. It’s LCOL, near lots of family, good weather most of the year, lots of family friendly activities, beautiful architecture, unique neighborhoods, and a vibrant culture. On the flip side, it has terrible public schools (although the charter system seems to be improving things somewhat), a high crime rate, poor public transit, and a job market that goes up and down with the oil industry. I also get frustrated that there are not many good places to go for a weekend road trip (which to me is 5 hours driving or less), and the airport is not quite large enough to have a lot of options for direct, cheap flights. But even with the cons, I love it here and have no interest in moving.
anon says
I’ve got a very similar pros/cons list for Savannah. Fortunately we have a few more options for road trips which makes up somewhat for the smaller, expensive airport.
Chattanooga says
I posted about Chattanooga on the main s i t e, but I’m coming back to sing its praises. I love everything about it except for the schools, but there are good public schools in certain areas, so even that isn’t a total thumbs down.
We live 10 minutes from downtown in a neighborhood with big yards and old trees and houses built in the 1950s. The mortgage on our 1700 sf 3/2 house with a big attic and big basement is $900 a month, including insurance and taxes. Traffic is not bad, there are tons of things to do with little kids– a great children’s museum, the aquarium, Coolidge park, great playgrounds, tons of hiking and outdoors activities, chill restaurants. It’s a small enough town that you run into the same people everywhere, so it’s easy to make friends. We run into our child’s daycare friends and their parents at the playground we go to, for instance. The private schools here are really good too, though expensive. However, the generally LCOL will allow us to afford private school without a struggle. The weather is great if you like warm weather. Which I do. We get snow maybe twice a winter, and it’s typically less than an inch. The whole city shuts down in a complete state of panic, which I think is charming.
My husband and I make a combined income of around $150k, and I feel like we live like kings. We aren’t blowing our money on Louis Vuitton or anything, but we both pretty much buy everything we want, fund our retirement, easily afford daycare (less than $800 a month per kid), and don’t feel crunched at all. My 10 minute commute really adds to quality of life with a little kid. The city is also so incredibly beautiful. Driving into downtown over the Tennessee river, seeing the mountains and the sun shining down… it’s so great. Love it here.
Anonymous says
I have long suspected that Chattanooga is what I wish Austin still was! Now if only I could find a job there in my line of work!!
Butter says
I remember your comment the other day. This sounds perfect and exactly what we’re looking for! Sounds like Anonymous and I will be competing for jobs there soon… ;)
Anonymous says
PDX suburb, formerly in a hip PDX neighborhood but left for schools and yard.
I love our region. It’s HCOL. Housing costs have skyrocketed, and I’ve read we have some of highest child care costs in the country. Comparing with friends, I’d say it’s similar to NoVa in childcare and not far behind in housing. The employment market is fine. It’s not blowing up, but it’s definitely not shrinking.
I’m okay with our city. I really like some things related to family life (overwhelming support for schools, financial and otherwise; every restaurant is family friendly; Costco is handy; parks are very well planned and maintained), but not others (no public recreation department – everything is private gyms and spendy; hours for everything are set for SAH parents; not walkable/bikeable at all). I also like that our city is diverse in income and race/ethnicity; my kids’ classrooms are similar to a cross section of the US. As an adult human, I like that we have so many bird species and open views in our ample yard in a neighborhood of ample yards, but I do not like the traffic congestion and long commute or lack of interesting options for food, culture, etc (feels homogenous and dull compared to our urban neighborhood).
anon says
I live in NYC, and I have a love/hate relationship with it but don’t forsee leaving. The main reason is I work in the arts, and I highly value the incredible access to the arts we have here. Now with a small child, it is more theoretical than practical, but someday…also my job would be hard to replicate elsewhere. I mean, I could probably find a similar job–I do fundraising for a nonprofit theatre company–but the range of choices in the field would be much smaller. My husband is a high school teacher, and we live in fairly deep Brooklyn in order to afford this. If I lived elsewhere I could maybe work less and have more time to actually make art, but it is hard to say if I would actually do it. We have no nearby family but have built up a lot of great friends and community; having grown up in places where I never felt like I fit, this means a lot to me. Major downsides are: COL, everything is a pain, and everything is crowded. Two kids would probably push us over the edge, but we’re sticking with one.
Twin Cities! says
Not sure if anyone is still reading, but the Twin Cities at one point had the highest number of per-capita theater seats outside of New York, at least in North America. We have an incredible theater community, including a historic theater district and a bunch of fringe theaters. We also have a huge variety of public schools (and private) for a teacher to choose from. So if you ever want to find a lower cost of living and a wide variety of jobs…look here!
TBK says
Super gross question. One of my sons seems to consistently poop sometime in the middle of the night. I check on them when I go to bed, around 10:30 or so, and if I smell a dirty diaper, I’ll get that twin up and change him. But most nights they’re clean as of my bedtime. But when I come in in the morning, this one always has a dirty diaper and by the slightly dried/sticking to his backside/crotch I can tell it happened a few hours earlier. This is causing really bad diaper rash. The purple Desitin does a good job on it, but poor little man was walking funny this morning his diaper area was so red and sore. This happens at least 3-4 times a week, so the diaper rash never fully clears up before he has another bout. Since it seems to be happening at like 4:00am, I can’t figure out what to do about it. Any suggestions?
Anonymous says
We use just vaseline. I find that sometimes the diaper rash creams are actually irritating. Really heavy on the vaseline though – like thick enough to see it on the skin over the whole area covered by the diaper. This should create a physical barrier so the poop doesn’t irritate the skin.
Plus lots of diaper free time in the morning before breakfast to let it air out after all night.
A warm bath before bed might help him poop earlier. One of my twins poops in the tub all the time – he hates it but it’s clear that the warm water relaxes him – I’d rather deal with cleaning the tub vs. chronic diaper rash though.
Syd says
Try putting the diaper cream on before they go to bed as a preventative measure. It won’t stop the diaper rash completely but it should help protect the skin during those few hours!
Anon says
Do you put Desitin on before bed? We started doing that most nights when I stopped changing diapers in the middle of the night. My cousin goes a step further and applies a layer of aquaphor with the desitin. It creates a barrier that prevents anything from actually sitting on the skin if they go to the bathroom (it also has the added benefit of making clean up super fast and easy in the morning since everything wipes off easily).
TBK says
Why did it never occur to me to put anything on before bed? Thank you everyone! This should make a big difference.
(was) due in June says
We use diaper cream with every. single. change. Aquaphor diaper cream during the day, and triple paste at night. Nothing prevents or cures diaper rash like Triple Paste.
Anon in NYC says
Aquaphor is our go-to as well!
hoola hoopa says
It will make a huge difference! Good luck!
It’s always upsetting when they end up in that cycle, but luckily it will shift – hopefully soon!
JEB says
My pediatrician recommended something called Calmoseptine when my daughter had a terrible diaper rash that just wouldn’t clear. It was amazing and cleared everything up quickly. It’s our go-to now when we have occasional issues. I found it on Amazon.
TBK says
Thanks! Just ordered some.
lucy stone says
Does anyone have a Spectra S1 breast pump? I was thinking of getting it for my insurance covered pump to keep at work, since it’s apparently super quiet, but almost everyone I know is a Medela person.
Butter says
I have the Spectra S2 and I love it. It’s quiet, small, and gentler than my Pump in Style. I also like that it’s more customizable. The big pain is the parts (harder to find) but you can buy the adapters that let you use Medela parts, it’s just a little bit more to remember in the morning.
GGFM says
I keep an S2 at the offie and a Medela PIS at home and prefer the S2 for the same reasons (plus, have the same complaints about harder to find parts). I started off with Medela so all of my bottles were narrow neck vs. Spectra’s wide neck – purchased some bottle adapters online and the problem was easily solved. It’s much quieter than the PIS, which I like for the office.
LC says
I have an S1 and I love it. I bought it out of pocket on the advice of my lactation consultant, who recommended it as superior to Medela and certainly to my Ameda Purely Yours — the only pump my insurance would provide, and which I find to be only barely better than useless. It’s not only super quiet, but it’s also much more comfortable. I second Butter’s comment that the only drawback is that the parts are a little harder to find.
BKDC says
I haven’t even purchased my yet, but it was highly recommended to me by the staff at my local breastfeeding center. My insurance provides me with an Ameda Purely Yours, which I found to be absolutely terrible the last time I pumped. This time, I’ll be purchasing a Spectra (not sure which one yet) OOP rather than deal with the Ameda.
Katarina says
I have a Spectra S2 and an Ameda Purely Yours. While I find the Spectra better than the Ameda, the Ameda was fine for me. The Spectra is quieter than the Ameda, and I find it easier to get a letdown. However, I only had the Ameda for my first, and it worked fine. It is much smaller, I never understood why people kept a pump at work, until I got my Spectra.
Closet Redux says
Does anyone have any experience testing positive for the antibody that can cause hemolytic disease of the newborn? I am of course freaking out.
Anonymous says
Ask them to retest. My son screened high on a newborn test. It would have screened him in to undergo further testing. I asked what the result was and what the cut off was. It was very close to the cut off so I asked them to retest. Turned out that he screened out on the second test so the further testing was not necessary. I felt comfortable with the result because he exhibited zero symptoms of what he had screened positive for.
Closet Redux says
Thanks for this. I am just at the end of my first trimester, so I am the one screening positive.
Anonymous says
At this stage, request they retest you (presuming it’s just a blood test and not something invasive). If it is positive, ask about how this changes plan for labor and delivery, do you need to go the hospital earlier than normal when you go into labor? Will baby need any NICU time once arriving? Knowing what to expect can help ease your mind. You can also look into the ASOG guidelines to see if what you’re being told is best practice.
Anon in NYC says
My friend did. She was freaked out and a little grossed out by the thought of the RhoGAM shots but did them during her pregnancy and her daughter is fine.
Anononono says
Just because of my blood type, I had to get the RhoGAM shots during pregnancy. I had always known I would need them (like, before I even knew I wanted kids) so it didn’t feel like a huge deal to me. I hope that this is just a tiny bump in the road! <3
Closet Redux says
Thanks everyone