Budget Thursday: Striped Pleated Skirt
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This is a fun, cute skirt that looks like it could be much more expensive than it is. In a quick perusal of Anthropologie, they have several mid-length, colorful, pleated skirts being shown for fall — and this one is a very convincing dupe. I really like the wide stripes and the color combo, and extra points for an elastic waist — woo! The way it is styled here looks a little crazy to me and definitely does not do the skirt justice. I would do a simpler shirt, shoes with a heel or block heel, and accessories that matched the skirt. The skirt is $24.99 at Target and comes in sizes XXS–XXL. Striped Pleated Skirt
A plus-size option is $29.99 and comes in sizes X–4X.
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Sales of note for 9.10.24
(See all of the latest workwear sales at Corporette!)
- Ann Taylor – 30% off your purchase
- Banana Republic Factory – Up to 50% off everything + extra 20% off
- Boden – 15% off new styles
- Eloquii – $29 and up select styles; up to 50% off everything else
- J.Crew – Up to 50% off wear-to-work styles; extra 30% off sale styles
- J.Crew Factory – 40-60% off everything; extra 60% off clearance
- Lands’ End – 30% off full-price styles
- Loft – Extra 40% off sale styles
- Talbots – BOGO 50% everything, includes markdowns
- Target – Car-seat trade-in event through 9/28 — bring in an old car seat to get a 20% discount on other baby/toddler stuff.
- 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
- Hanna Andersson – Up to 50% off all baby; up to 40% off all Halloween
- J.Crew Crewcuts – Extra 30% off sale styles
- Old Navy – 40% off everything
- Target – BOGO 25% off select haircare, up to 25% off floor care items; up to 30% off indoor furniture up to 20% off TVs
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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?
1. I’m not feeling that skirt.
2. I definitely bribed my kid to get dressed and go to daycare with a fruit gummy this morning… which he got when he was at school, fully dressed, actually sitting on the potty at school.
3. Then one of the daycare teachers (young, college-aged woman) told me that I’m what she aspires to be when she’s ‘a real adult’.
4. Are we like 100% sure I have to feed my kid a varied diet and can’t just let him eat Mac and Cheese and PBJ and cereal for every single meal…?
I could dig that skirt for the weekend maybe? with pointy flats and a white vneck tee or something? It’s something I would probably think was cute on another mom at the park but wouldn’t ever try myself.
Couple’s counseling comes up a lot on here, and I want to hear opinions on if you view it more as treatment or preventive care? AKA is it the flu shot or Tamiflu?
Situation: My husband grew up with a mother who continues to be emotionally abusive to this day. If she is displeased (over something that would literally not even be worth bringing up to a normal person) she will give her children the silent treatment… sometimes for actual years. OR she will sulk around and refuse to speak to you but not say what you’ve done to displease her. OR, she’ll tell you what you’ve done, but instead of “you said ____ and it felt a bit insensitive and it hurt my feelings” it’s “you’re horrible and you’ve always been horrible and mean”. I’m not exaggerating. (IMPORTANT NOTE: she has not done any of the above to me except the silent treatment, at which point my husband promptly told her she could not treat his wife like that and asked her to leave our home. She has not spoken to us or seen her grandchildren since).
Anyway, I view the silent treatment and/or sulking around obviously mad at someone but refusing to talk about it to be emotionally manipulative at best, if not emotionally abusive. My husband, understandably, thinks that holding in when someone has hurt your feelings (even if it means you’re visibly miserable and upset) is how you handle things. I prefer to go “hey, when you said ____earlier it hurt my feelings. I tried to get over it, but I’m still feeling sad about it”. That obviously makes him very uncomfortable, and a bit defensive, because he’s never experienced that and doesn’t know what an appropriate reaction should be. He’ll basically be like “No it didn’t” or “don’t say it’s my fault”. I’m sure, internally, he’s bracing for the “AND YOU’RE A HORRIBLE PERSON” follow-on he grew up with.
Anyway, believe it or not, this hasn’t created a huge problem. I usually take some time, and within a few hours he comes to me and says “look, I really am sorry. I really didn’t mean to hurt your feelings when I said ____, I see now what you were saying about how you took it, and I didn’t do a great job of listening”. However… in the interval it takes him to apologize… I feel my heart harden toward him. And it only 90% softens after the apology. I’m worried that remaining 10% is going to accumulate over time, and I don’t want it to. I would certainly qualify us as “happily married”. 99% of the time I cannot believe how lucky we are to have each other. I just want to make sure I continue to feel that way.
Is this a couples counseling problem, or something I should encourage him to seek his own counseling for? I feel like maybe if he heard a third party say “the silent treatment or being demonstrably upset with someone and refusing to tell them why is not acceptable behavior” he would work to make sure he doesn’t do that, and would also come to realize that how his mother treats her children is not OK, and not what he deserves.
Moms of preschool girls, what do your girls’ cold weather wardrobes look like? Kiddo is about to turn 3, and I really need to get some fall clothes for her. In the past we’ve done leggings and tunics/dresses. almost exclusively But it suddenly occurs to me that the tunics/dresses could be hard for her with potty training and going to the potty herself this winter. She recently sat on the potty at home in a dress (which she wears all the time), and asked me to help her keep it out of the way. Is this a big deal, or will she learn soon enough and I should go with our usual formula? Any recommendations on non-jean, non-legging pants? Since she’s so used to leggings, she goes crazy if she has to wear something as constricting as jeans (word), but she might finally be getting too old to continue leggings as pants. Thoughts?
Never too old for leggings as pants! In preschool my daughter did leggings with T-shirt’s, and while I would not wear that “look” myself, it worked for her. (And tunics weren’t too bad, but my daughter is tall so they wore more like swingy/trapeze tops.)
For moms of boys, at what age did you stop letting them see you undressed? Son is almost 6 and will sometimes come in while I’m showering or see me when I’m getting out of the shower. But more often, he will see in my undergarments while I’m getting dressed. He seems to care less and I feel the same but am wondering at what point should I be covering up more.
Speaking of clothing, I’ve noticed a weird thing with my kiddo. I’ve bought her a few comfy cotton dresses from Hanna and Tea (on deep discount), but she really prefers her cheap dresses from H&M, Kohl’s and Target. I love the idea of buying higher-quality items, but what’s the point if she doesn’t want to wear them? I wonder if the cheaper, thinner fabric is comfier, or something. It’s puzzling.
To what extent do you try to hide the fact that your kids are there if you get an unexpected work call? I got a call at 6pm last night, while I was making dinner and husband wasn’t home yet. LO was playing quietly and calmly, so I just took the call and tried to keep an eye on him while far enough away that if he squealed it wouldn’t be super obvious.
At the same time, it was 6pm, and it isn’t crazy to think I’d be home with my family at that point. It wasn’t client facing. I’m probably overthinking this, but I just worried it would be unprofessional if my colleague heard me say something to my son or heard him cry in the background.
In these situations, do you take the call but tell the person you have to call them back? (after LO is asleep or another caregiver arrives) Or do you risk it and hope no crisis erupts while you are on the call?
Do you help reinforce what your kid is learning in school? Kiddo is in a new school and we don’t really know what they cover during their lessons. I am used to her old school where the teachers would tell us about the general theme for the week and we would help at home by talking about the topics. For example, if the theme was “things at a farm,” we would talk about farm stuff, maybe check out farm books at the library, and go to the farmer’s market. The new school does not communicate as much. I also don’t do drop off, so I don’t get to see the main teacher. The assistants that are there when I come for pick up have no idea what’s going on. Ugh, rant. I just wish I could be more involved.
I picked up my almost-3 year old from daycare yesterday, and when I got to his classroom, the class was watching a movie (something animated about robots) on the teacher’s phone. The phone was propped up on a shelf so all the kids could see it, and it was hooked up to a speaker that seemed to belong to the school.
I have never seen them watch a movie at daycare before. I was very surprised and pretty disappointed. We were very strict about no screen time until he was 2, and after 2 we allow very limited tv. I really like to save tv for when I’m solo parenting and need a few minutes to get ready. I feel like daycare should not be using my last-resort entertainment methods….
I don’t think the teacher thought there was anything wrong with this, because she was doing it at pickup time when she knew parents would see, and the classroom is such that any of the administration/her bosses could see as well.
We have been at this daycare since he was 3 months old, and I picked it because we loved the infant care. As he has gotten older, I’ve been less impressed… after he moved out of the toddler room and is now in the preschool group, I feel like the teachers are harried and distracted, and I feel like he doesn’t get the care and attention I want him to have. I haven’t been able to pinpoint why I feel that way, but the movie thing was a good example.
Should I look for another daycare? I hesitate because he has dear friends in his class that he’s been with since birth, PLUS his little brother is in the crawler room– and I still really love the infant and toddler care there. And I don’t want to do two dropoffs/two pickups. Any thoughts please?
I have this skirt, and I wear it to work with a tucked-in black t-shirt and heels, and I always get SO many compliments.
Do any of you have experience sending your kids to a daycare/preschool affiliated with a university where the child development faculty and grad students sometimes come in to use the kids in their research studies? DH and I both are affiliated with a university, and the university run daycare is like this. You get info about each experiment in advance and can opt out, but it was made clear to me that you shouldn’t enroll your child unless you generally want to participate. I don’t know how wild I am about my child being a lab rat, but in many other ways this daycare seems to be the best in the area and matches up well with what I want (no screen time, organic meal options, teachers all have college degrees, etc).
This may be a dumb question, but what do you use to carry snacks or send your (little) kids with to school/daycare for lunch? All the lunch box Tupperware or glass seems huge for the amount I’m sending my one year old with. I am looking for something like those munchkin snack containers but with two sides. It seems like an easy ask but I can’t find anything like what I’m envisioning.
Experienced Mommies -help me make a decision! We have a 13 month old (will be 14 months at the time in question). She is a great sleeper and isn’t walking yet, but is close. Anyway, DH and I both took a week off from work and planned to take a family vaca the week of 10/8. The location has pretty much been been up in the air (mostly due to work schedules, but also because we generally just book things last minute depending on where we “feel” like traveling). We live on the east coast. Our best friends (a married, childless couple) live on the west coast. We debated going to visit those friends for that week that we took off, and when we just broached it with them – surprise! They are going to Hawaii. We have traveled all over the world with this couple and are seriously considering meeting them in Hawaii for that week. We actually went there earlier this year with DD, albeit to a different island. I already know that the flight won’t be relaxing as we have flown with her many times and I miss the days of flying with her when she wasn’t mobile. :)
My concern is that we are moving. We planned to move in early November, but buyer wants to close on our current home sooner, which is great because we are closing on our new home next week. BUT now we’d basically come home from vacation and move in the same week. Logistically, it will be fine. We will have enough time before we leave to get the new place painted and cleaned, we can arrange for movers to pack for us when we return, but I just don’t know how DD will handle it. She is generally an easy going tot but as she comes into toddlerhood she is definitely more “opinionated.” What if we are in a hotel for a week, in a completely different time zone, and then we come “home” and a few days later, home is somewhere entirely new? To be fair, we live in an apartment and we are literally moving into the building next door, so her nanny, friends, classes and local haunts are all staying the same. Her bedroom furniture will all be the same. I don’t know if I’m overthinking this or if it’s better to not vacation (or go somewhere closer, same time zone) to make it all easier? Has anyone moved with a 14 month old? Help?
I really like this skirt too! More skirts with elastic waistbands please! I work in a casual and active environment and I love pieces a that are comfy and colorful!
Question I had from the lunch packing post the other day- for those of you whose kids pack their own lunch: please tell me your logistics, menue, and ssecrets! How old were your kids, and how did you get them to be onboard? I have a six year old and when I suggested that she could pack her own lunch she said, “But I would just pack candy!”. Right now I pack lunch the night before, but would love to get it completely off my plate.