Family Friday: Suspend Family Game
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I’m always on the hunt for new games we can play as a family.
This tabletop balancing game from Melissa & Doug would make a great holiday gift for my kids. This game is designed for one to four players, so your kids (or even you) can play alone.
Like Jenga, each player takes turns adding pieces until the sculpture comes tumbling down. Kids will work on their hand-eye coordination and logic as they carefully add new wires to the base.
Melissa & Doug’s Suspend is available at Amazon.
Sales of note for 1/16:
(See all of the latest workwear sales at Corporette!)
- Nordstrom – Cashmere on sale; AllSaints, Free People, Nike, Tory Burch, and Vince up to 60%; beauty deals up to 25% off
- AllSaints – now up to 60% off (some of the best leather jackets!)
- Ann Taylor – Up to 40% off your full-price purchase; extra 50% off sale
- Banana Republic Factory – 50% off everything + extra 20% off
- Boden – 15% off new styles with code — readers love this blazer, these dresses, and their double-layer line of tees
- DeMellier – Sale now on, free shipping and returns — includes select options like Montreal, Vancouver, and Venice
- Eloquii – $29 and up select styles; extra 50% off all clearance, plus ELOQUII X kate spade new york collab just dropped
- Everlane – Sale of the year, up to 70% off — reader favorites include their scoop tee, Dream Pant, ReNew Transit backpack, silk blouses and oversized blazers! New markdowns just added
- Hannah Andersson – Up to 30% off all pajamas;
- J.Crew – Up to 40% off select styles; up to 50% off cashmere
- J.Crew Factory – 40-70% off everything
- L.K. Bennett – Archive sale, almost everything 70% off
- M.M.LaFleur – Tag sale for a limited time — jardigans and dresses $200, pants $150, tops $95, T-shirts $50
- Spanx – Lots of workwear on sale, some up to 70% off
- Talbots – Semi-Annual Red Door Sale – 50% off + extra 20% off, sale on sale, plus free shipping on $150+
A silly Friday thread: If your kid (this year or in years past) has had to do the “disguise the turkey” project in school, how did s/he/you all disguise the turkey?
Kid 1, who plays tennis: Colored as a tennis player, used cupcake liner as tennis skirt and I think made some kind of net with pipe cleaners
Kid 2, who dances: A ballerina- colored it, used fabric for the shoes.
Kid 3 (my kindergartener this year): colored the turkey in a NASA space suit and colored planets around him. “We gotta get him off Earth if he’s going to survive.”
I posted before realizing it was yesterday’s thread, but figured you may still be looking for responses:
Context: I delivered my first child at age 40, and my second at age 42 (a month shy of being 43). Both were conceived via IVF due to factors unrelated to my age.
I saw the OB monthly in my until I was 28 weeks, then every other week until 36 weeks, then weekly until I delivered (and a NST at each of those weekly appointments starting at 36 weeks). I saw a MFM monthly starting at 10 or 12 weeks, frequency never increased.
B/c of combo of my age and IVF, my practice’s policy was that I would be induced at 40+1. I had uncomplicated pregnancies and no factors that would have suggested c-section. For my first, I was induced at 40+1 and had an uncomplicated, unmedicated (except for pitocin) v-delivery. For my second, I went into labor at 39+6 and baby was born 6 hours after my first contraction, uncomplicated and entirely unmedicated.
I saw the midwife at my OB practices a few times towards the end (I was not allowed to have her as my primary because my age plus IVF made me “high risk”) and she said I was lucky that they were letting me get to 40+1 because they often try to induce by 39 for patients with my profile. She was also the one who laughed when they started making noises about inducing me early because they thought my second baby was big, and told me to hold up my hand and tell her my shoe size. She held her hand up to mind and then said “Well, I’ve just measured your hand, I know your shoe size, and I’ve just been in your pelvis – your body can handle a big baby”. Loved the laid back approach. He was 8lbs 5oz full term, so not even big.
A Friday lesson in when it’s OK to be “that parent”–because I’m clearly still learning!
My 10 year old is signed up for town basketball. Her league is 3/4th grade and there are “evaluations” where they watch the girls play and try and make the teams fair (ie no team full of all beginners, no team full of 5′ tall kids, etc) and then they create 6 teams of girls that play all winter.
My kid is sporty and knows a ton of kids in town from school and other sports/activities over the years. She went to 4th grade evaluations and knew nearly every girl there, at least by name if not friendlier than that- she said there were only 1-2 girls out of the 20 or so that she didn’t recognize. She knows a good handful of 3rd grade girls from her elementary school and other activities.
I happened to log in and see the team rosters yesterday (one of my other kids is also playing and got her team). Of the 9 girls on the roster, I didn’t recognize a single name. I texted a few friends and it turns out that the team has 7 3rd graders that go to other elementary schools in town and 2 4th graders- my daughter and a girl that goes to private school.
We’ve done easily 5 years of town sports and gotten placed on all kinds of teams- but no matter what, we knew at least ONE other kid/family. Maybe not a friend, maybe not even someone she liked, but just like, a friendly face.
So I did the thing I hate. I emailed the organizer and asked if they could make a change. I said it didn’t matter who, but could they either move someone from her school (3rd or 4th grade!) to her team, or put her on a team with any of the 12 girls we know playing from other elementary schools, or consider swapping her to be on a team with one of those kids. They IMMEDIATELY emailed back and said they could.
Her new team is 2 of her good friends, 2 other 4th graders from her school, and 4 3rd graders from her school–all of whom she knows, and two of the 3rd graders are her friends from the bus. Both coaches are parents we know- they have kids that are friendly with my other two kids. There is a second team (of the 6) that is 80% her elementary school, and has her best friend on it. And the other 3 teams are all filled with kids she knows- both 3rd and 4th graders.
Anyway, I thanked the organizer (probably too much) and spent the night feeling guilty about being *that* parent, and for potentially creating a team with a bit of an upper hand (this team she got switched to seems to be loaded with tall 4th graders, but who knows- maybe the first team is loaded with tall 3rd graders!) but honestly, I’m so grateful. She went from a team where she’d be really unhappy to a team she is buzzing around excited to be on.
Last year, she was placed on a basketball team where she knew from around town– 2-3 of the other 3rd graders and the 4th graders were not kids she knew but they went to her school. That was fine– and she had a great season and became buddies with some of the kids she didn’t know very well. But this year– I was shocked given how many kids we know that she could even be placed on a team of 10 where she didn’t know at least one kid!