I am a 44-year-old man, with a seven-year-old son. His mother and I are divorced, and I moved out when he was three. We share custody; he is with me three days/nights a week including part of the weekend. He is doing well at school and has varied interests. He is a very happy child and the most precious thing to me.
They say three is a trend, the rate of occurrence upon which one moves past the threshold of randomness and into the realm of fixed preference that we often identify as "taste." Levi seemed to like older movies and TV. Levi seemed to dislike newer movies and TV. I sat down to watch an episode of Pee-wee's Playhouse with him, and a hypothesis about why this is the case took shape.
4. A six-pack of large reusable, prefold cloth diapers that can be used as diapers (of course) but might even be better as super absorbent workhorses for dealing with puke, leaky breast milk, sweat, or any other spillage that a baby or toddler can bring.
I rented out a local neighborhood restaurant for her first birthday. We had an open bar, matching outfits for the whole family, a photographer, a face painter, a balloon artist, and even glitter tattoos. Her birthday cake was two layers tall. We had a ton of desserts, pizza, pasta, and quesadillas. We even had a Build-a-Bear instead of traditional goodie bags for each child to take home.
With more than a decade of experience working as a design and tech analyst, Andrew Hogan is all in on the efficiency and ease that tech brings to our lives. But lately at home with his daughters (ages 4 and 18 months), Hogan is grappling with something unwieldy and undefined: how parents, kids, and technology interact, from smartphones to screen time to AI.
The internet has my children obsessed with US fries and square burgers when the best chips in the world are right on their doorstep I have a relaxed approach to nutrition. Like many dads, I figure that if the kids are eating, then all is well. It doesn't really matter if they are having a Nutella sandwich for dinner or
Succinctly put, Kylie replied, "Who the f**k is we?" "Men can be so annoying," the wife of Jason Kelce quipped, before admitting, "Now I do think I've corrected myself a couple times on this show about me saying 'we were pregnant' or 'we got a positive pregnancy test.' " However, Kylie strongly related to the pregnant woman, saying, "I completely see where this woman is coming from. Also, being on the other side of things, being out of pregnancy, that feels like my brain during pregnancy.
Let me preface this response by apologizing in advance for what I'm about to advise because I know it will most likely be something you do not want to hear. But right off the bat-yeah, George made a selfish, impulsive, fucking dumb decision. It is honestly one of the most insane things I've ever heard but...I kind of love it? I know, I know-Crazy George doing his Crazy George stuff is a burden to you and your household. But let's look at the plus side h
Our entire family sits down to have a meal together several times a week. We ask each other questions, find out what's going on in our kids' lives, and share funny stories. Though mealtime can sometimes be chaotic, with bickering and typical exhaustion, we also relish in the limited opportunities we have to sit, face-to-face, and share a meal. We also have some family time on Sunday mornings, attending church together, and the occasional Friday night, where we can watch a movie.
Melinda Turner starts her day at 3:30 a.m., and within 30 minutes, wakes her 8-year-old daughter for school. She packs their bags and by 5 a.m., heads out to drop her child at an in-home day care - one of the few providers in her area that opens before dawn. Turner, a single mother, then drives to her early shift at a manufacturing job.
Modern people "like to imagine ourselves as autonomous individuals, but in the natural human life cycle we spend a large proportion of our lives dependent on others," said Louise Perryn. "We often feel a longing for something like a village," especially "college-educated, relatively affluent Americans who moved away from their extended families in pursuit of career opportunities." Yet "even though forming communities" would "solve many economic and practical problems," particularly in raising children, few people actually "make the attempt."
This work has many names to me: mental load, emotional labor, logistical labor and, especially, narrative labor (the effort of constantly explaining myself, justifying choices, making life make sense for everyone else). It's the work that says, "I'll just do it; it's quicker." Or, "It's fine, I'll figure it out" Or, "No one else will remember, so I'll make a list."
The 2025 Netflix documentary, UnKnown Number: The High School Catfish, depicts the true story of a mother in Michigan who shockingly barrages her teenage daughter with vicious text messages for nearly two years. The texts, sometimes up to 50 per day, included death threats, sexually explicit messages, and even a directive to the daughter to kill herself. Why would a mother do such a thing?
Gift-giving is an extension of a relationship and an expression of feeling. Thank you is not a phrase that has passed out of the lexicon. But we don't give to receive thanks. However, if you're feeling the relationship is one-sided, maybe it's time to change the mode of communication. That communication is key here. If you want to hear from the other grandchildren more, you can say so.
Men are slightly less likely than women to awaken to quiet crying sounds but are just as likely as women to awaken to louder crying sounds. The researchers found a very slight difference at the lowest decibel level (33 to 44 decibels-which is a little bit louder than a whisper), with women being 14 percent more likely than men to awaken to both crying sounds and alarms at this level.
Thanks to the trend for gentle parenting, the concept of big feelings has become big money online, and for the most part I welcome that (Big Feelings isn't the only song that reflects this cultural shift; the animation Small Potatoes on CBeebies has a song that goes Feelings / I've got so many feelings, which my husband likes to sing to me when I'm premenstrual).
The couple announced the birth of their fourth child, a daughter, in a joint Instagram post Oct. 11. The announcement included a video montage of their daughter, featuring clips of Nara Smith cradling the newborn against her chest, Lucky Blue Smith cuddling with his daughter and an adorable shot of the couple's three older children marveling at their sibling. "she's here!" they captioned the post. "welcome to the world little angel." They did not share their daughter's name.
Now, my dad and "Britney" now have a son who is a little under a year old. He and Britney are forever after me to take him for the afternoon or even most of the day, supposedly so we can form a sibling bond. I suspect they are trying to use me as free child care and have steadfastly refused, which has angered them to no end.
"I think the relief was realizing that you can only do so much at once," Rhimes said. "I mean, I think that the struggle and the way we're told like, lean in, or you can have it all, or all these things - it's such bullsh*t."
Hilarie and Jeffrey initially lived between LA and NYC. However, they both always wanted to live on a farm - a shared dream they discussed on their second date. So, after welcoming Gus, they relocated. Their family has expanded to include animals like alpacas, Highland cows, ducks, chickens, donkeys, and an emu. Hilarie wrote a memoir, The Rural Diaries, about her life on Mischief Farm. They also ended up co-owning the local candy store, Samuel's Sweet Shop, with Paul Rudd and Julie Yaeger.
Obviously, there are the expected changes - a squirming new member of the family, of course, probably accompanied by more sleepless nights and a LOT more poop. But I'm curious to know: What are the unexpected ways your life changed once you had kids? Did having a kid change your whole perspective on life? Did parenthood upend your finances in a way you didn't foresee? Or maybe you're just more tired than you ever thought humanly possible.
First, I want to tell you that I've been there. Sometimes, as you're discovering, there really isn't much to do except take a break or sit things out if that's what your kid needs. In those cases, I would suggest that if you have a co-parent, the two of you take turns hanging out with your child so that it's not always you missing out on the chance for community.
Isabel has shared several TikTok videos of Aspen and Mr. Bones on Tiktok as they visit the doctor, go to the grocery store, play on the swings, hop on the back of a bike and ride in the car (with the skeleton on Aspen's lap). And of course Aspen happily snuggles up to sleep with Mr. Bones in her crib.
