I’m trying to decide if this is just a personal problem/annoyance….or if it’s something that should be corrected.

To be clear, I do not text anyone except my wife or mother on my personal phone when my kids are awake/around. I consider my phone behavior to be acceptable.

My kids (twins, 9) will regularly come up from behind me and start reading the texts. Today, my daughter asked me why it mattered if they saw what I wrote to mommy. It’s a good question. But sometimes we are talking about school, kids at school, teachers, etc.

Is it inappropriate behavior for my kids to hover and read my texts? Or is this a personal problem?

Thanks.

My MIL is a big crafter and makes us a lot of homemade stuff. It's beautiful things like quilts, toys etc.

I can tell that it takes a lot of time and effort and we use a lot of the things.

Now some stuff is unfortunately dangerous in my opinion. Like a beautiful play mat, but with what feels like hundreds of buttons sewn on. Or a busy book, also full of buttons. In general there is a overuse of tiny buttons on stuff.

With the mat I just cut all the buttons off, the busy book baby only gets when supervised and I'm holding it at all times.

I tried to bring up my safety concerns, but all I get is rolled eyes and that I'm overreacting and that her kids were fine playing with these things etc.

Should I just put everything away till baby is older? Or just keep cutting off everything? It's just so frustrating.

The biggest issue I have is her texting me from school, relying on me to help her make decisions she should be making on her own. I HATE that they allow phones in school. Not in the classroom. But everywhere else during the day. “Should I go for geometry help during lunch?” “Ugh I forgot my Invisalign” “I’m so stressed I have so much homework” “Should I email the athletic director and what should I say?”

She’s a sensitive kid, very indecisive, stresses a lot, and has anxiety. But a really good kid. We’ve talked a LOT about her needing to make her own decisions. I really feel like I don’t coddle her and I don’t always help her out when she texts me throughout the day - I often give a quick “your decision” or “I’m busy, good luck” response. Which I often am! I work (my schedule is very fluid, sometimes I’m at home and sometimes not) but it’s often pretty grating to be getting texts about things my 15 year old should be figuring out on her own during my workday.

I think I really need to set some boundaries here and have a talk about this or this issue isn’t going away. She’ll likely be in college in 3 years or wherever she is at 18 she just can’t be texting mom about every little thing. Or god forbid what if something happens to me, I might not always be around for her in a time of need. My biggest concern though is that she’s using this as a crutch because she’s had a lot of social struggles, especially recently. Her closest friend ditched her and she’s struggling to find her place at school. Sometimes she has no one to talk to at lunch, so I know it’s a relief to be able to chat with me a bit or to vent. She had a really really tough time with lunch at the end of last year and it really broke my heart.

It’s hard to find people who can relate to this because most people’s teenagers want nothing to do with them! My daughter on the other hand wants to talk and be with me constantly. And yes while it is in some ways nice, it just worries me that she’s not maturing as she should and gaining her independence. Ironically she did go away for 2 weeks this summer and thrived, and I thought maybe we’d see some changes, but now with the new school year I feel like we are right back to square one.

My kid’s school keeps planting seedlings as a project. So we are on the 3rd or 4th one. (And it is still pre-k.) I had a few herbs growing on a windowsill and my kid was excited for his plants to join them every time they sprouted something. I have fortunately (unfortunately?) improved at keeping plants alive and now have several pots of plants taking up the entirety of my south facing windowsills. Are we all keeping all of these plants? Letting them die “accidentally”? If they keep sending home plants idk how long it will last. There is no yard. No outside growing location. Just 6 ft tall plants in my living room.

Tonight my 11 year old lost her last baby tooth and I played tooth fairy for the last time (🥲) I’ve kept all of her baby teeth when she’s lost them and so now I’m realizing I have the full set lol. So what should I do with them? Like I feel like now that this phase is over I should bury them or do something with them. Any ideas?

Son is a 7th grader and just simply hates school. He seems to have many school friends, is a good student, no behavior problems. We just can’t figure it out. Today was the first day of school and again this year he just hates it! How do your middle schoolers feel about school?

My daughter started kindergarten and was very excited to start following a big girl routine. I very much want her to have discipline / responsibility/ life skills so we developed a short check list of after school things to do. The rule is when she gets home from school she is to wash her hands, unload her lunch box and put the dishes in the sink, and put a snack and fresh water bottle in her backpack for the next day. It takes just a few minutes but I feel it is really important for her to get into a routine and also will help her build confidence / long term life skills. She is also responsible for practicing the piano for 10+ minutes and that’s pretty much the routine.

When she is with me she definitely still needs prompting from time to time but she gets her little routine done after school.

I work two nights weekly and when my husband is caring for her after school everything goes by the way side. Piano is skipped some the time because he has bad time management skills TBH but the other after school routine never gets done. I always come home late at night when she’s in bed and find the snacks and water bottle not packed. It’s a small thing but it irks the crap out of me because these small habits are setting a foundation for a life of success. It’s also undermining because I work so hard to help her be responsible and establish a routine and it’s like one step forward, two back.

I am just insane and rigid and asking too much? I’ve talked to him about this multiple times but tonight walked in to the same situation.

I’d love to hear what you all are going as! Also…. Any suggestions for a triangle family? He will be 18mo for Halloween. We’re a huge Halloween family, but I always panic when choosing a costume!. Now that I have to theme THREE? Oh lord. So I thought I’d start early 😂

We are hosting our annual Halloween party, and our theme is witches. I’m not fully set on us having to dress in party theme, though. It’s more for the food and deco. But I do like the idea of all 3 of us having a group costume, especially since this is probably our last year where it’s more our choice than his.

Happy Spooky Season! 🎃 👻

How do you find time to shower, eat, cook, do laundry, or even use the bathroom when your newborn needs you constantly?

My parents are helping right now, but they’ll be leaving soon, and I’m already stressed about managing everything alone. Especially when I need to use the bathroom or take a shower and there’s no one else around to watch the baby. What do you do if the baby starts crying while you’re in the bathroom? Do you leave the baby somewhere safe and go anyway, or wait until they’re calm?

I’d love to hear your realistic newborn survival tips!

My son and I met a family who is at the same school as he is and who happens to live right down the street.
I talk to the mom often and we tried to get our boys together almost weekly last year when they were in TK. We stopped over the summer because I was welcoming a new baby and they were always around people who were sick.

My son loves other kids but it seems like not a lot of kids love to play with him. He loves tractors, construction, monster trucks and all of that.

I have noticed that prior to me having the new baby, my son seems very excited to play with boy from down the street. But it doesn’t seem to be reciprocated. When my son would go over to his house to play, the boy wouldn’t play with him much, only boss my son around and tell him he isn’t allowed to play with x toys.

Recently my son has mentioned that he has tried to play with the boy at recess but the boy keeps telling him no he doesn’t want to play with my son. My son mentioned he felt really sad that the boy didn’t want to play with him.

Do I keep scheduling playdates even though it seems like the boy doesn’t really like my son? My son says his best friend is the boy down the street.

We’re currently on vacation, and my son (3 1/2) must have picked something up. He has the normal sick stuff. Fever, tiredness, the works (no coughing). This would be fine if our flight home wasn’t for tomorrow! What can i even do? His father and I have to get back to work, and we have nowhere to stay past our Airbnb reservation here. Can you fly with a sick kid? It should only be a ~3 hour flight, but even the airport is a lot for a poor sick baby. I’m lost on what to do and stressed beyond measure. 🫠🫩

How do I get twin 3 almost 4yr old girls to poop in the potty??? Im so tired of pullups but they just won't poop im the toilet. They've pooped on the potty 6 times between the 2 of them and got lollipops each time but they were all done accidentally. They poop in their panties almost every day no matter how many potty breaks instructing them to "push like they're farting" goofy I know but they fart on command lmao. We've talked about being able to go to school, and ice cream for only the one who poops in the potty, and that it yucky to poop in our panties. What do we do. I want to get them in preschool but cant if they arent potty trained.

We are doing some renovations and have a room (a converted attic floor to livable space with fairly high ceilings) dedicated to a play room. I was looking into some climbing structures (indoors) with foam mats, or like a Little Rock climbing situation up one wall , but I’m curious if people who did this find their kid doesn’t actually uses the space and if they felt it was worth it. There are infinite options online (swings/climbers/foam pits). Does anyone have any suggestions/personal experience/recommended items. My son is 2 and we have another one coming but I want it to last a few years atleast.

My mother is very overbearing. She often makes me doubt my own parenting skills and the ability to have more kids (I currently have one toddler and want to have more).

She'll just say the most hurtful thing. I know in my heart that I'm a good mother, but she makes me feel weak and not good enough.

What helps you feel confident as a parent and overcome criticism from other people?

To any experienced, go-with-the-flow type moms, I need your advice and encouragement.

I am a first time mom to a 7.5 month old. We have not sleep trained him and we have been co-sleeping with him since he was born. It wasn’t a conscious decision we made; it just happened naturally and most days I am happy with our setup.

My son is a decent sleeper for the most part. He wakes up in the night a couple times as babies do, but generally speaking we can function on the hours he gives us at night. He’s also been great at taking long naps. He loves his sleep! lol.

However, since 6 months he’s been going through big transitions and his sleep has naturally changed. It took me time to figure out what to do, and despite being a more gut driven mom who uses wake windows as a guide and his sleepy cues as my signal, I was forced to tweak some things with his schedule and do a little bit of mental gymnastics. Which seemed to do the trick!

Still, he will occasionally have a short nap ending early- to which he is very upset about. I find myself incredibly anxious when a nap ends at the 30 minute mark, despite following wake windows and his tired cues. 5 minutes of rocking and he’s typically out like a light, but some days even that does not make it a guarantee he will remain sleeping for long. And because the “experts” say a baby at this age should be sleeping 12-15 hours a day, I stress if he is under that. I think I use the Huckleberry app as a crutch as this point. I don’t know how to stop because I like to know exactly how long he’s sleeping.

I just know that when he sleeps he thrives. And if he doesn’t sleep well, it affects the rest of the day and he gives me the most grief then because I’m
his mom. Anyways, was anyone else once like me? How did your kids turn out? How did you handle their sleep? How did you evolve? Any relatability or advice would help.

We joined an outdoor private school and today was the first day. I was informed the other kids were hitting my child with sticks and just being really mean to him. It’s a small class with three teachers and I’m sad this happened because we picked this private school because we believe in the nature inspired educational thing. Our son spends all his time outdoors or playing indoors so we figured an outdoor nature school would be awesome. But it sounds like at one point the kids were hot and tired and all decided to take it out on mine?
Even hitting him with sticks. Thinking of just putting him in public school now because this was awful

Okay this might sound ridiculous but please tell me I'm not the only one 😂

My baby has started waking up the second I put him down after falling asleep.

So for the past few weeks I've been doing this whole ridiculous operation where I warm the spot on the bed with a hot water bottle, remove it before putting him down, put my hand on the mattress for a minute, then VERY slowly slide my hand out and pray to god 😂

Today I was doing this at 2am and thought...

WHY AM I ENGINEERING A FAKE WARM SPOT ON A MATTRESS AT TWO IN THE MORNING??

Surely other parents have figured out some better solution to this??

And it got me wondering what other completely ridiculous little hacks everyone has developed because the actual product doesn't exist / doesn't work / is just not worth buying.

What is your most unhinged baby hack? 😂

I am 24, a first time & single mom, just for context. My daughter turned six month old recently and was given the greenlight today at her doctors appointment to start eating solid foods as frequently as she likes. I’m gonna start at just dinner times and go from there. I have absolutely no idea what I’m doing, I’ve been seeing that I have to steam the food before I blend it. Is it normal to have to buy one of those machines that do it all for you? Or is it less effort that I’m thinking to just do it all at home? Now onto prepping and storing and refrigerating the food, are you all just making it for your baby per meal fresh? Or do you prep a couple things at a time and put them in the fridge? I’ve seen that you should treat your babies leftover food like you with yours, so typically 24–48 hours in the fridge. Or up to six months+ in the freezer. Am I understanding all of this information correctly? I just wanna make sure I’m doing all of this right, haha!! TYIA🫶🏻🫶🏻

My son has just started p2 and we've just had our first piece of homework home.

He's a genrally bright and understanding kid but he is geting very frustrated very quickly when it comes to my wife or I trying to help him with this stuff.

He gets super restless and squirmy, obviously because he's finding it difficult and is just generally very hard to get to try.

I think he's feeling behind in class as I know some of his peers are a little more advanced than him but I'm really keen to avoid this feeling of being left behind becoming an internal narrative for him.

I'm not totally sure what to do about this other than try to get over this hump by making it a religiously regular thing in the hope it just clicks for him (reading and writing is the main thing, but we also struggled with telling the time tonight... I totally know he could get the latter he just wasn't able to focus).

is there an obvious skill that I can help him develop here? Is it possible that my concern is showing through and it's making him kick against it even more/causing him more strife.

I need tips from people who've overcome similar, please!!!!

I feel like I might be a horrible parent even asking this. My husband and I were really excited last year to get tickets for a concert. We have a babysitter lined up and everything. I just got the email that Meet the Teacher night for my son’s 3k is the same night.

Should we cancel our plans to make sure we are at Meet the Teacher night? We would take a loss I’m sure on the tickets. If you think it makes a difference, my husband and/or I will be at school every day for pickup and drop off, so we will get to know the teacher I think, but I’m not sure if we are jerks if we choose to attend the concert. It is of course the one thing we have planned the whole month that would conflict with Meet the Teacher night! What would you do?

I have a 3 year old that recently seems to have intense tantrum. She would scream, cry, shout and sometimes hit. These tantrum can last anywhere between 20-45 minutes. Its always so intense and it took so much out of me to try and calm her down. Im trying to find patterns for her trigger but sometimes its saying the wrong thing upsets her. On a bad week this can happen multiple times a day or a couple of nights in a row (lasting at least half an hour).

Is this normal? Anyone elses kids are this intense? We are flying overseas in December (not her first trip) but i have major anxiety now since shes been having these intense tantrum/meltdown.

Also, parents how do you regulate yourself after an intense tantrum. Its been nearly an hour and I feel like my body is still in a fight/flight mode 🫠

Hi,

I could really do with some advice. I have a 21month old who we are trying to transition into her own room as we have a new baby arriving in October. She hates sleeping in her cot and ends up in our bed most nights but I think that is because she finds the cot small. She can easily climb over it onto the bed and she’s always banging her body against it in her sleep.

Her new room has a double bed, it’s not a floor bed but it’s fairly low to the ground not too high. I am thinking of getting toddler rails for her.

I would really love some advice or recommendations for any rails people have experience with and also I have some questions.

The bed is against two walls (one long side and one short side), there is a slight gap between the wall and the mattress on the long side. Would I need a rail for this side?

I am struggling to find longer rails as it’s a double bed, does the rail need to cover the whole parameter of the bed? E.g one long one completely covering the long side and another on in the short side?

Should there be a gap so she can get in and out? If so where is best to put this gap to reduce fall risk. Or should I only just put a rail on the long side so the short side (bottom of the bed) is open for her to get in and out?

My main concern is her falling out of the bed obviously. Do I need one that she can’t climb over? Though I don’t think there will be one tall enough as the mattress sits on top of the slats rather than inside. She is a very active sleeper and moves about a lot in her sleep!

Thank you in advance!

Hi, I will try to keep this brief. I have a 3 year old that throws tantrums and meltdowns that last for very long periods of time. They always start from the smallest of things which I think is normal toddler behavior. Today it was because I simultaneously wouldn't/would help her open up her toothpaste tube. She will begin to scream at me to which I will usually respond by saying something like, "I don't respond to screaming." The screaming will get so bad that I will try to calm her down by distracting her. Usually asking her to tell me the color of the wall or count how many fingers I have. That doesn't always work however and she will usually go right back to screaming after I have "distracted" her for a bit.

The tantrum becomes a meltdown and the meltdown feels impossible to come back from. She will thrash and scream in dangerous ways. I have to pick her up and bring her to her room to avoid her hitting her head or herself on the tile or wood floors. At a certain point I will just try to ignore her until she is ready to calm down and that rarely works. After about 1.5 hours I will feel so hopeless, angry, and frustrated that I break down crying. I cry so hard my head hurts and it typically makes the meltdowns from my child worse though at a certain point I can't help but cry.

When the meltdowns have reached past 2.5 hours I have no choice but to keep her in a room and take a break from her for a half hour. I feel so angry and frustrated that I feel like I am going insane. I usually have to give up on any plans we had for the day and just try to calm her down by distracting her with books or toys.

I keep getting torn about what is best to do. If I distract her, isn't that rewarding the tantruming behavior? If I ignore her is that telling her that her mom won't comfort her? I don't know it is all just so confusing.

I have been reading the book "How to Talk to So Little Kids Will Listen" and I have admittedly only gotten through the first two chapters but I can't even imagine how any of the strategies would help if my child won't even hear me talk in the first place.

Anyway, any/all help is appreciated!