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Monday, June 23, 2025

Kick Off The Summer Season With The New Baby Shark x SHEIN Collab

By  at June 23, 2025  , , , , , , , , ,  No comments

Baby Shark knows a thing or two about virality, and its latest partnership with SHEIN is sure to follow suit. The thoughtfully designed collection celebrates the 10th anniversary of Baby Shark with colorful characters and oceanic motifs decorating baby and kids' clothing, coordinating adult pieces, and even a few accessories. Inspired by the internet's catchiest fish in the sea, the fun swimwear, cozy lounge pieces, and cute flowy dresses are graphic in color, easy to wear, and practical for all the excitement that summer brings.

For outdoor playdates, a logo tee livens up a pair of athletic shorts, while a splashy button-up, worn with khakis, offers a creative take on dressing for a backyard BBQ. Unsurprisingly, the collab is heavy on swimwear. Think: one-pieces with shark fin hoods, rash guards with cool cutouts, and a Mommy Shark two-piece complete with ruffled bottoms, all of which deserve a spot in the suitcase for your next getaway. On the loungewear side, graphic matching sets are comfortable and cute for just hanging out — and for coordinating family pics — while rompers make the debate over getting changed into something cozy easier than ever.

From hot beach days to afternoon poolside hangs, these eye-catching pieces are guaranteed to make a splash with the little ones in your life. See our favorite picks from the collection below, and shop the full Baby Shark x SHEIN collection here.



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I've Rediscovered My Vanity After 40

By  at June 23, 2025  , , , , , , , , ,  No comments
Fiordaliso/Moment/Getty Images

A few months ago, I took my annual pilgrimage to The Runway Sample Sale Boutique in the Atwater Village neighborhood of Los Angeles. I don’t live in Los Angeles, and I am not in a line of work that requires me to be fashionable. In fact, I spend most of my days at a desk in my bedroom closet. I’m not dating – the man I’ve been with for twenty years thinks my rattiest sports bra is sexy. And my two children do everything in their power to destroy nice things.

And yet, I find a way to make it there, with whatever I’ve put aside to spend, to take a few hours to try on the dozens of delights I always find amongst the eclectic, locally-sourced designers whose discount merchandise they peddle. Why? For me, just for me.

A surprising phenomenon has occurred in the past few years – after my children started going to one free and local school and I turned forty and started to slip from the male gaze. It’s that my style is, I believe, only just peaking. More days than not, I am looking at myself in the mirror before I go out the door and thinking “damn, she’s fine!” I am putting in just the right amount of effort. I have started wearing my “New York” outfits at home because, who cares if everyone else is in hoodies? Despite not having a flat stomach, I am wearing crop tops.

It’s not that I feel young again, it’s that I feel, finally, like myself.

It’s not that I feel young again, it’s that I feel, finally, like myself. When I was in high school, I painstakingly picked out my outfit for the next day each night. I would sit in my cranberry-red room, talking to Mae or Jeannie, the cordless tucked under one ear and Portishead blasting on my boombox, while I painted my fingernails to match. Butter yellow to go with my shell-toe Adidas. Deep pink to match the accents on the sheer blue top I “borrowed” from my brother’s girlfriend for years.

Of course I am nostalgic for those nights – having the time and attention span to devote to decking myself out like a new bride each day. But if I really return to the feeling, it wasn’t luxury, it was fear. Of being judged and rejected. Of never, ever, being loved back. The effort was a cover, a wild scrambling for something to control. My ex’s best friend was rumored to have said back then, “What do you get when you slap Sarah Wheeler in the face? A handful of make-up.” It was true. And the make-up served as armor against the sentiments in that joke. If I was going to be slaughtered, I decided, at least it would be in my prettiest dress.

Since then, my relationship with my body, my self-image, and of course, with fashion, has charted a complex course. Trying to get pregnant forced me into therapy for my disordered eating and body image. Pregnancy and birth and postpartum forced me to get comfortable with not having much control over how I looked. And perimenopause, or the adjacent space my body currently inhabits, has forced me to ask, if there are no more hoops to jump through to prove myself as a woman, can I just have fun??

These days, this is my idea of fun: Sephora with my seven-year-old, despite my anxieties about her shifting girlhood. Instead of asking “do I look good in this lipstick?” I model for her “I feel so happy with this purple eye shadow!” Sharing custody of an LED face mask with my buddy, because we are too self-obsessed not to be intrigued by the promises of better skin, too frugal to buy our own, and too wise not to pass up an opportunity to make a silly game out of our vanity.

I even stay up late in my bedroom sometimes, Facetiming with my bestie and applying nail stickers, my latest obsession (this is my favorite brand), which last longer than one day, cost far less than a trip to the salon, and give me a little thrill every time I gaze at my hands.

At the end of the day, I want to use the time I have left in this body to adorn it – to treat it as a canvas for artistic expression, for humor, for happiness. That is what I feel when I rock the hard-shelled silver mirror clutch I picked up on my last LA visit, something I would have questioned, a decade ago, whether I could “pull off.” So if you’re pushing 40 or 50 or have lost the thread on what your image means, I’m here to encourage you to make it your own. You can pull it off, trust me. Don’t be afraid, luxuriate in yourself.



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Wednesday, June 18, 2025

As An Experienced Mom, This $27 Gift Box Is My Go-To Baby Shower Gift

By  at June 18, 2025  , , , , , , , , ,  No comments

The funny thing about becoming a parent for the first time is the way it shows you just how little you know about parenting. An example: when I was building my registry, I went for big ticket items like my stroller and crib along with novelty finds like fun outfits and toys. I didn’t even know to factor in the fact that diapers were the one item I would be using more than anything else. The truth is, at the time, diapers just didn’t seem like something to ask for, but when my daughter arrived (and I realized she would require 10 to 12 diaper changes per day), I wished I would’ve.

If I were building my registry today, things would look a bit different. In place of cutesy newborn outfits and pricey crib sheets, you’d see more practical items like diapers of different sizes and plenty of wipes — both of which are included in the Millie Moon Luxury Diapers Newborn Gift Box. The full-fledged newborn starter kit comes with a trial pack of their cloud-soft, derm-tested Luxury Diapers for newborns and the next size up so new parents can find the right size for their little one. Plus, it comes with a full pack of their popular Sensitive Wipes for complete diaper duty prep.

Alone, those would’ve been enough for me to jump for joy, but Millie Moon also rounded out the gift box with bespoke newborn extras: a super soft hooded towel, an owl plushie, and a full collection of three Millie Moon storybooks. I’ve already picked up one of these gift boxes for a shower at the end of this month, and I can’t wait to give the mom-to-be the best of both worlds — essentials she’ll really need and precious gifts that are heartwarming to receive. Ahead, learn more about each of the items in the gift box before grabbing one for the new mom in your life.

Size Newborn Diaper Trial Pack

The first thing your baby will wear once they’re born is their diaper, and these newborn sized ones from Millie Moon are designed with an umbilical cutout to be extra gentle on a newborn’s sensitive belly area. They’re also super soft against their sensitive skin, plus they’re made without lotions, latex or fragrance. It’s peak luxury for baby that’s affordable for you (especially with all those daily diaper changes).

Size 1 Diaper Trial Pack

Because babies can go through surprise growth spurts, it’s always helpful to have the next size up of their go-to diaper. The Millie Moon gift box has got you covered with Size 1 diapers that are just as cloud-soft with dermatologically-tested comfort you can trust when they outgrow their newborn sizes.

Sensitive Wipes

Pro parenting tip: you can never have too many wipes. Millie Moon Sensitive Wipes are ideal for getting your baby’s bottom clean without irritation, but they’re also the perfect size pack to throw in your diaper bag for quick errand runs. They make on-the-go diaper changes easy and are even helpful to have for small messes like spit-up or wiping runny noses.

The Millie Moon Storybook Collection

Reading to my newborn daughter was one of my favorite ways to bond with her in those earliest days together. Picture books like the three that come in this gift box (they’re written and illustrated especially for Millie Moon!) help engage their curious and growing minds while giving you a sweet way to bond with your baby.

Super Soft Hooded Towel

I really loved bath time with my daughter — from cute bath toys to wrapping her up like a baby burrito in her hooded towel, it felt like a routine that we got to share. The cozy hooded towel that comes in this Millie Moon gift box is a great one to have in your bath time routine rotation (and is just downright adorable). Similar versions typically cost anywhere from $16 to $50, so getting one of this quality as part of a $27 gift box is quite the deal.

Adorable Owl Plushie

On their own, plushies are go-to gifts for people who want to give your baby something precious they can cuddle with through the toddler years. The adorable owl in this gift box is as soft as Millie Moon diapers and is a thoughtful touch that’ll become one of your baby’s favorite comfort items as they grow.

As a new parent, you’ll have a lot on your plate and the gift-givers in your life just want to support you and your new bundle of joy. To help them do just that, I’m loving the Millie Moon Luxury Diapers Newborn Gift Box as my go-to gift for new moms. They’ll get $60 worth of high-quality essentials, and I’ll get to know they’re supported with a beautiful, thoughtful gift that’ll help them through those earliest moments.



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Monday, June 9, 2025

The Question That Haunted Me Through My First Year Of Parenthood

By  at June 09, 2025  , , , , , , , , ,  No comments
damircudic/E+/Getty Images

“What’s your support system like?” my doctor asked as I tried to calm my baby. I was at my PCP’s office to get some insight into the persistent elbow pain that was making it difficult for me to open my apartment door or pull the covers over me at night—not to mention feed, hold, and sooth my baby who especially liked to fall asleep in the crook of that injured elbow.

My daughter had arrived six weeks early and needed to be fed in a specific position that required me to hold her head up with my left hand, the weight of her tiny body settling into my joint. But, like a lot of people I encountered in those early days, my doctor was having trouble getting past the single mother thing. “I’m worried about you,” she said, when I made the mistake of mentioning that I wasn’t sleeping. I was worried about me too, but I really needed help with my elbow.

“What’s your support system like?” was the first question almost anyone asked when finding out I was raising a baby without a partner—from potential mom friends at tot gyms to all kinds of medical professionals.

When I was pregnant, I got “what’s your support system like” ffrom a homeowner who was renting out an upstairs suite in a cohousing community. Because these cohousing communities can be expensive, I wanted to rent a room in a shared house. But the homeowner balked as we tried to nail down a time for a tour. Instead, she wanted to schedule a call to talk about my support system.

The question was tough for me—it was something I had been asking myself, with some trepidation, since before I had gotten pregnant. Would the life I had made, the seeming haphazard connections collected over the years, be enough to sustain both me and a baby? I didn’t particularly want to get into this with my future landlord or, worse, be evaluated based on my ability to obtain this magic system. I told her that I thought her question was discriminatory (since she was not asking non-parents the same thing), she apologized profusely, and we parted ways.

But the incident jolted me: it was the first of a series of interactions that made me aware that by deciding to have a baby, I had stepped into a role loaded with cultural baggage. “What does your support system look like?” started to sound a whole lot like “Where do I place you on the scale of superhero to sad sack?”

There is just so much baggage around single moms. In the 80s and later 90s, “unwed mothers” were used as cultural (and racial) boogeymen to push through Bill Clinton’s welfare cuts. Single mothers, the rationale went, were a drain on federal resources.

In the intervening years, with the rise of single parents by choice, an alternative narrative has taken hold, one of people who can afford to have babies on their own and are doing just fine. Yet, the words “single mother” remain a powerful cultural and political category – just look at how the Trump administration categorizes us – that bring up anxieties about the cracks in our social system.

Single mothers are scary because they are a drain on the state—they fail by being poor. When they succeed by being able to support themselves, they are scary for a whole other reason: they seem an affront to the idea that women need men.

I straddle these two poles. I am a single mother by choice, not by chance, with all the privilege that comes from a suburban upbringing and an excellent education. When I got pregnant, I had a good middle-class job. By the time my baby was six months old, I’d been laid off, and my search for new work was hampered by the lack of affordable childcare—I languished for close to a year on a waitlist for subsidized care, attempting to apply for jobs during naptimes, when I wasn’t trying to recover from sleeping only a few hours the night before. In other words, I have never met the ideal of a totally self-sufficient, self-supporting mother.

“Are you happy with your choice to become a single mother?” another doctor asked me, five months after my failed attempt to get help for my elbow. When I told him I was, he responded “Oh good, because a lot of women do it and then think ‘oh no, what did I do to myself?’”

I translated his question to: “Do you regret your decision to move forward in life without a male partner? Shall I think of your story as proof that the biases I already have are well-founded?”

But back to my elbow. When my baby was almost two, someone finally paid enough attention to order an x-ray. It turned out I had osteoarthritis.

The problem with these questions is not the questions themselves but how they stop conversations that could actually help me. My PCP failed to order an x-ray or refer me to sports medicine. My potential landlord contributed to me never finding a cohousing community and missing out on the support that could have offered. And the doctor who wanted to know if I regretted my choice alienated me such that it was another year before I found effective medical care.

Midway through my first year of parenting, when the support system question came up, I started responding “Are you asking because you have resources to offer?” They rarely, of course, had what I needed

There’s only one time when the support system question led me towards support rather than away from it. Four years before I had my daughter, I asked my gynecologist if she could tell me what steps I should take to start trying to conceive on my own. She pointed me to a midwives’ clinic at a neighboring town and told me to take folic acid. Then she asked “do you have family that can help?” I shook my head, dreading what she’d say next about how hard it would be. She smiled warmly. “You’ll figure it out,” she said. “People figure it out.”

And so I am.



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Wednesday, June 4, 2025

6 Expert Tips All First-Time Parents Need To Know When Looking For A Childcare Provider

By  at June 04, 2025  , , , , , , , , ,  No comments
Dusan Petkovic/Shutterstock

Becoming a first-time parent means navigating a world of new experiences. New sleep schedules, new social plans, new baby gear all over your house... While all of these changes are major adjustments, they don’t tend to feel as daunting as finding the right childcare for your baby.

Learning to trust your baby to someone else is a monumental experience, whether it’s a few weeks after birth or beyond their first birthday. Having someone earn that trust takes research, tours, and thoughtful questions. But beyond that, it’s also important to consider things like the connection between home and school, and what your child’s daily routine will be. These details can reveal how well a care provider's values align with your own.

Dr. Lauren Loquasto, senior vice president and chief academic officer at The Goddard School, says these deeper considerations can boost your confidence — especially if you start the search early.

“We never grow and develop as quickly as we do in the first 2,000 days of life,” she explains. “In these first five years, the foundations of all social interactions, communications, learning, and self-care are established.”

That’s why it’s essential to keep a few key factors in mind. Below, Dr. Loquasto shares smart childcare searching tips, plus fills parents in on what they should look for — from curriculum to safety — when choosing a childcare provider.

Tip #1: Start Your Search Early

You can never be too prepared — especially when it comes to childcare. In high-demand areas, parents sometimes start exploring options even before conception, Dr. Loquasto notes.

“Generally speaking, however, exploring childcare options should begin during pregnancy if infant care is needed. Infant programs are small with limited slots, so it is important to get a spot reserved at your preschool of choice.”

Tip #2: Bring Curriculum Into The Conversation

An educational curriculum might not be top of mind when considering infant care, but Dr. Loquasto says it should be, seeing as learning begins in infancy. A strong early learning program can shape your child’s overall development as they grow.

“The Goddard School has an innovative education program called Wonder of Learning which represents the most current research on how children learn best with a strong embedded focus on academics, social-emotional learning, creative arts, music and movement, outdoor learning, and technology,” Dr. Loquasto says. The Wonder of Learning curriculum encompasses infants through kindergarten and is intentionally designed with the flexibility for teachers to tailor the instruction to the interests of the children in each class.

Tip #3: Keep An Eye Out For Health & Safety Practices

A huge part of making sure your baby is well-cared for is ensuring that health and safety practices are prioritized throughout the caregiving facility. “Health, safety, and welfare of children should always be the top focus,” says Dr. Loquasto. “The Goddard School knows that health and safety is first, and this is considered in every decision made at the school.”

As you tour, look around for health and safety measures (think: secured cabinets or first aid kit access) and ask direct questions like:

  • “What measures do you take to keep children safe and healthy?”
  • “What’s your protocol for an emergency?”
  • “What is your cleaning/sanitizing protocol?”

Tip #4: Observe Teacher-Child Interactions

Since your child’s teachers will be the people responsible for their well-being and development when you’re not with them, it’s important to observe how they interact with other children in their care.

“You should look for happy, engaged children and caring guidance from teachers,” Dr. Loquasto says. “Happy teachers lead to happy children in a preschool.”

Tip #5: Prioritize The Home-School Connection

During this critical time in your child’s life, the best way to reinforce the care your child gets at school is to have open communication with your childcare provider. At The Goddard School, this relationship is key to a high-quality early childhood education that makes way for healthy, sustained long-term development.

“Investing in a high-quality early childhood education provider is investing in a strong foundation for your child,” Dr. Loquasto says. “Many developmental and learning domains have critical windows, meaning there are prime times to maximize these areas.”

Tip #6: Come Prepared With Non-Negotiable Questions

No matter how much you prep, looking for a childcare provider is still a lot of work. Save some time by having a list of must-answer questions ready to go as you call around and start touring. Here are some that Dr. Loquasto recommends parents ask:

  • “Please share with me what my child’s day will be like in this classroom.”
  • “How is your school’s educational program designed to meet the needs of my child?”
  • “How will I be communicated with about my child’s day and about my child’s progress in your program?”

With answers to these questions, plus all of Dr. Loquasto’s expert advice, you’ll be well on your way to finding a childcare provider for your growing family.



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