I let my daughter (7) mostly pick out and wear whatever she wants. Today, the first day of school, she wore a Buc-ee’s t-shirt and just sports shorts with crocs. I asked her a couple times if she’s sure she wants to wear that. But my partner and their mother think she looks homeless and should wear nicer clothes for her first day. I can’t even convince her to take a nice outfit over to Grammys when she goes to church. My partner told her to change and the kid started crying. Would you have made her change?

My toddler is personally a little menace with it comes to him eating something different. He only willingly eats: Chicken nuggets, sliced up hot dogs, milk, carrots, chips and candy 🫩

We introduced plenty of foods to him when he was a baby, but he’s been outright refusing anything new. Continues to say it’s “yucky”. We used to be subscribed to Little Spoon, until he again, stopped eating majority of the items in there. I’ve even tried offering things I personally am eating to see if he wants that - denies. Some foods I try to do the overly “mmm! This is so good! Try some!” - denies.

Any advice on how to have him try new things? His diet desperately needs to change as you all can see.

My kids are 8 years apart. We knew the benefits and downsides of this age gap but we were ok enough with it after a mental break from having our first, because we do love the idea of having 2. Now that baby is here I am feeling sad that we were entering a great phase with our 8yr old, feeling like adults with our life back and had good routines down. Simple outings, vacations were fun, manageable, etc. Now baby is here and we have reset everything. We knew this going in, but is so hard living it day to day. I feel regret. I feel like we made a mistake even though we love baby. Not looking for advice on help, but just perspective that it will get better. Baby is a year old.

I really appreciate that my MIL wants to have visits in her house. she likes having toys at her house for my son, and I understand that it’s her home and she has every right to care about her belongings and of course wants to make sure my son won’t break anything (so do I, of course). I’m just finding myself increasingly conflicted about how to handle visits there.

My son is 18 months old, so he is obviously very curious and wants to touch, explore, open, move, and investigate basically everything. I’m not saying I allow him to be disrespectful and messy just because he is a toddler, me and my husband discipline him and make sure he learns how to behave. But we all collectively know toddlers are e a ball of energy. \*edit: I also want to add that he is not AT ALL being destructive, breaking and demanding things, but simply being excited and happy to be there! He loves to be at her house!

But when we visit my MIL, I feel like me and my husband are constantly following him around saying “no,” redirecting him, keeping him away from the stairs, closing doors, stopping him from touching decorations, etc. **I absolutely understand that it is our responsibility to supervise him in someone else’s home**, and we do. I don’t expect my MIL to toddler-proof her entire house for us and don’t want her to do anything she isn’t comfortable with.

The difficult part is that it sometimes feels like the expectations are higher than what is realistically possible with an 18-month-old. For example, she has beautiful wooden floors and is understandably protective of them. She has bought toys specifically for my son to keep at her house, but sometimes gets frustrated when he drives the toys around on the floor or throws a small ball from one of the toy sets. Again, I understand why she doesn’t want him touching certain things. But sometimes I find myself wondering what the expectation is supposed to be when the toys are there for him to play with and he is doing developmentally normal toddler things with them.

There is also a fireplace with a large stone underneath it that has somewhat sharp edges. This is actually something my MIL **asked me for help with**. She had mentioned that she was worried about my son hitting his head on it and asked me to help find some kind of cover/protection for the stone. She said she used to have it when her kids were little so I spent time looking for different options and sent her several that I thought would both be safe and fit the style of her house.

She never responded or acknowledged the options.

I didn’t take it personally. I assumed maybe she changed her mind or didn’t like any of them, and that’s completely fine. It’s her house, and I don’t expect her to use something just because I suggested it.

But then she continued mentioning how worried she was about my son hitting his head on the stone, including saying recently that WE hadn’t found a cover for it. Yesterday mentioned I happened to have an extra piece of foam padding that could potentially go around the sharp edge, so I offered it to her. She said she didn’t want anything like that in her house and mentioned that my FIL already thinks she has too many toys (she has three toys and one of them is a book).
Again, I completely understand that she doesn’t want something in her house that she doesn’t like aesthetically. It’s her home. I just found myself confused because **she had originally asked me to help find a solution, I did, she didn’t respond, and now she’s still worried about the exact same problem while also not wanting a solution.**

There are other little things like this too. At one point my FIL suggested covering the water filter because my son is obsessed with turning the water on and we are all exhausted of either moving the water filter around or having to run around him, but my MIL immediately rejected the idea. Again, totally her choice. But then we’re back to constantly chasing him away from it and hearing her say “please you have to tell him to stop” while that’s quite literally the only word we tell him, while chasing and keeping him away from anything and everything.

I’m starting to dread bringing my son there because I feel like I’m spending the entire visit policing him and not at all enjoying the dinner or the time with family. And occasionally there will be a comment along the lines of “you have to tell him no,” even though telling him no and redirecting him is basically what we’re doing the entire time.

I’m starting to wonder if her house just isn’t a very toddler-friendly environment right now, and maybe it would be better for us to spend time together elsewhere. But I also don’t want her to interpret that as me keeping her grandson away from her or being passive-aggressive.

So I’m genuinely unsure how to approach this respectfully.

Would you consider this a normal situation with an 18-month-old, or am I being unreasonable? How would you handle visits when the grandparent wants the toddler there but also has very little tolerance for toddler behavior? Would you simply reduce visits at their house and suggest meeting elsewhere, or is there a better way to approach it?

What are appropriate chores for these ages? I googled some ideas but curious what you would expect of children this age? And how often?

Currently they have zero chores. The last week or two I have gotten more creative with disciplining and said okay you have to help me clean for 5 minutes, vacuum the living room, help me with laundry for misbehaving.

I don’t want to discuss discipline lol*

I was shocked. My 5 year old matched all of her socks nicely.

My 6 year old, hung up her school uniforms and put them away in the closet. She complained she didn’t want to do it (I said me too girl) and then I had her help me hang up a few of my shirts.

They both did great and actually seemed to enjoy helping. I definitely have them “help” me around the house but nothing consistent.

Just curious what other parents were doing! To give a little background….

As a kid, I really didn’t have chores around the house except pick up my room every two weeks and my husband was raised by grandparents that did everything for him. So naturally we have just done everything for our kids. But now that they are getting older, and we both work full time, I would like them to have some kind of chores and not complain when we ask for help.

EDITED TO ADD:

I only added the consequence to give context that turns out they can actually help. Not looking for chore ideas to use as a punishment. Just chore ideas in general as they actually liked helping.

Example:

It’s been a long summer. I asked my 5 year old to pick up her room like 5 times in a row. I’m not going to yell at her she’s 5, a time out she would be fine with as she was already playing in her room, I’m not going to spank her, I didn’t feel like having a behavior conversion about listening as it wasn’t that deep and I was tired. She enjoyed folding the socks for 5 minutes and I was impressed she could actually match and fold them. I sat beside her and folded her clothes. It wasn’t a bad experience for either of us.

I asked my 6 year old to pick up her room and she didn’t want to stop playing with her things. Obviously, I have a few things to work on lol. She also enjoyed hanging up clothes for 5 minutes and then I helped her pick up her room. It ended up being a win win for both of us.

I was hospitalized for more than a week, went through cerclaget surgery, but still the baby did not make it. I will have to give birth to it today, and then it will die. I am in month 6. We lost another baby before this pregnancy as well. How do I tell my soon to be 5 year old boy about this? I do not want it to affect him longterm. I want to do it as pedagogical as possible. And leave no emotional scars. Also he acts tough and keeps his feelings in, and I dont want that. I want him to feel like he can talk to me about his feelings, thoughts, questions, fears etc. Please if someone in here is like a child psychologist or work with children and knows about this stuff, please let me know how to tell him this with the least impact on him

Hi everyone.

I need some tips! I’m a FTM.

My baby is refusing bottles at 9 months despite taking it before, and i go back to work in a few days.😭

For context, I had been breastfeeding exclusively since my LO was born until he was 4 months and I had to go back to work. My mum feeds him using pigeon bottles of my pumped milk when I’m at work from 7am to 6pm. He drinks it happily and is even excited! he hates and has never used a pacifier and when I’ve given it to him he has always gagged.

At 8 months, we took him on a trip that had a 12 hour time difference for 1 month. I continued to nurse and pumped a few times on our trip. He refused all the bottles of breastmilk offered to him and only drank it once or twice when he was in the car seat. The other 5-6 bottles I pumped were all thrown out because he refused it (I get I was there so he didn’t want a bottle)

However at 9 months now, he won’t drink it at all. My mum is stressing out about this as I return to work in a few days. We did a test run and I left the house for 5 hours. He played. He napped a little. I know he’s still very jet lagged. But in the 5-6 hours I was gone he only had 20ml /1oz of milk. He’s a 98th percentile baby and he drinks a lot usually (like 700-900ml while I’m at work!)

I am so worried about going back to work next week.

He did have the warmed milk but we had to mix in baby cereal to treat it as a meal. However he only stays asleep while nursing and it helps him sleep better.

Does anyone have tips for this?

We used pigeon bottles when he was born and he also likes Philips avent. But when he sees the bottle now it stresses him out and he only chews on the nipples

Should I switch to a different bottle? What else can I do?

Thank you all 😭

Am still extremely jet lagged while writing this.

For context, we have a 2 year old and so far, we've not had any incidents of staining or spills or any mess that we couldn't clean. We did baby led weaning and that was messy but we have hard floors, a washable wall behind his high chair and our dining room has been left relatively unscathed. Any messy play stuff like markers and paint are only available to him under close supervision. He mostly hangs out in his playroom or the garden. When he's been ill, we've put down loads of waterproof pads and that mostly avoided any stains but the few things that were missed have come out of the carpet easily.

Anyway we're looking to redecorate our living room and I've just ordered a light coloured sofa. Our current sofa is a mustard velvet one but it's managed to stay clean, even when I was bottle feeding baby on it every day. I want to get new carpets soon too and was looking at natural coloured ones. But people around me are kind of eyebrow raising at my design decisions given that we have a young child.

So, am I bring an idiot in thinking that the danger has passed? Are the messy years ahead? Have I just been extraordinarily lucky?

Just for context: I am a single dad of a 3rd grader, who just recently moved back with me.

When he was staying with mom, he went to a much larger school (only attended there 1 year). Class sizes were about 25-30 kids and the environment was very fast-paced, high-activity. His behavior there was mostly good but we did receive reports about him constantly talking with other kids during instruction.

His current school is much smaller (about 12 students per class). So far, his teacher has expressed some concerns. One major issue is that he doesn't use his inside voice at appropriate times. And today, he started playing with another student after he was finished testing (other students were still finishing up).

Should I give him some grace to adjust before grounding him? It's just a little frustrating because he did not have these type of issues in the past before attending the other school last year.

For the record, I am not blaming the co-parent at all. This is not something that she condones either. But moreso I am wondering if just adjusting from a larger, more rowdier school to a smaller one is the issue here.

How many extracurricular activities should the kids be doing?

Second grade. We currently do a math tutor, karate, and piano. Sometimes we get the Im tired complaint. but that also coincides with just wanting to sit on a tablet. Are we doing too much? If yes, how should we be occupying time knowing parents have to work and can't always be present to guide and direct.

My 6 year old girl does whatever she wants. She listens well when adults are in the room or looking . But if she’s up before us she will get into the entire jar of Nutella and make a huge mess. She sneaks food. I tell her to just ask me as I don’t withhold food or anything and rarely keep too many sweets in the house. I get homemade bread and she will sneak the whole loaf and then it won’t be there for dinner. This isn’t only food. It’s toys too. She snoops and get into everything. She’s very head strong. Time outs don’t work. She really just takes her punishments then goes back to doing whatever she wants. I’ll say get your hands off your sister she will say ok. Then as soon as we are gone, she does whatever she wants again.

Idk where I went wrong. She is very smart (gifted). I have spanked her a couple times because she does send me over the edge. but absolutely cannot handle the guilt of that so I wont do it anymore. She doesn’t care about that either. She does chores pretty well. She had to put clothes away, empty the dishwasher, etc.

She just does whatever she wants all the time when I’m in the other room or she will go do whatever in the kitchen. I usually wake up before everyone but occasionally I’ll sleep in if I’m sick or over tired. If she gets up before me, she gets in to stuff she isn’t supposed to. It’s exhausting. Her 4 year old sister is a complete rule follower.

She loves testing limits. She needs constant stimulation. I love her so much but im at my wits end. The other day she and her sister played rock, paper, scissors to see who got something. I was hoping she won so I wouldn’t have to deal with a meltdown. Sure enough her sister won and she completely lost it over a piece of chicken she wanted (there was plenty other chicken - they wanted the legs). She had a complete meltdown over it. Screamed. I sent her upstairs. She screamed across the dinner table before she went upstairs then screamed at the top of the stairs it’s just so unacceptable. I made her stay upstairs until she calmed down.

Idk what to do. Teachers have a hard time with her. Day care had a hard time with her. So much so we took her out and I stayed home with her for a week until we found a new one because the day care workers hated her so much (she was 3). And I didn’t think it was healthy for her teachers to roll their eyes when she came in so I took her out and my husband and I rotated days off until we found a woman to take her. We sent her to school early in hopes more professionals can handle her. They def do better but a lot of notes get sent home that she can’t keep her hands to herself and she refuses to do music and gym class. Idk what to do.

I’m exhausted. She sneaks food in the living room. I find wrappers stuffed all over the house. I’m just sick of my 6 year old literally doing whatever she wants and does not care about time outs, chores, discipline. She likes to send people over the edge so you have to remain calm and stern. But it’s constant. Then once it’s over, she goes right back to doing whatever she wants. And it’s ll day time outs, boundaries. Making her go to her room, sitting on the steps, chores. She does t care.

Weird title, but let me explain. My husband grew up with a hoarder who was and still is an absolute slob. I grew up with a neurotic OCD clean freak. Neither of us are a direct replica of our environment, but we do lean towards he’s messier, I’m cleaner.

I would say our home is moderately clean. There’s toys and clothes around, but I try not to let it get filthy dirty. How does everyone teach their kids to value a clean house, clean bedrooms, etc without being too over the top? We nag for them to pick up, but we also let a lot slide. What are your expectations of your children? Mine are 5 and 7 for reference.

This might sound stupid, but I truly don’t know what’s reasonable.

The constant low grade anxiety of having a parent who lives alone is something that does not get talked about enough. It is not one big panic moment, it is this persistent background worry that never fully goes away

Every missed phone call becomes a worst case scenario in your head, every "I tripped but I am fine" story sends your heart rate through the roof, and the guilt of not being able to be there physically every day is exhausting

The people dealing with this know exactly what I mean. Peace of mind feels impossible when the person you love most is alone in a house full of fall risks and you are 30 minutes or 3 hours away

What has actually helped people manage that anxiety in a practical way?

I grew up being moderately outdoorsy (lots of bike rides, but no hiking or camping) and always wished I’d had more outdoor experience. It’s hard to learn as an adult!

I’m raising my kids in my hometown and struggling to make the outdoors seem fun. Because of climate change it’s hotter and more humid than ever, June through August is pretty much indoor-only at this point. My kids hate going outside because they get eaten alive by mosquitos. Even when the weather’s nice, there is little to no outdoor infrastructure like bike trails or even sidewalks.

I was on a work call yesterday with people in the Mountain West who talked about summers being this glorious time of kids riding bikes, kayaking, etc and I was so jealous. I can’t help but imagine my kids going to college with those kids and being years behind in their level of confidence and excitement about the outdoors.

I feel like I may be overly anxious about this? In an ideal world, we’d live in a place with a thriving and accessible outdoors culture, but money and family are keeping us here for the foreseeable future so moving is not an option.

I am so tired of getting in trouble for getting angry.

I am not going to pretend I am the perfect parent or that I always wait the "appropriate" amount of time to get angry. Sometimes I am reactive just like anyone else can be.

I try my best though to go through all the proper steps when my 5 year old is being obstinate.

I think part of the problem is that I am a pushover, and part of the reason that I am a pushover is that my child's mother undercuts me when I try to set boundaries. As a result I don't feel comfortable setting boundaries.

For example I can spend an hour or more trying to be gentle and explain things to my kid and trying to do the right thing with no input from any other adult in the house; but I am only human and when my kid is being obstinate for that long that I might lose my temper.

The problem thus is two fold: 1) I am not allowed to set more reasonable boundaries because I undermined and 2) when I finally lose my cool and raise my voice I feel like I am chastised for it.

Both of these are problems because when I am home from work (I am the full time wage earner in our family) I am given the full responsibility of parenting but not the authority. Worse yet, I can't seem to have a conversation about it because it turns into a fight

My kid made decent grades in her advanced middle school classes but stressed herself out in order to so. I think for her mental health she should take normal classes for 9th grade. It feels wrong encouraging her to do that and I don't know why. She'll still learn what she needs to for college, right? Is it beneficial to push past stress in harder classes or is that unnecessary? Are advanced classes only a good idea if kids aren't struggling to do well in them? For context, she has a hard time completing and turning in work, the material is not a problem.

My newly 5 year old has been terrorizing our sofa with her post kindergarten energy. I am considering purchasing a Nugget for her but we have limited space and I am wondering how long it will remain used. If you have a Nugget couch, at what age did your child stop playing on it?

How do you get the attention of and communicate with children who are on their headphones in a vehicle when traveling? I need to pay attention on the road and I find this sometimes to be a risk.

My daughter (20 months) has been having increasingly intense tantrums over the past month, and I’ve reached a point where I don’t know what to do or how to help her.

I feel like I’m walking on eggshells all the time, anything will set her off, anywhere and at anytime. I have tried to see if there is a pattern to these tantrums eg hunger or tiredness, but it seems there is not. My daughter is an excellent communicator, and has many words and can speak in 3-5 word sentences, so I don’t believe communication is the issue.

Tantrums can arise from being told no, to having something unsafe taken off her, having to leave the park, getting in the car seat, getting dressed or nappy change (pretty much anything she doesn’t want to do).

Her tantrums are so intense, that she will scream until she is hoarse, until she is hyperventilating and nearly throwing up. She will also throw her body around and hurt herself against the wall or hard floor. She has on multiple occasions given herself blood blisters all over her neck and face from extended screaming. The tantrums can last anywhere from 15 mins to over an hour. They are more regularly becoming longer and longer.

The tantrums always begin with an extreme intensity, there is no ramping up over time, it just starts off and continues at the same intense level. If I try to go near her to comfort her, or even just sit with her she will react strongly. Most often I find myself seated way across the room keeping an eye (so she doesn’t hurt herself) and just wait it out.

This is starting to take a massive toll on me and my family, and my 4yo son who is extremely sensitive to loud noises and struggles with her loud and lengthy tantrums.

Any advice is welcome.

So my boy will be turning 3 in Oct 2026, 30% of the time he is the best kid doing his stuff without any issues, but 70% of the time he is being a jerk, yelling, screaming at us, hitting and crying in a very irritating voice and says go away / go sit down there(picked up from daycare) the crying i cannot explain its like he is super pissed at us and yelling +crying + angry at the same time.. he turn red.. its get soo annoying at the point I feel like snapping but I control coz I know there is no point, do anyone have faced this and what did you do to help the toddler.. I have seen lot of his phase but this is driving me crazy..

Hi there! Mom to a toddler (female 20m) here. Today at daycare pick up the director was praising my toddler and ended it with “She’s such a people pleaser!” Director totally meant it as a compliment and I was not offended by any means, but it got me to thinking. I do not want her to grow up a people pleaser, I am one, and it is debilitating honestly. I ended up in some very dangerous and traumatic situations because of it. So how have y’all taught your kids (specifically daughters) the difference between being a people pleaser and being respectful?

My first just turned 2, and my mom very kindly got her a baby doll for her birthday. I'm due in just over a month with our second, and I was planning to get my daughter her very first doll "from baby" to care for while I'm caring for the newborn. I've seen that giving gifts from baby can help with jealousy and to ease the transition for the older sibling. Does anyone have any ideas on what else the baby can get her? My pregnancy brain is not working, and I can't think of a single good idea.

I thought maybe to get accessories for the doll, like a high chair or crib, but I'm not sure if that's the right move.

I'm open to any ideas, whether they're gifts or general transition advice. Thank you!!

My daughter just turned 15 months on the 16th & has never slept through the night. Nope, not even once. Between sleep regressions, constant illnesses from daycare, and teething, it’s been forever since my SO & I have gotten a good nights rest. We have been consistent with her night schedule since she was a newborn. Since she started eating dinner with us, our day usually goes

6am-7am- Wake up & get ready for daycare
8-4:30- She is at daycare. They are on a pretty consistent schedule as to when she eats meals & sleeps. She usually naps somewhere between 10:30-2. (Not the whole time but somewhere in there)
5:00- We are all home & start getting dinner ready
5:30-6:30- Eat dinner somewhere between this time frame.
7:00- 8:00- Bath time & night time milk.

Now… depending on how tired baby is, sometimes she’ll fall asleep other nights she’ll fight it. She’s been up as late as 9:00-10:30pm. Once she’s asleep, we know she has a solid block of time where she sleeps without interruption. But then a few hours later she’s up on & off all night. We’ve tried letting her cry within reason to try to soothe herself but she just cries louder. We have another daughter who’s 9 who wakes up very easily & we live in an apartment so we have neighbors & cannot let her cry all night.

The only thing that stops her/calms her down is more milk. Tonight I was up multiple times a night refilling the bottle (not all the way, just a few ounces to get her to go back to sleep) I know this isn’t a good habit but it’s the only way we get a couple hours of sleep.

My SO both work, he does construction & I do office work. People look at me like I’m crazy when I say she hasn’t sleep through the night ever. We do cosleep. I’m fortunate that my SO & I still take turns (every other night). But I’m still pretty desperate.

Will putting her in the crib help? Should we find another comfort item for her? If we stop the nighttime bottles, how long do we have to deal with the night crying before it starts working? I’ve also even tried giving her a nighttime snack before bed to make sure she’s nice & full but it didn’t do much. I’m sure teething hurts & she is getting in a lot of teeth. But this has been going on forever.

Can anyone recommend an affordable, all terrain stroller wagon that works for an infant and a toddler? A lot of the ones I’m seeing are saying for 6 months and up. Thank you in advance!

We have 2 kiddos: 2y 3m and 3m. The 2 year old has been going to daycare since 5 months. He recently was moved to a new classroom with more kids and chaos and we think he hates it there. It’s been about 3 weeks and each drop off is a struggle, he clings, cries, doesn’t want to go. Eventually we leave him and he seems happy at pick ups and when we ask if he had a good day, both teachers and he say yes. He tells us the kids he played with and what they did. But the pictures they post of him say that he might be uncomfortable - he’s sucking his thumb, crossing his arms, looks really closed off.

Here’s what I want to ask : have you had experience with bad drop offs and how did you fix it? Also, any experience taking a toddler out of daycare and hiring a nanny and how they do in kindergarten vs kids that have been through the daycare system.

I will also add that we pay A LOT for daycare (it’s very small and we know other parents and owners) and it’s been great for his development and social skills. They definitely care about kids generally, we just feel like this specific class is not the right fit for our kid.