The Ugly Volvo

Old Posts

  • Why You Should Never, Ever, Ever Get A Tattoo (but Having a Baby is Fine)

    I’m not super pro-tattoo or anti-tattoo.  I’ve debated getting one in the past but never that seriously.  But my mother is vehemently anti-tattoo.  Listed below are the reasons my mother has always given me for why I shouldn’t get a tattoo. And I understand that she’s from a different generation.  And I love my mother very much.…

  • An Open Letter to My Dog After the Birth of my First Child

    Dear Tig, Here’s a list of things for which I want to apologize: 1.  I’m sorry for every time I loop your leash around the doorknob and hurriedly say, “Two minutes!  I’m going to take you outside in two minutes!”  Because I am not going to do that.  You know, as you watch me struggling…

  • Filing for Reimbursement of Time Spent Folding Laundry

    Hi, I’d like to submit my yearly hours of time spent folding laundry—mine, my sons’ and the communal laundry (sheets, towels, and occasionally the sofa cover)—for reimbursement.  I am not looking for monetary reimbursement, I would specifically like to be reimbursed in time spent.  As we’ve recently gone paperless, please notify me via e-mail when…

  • An Open Letter to the Female Hat-Wearing Dog From “Go Dog, Go”

    Dear female hat-wearing dog, I bought your book to help my son learn prepositions and adjectives and was, from the first read, inexorably drawn in by your heart-wrenching struggle for approval.  Momentarily distracted by the humdrum parade of big dogs, little dogs, black and white dogs, I watched as you walked in, brimming with joy…

  • Yelp Reviews of Newborn Babies

    We obsessively check online reviews to see if a movie is worth seeing or a restaurant is worth visiting.  If anyone was considering having a newborn baby and wanted to read the Yelp reviews first, here they are. *              *               * If…

  • All of my Issues With the “Goodnight Moon” Bedroom

    I’ve read Goodnight Moon almost every night for the past two years.  It’s a wonderful book which my son enjoys.  Here are some of my issues with the bedroom depicted in it. 1.  The Size of the Bedroom This bedroom is enormous.  There is no one, I think, who has not noticed this.  As someone…

  • Reasonably Good Advice Written on Bananas

    My mother used to write on my bananas.  It is one of those weird things I remember about my school lunches.  I remember that she would always pack me a Red Delicious apple (which I would promptly throw in the garbage because Red Delicious apples taste, if I am being generous, like damp cardboard) and I…

  • What All The Other Parents Are Doing During The Day

    The first few months staying home with my kid were hard because being alone all the time is rough.  And people would point out, “But you’re not alone!  You have that baby!” except that having a baby is not the same thing as having another adult person around with whom you can have an actual conversation.  You…

  • Parenting Olympics

    For those of you angry that having a child prevented you from qualifying for the Rio 2016 Olympics, remember that while you may be losing at international sports competitions, you’re still in the running for a few other medals: Event 1: To level the playing field, this event is divided into multiple weightclasses: Newborn Infant…

  • What I Do All Day When I Am Home With The Baby

    I am, for now, a stay at home mother. People sometimes ask what exactly I do during the day and I never have any idea what to say. Below is a fairly accurate description of most of the things I do on any given day. To save time, repetitive actions like changing diapers and feeding…

  • A Breakdown of your Child’s Eating Patterns

    (Click graphs to enlarge.) *               *               * SEVEN STARS FARM ORGANIC PLAIN WHOLE MILK YOGURT *               *               * ORGANIC ROASTED BEETS *               *               * TRADER JOE’S BRAND CHEERIOS *               *               * PEAS FROM LOCAL FARMER’S MARKET (ALSO ORGANIC) *               *               * WHATEVER YOU WERE EATING *               *               * COOKIE/CUPCAKE/CHOCOLATE/ANYTHING CONTAINING REFINED SUGAR *          *          *…

  • A Ten-Month-Old’s Letter To Santa

    Dear Santa,  I am a ten-month-old baby and I write because my mother has been sending out my “Christmas List” to people, and her list does not in any way represent the things I really want.  I could give two s#*ts about receiving stacking cups. And I know you’re ready to make the joke about…

  • The Amazing Butternut Squash Soup Recipe That Everyone Should Make At Least Once

    Love butternut squash soup?  Looking for that amazing recipe that everyone on earth seems to have?  Look no further!  Follow the instructions below for soup so delicious it’ll change the way you look at fall! *               *               * Step 1.  Buy one or two mid-sized organic butternut squash from your local farmer’s market.  Look for…

  • The Nine Hundred Dollar iPhone Photo

    I’m not going to say that we flew down to Florida to get a picture, because we didn’t.  We flew down to Florida to see my grandfather, who is 94-years-old and my son’s only living great-grandparent.  All my own great-grandparents passed away long before I was born, as did my husband’s great-grandparents.  So I’m not…

  • 10 Quick, Easy Meals for Moms!

    So I signed up to have a kid and even that, really, did I have any idea what I was signing up for?  Of course not.  No one does.  But I am doing it.   I will put in a lot of time to help my kid learn how to be a good person.  BUT, I…

  • A Baby Book of Disasters

    So I have this baby book for my son that I use to record his milestones, and it is boring.  It is so, so boring.  Half the time I don’t even remember to write things down when they happen because I am so wholly uninterested in recording things for this stupid book.  “Today he rolled…

  • Oh, he looks “JUST LIKE YOU”

    When the baby was only a month or so old everyone kept saying, “Oh wow, he looks like your husband.  He looks so much like your husband!”  And now he is six months old and at a family gathering the other day I had at least 10 people say that he looked exactly like me.…

  • Having A Baby Solved All My Problems

    Having a baby solved all my problems. All of them. A year ago I was just like every other slightly anxious cardigan-wearing woman in her early thirties, wondering if my life was on the right track. I was nervous about money, about my relationship, about my job. I needed a quick, easy fix—something simple I…

  • Approximate Food Consumption of my 16-Month-Old Son

    A rough estimate of how much food my son eats when compared to other things that consume food.  Click to enlarge.

  • The Best Instagram Filters for New Parents

    I don’t use Instagram all that much (so apologies if you follow me on there and are less than wow-ed by the photo of my dog I post once every three months). I like it in theory, but most of the filters (with the exception of the black and white one) look more or less…

  • Why Having a Baby Reminds me of Garfield Minus Garfield

    I love the site Garfield Minus Garfield. If you don’t know the site Garfield minus Garfield  it’s a website run by a guy named Dan Walsh who takes Garfield comic strips and digitally erases Garfield from them.   The reason I love Garfield minus Garfield is that when you erase Garfield from the Garfield comic strip, what you get is three panels of…

  • DAD BRIDGE WALK (A Poorly Titled Post for Father’s Day)

    It is Father’s Day this weekend.  And I am lucky enough to have a wonderful father. For anyone who’s going, “WAIT, WHAT IS HAPPENING, I CAME HERE TO READ A QUICK AND SNAPPY THING ABOUT FATHERS, PREFERABLY WITH ILLUSTRATIONS AND POSSIBLY IN A LIST FORMAT,” do not read this.  It is too long.   It…

  • 9 Conversations About How My 15-Month-Old Son is Not Yet Walking

    Will have a new post up on my own site early next week (and will be posting more regularly) but for now the latest post is up as a guest post on the Someecards/HappyPlace website. The post is about how my kid is 15-months-old and still isn’t walking yet and look, he’s fine, he’s fine, I…

  • Totally Cute Diaper Bags That Don’t Look Like Diaper Bags

    There was a thing I did not know about before I had a baby, which was: “Diaper bags that do not look like diaper bags.” Do you know what these are?  I did not.  These are really well-designed, hip diaper bags that look like large designer handbags or tote bags so that while carrying them…

  • What I’d Really Like for Mother’s Day

    Wrote a guest blog this week for HappyPlace.com on what I’d really like for mother’s day.  I in no way intended for it to come across as cruel or mean so I apologize if that is how it seems.   You can get to it by clicking the link here:  What I’d Really Like for…

  • Don’t worry, because I am so totally on top of my child’s health.

    I try to be careful with my son’s health. Not crazily “I Purell my lips when I kiss him” careful, but careful, regardless.  It is hard, sometimes, not to immediately assume the worst when things go wrong.  The other day he coughed and 85% of my brain went, “All children get sick and cough!” but…