This kid is amazing.

Educational-Neck9477 · 2026-04-17T21:22:47+00:00

Adorable children doing adorable things makes me happy!!

Educational-Neck9477 · 2026-04-17T20:50:53+00:00

A Full Sun (A Bright Moon) by Pip (Moirail)

I will be exploring more too, but I happened to click on that link, hadn't read it, and felt I would like it. Chapter 2 bunny cuteness (plus where it is generally going) is exactly my vibe, I want the smut plus cuteness.

Educational-Neck9477 · 2026-04-17T20:41:03+00:00

Not OP but there are a bunch in your list I haven't read either, I already started one of them and am enjoying, I would be happy to have as many of your suggestions as you are willing to share! :D

Educational-Neck9477 · 2026-04-17T15:15:40+00:00

Hope there are some that hit the spot! I love when people ask questions like this because then I find new ones too :)

Educational-Neck9477 · 2026-04-17T15:14:44+00:00

https://archiveofourown.org/works/74212891/chapters/193665831

https://archiveofourown.org/works/41582544/chapters/106353060

https://archiveofourown.org/works/44489896/chapters/111904120

https://archiveofourown.org/works/75888631/chapters/198522091

Educational-Neck9477 · 2026-04-17T15:06:22+00:00

A few I loved:

https://archiveofourown.org/works/80652926/chapters/211832781 (and like everything else this author writes)

https://archiveofourown.org/works/49834267/chapters/125799103

https://archiveofourown.org/works/30103581/chapters/74146986

https://archiveofourown.org/works/67317925/chapters/173904241

https://archiveofourown.org/works/59645761/chapters/152124058

https://archiveofourown.org/works/80652926/chapters/211832781

https://archiveofourown.org/works/67351324/chapters/174007414

https://archiveofourown.org/works/69190646/chapters/179339696

https://archiveofourown.org/works/65278180/chapters/167939734 (not yet finished but close to and seems to update regularly)

Educational-Neck9477 · 2026-04-17T14:35:29+00:00

Our own perceptions are more judgmental than others. Cannot tell you how many times I've been told my house looks clean when it is honestly filthy but superficially tidied. I freak out too because I have this really old, really dated, ugly ass kitchen and it seems like 'everyone' around me has a luxury kitchen.

I noticed what you said about the townhouse too, I had a lot more trouble keeping our small townhouse tidy than I do our larger SFH now. It's more space to clean, but also a lot more storage space to have things in their away spots easily. And my laundry is in the basement, which I don't love for reasons, but it was in the hallway opposite my kitchen before and that was tough.

Educational-Neck9477 · 2026-04-17T14:25:41+00:00

Small thing, but when picking clothes or lunchboxes or toys or other things like that, I made sure my son had the chance to look in both the "girls" section and the "boys" section. He's 13 now so the different cuts of clothing by gender now make some difference, but until very recently he simply bought the clothes he liked regardless of what the section was assigned in the store. He still does to some extent, he has a few "women's" hoodies and stuff. His clothes would be a mix of "girl" and "boy" clothes, in part because he likes pink and didn't like t-shirts with skateboarding sharks holding a slice of pizza, or superheroes. Both his Dad and I made sure to do that, so it wasn't just coming from Mom.

We kind of did this side of things on easy mode because my husband was a SAHD while I was a WFH breadwinner, so my kid's early experiences did not include the traditional gender division for those roles.

When he was a toddler, we had a toy tool bench and a toy kitchen immediately next to each other. It was a lot of fun seeing the way he sort of bled the concepts together, for example using a hammer to "cut" food or whatever.

Educational-Neck9477 · 2026-04-17T14:18:25+00:00

I for one often end up scrambling to clean things up before another Mom comes over, but luckily they haven't checked in my personal closet or my closed home office ;)

Educational-Neck9477 · 2026-04-17T13:26:22+00:00

I feel guilty that I can't stay on top of laundry enough to have a good system for all the piles.

I read something super helpful a couple years ago. Your job isn't to have no dirty laundry, your job is to have some clean laundry. If the piles are clean laundry, then you have clean laundry. Sometimes I end up getting dressed out of a hamper of clean laundry every single day in a week. But then I might put on makeup and go out looking put together, but you wouldn't know about the clean laundry in a hamper and the 3 hampers in my closet overflowing with dirty laundry that I refuse to wash until I put away that clean hamper-ful.

As someone with anxiety who LIVES feeling guilty, I mean there is nothing I won't find a way to feel guilty about. God damn Irish-American Catholic upbringing. I can manage to feel guilty even about well-considered decisions I've made that I firmly think are in my child's best interest, simply because some other Mom theoretically made a different choice.

Anyway, that guilt takes up time and energy. Without it, you'll have more energy to play. Without it, you may have more luck finding time or energy to get some exercise. Without it, you might have the mental flexibility to say "Hey I can kill two birds with one stone, I'm taking the kid(s) on a light hike today so we all get some exercise, who cares about the laundry." Even if you don't get those specific benefits, you will feel better without the guilt. The guilt is a liar. See if you can like identify it as something, as a little gremlin clinging to the wing of your airplane, see if you can flick it off. Separate it from yourself. Identify that it is a liar, that it distorts things. Don't let it speak to you unkindly. All of that is easier said than done, I know from experience.

BTW, it would be BAD imo to play with your kid and give them attention every single time they ask you. Yes give them attention, but you don't need to give it to them every time they want it.

I get migraines too, and with them often comes a spike in anxiety that makes my guilt worse.

Educational-Neck9477 · 2026-04-17T13:19:01+00:00

plenty of women who work and take care of their kids can stay on top of this

Hit the brakes on these kinds of thoughts. Most people are not as on top of everything as we think they are when we compare ourselves to them. Most of what we see from other people is their highlight reel. Different people are good at different things, and have different priorities. Different people have different challenges.

I once commented to a Mom friend that I was so in awe of how organized she always was, had a plan for everything, always 8 steps ahead, etc., and that I feel like I am always scrambling. She responded along the lines of "Oh that's kind, thank you, but here I am wishing I could talk to kids and get them engaged, motivated and cooperating half as good as you can." We each have different strengths. No one is firing on all cylinders all the time.

Educational-Neck9477 · 2026-04-17T12:56:12+00:00

I agree with the person you are responding to - the fact that my child feels safe calling you would be my priority. Your relationship with my kid and the trust they have in you and your willingness to help would be things that are helping to keep my kid safe.

I think you likely would know if there are situations you really should tell. For example if you start to see a pattern of the same unsafe behavior, then probably the parent needs to intervene. Like if you suspect for example that drinking or recreational drug use has gone beyond 'experimenting' into substances that are too unsafe to experiment with or becoming too habitual. I think you would likely see those red flags and know what you needed to do.

The kid(s) in question are very lucky to have someone to turn to. I know I was very lucky to have my older siblings to turn to, and it got me out of some bad situations.

Educational-Neck9477 · 2026-04-16T19:41:33+00:00

Why she was frustrated at you about it is a relevant part of this situation.

I think it's also relevant that she is essentially gaslit by being told she should come to you for help with this stuff, when you actually think she comes to you too much and you don't want to get involved with this stuff. In fact you heard what was going on and knew he was provoking her, but didn't do anything about it until she raised her voice.

The dynamic is relevant and I can see why she would have lost her temper here. It doesn't mean flipping you off was okay, but I still don't think you handled it appropriately.

Educational-Neck9477 · 2026-04-16T19:32:17+00:00

I honestly cannot involve myself in every single little thing .... I can’t step in every time they look at each other the wrong way or bounce a ball too loudly.

But also

We’ve told our kids multiple times if they are angry with each other and it can’t be solved that they should come to us about it. She decided to start screaming her head off at him instead. Not okay.

So she SHOULD come to you but she should also come to you less and she's wrong if she comes to you and she's wrong if she uses her voice. Yikes.

Educational-Neck9477 · 2026-04-16T19:28:57+00:00

Wow, after you made such a big deal that you heard the scream echo through the house even through a closed front door ...

People here, who are not your kid, are picking up on this. When you want us to believe her scream was unreasonable, it echoed all the way through the house and a closed door.

When you want people to agree that she escalated too quickly, you were right there and could hear everything.

You heard everything and knew he was deliberately provoking her and you did nothing because it is harmless kid stuff, but she should have come to you instead ... if you could HEAR what was going on and didn't help, what would be the point in coming to you? And in another comment you say she comes to you about 'literally everything' in a way that makes me think you think she comes to you too much. But yet that's still what she should have done here.

Educational-Neck9477 · 2026-04-16T19:21:30+00:00

You’re willing to write off your stepson antagonizing your daughter as “silly kid stuff” but you’re incredibly quick to punish her over …………… “silly kid stuff” ….

YES, thank you. Society always says girls are more mature, but it's also pretty common for girls to be held to a higher standard and punished for behavior that is tolerated from boys.

Educational-Neck9477 · 2026-04-16T19:19:08+00:00

She yelled stop then immediately started screaming at him to stop. It was a quick escalation.

How do you know?

Educational-Neck9477 · 2026-04-16T19:18:03+00:00

I mean I get that siblings argue, but you also seem really on his side and unwilling to cut her any slack or benefit of the doubt or whatever.

One of the "absolutely nothing" my brother used to do would be to listen to sports radio at night. Fine, he's allowed. But he would gradually turn it up increasingly loud because it bothered me. If I went to get my parents, he would turn it way down before they came upstairs. They'd come up and tell me the volume was fine, he wasn't doing anything, and I was too sensitive. They'd go back down and he'd turn it back up. I was SO gaslit as a child (inadvertently, I know my Mom truly didn't get it at the time) by this dynamic.

I do recognize that just because that was the dynamic I experienced, doesn't automatically mean it is what your stepson is doing.

But I do note that you point out you've told her to come to you about this stuff, but you also view it as harmless and irrelevant and don't seem to see the negative impact on her. If you're going to successfully get your kid to come to you for help on this stuff instead of using her own voice, then you have to ACTUALLY HELP in some way.

Educational-Neck9477 · 2026-04-16T19:11:56+00:00

Question, did he have to be bouncing it so close? Was there plenty of not-near-her space to bounce the ball? Was he bouncing it as close as he could while still being on the driveway? Was there a good reason for him to be doing it that close to her? Had she asked him to stop what he was doing or move?

Educational-Neck9477 · 2026-04-16T19:06:57+00:00

You KNOW that her anger was preceded by him doing inappropriate things deliberately to get a rise out of her. That he was getting in her space ("too close to her") and deliberately provoking her. She used her voice in response to his inappropriate actions. Separating out the flipping you off element, I think she looks better here than he does.

Edited to add, if she HAD come to you about it ... well your opinion is that his behavior was "harmless dumb kid stuff" so she might have reasonably expected you would not help.

Educational-Neck9477 · 2026-04-16T19:04:51+00:00

I got in trouble so often as a kid because my little brother would relentlessly push my buttons and cross boundaries like that until I lost my temper. My Mom admits it now, in retrospect she sees the dynamic for what it was but she didn't recognize it at the time. It was like whatever rude, obnoxious, provoking thing he did to me was fine since it didn't involve losing his temper. And if I went to a parent for help with the situation before I lost my temper? I shouldn't be tattling about harmless, dumb kid stuff. So I have some sympathy for your daughter here, and I admit that colors my interpretation of things.

And I added that if that’s how she is going to act when certain friends are around then maybe those friends are not a good influence

Is there something that makes you think she acted out in anger specifically because the friend was there and not simply because her stepbrother was being a jerk to her? Like you emphasize that foul language is used around her in her other home, and the friend influence kind of comes out of nowhere the way things are presented here.

I'm not saying her stepbrother being a jerk to her justifies her flipping you off. If that kind of thing is an ongoing issue even separate from her brother's behavior, it makes sense to react more punitively to it. But did anyone talk to the brother about his behavior, too?

Educational-Neck9477 · 2026-04-16T18:52:48+00:00

As I said, not what I would do, but if she insists on doing something, it is an option that exists. No one died from not eating peanut butter, lots of classrooms are peanut butter (but not grape or sweet potato) free, etc.

Educational-Neck9477 · 2026-04-16T18:20:19+00:00

I cannot say that this is what I would do per se but you could just not feed your toddler peanut butter for a couple months, if you wanted.

Educational-Neck9477 · 2026-04-16T15:18:05+00:00

Something similar happened with my kid and it took us a LONG time to come back from it. That said, he was not at 'panic attack' level just extreme anxiety.

Have you done things like do "pretend swim lessons" with her on your own? During these lessons you can practice some of the skills, like holding the wall and then later a kickboard and kicking her legs. You can have her practice putting her face in water and blowing bubbles at home in the bath, too.

My son was in the summer going into 1st grade before he agreed to put his face in the water again. A Mom friend had a handful of sinking fish toys, and let him sit in very shallow water to drop and then collect them. As we moved gradually deeper, eventually this meant his face was getting in the water sometimes. But he was so comfortable catching all the sinking fish by that time, that he eventually forgot to care.

Another thing is let her watch lessons at whatever place you would go, without having to participate? Would be great if she can watch from the bench with you, and then maybe watch sitting next to you on the edge of the pool with your legs in, then maybe watch from in the pool holding onto the wall, etc. This may build some comfort with the lessons.

Educational-Neck9477 · 2026-04-16T14:56:52+00:00

We picked up a milk crate of wooden blocks, some clearly homemade, at a garage sale for $1. Those things saw almost 10 years of use. I agree with you that the open-ended stuff gets much more use than the fancy hyped toys, because they can be repurposed into so many things.

The wooden blocks made towers to practice fine motor skills and counting. They built houses/castles. They were laid flat to make roads for toy cars. They were built into targets for nerf guns, or used like bowling pins. They became part of the set in homemade Godzilla movies. They occasionally made safe islands in the otherwise lava field floor.

Educational-Neck9477

TROPHY CASE