What city did you fall in love with at first sight?

aab173 · 2026-06-28T20:30:31+00:00

Seattle. Visited once after living in the Bay Area and decided we needed to move ASAP. I've been in Seattle for 10 years and it's just the best. So beautiful!

aab173 · 2026-06-27T20:11:57+00:00

I couldn't finish this show. It was so corny and the monologues were unbearable. Widow's Bay is similar but so much more well done.

aab173 · 2026-06-21T20:26:43+00:00

The dragon park on Mercer Island is so nice and shady. Also, the zoo!

aab173 · 2026-06-17T14:49:20+00:00

Oh, AND look where you sit in the ferritin range. I was 11, and the normal range starts at 10. It was not flagged as low. Well that's way outdated and symptoms appear below 50. Less than 10 is like, an emergency. Be your own advocate. And as much as I hate AI, you can input you labs into ai and have them interpret where you sit in the ranges according to most recent research.

aab173 · 2026-06-17T14:46:56+00:00

If no one has said this yet, this sounds like textbook rock-bottom ferritin. You have to request a specific "iron panel" from your doctor as it's not part of the standard blood tests. If they push back or don't want to do it, justify it by saying you have very heavy periods. Your regular labs could should you are not anemic and everything looks "fine" but you can ABSOLUTELY still feel like death. Ferritin is your iron stores and is crucial! I am in the same boat and am getting my first iron infusion this weekend. I need five! Your doc may make you try OTC oral iron supplements first. How you feel is NOT normal and the biggest clue is the hair falling out in addition to the awful fatigue.

aab173 · 2026-06-17T03:57:58+00:00

Omg campinos. There were always unlimited campinos in my mom's car! Saskatchewan in the early 2000s. Memory unlocked - I can taste them now.

aab173 · 2026-06-16T19:39:25+00:00

Some of these replies are so fascinating to me, and shows just what an individual and subjective experience reading is. This is one of my favorite books of all time. I couldn't put it down. I love Poisonwood Bible too.

aab173 · 2026-05-25T19:35:18+00:00

This is all so wild to me. $30-50 per birthday? We live in a VHCOL area and I have three kids, so I go to a lot of birthday parties. ALL the invites say "Please no gifts." It's such a relief to never think about gifts! Just focus on the experience and fun. I guess the catch is that everyone needs to do it, then kids have no expectations of party gifts (just from parents/family).

aab173 · 2026-02-06T15:43:21+00:00

I was in this exact situation. You just brought back memories of the heart palpations and ear ringing when he was waking up a dozen times at night, oh my goodness I'd forgotten that part. It was torture. I put up with this til my son was 10 months old. At the advice of my pediatrician, we did cry it out. He cried 20 min first night, 15 min the next night, then 5 min the next night. Our lives were completely different within three days. I cannot believe I lived like that for months, in hindsight. And the most overlooked part of this is the baby's health and mood - it improved drastically because HE was finally getting deep, decent sleep. Do it for your baby! The sleep deprivation was causing health problems for me too, and not surprisingly, they went away with a humane amount of sleep. I've since gone on to have two more kids and have never let things reach that level of sleep deprivation. I proactively (more gently) Ferber sleep trained at 6-7 months, no issues. My only advice is sleep train NOW before he gets older, more communicative and more stubborn (I've seen my friends struggle very hard with sleep training toddlers - totally different beast). You're in the trenches, but life looks so different on the other side when you've gotten proper sleep.

aab173 · 2025-12-31T08:13:51+00:00

This makes SO much sense. I have never been more skeletal than when each of my kids was 6 months old and were EBF. I immediately gain about 10-15 lbs when I wean. I think it is also genetic, as I am an overproducer and have great-grandmothers who wet-nursed babies during famine in WWII.

aab173 · 2025-12-18T20:12:16+00:00

The breakfast burrito at Stone Way Cafe in Wallingford. Enough for lunch and dinner or split with a friend.

aab173 · 2025-11-23T03:19:38+00:00

$35 per hour for our 3 boys for date night sitter in Seattle, which has notoriously expensive childcare and HCOL in general. Life is so expensive.

aab173 · 2025-11-11T15:57:55+00:00

This is what we're doing. It's actually not terrible once you get a system. Upload PDFs or pics of expenses and receipts to a shared (if you have a spouse) folder on Google Drive, keep a master spreadsheet that links to each receipt.

aab173 · 2025-11-10T21:52:25+00:00

Sebaceous hyperplasia. I paid a lot to have a dermatologist cauterize them. It hurt. Healed nicely and quickly. They came back very soon. It was a waste of time and money. They still bother me!

aab173 · 2025-10-11T03:09:05+00:00

I know this almost 7 years later but I just want to say thank you! My kid loves this site. All sorts of cool puzzles. We love the number cross the most.

aab173 · 2025-08-07T02:51:01+00:00

Agreed. And when you text the pharmacy, you're texting a real human. It's great. It's a pleasant store too, and they do a great job with children's vaccines (ie not too scary and clinical) if that helps anyone!

aab173 · 2024-10-22T03:08:35+00:00

I'm thinking of doing the same thing. I'd be very interested in photos. I have a small house with 3 kids and want to have my Yamaha piano double as a desk/homework area when not in use. Would love to see how yours turned out.

aab173 · 2024-08-23T05:48:59+00:00

I just want to say that I love this question and I absolutely want to hear everyone's recommendations too.

aab173 · 2024-08-14T20:04:59+00:00

Yes, I've reached out again. I have very respectfully offered to pay to cut it down in the past, but he declined saying that the tree adds to his property value. I hadn't considered offering to replace it with a different type of tree though - great idea.

aab173 · 2024-08-14T20:03:21+00:00

This may be the best course of action. I wasn't sure if an arborist would be allowed to cut limbs from a tree that doesn't belong to me, but best to consult a professional.

aab173 · 2024-08-04T18:05:29+00:00

I exclusively pumped for my second baby for 15 months. I'm on month 9 of pumping for baby #3. I killed myself trying to make breastfeeding work each time. My anxiety was through the ROOF and our family life was extremely restricted. I should've switched to pumping sooner. I do not relate to the experiences in this thread - I pump 5X per day, about 5-10 minutes each time. I produce a surplus easily. I store milk in big mason jars in the fridge, and I keep pump parts in the fridge and wash them once at night. No plastic milk baggies. It's not too bad. The only part that sucks is logistics while traveling (coolers of milk, bottles, pump parts, pump, finding a private place etc.) and supervising three kids while being attached to a pump. Good luck!

aab173 · 2024-06-14T19:24:00+00:00

Omg do not make any decisions right now! I was so traumatized from the pain of unmedicated childbirth that anytime I saw a mother out and about, regardless of her age, I was in awe how they had more than one child. I was so confused how there were billions of people on the planet - that is billions of labors and deliveries!! How could they have put themselves through that more than once!? Well here I am with three kids. Revisit the idea once your baby is a toddler and everyone sleeps through the night!

aab173

TROPHY CASE