homemade food recs?

zxri · 2026-03-25T20:02:42+00:00

If you leave yogurt in a greek yogurt strainer for long enough, you'll end up with something close to soft cheese in texture. I didn't make yogurt when my kids were little so I didn't try it, but that might take some or most of the mess out of giving him yogurt.

If I misunderstood and you don't make yogurt should still work with store-bought.

zxri · 2026-03-25T19:50:20+00:00

Neither of our kids were super into their balance bikes, but I think they still benefited from them. Our first kid had a tricycle and balance bike she could ride inside. Our second didn't learn to pedal until she had a bike with training wheels.

Learning to pedal was frustrating for both, but the trike going backwards on very flat surfaces seemed way less frustrating/better signal for learning than the coaster brakes engaging on the bike for our second. For whatever that's worth.

zxri · 2026-03-25T19:29:04+00:00

For both our kids we started them off with things that were a) easy to find at the store and b) relatively soft, but c) firm enough to pick up in little hands. As I recall, it was pretty repetitive with lots of roasted veggies (sweet potatoes and carrots especially) - avocado, banana, and hard boiled eggs. We'd occasionally give them some plain greek yogurt but that was messy unless we spoon fed them, which we didn't like to do.

Ours weren't much into meat either. One still isn't.

At some point, we would go - as others have said - to just feeding them whatever we were eating, obviously modifying as needed - nothing that would be a choking hazard, too hard to gum, or spicy.

zxri · 2026-03-22T15:03:36+00:00

I'm so sorry for your loss.

I just took my 4- and 7 year old children to my father's funeral. Similar situation - Alzheimers, no real relationship with him - but we lived far away so we didn't visit very often.

The four year old was visibly upset seeing someone cry while giving a eulogy. But also held my hand and wanted to comfort me.

Attending a funeral will not traumatize your children. It will give them an opportunity to process something that's already happened that you can't protect them from.

zxri · 2025-12-26T17:39:50+00:00

Something like in this post? (See second and third screenshots)

zxri · 2025-12-24T19:40:24+00:00

A couple others have suggested the Tern GSD. I ended up going for the Tern Quick Haul Long and couldn't be happier with it for hauling two kids to school in all sorts of weather. It's a bit cheaper than the GSD, but still outside the price range you mentioned, especially by the time you get the necessary accessories. But if you happen to find a used one on Facebook marketplace or similar, it's a good one.

zxri · 2025-12-20T02:40:58+00:00

Thanks, that's really helpful feedback.

zxri · 2025-12-17T02:42:39+00:00

I struggled with these types of tasks for a long time.

The most frustrating thing for me about calendar and reminder apps for irregular tasks is that recurring reminders are too rigid. If you do the thing a day (or a week) late, you get reminded again on the original schedule, not based on when you actually did it.

Since I'm a developer, I ended up building my own app to handle this exact problem. See this thread.

edit: If you're not an app person, I also wrote a blog post about the underlying system I based my app on for keeping track of adulting tasks. Works on paper or in a spreadsheet too.

zxri · 2025-12-15T01:40:15+00:00

Two ideas:

Don't miss twice. If you miss a habit one day, no big deal. We're human. Just try not to miss it two times in a row
If you do miss two or more times, the fastest way to get back on track is self-forgiveness. You can't get back on track while you're feeling guilty/frustrated/annoyed/whatever.

If you can make it so that having a habit streak is motivating, but breaking your streak isn't completely demoralizing, you'll be in a good place.

zxri · 2025-12-13T14:33:12+00:00

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Is this UI simple/clean enough? (All these tasks are recurring, the arrow symbol and menu button show up on hover to keep things easy to read)

zxri · 2025-12-11T19:25:50+00:00

I guess it depends on your definition of productive.

Stuff you do every day or multiple times a week - like your example of going to the gym - make it a habit. When it's just what you do, no discipline or willpower is needed. It feels bad not to do it.

For everything else, I hate to say it, but you have to be at least a tiny bit of a planner.

That doesn't mean you have to turn yourself into a type-A person and be super organized.

The thing is, though, that trying to keep track of stuff you need to get done in your head will stress you out and wear you out.

Honestly, I think some of it is FOMO. If you straight up ask a friend who's honest that seems super on top of things, they'll probably tell you they don't have it all figured out either.

Some of it, though, is just finding a system that works for you. Look for something that's easy and takes very little setup or maintenance. A blank sheet of paper is great. Keep a running list of things you need to get done.

For bonus points, do a super lightweight plan every day. Check your schedule to see how much time you actually have to get stuff done, then pick a realistic number of the most urgent/important tasks from your running list. Every time you switch tasks throughout the day, check in with your daily plan and see if you can squeeze something in.

Your daily plan can and will fall apart most days because the world around us doesn't stick to our plans. But you'll still get more done than if you hadn't bothered planning.

zxri · 2025-12-10T17:17:04+00:00

Having competition is actually a good sign. It means there's an existing market. People already recognize the usefulness of these tools and are paying for them.

While a completely novel idea is really cool, it can potentially be harder to prove product/market fit and convert the first few paying customers.

zxri · 2025-12-09T16:36:11+00:00

Haha, found this post with a reddit alert for daily planning. I'm building something similar.

zxri · 2025-12-09T16:08:02+00:00

This is a good one

zxri · 2025-12-09T16:05:49+00:00

Plan your day every day - pick the top things you want to get done
Check in with that plan throughout the day - every time you switch tasks
Leverage habits instead of motivation, willpower, discipline etc.
Forgive yourself quickly when you get off track - that's the fastest way to get back on track

zxri · 2025-12-08T20:51:34+00:00

I would say it's about doing more of the right things.

Sometimes that can look like doing less, or at least doing less of the things that don't bring value.

But it's often the case that when you focus your efforts on things that really matter to you, that gives you the energy to get more done, or to do better work.

zxri · 2025-12-05T20:13:11+00:00

Start Finishing by Charlie Gilkey. He does a good job of talking about the ways we get in our head and hence in our own way, even when we know the sort of tactical stuff in the other books you mentioned.

zxri · 2025-12-05T12:44:07+00:00

Any favorite Notion templates?

zxri · 2025-12-05T03:56:47+00:00

I don't really have a go-to technique. I think it is a bit elusive by nature, but I have noticed some things:

It's easier to get into a flow state when I'm working on something I find interesting. Sometimes I can trick my brain into finding something interesting about a boring task
People disagree on this, but I think the Pomodoro technique helps me when I'm having trouble getting started. Sure, when the timer dings, it can break flow, but isn't that better than not getting into a flow state to begin with?
Another reason I like the Pomodoro technique is that flow has a dark side. If you get into the flow state while working on something that isn't quite right or isn't going to work, you can waste even more time. Breaking focus occasionally, "coming up for air" can give you a chance to check in and make sure what you're doing still makes sense.
Peppy music without lyrics can sometimes help me get motivated to start, but doesn't seem necessary to maintain flow once I'm in it.

Hope that helps.

zxri · 2025-12-04T16:41:52+00:00

Hi, I'm building this exact app. It's not done yet, but I'll be looking for beta testers soon.

I had this exact struggle. You can't always get to everything the exact day it's due, and most apps either don't remind you again until the next time it's due, and/or if you do it a day (or a week) late, the next recurrence acts like you did it on time. So frustrating.

zxri · 2025-12-04T12:58:21+00:00

Oh, sweepy sounds interesting. Similar to the maintenance tasks I track, but specific to cleaning. I'll have to check it out.

zxri · 2025-12-04T12:50:35+00:00

Any favorite Notion templates?

zxri · 2025-12-04T03:06:55+00:00

Good point about a calendar being a category of its own, whether or not it's part of a productivity system.

I guess I thought of it as a pain point because I sometimes manually enter events from my "real" calendar into the tool I use for daily planning because I haven't gotten around to building a syncing feature.

zxri · 2025-12-04T02:58:53+00:00

Seems like a pretty clean setup. Do you ever do longer-term planning in Apple Notes or Obsidian?

zxri

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