Daddy Types: December 2006 Archives

December 2006 Archives

December 31, 2006

BabyCenter's Top 100 Names Of 2006 Sound Pretty Familiar

But then, I guess that's the working definition for a List of Most Popular Names. Clear trends: The old-fashioned girly thing [Hannah, Isabella, Emma, Olivia, Abigail, Ava, et al.] The Ethan/Ryan/Joshua/Jack are the new Michael/John/Matthew/Robert thing, and The awesome power...
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Princess Industrial Complex Drives Feminist Crazy

Too bad for Peggy Orenstein that her looong lament about third-wave feminism's powerlessness and lack of viable response in the face of the Princess Hegemony came out the same day American girls were opening their $3 billion worth of pink...
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December 30, 2006

Papa Bricoleur's DIY Baby Rocker

I've felt bad for not responding to the several emails I've gotten recently asking for advice on cool rockers or baby swings. For a long time, I thought that the reason I couldn't bear to post about them is because...
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VV Cute Thumbprint ABC Poster [sic]

Sarah Neuburger sells her art and designs on her site, The Small Object. Which I guess is a plausible explanation for why this achingly cute thumbprint ABC "poster" is only 8.5 x 11 inches. There are also a bunch...
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December 29, 2006

German Town Development Pioneers Car-Free Living For Families

Unfortunately for readers in the Philadelphia area, that's "a German town," not "Germantown." Vauban is a new, 2,000-home development in the university town of Freiburg, Germany that's being developed on a 94-acre former military base as a haven for green,...
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Neal Pollack To Gothamist: I Am Hipster Dad, Hear Me Roar

Does the IRS have a Schedule C code for "Hipster Dad"? Because judging by his interview on Gothamist, Neal Pollack needs one. His parenting memoir Alternadad, due any day now [Jan. 7th, to be exact], got optioned for a movie,...
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All I Got For Christmas

Tis the season for coming clean. Daddy Types policy is to decline freebies and pay-for-play swaps of product and coverage. With the exception of all the cars mentioned on this site, no one can buy their way into Daddy Types'...
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All The World's A Playmobil, And We Are Merely Playmobilers

The kid only had one request of Santa this Christmas, but it was highly specific. And challenging: "A digger, and rocks, and sand." The digger would be easy enough, I thought. Even though I got priced out of that...
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The Toys Of Artist Richard McGuire: A DT Interview

How does awesome work from less than ten years ago disappear from the parenting culture? Granted, ten years is like five toddler generations ago, and I'll be the first to admit my baby trend radar was completely non-existent until just...
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Crazy Horses: DWR Slashes Prices On Rocking Beauty Knock-offs

There may be some justice left in the world. First, DWR knocked off a widely published design classic from the 1950's long attributed to Phillip Johnson, by trying to pass it off as an anonymous piece of modern folk...
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December 28, 2006

Cars You Can't Have: Euro Edition

Where to start, another trip abroad just leaves me wondering what the hell is wrong with the car executives in the US? There are so many awesome-yet-practical, family-friendly cars in the world, and yet here we are stuck in a...
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Yet Another Sleepless Travel Day

You gotta figure you're in for a rough ride when the kid sleeps less than either of you. We just rolled in from France, via Munich and the Reston, VA Chick-Fil-A. The kid not only hasn't slept more than 30...
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December 27, 2006

Flash: Hollywood Depiction Of Parents Idealized, Judith Warner Critique Unfollowable

Maybe it's this crazy French keyboard, but I read Judith Warner's NYT essay about the problems with Jude Law's portrayal of a too-perfect widower dad in The Holiday, and I can't think of anything to say. Except that wasn't Jude...
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Robert Smith Drives A Bugaboo!! Uh, Wait...

Sorry, false alarm; It's just an illustration by Paul Corio in the Village Voice for a story about hipster music for babies. The article, by new dad Paul Ott is pretty level-headed. Ott's rigged up "a pink iPod Mini...
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q right column missing?

i got an email that the right column is showing up down below the entries. Any webheads have an idea why, please let me know; I can't get to a net cafe for another 4hrs... thnx [update: I should've known....
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DT Namewatch: #24: Lost In The Christmas Shuffle Edition

Zeke & Zoey Zodrow, twin Santa-fearers [via southflorida.com]...
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December 26, 2006

Dt Namewatch #25 France Edition

Posting via cel today: wellington koo, foreıgn minister of china, 1906. arsulina, integrated bus-pioneering maid, 1956 [both via iht.com] foulque, local prince bruno, local politician werther, goethe character tips? names [at] daddytypes [dot] com...
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I Saw Maman Lynching Santa Claus

Bonnes Fetes, everyone. The hypermarches were packed, but the churches were practically empty here in France the last couple of days; That, combined with the fact that all the Peres Noel in the village here in Provence are depicted...
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December 22, 2006

For Now, Just One Piece Of Advice: Stay Far, Far Away From Frankfurt Airport

If most airport checkpoints are useless security theater, the worst airport in the US is a high school version of Our Town, and Frankfurt airport is every Cirque du Soleil playing simultaneously at the Bellagio with Celine freakin' Dion singing...
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December 21, 2006

In Process: One Sweet, Sweet Dad-Made Heirloom Crib

Another Jason, Nakashima* Studio–woodworker Jason Banks, is hard at work on a crib for his son, due in a few months [congratulations!]. After putting in long hours at work, and making dinner for his pregnant wife, Jason has been tweaking...
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Celebrity Pregnancy Industry Has A LaToya, Too

Tori Spelling driving a freakin' dog stroller around that Old Navy-to-the-stars, Kitson. [image: flynet/popsugar, thanks trent]...
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Tis The Season To Kill Time Clicking Through Scared Of Santa Photo Galleries

Dumber than a sacka hammers? Funnier'na gallery of Scared of Santa photos. The LA Times has gotten in on the tradition started by the Chicago Tribune and added to by the folks at SouthFlorida.com, by getting their readers to...
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DT Namewatch #23: "There is no such thing as a 'good' name or a 'bad' name" edition

Lichai and Ila, well-dressed brother and sister [via babble] Alastair Roderic Craigellachie Dalhousie Gowan Donnybristle MacMac, aka Wee Gillis. I think MacMac's my favorite. [via nybr] Widuran Bertram, source of the quote in the title [via bbc] Remo, Italian...
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December 20, 2006

I like 'em fat like that, too!

Let the cats all criticize, Joke about my baby's size; She's reet with me Because you see: I like 'em fat like that. When she bounces down the street, She's a whole heap o' honey, and ain't she sweet? Feels...
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Tickle Me Emo

They make TV with the comedians they have, not the comedians we want. Of the few I've seen all the way through, Mad TV's gags seem about 10% funny [i.e., they go on 10x too long]. Tickle Me Emo...
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Naming Like It's 1904 And/Or 2004

British folk are apparently all naming their kids after their grandparents now, says the BBC's Keely Paice, with lots of 1906-era names like Henry and Max and Ruby and Alfie. Alfie? That's a character on the Eastenders, so they're actually...
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Hey Baby, What Say You And Me Make A Tax Deduction Together?

I was having a hard time parsing this NYT article about the correlation between the number of kids born in the last week of the year--between Christmas and New Year's--an increase in the value of dependent-related tax deductions.In the last...
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December 19, 2006

Belly Door By Elmgreen & Dragset

A few years back, some artist friends in Berlin, Michael Elmgreen & Ingar Dragset, made a series of sculpture/installations that involved doors. Doors with two handles, doors two doors facing each other and chained together, etc. The idea seems...
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Get Ahead Of The Obama Name Curve

There are probably a handful of 6-year-old Ralphs out there whose parents are really wondering if they should've named their kid after the man who threw the election, so it's understandable if people want to wait until he's actually president...
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Chinese Regulations Changes To Affect Large Segment Of The Adoption Population

The Chinese government is tightening application requirements for foreign adoptions, according to the NY Times. For applications submitted after May 1, 2007, China's Center For Adoption Affairs will not permit foreigners to adopt if they: are single, are on anti-depressants,...
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This Office Party Story Doesn't Pass The Sniff Test

If it's true, then the apparently child-free Liam just didn't spin it right. Because if there's one thing a baby's good for, it's taking the blame for farts. RAISING A STINK AT THE OFFICE XMAS PARTY... [...
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NYT Tries, Fails To Put Chad Pennington's Appearance On Sesame Street In Context

Chad Pennington and some of his fellow NY Jets taped a segment on Sesame Street last week. In grand "leave no metaphor unturned" sportswriting tradition, the NY Times' Karen Crouse basically tries to credit Elmo for helping the Jets recover...
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The New York Review Children's Collection Puts Awesome Books Back In Print

When I discovered Richard McGuire's incredible kids' books, it blew me away that titles from just a few years ago could already be out of print. [Which isn't the same as being unavailable to buy, of course, but still.] There...
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This Week In Dog-Baby-Bad Parenting Insanity

Am I the only one who's ready to call BS on recent coverage of bad parent-and-pet stories? I mean, if Gardenia Johansson had better publicists, maybe her story would be that she was just trying to protect her baby's toes...
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DT Namewatch #22: Sorry, I Was Shopping Edition

I had this edition of the Namewatch ready to go, then I ran into a friend an engaged her in conversation. Plus, I had to wrap some Christmas presents. Do you think that's wrong? names [at] daddytypes [dot] com: Gardenia,...
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For Sale: One Sweet, Sweet Dad-Made Heirloom Crib

Hmm. Seems like everyone but me has managed to finish his kid's bed. Wisconsin furnituremaker Jason Holtz emailed with an offer too sweet not to post: a beautiful, award-winning hardwood crib--solid cherry and maple, with curly cherry end panels--he...
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December 18, 2006

The Crocheted World Of Golfini Della Nonna

At the Bubble New York trade show last summer, the amazing crocheted creations of Golfini della Nonna filled a happy booth, but by the time we got around to that side, the kid was ready for a nap, and...
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iFrogz Tadpole The Imperfect Solution For The 4-iPod Family

Core77 gets all philosophical about the iFrogz Tadpole, a rugged, fun-looking iPod case for kids that's perfect for letting your kid watch videos at "the car, grocery store, bus stop, doctor's office, stroller and more!":could this be an indicator...
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Hexi-Hollow Better, Not Better Named Than Hexagon Happening Hollow

The Children's Factory is a grandparent-run company in Missouri that's been making brightly colored vinyl-covered foam furniture for the kids institutional market [i.e. daycare centers, schools, libraries] since 1982, back when gas was like 75 cents/gallon. Putting one of...
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December 17, 2006

Welcome To Disney Campana: The Mickey Plush Toy Sofa

I know what you're saying. You like the Campana Brothers' awesome sofa made by lashing plush toys to a steel frame, but for $15,000 [up from $11,000 just a year ago!], you don't want some generic stuffed animals from...
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Introducing The Bugaboo Stamp

For its new, 2007 stamps, the Dutch post office, TNT Post, commissioned the Amsterdam firm ...,staat to create a series of Dutch design icon stamps. Not like windmills or wooden shoes or anything [though tulips did make the cut]....
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Blog It Or Buy It? Sweet Baby Face Vintage Swatch

Can't. Stop. Blogging. Must. Keep. Mouth Shut. And. Bid. Arrghh... Oh, what the hey, I only use the clock on my cell phone these days anyway. If I bought it, this 1995 Swatch with adorable baby faces all over...
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Have You Seen Me? My Name Is The PlayAll

This was one of the coolest toys we had growing up, and I can't find out a single thing about it. It was called a Playall [Play All? Play-All? PlayAll?], which, in this CD and MP3 era, turns out...
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December 15, 2006

Star Of Jersey Girl, Gigli Says He Doesn't Want To Embarass Daughter

Good luck with that, Ben. [strollerderby @ babble.com] possibly related, unless you're at work: [youtube via goldenfiddle]...
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Toot Toot, Chugga Chugga, Small Faded Red Car

Last summer photoblogger extraordinaire David F. Gallagher snapped a picture of an abandoned amusement park car in Bensonhurst, Brooklyn. If the carbon dating tests come back positive, the photo is definitive proof that The Wiggles are descended from those...
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Pinhead Takes The Dog Shopping

Gardenia Zakrzewski Johansson was arrested after she took her dog into Nieman Marcus in Scottsdale, AZ, but left her 2-year-old son in the car. She had asked valet Quest Wolfe to keep an eye on her son, who was sleeping...
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Christmas Is The Time For Sharing

If this quote is abrupt enough to get you to watch Diane Sawyer just to see if that's really how Angelina Jolie talks, the USA Today's editors will bring home the prize Turkey in the Poulterer's window, not the little...
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Baby Gate Mod Lets Cat, Random Limbs Under

Struggling to make it work with a baby and a cat? "Why lay down 50 bucks or more for a gate (that has less than a 2' opening), when you can MAKE exactly what you need for next to...
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DT Namewatch #21: Analyst Edition

Oddly, I didn't hear many first names during the JP-HK trip. Here's hoping you've been listening for interesting, unusual, cool, or awesome names. Send them in to names [at] daddytypes [dot] com: Alasdhair, alternate spelling of Alastair, also Stella McCartney's...
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December 14, 2006

Cars You Can't Have Wrap-up: Nissan, Honda, Mitsubishi, Scion, Mercedes

I'm cleaning out the to-post folder here at DTHQ, and there are a few more cars you can't have, plus one I can [HAH!]: First off, the new Scion xB, called the Toyota bB in Japan, is just pimpy enough,...
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Kyoto Claw Game Big Enough To Swallow Three Toddlers

Things really are different over there. For example, we saw these claw plush toy machines in the covered shopping arcade area of Kyoto. The prize door is so freakin' big, you could fit a whole Chuck E. Cheeseful of...
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Q: How Long Does It Take To Slap A Volvo Badge On A Mazda?

A: two years. [1] Top: 2009 Volvo XC60 Concept [jalopnik and jan at kidsrepublic.nl] Bottom: 2007 Mazda CX-7 Reality [daddytypes] [1] And yes, I know it's built on a different platform....
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Norwegian Wood: Nice Toys By Olav Øen

These wooden toys by Norwegian designer Olav Øen have a happy Scandinavian vibe: a little Bojesen in that bear, a little PlaySam in that car, a little IKEA in those stacky things, a little superbright color to compensate for...
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Cut & Dry: Circumcision Lowers AIDS Risk

It's official now. After a French study in South Africa showed the same results last year, the US and the WHO have made pronouncements about two large-scale studies in Africa that showed circumcision significantly lowered men's risk of HIV infection...
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Studies: Do Something, Anything, To Get Kid To Sleep

Seeing as how it's based on a review in the October issue of SLEEP, the journal of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine, I'd say the Times was asleep at the wheel with this story about which behavior techniques get...
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Japanese TV Silliness: Less Ninjas, More Robots

OK, I swear, I'll stop for a while. It's just that the third day of jet lag is the toughest, and I've got the last, daybreak shift with the kid, and it turns out the National Geographic watering hole...
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December 13, 2006

Robert Mapplethorpe's Children's Portraits

I swear, I didn't plan for it to be art day, but there you go. The late photographer Robert Mapplethorpe is now best known for his minimalistic homoerotic and sadomasochistic nudes [OK, and maybe his sensual photos of orchids, but...
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Sail Away, Sail Away, Sail Away With The Kid. And The SeaSwing.

Cue up the Enya, baby, because come Springtime, we are finally going sailing again! Now that Kids Nautique has created the SeaSwing, we'll be able to clamp the kid onboard in a safe, upright position either in her Maxi-Cosi carrier...
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Ausgezeichnet! Cool Wooden Toys From Behind The Iron Curtain

While our parents were ducking and covering in the US, singing the praises of Howdy freakin' Doody to ward off the evils of communism, in East Germany at least, those same commie bastards were cranking out some mighty fine-looking...
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Andrea Zittel Made This Hat For A Friend's Baby

Another artist I really like: Andrea Zittel. Her work explores the boundaries between art and design, modernism, minimalism, and manufactured personalization. I'd love to see what kind of baby/kid environments she'd come up with. She has also been making...
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Kids On Art: Felix Gonzalez-Torres

One of my favorite artists is Felix Gonzalez-Torres, whose work I used to collect before it went stratospherically beyond my price range. We installed a sculpture of his, 180 pounds of wrapped candy dumped in the corner, a couple...
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December 12, 2006

Japanese TV Silliness: Pitagora Suicchi's Algorithm March. Also With Ninjas

This will be the last post about ye random Japanese kid's TV program for at least several hours. If you're fed up, I'm sorry, but it's the ninjas' fault. Pitagora Suicchi's Algorithm March, solo, then together with ninjas [youtube]...
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Back, Back-up, Backed Up, The Shirts Off My Back

As you may have guessed, we got back from Japan and Hong Kong late last night. A couple of things from the checklist: First, thanks and welcome to Andy, modernist design shark and daddytype, who began a guestblogging stint here...
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Cars You Can't Have Unless Ford NA Gets Its $*&# Together: Mondeo Wagon

Ford NA has a long, storied history of botching the introductions of awesome rides from Ford Europe to the US market. The Merkur [flop], the Contour/Mystique [who?] the redesigned Focus [no-show]... Reports have surfaced that another cycle of build-up...
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Framy The Square Dog: The Second Pitagora Book

And here I thought traveling 28 hours straight would be enough for a clean break with Japan, and yet here we are, slogging through jet lag by watching episodes of Pitagora Suitchi online all afternoon. Visiting Masahiko Sato's website,...
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10 Stick Anime & Framy: Awesome Japanese Kid's Anime

One discovery last week was a pair of really beautiful, smart, and funny animated segments on an NHK kid's TV show called Pitagora Suicchi [Pythagoras Switch]. Juppon Anime [10 Stick Anime] is a story or game told by 10 animated...
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Who Gets A Puppy Right After Having A Baby??

Also from Yahoo News, a 6-week-old pit bull puppy gnawed four toes off a 1-month-old baby girl in Louisiana. The kid was in an infant carrier on the floor next to the mattress where the parents were sleeping. The vet...
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Jim Lambie, The Olan Mills Of The 21st Century

There's almost no better backdrop for taking a photo of a kid than a floor installation by the Scottish artist Jim Lambie. I got some pics of the kid on the Lambie installation this summer at the Hirshhorn in...
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Donald Judd Twin Daybed

If only I'd done a little more research, I might have known that Donald Judd did, in fact, make a smaller version of his daybed. This almost-twin-sized version [111x116x204cm] dated from 1993, while the artist was still alive, was...
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UK IVF Law Changes: Fathers Less Necessary Than Sperm

A government white paper recommending changes to the UK's regulations governing sperm donors is expected to be released Friday. The Daily Mail got all worked up over a leak of the report, which is expected to do away with the...
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December 11, 2006

"I'm There For You, Son, 80 Perc--Hold On, Let Me Get This"

Parents ignore their kids to do email on their BlackBerries. The kids who are old enough to talk seem to take this personally, even the ones who play pretend Blackberry themselves:One of BlackBerry's biggest defenders, Jim Balsillie, the chairman of...
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Crawligator-ing Is Not A Crime!

This vintage Creative Playthings toy a tummy skateboard for babies, makes tummy time mobile. Not clear what the CPSC has to say about this thing in our newly enlightened era, but this particular Crawligator is certainly in exquisite condition....
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Cars You Can't Have: VW CrossPolo

This was one of the cars that started it all. The VW CrossPolo was in a dealership across the street from my wife's conference venue, and it taunted it us with its higher stance, its sweet turbodiesel, its FauxWD,...
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Hong Kong Airport Authority Forgets To Renew Subscription To Mothering Magazine

Previously: Mothering Magazine's International Breastfeeding Icon Design Contest...
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December 10, 2006

Antonio Vitali: Spielzeugdesigner

Swiss eBayer a.r. has just listed this very early and beautiful set of hand-carved wooden figures, dollhouse and furniture by Antonio Vitali. According to a.r., these were sold at the Swiss National Crafts Store (!) in the 1940s and...
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Hmm. Study Didn't Say: Smoking Moms 2x More Dangerous Than Car Seats

A study at the University of Auckland [NZ] looked at the cases of 43 babies who suffered lack of oxygen. In 9 of those cases, the survey found, kids were resting in an infant carrier for some extended period of...
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The Little Empress's High Chair

The venerable Mandarin Oriental Hotel in Hong Kong just got a freshening up, I'm told. The fact that it looks the same to me as it did 12 years ago must mean it worked. One thing it didn't even...
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December 9, 2006

PlaySam Streambox

Though we obviously bought them for us--because they're the kind of slick, beautiful toy you don't mind lying around the house--the kid loves her PlaySam Streamliner cars. She races them around against each other. Once she was old enough, we...
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December 8, 2006

The Kid Learns The Lesson Of Bad Feng Shui

Yesterday/Friday, we shipped out of Kyoto and headed to Hong Kong for the weekend to visit some of the grandparents, who are here doing the expat banking thing. They live at The Four Seasons, which is known in Chinese as...
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Scary Russian Playgrounds

Surreal, inventive, kind of handmade, unacquainted with the details of corporate intellectual property licensing or liability insurance, these playgrounds represent the best aspects of the Russian children's spirit. And even though the scale model of the Kremlin has more...
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Midnight, And The Kiddies Are Sleeping

The New York Times reports that many very young children are attending Broadway theater shows: Kate’s first show was “Beauty and the Beast,” which she saw when she was 3. Ms. Gerathy admitted that 3 was young, but she wanted...
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Cars You Can't Have, Vol &c &c: Honda HR-V

The Honda HR-V was the first car I couldn't have I saw when we went out of the hotel in Kyoto. It's 2WD or AWD, and frankly, it sounds pretty straightforward and Civic-based, mechanically. But it looks a lot...
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December 7, 2006

Style And Substance Duke It Out With Bulloni Musical Tree

Yeah, let me think about that Bornelund stuff again. When you drop a marble down the gradated color disc-leaves on this eye-popping wooden tree by Swiss toymaker Mario Bulloni [whose company just went out of business, as far as I...
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Build A Landscape: Damn, Jegro! That's All You Had To Play!

If you can find your way to a Bornelund toy store in Japan, you'd better be prepared for some of the highest concentration of top-in-class toys from all over the world. [Or at least from Japan and Europe. In....
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December 6, 2006

RIP James Kim, Very Much A Hero Type

After the great news that his wife and two daughters were found alive and safe after several days, the discovery of James Kim's death is a very sad end to the story of a family who went missing on a...
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Vintage Toy Wooden Baby Carriage Kay Bojesen Denmark

Two weeks ago this sweet, little stroller designed by Kay Bojesen sold on eBay for $355 plus shipping. Forty-two years ago, you could get one in mint condition directly from Creative Playthings for $3.25. A 1964-65 catalog lists 11...
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Dwarfist, Deaf Parents Down With PGD

[Q: Is Dwarfist a word?] A recent survey of 190 clinics offering Prenatal Genetic Diagnosis, or PGD, found that in 3% of cases, PGD was used to select embryos with a particular genetic anomaly, not without. Those cases were either...
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December 5, 2006

Cars You Can't Have, Vol. XXV: Honda Wagons

It's one of the most excruciating things about traveling outside the US: seeing all the awesome cars that never make it into the US market. Literally within 15 minutes of leaving the hotel, I saw four cars I've lusted after--in...
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Alone in the Wilderness

Am I the only one not convinced that a 529 savings plan is the only way to save money for future education expenses? I want to save as much as possible for the Kid's future—but what if her future...
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BorneLund Fantasia Series: Beautiful Birch Laminate Pulltoys

BorneLund, the way-serious-about-fun toy store in Japan has been discussed here before, primarily as a rally point of the world's high-end wooden toy designs. But they've also commissioned some incredible toys of their own, like that 8-layer apple puzzle...
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Iiwi: Japan's Most Incredible Baby & Dog Store

It's exactly the kind of serendipitous experience you hope for on a trip: you stumble across an utterly unique, mindblowing store that's obviously the product of passionate, discerning and very entertaining people. The kid and I were on our...
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December 4, 2006

Greg Wigga Gets Mad Props From Salon.com Wigga

At Salon.com, King Kaufman pays tribute to The Wiggas on the occasion of Greg Wigga's retirement:The four men, who are white, affect the personas and speech of black American hip-hop stars. Each wears a distinctive, solid-colored shirt onstage and in...
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TGI Not Freitag: Passchal Dad Bag Made From Recycled Tires

Reuters somehow uncovered a new diaper bag design for men from a Richmond, VA-based designer, Passchal, who works exclusively in the medium of recycled inner tubes and tires. It looks a bit like that eel skin that was so...
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ABC News Discovers A Business 2X As Big As The Movies

Barely two days out of the country, and look what I miss. Somehow, the Baby Spa Industrial Complex has avoided detection by ABC News's crack team of reporters until now:Moms and dads across the country can now take their babies...
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Low-Tech Toys Cause Kids To Drop Out Of Harvard

Nancy Carlsson-Paige and her fellow early childhood development professor Diane Levin say parents should avoid electronic toys, especially for very young children, because they deny kids important lessons in human communication. Levin has even co-founded an elaborately acronymed organization, Teachers...
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Another Daddy types

Hello, my name is DT reader Andy and I'm going to be writing here for a few weeks while Greg is in Japan. I'm a new Dad, my daughter Elsa is 14 months old and I've been reading daddytypes for...
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Dude, Check Out Those Bassinets! Lucky Little Bastards

The caption on this photo from the LA Public Library's online photo archive reads:Unmarried teenage mother-to-be tries to reach a decision about her future. She wanders up to the nursery at St. Anne's Maternity Hospital on December 17, 1958,...
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December 3, 2006

Ugh. How Do You Explain Jet Lag To A 2-yo?

at 4-5AM? We're doomed. On the other hand, mid-night Kyoto is plenty safe for walking around....
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December 2, 2006

Evolving Approaches For Gender-Variant Children

The question of a kid's gender is usually not much of a question at all, and as he or she grows up, the sense of identity, behavior, difference, and expectation all take shape. A very small number of kids are...
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December 1, 2006

Bugaboo Or Soloflex? The New Dilemma

The Bugaboo's been in the trunk for a few days, now we don't have anywhere in the hall to throw our coats....
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Le Petit Prince, Le Ventre Geant

Meanwhile, elsewhere in Germany, a happy couple prepares for the arrival of their baby by decorating the nursery, or kinderzimmer, as it's known over there, with a delicately rendered scene from The Little Prince. And an equally masterful, silvered...
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Mein Bauhaus, Er Hat Giant Blocken

I think we've safely dispelled the inherited notion of Bauhaus-era modernism as a purely black & white affair. The turtlenecks of the Weimar children who were allowed to play on these tables and chairs in Walter Gropius's 1923 Haus...
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The Kid, The Bunny Boiler

Until the kid exclaimed, "The bunnies go into their swimming pool!" as she poured out the box of her favorite food, just now, I never made the Annie's Organic Bunny Pasta - Fatal Attraction connection. Now it seems so...
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Before They Were Wiggles

It's the beginning of the end of an era. I'm sure you'll be seeing this on the VH1 special soon [if you watch VH1, that is]. For the rest of us, here is a 1987 music video by The...
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