Daddy Types: October 2008 Archives

October 2008 Archives

October 31, 2008

Mega Nerd Dad Makes Mega Cool Mega Man Costume For Kid

Wow. Kevin Craine made old school video game costumes for himself and his two sons. But so far, he's only posted the build and demo for his 3-yo son's insane Mega Man costume online. The giant boots, the sweet,...
[read the full post...]

DT Friday Freakout: Spooked Edition

Happy Halloween! Just in case there wasn't enough to be scared about besides gay people getting married on the beach; Communist Muslim Terrorist Presidents winning in a landslide; lamp post-shimmying Phillies fans dropping from the sky; and the paralytic spasms...
[read the full post...]

Discovery: We Read: A to Z

At the library the other day, I flipped through the children's books for sale, a usually motley shelful of discards, donated books, and junk. This time, though, there was a great old copy of Leo Lionni's Frederick; a nice...
[read the full post...]

The Kid Designed Her Own Halloween Costume This Year

Until she went to the dinosaur museum in St. George, Utah on our visit to the grandparents, the kid was going to be that easiest of all Halloween staples--a ghost. Then suddenly, a few days after we got back,...
[read the full post...]

"We're Potty Training And Anything Can Throw That Off"

And she did mean anything:"I was potty training Anna, she was sitting with her book. I stepped away for five minutes and I hear her fighting with somebody, saying, 'It's mine, it's mine!' I turned to go back, the book...
[read the full post...]

October 30, 2008

Not Luigi Colani?? Another Non-German Engineering Scandal

Where's Brooke Shields when German engineering and design need her? First, we were forced to contemplate the reality that the "German engineered" VW Routan minivan is, in fact, a reskinned Chrysler Town & Country. And now, it turns out...
[read the full post...]

Gregslist: Blobby Architect Wants To Recycle Your Toys Into Furniture

Remember last month how I mocked the Venice Biennale-winning installation, Recycled Toy Furniture by blob-loving architect Greg Lynn for being neither recycled, nor toy, nor furniture? I mean, seriously, you expect me to believe there are giant, plastic ride-on eggplants??...
[read the full post...]

The Crazy Babyswingers Of WTFistan

I guess they don't have nursemaid's elbow in whatever country it is where circus people swing their babies around like a sack of unwanted kittens. I'll start researching this clip, but if anyone can ID the language of the...
[read the full post...]

Eine Kleine Matchbox Zoo

This awesome vintage toy zoo from Germany fits into eight beautifully designed matchboxes. The pieces are so small, you have to wonder if they might actually not even be a choke hazard; just wash'em down with an extra bottle....
[read the full post...]

Quirky International Adoption Countries Have Own Complications, Laws

International adoption has been booming of late, and it turns out to be a complex, ever-changing landscape fraught with cultural differences, legal and ethical dilemmas, and emotional trials. So naturally, the best way to understand this phenomenon is through the...
[read the full post...]

B-O-L-O-G-N-A Juice

That's not all it was, but it was a reminder, as if I needed one, of the downside of "I can do it all by myself." The other day, the kid wanted a snack. Not just any snack, though, but...
[read the full post...]

October 29, 2008

Brooke Shields: The Sally Struthers Of The Routan Generation

Uh, wow. I can understand how tough it must be to sell a rebranded Chrysler Town & Country minivan as an actual, German car. " But if I were in Volkswagen's marketing department, I probably would have gone the, "Technically,...
[read the full post...]

FDA Science Panel: This Week, BPA Is Dangerous, Study Is Flawed Again

The scientific-sounding arguments about the health risks to infants and toddlers from Bisphenol-A just bounce slowly. from. damning. revelation. to. exoneration. and. back. again. It's like watching Pong on the world's slowest computer. Or like playing chess by mail with...
[read the full post...]

Merry F-in' Christmas, Pauly! Cervini's Custom Lil C500

Hell yeah, you're a guido, and f-in' proud of it, bitch. An' your kid's gonna grow up just like his old man, summers on the Shore and what not, you gotta problem withat, go back to the f-in' city....
[read the full post...]

Streicher's: It's An Entirely Different Kind Of Diaper Bag Altogether

It's an entirely different kind of diaper bag. For a long time, when we had one, normal-sized diaper bag, I was not a fan of the dad bag concept. It was easier to have one gender-neutral bag that was always...
[read the full post...]

Wow. A Cure For The Wiggles

It's funny, The Wiggles used to really bug me--and then we stopped letting the kid watch them, and they dropped off her radar. Problem solved. Awesome how that works. If your kid isn't so easily weaned from his Wiggles obsession,...
[read the full post...]

October 28, 2008

Border Guard: If That's A 5-lb Sausage In Your Diaper, You're Not Happy To See Me.

View Larger Map Meanwhile, in Foreigners & Their SUVs News:A 21-year-old woman tried to smuggle nearly five and a half pounds of chorizo concealed in several baby diapers inside her SUV at the Hidalgo-Reynosa International Bridge just before midnight Friday,...
[read the full post...]

Sublime Muppet X Station Wagon Mashup In Germany

In order to issue someone a speed camera ticket in Germany, it's necessary to have an identifiable photo of the driver, not just the car's license plate. Which, because of the sensitive camera calibrations, means all you need to...
[read the full post...]

I'll Take Ridiculous Radio Flyer Concept Studies For $1,000, Alek

This over-contoured rethinking of the traditional red wagon was created by a design intern over the summer when the economy seemed slightly healthy, and it features a luxe interior with basically no alternative play patterns beyond getting pulled through the...
[read the full post...]

October 27, 2008

Lynskey Performance Titanium Tricycles Now Available In Cycling Paradise

The stock market's a mess. The banking system's in disarray. The real estate market is a disaster. And now even Daddy Types' comments system has tanked. Fortunately, the production of customized titanium performance tricycles continues unperturbed. And not just...
[read the full post...]

Partisan Hack, Or Thou Shalt Not Commit Kidultery

You know, when I started this post last week, it was going to be a self-righteous sermon against the evils of kidultery and how, when nominal adults get all fixated on designing toys for their own amusement and not...
[read the full post...]

Ferrari Car Seat Makes Station Wagon Sexy, Faster

.flickr-photo { border: solid 2px #000000; } .flickr-yourcomment { } .flickr-frame { text-align: left; padding: 3px; } .flickr-caption { font-size: 0.8em; margin-top: 0px; } Ferrari - baby seat, originally uploaded by kola_78. The scene from the backseat of a...
[read the full post...]

October 26, 2008

Darth Mall: Imperial-Style Russian-Tuned VW Transporter

Though it's a few years old now, and Zestline, the Moscow tuning shop which created it has disappeared from the web, this heavily modded VW Transporter--dubbed the Zestline Bomber--is worth a shoutout anyway. Partly because it reminds me of...
[read the full post...]

Mini Mies: Dad Builds A Farnsworth Dollhouse

.flickr-photo { border: solid 2px #000000; } .flickr-yourcomment { } .flickr-frame { text-align: left; padding: 3px; } .flickr-caption { font-size: 0.8em; margin-top: 0px; } exterior 1, originally uploaded by j&mgorman. Josh's' son Camden is almost two and getting into...
[read the full post...]

October 25, 2008

DT Friday Freakout: Uh, Better Late Than Never? Edition

You know, these days it just seems like there's no shortage of things to freakout over--but here are a few more kid- and parenting-related bits of news and research to ruin your weekend quicker'n a rainstorm at the World Series:...
[read the full post...]

Whatcha Got There, Kind+Jugend Dude? Is That The Hoppop Motta Walkbike?

Why, yes, yes it is. Hoppop is a Belgian outfit founded by baby footprint art mogul Christophe Verlinden, which came to the Kind+Jugend expo last year with the Hoppop Original, a hardcase diaper bag that converts into a booster...
[read the full post...]

Luke, You're My Uncle: Sweet Nursery Mural By Luke Ramsey

Luke Ramsey is an artist, illustrator, and co-founder of Island Folds, the indie Canadian art publishing company I just posted about. He's also a kind-of uncle to his friends' son Sam, who scored this sweet mural for his first...
[read the full post...]

Babywearer On Elm Street

We're not in the city this weekend, so I am very bummed to be missing the New York Art Book Fair. Thankfully, Paddy Johnson is taking some inspirational photos of the event, which is how I found this. It's...
[read the full post...]

WillDrawAnything.com Will Draw Anything Like, Say, A Nerdy Birth Announcement

That's what new dad Ryan Parr got for his two bucks. Here's hoping he also gets a hefty chunk of equity in the social networking site his daughter just launched. Will Draw Anything 458: New Born starts social network [yirmumah...
[read the full post...]

On The Road With Misters T And JDG

Jim found a 1983 coloring book, On The Road With Mr. T in a thrift store. "The captions were incredibly boring," he says, "so I rewrote some of them." And how. I cannot, for the life of me, imagine...
[read the full post...]

October 24, 2008

Mary Heilmann's Clubchairs, Kid-Size, At The New Museum

I first came to know Mary Heilmann's pop-infused minimalist paintings after collecting the work of Ruth Root, a friend who took inspiration from them for her own colorful abstractions. The retrospective of Heilmann's work which just opened at the...
[read the full post...]

Once Thought Extinct, Stokke Hippo Spotted In The Wild

Well, the wilds of Sweden, anyway. I've seen exactly one of these awesome Stokke Hippo rocking toys before, in a baby store in Reykjavik, Iceland. I'm sure that one's since been chopped up for firewood, but artist/blogger Elisabeth came...
[read the full post...]

Meet Little Jeroen, Dutch Modernist Hillbilly Child With No Pants

Now I like modern architecture and the Dutch and the babies as much as the next guy--probably even more. But it's not the wood stove, or the firewood that looks like it was picked up from the forest floor...
[read the full post...]

October 23, 2008

Carbon Dating On A Pig: Bronze Age Toy Found Near Stonehenge

Archaeologists announced the discovery in an infant's grave near Stonehenge of a carved stone pig. They belief that the 2.5-inch figurine, which dates back more than 2,000 years, is either a toy or a memorial/funerary object for the baby's...
[read the full post...]

Orbit On The Office: You Can't Buy Publicity Like This

So after posting about the Orbit Baby System's appearance on The Office last week--and the ensuing discussion of the suckage of product placement, I got an email from Joseph Hei, the co-founder of Orbit. As you can see from...
[read the full post...]

Duly Noted

Time: Just now. Place: Right here. Me: Hey Kid, time to get out of the bath. Kid: OK. Me: Get your pajamas on, and then come watch this Obama thing with me. Kid: No thanks. I'm not as instrested in...
[read the full post...]

I Wish I Could Quit You, Palins

Dang it, I'm gonna miss them when they're gone. From a long interview with People Magazine which included questions submitted by readers like you'n me:People: Alicia also wondered if you had any more unique names up your sleeve. Sarah Palin:...
[read the full post...]

Rad Mad Scientist Blocks, Lasercut For You By Xylocopa

Awesome. Just. Awesome. These incredible maple blocks, laser-engraved with line drawings from the hilarious world of mad scientists, showed up at Make Magazine's latest Maker Faire in Austin. They're by the laser-cutting artists at Xylocopa, a husband & wife...
[read the full post...]

Mots Animaux By Jean Réal

I can't quite figure out what Jean Réal's new book, Mots Animaux, actually contains. And though I get that it has something to do with animals, this artsy animated trailer of abstracted animals in reverse alphabetical order doesn't help...
[read the full post...]

October 22, 2008

It's Beginning To Look A Lot Like Kristian Vedel

Sure, Kristian Vedel's molded plywood chair/desk is an elegant classic. But could your kid stand on it? Or ride it around the house? Gablenz is a German woodworking firm that makes traditional furniture, toys, those little whirligig things with...
[read the full post...]

WHOA, Is Sarah Palin's Stylist Also Paris Hilton's Stylist?

UPDATE: Lisa Kline says not. Or at least Lisa Kline's publicist does. I spoke with Lisa Kline of Beverly Hills' publicist, who said that, while she wishes she could take the publicity, it's not her Lisa Kline. In fact,...
[read the full post...]

Here's The Tiny, Adorable Scoop On Trig Palin's GOP Shopping Spree

"I say beware of all enterprises that require new clothes, and not rather a new wearer of clothes." - Henry David Thoreau, Walden, 1854 So as part of their report on Sarah Palin's $150,000 Neiman Marcus makeover funded by the...
[read the full post...]

No More Calls, We Have A Winner

The contest for the Best Halloween Costume, 1-year-old division, is over. The winner is Movable Type scion Penelope Trott. The Saddest and/or Greatest Costume Ever! [nested via waxy]...
[read the full post...]

October 21, 2008

Palin Comparison

A couple of news stories about Sarah Palin and her family get me thinking a bit about how differently our culture--or at least the media and the people who parrot it--treat men and women in the same job. Politico reports...
[read the full post...]

Chest-Painted Dads For Palin

Sure, Sarah Palin's totally unqualified to be president, but to the meatheads at her rallies, she's still a TUTBPILF. The NYT reports on another surefire place to go to avoid hipster baby names [two words: Maverick Maverick]: "Katie Couric...
[read the full post...]

Here Comes The Lost Steven Zuckerman "Imagination Rain" Again

Old School Sesame Street fans--and readers of DT and The Onion AV Club--will recall that of the three classic songs he recorded in 1970, composer/performer Steve Zuckerman liked "Imagination Rain," the ode to mind expansion, even more than his...
[read the full post...]

October 20, 2008

Anchor Stone Blocks Exist, Are Made Of Stone

I've got to clear these damn browser tabs. Anchor Stone Blocks were created in Germany in the late 19th century. They're red, yellow, and blue cast stone, designed to mimic the brick, limestone, and slate, respectively, of traditional European...
[read the full post...]

How Your Hipster [Sic] Baby Name News Is Made

The magazine, book publishing and TV show didn't work out, so ex-New Yorker editor [seems so long ago] Tina Brown launches a website, The Daily Beast, which "sees itself as a must-read for hipsters in news, politics and pop culture."...
[read the full post...]

Creative Playthings Family Scandal! Rocking Beauty Had Sister Named Rocking Ugly

As everyone hopefully knows now, the iconic Creative Playthings design, the red ball-equipped Hobby Horse, was not designed by Philip Johnson, and the Philip Johnson who didn't design it was the creative director of Creative Playthings, not the feisty,...
[read the full post...]

Kaleidoscope-ic, Man: Phillips dePury Tries To Bogart My Toyage

Ceci n'est pas un toy. Ceci n'est pas un dollhouse. Ceci n'est pas a house at all. Because if it were any of that, would it be being auctioned off at Phillips dePury this Saturday? Bien sur que non....
[read the full post...]

October 19, 2008

Crewel Kids: Vladimir Kagan X Erica Wilson Mashup Rocking Chair

So swoopy furniture designer Vladimir Kagan and pre-eminent needlework artist Erica Wilson are married? Who knew? Besides, that is, the folks who bought this Kagan Contour Rocking Chair covered in Wilson's crewel forest scene back in the day? Rago,...
[read the full post...]

October 18, 2008

Orbit On The Office: "$1200? That's What I Spent On My Whole Bomb Shelter."

In this week's episode of The Office, Michael's throwing a baby shower for Jan's anonymous sperm donor baby. It's pretty hilarious front to back, but Dwight's test drive of the Orbit Baby System just might be the best stroller...
[read the full post...]

Of COURSE The Venza Is Not A Camry Wagon

If it were a Camry wagon, could it do...THIS? Or...THIS? I rest my case. Live Shots Of Toyota Venza AS V By Five Axis Coming To SEMA [jalopnik] Live Images Of SEMA-Bound Toyota Venza Sportlux By Street Image...
[read the full post...]

Frankly: Taliesin Treehouse By John Rattenbury

Taliesin Architects was founded to carry on the work and philosophy of Frank Lloyd Wright. And while I don't know if Wright ever actually designed a treehouse, I expect if he did, it would have looked a lot like...
[read the full post...]

Tarantino X Frank Lloyd Wright Mashup, Of Sorts

It's a small New Jerseymodern design world after all. Did you know that architects Lawrence and Sharon Tarantino, whose EVA Foam kids furniture [above] is produced by Offi, are experts in renovating and modernizing Frank Lloyd Wright's postwar buildings?...
[read the full post...]

Mesdames Et Messieurs, Je Vous Presente Calder's Circus At The Whitney

For years, Alexander Calder's awesome theatre/performance art/toy/sculpture Circus has been in the lobby of the Whitney Museum, entertaining its way into the psyches of generations of city-dwelling kids. It's made of dozens of little articulated toy figures, which the...
[read the full post...]

October 17, 2008

DT Friday Freakout: WTFormula Edition

Here, let me ruin your parenting weekend with worry and annoyances torn from the headlines and the annals of way-too-preliminary research: "HEY MOMS!" Holy crap, Similac's new pack could be the greatest thing since Nabisco Double Stuff Oreo-flavored formula, but...
[read the full post...]

What's The Story With The Four-Armed Swami Counting To Twenty?

Alright, so I'm a little obsessed with what is admittedly my favorite old school Sesame Street animation ever: the four-armed swami counting to 20. But what can I do? To this day, I don't say "Once, doce, trece, catorce"...
[read the full post...]

October 16, 2008

Consider The Lobster. For Dinner

With apologies to the memory of the great David Foster Wallace, I gotta say, this video of a kid meeting his first box of mail-order lobster is SO FREAKING CUTE. [via radar]...
[read the full post...]

The Straws Are Rockets Firing Up To Kill The Meteors

.flickr-photo { border: solid 2px #000000; } .flickr-yourcomment { } .flickr-frame { text-align: left; padding: 3px; } .flickr-caption { font-size: 0.8em; margin-top: 0px; } Someone's Been Playing With My Missile Command..., originally uploaded by daddytypes. See, that's the grass...
[read the full post...]

Dad Fights The Car Seats, And The Car Seats Win

David is a new dad and one of the car guys [little c, little g, Magliozzis, relax.] at Cars.com. Well, the kid's six months old now, and Dave's care-free days of swapping the bases for his son's infant car seat...
[read the full post...]

October 15, 2008

Group Hug! Nice Customer Service Stories From Wooden Toy Companies

There's a story on Consumerist about how awesome Melissa & Doug's response was when a mom called about a broken propeller on her daughter's new wooden plane. Though she only called about replacing the plane--and warning the company about the...
[read the full post...]

October Surprise: Maverick Dad Names Daughter Sarah McCain Palin

After his wife thought they'd decided on Ava Grace, Elizabethton, TN resident Mark Ciptak filled out the birth certificate forms at the hospital and "secretly named his baby girl Sarah McCain Palin." Secretly as in, he was talking to the...
[read the full post...]

October 14, 2008

If You're On Our Flight This Afternoon, I Apologize In Advance

I think K2 must be cutting an upper tooth while contracting the flu and food poisoning and growing pains, because the last 24 hours have been the single worst day and night of her short life. She was an inconsolable...
[read the full post...]

Translation: Bourdain's Kid Eats Mashed Corn, Rice, Cheese

I have a feeling tough guy/chef Anthony Bourdain dictates into a digital recorder, then has some lackey at the Travel Channel to type them up. His blog posts read like a stroll through the Umbrian market in his head, which...
[read the full post...]

October 13, 2008

But Does The Netto Crib Convey?

Ahh, remember the real estate travails of young families in Manhattan? Curbed has the lowdown on a 2-3BR, 3,200 sf loft that's been customed out in true bubbly style--and which has been pricechopped from $3.5 million to $2.5 million...
[read the full post...]

That's Eye Candy We Can Believe In

I like context, backstory, credits, and yes, the occasional "put in shopping basket" link, so I don't like random web collections of sheer eye candy. But for this 500 image-and-counting flickr pool, I'll make an exception: This artist, Ric Hugo,...
[read the full post...]

Wow, Did The Kid Love Digging Up This Fake Dinosaur Skeleton

Somewhere in the past few years, a farmer in the city my in-laws retired to, St. George, Utah, found a motherlode of super-detailed dinosaur tracks and fossils, and they built an entire museum around them. Just like that. So...
[read the full post...]

October 11, 2008

Rubber BetterBaby Cages

It kills me to think of the vast trove of historical information that's been dumped by eBay over the last decade. If nothing else, I'd think it'd be valuable to have the price history of certain types and categories...
[read the full post...]

A Peaceable Kingdom, The Shaker Abecedarius By The Provensens

.flickr-photo { border: solid 2px #000000; } .flickr-yourcomment { } .flickr-frame { text-align: left; padding: 3px; } .flickr-caption { font-size: 0.8em; margin-top: 0px; } A Peaceable Kingdom, The Shaker Abecedarius, originally uploaded by Hillary Lang. I backed into this...
[read the full post...]

October 10, 2008

DT Freakout Of Town Edition

We're traveling this weekend, landed in Las Vegas late last night, drive-thru In 'n Out, and on to St George, Utah for a little volcano hiking and grandparent time. Posting will be a little light, or at least a little...
[read the full post...]

KidsLab Successful Belgian Experiments For Wall And Floor

I was not really aware that kids had lifestyles, but that's just one of the little differences revealed by the happy existence of KidsLab, a Belgian lifestyle brand for children and their imaginations. KidsLab encourages children to be themselves...
[read the full post...]

Zach & Henry's Excellent Adventure

Zach, a friend in DC who is finishing law school, was going out to a job interview in Salt Lake City a couple of weeks ago. At the last minute, he and his wife thought it'd be fun to surprise...
[read the full post...]

October 9, 2008

Wal-Mart: Don't Compete With Someone Who Buys Toys By The Shitload

The Wall Street Journal reports that Wal-Mart has scattered a bunch of $10 toys in the aisles of its stores this Christmas season--which is apparently in full swing. Some other retail giants are doing the same thing. Wal-Mart doesn't say...
[read the full post...]

Cold Medicine Companies See Writing On Wall, Slap Warning On Box

Truly, nothing inspires confidence and medical credibility than hearing a big pharmaceutical company trumpet the safety of their children's cold medicines one week and then suddenly do a 180 and announce a voluntary [sic] ban on those same meds for...
[read the full post...]

October 8, 2008

Remember That One Kid With The Prouvé Bed?

The one in Paris, whose mom is an antique dealer? And he had that dog lamp on the pull-out night table attachment? Yeah, well, there may be another one. One of those 1953 Antony daybeds by Jean Prouvé &...
[read the full post...]

Wow, Mark That To Market: Noguchi Baby Monitor At Wright20

If you have an extra one of those Zenith Radio Nurse and Guardian Ear sets designed by Isamu Noguchi in 1937 lying around, you might want to dust it off. A very fine-looking example just blew through the pre-sale...
[read the full post...]

E15 Children's Tafel For The Glorious People's Revolution

When the revolution comes--and at this rate, we'll all be citoyening each other by Thanksgiving--I hope the mob will go easy on Belgian designer Hans de Pelsmacker. Sure, the child-sized version of the HP01 table/bench he designed in 2000...
[read the full post...]

October 7, 2008

Homebrew Star Wars Alphabet

More oblique Star Wars alphabet goodness, this time from artist Michael Fleming, who put something close to a year of spare time into creating the artwork for his alphabet of decidedly minor Star Wars characters. A female Yoda named...
[read the full post...]

Curry Rice. K2 Eats Curry Rice.

.flickr-photo { border: solid 2px #000000; } .flickr-yourcomment { } .flickr-frame { text-align: left; padding: 3px; } .flickr-caption { font-size: 0.8em; margin-top: 0px; } Curry Rice Bento Boxes, originally uploaded by SnoopyBento. I'm sort of getting used to K2...
[read the full post...]

James Earl Jones To The Alphabet: I'm Your Father

Did you know James Earl Jones not only had a stutter, he was functionally mute for like eight years? And that his counting to ten segment tested the best of all the clips in the Sesame Street pilot they...
[read the full post...]

Study: Fans Definitely Create Breezes, May Reduce SIDS Risk

The Friday Freakout is so far away, and we'll be traveling for the holiday anyway. Besides, this is happy extremely preliminary science: Some Bay Area physicians have published a study showing that the use of a fan--and/or an "open window"...
[read the full post...]

xO Skool Desk, Or I Know What Philippe Starck's Intern Did Last Summer

Last spring, Philippe Starck said design was dead, the materialist culture he wallowed in was superficial, and he was quitting in two years. By which time he will have put SKU numbers on all the random renderings his interns have...
[read the full post...]

October 6, 2008

Obama X Cute Overload Mashup

He'll fix the economy and health care; rally the nation; end the wrong war and take out the terrorists; rebuild America's standing; restore the Constitution; hell, he'll even bake us all a loaf of his grandmother's bread. But not...
[read the full post...]

Phil & Teds Peanut: The Last Shiny Metal Bassinet Of The Day

"Pimp your ride" this and "graffiti homies" that, get some "adapt-itude" so you can deal with "those little mother suckers!" The Phil & Teds website is so busy being so damn edgy in every possibly edgy way, you'd think...
[read the full post...]

Plexi Hospital Bassinet's A Plexi Hospital Bassinet, Except We Call It The Plexi Hospital Bassinet

When you don't know the answer to something, it's always a buzzkill when your own site comes up in the Google results. It happened to me last night when I was trying to find the manufacturer of those awesome...
[read the full post...]

You Take A Seat, I'll Take That Sweet Berceau De Maternité

No, the other one. Let's face facts: France is a nation in love with crazy bassinets, so it's no wonder that French "families who demand design" would choose a shagadelic, egg-shaped bassinet that matches their Seat Altea XL over...
[read the full post...]

Pay No Attention To The Mother Under The Blanket

The things people collect. In order to get 19th century kids to sit still long enough to take a photograph, moms would hold the baby on their laps--while being completely covered by a blanket. The effect: a baby all...
[read the full post...]

October 5, 2008

Bet Your Kid Don't Have A Hitler Chair This Fancy

Yeah, his Hitler chair is probably from Wal-Mart, made outta plastic. It ain't handcarved and handpainted by Dow Pugh. Why, he's the finest children's Hitler chairmaker in all a Cumberland County. Lot 656: Dow Pugh, Hitler Child's Chair, est....
[read the full post...]

"All I Smell Is Raw Power And Speed"

[via daring fireball] "Where the hell are the singin' cats?" is burned into my brain, but hearing David Letterman story about Paul Newman and their matching Volvo 960 station wagons which Newman's racing goons outfitted with Ford 302 V8 racing...
[read the full post...]

The Post-Modern Literalist's Guide To Parenting

The Swedish literary criticism quarterly Glanta recently published a satirical article on raising children in strict accordance with the arguments of post-modernism. It reads a bunch of tips cobbled together one night at an MLA convention, and it pales in...
[read the full post...]

October 4, 2008

Seriously, Who Wrote The Music For That Sesame Street Crayon Movie?

PBS has been advertising on Daddy Types lately, for which I am grateful. But Sesame Workshop's media office has not responded to several requests for production information about the classic "How Crayons Are Made" movie. The Muppet Wiki information is...
[read the full post...]

DT Friday Freakout [On Saturday]: One Of Those Days Edition

Yeah yeah, you don't need to tell me that the Friday Freakout is late; it was one of those Fridays. On the bright side, the kid is as giddy as a schoolgirl about going to preschool now. And on the...
[read the full post...]

I, For One, Welcome Our Spandex Lucha Robot Overlords

I mean, I know the robots are plotting to enslave the world by positioning themselves in close proximity to our human offspring. Where they wait, in silence, until the Robot Emperor gives the signal...then KABLOW! But when they have...
[read the full post...]

Many Of You Feel Bad For This 1966 Maclaren Stroller

That is because you are crazy. The new one is much better. [1] And if you really want one like this, you can get a Kolcraft for $12 at the drugstore. O.F. Maclaren, Baby Stroller, 1966 [moma.org] 1966 and...
[read the full post...]

First, Get Three Million Dollars: NY Times' Handy Tips For 'Family Friendly' Househunting

Did you know it's actually illegal for a broker to call a building "family friendly"? True. The NY Times has an article with very useful tips for figuring out if you could actually put a kid in the $2.5 million,...
[read the full post...]

Ljus Krön: The Sound Of One Hand Strolling

Alright, so it's the Ljus Krön by Christian Rancati [1]: only slightly more pronounceable than Gitta Gschwendtner, but a hundred times more eyepopping. When I saw the Kron among the Kind + Jugend press conference photos, I was sure...
[read the full post...]

October 3, 2008

Kind + Jugend '08 Stroller Rally

How about some good, old-fashioned strollerporn reveals from the kind pressefolk at kind + jugend? There were several new models from well-known--HOLY CRAP WHAT IS THAT THING, AND WHERE CAN I GET ONE WITHOUT THE VELOUR???...
[read the full post...]

October 2, 2008

More Dutch Memories: Canada And The ABC's Of Dental Care

A couple more interesting-looking vintage children's books from The Memory of The Netherlands: Hi Ha Canada is a sweet, modernist celebration by graphic artist Mart Kempers of the liberation of Holland by Canadian and Scottish troops in World War II....
[read the full post...]

Chicco And The Man [And His Natural Sucking Instinct]

Did you know it's actually pronounced "KEE-koh", not "Chee-koh"? Just one of the many things I learned from Pamela Paul's book, Parenting, Inc. One thing that's not in the book: the Italian word for pacifier. Succhietto. [SOO-kyee-Etto] And I...
[read the full post...]

Kind + Jugend '08 Bath-Time Highlights

I've totally dropped the ball on the Kind + Jugend-themed Oktoberfest this week. But here are a couple of bathroom beauties, courtesy of the K+J Presse folken: The Flexi Bath folding infant bathtub is from Danish bathing startup, A Real...
[read the full post...]

The Worst Mercedes 450 SEL 6.9 Station Wagon, Except For All Those Others

Oh my. A classic Mercedes aficionado blogging at Tamerlane posted this sighting of a 450SEL 6.9 wagon, supposedly the "only one commissioned by Mercedes" itself for "the head of MBUSA." That raised roofline was causing me much pain, until...
[read the full post...]

October 1, 2008

W Is For White Baby's Burden: Nieuw Indisch ABC Book Looks Pretty Awkward Now

Make no small web plans. The ambitiously titled site, "The Memory of the Netherlands" combines nearly 400,000 objects from 67 different collections, including selected scans of nearly 700 illustrated books from 1810 to 1950. The 1925 Nieuw Indisch ABC...
[read the full post...]

Classic Cosco Chair In Rare, Sweet Rocker Format

These molded plastic Cosco chairs from the early 1970's are kid design classics, [don't they look nice in Swiss-Miss's living room?] though I always look at them funny when I remember they were originally intended to be used as...
[read the full post...]

Wood By Ten: Cute, Cheap And Into Production

OK, new theory: maybe no one in London remembers the Childsply and Childsform group design challenges and exhibitions because the entire London design world consists of an endless stream, year in and year out, of group design challenges?? ["Hello...
[read the full post...]

Childsform: So Far, We Know There's A Spool Stool By Michael Marriott

Looks like it's one-off, mushroom-shaped stool day around here this morning. DT readers from a few months back might remember Childsply, the 1999 children's design challenge sponsored by the London design/vintage dealer twentytwentyone. The concept was to see what children's...
[read the full post...]

Tony, Nanna. Nanna, Tony: Marble-top Trissen Stool On eBay

Now this next item, it's a really immaculate piece. Exquisite workmanship, pure class. A gentleman--really, he's an artist--right here in Staten Island--really, he's like a father to me, a true inspiration, what he does--he took a plain little wooden...
[read the full post...]

« September 2008 | Main Index | | November 2008 »