Daddy Types: April 2012 Archives

April 2012 Archives

April 30, 2012

Unidentified Local Man Contemplates Decline Of Civilization, Futility Of Existence

A few years ago, I had an offer for a book deal; I was going to write a celebrity parenting advice book. In fact, I started writing before the deal was set, wrote an awful lot of it, in fact....
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Front Airbag Igniting, Very Very Frightening

Like you, I'm sure, my first reaction to seeing this dad leading his kids in a rousing rendition of "Bohemian Rhapsody" on the way to school in the morning was, "Screw the Disney-era Muppets, who needs'em?" And your second...
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April 29, 2012

The First Rule Of Maclaren Bankruptcy Club

So on Wednesday I was all excited because it looked like at least somebody still cared about the reports of financial shenanigans in Maclaren's stealth bankruptcy liquidation. And I figured I'd get around to posting about it, because that somebody...
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April 27, 2012

I Hugged Myself Today, To See If I Still Feel

When I was getting ready to go to Brigham Young University, a year early, my parents assured me that everyone was popular in college, so I signed up for the honors dorm. Which was full of nerds. My roommate was...
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How's This Folding Wagon Look To You?

I've now seen a couple of people hauling their kids around in one of these folding wagons. Mostly on daytrips from the suburbs to the zoo. It sure makes more sense than bringing one of those giant red plastic...
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DT Friday Freakout: Class Edition

The Friday Freakout, a compendium of parenting headlines delivered all at once instead of dribbled out daily, to ruin just your weekend, a Daddy Types exclusive: During the Obama administration, the food and beverage industry has doubled the amount of...
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Three Of The Four Rocking Horses Of The Apocalypse, By Marc Newson For Magis

A reading from the Book of Revelations:1 And I saw when the Lamb opened one of the seals, and I heard, as it were the noise of thunder, one of the four beasts saying, Come and see. 2 And...
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April 26, 2012

Area Man Says That Gender Reveal Cake Is A Freakin' Uterus, Dude

Look, I'm outnumbered 20:1 by the Duggars alone, so I know DT's not gonna put a stop to the reality TV-style, socio-emotional construct of the gender reveal party, at least overnight. But if just one more expectant parent thinks of...
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Craigslist Find: Creative Playthings Garage

That steel drum may have gotten way, but there's still sweet Creative Playthings goodness to be had out there. Like this classic Playtown garage, with the working molded ply elevator, which DT reader Nathan spotted on Craigslist in Chicago....
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April 25, 2012

Take Care Mommy!

I delete a shit-ton of these things just from the subject line alone, so kudos to these folks for getting me to read the salutation...Hello Mommy Blogger! :D You have ventured to create a successful empire of pregnancy-mommy-influence. Your decadence...
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It'll Look Great On Her Pre-K Application

I showed this to the kid last night, and she was all, "Kickstarter? Back when I was 4, all we had to self-publish our homemade storybooks was blurb.com!" Actually, she said, "See, that kid gets to chew gum, and...
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April 24, 2012

Damn You, eBay, And Your Creative Playthings Steel Drum With Handpainted Logo

If eBay were a person and not just an affiliate-linked advertiser, I'd come over there and punch it in the nose right. now. for not having a system that sends reminders to bidders that items they are bidding on--and...
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They Grow Up So Fast: Frans Hofmeester's Time-Lapse Kid Portraits

My wife's been doing something similar, if far less extensive for us, actually: she takes identical portraits of the kids on their birthdays, and it's fascinating to see them grow up and change--and not. It's always a bit of...
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April 23, 2012

An Important Life Lesson From The Parents Of Baby Cha-Cha

Tara Ariano reports for The Awl, from a bar in Orange County somewhere, where the kid who was Dancing Baby is paying his way through UC Irvine by doing public appearances. His dad Steven got him the Ally McBeal...
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April 22, 2012

Late Antonio Vitali Toys

The extraordinarily subtle biomorphic, sculptural abstractions of Antonio Vitali's Creative Playthings-era carved wooden toys are icons that can bring thousands of dollars at auction. The woodblocks-with-eyes-drilled-out dolls from his Phoning It In Era? Maybe not so much. Vintage Wooden...
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When A Horse Really Loves Another Horse

Thanks Hasbro, I was finding it awkward to bring up the important subject of sex work with my 4-year-old, but her big sister asking what "stud" means while playing Monopoly Horse Lovers Edition provided the perfect opportunity....
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April 21, 2012

Edward Gorey's The Black Doll Plush Toy

Awesome fur coat-wearing, goth weirdo writer/artist/illustrator/playwright Edward Gorey used to make stuffed animals for friends and the cast and crew of his plays. Rarely, he also made them for sale, like the 26 handsewn, rice-filled Figbash dolls that accompanied...
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April 20, 2012

Cardboard Arcade Kid Kicks Your Ass For 2nd Week In Row

In the last week, Caine's Arcade has raked in another $80,000, bringing the total for the kid's scholarship fund to over $170,000, which it sounds like his parents are hoping to tap into starting at Catholic high school, and maybe...
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Some Headlines Can't Be Beat

Sarah Palin's New Grandchild Here Six Months Early [wonkette]...
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Creative Playthings Tractor Is Not All In Your Head

So I see this Creative Playthings tractor listed, and at first I'm like, "Wow, Frank Caplan, way to pare down the toy design to the bare essence, thereby stimulating the child's imagination, rather than just his senses, all the...
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April 19, 2012

Bouncy Stonehenge By Jeremy Deller

Seriously, they may not have been able to keep a drummer, but Spinal Tap did manage to hold onto the title of Best Stonehenge Model for a very long time. Until the day British artist Jeremy Deller's full-scale Bouncy...
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April 18, 2012

Maybe You Won't Forget To Check The Car Seat Now, Though

Especially as the weather gets warmer, someone on Reddit user Brickmaj's block in Brooklyn wants you and everyone around to remember to check the back seat when you get out of the car. Because forgetting the kid's back there...
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Days Of Volvo Heaven

Bwahaha, screw the animated gif; the Volvo wagon getting air shot you want to watch is this here YouTube video, in which a 1991 740 practically dances across the plains at magic hour. I do believe this was taken...
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Turn On The Air: Volvo Wagon Mayhem

Not sure how or when the tipping point was, but I totally don't mind if Daddy Types becomes a center of Volvo station wagon mayhem excellence. I found the photo above on Motor Trend's handy 2009 faux-tutorial on shooting...
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Puzzle House: Slot-Together Playhouse For America

DT commenter ollie makes a fine point, that you don't have to be in Finland after all if you want a sweet, slot-together plywood playhouse. Modern Playhouse will make one for you and ship it right from the Scandinavia...
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April 17, 2012

Sadface: Maja Slot-Together Playhut Only In Finland

Why is Heikki so sad? The color alone of Minna's awesome Maja flatpack, Finnply playhouse should have him jumping with joy. On top of that, he lives Finland, the only country where you can actually buy one. Maja playhouse,...
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Rough Day For Kids On The Leashes

It's definitely kids-on-a-leash season in our neighborhood near the National Zoo in DC. But short of making up for your inability to keep a monkey from running into traffic, I still can't support it. The leash is learned behavior...
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April 16, 2012

8x65: Aalto Kid Chairs & Table At LA Modern

Sure, it was designed in 1935, but these eight Alvar Aalto kids chairs, #65, could really be from almost anytime. So check with the auction house, or just accept that at around half the current retail cost, the $2-3,000...
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J-Diapers WTF?

Glad to know the Japanese tradition of putting inexplicably awkward baby photos on their diaper packaging continues. [And yes, I too wish I hadn't seen the overlap with the characters in the lower corner, so I could continue to...
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April 14, 2012

Where The Hell Are The Screaming Chickens?

Who puts a Screaming Chicken on a Volvo station wagon? @ Washington Square instagr.am/p/JaWNhYp4FC/— Todd Lappin (@TelstarLogistic) April 14, 2012 That settles it: Todd Lappin is the Grand Master of Awesomely Wack Volvo Wagons. Previously: Bernal Dads take on the...
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DT Is Long BNNY

The Wall Street Journal has a nice profile of Molly Ashby, the private equity rock star whose firm took a controlling interest in Annie's, Inc., the organic food products company, in 2002, and which just took it public. With the...
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Just An Observation, Not An Argument for Manpurses

K2 getting herself up in the middle of the night and going to the bathroom to blow her own nose would be much cuter if it didn't involve her not being able to breathe or sleep. Yesterday on the way...
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Bean

Bean, sorry I believed the gossip.. Mommy loves you— Courtney Love Cobain (@Courtney) April 14, 2012 When we went to Mrs. John L. Strong for our baby announcements, one of the samples she showed was for Frances Bean Cobain. I've...
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April 13, 2012

Formica Kids Chairs From Mass Modern Design

Mass Modern thinks these awesomely uncomfortable-looking Formica kids chairs are 1970s Dutch, but I'm gonna guess that Martino Gamper finally figured out what to do with all the nightstand shelves he had left over after hacking all Gio Ponti's...
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Sweet Picture Matching Dominoes From Abbatt Toys

These picture dominoes from Abbatt Toys have a pretty sweet 60s look going on. Which reminds me of how 00s or 10s all this stuff around us is gonna look someday. Vintage Object Puzzle Dominoes pictures Abbatt toy 1960s,...
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April 12, 2012

Oxfordist Hearts Designer Babies

Oxford human advancement ethicist Julian Savulescu apparently believes that we should be optimizing the genes of the kids we make. He says so in this Philosophy Bites podcast, which I confess, I haven't listened to yet, but which I believe...
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April 11, 2012

Caine's Arcade, Directed By Nirvan Mullick

You know, I spent yesterday wondering about the mechanics of flashmobs, and how maybe a little less reality-TV-stagier might be better, like when Improv Anywhere showed up and freaked that one band out by singing along to all their...
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April 10, 2012

Plushie Purple Panda Pittsburgh Preschool Pandemonium

See, this is what happens when PBS takes Mister Rogers off the air. How is a preschooler these days supposed to know what the hell a giant, mute droning, alien Purple Panda even is? And no offense, David Newell,...
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It's Short For Abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz

"Somewhere in the middle it gets awfully queer to me." Really, though, all I can think is that Abcde is going to have a serious ZOMG moment when she's old enough to correlate her name with the alphabet song....
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Kids Play The Darnedest Things

So K2's got the Playmobil house and garden set out on the floor next to me, and I suddenly hear, "Let's go play!" "Great, how can I get out of my meeting?" Playmobil The Home Office, $13.99 [amazon]...
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April 9, 2012

Lille Huset Slot-Together Eco-Dollhouse Kits On Kickstarter

Alright, this is pretty sweet. Chicago kids designer/author Alyson Beaton is using Kickstarter to launch lille huset, a collection of flatpack, slot-together dollhouses made from paperboard and birch ply. They're somewhere between permanent and recyclable, light and easy to...
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Prego: It's In There! There Being My Uterus!

I know, I know, but seriously, isn't Prego the weirdest as hell name for anything?...
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Surely Crunchy Vacctivists Will Infect Us All

If the inadequate vaccination schedules don't, that is. And really, it's mostly the tiniest kids who can't get vaccinated yet who need the herd immunity in the first place. Discover Magazine's Bad Astronomy blog points to a local Fox News...
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On Reinventing The Wheel

After 20 yrs of new dad rockers making kids records because they can't find any good kids music, you'd think they'd be able to find some.— Kevin Guilfoile (@kevinguilfoile) April 9, 2012 The more forgotten kid-related goodness I discover from...
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April 6, 2012

Toy Fair Funny Sad

You probably already know it, but Lisa Hanawalt's sketch-based report from this year's Toy Fair is pretty awesome. Even if the Playmobil people come off as Chia-mocking Heathers. I mean, I know it's Chia, but come on. At least...
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'An Emotion Stroller.'

How do you top sponsoring a Gender Reveal Twitter Party? With the world's most oddly affecting PR contest giveaway email blast subject line! And so Boston area baby store Magic Beans invites us to: "Meet Babyhome & win an Emotion...
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DT Friday Freakout: Free Range Organic McNuggets Edition

A roundup of headlines from the worlds of science, politics, education, and parenting to ruin your weekend all at once, it's the Daddy Types Friday Freakout: Fast food causes depression. [psychcentral via the awl] And not just by finding out...
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April 5, 2012

Baby Helmets And The Slippery Slope

I used to roll my eyes at the Baby Helmet but now I think _it depends on the baby_.— Tom Scocca (@tomscocca) April 5, 2012 Previously: Thudguard makes me more worried about the kid's inherited brainpower...
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Tri-Ang Pedal Racer Mostly For Export

Complete scans of The Meccano Magazine going back to 1916 are now available online, and are probably filled with many forgotten awesome treasures and products that might be of great benefit to the dads and youth of today. But...
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Other Daddies Typing: Didactic Pirate Edition

Congratulations and hats off to Seth at Didactic Pirate, both for a well-written post, and for coming to terms with the reality that he is neither descended from circus folk nor a werewolf. Honesty [didactic-pirate]...
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April 4, 2012

Like Say, For Example, Stop Walking!

The whole point of a toddler is that they don't know what it is they're "supposed to do" in any given situation. So yelling your kid's name with increasing volume, urgency, and anger is not going to make him suddenly...
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How Your Peeps Are Made

The NY Times' Nikolas Koenig went inside the Peeps factory and all he got is this awesome, Mister Rogers-worthy slideshow of how Peeps are made, which happens to be a question I've been fielding for several days now. Perhaps...
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April 3, 2012

Pinball Number Count Remix Compilation

We've come a long way from DJ Food. In 2003, Sesame Workshop released a CD boxset, Songs From The Street: 35 Years Of Music, that included DJ Food's remix of the classic Pinball Number Count, which was performed by...
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April 2, 2012

DT Giveaway: Swag-Filled Bugaboo Organizer

We don't do PR freebies around Daddy Types, and no giveaways. Except sometimes, when some sweet PR swag slips through the cracks. Like the fine-looking Bugaboo Universal Organizer that showed up unannounced a little while back, which was stocked...
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I'm So Happy The Carbonite Is Gone. I'm Movin' On.

You know what, the Episode IV or Episode I debate is over. The Jar-Jar dilemma, the Young Anakin annoyance? Over. Clone Wars TV vs. movie? Irrelevant. There is now only one Star Wars movie your kids need to see...
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The Invisible Cost Of Free Shipping

It's Monday before lunchtime, and Mac McClelland's account of being a warehouse wage slave is already the most depressing thing I'll read all week:The gal conducting our training reminds us again that we cannot miss any days our first week....
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Shady Baby: Maclaren's Secret Outlet Stores

Alright, here's the short version of this post: Farzad Rastegar's basically got two front operations in random condos in Norwalk, Connecticut to unload recalled Maclaren USA strollers online. Some of those strollers come from Maclaren USA, the subsidiary Rastegar put...
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April 1, 2012

Breast Is Best: Boobs Prints By Wary Meyers

Uma be praised, but wow, this is an awesome achievement. Wary Meyers has unleashed their exclusive Boobs prints onto the world, in pink, brown, and zombie [for now], and in two ample sizes. If only they were $80.08. Wary...
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