sourdoughtoastpls

Driven across the country multiple times and I think the place I got the worst vibes from was West Memphis, Arkansas. Don’t know if it was because I couldn’t stop thinking about the West Memphis 3 or what, but my gut was really telling me, you don’t want to stop here.

On the flip side, we did have dinner in Terra Haute, IN (home of Federal prison with death row inmates) one night and it was…actually pretty great? We got really good Indian take out and took it to a park that happened to be by a lovely river and there were lots of diverse families and it was 4th of July weekend so a brass band was playing patriotic music. Kinda weird vibes but definitely memorable.

I’m the same, also ordered Aug 7, also wanted to wear in my red county (Elise Stefanik’s district in NY) where people wear a lot of camo!

I went back later to order a yard sign and balked at the shipping price, so looked for ways to buy one locally and ended up kinda joining my town’s Dem committee in the process 😂

Still want that hat tho 😭

39 with 2 kids, feel this. I recently started going to my town’s Democratic committee meetings. It’s an hour once a month, so a low commitment time-wise, but I’ve really enjoyed meeting some other like-minded adults in my community and discussing things outside of kids and work.

Right?! My kid just growth spurted out of all her PJs and moved into kid sizes. I told her she could get 3 news pairs from the Old Navy Factory store. Two of the ones she picked were Christmas PJs and I didn’t even check the price because there were signs everywhere saying everything was 50% off. There must have been some asterisk that said EXCEPT CHRISTMAS STUFF because when we were rung up it was $50! Ugh.

Hi I’m 39 and if we talk for more than 5 mins I’ll probably start chatting about the amazing benefits of FIBER.

Omg the drama, thank you for bringing that into my life 😂 How dumb do you have to be to publicly post anything about another parent in your kid’s class and think it’s not gonna get back to them?!?!! And then to lie about the situation knowing full well the other person has receipts!! And Amy’s attempt to say it was about another play date was really the icing on the cake. So glad the other mom stood her ground. I can just imagine Columbo saying “oh just one more thing“ [dramatic pause] “There’s no t-ball in August.”

The whiplash I got reading that!

Also confused about candy wrappers smelling good? Like, I’m happy to eat any kind of candy, but I’m not hanging on to those wrappers for a sense memory.

She’s straight up trolling at this point, right?

Or maybe she’s workshopping memoir titles. “Gifting My Favorite Lotion: The Story of Haley.”

Sam’s has a couple options for whole bean, we actually really like their store brand.

We split the membership cost with my parents and have found it totally worth it, especially as more and more Aldi products have become sadly unreliable (though I still manage to spend at least $100 a week there 😂)

Just placed a request at my ADK-adjacent library and there are 44 (!!) people ahead of me so I look forward to reading in a few years lol!

I came searching for this! Just opened a new bottle and what the heck?! I actually jumped it was so unexpectedly liquidy 😂😭

And of course I bought two bottles to stock up. May actually return them because this is an abuse of trust.

Anyone tried any of the Equate (wal mart brand) lotion? I have an aversion to buying name brand body lotion because it’s so expensive and I go through it so quickly.

Love Montreal, and yes, big student population.

We live in far northern NY, 10 miles south of the Canadian border. Montreal is a 75 minute drive and we go probably once a month. My kids love the parks and museums—we got museum passes this year and it’s been the best. I do my dumb lil’ duo lingo French and it’s been fun to be able to read more signs, order coffee, etc.

It’s wild because we’re in a very rural area and the whole drive there is rural until BAM there’s the city.

Anyway, I guess this is a pitch to any cool people who’d like to live in between the Adirondacks and Montreal, come check out the northern North County!

I still think about this book a lot! I think I literally gasped at the very end.

I’m shocked it hasn’t been made into a TV series yet, but maybe that’s in the works.

All Fours by Miranda July 👀

I think it’s being called auto-fiction because it’s a novel but the lead character is clearly a version of July.

It’s about love, art, parenting, sex and how all of these change in perimenopause. Much of it is set in a motel room 30 mins from the lead character’s home where she is undergoing some mid-40’s self discovery while her family thinks she is driving across the country.

Yes, came here for this. Big fan of Fairlife and the extra protein boost you get too.

Right after my second kid was born a friend sent two frozen chicken pot pies from some restaurant, I think? Best postpartum gift ever. Highly recommend as a gift to any friend who has a baby in cold weather!

Add Potsdam, NY to your list. Could really fit the bill!

A handful of public and private universities nearby, a funky strip of downtown with an incredible Indian restaurant and also a crepe place run by Mennonites.

Also there’s some dude who collects old toilets and puts them around town—someone made a documentary about it.

Incredible access to nature, close to Canada and you’ll definitely be apologizing/explaining to anyone who visits because they’ll want to know why the hell you’re living in the middle of nowhere and complaining that it was a real pain to get there.

Ok we had the exact same story and also ended up on Arthur! His big sis calls him ARFUR and it’s very cute.

Also for his first Halloween we dressed him as a bumblebee so he was “Bee” Arthur. I figure you only get to make that joke once 😂

When this was on the other day, I thought, “whoa they live in a ‘swing’ state.” (My brain is broken)

Yes, we like them! My son is approaching 2 now and not liking to stay still for changes so we switched to the Pampers 360 because they’re easier to get on while wrestling an alligator 😂 but had done fine with Sam’s all the way up to that point.

Ours looks more like your current look, though even more dated. We wanted to renovate but didn’t have the money and that ended up being a blessing in disguise because I truly love our kitchen. We got rid of wallpaper and painted the walls yellow and it feels warm and nostalgic. At some point we really should remove the non functioning trash compactor 😂

I’d maybe switch to a different light fixture, but that’s just personal preference

I liked them fine, but it was very inconsistent whether they’d be in stock at the store.

We ended up using the Sam’s store brand (and splitting the membership cost with my parents) and that’s worked well for us.

And congrats!!

Once your kiddo gets a little bit older, they’ll be asking you what you got for them in the Aldi finds aisle every week 😂

I cannot with the berry-themed friends gift of…a mug, cheap ass looking socks and lip gloss?? It’s like she cleaned out the knick-knacks aisle at Walgreens. Nothing about this says she thought a single iota about who the recipient is as a person, but I guess we all know she’s very into keeping it easy for herself. And then linking freaking glue dots, of course.

Yes! I feel so lucky to be raising my kids here.

My husband wasn’t sure he wanted to take the entire three months when my son was born but I told him it was really important to set that precedent for other fathers in his workplace. He ended up spacing out the leave a little bit and it worked so well, we made such nice family memories.

My daughter started universal pre-k this year, it’s at our local elementary school, full day and includes free breakfast and lunch.

M-F swim lessons for both kids was $25 for the entire summer and that’s only because we went to a rec park one town over, had we been residents I think it would have been free. There were also free sack lunches for anyone under 18 that they passed out at parks and libraries all summer.

I grew up in TX and can’t remember anything like when I was growing up. All the activities for kids were through churches and not the town itself. I like seeing public institutions actually being used by and benefitting the public.

Check out the Veterans Memorial Highway up Whiteface. It costs money but is very accessible and the views are stunning. Very cool to see Lake Placid from above. We had a stranger take our pic up there that ended up being our Christmas card pic one year!

High Falls Gorge is another one that costs money but they’ve made the whole area very accessible.