My First Mailbag of 2025
From holding kindergarteners back to keeping a marriage fun to…COVID?
I did a casual AMA with my Twitter followers several months ago. This is a bit different in that all of the questions are from my paid Substack subscribers as opposed to Twitter followers. Also, this is a totally separate thing from my advice column, which launched the other week. However, the link to submit to both is the same. If you want to submit one for a future AMA (or advice column/article request) the link is at the bottom of the article, for paid subscribers.
Also, please fill out my survey for singles! It’s anonymous!
I'd love to hear your thoughts on the recent trend of redshirting kindergartners [starting kindergarten at 6 instead of 5.] I've seen evidence that it can help bridge the maturity gap between boys and girls, but also that UMC parents do it for HS sports and getting scouted early for programs like gifted and talented. Candidly I'm considering for my May birthday 4-year-old.
I’m very pro-redshirting when it’s necessary and I think districts should stop banning it. I covered this a little bit in my article about boys. I don’t believe in redshirting kids just so they can be the biggest and smartest kid in their class, I think it’s really only a good idea for kids with delays, especially kids born in the summer, and especially boys who fall into the aforementioned categories. My husband and I both have summer birthdays. He was redshirted and I wasn’t, and it basically set the stage for our entire childhoods. He was popular, athletic, and generally everything went well for him and I was…well, the opposite. Nobody likes the little girl who cries when she loses at kickball (and who quite literally always loses at kickball.) Some of that was probably my own shortcomings that redshirting wouldn’t have solved, but I do think I was behind my peers socially/emotionally which contributed to my social issues. Granted, that’s the reason this Substack exists, so perhaps there was an upside.
Kiss, Kill, Marry, for your doodles.
I guess I’d have to kill Damien the Neckbeard because he is not only annoying but a dated 2017 trope. I’d kiss the sexy bird man, and I’d marry Nick, because he’s in the doodles too! Examples below, for those out of the loop:
How do you keep “the spark” alive and healthy in your relationship and was this different before you had kids?
For a long time after becoming parents, we just…didn’t. We definitely went over a year without a date night because of covid coinciding with the birth of our first child. In fact I think our first child was almost two when we finally went on a date night. This is what I wore, BTW! Any excuse to post an outfit.
Anyway, since then, we’ve started going on date nights at least twice a month. We found a babysitter we like, and Nick’s parents visit often enough that they can babysit for us. But with my anxiety, I admittedly have a hard time leaving my kids with anyone I don’t 100% trust, so we don’t have a big Rolodex of people who could babysit for us. That’s probably the biggest hurdle to making date nights regular. Also, Nick has a rule (which I often break) that we aren’t allowed to talk about the kids on our date nights.
Before we had kids, we spent basically all our time together, did lots of fun things together (traveling, dinners out, etc.) even when we had no money (that’s what Groupon was for!)
I asked Nick this question too, to make sure I wasn’t missing anything, and he said that keeping in shape (per our fitness guide) has helped keep the spark alive. But that’s not a priority for everyone, so it didn’t initially occur to me. However, if you’re interested in this topic—especially from the POV of a parent trying to get back into shape or maintain fitness after kids, I do recommend our fitness guide!
Have you ever considered the pros and cons of revealing your identity? Becoming a known figure could potentially open up so many new opportunities for collaboration, influence, and growth. What’s holding you back, and what would it take for you to make that leap?
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