Coffee Break: Wells Waterproof Coat
This post may contain affiliate links and Corporette® may earn commissions for purchases made through links in this post. As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.
This waterproof coat from Boden looks great — and I LOVE that it comes in petite sizes.
I've pictured the beige version with orange details — nice! — but I also really like the navy coat with neon green details.
(There is also a very 80s-inspired colorblocked coat, if that's your thing!)
All of the colorways come in regular and petite sizes 0-22. The coats are $225-$245 (the pictured one is $225), but try code VDXR to bring them down 10%.
Sales of note for 5/13/25:
- Nordstrom Rack – Looking for a deal on a Dyson hairdryer? The Rack has several refurbished ones for $199-$240 (instead of $400+) — but they're final sale only.
- Ann Taylor – Suit Yourself! 30% off suiting (and 25% off your full price purchase, and 40% off sale)
- Talbots – 40% off entire site, plus free shipping no minimum!
- Nordstrom – Beauty Deals up to 25% off (ends 5/17)
- Banana Republic Factory – Up to 50% off everything
- Boden – 10% off new women's styles with code
- Eloquii – $25+ select styles + extra 45% off all sale
- J.Crew – Up to 50% off must-have styles + extra 50% off select sale styles
- J.Crew Factory – Up to 60% off everything + extra 50% off clearance
- M.M.LaFleur – Lots of twill suiting on sale! Try code CORPORETTE15 for 15% off.
- Rothy's – Up to 50% off last-chance styles + gift cards give $100, get $20
- Spanx – Lots of workwear on sale, some up to 70% off
Hi hi. I got a hysterectomy and then my hair just . . . stopped growing. Any tips?
Also, PSA, do not freak out when you find out you have to get a hysterectomy and chop off your hair unless you REALLY mean it. Freak out in some other way.
What do you mean that your hair stopped growing? How long has it been since your hysterectomy? Tbh, if I knew that was a side effect of hysterectomies I’d be more inclined to get one so I don’t need haircuts.
It just stopped growing. It’s been six months and no growth.
What did your doctor say about this symptom?
If I had had a chance to ask my doctor, I probably wouldn’t be asking here.
Are you supplementing your hormones? I would think that would make the most difference.
See a dermatologist who specializes in hair. A regular dermatologist is not good enough.
As you wait (up to 1 year in my city) to see the dermatologist, see your primary care doctor so they can check basic things like your thyroid function, iron/ferritin and basic vitamin levels (B12, folate, vitamin D).
I’d also send a message to your GYN and ask – what’s up? Am I entering perimenopause? Did you take my ovaries out in addition to my uterus, by mistake?
Thank you, this is helpful.
Oh boy, I have never heard of this before. My guess is that it’s hormonally related but IDK!
Source: had a hysterectomy 2 years ago.
It may not just be hormonal – it could be your body’s reaction to anesthesia. Going under does weird things to your body and it can take 6+ months to work its way completely out of your system.
Following up on the morning thread, for with young kids (under 5), how many of you allow personal phone or tablet use in restaurants? Is it every time or only if needed?
My post cut off too soon – was going to add that this issue hasn’t come up for us yet with our baby but I’m curious to know what most people do these days.
Never. We leave if they aren’t behaving.
We also don’t allow it for the adults.
Same. Never. None. I have four children from ages 3 through 13 so this is not advice from a POOPCUP. We have a great time in restaurants although when all the kids were littler we did prioritize restaurants that provided prompt and attentive service.
Nada. Don’t do it. It is a super hard habit to break and all of my friends who started it really regret it now that our kids are older.
Interesting the first couple of responses are united on this – they sound just like my boss who was giving me (unsolicited, lol) baby advice and it morphed into “and whatever you do, don’t let them get a smartphone. It’s too hard to walk back from.”
Nope. Not at home during meals wither. It is a brutal habit to break (for adults too!).
Nope, never. A friend of mine does it and her 8 yo is completely addicted to his phone and it’s kind of obnoxious. I bring crayons, stickers, we walk around, we leave if it’s not going well.
My kids are teens/tweens now but we’ve already had a ‘no phones at the table’ rule. When they were small we ate quickly but talked, played games at the table, brought crayons for drawing, let them read a book, and/or took many laps of the restaurant.
What do you do if you’re out to dinner with friends/family and their kids are on screens next to yours?
Tbh, I don’t get dinner with them at a restaurant again. I don’t know if that’s healthy! But it’s what we’ve done. I need their kids to be hanging out with my kids or everything goes to hell.
So, I haven’t had this happen, but I have thought about what I’d do if it did. I think I would try to make it a “what if you guys play this game/watch this show together” thing where I’d bend our approach but maybe still try to encourage some form of socializing? But if that wasn’t a good solution, I still wouldn’t give mine a screen. 1) We don’t have a tablet and I’m definitely not cool with letting him go to town on YouTube on my phone; and 2) he knows/accepts that some families do screen time at meals but we don’t.
Interestingly they also kind of look askance at kids who can’t eat out without a screen now and are proud/glad that they can hold an adult conversation at dinner. There is a BIG age gap among cousins so the oldest ones were too young to have screens when mine were small and now mine are old enough to model better behavior for their decade younger cousins. It did come up a few times with family friends on vacation and we kind of let it go and filed it under vacation rules.
I’m genuinely curious how many of these responses are from parents with kids who are currently under 5.
For us- it’s rare but we do sometimes allow it. I’m assuming this is coming from the Bar Harbor question and that’s a time where I’d 100% do it. Huge change in routine, having to accommodate multiple families, special circumstances? Absolutely kid, veg your little heart out.
In our day to day life at home? Nah, we just bring lots of toys and go to more family friendly places.
People are going to have different opinions on this, but being away from home with family you don’t see often is more novel and the kids often don’t miss the screens as much. There’s just more going on and the vacation vibe is different too.
Two to three restaurant meals a day for multiple days in a row is really hard for toddlers. I’ve never seen novelty of new family overcome that.
I’ve never taken a toddler to a restaurant more than 1x/day on vacation. It’s just not realistic for anyone involved.
Unless you’re staying in a house with a kitchen (which OP said she’s not) I do’nt think it’s realistic to eat out less than twice a day. You can eat a big breakfast and skip lunch or get coffee and pastries for breakfast and not go to a restaurant until lunch, but you can’t have no sitdown meals until dinner. Or at least I can’t!
We are cheap, so when traveling we usually do hotel breakfast (which the Bar Harbor OP says the hotel provides), quick-service lunch, and sit-down dinner. With little kids you can bring the breakfast back to the room if necessary, and you can get lunch to go.
Yep, anon @3:41, that’s basically what we do, although we frequently do meals at the park because both toddlers love a picnic right now!
I’m the first poster and I have two kids under 5.
We do do screens during vaccines/other medical procedures, or in situations where we can’t get up and leave with them (planes, basically). Otherwise, we have left restaurants early, we’ve had one parent doing laps with a toddler, etc. But we’ve held the line.
Mine is under 5, and I’ve never allowed it, but I don’t judge if people do, and especially on vacations, I feel like even young kids can understand that normal rules don’t apply and that doesn’t mean they’re not going to be back once we’re home. I’m lucky that my kid is really good in restaurants, and I’m also okay with checking out of the socializing for a bit to read a book or play with a little toy if there’s some attention needed – this is just not a parenting area where I feel like I need a little bit of a break. (Believe me, there are plenty of others!) If I had more than one little to manage, or if restaurants were more of an overwhelming experience for mine, I’m sure it would have happened a few times. And I’m lax on tons of other stuff that I’m normally a little more structured about on vacation.
Isn’t the better question to ask which commenters have kids around 10? I think the point is that, yeah, everyone would admit it is easier when your kids are under 5, but it isn’t worth it because it is hard to break when they get older.
It was not hard to beak at all. Unless your kids are on screens constantlyyyy and have no experience ever doing anything else, this is a really overblown concern.
We use tablets/phones in moderation, and it works for us. We use the ipad sparingly, in situations where we end up someplace more boring or for a longer time than the kids can handle, and we can’t just leave. For instance, at a multi-generational family get together at a restaurant that lasts longer than we would normally spend, we might take it out when the kids get restless. Or if we’re on an airplane and we run out of books/coloring/snacks/activities. Maybe in the waiting room for the dentist if it’s taking a really long time. I will say that after we’ve used it more often than usual, like on vacation, it takes a week or two to ramp back down and we might see more bad behaviors in that time, but it’s worth it to me to use it for travel days anyway. It’s just a tool and it does need strict guardrails, but it’s nothing to be scared of!
Same.
Also, if people judge me for handing my phone to a kid in a restaurant, they don’t also get to judge me for stepping out of the room with a toddler or briefly excusing myself from a conversation to read to a preschooler.
Who judges you for both? You’re right, that would be pretty crappy.
No one judges parents for the second set of things, do they?
Never, but I don’t judge those who do, especially on vacation (unless the volume is on with no headphones – then I judge). We only have one kid so it’s easier for us to entertain her or have one parent step out with her if needed. I also think it’s totally possible to avoid it at home, and make an exception for vacation. Vacations are a different level of difficulty with jet lag, exhaustion, disruption to routine and multiple sit down meals every single day.
We almost did it once at an all-inclusive resort where the meals were taking a really long time. Three sit down meals a day is just *hard* for a little kid, and not something you do at home.
From the perspective of a diner who doesn’t have kids, it is SO much nicer when they are occupied by something that isn’t a screen. I understand they aren’t old enough to just sit and talk! By all means bring crayons, books, puzzles, or other quiet things.
But restaurants are often darker than at home and so bright flashing cartoons out of the corner of my eye are super annoying. And sometimes they don’t have headphones for the kid!?!
I do agree that bright flashing cartoons can be super distracting to the table and fellow dinners.
I see kids watching a cartoon without sound every now and then.
well that’s the same “flashing lights” annoyance I mentioned, but the reason I call out “no headphones” is because some parents let their kid just have the volume on. Nope nope nope
I have 3 under 4 and will risk the wrath of the commenters here! We very rarely go out for dinner but the last time we did, we allowed our 3 year old to look at photos on dad’s phone. She colored and played most of the time but dinner took probably two hours (not our choice but MIL tends to do what she wants).
I do think looking at photos of family is different than watching cartoons or playing a game. We don’t do it, but I wouldn’t judge a parent who did.
If it was just us then we didn’t allow it — we would leave if we were misbehaving. But we only went to preferred restaurants and generally could put our entire order in within 3 minutes of sitting down.
That said — for family meals (like this morning’s question) we absolutely would have allowed it. People are talking and laughing, no one’s ordered anything for 20 minutes, people are slow eaters, etc, etc.
As someone with teens, this is really interesting to me. When mine were small, we let them look at videos on our phones and/or tablets at restaurants when they were little and it was…fine? We’d generally make them talk to us for a while and/or color but if the meal was going long (like with the in-laws) we’d let them watch shows or play games. They are reasonably nice humans – the boy in particular is quite empathetic but even the girl is showing signs of caring about others.
Yeah, I have 8 and 11 year olds and they occasionally had screens in restaurants when they were little and turned out fine. We never took them to fancy places, so darkness wasn’t a concern. There are probably some exceptions, but I think in general if a restaurant is dark enough that someone would notice a screen at a different table it’s not really a place for little kids. And OP was asking specifically about Bar Harbor, which has tons of casual places with outdoor seating where half the guests will have kids under 5 in the summer months.
Same. It wasn’t a big deal to use a screen when our kids were little, and none of them now use screens at meals.
I’m glad we weren’t hand wring-y about it, as I think we ended up doing a lot more than we otherwise would have if we felt so constrained (had to leave immediately after eating, or couldn’t travel to certain places bc there were multiple restaurant meals). On balance, I think the experiences more than made up for the limited screen time they got when they were pushed out of their normal routines.
My kid is 10 now, but we have never allowed phones or tablets at restaurants or even at home during dinner. We turn the TV off, or at least pause, if we’re watching something at home (lately, the NBA playoffs have been on a lot).
I’m not anti-screen, but the dinner table has always been my bright line. At restaurants, our son has always been allowed to color or play with small toys we bring to the restaurant. Between the ages of 1 and 5, we rarely went to fancy, sit-down restaurants with him. When we did, one of the parents would typically take him outside to walk around after ordering and while we waited for our meal.
He turned 5 during lockdown, and we didn’t go to any restaurants until he was 6, once we were vaccinated. By then, he was old enough to sit for the entire meal with a small toy. His favorite restaurant toy since has been Kanoodle–we brought one to the first sit-down restaurant we went to post-Covid, and now we’ve been through regular, genius, extreme, flip, etc. They are amazing restaurant toys for the 6-10 age group.
we only use tablets for the kids on airplanes. maybe on occasion we look something up on a phone during a meal, like kiddo wants to know what country is next to Spain or some other random question like that. we should probably get into the habit of waiting until later. we do let the kids color at restaurants, we also often sit outside where they can get up and play on a sidewalk where we can see them or something like that. we dont go to super fancy restaurants with our children
replying to myself, but my twins just turned 7. Admittedly, they did not dine indoors at a restaurant from 22 months until maybe age 3.5/4 due to the pandemic, which I realize would’ve been hard ages, but we did dine outdoors. in fact i recall our last meal out in March of 2020 with them and they did great at the restaurant, except when they finished their desserts and wanted more. we don’t do 3 course meals, try to order quickly after sitting down and/or bring them some veggies/fruit to eat while waiting for their meal
For the love of the rest of us, if you bring a kid to a restaurant let them use these things.
Nah, kids are allowed to exist in public and be kids. They did pre-2008 too when smartphones weren’t an option. You survived dining next to them.
I feel the exact opposite. I don’t want to hear some kid’s Bluey cartoons blaring at the table next to me. Normal kid noise is fine.
This entire thread has been weird to me because this definitely seems to be the dominant position where I live. At one point, we were just shocked that all the kids at the restaurant we were at (a Chuy’s) were so well behaved, and then we realized they all had tablets. There definitely seems to be less tolerance for kids to misbehave today now that tablets are an option than I remember growing up pre-tablets.
Tolerance has not changed, kids just used to be very afraid of their parents and thus behaved.
No, parents used to actually parent. I was a well behaved kid but I was never, ever afraid of my parents. I was disciplined by them and respected them, but fear did not enter the conversation.
I was never afraid of my parents either and we went out to eat as a family (like everyone did) before screens were an option. Crayons were the norm.
I wasn’t behaving out of fear of my parents. Do you really think every time you see kids from another culture behaving appropriately at a restaurant that they’re just very afraid of their parents?
I kind of feel the same. But probably because I was just at a restaurant this weekend with a kid screeching at the two of his lungs. I would have rather listened to cartoons.
Have a 4 yo and we don’t give screens at all, although I will say that we are more willing to go places that have tvs that kid can watch
Three kids under ten here, including a preschooler. We eat out often, including when kids were younger, and have only allowed this once, and funnily enough, it was in Bar Harbor so my husband and I could linger for an extra few minutes to finish our dessert.
We bring books, small toys (youngest is content to zoom a hot wheels car on the table), play hangman, and talk as a family. We’re very low tech/anti-screen in general; kids don’t get screens on car trips of any length (and we drive 9+ hours a couple times a year) or during the week. We limit to a couple hours each weekend day, plus airline seatback screens– mostly because that’d be impossible to control.
Oh man, I have such good memories of playing Hangman with my grandma at her annual white-cloth birthday dinner. Haven’t thought about that in years.
We get car sickness badly in our family so we’ve never been able to do screens for car trips. Lots of audio books and family conversations instead. I don’t say that to brag, frankly it would be nice to have that as an option but it’s just not possible.
I’m not sure that devices are really effective in keeping kids quiet in restaurants. Kids who “need” devices are often so wild that devices aren’t going to do the job. We never gave our kid devices in restaurants, but we had a naturally chill only child who was content to draw or people-watch. My younger SILs each have two kids who are terrible in restaurants, and phones and tablets don’t help. They whack each other over the head with the tablets, run around the restaurant screaming, destroy potted plants, etc. We avoid eating out with them as much as possible because it’s stressful and embarrassing. With kids like this who won’t be placated with devices, I think you really just have to take them to loud kid-friendly restaurants or eat takeout at a playground.
This is what I’ve observed – those that are placated by screens are those that would have done fine with a new coloring book or etch-a-sketch. And those that are wild are always wild. Mine is 16 months, so I’m just talking neighbors and family members.
Absolutely never. One of the only parenting positions I take that I see as black and white.
parent of a 7, 4 and 18 month old, fwiw.
chiming in for those who are feeling judged….We ended up with “surprise!” twins when our two older were 7 and 9. When the twins were 2 and 3, we were coming out of COVID, and the big kids had a legitimate need for socialization that the twins, honestly, weren’t ready for.
We liberally used screens during those tough toddler years, as I was often solo parenting all 4, and I needed to take an older kid to a Thing that was not what I otherwise would have chosen to do with twin toddlers (team dinners, sporting events in the evening, meet ups with my friends with older kids, etc.). Usually we waited until we had exhausted other activities, but I never thought twice about pulling out a screen when I couldn’t just pick up and leave.
And, you know what. It was and is fine. The twins are now 6, and haven’t used a screen in a restaurant in several years. I have no regrets. There were nights when sitting for an extra 15 minutes with my friends at a meal made me a better mom. There were nights when my big kids really needed to participate in a social outing or a sporting event that was going after the twins’ bedtime. And my twins don’t have a tablet (just random TV time during the weekends), and my big kids don’t have personal devices. So, like a lot of things with parenting, good for you, not for me works really well most of the time. Also, can confirm lots of my friends used screens with toddlers in similar settings, and most are now older, and none of them are using screens in restaurants or at meals. So, also being the voice of reason that it’s just fine.
Yeah I had my 3 year old out at a tex mex restaurant for 8 year old’s end of season basketball party the other day. Along with my six year old and 10 year old. And I definitely ended up having 3 year old watch bluey – with volume! Which I feel VERY BAD about! But otherwise, 8 year old was going to have to skip and we were the only ones in that section of the restaurant and the basktball team didn’t seem to care. Age gaps make things way harder.
She’s also watched shows at little league games. Baseball is really long y’all. And there are a lot of games in the season. Sometimes she just doesn’t have it in her.
See, little sisters watching TV on the sidelines for a whole baseball season year after year (often for older brothers) doesn’t sound great. I know someone with that dynamic and her daughter spent her own birthday on the sidelines in 110 degree Arizona heat. I’m sure you’re not describing anything that extreme, but it would be a much bigger issue than occasional restaurant screens.
Yeah, if you have mulltiple kids you need to divide and conquer. I have seen so many little sisters be prevented from playing sports because watching their big brothers’ baseball games all weekend every weekend is inviolable “family time.” I’ve also seen it happen to a big sister and a little brother in a family where the middle sister was a gymnast. It’s horrible to force your other kids to sacrifice their own pursuits for the sake of the favorite.
Oh man, stanning for activities parents/siblings here. I have three kids, and one is a serious baseball player. The other siblings always have a choice to go or not go to their sibling’s activities. One, the choir singer, rarely elects to go to baseball games, and that’s just fine. She’s a homebody, and loves having quiet time at the house without her much louder younger siblings there. The youngest, who is 5 and already showing signs that she will also be a sport kid, ALWAYS chooses to go to baseball games. She will run around with the other siblings for like 2 hours, but might hit the wall at the end of a double header, and take a break with a screen. Her brother makes a huge deal of the fact that she shows up for his games, and he always chooses to come to her soccer games, so it seems like it’s working out just fine. Both sporty kids then turn around and head to choir competitions for their older sister, so just again, for those for whom real life is messy/complicated and black and white rules rarely make sense, I see you. My (secret) flex is how well my kids get along and support each other, so I’ll take a kid who wants to support a sibling who is working really hard at something they love (and who then turns around and supports the other sibling back), even if it means that not every minute of every day is perfectly aligned with perfect child development.
Rarely do it. I think maybe a few times ever and they are in elementary now. We play games and talk. When they were smaller and esp if we were traveling we would bring things to entertain them. Coloring books, small toys, etc. I am a big fan of the dollar store for this. No bad residual habits from this btw unless you count their continued playing tic tac toe on the placemat a bad residual effect.
My youngest is 6.5 now but we did not allow it. That said, we didn’t eat out much because it was really hard! We also have 3 kids so if they are all on devices than WTF is the point of going out. We did (still do) a lot of take-out.
Anecdotally, I almost never see phones/tablets for kids at local restaurants but see them for the majority of kids when I’m traveling.
We only do it maybe 5-7x a year when we are on vacation. We are not anti screen; he gets 15 minutes a day on weekdays and unlimited on airplanes. I just view eating out as family time and we use it as a case of last resort on long days while traveling.
Our kids are tweens now, but when they were that age the answer was never. I would bring a bag with coloring books, paint by stickers, markers, water wow, etc etc to keep them occupied. We still do not allow phones or tablets at restaurants (adults or kids), and our kids are totally used to it now and don’t even ask.
+1
We used screens a lot when the kids were toddlers and we were traveling or were at an unusually long meal. We did not allow screens at the table past the age of 4, and our now tweens also never ask for screens now.
We don’t allow a phone or tablet but have a couple of books that we bring along to look at while we’re waiting for food. The books are seek and find (Where’s Waldo style) so they’re engaging but seem to be easy to put away once food gets there. I’ve also found that going out for breakfast is the best time for us. Everyone’s fresh and there isn’t the tendency to linger over food as muc.
I try really hard not to judge parents doing this because kids in restaurants, especially when you don’t want them to make noise and cause a scene while you take longer than 5-10 min to eat your food, are hard. But omg I hate it so much. My husband’s first impulse whenever my kids start fidgeting in public is to hand them his phone, and it INFURIATES me. There are a million other ways to occupy kids without screens: observe the world around you, make up stories, have a conversation, play an game like “I’m going on a picnic” or I Spy, or “I’m thinking of something.” Learn to be bored. If they can’t behave appropriately without a screen, they’re too young for the space, or you need to take them outside to calm down and then come back. It’s frustrating AF when kids act up in public, but pacifying them with screens is not the answer.
TL/DR: Never. Off my soapbox now.
I do think a lot of people tend to act like it’s either screens or the kid is forced to stare at the wall. There are definitely a lot of things to do and games to play.
Plus a billion to let them be bored.
Our kids are 5, 8, and 12 and we do not allow it unless it’s something that’s being shared with the table. Then the thing is shared and the phone/device goes away.
But to be honest, most places we go out to eat has some game or other on, so my kids ate often glued to that. I do travel with Uno and Spot It to try to distract the kids when they get restless, though.
I love a good adult field trip. By this I mean a half day or day long activity where I get to learn about something random or new – like when you were a kid. We are going to NYC in a couple months. Anyone have any good recs for tours, exhibits, random places you went that were worth it? We’ve done a couple architecture based tours in the past visits.
I really want to go to the Tenement Museum
It’s been a while since I lived in NYC, but I really enjoyed the Tenement Museum (on several visits), a food tour of Hell’s Kitchen, Ellis Island, a tour of the UN, and an after-hours tour at MOMA. DH and I used to do “field trips” to the Met where we picked a gallery we were unfamiliar with (like, medieval arms and armor) and dove deep on just that gallery.
I haven’t been, but I’ve heard great things about the Intrepid, the Morgan Library, Roosevelt Island and Governor’s Island, and the Transit Museum.
I’d also encourage you to check out one of the smaller art museums–the Cloisters, the Guggenheim, and the Whitney are all great.
Roosevelt Island is super fun. Take the tram, walk around … there is a lot of cool history there.
Finish with a picnic.
If you have the time to leave the city, check out Princeton, NJ.
Why on earth would somebody want to go to Princeton instead of spending time in NYC?
+1 nothing against Princeton or college towns in general (I live in one and love it) but this is definitely one of the more bizarre travel recs I’ve seen here.
The Frick museum has re-opened! It was my favorite museum.
Has anyone gone since they re-opened?
we really loved the tiffany exhibit at the new york historical society — the brooklyn botanic was also fabulous but i’m in my flower lady phase.
I know Context Tours offers tours there, so do the Bowery Boys I believe.
Ellis Island is really cool. Also highly recommend taking the Crown tour of the Statue of Liberty if you can get a spot. And then there are a million amazing museums with rotating temporary exhibits – what are you interested in?
I live in NY and I enjoy the Bowery Boys podcast, which is a NYC history podcast. A lot of times they do episodes that are tie-ins to museums or other spaces, including about recent collections or changes. (For example, they did a recent episode about the Frick Museum, including about the renovation/re-opening that another commentator mentioned). They’ve been doing the podcast for more than 15 years, so there are lots of episodes, but if I were you, I’d skim the titles to see which subjects are most interesting to me and then listen to the podcast and consider if I wanted to visit that place.
If you do listen to the podcast, you’ll also see that there is an affiliated walking tour company (they advertise it on basically every episode). I haven’t taken one of their tours, but there are tons of walking tours in NY based on lots of different interests, so you could also look at walking tours for suggestions.
Somewhat related – https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2025/05/12/my-new-york-city-tour-of-tours
NY Historical Society has interesting exhibits, lectures, and tours. The calendar fills out closer to the date, so if you don’t see anything interesting now, check again in 3-4 weeks.
If you’re into Hamilton, the Hamilton Grange and Morris-Jumel Mansion can be combined in a day. Also in Upper Manhattan, I’ve heard that the Hispanic Society Museum is spectacular.
This isn’t unique, but walking over the Brooklyn Bridge is amazing. There are plaques all along the walkway about the history of the bridge. Totally a field trip!
haven’t been since I lived in NY a decade ago so someone who has been more recently should chime in if it’s still fun, but if your trip happens to coincide with the Jazz Age lawn party on Governor’s Island, that. Just walking around Governor’s Island is worth a trip.
The Museum of Broadway was a big hit on my last trip.
My boyfriend and I are going on a long weekend trip to Chicago! We’re coming from the south, but he lived there in his early 30s (so definitely pre-pandemic). We have a pretty solid roster of activities lined up, but where should we eat? I’m thinking mostly casual places with maybe one nicer dinner.
Also—what should I wear?! We’re going mid-June, so sounds like the weather could be all over the place.
I was just there and had the most amazing meal at Frontera Grill. I highly recommend that restaurant and all of Rick Bayless’ restaurants.
Frontera Grill is my favorite restaurant in the world and I visit every time I am in Chicago.
I have bought a jacket in Chicago in the first week of June out of desperation because I was just. so. cold. I could not handle it. So definitely pack a substantial sweater, sweatshirt, or jacket of your choosing because it can be uncomfortably cold there, even in June.
Conversely, we were there in late June in 2022 and it was so hot – the heat index was nearly 100. So check the weather!
It’s going to be 90 on Thursday…. climate change is a real B.
I’d say in late June really cold weather is exceedingly rare, but you should definitely have a light sweater because the evenings can be cool, especially if you’ll be near the lake.
Bring an extra pair of shoes, we got soaked in a surprise downpour in June and I had to buy a new pair of shoes at a department store. It also went from 80 to 55 in a few hours so I second the jacket rec.
Sepia is phenomenal for a nicer dinner. I like it more than some of the fancier Michelin places.