Corporette.com

Updated: Apr 16, 2024 189 Comments · by

Coffee Break: Bri Mary Jane Flat

Coffee Break

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.

red patent leather Mary Jane flat

Sam Edelman shoes are always a reader favorite, and it's easy to see why — they're affordable, trendy, and generally comfortable.

The brand has a bunch of Mary Jane flats out right now — we've featured the Michaela flat before, but this newer pointy-toed Mary Jane (pictured) looks fabulous. I'm also eyeing the mesh Miranda Mary Janes!

(Questions I've asked myself today: is red springy? Is red patent springy? There are other colors, but I've decided that YES, it is something I'd wear in spring, mostly because I love light blue and red together, and light blue is springy. For example, try wearing them with a denim dress or something else with a strong light blue component.)

The shoe is $130, available in four colors, in sizes 5-11.

Sales of note for 10.10.24

  • Nordstrom – Extra 25% off clearance (through 10/14); there's a lot from reader favorites like Boss, FARM Rio, Marc Fisher LTD, AGL, and more. Plus: free 2-day shipping, and cardmembers earn 6x points per dollar (3X the points on beauty).
  • Ann Taylor – Extra 50% off sale (ends 10/12)
  • Banana Republic Factory – Up to 50% off everything plus extra 25% off your $125+ purchase
  • Boden – 10% off new styles with code; free shipping over $75
  • Eloquii – Extra 50% off a lot of sale items, with code
  • J.Crew – 40% off sitewide
  • J.Crew Factory – 50% off entire site, plus extra 25% off orders $150+
  • Lo & Sons – Fall Sale, up to 35% off
  • M.M.LaFleur – Save 25% sitewide
  • Neiman Marcus – Sale on sale, up to 85% off
  • Spanx – Lots of workwear on sale, some up to 70% off
  • Talbots – 50% off 2+ markdowns
  • Target – Circle week, deals on 1000s of items
  • White House Black Market – Buy one, get one – 50% off full price styles

Comments

  1. It's me.

    What shoes would you order overnight or two night delivery to wear on a trip that will involve a lot of walking? Help!!

    • anon

      For context, size 8, this is a stylish city trip, and I would like to wear skirts/dresses.

      • anon

        You can have comfortable feet, or you can prioritize fashion, but you can’t have both.

        • Anon

          Not sure what you mean by fashion, but there are shoes and boots and sandals comfortable enough that they don’t need to be broken in at all, and that I have successfully substituted for grandma sneakers with orthotics without issues. And my feet have a lot more problems than the average foot.

      • Anonymous

        If style is a real concern, I had great luck with Gentle Souls sandals a few years ago, though they were secondary to some Josef Seibel sneakers I also took.

      • Anon

        I just bought the Ecco Soft 7 sneakers based on recommendations here and they are as comfortable as everyone says and cute with skirts and dresses. I got them in the gold color but there’s lots of options. My regular size fits about a half size too big, which works well with my cushioned no show socks.

        • Anon

          I’ve never tried the sambas but I’ve worn the courtsets on many trips where I logged 5-10 miles a day for many days straight and had no problems. And I’ve had issues with a lot of other sneakers. I have size 8.5 with a wide toe box and narrow heel.

        • Anon

          Sambas are not all the comfortable, in my opinion. I would choose Ecco, Paul Green, ON, Hoka or New Balance over anything Sambas. I love the look of Sambas, but they are mid comfort-wise.

    • worried

      I also suggest ecco sneakers (doesn’t have to be the ecco soft 7s — their other sneakers work well too). I also suggest New Balance 574, 327s – both also work with insoles. For sandals, I have had luck with Naot sandals, but sizing the sandals is easier than the shoes for me. I have done many city trips with tons of walking every day, and without an insole supported by a good shoe/ sandals, your feet/ back/ calves will hurt!

    • Anonymous

      If you can’t do sneakers (for example, a work conference), I’d go with something by Vionic or Softwalk. I’d also order a few styles since sometimes a strap or the like can hit wrong.

    • Anon

      Another ‘Rette recommended the Dansko sandals and they’ve worked well for me. True to size. One style is called “Sam.” Good luck!

  2. anon

    Any comments or success stories or bad stories or anything else on cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia?

    • Anon

      If a problem is “cognitive” or “behavioral,” CBT may help. So if you need to dismantle unhelpful beliefs about sleeping, or learn to break disordered thought patterns, or implement sleep hygiene practices, CBT may be relevant.

      If your insomnia is from something else (like a medical condition, or something more psychologically complex like trauma), it’s possible to spend a lot of time barking up the wrong tree with CBT, which can be frustrating.

    • Anonymous

      What kind of insomnia? Getting to sleep or staying asleep?

      I used CBT and anti-anxiety meds and other learned coping mechanisms. They all helped me fall asleep better. Getting a diagnosis of sleep apnea and a CPAP machine helped me stay asleep

  3. Anonymous

    I bought the sheer rhinestone Mary Jane’s from this brand and I’d recommend them. Super cute.

    It’s been three years and my husband
    and I are coming out of the new baby, grief and pandemic haze. We’re losing weight and looking to glow up as the kids say. Does anyone or anyone’s spouse have any experience with a hair transplant? My husband is interested but sheepish about asking friends. Also, I’m looking into an early 40s facelift if anyone has experience. Thanks!!!

    • Senior Attorney

      I had a facelift in my early 50s and my standard advice for all cosmetic procedures (probably including hair transplants) is take the surgeon’s estimated recovery time and double it.

    • Anon

      I’d suggest looking into ‘The Beauty Broker’ – a consultant who helps match patients with surgeons. I follow her on IG and she seems very knowledgable about surgeons/procedures and thoughful about what she recommends/when. Her personal aesthetic is very ‘Bold Glamour Filter’ IRL but she seems very reasonable/sane in terms of procedures and results she advises for her clients.

    • Lily

      Is getting a facelift in one’s early 40s really a thing? (no judgment). Is there even that much to “lift”? My mom had one in her mid 50s and I thought that seemed a little early (but she looked grea afterwards FWIW).

    • Anon

      Check out Turkey. The best hair transplant surgeons in the world. I would normally not recommend international travel for cosmetic procedures, but this is an exception

      • Anon

        I have run into this also. IDK why Turkey, but it is definitely a big thing there and big international travel to it thing there.

        • Anon

          My friend just sent me a pic from the airport in Turkey where it seemed like all the male passengers were wearing wide black headbands post hair transplant.

          • Anon

            I’m going to Turkey in a few weeks and am so curious to see this! I will keep my eyes peeled for it.

    • Anon

      I am planning a lower facelift in the next 18 months – 2 years. I will be mid fifties. I had an upper blepharoplasty earlier this year and it made a huge difference (and was also a good way to tryout the surgeon). From what I understand it’s important to be at a stable weight before and after. I am a subtle tweaks sort of person. I don’t want a dramatic difference so to me doing these things “early” creates a wow, she looks great but I’m not really sure why.

  4. anon

    i am a lawyer and i sit on my HOA board. i know that the HOA is insured as required by law but i have been trying to get a quote on what it would cost me to have my own additional D and O insurance and travelers (which is who i use fro my homewoners) doesn’t seem to know what i mean. does anyone have person d and o and can you tell me what company you use?

    • Anonymous

      D&O is taken out by the company that “employs” (I understand you’re not employees in the technical sense) the covered directors and officers. The directors don’t get their own policies. Take a look at the bylaws re indemnification/advancement to make sure you’re happy with the entity’s obligation to cover you for any expenses. Even if the D&O policy would deny coverage for whatever reason (ie insured vs insured), the entity might still be obligated to pay your legal fees.

      If you’re concerned about your own liability then you can get additional professional liability insurance I suppose. Make sure you have an umbrella policy on your house.

      • anon

        thanks to you both! i have real concerns that the HOA is underinsured. that’s what is pushing htis.

        • Anon

          I thought the AmWins article had a good point about shared policy limits really exposing individual board members.

          disclosure – I’m an insurance expert, but not a D&O expert.

    • Seventh Sister

      You might be looking for an umbrella policy – we have one and it gives me a lot of peace of mind. I do a fair amount of volunteer work and I’m always vaguely worried someone’s going to sue me for something ridiculous.

      • Anon

        I don’t think your umbrella policy is going to step in to cover you for your liability related to being a board member.

        • Seventh Sister

          Well, it depends on the policy. Ours covers pretty much anything we could be sued for that isn’t criminal.

  5. Anon

    AITA? I WFH. We have a fenced in yard, and on nice days, I let our 8 year old dog outside with the screen door open for him to come and go as he pleases. Unbeknownst to me, he dug in DH’s newly planted (on Sunday) vegetable planters yesterday. (I guarantee you it’s because DH used blood meal fertilizer which smells deeeelicious to old hound dogs.) DH fussed at me, saying I was irresponsible and that I had better not let him out unattended anymore.

    Um. He’s a dog. In a fenced-in yard. That’s the point of the yard – that he can be on his own. Sorry if you used delicious fertilizer, but it’s not fair to him (or me!) to never allow him outside unattended again because he might dig in your pots. And 99% of the time he’s out there, he’s sunbathing. And I’m not sitting out there all day long.

    Thoughts?

      • Anon

        +1. I’d be really upset if my spouse blew me off to the level you seem to be doing to your husband. If I were you, I’d be saying “I’m so sorry honey – I’d be annoyed too if I had put in all the work that you did on those planters. Would it work to put up chicken wire as a temporary measure?” Acknowledge the frustration and work together to find a solution.

    • Anon

      NTA, it’s crazy to say a dog can’t be left unattended in a fenced in yard.

      • Anon

        I have never left my dog unattended in the back yard for any significant length of time.

        • Anon

          I do it frequently (when it’s weather appropriate), as does everyone else I know with a fenced in yard and a dog who likes being outdoors

        • Anon

          What? If you have a fenced yard and the weather is nice it’s completely normal to leave a dog unattended. I do, as do all my neighbors.

          • Anon

            Our neighborhood has coyotes (my husband has seen them while running in the early morning) but it’s very rare for them to be out in the middle of the day when a dog would be lying out in the sun. They’re active around dawn and dusk. Lived here 20+ years, most people have dogs and I’ve never heard of a dog attack by a coyote (and I’m sure I would know if one happened, people are always posting about much more minor events in local Facebook groups and NextDoor). A bird did attack a small dog once but the dog survived, and I doubt being unattended was a big factor because a bird can swoop in so quickly.

          • Anonymous

            I had a neighbor whose pit bull and lab were attacked in the backyard. I wouldn’t be too sure on that.

          • Anon

            I can believe a coyote got into a fight with a pit bull and a lab, but it wasn’t trying to eat them for dinner. And it didn’t have a chance at winning the fight.

    • Anonymous

      YTA. If the dog is destroying property then clearly he needs to be watched more carefully. I’m not sure why you’re trying to blame your DH for using the wrong fertilizer when the problem is the lack of supervision.

    • anon

      Your DH needs to put some fencing around the raised beds, but also, do try to care at least a little bit.

    • Anonymous

      Can you grab a laptop and chair and work outside with him on a chain? That’s what I do. And I can only do it certain times of year since my little yard fan ate a black walnut off the ground at the end of summer last year and almost died. Coyotes jump fences, you’re giving open access to your home to other critters, and stuff like the plantar thing are just a few reasons why it’s best to be around, even if it is fenced.

      • Anonymous

        Also watch what sort of mulch and insecticides DH is using. Lot of poison potential. He should be putting some sort of fencing around things if you need the dog to stay out for whatever reason.

      • Anon

        This. We used to let our dog out unattended until one day we noticed a coyote practically salivating on the other side of the fence. It’s a safety issue, not just a dog destroying your husband’s hard work issue (which you should be more sympathetic about)

    • Anonymous

      NTA. I do understand your husband’s frustration, as someone who loves a container veggie garden. But you can buy vegetables at the market if the plants don’t succeed. There is no substitute for a happy, carefree life for your senior dog (or for you). And did you not pay good money for a fenced yard in an amount that exceeds your veggie budget? There probably is a barrier that would deter your pup, perhaps with a bit of coaching. Working that out seems like a joint project for you as a family

    • anon

      It appears that there’s room for compromise here. Can you guys work together to figure out a way to protect the plants and let dog out unattended?

    • Anon

      NTA, because you have to meet animals and small children where they are.

      It isn’t reasonable to ask an animal to ignore something totally delicious and available, unless maybe you have trained the animal on that particular area (eg, don’t eat off the coffee table). So your choices are to keep the dog inside, train it in avoiding that particular delicious area, or not use yummy fertiliser.

      Info: does your DH ever let the dog out unattended when you aren’t home?

    • smurf

      ESH. Not letting the dog out to enjoy the fenced in yard ever again is a huge overreaction by your DH. Your dismissiveness of him/what happened also sucks. Figure out a way to cover / fence off the planters.
      (like, if you had worked all day on an amazing roast & your partner left it somewhere easily reachable by dog, it would be reasonable to be annoyed if partner leaves dog in the room with said roast unsupervised & he demolishes it!)

      • Anon

        +1 to that example. Would you be happy if your DH went on Reddit and posted “AITA, my wife was the one who made a delicious roast?”

      • An.On.

        I’m assuming the push back on your husband’s suggestion is because you don’t want to be at the beck and call of the dog every time he wants to go out or come in, which, as the owner of a cat, I understand, but still, he destroyed something that was important to your husband on your watch and it would be kind to acknowledge it.

        I once let our very excitable dog into the garage without making sure my husband (who was hanging with his buddies in the garage) was ready for him because I was sick and tired of listening to the dog whine at the door and the dog ended up rampaging in and breaking a fragile piece of my husband’s garage decor. I felt really bad about it and ended up gluing it back together and my husband really appreciated it even though I don’t think he blamed me for the accident. Can you help your husband re-plant as a show of good faith?

    • Anonymous

      I have a flower garden and it annoys me when the neighbor’s cat gets in my plants because I put in a lot of work to maintain this garden. Yes, your husband can install fencing or something to deter the dog, but you are not being a responsible pet owner and are being dismissive of something your husband enjoys as not having as much value as the dog’s freedom.

  6. Anon

    Episcopal friends: what is the song that that they play during the Maundy Thursday service that might be described as “hauntingly beautiful”? And would it be OK to play at a funeral or graveside service? The service may not be in a church (may be at the funeral home or graveside) but the person to be buried attended an Episcopal church.

    • Anonymous

      Are you talking about Ubi Caritas? It’s a Gregorian chant traditional to Maundy Thursday that has been set by various composers.

    • Any of these?

      These were all sung at the Liturgy of Maundy Thursday service at St Paul’s in London this year. All beautiful.
      Gloria by Vierne
      Ubi Caritas by Duruflé
      God so loved the world by Steiner
      My Soul is Exceeding Sorrowful by Eleanor Daley

      • A few more

        These were the Westminster Abbey ones this year:

        Byrd Mass for five voices
        Gibbons Drop, drop slow tears
        Duruflé Ubi caritas et amor
        Poulenc Vinea mea electa
        Séverac Tantum ergo sacramentum

        Of these, I would think the Vinea mea electa, God so loved the world and Drop, drop slow tears could all be called haunting. You’ll find examples if you look them up on youtube, e.g. with the King’s College Choir or Trinity Choir.

    • Seventh Sister

      Episcopal priests are (in general) fairly chill about such things, I”d just ask the person in charge of arranging the service.

      FWIW, a lot of melodies get reused (e.g., there’s an Easter hymn that has the same tune as an all-purpose hymn) with different lyrics.

    • Anon

      The music choices aren’t standard sothere are many things it could be. That said, the Pange Lingua (“Sing My Tongue the Glorious Battle”) is one of the most ancient hymns used for Maundy or Good Friday. It’s medieval and incredibly beautiful, so might be what you’re thinking of.

    • Anecdata

      If you think you might recognize it if you saw it, the hymnals often arranged by occasion, so feel free to drop by the church and flip through the hymnal to Maundy Thursday. There should be a lookup table in the back of the book but if there’s not, the “seasonal” section goes in calendar order, so eg. find Christmas, keep flipping through Lent, if you get to Easter go back a little

  7. Anon

    I saw an article that the US FDA allows all sorts of toxic chemicals in bath products that the EU doesn’t. (Because of course we do – freedum!) What are your favorite European bath brands? I take a bubble bath or scented Epsom salt bath most nights. Thanks!

    • Anon

      My understanding is that the EU is overly cautious about this. My friend in France makes me bring her deodorant from the US whenever I visit, lol. I’m not an expert and would guess that probably the ideal would be a balance in between the US approach and the European approach but I wouldn’t assume Europe is automatically better on this issue.

        • Anon

          Yup. American regulation of cosmetics and supplements is effectively non-existent. It’s a total joke and people are right to seek out products from the EU.

      • Anon

        There’s a difference of philosophy (guilty until proven innocent / precautionary principle, vs. innocent until proven guilty). USA basically volunteers to be the guinea pigs on this stuff, and EU waits until more data is in. Whether this was the right call in any individual instance of course varies!

        • Anon

          For new products with new chemicals, this is mostly true, but the U.S. also does not remove products with ample evidence of harm from the market. It’s almost impossible to see something harmful removed. I definitely defer to the EU for chemicals with long evidence histories.

          • Anon

            Thanks for pointing that out; you’re right that it takes ages even when the research has piled up. Even for FDA regulated things, which a lot of things are not!

    • Anonymous

      I don’t know that it’s because of personal freedoms that I associate with “freedumb”

      I think it’s because of lobbying on behalf of corporate freedoms

      So yay democratic capitalism?

    • RiskedCredit

      So, from England and I highly recommend sanex as a brand. It leaves my skin buttery soft. I do a lot of Neal’s Yard too. SpaceNK is just wonderful for finding US brands which are good as they already meet the EU rules (SpaceNK were shipping to Europe as late as November last year). It’s all very expensive. Another good website to look at is Superdrug. To buy, go on Amazon .co.uk and log in with your regular U.S. account. You can ship a lot of things to yourself. Don’t spend more than $100 in a transaction and mark it as a gift.

      Here in the US I use the lavender scented bath salts online with Costco. It’s an 18lb bag and just wonderful.

      Radox is excellent but with the liquid, a little goes a very long way. It’s heavily scented because of the herbs and a one way trip to a yeast infection if you are too liberal with it. I recommend using that brands bath salts only at first until you establish if you are fine with their mix.

  8. Anon

    I live in a state with a very robust university system (one top 10 public university, one top 20 public university, and several schools in the top 200). I would be happy for kiddo to go to any number of in-state schools. Current in-state tuition is less than 10k a year at every in-state school. If kid graduates with a 3.0, they’ll automatically have 80% of tuition covered as long as they maintain a 3.0.

    Would this impact how much you save for college?

    • Anon

      Yep. Kid does not need to go out of state. If they choose to make that decision, they can finance the rest on their own.

        • Anon

          Ditto.

          I say this a lot: there are loans for college, there are no loans for retirement. So if the choice is saving well for retirement and saving a few grand for jr vs saving ok and saving ok, the answer all.day.long. should be retirement. Elder poverty is no joke. And junior won’t thank you for forgoing years of interest in the name of giving him college money when he’s having to help you financially in your golden years.

          • Anon

            +3. We saved enough for the expected cost of in-state and then stopped saving so we could add more to our retirement nest egg. My parents intend to pay the difference if our kids want to go somewhere more expensive. That will be nice if it happens. If my parents use up all their money or decide to give it to someone else, my kids will be fine at in-state schools. Our retirement is more important than a fancy private college.

      • Anonymous

        Agreed, though I might have the caveat that (assuming you can) you will pay for a semester abroad/summer trip/semester at another school, as I do think getting out and getting exposed to new things is critical in those years.

        • Anon

          My daughter’s semester is Italy, including all travel (and there were lots of weekend trips in addition to RT airfare from the US) actually cost the same as her public university tuition and living expenses.

    • Anon

      I would continue to save extra because the costs are likely to go up a lot, but yeah, overall I wouldn’t attempt to save for private. Private costs are near $100K per year at the top schools now.

    • Anon

      No — stuff like this can change. I’d save, but outside of a 529 plan. Higher ed is easy for states to underfund and then they take OOS students to plug budget holes and your kid might not get into the good state schools.

      • Anon

        Agree with this poster. You’re making at least four bets here: (1) the schools continue to be acceptable standard for you between now and whenever kid(s) go to college; (2) tuition costs will not dramatically change over the intervening years; (3) the scholarship program will continue to exist in its current form and kid(s) will qualify for it for multiple years; (4) the schools will continue to accept in-state students at similar rates as current. Are you comfortable with those bets given the ages of your children and the expected policies of your state for the years / decades between now and then? I would not be, in particular, #2 and #4 are actively dissolving at many state universities across the country right now. You could minimize some of this by planning for a mid-ground, like save for the in-state equivalent excluding the scholarship and assuming an extremely aggressive tuition increase rate.

        • Anon

          My sister in TX made the same bet and did a pre-paid tuition plan for UT, and then her very very bright straight A students didn’t get into UT Austin.

      • Anon

        In the middle of my schooling my in state tuition increased from $7,000/year to $28,000/year (literally overnight with no warning). An extra $63,000 in unexpected loans was not pleasant.

      • Anonymous

        This. Our top state schools cost 4 times as much for in-state students as they did when my daughter, now a high school senior, was born, and they are much harder to get into. Nothing is a sure bet anymore and it will just get worse until there is a grand reckoning that may never come since enough people are still willing to put up with the system. Also, a big state school is not for everyone.

    • Anon

      Yes – I wouldn’t save as much as if there was no Bright Futures (or whatever your state calls it) scholarship, but understand that a LOT of kids lose that scholarship after the first year, that a process for getting grades up and the scholarship back may or may not exist. If it does exist, it’s likely to be very onerous.

    • Anon

      Yes. I live in a state with a similar public option, minus the tuition scholarship, although my husband and I are state university employees who get 50% off tuition (but not room and board). We saved enough for four years of in-state public university when our kid was very little. That is the default option. In the unlikely event our kid can get into Ivies or similarly prestigious private universities, we would likely receive significant need-based aid (our HHI is <$200k) and could cash flow the rest of the difference. We’re not interested in paying more for a private university that’s worse academically than State U and won’t allow our child to take massive loans for undergrad, but if our kid gets a merit scholarship they can use our saved money and potentially some smaller loans to go to a private college that’s lower ranked than State U.

      We will of course communicate all this to our child before they apply to college.

    • Anon

      Yes, though be careful about the terms of those scholarships that require students to maintain a 3.0. I’m a STEM prof at a large state university, and it’s not at all uncommon for even pretty good students to have a hard time doing that in their first few semesters when they have to take all the math and science prereq classes and they’re still adjusting to college more broadly. I’m not in a state where those types of scholarships are common, but I’ve heard that in some states, lots of students lose them after the first year and there’s no way to get them back, even if their GPA improves later.

      • Anon

        Not the OP, but based on Thai, I’m guessing Texas, Florida, or Georgia:

        https://www.usnews.com/best-colleges/rankings/national-universities/top-public

        Just my own bias: I would save more if this were Florida (and not because of Ron DeSantis, whom I don’t hate). Just my observation that kids from UGA, Georgia Tech, and UT-Austin come from all over the country and after graduation, go all over the country. I don’t quite see the same thing with UF kids: it’s the best of the Florida kids, with some out of staters, and they stay in Florida.

        • Anon

          I would agree with you about UT Austin and Georgia Tech but I think UGA is just as regional as the big Florida schools.

      • Anon

        Pretty sure it’s Florida. All the info she shared tracks with Florida’s Bright Futures program and they have one top 10 school (UF) and one top 20 (FSU). But she left out the crucial detail that DeSantis is trying to destroy public higher ed and faculty who have options are fleeing the state in droves.

      • Anon

        Georgia. Getting into UGA or GA Tech is very difficult, but many of the regional schools provide a solid education and feed students to competitive graduate programs every year.

    • Anon

      This is Florida, right? I wouldn’t count on the public universities being robust in 10-15 years. My spouse is an academic at another selective public university and almost all the domestic job applications they got this year were from faculty at UF and FSU. Basically every professor in that state wants out. (And we live in a red state!)

      It’s really sad because UF especially is an amazing and affordable school currently, but I just don’t think you can count on this in the future.

        • Anon

          Oh ok – that is much better! You probably know but FYI that Georgia Tech is incredibly hard to get into. I know multiple kids who got into Ivies and didn’t get in there.

          • Anon

            Definitely familiar with this. Kiddo’s dad is an alum and we have lots of friends with students there now. It’s slightly easier for in-state kids, but still very difficult. Tech also doesn’t consider legacy status for freshman admissions (which is a good thing in my book).

          • Anon

            Do any public schools consider legacy status? I thought that was exclusively a private college thing. And even there it is becoming much less common (which I agree is a good thing).

          • Anon

            UVa does not anymore. Virginia just banned legacy consideration at public institutions.

          • OP

            And a lot of schools who (loudly) don’t consider it for freshman admits do for transfers.

          • Anon

            Why consider it for transfers?

            TBH, some place like UGA likely has so many legacies that it’s not really special (the way athletes or advancement-special-cases are); maybe somewhere like Hamilton or Wellesley it matters b/c schools care about full-tuition payers, likely-to-attend-if-admitted #s, etc., but I have no sense of the real numbers. Not sure if being a legacy at Bama is going to help my future kids, but unless I’m paying high OOS tuition, probably not.

    • anon

      It depends. How much do you have? How old is kid and what are the chances they’ll get into a tippy top college? What are the chances they’ll need to go out of state for their preferred course of study?

      If only saving for public university means that you have a house in a nice neighborhood and decent schools and get to go on some nice, but not absurdly luxurious, vacations and adequately save for retirement, I think it makes sense to save for a public education.

      If you’re so well-off that you wouldn’t qualify for much financial aid at an extremely generous university like Princeton and kid is likely to be admitted to a school like Princeton, then that’s a different story. I’d be pretty unhappy if I was admitted to Princeton and couldn’t go because my parents valued a 5,000 square foot house and a country club membership more than my education.

      • Anon

        I think that’s a pretty obnoxious level of entitlement to one’s parent’s money. So a parent saving for State U is not good enough for you? How about their retirement? Should parents save for their own retirement? Are parents allowed to have nice things or go on vacations? Let me know.

        I love my kids to death and am just finishing paying for their college, but an attitude like that from them would piss me right off.

        • Anon

          The anon above covered that. She was saying, I think, that if parents are loaded and the kid is super, super smart, they should get their financial house in order and figure out how to pay for a school like Princeton.

    • Anon

      depends on the state and my financial resources. i live in TX, i don’t know if i want my daughter to go to college here (at least not right now). if I lived in Michigan, idk if I’d want my kid to go to college there (at least not right now, we’re jewish). i have no idea what my kid might want to study, but my kid is 6. also as discussed recently on this board, some schools have more support services. i also come at this from a privileged position of DH and I being able to save for college for kiddo and we have grandparents contributing to 529s as well, without us currently making huge sacrifices. if we had a different situation, i might feel differently. DH and I also met at a private institution which we both graduated from without any loans, which also impacts how I feel about this.
      it is a very personal decision with no one right answer.

    • Anon

      It did for us. We gave each kid a budget per year (increased slightly from Kid 1 to Kid 3) based on the cost to attend one of our good in-state schools and live on campus, assuming kid qualified for one of two tiers of state subsidy (Hope or Zell; we’re in Georgia). Only our oldest went in-state, but the other two stayed within their budget with academic or athletic scholarships and went exactly where they wanted to go. I don’t know how it is in Florida, but Georgia colleges seem to jack up the cost of on-campus room and board (and fees; OMG, the non-tuition fees!) versus what our younger 2 paid at private schools outside of Georgia. This really diminished the value of free tuition when we compared the true out-the-door price.

      • Anon

        Great point on tuition versus fees. For years, UMass charged something like $857 a semester in tuition – and $10k in fees.

    • anon

      How old is the kid? I am nervously awaiting the quality and reputational decline of our once-well regarded state university, as it is forced to respond to recent culture-war legislative mandates.

      We already feel the impact of budget cuts, and if academic freedoms continue to erode, our in-state employee discount rate may be less compelling for our youngest kid.

    • LawDawg

      What if you and your kid decide that they would be a better fit at a SLAC? Or any school with smaller class sizes? What if they are clear on an intended major where another school would be a much better fit? Or what if your kid wants to experience something different? I live in the midwest and my kids went to a SLAC in the PNW and an urban university in the south. They both had experiences that they couldn’t get from the state school. I believe that college is about an experience as well as an education and I wanted to save so that my child had access to all of that. Of course, this is dependent on your ability to save and how much it would affect other priorities (retirement, mortgage payments, vacations, etc.). If you don’t value those other experiences, then maybe it’s fine to make the kid pay for them. My feelings were different and I saved accordingly.

      • Anon

        Just a different perspective. My parents saved $250k+ to send me to a very fancy private college and I think they were nuts. Not least of all, because they have modest incomes and would have gotten need-based aid if they didn’t have a quarter of a million dollars of cash sitting in the bank at the time I applied. That’s the perverse math of college financial aid, the responsible people who save money get nothing. It didn’t impact their ability to save for retirement, very fortunately. But I think they deprived themselves of things unnecessarily and I could have got a better education at a public university or a slightly less elite but still very good private school (for reference, I had big merit scholarships at places like Wash U and Johns Hopkins, so I by no means would have been stuck at a terrible school if they’d refused to pay for my dream school).

        DH and I aren’t going to say to our kids “it’s State U or nothing” but we’re going to weigh costs and benefits carefully, ask them to consider where we would be eligible for need-based aid and where they might be able to get some merit aid, and we won’t automatically pay for any private college just because we can afford it.

        • Anon

          We said “It’s State U or loans for the difference” to our kids. It has worked out well. My daughter tells me her friends’ parents just said “you can go anywhere” without discussing the finances, and most of those kids now have significant loan burdens. It’s always worth it to have money conversations with your kids.

      • Anon

        Valdosta State, Georgia Southwestern and other regional state schools do a solid job in this category. For most of us “the experience of college” as you’re defining it is out of reach, but there are plenty of options that are still good. When the options are “the experience of college” or “the experience of adulthood, employed, without crushing debt”, I’ll take the latter.

        • OP

          This is where I fall as well. I also have degrees from a SLAC, a highly selective private research university, and my state flagship. Guess which has opened the most doors for me?

          • LawDawg

            Do you think you would have gotten the same thing out of the state school if you hadn’t had the SLAC experience? Do you remember why you thought the SLAC was the right choice for you at the time? Your original question was about how much to save, but your responses are about what you want to tell your kid to do. If you want your kid to go to a state school and want to strongly encourage that, that’s fine. But say that.

          • Anon

            I’m with you, OP. I did not attend the college that was most perfectly tailored to my preferences and personality (went to WashU due to scholarship, would have been a better fit at a New England SLAC), and you know what? It was fine and I graduated debt-free, which let me do things I never could have if I’d had to immediately start servicing massive debt. For most kids, pretty much any decent undergrad will be fine.

    • Anonymous

      No. I’d really like for my kid to get to decide about college without needing to factor in price.

      • Anon

        See I feel the exact oppos i t e. I think more kids need to think about the value of money and what they’ll be getting for the tuition costs. We have plenty of money and could send our kids anywhere but I don’t want them to take it for granted that they get to choose anywhere they want without factoring in value. Most high school students choose colleges based on really dumb stuff anyway, like thinking the campus is pretty or meeting a cute girl on a tour. No judgment – I was a dumb teenager once too. But adults should have some say in this decision because 17 year olds don’t know what’s good for them.

        • Anon

          I want my kids to think about price, but only b/c we don’t have unlimited funds, so $ you spend on undergrad isn’t available for a house downpayment or graduate school or a wedding or a car. Blow it all on a journalism degree and then realize you liked the idea of nursing and doing a BA->BSN and then a nurse anesthesia program (which a friend’s kid did) adds up even if it’s all at State U.

        • Anonymous

          That’s great? I’m not trying to talk anyone into my preference it is just what I feel is important for my kid and what I would like to do if I can.

    • Seventh Sister

      To be honest, I wouldn’t bank on the tuition staying that low. Back in the dawn of time when dinosaurs ruled the Earth, CA had super low in-state college costs. That changed dramatically in the 1980s, and now CA in-state tuition is just like all the other states, more or less. You might move, the university system might be profoundly underfunded and unable to keep giving out those kinds of breaks, you might have a kid who has an excellent reason to go somewhere else.

      • OP

        Good point! I will say that keeping UGA affordable for Georgians is one the few bipartisan sacred cows in the state, you never know though.

        • Seventh Sister

          What happens in a lot of places is that they jack up the fees or other costs if they can’t raise the tuition.

          Related: I had a couple of interns who had gone to UGA on the Hope scholarship and they were lovely. Smart, thoughtful, very ambitious, not full of themselves.

  9. Anon

    Partner and I want to start a vacation jar that we each put cash into. (We make considerably less than those on this board, so earning interest at a bank isn’t a factor.) Any suggestions for a cute vessel to put the cash into to make this more fun?

    • Anecdata

      Do you have a vacation destination/type (Beach lounging, a cruise, NYC) that you’re saving for? something related to the trip itself could be fun, so every time you put money in, you’re reminded what it’s for

      (free version is: print out pictures of destination and tape then over a jar)

      • smurf

        ooh def this! also, I’d consider if seeing the cash is more motivating to you (get something clear) or would be tempting to spend elsewhere (get something opaque!)

    • Anon

      I think you’re making a mistake by not opening a high yield savings account. With interest rates at 4-5%, interest is still a big factor even if you’re not putting a lot of money into it. Also physical cash is so easy to lose or have stolen.

      • Anon

        +1. Get a jar for loose change if you want, but the bulk of the savings should take advantage of the highest interest rates we’ve seen in well over a decade.

      • Anon

        Get an online HYSA. You can get 4% or more easily without needing a minimum balance.

        I make 60k a year and have my emergency fund and all of my sinking funds in my Ally accounts.

      • Anon

        This. Every bit of interest helps. If you only earn $100 in interest, treat yourself to drinks at the airport.

    • Anon

      No suggestions but the Up “paradise fall” jar came to mind and I sincerely hope you guys get to go on your vacation.

  10. Anonymous

    Piggybacking on the NPR thread from this morning, I am also seeing the latest on turmoil at NYT over problematic and biased editorial “standards.” And reflecting back on some of the other problematic recent “reporting” from NYT. How are you filtering through the reporting these days? Are you augmenting with other sources? Looking to foreign sources? Trusting your instincts to know when you are being manipulated?

    • Anon

      I do augment with other sources. For me, some of the things I’ve come to realize on my own have evolved over 10 or more years. It hasn’t been a quick process to realize ways in which I was being manipulated. I’ve also had to let go of knee-jerk reactions like “that’s a conservative paper.” Some of the best, most hard-hitting journalism I’ve seen in recent years has come from moderate or conservative sources. Finally, I go to the source myself. When people tell me “so-and-so is a horrific bigot,” I go and look at what so-and-so has published instead of taking critics’ word for it. The difference between what was actually said and what critics say someone said can be night and day. This has made me increasingly skeptical of publications that do not interview both sides or offer a right of reply.

      • anon

        my kid is a junior in high school (i’m not the person who was posting about supports at liberal arts schools yesterday) and he got a flyer from High Point which included an article and dang if i didn’t agree with every word of it and i consider myself to be way left of center new yorker.

    • Anon

      it is almost impossible to keep any bias out of reporting. even simply choosing a headline involves some degree of opinion and in this day and age it is often about what will generate the most clicks. i recall an assignment from late elementary school/early middle school where my teacher instructed us to read 3 news sources and watch one on TV about the same event to see which ‘facts’ were the same across all sources, which were different, etc.
      that has stuck with me all these years later so i try to read multiple sources. also – with certain types of issues like pertaining to certain foreign policy, etc. i presume (and hope) that not all info is available to the public

    • Anon

      Most reporting has to have some sort of angle, otherwise it’s not a news story (with exception of breaking news of major events, which should be factual). I try to read a few sources, but mostly liberal ones, and I trust my own critical reading and critical thinking skills to question things that seem questionable. I am also pretty good with understanding statistics and basic math, so I’m not easily mislead by numbers. I’m very liberal and read NYT, The New Yorker, The Atlantic, and listen to WNYC regularly, and read occasional articles from other places. I also follow local news and crime reporting in the gothamist, NY Post. NY Daily news locks me out after one article a month, so I rarely bother with them.

    • Anon

      I don’t know, but I think anyone who did not realize until this week that NPR has an incredibly strong liberal bias may need to do a deeper dive into her instincts. It’s like when you grow up next to a pig farm, you do not smell the pigs until you spend enough time away to cleanse your olfactory receptors. NPR has, for my entire adult life, had a bias. I, a conservative, listened anyway, sorting the wheat from the chaff (or news from opinion) until they went off the deep end after 2016. It was like everyone lost their mind at the same time. I don’t like Trump, either, but the vileness of the reporting on him was insane. If the NPR revelations are, well, revelatory, maybe spend some time away from the pig farm.

        • Anon

          She doesn’t, actually. She makes perfect sense to me. It doesn’t make us bad progressives to admit that the reporting on Trump from
          NPR reached hysterical levels.

        • Anon

          The reporting on Trump did stand out. I remember a lot of unfair out of context quotations. It was especially egregious because you don’t have to write anything unfair to make Trump look bad. He does that on his own! On an average of every forty seconds! But I think they couldn’t resist the clickbait.

  11. Anonpls

    I’m heading solo to Chicago in a couple of weeks for a short two-night stay so will only be in town for a full day. Any recommendations on places or areas to stay? I’ve seen the main sites since it’s not my first time there, but probably want to spend some time at the Art Institute. I’m mostly interested in the food scene and walking around. Would appreciate any restaurant recs too!

    • Anon

      I used to tag on a night or two to my Chicago business trips, just for fun. I’d stay somewhere on the Miracle Mile.

    • Monte

      Do you have to do anything else while you are there? If you have other work to accomplish, Magnificent Mile might make sense. If not and you just want to walk around, I would do the Robey in Wicker Park — easy access to real neighborhoods (since Mag Mile is tourist-focused), shopping and food, and a quick Uber to the Art Institute. Maybe Hotel Lincoln if being by the lake is of interest.

  12. Rocky Mountain Mama

    Hi Team,
    I have seven navy sweaters. They all fit in the same niche aka a cheap sweater I bought 15 years ago before I had three kids. I’d like to replace all of them with the (or two) perfect navy sweater. I’d like to spend less than $500. And, to complicate matters, I’m allergic to wool. Any recommendations?

      • Rocky Mountain Mama

        Maybe one crew and one v neck? I’m curvy and wear a small or medium depending on the fit.

        • Anon

          Land’s End has really nice cotton sweaters. LL Bean does too, but those may be thicker. Depends on what you’re looking for.

    • Anon

      YMMV but in my experience sweaters aren’t something where you can spend a lot and invest in a couple pieces that will wear like iron – bags, coats, shoes, denim, suiting, yes. But sweaters – even the pricey ones – all pill and lose their shape pretty quickly so IMO this is one category of fashion where it’s better to just buy cheap ones and replace them often.

    • Anonymous

      I’ll add Peruvian Connection to the list.
      Some of what they have is “a look,” but they do have some plain knits and I have found their cotton items to be of excellent quality.

Back to Top

About

Work with Corporette®

Serious Stuff

work fashion blog press mentions