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Wednesday’s Workwear Report: ICONS Maxine Cotton Poplin Button-Up Shirt

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A woman wearing a white button-front blouse untucked, with blue jeans

Our daily workwear reports suggest one piece of work-appropriate attire in a range of prices.

Spring is (hopefully) just around the corner, so I’m pining for a perfectly crisp white shirt to add to my collection. This one from Rag & Bone is 100% cotton and slightly oversized, but in a chic way. Everything about it is screaming “off-duty '90s supermodel” to me.

Wear it to the office with a midi skirt for a spring-y, Carolyn Bessette Kennedy-inspired look.

The shirt is $228 at Nordstrom and comes in sizes XXS-XL. 

Sales of note for 4/10:

291 Comments

    1. I have a pair from a few years ago and I like them. They have a fair amount of stretch but do not end up baggy after an hour like some other brands I own.

    2. I just returned 3 pr of the low rise (I am a petite). They did zero for my butt.
      psa pay the $3.98 for the free return shipping

    3. I have two pair of the Chester slim straight jeans in different washes (grey and light indigo). I really like them. The style suits me, they are holding up well after almost a year, and I like the 99% cotton/1% spandex fabric. Agree with the other poster that they do not get too baggy after wearing. The light indigo is a good color for spring/summer.

  2. I was all into the long hair aesthetic of Love Story (before we all started twirling our hair like we had a pageant every day). I have a haircut coming up and was looking for just a small trim when I saw a picture of me with long hair during COVID. Interfriends: remind me gently pls that it is OK to have corporate-style shorter hair. Not all of us grown long, glorious manes of hair. Sometimes it is just sad and long and I shouldn’t let the interwebs and TV tell me otherwise.

    2. I’ve had an Anna Wintour type bob 80% of the time since college. Grew it out for my wedding because I wanted an updo, chopped it back at my next cut. Grew it out in my mid-30s just to see, and that lasted 6 months before the chop. Do what works for you.

      1. I requested a chin-length bob and it wound up jawbone-hinge length and made me look like I had chipmunk cheeks. I was going for edgy and that length made me look like I had a toddler shape (but with a job and some serious RBF).

    3. No matter what haircut you get now, it will grow. If you know you like a long hair aesthetic, you can also ask for a shorter cut that will grow out nicely.

    4. After many years of long hair, I got mine cut to collarbone length about a year ago and it’s been awesome. Easier to dry and style and I think it frames my face better too.

    5. I’ve always had long and thick hair and saw an appalling picture from the back where it looked thin and stringy. It isn’t! But it isn’t showing up the way I thought it was. Still haven’t made the move to cut it, but it’s been on my mind.

    6. when tempted by hairstyles I see on TV, etc, I find it helpful to remember almost all of those women are wearing fake hair (instead of or in addition to their real hair — extensions, etc).

      1. CBK’s hair was real and a treasure to behold on the NYPost. But some people are genetically gifted. My genetic gift is to be good at high school level math, so I have to learn to be realistic about what gifts I have vs what is just wishful thinking. Loving the strict 90s minimalism that was a correction after Bob Mackey’s 1980s exuberance (and the market crash).

        1. she did have great hair but didn’t she spend like $450 a month just on color, in the 90s? so great but also not natural hair.

          2. Even if that was true, it was color. Color has never been my challenge. It’s baby fine hair that fuzzes in humidity and is also oily. It is shiny and pretty but has no movement and a cowlick. It’s not hair commercial hair. She had (through genes and science) hair commercial hair. The heart wants what the heart wants.

          3. The color wasn’t natural, but the length/thickness/texture was. She had straight-ish hair naturally, but it would also hold a wave. I seem to recall from an interview with a friend that CBK would braid or twist her wet hair up and then let it air dry for a more wavy texture. This was also in the 90s before styling creams/oils/texturizing spray were really a thing so that was very much not an ‘I spent an hour with hot tools and potions’ hairdo.

          4. I read she was a Kiehl’s crème groom with silk user. IDK if it was true but that was a cult product back then, so believable. I have slick fine hair, so this really did not work for me, but I tried.

          5. Yes, didn’t Plum Sykes have an article about 11-day blondes? And a custom Burberry trench with pink lining. No idea of the location of my keys but can recall Vogue articles I read as a suburban teenager.

          6. Plum Sykes wrote an entire book about “bergdorff blondes.” I thought I was 14
            days but yes it was a thing.

            More people have hair extensions than you’d think. I go
            to a salon where they specialize in extensions. While lots of people have two feet curtains of hair, plenty have a subtle row or two in hair well above their bra line just to give it the volume at the bottom it needs to not look stringy. Yes, the amount of maintenance I require to look reasonably well groomed at this age is ridiculous, but extensions are mostly worth the hassle and expense.

        2. ….who is CBK? Google says “Common Body of Knowledge” or “Central Bank of Kenya.”

    7. Word. I have shorter hair and am not likely to change it. Long hair can be beautiful, of course, but any time I’ve had longer hair, I haven’t really felt like myself. My short hair is dead easy, stylish, and work-appropriate.

    8. It is okay to WANT shorter hair! Don’t guilt yourself. Go be an awesome polished corporate hottie.

    9. I am a long hair fan, I think a lot of people look better with it too. The key is still maintenance- you still need to get it trimmed and probably colored unless you’re a genetic lottery winner.

      1. See, I’m the opposite. I think a lot of women hold onto long hair that’s really not doing them many favors. To each her own.

        1. Yep, every time I see someone with a fresh chop I just think it ages them. But again, you need a stylist and maintenance. Just letting it grow and doing nothing is probably what you’re thinking of.

          1. I agree with you. Short hair usually needs layers. It looks like a soccer mom cut when you hack off several inches but keep the ends too heavy.

          2. You know what really ages me? My long, thin, fine stringy hair that just hangs there. If I had thick wavy locks, I would grow it long.

        2. I am holding on to long hair and have recently decided to quit with the gazillion products and every other day blowout, grow it out from shoulder length to genuinely long, and roll with its natural texture, which is messy curls. Messy because some hairs make up lovely corkscrew curls and some of it is just wavy frizz. I am an Old, but I’m also a government lawyer in a semi-rural area where no one expects me to be a fashion plate and would likely be suspicious of me if I were. I am in my 60’s with wild woman hair and frankly I’m kind of loving it.

      2. You also have to be really on top of build up (from hard water, products) and damage (from products and styling), or it will just look bad.

          1. True. I do think a lot of people think they have bad genes when they just have actively bad product.

    10. I have wavy/curly hair and it either needs to be a lob slightly above my shoulders, or below collarbone length. Anything in between and the texture just looks messy/frizzy on me. Long layers also help when I feel like I want move movement/drape around my face.

    11. You have to go with what works for your hair texture, face shape, and body type. I will have a pixie cut forever because longer hair looks either dowdy or unnatural on me, and anything longer than a couple of inches requires a time-consuming daily blowout that instantly droops upon exposure to humidity,

      1. Yup. My hair texture means that short hair is so much easier to maintain, even with frequent cuts, and ultimately looks better.

        Also, this might be counterintuitive, but I have a cute-enough but not very memorable face. With longer hair, I disappear and look aggressively average. Shorter hair gives me more of a memorable look, if that makes sense.

          2. I’m glad somebody found it useful, ha! It’s just really true. My face isn’t very interesting so I need interesting hair.

    12. Short hair for all but one year of my life and love it that way. Do what makes YOU happy!

        1. My facial structure, hair, and body shape were just never meant to look sweet. I find the Kibbe body type analysis hugely validating. I am a “flamboyant gamine,” which explains why I can rock an edgy pixie but look awful with long hair. I actually look more feminine and attractive with “boyish” hair and clothing.

    13. I have wavy hair that is very thick and appears straight when it is long. So probably closer to this style. I still keep it around shoulder length because drying it when it’s long is such an ordeal. And it gets in the way all the time. If I could afford a weekly blowout (and didn’t care about the health of my hair), I might feel differently about long hair too.

  3. Not to harp on last night’s subject, but I’m a little amazed that some commenters think that having teenagers learn to prepare their own food is “bad time management.” No one wants to live off of cheese sticks or hummus, and it’s perfectly reasonable to think they can figure out 5 minutes to make a sandwich and cut an apple. It’s good for them, even if it is a little stressful for them initially. Eventually they’ll figure out that they need to boil some eggs ahead of time, or pack 2-3 sandwiches for the day if they won’t be home until 6.

    2. I have a bunch of friends / colleagues with older kids and honestly, it’s really informed my parenting in positive ways. One friend had her nephew plan a meal and cook it every Sunday, another was a single mom and taught her son to cook early on. Both of them have found it really nice to feed themselves good food + made friends at university because they knew what they were doing in the kitchen. Versus me, I spent my first independent years living off of bean burritos, cereal, and those TJ salmon patties.

      I’m a great cook now, but it was a rough transition and I’ve had more “apples and pb” as dinner than I’d care to admit. I’d much rather make dinner by myself with a podcast in my ear, but their example has really encouraged me to bring my son into the cooking process. He’s 8, and he has a few recipes under his belt, uses a knife safely, and is keen to learn. I’d much rather him poach me an egg than his dad (overcooks them, every single time!)

      1. My teen is a very competent cook and an excellent baker. Sometimes she’ll whip herself up some eggs or fried rice for a quick lunch. Other times she is too hangry or doesn’t have the bandwidth or the time and inclination to clean up afterwards, so she eats a bagged salad. We need to cut the kids a little bit of slack here. They are busy and stressed just like we are.

        The “ingredients household” thing is just another judgmental fad like gentle parenting and attachment parenting that makes moms responsible for their children’s outcomes. In an “ingredients household,” mom is the one who has to teach the kid to cook, monitor the pantry and fridge contents and have ingredients for any possible meal on hand at all times, suggest meals for the kid to cook, and then ensure that kid has cleaned up afterwards.

        1. An ingredient household is a choice, not a fad. Parents are responsible, to some degree for their kids and who they become. I don’t think society actually pins this solely on moms, not even in popular culture.

        2. Lmao no it’s not a fad, it’s just how us poors do it so the food budget isn’t sky high. Some of y’all forgot or never learned how to cook on a seriously tight budget and it shows. Same with eating what’s in season. It’s cheaper. You do you, but as long as I’m feeding my household and assorted extras who come by because there’s no food in their houses, we’re an ingredients house.

          1. Yeah my grandma grew up dirt poor and my mom grew up simply poor. Both grew up in “ingredients houses” because a big portion of what they ate growing up was food that they grew and canned themselves, or farm animals that the menfolk processed. People have been eating like that a lot longer than Doritos and frozen pizza have been around.

          2. I’m not talking about poor people who can only afford ingredients. I’m talking about bougie moms who use the term “ingredients household.”

            Nowadays, though, it’s cheaper to buy processed food than ingredients.

          3. I don’t think processed foods have beat rice and beans and onions yet. Or you’re shopping at the wrong stores if they have.

          4. Prepared foods only cost less if you’re comparing to fancy ingredients or out of season produce. You would not guess how little your meal cost me to buy and prepare (in dollars or time) if you had dinner at my house. It’s a skill I’ve developed just like any other skill one might need. It’s not magic… I may not be wealthy but I’m for damn sure not going to be miserable when I sit down to dinner.

    3. That post from the other day floored me. When I was a teenager I don’t think my mom once ever made me lunch or nagged me to eat lunch. I just ate if I was hungry! I figured it out!

      1. Same, I think I was in 5th or 6th grade when I was in the kitchen fixing myself sandwiches for lunch on the weekends. Everyone made their own lunch. Mom asked what kind of sandwich fixings I wanted each week when making the grocery list. The concept of an adult “making lunch” for the family is odd to me!

        1. And growing up, my family ate every meal together except for breakfast, which was a fend for yourself situation. All families are different.

          1. We ate lunch together as a family, it was just fend for yourself in the kitchen for fixing your own plate.

      2. Yeah unless it was a proper family Sunday lunch, I can’t remember my mom ever having made me lunch on the weekend time after maybe 6th grade. She is extremely supportive and did my laundry all through high school (single mom, only child, she said it would be a waste of water for us to do separate loads) but would have laughed in my face if I asked her to help me with the water not boiling.

      3. I have a teen who does not get hungry – but he sure as heck gets hangry. I don’t make his lunch, but I absolutely “nag him to eat”. I call it parenting the kid that I have -teaching him that he needs to eat at regular intervals in the interest of his family/roommates/partner not killing him is part of raising this particular kid.

        1. Totally fair. Kids need to understand/be told the reason behind their feelings so that they can make their own connections between cause and effect, and sometimes it has everything to do with food and hydration.

        2. I greet my son’s best friend at the door with a spoonful of peanut butter and a glass of oat milk. A huge chunk of her behaviours seem related to being hungry (food has become a battle at home, which is none of my beeswax, but I can make sure she’s fed at my house).

        3. +1. My kid and I both have ADHD and have blunted hunger/thirst/bodily cues. I’ve taught him (and me) to eat on a schedule because otherwise it’s 3pm and I’ve only had coffee, or it’s 6pm and I eat my entire day’s calories and then can’t sleep well.

        4. I have this kid as well. She’s six and I was literally feeding her orange slices one at a time in between her yelling/sobbing at me about the boundary I was holding. The hanger was partially my fault – she’d brought a snack to our activity but I carried it in my purse and we both forgot to have her eat it. Five minutes later she was a rational person again. We are already starting the conversation, in an age appropriate way, about how she gets extra grumpy when she’s hungry and needs to stay ahead of it.

      4. Exactly. And I became a vegetarian when I was 13, so after that I ended up making a decent number of my own dinners too, especially as schedules got more complicated in high school and I wasn’t always around when my family ate. It’s not that hard!

      5. OK, some of us sit down as a family to eat lunch on weekends. It’s not that deep.

        2. Which is fine as long as you’re not wishing your kids move out because you’re so stressed about planning a weekend lunch.

        3. It’s totally fine if that’s what works for your family – but it’s also a totally reasonable thing to let go if it’s not working, and for the OP it sounds like weekend lunches (and kids’ inability to fend for themselves if weekend lunch wasn’t served) was a source of stress. Maybe she prefers to spend time with her kids hiking or thriftshopping or going to a movie + ice cream and taking lunch off her mental load frees up the space for that *and* her having some personal time too. It’s ok for a mom to need some personal time for herself, or arrange things in the household the way she prefers some of the time too.

      6. My mom gave me $40 per week for lunch/allowance in the 1990s. I could either buy lunch at school or make my own lunch, and keep the balance. Decided on PB&J and got the purse I wanted.

        1. My mom did that too and I have never understood it. Packing lunch is not free–in fact, it’s more expensive than buying school lunch.

          2. Huh? I went to school in two different areas and have kids in a third area. In all three areas packing is way cheaper than buying

          3. You can let a teen decide whether to pack or buy lunch without making her pay for the purchased lunch. Making her pay for the purchased lunch but not the packed lunch is a way to incentivize packing lunch, on the assumption that the purchased lunch is less healthy.

          4. My high school lunch was $1.25, and high school lunch for my kid is $3.50. It costs $6-7 to pack a decent lunch.

        2. Are you me? This is how I funded my life in high school. I may have eaten PB&J for 4 straight years!

    4. I was also surprised by the lack of nuance between snacks and “snack food”. Nothing wrong with keeping fruit, nuts, cheese sticks, carrots and hummus etc on hand*.

      I think all teens should learn how to cook, but I also think keeping snacks on hand is fine. I could see “meals only” leading to overeating. Plus, learning how to manage food intake (hunger cues, overall balanced diet over the course of a day, fueling for activity, when to choose a snack vs. something more filling) is honestly a good life skill.

      I’m an active adult (and former college athlete). I workout 6x a week and work with an RD and snacks are always part of my diet.

      *I also think having less healthful options on hand and learning how to balance them in with an otherwise healthy diet is also an important life skill, but probably not appropriate at this time fot that poster’s child.

      **also as a former athlete, while weight is most closely correlated to diet not exercise, I think everyone benefits from more movement! And that team sports are great for kids.

      1. I would bet so, so much that there are less healthful options that you never ever purchase or eat. Sometimes the life skill is just not regarding everything a store chooses to sell as really worth eating.

        1. I’m very anti snack food, and snacking in general, but sometimes you need something to keep you going. I use peanut butter or protein shakes for this.

          1. Of course. I get pre-packaged snacks of different kinds too.

            But I honestly don’t go out of my way to buy less healthful options to keep on hand to achieve some kind of balance in my diet. For me, never eating certain kinds of foods has made them less palatable to me, which is fine.

            I think people frequently preach moderation in everything while imagining an already very curated diet.

          2. The point is to not eat the “unhealthy” snack daily or in extreme amounts.

            If I’m really hungry, I will grab the Snickers from the checkout lane because it’s shouting “BUY ME AND EAT ME NOW” and devour that while still in the store’s parking lot. But not every day, and not multiple times and in lieu of dinner.

          3. So the store’s checkout lane decided for you what you were going to sate your hunger with that day. I agree that is not a big deal unless it’s happening all the time (though if you go long enough, you may eventually find that they’re just too unappealing to choke down).

            But if the Snickers are in a Costco sized pack in your own kitchen pantry, you’re the one who decided to make it so conveniently available in your own home. That’s a situation a lot of us try to avoid creating for ourselves, since a candy bar is designed to have more immediate appeal than any of the other foods we might eat from the pantry, and it’s just a waste of willpower to spend it on this at 10pm on a Thursday.

    5. I’ll bite as I missed the conversation yesterday. I watched my teen and college-aged niece and nephews wear out my SIL with domestic helplessness and decided to start early. We have been involving our kiddo with meal preparation since he was 2. Four years into it now. DH and I still lead and guide in the process of cooking meals and prepping kiddo’s lunch for school, but we’re pretty confident that he’ll be able to do everything himself as soon as he’s strong enough to handle the cast iron pans. I feel for all the moms who bear the bulk of domestic load. No advice to teen/tween parents, but for the parents of littles, it’s okay to take the time to train them young.

    6. Everyone does need to learn some basics, but there are always going to be people (myself included) who are willing to compromise on eating something delicious and homemade in the name of not cooking. I’m 37 and know how to cook and would choose to do almost anything else with my time. I learned the basics in my preteen years and was very independent. It’s just how I’m wired. Give me a pack of cheese and some crackers to eat on the side of a mountain any day of the week.

      1. This is my 16-year-old DS. He would live on snacks if we let him. Unfortunately, he is on the small side for his age and low weight has been an issue in the past, so that is not a solid plan. He is CAPABLE of cooking basic things, but whether he does it when we’re not around is a whole different story! It honestly worries me.

        1. So get him healthier convenience foods or require him to meal prep ahead of time. My similarly lazy low-appetite teen has figured out what options will get her to actually eat meals.

        2. Do things like a cold Costco rotisserie count as snacks, or is it less about prep time and more about only wanting to eat starches? (We’ve encountered issues with both before for different reasons; sometimes only certain types of snack foods appeal.)

          1. It’s only wanting to eat starches. We have many options available, such as lunch meats, the aforementioned chicken, cheese sticks, yogurt, fruit galore, etc. He craves pure carbs at all times. He will choose the same thing to eat for breakfast for 4 weeks, then is so thoroughly sick of it that he’ll never touch it again. I admittedly am really sensitive about kids and food topics because it’s been a very difficult thing in our house, despite lots of trying, monitoring with a dietician, etc.

          3. I think that is a common thing (the nothing but starches + eat the same thing for weeks and then get completely sick of it).

            There are some medical approaches beyond what dietitians offer (medically advised supplementation can be crucial so that a vicious cycle of deficiency doesn’t develop, but some providers are more supportive while others seem to think malnourishment will motivate healthier eating; I’m strongly against the latter idea since deficiency can badly exacerbate food aversions).

            Personally I did not know I had perpetual low level nausea until the first time I was given Zofran… I just thought that was just how it felt to be alive! But all of a sudden I wasn’t a picky eater anymore. It bothers me when healthcare acts as though eating patterns are behavioral and drop the ball on sensory issues, GI issues, that are treatable.

      2. That’s fine! Can you feed yourself in a way that makes you reasonably satisfied? Great. Not all meals need to be gourmet or even homemade.

        We were talking about a mom whose kids couldn’t locate the food in the fridge without contacting her. Absent severe disabilities that seems both unacceptable and a situation she created. I was surprised there was more sympathy than pushback. Especially since her internal monologue was “can’t wait until they leave” and not “holy smokes I have dropped a major ball in parenting these kids and need to course correct.”

        1. Every parent I know thinks “holy smokes I have dropped a major ball in parenting these kids and need to course correct” on a regular basis. Sympathy is an underrated response.

          2. The mom also sounded (reasonably!) exhausted. Teaching your kids skills like taking the bus, cooking, problem solving, etc important but it’s also WORK. Telling someone who’s burnt out and exhausted that they need to do more is not helpful. Take that weekend off, even if your kids burrito-taxi all their meals, sleep in, read a book by the pool & *after* that make a plan (with their dad) for the life skills stuff going forward

          3. The people criticizing that mom were telling her just to let the kids fend for themselves without teaching them anything. That is not realistic.

        2. That post wasn’t just about food. It was about driving, emotional support, etc. Parenting teens is intense and exhausting whether or not they can cook.

          1. Which is probably a great reason why one should make sure one’s teenagers can boil water and make a sandwich without texting Mom for help…to take one thing off her plate!

          2. The one yesterday was specifically about kids looking in the kitchen and not finding food that was there or being unable to boil water without calling mom. That’s not emotional support. Thats an actual problem.

    7. Now that we have chef’s kitchens and HGTV, I think “cooking” has become too much of a mental burden. It should mean being able to feed yourself quickly and easily (refried beans and cheese and hot sauce, eaten with chips), using leftovers well and freezing things so that you can make a banana bread on Sunday and cut it up and freeze slices so you can bring them with you as a snack. It’s not “get out a lemon and zest it and then do 100 steps with specialized implements and 50 ingredients.” Like how we prep-cook and use frozen items so that car camping cooking is just warming many things and cooking few things. It doesn’t have to be hard but kid cooking classes tend to be Top Chef vs what you might learn in Scouts.

      1. Yes, this! I like both kinds of cooking, but when you’re hungry it’s absolutely possible to get a reasonably healthy and tasty meal prepared within minutes if you have a well stocked pantry, fridge and freezer.

      2. This is all true, and even I tend to get in my own way sometimes with making things more complicated than they really need to be.

      3. The tortilla may taste better if it is fried up in butter, but it’s not required in a hurry. Just pair it with something and have at it. A grilled cheese if you are short on time can be a cheese sandwich. You can make your own lunchable or fancy cheese board. Just don’t starve. An easy meal or snack can still be quite healthy and from my teens / 20s, involve no prep or cleanup beyond a fork and plate/bowl. One year I lived with just a microwave and had to do dishes in my sink. Even now, with a dishwasher and stove, I really try not to make a mess or use excess dishes (unlike my BF, who will cook and use every dish and the kitchen is a mess).

        1. This is why I love my toaster oven. It’s great for heating tortillas and bread to make burritos and hot sandwiches without getting pans dirty, just a plate and maybe a bowl to heat up fillings in the microwave.

      4. This. In the 90s when takeout/fast food wasn’t really a thing (we maybe did pizza or chinese once a week) my mom had to get dinner on the table very quickly after work. Most nights were boiled frozen veggies, defrosted meat that was then broiled, and rice/bread/potatoes. I would have loved more flavor and less soggy vegetables but overall the easy starch/some sort of quick veggie/protein formula is what I do for 90% of our weeknight meals.

        1. This kind of “cooking” is why I was underweight until I got to college and had access to food with flavor.

          1. +1 – I deeply identify with the beginning of ‘somebody feed Phil’ when he talks about experiencing food with flavor for the first time. I started taking over the cooking when I was around 14 or so since I was desperate to eat something I actually liked for dinner!

          2. OMG me too. I was regarded as a picky eater and went off to college underweight. Turns out I just don’t like bland, mushy food.

      5. Exactly. Cheese, crackers, and an apple is a perfectly respectable meal in my book. So is a sandwich, an easy salad (greens + half a can of chickpeas or tuna + chopped carrot and apple), pasta with sauce + chickpeas + sauteed veggies, a frozen pizza in a pinch, etc. Can I make more complex meals? Of course. Am I making them on Wednesday night? LMAO no.

        1. +1 that’s why I was the commenter saying that i figured out my easy simple roster in the first few months of cooking for other while working full time. I’m fully behind “life is drudgery” style complaining but how much effort really going into meal everyday planning unless you’re making new fancy stuff?

          1. It’s unrelenting (to steal a word from the thread below) and yeah sure sometimes I don’t feel like doing it, but to me, it’s just not that hard. I guess some of that is down to my natural inclination to be a Food Person, and it’s for sure helped by the fact that neither me nor my husband are picky eaters and we don’t have kids…but I also do it on easy mode 95% of the time.

            Get home from work, throw sweet potatoes in the oven, toss a couple of chicken sausages on the baking sheet 20 minutes before the potatoes are done, make a two- or three-ingredient salad that takes 2 minutes of chopping and 90 seconds to whisk a vinaigrette…to me, that’s not hard, especially for the return of an inexpensive, tasty, and healthy dinner. Others experience that labor differently.

          2. It is so much more unrelenting when you have kids at home, especially if they don’t drive yet and/or if there are special dietary needs. My kid is off at college and now I can serve dinner half an hour later or decide that dinner is cheese and crackers if I need to.

          3. I have kids and make a meal remarkably similar to the one described above. I’m
            Also not above cheese and crackers for the kids sometimes. Judge away. At least I’m not feeling crushed by the weight of meal planning.

      6. This!

        I think teaching kids how you “household” with your food is the best preparation.

        In our house, we cook double portions of carbs (rice and pasta, usually), and use the leftovers the next day, or freeze the rice for a quick stir fry when we don’t have time.
        Keeping some vegetables of choice in the freezer or fridge, and knowing how to make a few meals with them has made grocery shopping so easy. Out of bell pepper and zucchini? Buy 1-2 lbs of each and they will be used within the week for a Thai curry, Chinese stir fry (with spice mixes from the Asian store), or in a green vegetable stir fry with some grated parmesan tossed over pasta. Add a few eggs in whatever style you like, and keep a few pounds of chicken breast in your freezer and chop and fry as needed, and you have yourself a balanced meal in less than 15 min. And if really short on time, a ramen packet spruced up with some eggs and some dried herbs is not complicated, at all!

        Now, for a college student in a dorm this may not be feasible due to limited storage and kitchen access, but for a young adult it should not be complicated?

        My 10 year old son knows how to make a bolognese-inspired quick tomato sauce with ground beef, and can make scrambled eggs and pancakes. We supervise him at the stove, but other than that, it’s not that hard.

    8. The pushback was against the idea that kids should never be able to eat anything unless they cook a full meal from scratch. No teen, and no adult with a job, has time for that. The way to eat healthy when you are busy is to have quick healthy options readily available so you don’t end up grabbing fast food or junky snacks. Of course teens need to learn to cook, but the people saying that they should be forced to cook from scratch for every meal are not being realistic. You have to reduce the friction, not increase it. Example: If I have a carton of unwashed berries in my fridge, I am just not going to have the motivation to rinse them and put them in a bowl at breakfast time. If I wash them and portion them into individual containers when I get home from the grocery store, then I will happily grab a container every morning for breakfast.

    9. another thing my teen will not listen to me: using a cutting board. he insists on holding an apple in his palm to slice it. makes me want to hide every single knife in the dang house.

    10. The “ingredients household” people really seemed to be saying that if OP didn’t have any food on hand that could be eaten without cooking, her son would lose weight because he wouldn’t bother to eat as often. It was pretty judgmental, implying “your son is overweight because you make it too easy for him to eat. Just starve him a little by making him open packages and cook.”

      1. Yeah, I agree. I don’t love how that came across, and I think OP would be better served talking to a pediatric specialist than listening to people on the internet.

        1. With emphasis on qualified specialist, I agree with that part.

          I still think most of us have experienced that it’s easy to eat certain convenient foods (e.g. chips, cookies) if they’re there, but we’re also totally fine without them / eating something else if they’re not there.

      2. Lol, no. What they are saying is that snacks don’t solve your problem–they lead to mindless and unfulfilled eating, and people (teens) with limited impulse control will overeat them.

    11. i’m not saying this is good but i really did not learn to cook as a teen, but managed to do so and figure out meal planning as an adult.

  4. Does anyone else hear a clicking or grinding in their neck aka “crepitus”? Its not painful, and no one else hears it. I’ve seen a doctor and physical therapist for it who recommend improving posture and doing specific exercises. I still hear it though, one year later. I’m 30

    1. Like if you turn your head or roll your shoulders and you hear a creak? Yes all the time. It’s never occurred to me that it’s a problem, more just that I really need a massage ha.

    2. Yeah but it’s not painful so I haven’t done anything about it. Not even sure if there is anything to do about it.

    3. I’ve had it in all the joints below my waist since I was a kid. I sound like a haunted house going up and down stairs. The more I move the less it happens.

      1. I always sounded like someone was stomping on a bag of sticks when I got up in the morning and walked across the room. This worsened into “severe, advanced arthritis” by the time I was forty. Yay.

    4. Yes, but I’ve had a discectomy in my cervical spine and now have a titanium-based implant. So, no mystery as to what I’m hearing!

    5. I hear an internal noise that sounds kind of like old TV static. It’s different from the creaky joints popping, more like the neck tissues themselves just making noise as I move. Never dawned on me that this was odd or something others might not also experience.

    6. Yes. Are you having pain? decreased range of motion of your neck?

      This is very common, with aging, and will likely be more noticeable with time. Bones slowly degenerate (due to wear and tear + genetics) and arthritic changes can add small deformities over time. The popping/scraping of joints (and there are lots of joints in the neck!) reflect these changes.

      It likely wont go away. But continue to use good posture, do daily gentle neck stretches and core strengthening for life – for good alignment that will help preserve your spine.

      And stop staring downward at your phone so much! Bad for the neck joints and it leads to earlier in life neck wrinkles.

  5. How do you determine which index funds (or ETFs? I’m new to this world…) to invest in? I have $25-50k I need to do something with. Assume that everything else is fully taken care of – retirement, debt, emergency funds, etc. I know I want to invest it in to the market but I’m crippled by options.

      1. This. there are lots of ways to think about a mix of large/mid/small cap and US vs developed vs developing markets, but the low expense ratio is the most important thing.

        Personally I’ve always done mostly US total stock market or S&P 500, and then 10-20% each in international or specifically small cap funds. I ignore them except to rebalance back to my target mix annually.

    2. My own setup goes a little beyond this, but as a beginner, you’re not going to go wrong with VTSAX and relax.

    3. +1 to VTSAX. You can also google “Bogleheads 3 fund portfolio” and look at the specific ones that are recommended with your broker.

      With Vanguard there are lower fees if you invest more money — this is the difference between the regular and “Admiral” version of the fund IIRC. So know what the minimum is and make a decision for yourself.

      I’m heavily invested in regular index funds but my understanding is that ETFs are better for tax consequences though I’m not quite sure why. You can’t invest in them automatically though so I only invest in them when I happen to think about it.

  6. I was too late to reply to comments yesterday about the hungry teen boy – what do you do if you buy the good stuff (steak and salmon bites, quality cheese, yogurt, even tinned fish) and he eats like 4 snacks in one sitting because he’s hungry? They’re pricy lol! I need like a slow feeder puzzle bowl for my teen.

      1. LOL because you’re right. My son is young, but he’s in the 95th percentile for his height, so I know that Costco sized food is in our future.

      2. +1. We had au pairs when my kids were small and we got a Costco membership and swapped to good, but not premium $$, snacks VERY quickly. In our area Aldi and Trader Joes are sometimes even better priced for nuts, dried fruits, yogurt, and cheese for whatever reason.
        We also gave the au pairs a snack budget for ‘their’ snacks (stuff my toddler/husband and I wouldn’t usually eat) and they enjoyed comparison shopping/hunting for bargains – maybe try that?

      3. where do you think i’m getting everything? having large quantities doesn’t necessarily make the problem better because he sees abundance and thinks, great, time to chow down. But it’s more convenient for me to purchase a bunch at once (and far cheaper at Costco). I have a teensy small fridge in the basement, maybe I should hide some of the refrigerated stuff there? Sigh.

        1. In a bit confused. Do you want him to eat this food, or do you want this to be family food that he’s chowing down on before anyone else gets a crack at it?

          If it’s the latter, you need a bigger basement fridge, and that’s where the “family food for later” stuff goes. You also need to figure out what he’s going to eat if it isn’t salmon and steak. Rotisserie chickens? Greek yogurt? That stuff goes upstairs.

    2. Haha, this used to be me and those 100 calorie snack packs.

      I buy my tuna direct from Wild Planet. Not sure if it’s a money saver, but I’m usually well stocked. I generally think this is the problem with snack food–it’s not emotionally filling and people just keep eating, whereas a substantial meal, or something hot, usually calms down the belly. I like the Momofuku noodles + an egg for this.

    3. I’d definitely start by buying in bulk, not snack size packs. And not everything needs to be top quality when consumed in that quantity.

      1. lol I know – my guy friends in high school had boxes of Bagel Bites for their snacks.

        1. OMG this was my brother in high school! We have 4 kids, and my mom always jokes that we’ll need a second mortgage when we have a senior, sophomore, and twin 7th graders.

          My very frugal mom found clever ways to add calories to meals without adding much cost – it meant that meals filled us up for longer, and we were more satiated by what we did eat.

          – she cooked pasta in chicken stock, and always added garbanzo beans or black beans to pasta dishes
          – She put powdered milk in just about everything
          – breakfast was usually a PB&J, or she’d add whole fat yogurt to our oatmeal
          – after school snack was whole wheat toast with PB or cheese, salami, and crackers, and usually my brother ate the same thing before bed

          Basically, she figured out how to add beans, PB, or yogurt to every single meal. He still crushed entire boxes of bagel bites after practices, but she felt like this kept him fuller between meals

    5. This is my husband. Honestly, we just prioritize groceries over other things in our budget because we value good food. I do buy him cheaper versions of some things like cheese where he doesn’t notice or care. I still get the fancy cheese for myself because I do notice.

    6. A. You stop thinking in terms of “snacks.” And start thinking about “food.” If you want him eating steak and salmon, just buy . . . steak and salmon. Not “bites.” Stop buying “quality” cheese and just buy plain cheese. Buy yogurt in the huge containers, not the little snack packs.

      B. You teach him to heat up food and turn an ingredient into food. If he wants to eat the steak and salmon, he can learn to cook it. Or if you’re feeling generous, you can cook big batches and keep it in the fridge and he can reheat it. Turning ingredients into something ready to eat is your “slow feeder puzzle bowl.”

      2. Cooking big batches of meat in a slow cooker and then having it available during the week is my main mealtime hack. I’ll usually have a big batch of barbacoa beef, or pulled pork, or salsa chicken which can then become tacos/quesadillas/topping for a salad. We’ll also grill an extra steak/piece of salmon/chicken breast or two for leftovers.

    7. If they’re a healthy weight/active and are getting enough “good foods”, I think it’s fine to fill them up with empty calories.

    8. Don’t buy the good stuff if they eat it in massive quantities. Buy the cheap yogurt and the cheap cheese. And keep the expensive meats and fish for dinner, not lunches and snacks. Lunch is a salmon patty, not salmon bites.

    9. Yeah, I don’t like Aldi or Costco quality but do get most of our snacks at Trader Joe’s. They have dried fruit, nuts, reasonably priced cheese, hummus and other dips and fresh wraps.

    12. Buy carrots, cherry tomatoes, grapes, celery, broccoli and cauliflower florets, and encourage him to eat something with fiber every now and then. No wonder he’s hungry if he’s only ever eating dairy and meat.

        1. Fiber makes some people feel fuller by slowing down digestion a bit.

          We all need some vitamin C too though.

        2. I could, but I’d you can figure out how to post here you can also figure out how to do a basic internet search for the benefits of eating plants once in a while and the drawbacks of only eating meat and dairy.

          1. I was being polite. You’re saying nonsense things and I wanted to give you a chance to say a correct thing about nutrient dense foods, like meat and dairy, helping you feel full.

  7. About six months ago, a close friend of 15 years emailed me and essentially broke up with me (friend, not romantic). There were a lot of things in the email that surprised me, that I didn’t agree with, but all in all can honestly say had no idea they felt that way about me, things I have done or said, etc. I slept on the email for a couple nights and then responded with 2-3 sentences, that I am sorry I hurt them, and that I hope we can reconnect someday. I wanted to defend myself and refute their statements, but I didn’t. I thought I would miss them every day, but my dad passed away a few months later and that tore me apart (and despite a very public funeral, no word from former friend). This morning, I got a text from them with industry gossip – stuff we would’ve texted about all the time a year ago, but haven’t now in months. They ended with “can you believe this!?”

    I’m struggling whether to reply, whether to just hit “!!,” say something like “no wow that’s crazy,” or whether to really engage and see if that leads to a coffee or something. I don’t miss friend as much as I expected, but maybe I am still bitter about the email, my dad, …. Anyway. I know folks on this board have been on both sides of friend breakups. What would you do in my shoes?

    1. I think you should feel entitled to do whatever you feel like. You can totally ignore it. you can respond as if nothing happened. you can say, “i’m really surprised that you sent me this text considering our last response.”

      that said, they may think by you saying you hoped to reconnect someday, they think that’s what they are doing.

    2. Take this with a grain of salt because i was the other person here. I had a very close friend (knew her in law school but then we had a 9 month period or so where we went out 3-5x a week and texted several times a day) who all of the sudden I just… couldn’t. I don’t remember having words with her, I think I just ghosted her. I always regretted it, recognizing that even if I couldn’t deal with her drama that she deserved better than that.

      About 5 years passed — she moved, I got married and had a baby. I don’t remember what prompted me to text her but I did and just said, “so I think we should be Facebook friends.” And we are, and I’ve always been very glad that she accepted my request. (This was about 10 years ago now.) We’ve messaged a bit privately on FB and publicly on her posts and we’ve never discussed our “breakup” but I enjoy seeing her thoughts on the world and things and seeing her very! different! life than mine, which includes circus classes (maybe stripper dance classes too?) and fire juggling and wild hair colors and lots of tattoos.

      So — my advice here is ask yourself if that kind of relationship would be OK with you. I had another friend — 2 year roommate who ghosted me after I moved out — but she’s been in my thoughts lately because she’s semi-related to a big news story. I wouldn’t accept her back in my life without major apologies on her end.

    3. I’d probably reply with, “Was this meant for me, or misdirected? Haven’t heard from you in forever and wanted to confirm before responding.”

      1. This is so passive aggressive, don’t do this. It sounds like the ex-friend is sending a low stakes message to take OP’s temperature. It’s easier for her to text something fluffy than cold call OP and say she’s ready to explore a friendship again.

        If you want to get back in touch then respond to the gossip, chat casually, and see if she tries to make plans or make an apology. If you’re done with her then don’t respond.

        2. Is it passive aggressive? it’s kind of unhinged behavior to send someone an EMAIL friend break up then try and casually text later.

    4. I would just say that your dad’s death hit you hard and you aren’t following/aren’t in the mood for industry gossip.

      Let her take it from there. Her reaction will tell you a lot. Maybe she didn’t know that he died. Maybe she felt that reaching out at that time would be hurtful. Maybe she’s not a great person and doesn’t consider your emotions.

      1. I second this approach. It’ll keep things civil or lukewarm at the very least for future encounters.

    5. I wouldn’t respond because I don’t care for the approach of pretending nothing happened. If your friend sincerely wants to reconnect, she needs to somehow address what happened, even if it’s only I’ve missed you or something similar. Sometimes we knowingly or unknowingly hurt people. There is no way this person doesn’t know her email hurt you, and I think jumping right back in will at best leave you feeling uneasy and at worse, hurt you again.

    6. If it were me (and it’s not) I would respond with a surface ‘wow! Crazy!’ Or something and not expect more from it. But I wouldn’t blame you if you ignored. I think they showed you that they’re inconsistent and you shouldn’t expect more but you don’t have to DTR or get your heart broken again.

    7. I’d either send the “!” response reaction back, or ignore it. Unless you really do want to reconnect.

    8. Block and let it go. You didn’t miss them, they chose to sit out life changing event, and then after breaking up with you, chose to send a random text to see if you’d ignore their past behavior. Walk away. Some things really do have an end, and that’s ok.

    9. I’d treat it as an icebreaker. I don’t think it necessarily means she’s acting like nothing happened; it might be a way of feeling things out to see if you’d be up to meet and make amends. I’d put as much effort into the response as she put into sending it; ie, “I hadn’t heard that, thanks for sharing.” (And yes I’d end that sentence with a period.)

      1. What about responding with the truth? Something like: I appreciate you reaching out with lighthearted news. But I’m still trying to process how our last interaction went. It was really hard for me to read your email, and I feel like we didn’t ever have a chance to talk through the issues you raised. I also am still reeling from my dad’s death last month. I would welcome the chance to talk through this issues, but I’m not ready to reconnect as if none of this ever happened.

        1. Agree — just be truthful. “I’m surprised to hear from you after your email and after not hearing from you about my dad’s passing.” And then you can add a sentence that is truthful about what you want: “I’m happy to meet to talk through what happened,” or “I’m not prepared to reconnect.” or just “I wish you well.”

  8. I don’t really have a point here, but it’s been really interesting to observe the different relationships people have with food and meal preparation over the last couple of days.

    DINK so no kids to manage, but I do almost all of the dinner planning and prep for our household. Some weeknights it’s a drag, but I mind it less than other chores like washing dishes (ugh). Food is definitely my love language, and I don’t mind cooking for a group on family vacations at all–my family was/is a sit-down Sunday lunch family, so those family meals have always been a core way that we spend time together and show that we care. Is the physical act of cooking dinner for 10 in a poorly-equipped kitchen at a cabin outside a National Park the highlight of my year, no, but watching people I love enjoy food that I prepared for them with care and attention, enjoying conversation and laughter–that nourishes my soul a lot more than sauteeing veggies and boiling pasta for two on a Tuesday.

    Not saying anything is right or wrong, better or worse. Just have been doing some thinking based on conversations here and thought I’d throw it out there in case anyone else had been doing any similar (or wildly dissimilar!) reflection.

    1. I also love cooking for others. Some people will just never be food people. It takes all sorts to make a world.

      1. It really does. I do think there’s an interesting societal case study in how many people here think their own experiences are universal, whether with food or anything else.

        I still remember my shock when my freshman roommate said she didn’t really like food and only ate because she needed to in order to survive. That day, I learned that people can have really different relationships to food than I do. And I never had to worry about her poaching my stuff from the mini fridge!

    2. I enjoy preparing a big family meal for holidays and such. Day-to-day food prep is just more … annoying? Unrelenting?

      1. Absolutely. We do “Souper Sundays” and host friends, and I’ll go all out with homemade ramen broth, dumplings, and dipping sauce, but cooking on Thursdays between activities is such a drag.

        1. This. I can (and have) made multi-course meals from scratch, hosted major holidays, cooked for 10 in a vacation house, made complicated pastries for ‘fun’. That was fun and you get the joy of good company, long conversation, compliments, etc.
          However, knowing you need to feed your family dinner ever night after work/commuting and catering to picky kid palates, working on a budget, and then needing to clean up/prep for the next day is a whole other thing entirely.

          2. I can relate to this.

            I am a decent cook and enjoy the manual labor after a long day of brain work – but planning it and executing it within the constraints of a busy day, homework, chores and bedtime routines… That’s where it’s tiring.
            For me, always having enough ingredients on hand to be able to make 1-2 dishes from the rotation list is the best “hack” to save myself extra brain work around this.

      2. Yup. I love hosting and cooking for family/friends. I hate cooking for myself. I live alone and it’s a drag so I meal prep a hearty lunch and eat something super basic or “girl dinner” at night and just do your for breakfast.

        And even mu hearty lunches are basic (sheet pan chicken and veg usually). I save “fun recipes” for hosting.

        Though, I also hate cooking on vacation or for holidays. I don’t want to be stuck in the kitchen then!

        My dad’s love language is food, so he is always cooking for loved ones. He got it from his mother (a dietician), but I did not get that gene!

      3. Even as someone who doesn’t mind meal planning and prep most of the time, unrelenting is a good word for it. (And that’s why I always have Costco pizzas and lasagnas in the freezer.)

    3. I think the key is doing what you love without imposing that on other people. Love to cook and entertain? Host at your place and invite people over. Don’t get a holiday house and expect everyone you invite to do the same.

      1. People act like this is torture. Can you just accept that one night at a holiday house you are in charge of a meal? This was true even in college for group trips.

        1. It doesn’t have to be that way. That’s one way to plan a group trip and there are other ways to do it too.

        2. I mean, holiday house type vacations aren’t mandatory. I’ve been on one in the last decade – for a bachelorette, where I was of course going to do whatever the bride wanted – and of course I accepted it and did a lot of the cooking with absolutely no complaints, but I don’t plan or go on them for myself.

          1. The point is sometimes you just go with the flow and do something outside of your norm that other people are also doing. This won’t actually ruin your vacation unless you set the house on fire or start fights with people.

          2. I don’t agree @ 11:36 – I’m entitled to a vacation where I take a break from things I don’t enjoy. Cooking for other people is something I don’t enjoy. It’s a day to day grind, and there are people posting here who say that they don’t want to eat bad food. I get stressed cooking for people like that, even when I love them dearly and they love me. My compromise is that I’ll happily be in charge of ordering enough pizza so that there are leftovers, putting out bagged salad, and opening (a lot of) wine. But while I’m glad it’s easy for you, it’s not for all of us.

        4. I went on a non-guided river trip once (where the participants bring and cook all their own food) and it was INCREDIBLY complex to make meals for 18 people following the “menu” the leader provided with ingredients stored on 6 different boats. I would have been happy with oatmeal for breakfast and pasta for dinner most nights, but the menu focused on “variety” and it meant that each night’s cooking crew spent literally hours doing everything. I guess we got lucky, though, because our trip leader told us that they made the menu specifically because on a prior trip, each guest was assigned to “cook the dinner of their choice on their night” and that led some guests to make elaborate three-course options and one guest to present each other person with their own personal whole canned chicken. Google it if you dare.

          1. The canned chicken reminds me of the MASH episode where Charles and Margaret eat a canned pheasant.

          1. Yep, plus 1. I’ve done many of these trips, and I hate cooking for a group. I’m not a great cook, and we travel with foodies. Sometimes my food is outstanding, sometimes it’s fine, sometimes it’s terrible. I don’t want the stress of cooking for people who really care about how the meal will turn out overshadowing a precious vacation day. And, no while that’s not torture, I don’t have unlimited funds or time for vacations, so I’m not interested in spending a day stressed about my cooking. I’m glad others enjoy it – I like eating their food. What’s wild to me is assuming it’s not stressful or difficult for other people.
            So I order pizza and salad, and everyone is fine.

      2. THIS. If you want to invite me, do so. But don’t expect me to cook for a crowd in exchange for the “gift” of your invitation. For some of us, the trade-off is not worth it.

          1. Will it? I have lots of friends that I love and enjoy and even prioritize, but it’s not like a default thing to go to group holiday houses all the time. The reality is that my vacation time is really only enough to a) cover childcare holes, b) attend important events like weddings and c) go on some trips with my immediate family.

    4. I admire people who are good cooks and who love cooking – they definitely add a lot to the family and sometimes I’m in downright awe of their skills. Never going to be me, though. Cooking in the routine at home is unrelenting, as another poster said, and on vacation it absolutely kills the enjoyment for me (especially for a complex group in a small and poorly equipped kitchen without a nearby grocery etc etc.). I live in a small apartment and we have one small square of prep space, which obviously makes it even less fun. Takes all kinds in this world, though, and while someone else prepares the amazing grilled dinner at the lake house, I’ll gladly be the mom playing three flies up on the lawn with all the cousins. I’ll compliment the dinner and do the dishes too.

      1. DINK so I’ll take cooking over entertaining the kids 10 times out of 10. Even better if someone else will do the dishes afterward :) As you said, it takes all kinds.

        1. I’m used to DINK household adults being more interested in entertaining the kids since they’re not doing it all the time at home!

          3. As has been said: It takes all kinds! Being expected to provide free childcare at a holiday house would be my version of the women saying they’d rather not go than cook a meal for everyone.

        2. I have 4 kids…and I still hate entertaining kids. My husband and I always joke that we had 4 kids so we will never, ever, ever have to entertain a child. That’s why we gave them each other – go find another sibling to play with!! That’s what they are there for!

    5. I am a good cook, enjoy cooking when I’m not under pressure to do it, and love eating good food. It’s still a stressful grind to get a home-cooked dinner on the table every night and prep breakfast and lunches ahead of time. And I really do not enjoy holiday cooking or hosting dinner parties because of the sheer volume of cooking and cleanup involved at a time when I’d rather be relaxing. We went out to a fancy restaurant for Thanksgiving dinner last year and it was glorious. Maybe I’ll feel like cooking this year, maybe I’ll get a precooked turkey and make a couple of sides, and maybe we’ll go out again.

      1. Ordering a small pre-made family dinner for Thanksgiving from a local restaurant during covid was one of the highlights of lock down. For the first time since I was a teenager I got to just eat/enjoy dinner with minimal clean up vs. a multi-day prep/cooking marathon.

    6. Food is very fraught for me because I’m very much the type of person who would rather not eat than eat bad food. Most people are kind of crappy cooks so it’s hard to force myself to choke down food to be nice. I don’t love cooking but it’s sort of a necessity if I want to eat without an endless stream of take out.

      1. I don’t think my preferences dictate what is objectively good or bad (surely a lot of people enjoy their own cooking?), but at some point I dropped eating anything I don’t want to.

      2. I also would just peg to not eat rather than eat something I don’t enjoy. It’s caused me a lot of grief. Any time life gets stressful I don’t eat enough and lose weight, and I’m always borderline underweight. But people just think I’m so lucky to be naturally skinny OR they think I need some sort of ED therapy, which isimpossible to access unless you’re rich and near death. When I have the mental bandwidth, making food for a group can be enjoyable, so during a good vacation, sure. The daily grind is very grindy.

      3. I posted above – I have friends like this, and honestly, I hate cooking for them. It’s as stressful for me as it is for you. I love my friends, though, so the unspoken deal is that when it’s our turn to entertain, we order in. I’m a fabulous hostess (and in our routine of hosting, folks linger at my house the longest and latest), but nothing makes me more self-conscious than feeding people things I’ve made.

        Conversely, I’m freaking awesome at day to day food. I put it on auto-pilot, my kids eat healthy, homemade meals, but no one is too fussy about it, so there’s no stress. Right now, I have chicken and jarred BBQ sauce in the crockpot, and around 4, I will nuke some green beans and throw Pillsbury rolls in the oven, and feed 3 kids a healthy-ish homemade-ish meal on their way (*checks calendar*) Scouts, baseball, theater, and soccer this evening.

    7. To me, this is actually conflating two things – cooking/hosting and vacation – that are separate in my mind (but I understand that other people prefer to vacation differently). I also do almost all dinner planning and prep for our household (one child). I agree that some nights it’s a drag, but overall, I love cooking, food is also my love language, and I really love hosting. But to me, vacation is not a time for that – I see it as a time to get away and do fun activities that I don’t normally get to do at home. The whole holiday house cooking type of vacation to me is just…transporting my regular life to a different place with worse knives. I like my regular life, it’s not like it’s hell or anything, but it wouldn’t refill my cup any more than just being at home.

      1. I agree with this and I just don’t like the optics of the women being in the kitchen on vacation while the men are swimming in the ocean or seeing the sights. It’s so often the women.

        1. This feels lazy. In my life it’s primarily the men who cook–family, husband, friends. They care what they put in their bodies and take on the bulk of the cooking to better control it.

        2. Great point about the conflation, Anonymous at 10:52am. I guess I’ve never done a whole holiday house big group situation where one person was expected to provide food–every time, whether with friends or family, it’s been an “everyone takes one night” situation. My in laws even specify that ordering pizza checks off the requirement. If I was expected to provide nightly catering for 10, that would be a huge drag.

          I also don’t have a family or friend group where women are in the kitchen while men are off snorkeling. I mean, at worst my husband is sitting down with a beer, on call for “HANDS!!” if I need him.

          Again, just thinking through things. We all have different experiences.

        3. I don’t see this in my life; most men I know love to barbecue, and you can get all the ingredients prepped on the barbecue for some really great meals.

          1. In my social circle, it’s probably split 50/50 on who does most of the cooking for the household. In my home, my DH does way more of the cooking when the weather is nice because he throws everything on the grill. Or he’ll grill while I work on sides. This is very normal and expected in our circle.

      2. +1 – I mentioned the Tyler Place Resort yesterday as one of my favorite vacations with little kids. It was so, so nice to just show up to a buffet and not have to do any shopping/planning/clearing for every meal.

    8. My reflection (that I have thought a lot about recently) is that it’s really good that humans have such wildly varying interests. No one can do everything, let alone everything well. Things tend to work out when people do what interests them or what they can tolerate better than others can.

      To that end, I don’t judge others based on whether or not they have the same interests or ability to tolerate things that I do.

      1. I think the problem arises when people opt out of ‘interests’ that are essential life sustaining tasks, so then someone has to ensure the others don’t die because they have determined their interest to be wood working which idc if it’s rude, is not important.

        1. Wait what? Wood working has been important for longer than most our jobs have been and still is.

    9. I love to cook, but the grind of three meals a day plus snacks with kids is really a whole different animal.

      1. It truly is. It’s the hardest part of parenting for me – so much mental labor to plan something halfway nutritious that includes good variety and allergen exposure and have it end up on the floor!

        1. Yes–I think many of the people saying “it’s not that hard” are childless.

    10. The big difference is the grind quality of cooking reasonably healthy meals for your family,
      is reasonable amount of time.

      If it’s just you and another adult you can choose to invest the effort when you want to and choose not to when it doesn’t work for you.

    11. I was interested in the sheer amount of discussion. I don’t know how to cook, and preparing the few things I can make is miserable. I baked an apple last week, and was pretty annoyed by the end. I’m also not super interested in food, and will happily eat a peanut butter sandwich for dinner.

      Because I can’t and don’t cook, and have no interest in it, no one expects me to. If I’m responsible for a meal, people expect some type of takeout or prepared food. My partner likes to cook, and does the grocery shopping plus dinner every day.

    12. When it comes to the group trips, it’s also tricky when there are different budgets to work around. If someone wants to cook each night because they LOVE cooking, that’s different than “we have to cook each night because we can’t afford to go out.” If someone else in the group would prefer/can afford to eat out, they’ll feel pressure not to. It can be challenging to navigate the dynamics and find compromises.

    13. my MIL likes to cook and is a good cook. my in-laws have a beach house and it is lovely when we go there to visit, but she seems to sometimes get resentful that she spends so much time in the kitchen, yet she won’t really let others cook/insists on recipes with like 30+ steps that involve a lot of chopping, zesting, etc. when we would all be equally happy with store bought sauce poured on chicken to marinate and then put on the grill. or hamburgers and hot dogs. if she wants to cook complicated meals, that is totally her choice and I am grateful that she does the cooking, but it drives me nuts how she complains about how much time she spends cooking/grocery shopping, when no one asks her to do that.

      1. +1000. It bugs me when people act like they’re a basic salad, pasta, and jarred sauce aren’t enough on vacation. If you genuinely enjoy cooking more complex meals, great, but if you don’t, then don’t be a martyr.

        1. +1. We stayed in a cabin last summer and ate a lot of meals there. And they were dead simple. Grilled burgers, hot dogs, store-bought potato salad, a pizza and salad, etc. I did not feel burdened by that.

      2. Very very fair. Our most recent contributions holiday house contributions were 1. the aforementioned pasta and veggies with some sliced Italian chicken sausage on the side for those who wanted it, and 2. chicken I threw in a premade BBQ sauce that my husband grilled while I made couscous and a big salad. That is the vibe with my crew.

        My mom would be your MIL though. She likes her peace and quiet too much to be interested in the big holiday house setup, though, which is probably for the best.

    14. Food was just..not a big deal in my nuclear family. We had food, it was cooked, we went out probably more than most people in the 1990s, but we didn’t fret about people being fed over the age of 11 or so. We did plan meals and grocery shop, but it wasn’t the flash point of conflict or caring in my family. My mom did a lot of diet talk and fat talk, but it didn’t really affect what we ate all that much.

      My husband was raised by a mom with Huge Food Issues and a stepfather who just went along with the flow. I’m not a clinician, but 25-odd years of holidays and meals with her suggests she had a full-blown eating disorder from puberty until a few weeks before she passed away in her 80s (preparing huge amounts of food and not eating any, constantly talking about calories and fat and salt, being “worried” about nutrition and forcing food on others). Cooking and shopping are his main domestic tasks, so he does the fretting over each meal and attempts the food-forcing. It’s exhausting and a major source of domestic conflict.

    15. I personally enjoy cooking for a large group than myself most of the time, and I think it’s easier. I also don’t have kids to manage.

      That being said, I grew up in the south and learned to cook by the time I was in middle school. I also don’t think there is anything wrong with essentially eating the same meal every week. You can change the flavor profile of basic proteins and vegetables roasted in the oven with seasonings and have a nice meal (that a teen can absolutely do).

  9. Would somebody please remind me that every March-April I get really down about my looks, not because I’m hideous but because the winter pallor is in full effect? I’m doubling down on brighter lip colors to add some color to my face. Also, if anyone knows about a bronzer that looks good on cool-toned pink skin, I’m listening. So many bronzers are way too warm and just look dirty on my complexion!

    1. Go to Sephora at a not-busy time and ask for help finding a cool-toned bronzer. Every time I go there wanting to try a specific product, they help me find something that ends up working better for me.

    2. I’m the same! I always schedule balayage around this time of year to give my dishwater hair a lift. I use Nara Laguna bronzer (the lightest one without shimmer).

    3. Tanluxe face drops – mix with your moisturizer and it’s a wonderful glow for pretty much all skin types, just only mix a drop in or it will be too strong.

    4. My complexion is Dark Winter so I hate spring clothing. The colors make me look like death. Is this just a makeup issue or is it a wardrobe issue as well?

      Focus on blush instead of bronzer. Hot pinks that look intense in their packaging look surprisingly natural if you apply with a light hand.

      1. This! I am pale with a warm rosy undertone (if that makes sense). Blush makes a huge difference. A trick a make-up artist shared with me was also to put a tiny bit of blush under the outer part/arch of your eye brow. It brightens everything for me.

      2. Try icy blues, white and silver as your best «spring» colours.

        Cool emerald, lilac and deep grey, cool fuchsia, and blueish neon could also work.

        The Cool summer shades is where you can look first for lighter colors.

        Don’t do soft summer, but cool should be fine.

    5. I add a drop of a light pink illuminating liquid to my foundation or tinted sunscreen.

  10. Can someone explain to me like I’m 5 what a family office is? Or 25. I’m clearly not from the world of this.

    1. I work for a family office. We do all sorts of work from hiring/firing household staff to paying bills to making sure packages/mail are picked up if the family is on vacation or at another house. We coordinate with other professionals (attorneys, CPAs, etc.) about anything that needs to get done and help get it done.

      Basically, we make it very easy for our clients to live their lives by covering all the “chores” and financial matters.

    2. It’s an asset management team for whom one family (or a small group of families) is the sole client. They have access to your standard set of investments: private equity, hedge funds, real estate, VC opportunities, etc. At the more sophisticated end, they have a team that develops and acts upon proprietary investment theses. In my experience those theses tend to be much more niche than the theses from private equity or other investment funds. At the less sophisticated end, they just allocate the money out across other investment vehicles (so the work is in the allocation and tracking, and it would be a very small team). Bigger ones also often manage day-to-day cash flow and property management and may have a small team that also manages charitable work from the family foundation as well – with long reaching strategic goals, and often significant local political influence. Typically you need ~$100M to be thinking about this.

      1. Not part of this world, but this was my understanding as well. I’ve never heard of the managing household staff aspect.

        1. Yes. Same here. Family office = big big money and the employees are responsible for investment, tax, estate planning, etc. None of the household stuff.

    3. Family office is when you have full time professional and administrative staff supporting the family. Think assistants, accountants, lawyers, whoever is managing all the house staff (but not the house staff), etc. You more often see them when the family money is coming from partnerships (real estate, oil and gas) because there is not a clear c-suite of employees in the big family business or there are many different businesses that all require someone to oversee them. You also see it when there are a lot of trusts to manage or a lot of charitable giving to manage.

      1. I would say it is more wealth management focused than this reply. There may be other components but when I hear family offices invest I don’t think managing the staff, but rather dealing with a team of professionals both on the investment side (some are operating almost like VC funds) as well as managing how the trusts support the various generations.

      3. Adding onto this, these people usually own multiple homes internationally. The accounting and expense management gets complicated quickly. It’s not like reimbursing your one housekeeper for a monthly Target run. These families need robust systems to handle expenses across countries and currencies, especially if they own property somewhere that a lot of financial service providers won’t touch (like the Caymans).

    4. They manage the wealth and lives of the extremely wealthy. everything from tax, estate planning, HR, pilots, philanthropy, nannies, property management.

  11. Does anyone have a recommendation for a college counselor? Our high school provides the bare minimum. We need help identifying target schools beyond our state u. Kid somehow pulled off a 36 ACT and has no interest in ivy rat race. And our kid would be more receptive to guidance from a third party rather than perceived nagging from parents. Thanks!

    1. It sounds as if you want the kind of college counselor we hired–you can start working with them as late as junior year or the summer before senior year, they provide a basic consultation on schools to consider, they supervise the application process, they make suggestions on essay editing. For this you need to rely on local word of mouth. Ask parents of slightly older kids who ended up at “different” or out-of-state colleges, especially parents who have graduate degrees or are otherwise more academically inclined than the average parents in the area. I think I got names of possibilities from the pediatrician and our pastor, both of whom are highly educated women with kids a year or two older than mine.

    2. For college ideas, check out Jeff Selingo’s “Dream Schools” list and the slightly older and less selective list of “Colleges that Change Lives.” My daughter had top grades and test scores but no interest in the Ivy rat race and ended up very happy at one of the Dream Schools.

    5. With the entire internet at your fingertips, do you really need to pay someone for this sort of thing? Back in the old days, you could look at a reference book at the library that sorted colleges by types, sizes, public/private. All in the same book… Surely something like that exists online. And the student can do his own looking around.

    6. Helpful information to know: does your child have any impressive extracurricular activities? Grades roughly in line with test scores?

      Do you need merit aid or need based aid?

      ACT signals Midwest to me. How far are you willing to send your kid? Boy or girl?

      Academic areas of interest?

      Weather preferences?

      Large, medium, or small school?

      Any strong preferences for things like a collegial student body, lots of traditions, DI sports, etc?

      If you don’t know the answers to these questions, tour some schools. Get a general sense of the place. Swing by the admissions office so they know you’re there.

      Generally: look for schools a step down from the Ivy League and its equivalents. Midwest: WUSTL, Vanderbilt, Carnegie Mellon, Grinnell, Oberlin, St. Olaf’s, Carleton, Notre Dame.

      Then take another step down for options. The mistake people make is to aim high and have a safety, but not aim medium. Think: Rhodes, Truman State, Trinity, Wabash, Purdue, Marquette, Centre.

  12. I recently got through some work burnout and was feeling better for a few months now. I’m feeling stressed again and I think a 3-4 day weekend somewhere relaxing would help. I want it to be within a few hours from NYC via train, have a good blend of nature (ideally coastal) but with good restaurants and a decent spa. I also don’t want to rent a car when I’m there.

    Any ideas? I thought about Providence. I know the weather won’t be ideal.

    1. I love the finger lakes. If you’re ok bundling a bit, you can do some hiking, get good food and wine, etc.

    2. Beacon isn’t coastal, exactly, but the Hudson river is really scenic around there. Hour and a half from Grand Central, easy to do car-free. I’ve not been there, but friends have recommended the spa at the Duchess Hotel.

      1. I can also recommend The Duchess. I stayed in The Factory. If you go, The Beacon Daily and the Melzingah Tap House are great.

  13. Great pick. Love cotton poplin for summer. I also saw some fun options at Banana when I was poking around looking at what I want for a summer refresher.

    1. You can take TRAX Green Line downtown easily enough from their airport. It takes 20-ish minutes and costs $2.50. I’d get off at the City Center Station and walk around. There’s the City Creek Mall right at that stop. It’s an outdoor mall with a stream meandering through the middle with ponds and fish. There’s a food court with play ground if your kids are little. I like Zimbu if you want grab and go Indian food, or Cafe Rio and Costa Vida for Mexican/salads. . Also in the mall – Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory for a quick bite of chocolate or Deseret Book has the best ice cream (Graham Canyon is my favorite). The fountains outside Nordstroms do shows from time to time that are fun. For nicer dining, you can eat at The Roof on top of the Joseph Smith Building. You can watch the construction of the temple and see for miles in every direction. Walking around Temple Square can be interesting as well. Not sure what’s open since the temple is under consruction though? You can visit the roof gardens on top of the Conference Center right there as well.

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