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Weekend Open Thread

Market Day Striped MaxiSomething on your mind? Chat about it here. As warmer weather slowly arrives, I've kind of been in a maxi dress mood. I'm loving some of the striped ones I'm seeing, like this fun one by Puella (available in grey, navy, and mint, in regular and petites) — colors, the stripes, the different pattern, the uneven hem… very cool. It's $88 at Anthropologie.com. Market Day Striped Maxi Seen a great piece you'd like to recommend? Please e-mail tps@corporette.com. (L-2)

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294 Comments

  1. Even if the dress comes in a petite size, is that going to be a flattering look for us shorter ladies? I’ve shied away from maxi dresses thus far, fearing it would kind of swallow me up.

    1. I sometimes wonder this too but I have a friend who is about 5’1 and pulls off maxi dresses beautifully. I think the key is proportions

      1. My question is, where does one get a short(er) maxi dress? At 5’6, I’m not short, but every time I’ve tried one of these things on, they’ve been 2-3 inches too long for me and would end up dragging big swathes of fabric in the dirt. Are people getting them hemmed? I hate having to get my casual clothes hemmed, so if that’s the case, I’ll probably be avoiding the trend, unless someone knows of a brand that doesn’t assume all their buyers are 5’9.

        1. I’m only 5’4″ but have had good luck with the length of Old Navy maxis. PSA: there are maxi dresses for sale as part of Target’s Daily Deal today.

        2. I’m also 5’4″ and have recently bought two awesome maxi dresses from Gap and outlet and Max Studios (via TJ Maxx). Both have been fine with flats and perfect with 1-2 inch heels.

          1. Hmm… I just tried on a couple at the Gap the other day and found them to be too long … Maybe they were a “tall” version and I just didn’t notice? Well, I’ll keep trying, because I like the idea of maxi dresses for the summer.

        3. Any advice for longer maxis? I’m 5’10 and they always hang awkwardly a few inches above my ankles.

          1. I’ve gotten some in tall from Old Navy that I love. I”m also eyeing a tall maxi at Athleta.

          2. Rachel Pally’s trademark full-length caftan dresses are VERY long. They also come with raw edges so they can be easily hemmed (I’m 6’2 and took about an inch off of mine). The jersey is also amazing.

        4. I got a petite at LOFT.

          I’m 5’1″ and feel like I can wear a maxi without looking swallowed. I’m not entirely convinced the trend is for me, but to no fault of my height.

        5. I’m curious–why don’t you like to hem casual clothes? That seems like an awkward thing to have to work around when choosing items; you must have a reason that I’m not picking up on.

    2. I am 5’3′ also and i wish it would work but it is one of the perils of being short.

      1. I’m also 5’3-ish and I bought a very similar dress from Anthro 2 summers ago and it looks great (I think). I think you just have to try these things on – many maxi dresses can look great on us shorter folks. It’s all just about proportion and pattern. They’ve been my summer uniform for going on 6-7 years now. I am really mystified by all the “but I’m too short” comments I see whenever a maxi dress is recommended here.

          1. Sounds like someone never had to drag over a chair to get something off the top shelf.

          2. I constantly drag chair over and also use tongs to reach things off the top shelf as needed. But I can sleep comfortably on planes and love seats, and I think that is a fair trade off.

          3. I’m 5’5″ , wish I were shorter, and I constantly have to drag chairs to get things off the top shelf at my current height.

  2. Is anyone else going to the Bay Area Law Foundation Dinner (aka “Justice Awards and Dinner”) on May 9 at the SFO Marriot?

  3. I posted some time ago about building a house in northern VA. I got lots of great advise from you all about things to keep in mind. My house is underway. I signed with the builder and the architect is drawing up the final plans. I’m starting to think about finishes and anticipate being overwhelmed with the options in tiles, countertops, paint colors, cabinets, flooring, etc. Even choosing colors of the siding and shingles on the house will be tricky. Can any of you recommend a reasonably priced designer in northern VA?

    1. I interviewed a number of designers for our project and ended up going with Kiera Kushlan at residents understood. They have great pricing compared to everyone else I interviewed. Kiera and her business partner Jessica are easy to work with, very responsive, and really work hard to find solutions that are beautiful and functional for you/your family. I would highly recommend them. At the very least, meet with them! Unlike other designers, they don’t charge for an initial consult. Also, they had a waiting list when I first contacted them, so I was happy I did so before our construction started. It sounds like you’re in the same boat, so I would recommend reaching out to designers sooner rather than later, if only to get on their calendar. It is an overwhelming process, but they make it fun and so.much.easier. I definitely would not have survived without a designer. Good luck!!

    2. I’m building now too, though not in NoVa, our house is about a month from being done. We ended up doing all of the selections ourselves and I’m amazed at how well it turned out! Good luck and have fun!

      1. My husband and I are dreaming of that day when our house is almost done. We are looking forward to it so much we can’t even think about it. It’s too much.

    3. OP, we are considering building in NoVa also. Can you direct me to your previous post with the advice you received, and/or send me a note offline? Would love to pick your brain! My anony email is [this site] dot margaret at gmail. Thanks!

      1. The post was the 1/25 weekend open thread. You can find it by looking up teardown on the search bar for this site. I’ll send you an email. I’m still early in the process, but I’m happy to answer any questions.

  4. I must share with the ladies here even though I don’t post often, but I landed a new position today and had to share!!

    2. I’m trying to figure out what sandals to get for the summer. I’d really likea nice “go to” sandal. I live in Boston and need to be able to walk 2 or so miles in them at one time. I am considering Jack Rogers Navajo in platinum. I really like the style of them since they can be dressed up or down, but I wonder if they won’t live up to the hype. What are your thoughts on them/ do you have any other recommendations?

      2. I like my Navajos and they make cute dress-up sandals (especially if you want flat shoes rather than heels), but I also think they’re pretty uncomfortable. The footbed is really hard and I can usually only wear them for a few hours before my feet hurt. They hurt enough that they are making me seriously consider buying Birkenstock Gizehs, which are the exact opposite in terms of footbed comfort!

        1. Haha. That’s what I’m worried about. Do you think some stick on pads would help the comfort level? They’re so cute!

          Ideally, I’d like something as comfortable as Birkenstocks, but as cute as Navajos.

          1. Have you tried Earthies? I swear, they’re not paying me or giving me free shoes (I wish!) but they’re the only brand I can wear that’s as comfortable as Birkenstocks. They do more heels than flats, but something like this might work: http://www.zappos.com/earthies-toro-crystal

            I’m wearing a pair of Dansko sandals today, which are okay comfort-wise. They give me about 2 in of height without feeling like heels at all. They don’t have enough arch support & padding for me, although I have high arches and hate hard shoes, so it might be fine for you. I have the Sissy style, which isn’t made any more, but there are lots of others available now.

      3. I wouldn’t buy Jack Rogers to walk 2 or more miles in. I probably wouldn’t walk a mile in them. They are still essentially flip-flops as they have no other straps or straps along the heel, which will mean your toes will need to grip the shoes to lift them up. I buy BOC by Born sandals if that’s any help.

        1. Also, that adorable trim on the Jack Rogers sandals rubs (and sometimes cuts into) my feet where my toes grip them. I never noticed when I lived in the suburbs and didn’t walk as much, but I hardly ever wear them since walking longer distances is part of my routine now. For walking, I’d definitely recommending looking for something that’s smooth where it’s going to be rubbing against your foot.

        1. I second Born for comfort. I have a pair of Born gladiators (On Zappos, it’s similar to the Born Claudy) that are super comfortable. They aren’t necessarily the cutest, but they’re not bad, and if I need to walk long distances, they’re my go to.

        2. I have a pair of gold Born sandals similar to yours that are cute but very comfortable.

      5. Not sure if you’ll like the look, but Kork Ease are the most comfortable summer shoes for me. I have the Ava and can walk for days in them.

        1. Ditto on the Cork Ease. Plus they remind me of Buffalo sandals when I was little!

      6. I’m in Boston and I have several pairs of Jack Rogers…and I don’t wear any of them for long walks. Too hard, too floppy for cobblestones….but super cute by the pool!!

        1. i wear my jacks everywhere, have for years. they wear like iron and go with everything! i would not bring them as my only footwear for walking all day multiple days in a row, but a couple solid hours of city walking and plenty of travel has been fine. they are not the hugely most supportive shoes but good enough quality to remain reasonably comfortable. my only complaint is that the skin on my heel gets a little sore from the die-cut footbed. i am very pleased with the purchase five and three years into my very heavily worn two pairs. also watch out on getting them wet, the leather upper can stretch. fwiw i have them in the gold 1 in wedge (very neutral and versatile color) and black patent flat. i think the light-colored solids tend to get grodier a little faster from past experience. all that said, my feet are pretty forgiving as such things go so ymmv. if you generally have need for more supportive shoes you may be disappointed but if not you may be ok.

    3. Yay! Congratulation’s!!!! Happy day for all!

      I love Open thread’s! And I do NOT have to go to Baltimore this weekend! YAY!!!! The manageing partner told me to pipe down when talking about the looser in Baltimore who just think’s he can sign things and get PAID w/o doeing anything more for it. He want’s me to do all the breif’s, and he just sign’s them. FOOEY on him.

      We have to go down and go over the breif’s next week now, which leave’s me the weekend with Myrna, b/c Philip is still wavereing on meeting me or even jogging in the park. He is probably a little to mousey for me. I prefer a take charge kind of guy, provided, however, that he is not a tuchus Grabber! It is very dificult to find a guy who know’s where to draw the line and NOT to be grabbeing my tuchus, or like Gonzalo, my boobies.

      Myrna still want’s to meet Philip, but I am goieng to have to arrange a meeting at a resturant for all of us to meet, b/c I am still a little leary of bringeing Philip to my apartement. Some times, it’s the mousey one’s that become very agresive when they get into your apartement, b/c they think they have just crossed the finnish line. DOUBEL FOOEY ON THAT! There should be some thing explaeinng to these peeople that just b/c a girl bring’s you into her apartment does NOT mean you can grab her and do thing’s that you would NOT have permision to do just b/c you are INSIDE her apartement. FOOEY!

    1. You can take the girl away from the chevrons but you can’t take the chevrons away from the girl.

      (Or something like that.)

  6. Hemlines rise and fall with the economy. Microminis are big in boom times and maxi dresses are a trend of the great recession. As an unemployed law graduate, I refuse to wear maxi dresses on principle. Like my student loans that are in unemployment deferment, I refuse to acknowledge the terrible economy by wearing long skirts. (Yes, I know I don’t personally control the economy. That would be nice).

    1. I would expect the exact opposite. Aren’t longer hemlines more expensive to produce? I would think companies would cut corners in a recession and sell shorter skirts and dresses.

      1. That was my first thought. Though I do remember reading a piece about how hemlines fell during wartime because of the price of silk stockings. I don’t think that necessarily applies as much now.

      2. Plus more people out of work, looking for other opportunities to make some money…

      3. I think it’s psychological. When people feel good about things generally, they want to show off their legs. :)

    2. I remember reading something about maxi dresses coming back due to our exposure to the Middle East fashions. I don’t know if that’s true but the olive green jackets that are everywhere definitely have a military flavor to them.

  7. Just wanted to ask for good thoughts. My SO is on his way here – riding his motorcycle 700 miles. If this works well, he will be able to visit more easily, rather than driving the giant vehicle he drives in the mountains. He just called and he’s about 4 hours from here. I’m so relieved! I’ve been on pins and needles all day.

      1. Funny you should say that – that’s exactly what he said! It was the only problem he’s had thus far.

  8. Casual Friday at the office – so we had pizza and beer. I haven’t been feeling well this week and had some serious stomach issues so I passed on beer. Apparently the moment I left the room people started talking about whether I’m pregnant (resounding no). Are you freaking kidding me?!!! I pass on one beer and that gives men and women the right to gossip about me. U G H.

    1. Ugh, that’s so annoying. I could care less what people are eating and drinking or why they’re doing it.

      1. If you could care less, that means you do care to some degree. Emma Stone just made the same mistake in a recent magazine interview. I also could not care less what people are eating or drinking or why they’re doing it.

        1. I can barely remember hearing anyone ever actually saying “couldn’t care less.” I think it’s one of those corruptions of an original meaning now so universal that they’re not worth pointing out anymore, unless in context of a writing assignment you’re grading.

          1. I always say (and usually hear other people say) “couldn’t care less” and fairly rarely hear people say “could care less” (which is why it’s always noticeable to my ear when it happens) — maybe it’s regional?

          2. Same here. In Houston. People never say “could care less.” It is a corruption of meaning in that both versions mean the same thing, but I still say the right one. People who know the difference will notice.

          3. I find myself saying “could care less” with some frequency. I am usually particular about word choice, so I’m not sure why this one slips in.

          4. Language is about communicating meaning to a certain extent – especially somewhere like here where it is informal in nature. You *knew* what she meant – and I bet you also know that both versions of this phrase are in popular usage. So the only reason to correct her (since you don’t know her or have any investment in her correct grammatical usage) is to make you feel better about yourself. Just let it go.

            But…just so we’re clear…you’re mean you are and your means the possessive. And you are almost always FIGURATIVELY something or other (almost never literally). Okay, done now.

          5. While I recognize lots of people make this mistake and I should just let it go, this one bothers me more than most mangled idioms (intents and purposes, for example). Probably because if you think about it for two seconds, “could care less” makes no sense in the context in which it’s always used and sloppy language usage is annoying (this is why I’m a lawyer). Could=am able. “I am able to care less about this than I do now”=”I could care less.” “I am not able to care about this any less than I do now”=”I couldn’t care less.”

          6. @TCFKAG even if one version is popular, you should use the right one. That’s like saying oh but its popular to use “your” no matter what you are saying. I don’t know what this new this site trend is about “Words mean whatever you want them to mean!” but language is about defining things- communication is about meaning. But there is a reason we have so, so, many words- because we need them to communicate. I don’t think its mean to point out that someone is using a phrase wrong- one time someone pointed out that I said I phrase wrong here and it blew my mind! I had always been saying it wrong and I was really glad to be corrected here as opposed to the real world.

            To the OP- sorry you’re (just kidding:) work is so gossipy.

          7. Look – I’m not saying you should go around willy nilly using incorrect grammatical form. I think its great to know the correct form and to use it. High five to you. But I think the habit of people (not just here) to unnecessarily correct people in casual conversation for grammatical errors that do not prevent comprehension is almost always a pendantic exercise mostly meant to make the corrector feel good and gives little benefit to the corrected (though I’m glad one time you had the opposite experience.)

            And with that I finish arguing about something that I don’t know why I was arguing about in the first place. :-P

          8. In the UK I’ve never heard anyone say ‘I could care less’ – that said, ‘I couldn’t care less’ isn’t part of our daily lexicon, and I’d never correct anyone on it… just silently bristle!

    2. In these situations, I take a beer, take a sip, and then leave it on my desk for a few hours and toss it. This helps avoid the gossip — but I’m sorry you had to deal with that. That’s the worst.

    3. In the wise words of Ellen, JSFAMO. When I came back from extended sick leave, one of the admins told me that rumor had it I was out due to pregnancy. Having gained serious weight from prednisone and eating like a ravenous beast prior to going on sick leave, shrug. The horrified look on the admin’s face when she told me was the most hilarious thing ever – RU, PREGNANT??!!!?!? NEVER, SHE’S GETTING AN ARRANGED MARRIAGE FIRST. Facepalm.

    4. Ahhhh – I had the same thing happen to me last week at work, but because I had a couple dr’s appointments in a row (and, honestly, although this is soooo not anyone at work’s business, but my b*obs have grown about a cup since switching bc pills about 2 months ago). Seriously?! How is this anyone’s business! NOT prego and now convinced I’m fat or something :(

    5. I strategically turn down alcohol on a fairly regular basis. I figure if I do it often enough and randomly enough, people will be so acustomed to it that when I actually do get pregnant no one will notice.

      Just to be clear- I’m a light drinker in general, it’s not like I’d turn down a drink I really wanted just because hypothetically someone a couple of years from now might notice that I’m pregnant a few weeks earlier.

    6. God – because of my staggering number of health issues and the variety of meds I’m on at any given time – I turn down booze all the time. I wonder if I leave a trail of pregnancy rumors behind me?

      But, leaving all that aside, I hate beer. And if someone tried to offer me one, I’d STILL politely decline. Its so annoying that people thing “oh she isn’t drinking, MUST be with child…” like that’s the only reason a woman between the ages of 20 and 45 wouldn’t want to drink. Eye roll.

      1. I’m with you. I hate beer. So I would turn it down no matter what. I also ALWAYS turn down drinks at work because I either am working out later or singing. I guess it helps that everyone knows that about me and that I am not really of prime childbearing age. That whole assumption is just stupid. Even if it were true, its none of their business.

      2. Ditto, can’t stand beer (or wine for that matter), but if I ever turn down a free margarita or vodka & cranberry I’m almost guaranteed to be pregnant!

    7. So that’s why people post that question all the time. I hope you gave em what for, on behalf of the non-drinkers who are preggo

  9. Had a (very good) interview on Monday and haven’t heard anything. They told me they’d be in touch “soon” and had to interview a couple more people. I have a really good gut feeling about this. I sent follow up emails to the interviewers on Tuesday, and haven’t gotten a response. I just feel like I need to know one way or another so I don’t get my hopes up (as I have done before).

    I can’t do anything else, right? Except try to not think about it?

    I really want this job. Le sigh.

    1. I think your instinct is right. Hiring decisions can take much longer from the other side, so since you’ve already followed up, distract yourself with fun weekend plans and hopefully they’ll be in touch soon!

  11. Whiny TJ for those who are willing to indulge me:

    I posted some weeks ago about leaving my marriage, and about three weeks ago I up and did it. Got myself a super cute apartment, fixed it up nicely, left my extremely problematic and nasty husband. I was pretty exhilarated and excited for the first week or so, but now reality is setting in and I. am. just. sad. Thinking about having wasted 16 years of my life and starting over in my 50s is bringing me WAY down! Yes, I chose to leave, but believe me this was not my first choice — it was just the best of the bad options available.

    Sorry for the whining. If anybody has any pep talks, I’m in the market for one!

    1. there is a delightful book called “Live Alone and Like It”–written in, I believe, the 1930s! It’s a really inspirational single-woman mantra. I think it’s available on amazon. it’s fantastic.

      1. Thanks, anon! Just ordered it from Amazon! Looks like it’s going to be a fun read!

    2. If you’re in the mood for a life coach, check out Sarah Jenks. She has some free videos posted on her Live More Weigh Less program website that are inspirational (to me) even though I’m not actively trying to lose weight. If you post your city, I’m sure someone here will gladly meet up with you for a drink!

    3. Think how awesome it is that you get to spend the next 30 or so years without such a nasty person!

      Also, I know tons of people who have started over in their fifties and had amazing, fulfilling relationships and lives in general. Really, you’re going to look back in ten or twenty years and be incredibly happy you took the plunge.

    4. No pep talk, but I feel you. I’m nearing a similar move and while I really look forward to the freedom from a miserable relationship, the thought of moving out and living on my own is just sad.

    5. I can’t begin to speak to what this must be like, but I do always try to tell myself that there’s no such thing as “wasted” time. If you’d known what to do any earlier, you would have done it then. Unfortunately we can’t make shortcuts to the right decision every time.

    6. First of all, download Howard Jones’ Things Can Only Get Better and listen to it while dancing around your apartment in your underwear. After that, listen to his other song What is Love. Just because you can dance around listening to 80s techno-pop. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-OO9LloDSJo

      I was blindsided by a divorce (in my 40s) but came to realize how stressed and unhappy I had been once I was on my own. Even though you made the decision, it does take time. It takes time to be comfortable being alone. Do you have a pet? A kitty to snuggle with might help. I spent a lot of time with my now-ex and I had to get used to what my life was like alone. Truthfully, I love it. I have completely redecorated my house with things that I like and didn’t have to compromise on. I’ve bought all new art. I can travel where I want, when I want. I can eat chocolate Fiber One for dinner. I control my own money and my spending (a big deal). Nobody else is spending my money. I can spend two hours working out in an evening and nobody cares if I’m home. I have come to enjoy being alone. I’ll be honest that the one thing that gets to me is not having someone to distract me on a weekend when I’ve had a rough week. It’s easy for “monkey mind” to take over. But I’m working on that, too!

      You are going to be so happy you did this in the long run. Trust me.

    7. I also want to add that you should not feel guilty for being sad. That’s a bad cycle. You are sad because this is sad. Just realize that the sadness will pass, and you have a whole new world ahead of you that does not involve being mistreated!

    8. Thanks, ladies! I appreciate it!

      NOLA, all the positives of living alone that you listed are indeed positives and I enjoy them, or at least know I will enjoy them in the long run. I’m just still in the “wow, this is new and it kind of sucks” phase.

      At this point I would settle for knowing where I am when I wake up in the morning! I’m still super disoriented each and every morning. Argh.

      I wish I had a TARDIS and could just skip over this part! I know I will be happy to have taken this step, but right now it just kinda sucks! Glad to know it’s normal, anyway!

      1. You’ll get there. It takes time. And you mentioned beating up on yourself for “wasting” years of your life. I’m not going to say that you won’t still regret that. The other day, my SO said something to me on the phone that was so sweet that I hung up and wondered what the heck I was thinking marrying someone who didn’t feel that way about me. I deserved better and I couldn’t see it.

        1. No kidding! That’s part of what is eating away at me — why in the heck did I stay so long when he treated me so bad??

          But… that way lies madness. So… onward.

          On the plus side, I met with my lawyer this morning and got some better-than-expected news about what to expect re: division of assets. So perhaps the emotional devastation will not be matched by quite the level of financial devastation I had feared. Which would be kind of awesome. ;)

          1. ATOD, props to you for getting out. I understand completely what you are feeling WRT ‘wasting all those years.’ I had to start over in my career, too, so felt doubly stupid.

            Take comfort in the fact that investing all that time into your marriage means you know that you gave it every possibly chance. You can walk forward now with no regrets, no if onlys. And you probably recognize red flags and BS much more readily than you did even, say, five years ago. So maybe those years were not wasted.

    9. I moved into my own place after a long-term relationship several years ago – and while at first it was a relief, it was also upsetting. I was really down and clearly remember the empty, sad, lonely feeling. It was awful for a while, but just remember that it’s a natural response to such a big change in your everyday life – of course you are going to feel unsettled and sad for a while – but with time you will adjust and your new life will become your new norm. I couldn’t be happier now – still on my own and I really love the independence.

      In the short term – for whatever reason, watching old SATC episodes always really cheered me up. I wouldn’t even really want to watch them, but I made myself bc it always worked. That and planning a weekend around a long novel – if I felt like being a hermit, I’d just roll with it and read a whole Game of Thrones or other similar massive tome over a weekend. By the time I got through the series, I was feeling much better! Starting the whole Harry Potter series over from the beginning was also great brain candy.

      1. So funny you should say that — I watched some old SATC’s and found them so depressing I could hardly stand it! LOL

        But yes! on the novels! I got out of the habit of reading books while married because it, uh, compromised my ability to give Mr. Nasty my undivided attention. So I am having a grand old time reading in bed and in front of the TV and everywhere else in the Bachelorette Pad!

    10. Advice from my grandma, who survived her husband by 30 years, as I graduated college and moved off to a different part of the country for my first job:
      Always set the dinner table and serve yourself a good meal. Eat slowly, without distractions, and enjoy taking care of yourself.
      Over the years I’ve found the logic can be applied to other things as well.

    11. It’s never too late (or too soon!) to kick a nasty piece of useless baggage to the curb. It’s OK to mourn, but think about the cool stuff you can do now on your own – classes, parties, cultural events, hobbies, trips, etc. My aunt divorced my good-for-nothing uncle after 30 years of marriage and is now having the time of her life, running her own show on her own time. She’s gone on more trips and done more in her free time in the last two years than she did in the previous 30 years of her marriage. There is life on the other side of this, lots of it. Good luck and keep your chin up.

  12. Question for the ladies in banking or anyone with experience financing renovation work:

    We want to renovate our unfinished basement. We already have the architect drawings and quotes from before the recession put our plans on hold.

    We would be adding ~1000 sqft, two bedrooms, one bath, a large family room, and a laundry/pantry/storage room. Based on recent sales of comparable homes in our neighborhood, our (now ~2200 sqft, 4 bed, 2 bath) home would be valued between $360-400k – up from $275k now.

    The cost of the renovation would be between $30-45k, depending one finishes and extent of diy (by my unemployed and experienced husband). We would increase the home value *conservatively* by at least twice that. We would also then be able to refinance to a much lower rate (~3.5% down from ~5.3%), so our monthly payment would be equal enough for our finances.

    Here’s the issue: We currently have no equity in our home. Our home’s sell value is realistically the same as what we owe on it. That’s a realistic estimate based on comparables and a recent appraisal.

    We do, however, have two sets of parents willing to co-sign a loan using their loan-free homes as leverage. The idea is that we’d get the loan, do the work, and refinance with the new appraisal value and use the different to pay off the loan.

    My question is what kind of loan can we pursue to get financing to renovate a home without equity using the equity in another home? Is that a ‘construction loan’?

    We’ve spoken with our credit union, who told us that they don’t do those types of loans – would we need to go through a large bank? If so, do we need an account with them in order to get a loan through them?

    1. I thought this is what Home Equity loans were for, but you’re saying you don’t have any equity in the home, so I’m not sure. Could you call the company that owns your mortgage?

    2. I think the parents would just get a HELOC or a cash out refinance themselves and give the money to you. You would then pay them back after doing a cash-out refinance yourself after the work is done. A construction loan is a much different arrangement. The bank gets an appraisal of what the property will be worth once construction is complete and checks the license of the builder and issues draws during the project and after construction is complete it becomes a normal mortgage on the home. In your case, a construction loan won’t work, because the appraisal will check out, but you are doing the work yourselves.

    3. you need a construction loan, but you are going to have to do a lot of hunting to find someone to give one. Right now they are almost impossible to come by unless you have 20% equity in your home to start with. Would your parents be willing to do 2 separate transactions – they take out a home equity loan for the $45K and then you borrow the money from them under a separate contract? That’s the simplest path to what you want, but it puts a lot of risk on your parents.

      1. One option is for your parents to get a HELOC/HEL, then give you a private home equity loan, so you pay them back the loan, with interest (you could match the rate they get on the HEL, or make it a touch higher). We did a lot of research on private intra-family loans, and although we didn’t wind up doing it, we were going to go with National Family Mortgage if we did. They do all the paperwork for you and your parents for the private loan, and have an option to handle all the loan managing paperwork like tax forms. Or if your parents currently have investments that aren’t earning squat (common right now), they could potentially cash out the investments and loan the money to you in a 10 or 15 year loan – getting 4% interest from you would be a lot better deal than most investments out there right now, and that way you would be paying them back a fixed amount every month, almost like an annuity. My parents did this to give us the down payment for our house (although it was a gift, not a loan – with the understanding that by giving us some of their retirement funds now, we would help with some of their support when they are in retirement).
        This is the company we were going to use: http://www.nationalfamilymortgage.com/borrow/how-it-works/

        However – are your comp homes also ones with basement bedrooms? Because in most areas a 2,000 square foot 4 bdrm home that is 1 story or 1st and 2nd floor is not comparable in price to a 4 bedroom home where 2 are in the basement. No matter how nicely you renovate it, the value of basement living space just isn’t quite the same – and if you don’t use the appropriate “escape proof” windows, the bedrooms don’t “officially” count to realtors and banks.

        1. Yep, we have egress windows. The basement redos are definitely less, but the $360k referenced was for a poorly done remodel, so we’ll easily be above that. The $400k homes are above-ground bedrooms.

          Sounds like having the parents take out a loan is the way to go. Ugh, that seems like it’s asking so much more of them. We’ll consider going through a contractor and getting a construction loan, too,.

  13. Question–how much did you look around for child care when you were expecting?

    I’m expecting my first child mid-Sept and planning to take the full 12-week FMLA leave. I’ll be returning to work full-time mid-Decemberish. Yesterday husband and I toured a day care center less than a mile from our house, and I had no idea what I should have been looking for. I kind of want to go ahead and put down a deposit at this place because a) it’s super convenient, b) they seem like they know what they’re doing, c) their hours are really good, d) they only close for the major holidays; rarely close for bad weather–so super reliable. My mom thinks we need to look at a whole bunch of places, but anything else we would find would be less convenient. I just want to put down a deposit and have it settled early.

    Also…which pregnancy/baby blogs/boards do you guys like?

    1. I tried looking for pregnancy and maternity blogs but didn’t find any I really liked. I use the Babycenter community threads a lot to ask questions, browse others posts etc.

      For daycare centers, it depends on where you live. In places like NYC the joke is that you should start looking into them as soon as you think you might have conceived. The babycenter community threads have a lot of posts on questions to ask your daycare provider

    2. I did the same. One was super convenient and I felt comfortable with it. I put in the deposit on the spot. No regrets. I don’t see any harm in looking at a couple of other places, even if only to get your mom off your back.

      Bah, thankfully I’m past baby blogs and boards (kiddos are aging out). Can’t say I ever found anything worth recommending. I like the BabyCenter weekly emails, though.

    3. I went with the place closest to home that I’d looked at during pregnancy, then figured out when DS had been there just a few weeks that it had several real problems. I’d advise you to look at other places, just to see what’s out there, so you know what you’re getting (and what you’re trading off for convenience) with the place you’re thinking of.
      Thinking your little one is not getting the best of care is awful. Take the time now to give yourself peace of mind later.

    4. I called the 2 places with the best reputation in our town (and really the only 2 centers at the time) and was told they both had months long waitlists. Put our name on both, toured one, freaked out that my leave was almost over and started to cobble together a day by day plan with family & friends, then got a call that a spot was available 2 wks before I had to go back. Fate was on my side though, and our center has turned out great and I recommend it to everyone I know.
      I’d tour one more center if I were you, just to see what else is out there – that way you feel like you made a conscious decision. You should probably put your name on the waiting list for your 2nd choice place, in case something doesn’t go well with your 1st choice.

    5. I would put down a deposit at the place you toured and call it a day. When I was expecting my first the features you listed were what I was looking for.

      1. The things that surprised me were the attitudes of the people working with the kids and that there were no windows in the baby room. Not sure how I didn’t figure out the latter would be a problem when I toured it, but I didn’t. There might be something else a new mom wouldn’t realize is important until the babe is already there. The workers were cheerful when I toured and smiled at parents who did a quick drop off or pickup, but I lingered longer and saw and heard a lot, including a baby on a rigid feeding schedule who cried and cried without being comforted and workers not trying to hide that they didn’t like their jobs.

    6. I’m due in early october…I called 4 daycares in my area as soon as I had my 8w checkup, just to see what the deal was. One (a big, “bright” chain) gave me the full court press and told me I”d do best to come in ASAP because they were booking into 2014 already. I went in, took the tour, and felt like it would be just fine for our baby (big, clean, new, super convenient).

      The other centers said there was less of a rush, and I finally toured them about two weeks ago (at 15w). None of the centers are *totally* booked, but the one we liked best only had one slot left for when we’d want to start daycare (Jan 2014). We put a deposit down yesterday.

      The difference between where we picked and the first one (the chain) was that it seemed more “homey” (w/out being a home daycare, which we are not looking for). We toured at 6pm, and the kids still there were NOT cranky or bored. The staff was still cheerful, the director actually sent her kids to the daycare and then years later bought it. This center has a “don’t bubble wrap” the kids philosophy, which is very much in line with what DH and I feel. Kids get messy. Kids get diry. Kids need to be taught boundaries, rules, and manners (all the kids there are taught to shake hands and look adults in the eye–which we loved). There was dorky kid art everywhere. Staff turnover (for a staff of 25) was <2 staffers/ year. They get milk delivered daily from a local dairy, and have pizza fridays. They also have a kindergarten program, which we liked since we have a fall baby that will be too young for public kindergarten–but we don't want to red shirt her if we don't have to.

      We really thought the big new corporate daycare would be fine for our kid. And I think it still would be. But then we found this one. We decided it's where we'd want to work, and where we'd want to spend the day…and turns out it was $400/month cheaper to boot. Winner for us.

      So the long and short of it is, I'd suggest you tour the other few daycares in your area early this week. You may find one you like better, or you may reaffirm that you like the first one best. But it helps give you peace of mind, IMHO, if you've seen all the options.

    7. OK, so I did everything “wrong” when it comes to daycare. Even in my part of flyover country the conventional wisdom is that you need to get on a wait list before getting pregnant. Well, we thought my husband would be staying at home with the baby so we didn’t get on a waiting list. Then, he got a job offer a week after baby was born. Uh-oh. I toured a center that friends had used (and loved) that was convenient. They had a spot, we took it. What I liked was the number of long-term employees, the convenience and the happy babies. It probably isn’t a bad idea to look at a lot of places, but if the place near you has a good reputation and your gut tells you it is a good fit, go with it. In our case, I really trusted my friends and that’s why I moved quickly. Had I been on my own I probably would have checked out a few more centers, but I knew my friends had looked at bunches before settling on this one.

      1. Never underestimate the power of other happy parents – I think that is also why I feel so comfortable with our daycare – as soon as we told other locals where we were sending our kids all we heard was “our friends send their kids there and love it” or “oh, I’ve heard good things about it”. I didn’t hear on single person tell us they’d heard of someone pulling their kids out because they weren’t happy with it – only a handful of people who had had to pull out when their financial situations changed, and they all said they were very said to do so. Day cares where the staff love the kids, and the kids and parents love the staff and programs are worth their weight in gold – I think personal recommendations from someone you trust should count more than pretty much anything else.

  14. Ladies, I’m a midlevel corporate attorney and was recently contacted by a recruiter for a pretty good sounding in-house corporate counsel position. It’s in my city, hours are supposed to be much better, and I think I’d be a strong fit. Here’s my question: I expected that the job would involve a paycut, but I’d be curious to know how much is normal. Currently around $170 base and $195 including bonus in biglaw; the recruiter indicated the position would have a base of around $135 with potential for a larger bonus and stock. Does this seem right?

    Also, how did you know you were ready to move on from biglaw? I genuinely like my work, partners, and coworkers, but the hours are starting to wear on me. I feel like I’ve still go so much more to learn!

    Thanks in advance.

    1. I took about a 25-30% cut in base salary when I went in-house so that sounds about right. Keep in mind that in-house legal departments are just like law firms in that the experience you will have working there depends highly on the people you will be working with. I can say, having found a great team at my current job, that the more predictable hours and the reduction in my stress levels have been well worth the salary I gave up.

    2. I came from a small law firm, and my salary nearly doubled when I went in house, with pretty much the same hours. So, that was a big reason for the change, plus I hated the law firm I was at/the type of work I was doing (very low level) and felt there was no opportunity for advancement there. So for me going in house was a very easy decision!

    3. Depending on how mid-level you are, I think that is reasonable. I am in a big city and am a fifth year at a top 10 firm. In-house jobs at my level pay around $150k.

    4. At the time I was tracking this (5th/6th/early 7th) moving to a junior level in- house (5th year min exp) the cut was about 35%. It depends on the level of the in-house position and title alone won’t tell you unless you know the departmental structure, for ex Sr Counsel can be two rungs from the bottom or the top depending on structure at flatness of the org.

  15. Any tips from the hive on a successful transition from long distance relationship to non-long distance relationship? By way of background, my bf and I have been together for 6 months, but known each other for 2 years. We’ve only ever been long-distance and now he’s moving to NYC next month for work/so we can be in the same place. He has a few friends here, but he’s leaving behind his closest friends. I’m looking forward to us being together but also know it will have its fair share of challenges – communicating, giving each other space, I’m sure tons of stuff I’m not thinking about. Any advice you all have about what to discuss ahead of time and how to make it work would be greatly appreciated! In some ways, I feel like it’s starting a relationship from scratch.

    1. Will you be living together? I think there will just be natural growing pains that you will have to work out, have a general idea/conversation about expectations, how often you like to go out, going out together vs. with your girlfriends, etc. but he probably doesn’t know what his new life is going to look like. I lived three hours from my husband for the five years we dated, and we moved in together after we got married. There were some adjustments but it was a pretty smooth transition.

    2. My BF and I made a similar transition last July, except we were long-distance for 2.5 years when he made the move. And Congratulations on the end to your LDR! I was worried about all the same things. Like what if we don’t get along when we see each other more often? What if we break up and all that time together long-distance is wasted? Honestly, the transition really wasn’t a big deal. We had to figure out a schedule to see each other, which worked itself out pretty quickly (we didn’t move in together). We live about a 30 min drive apart still due to our job locations, so we see each other 1 night during the week and every day on the weekends. Giving too much/too little space hasn’t been an issue. You just need to be really good at communication, and we got really good at communicating due to the distance so hopefully you two did as well. Anyways best of luck!

  16. Anyone have any fun vacation plans for the summer? I’m off to Birmingham, Oslo, London, and Brugge.

    1. Peru, Montreal & Cabo + multiple trips to the west coast to see the fam! Can’t wait for summertime.

    2. Lisbon in June, and Yosemite in July. Also traveling to Charleston and Dallas for a seminar and wedding, respectively.

      1. Awesome! I’m in Birmingham to meet the family, Oslo for a wedding, London en route to Brugge and Brugge en route to my fieldwork in Belgium. A busy, busy summer (also have local fieldwork to do, a paper to cowrite, and an unexpected job offer to content with)

    3. DH and I are doing two west coast road trips – one to hit Yosemite, the PCH, the Grand Canyon and Arches (I think) and one to see Yellowstone, Grand Teton, Crater Lake and Portland (and some other stuff). Don’t remember the exact itineraries – one trip is in June and the other in September. I’m SUPER PSYCHED.

      1. You’re coming to see meeeeeeeeeeeee! We must go eat house-made pasta and hand-pulled noodles.

        3. SFB, that sounds like mean girls rubbing it in everybody else’s faces that you’re having an overnight and we won’t be there.

          I hope you and your guest have a marvelous time together. But please don’t post about it afterwards, like some kind of Facebook showing the rest of us how fab your lives are.

          1. Um….she really wasn’t….I don’t even know what to say to this other than that the other day SFBayAssociate posted food she liked in SF and I said “I want to have that.” But she and I don’t have any plans together…I think she meant more in the general “You’re coming to San Francisco” way.

            Either way, if she and I meet up, I promise we will not post a play by play Anonymous. No worries.

    5. I just got back from a long weekend in Seattle with my mom, which sort of “kicked off” my vacation season this year. I’ll be in Austin, TX for a girl’s trip over Memorial Day weekend and then head to France in September with my boyfriend. Hopefully we’ll be able to sneak in one or two short weekends away in there as well.

    6. Camping in Montana in July & my 20 year high school reunion in August. Not as fun as some of you, but I’m looking forward to it!

    7. Oh, fun!! Just got back from Amsterdam, planning trips to Israel/Jordan/Turkey, Seattle, NYC, [insert beach destination, still up in the air] and a long weekend back home. Can’t wait!

    8. Jealous!
      I think our summer destinations include local waterparks and river kayaking, southern Ohio/N Ky/S Indianna, and 3 nights in NYC (one of them in the Museum of Natural History, with my 10-yr-old)

      2. Hey, that’s where I’m from! Let me know if you have any questions. I think Southern Indiana is possibly one of the most beautiful places in the world in September and October.

      3. If you are going to S Indiana, you & your son might really like Squire Boone Caverns, or one of the other caves/caverns in the area. S Boone now has a bunch of little buildings on it like an “old time bakery” that are kind of touristy, corny and expensive, but the Caverns itself are really cool. My husband went as a kid and remembered it so well that he insisted we take my son as soon as he was old enough to remember, and we all enjoyed it. We bought the Louisville entertainment dot com book – it had a coupon in it for the cost of adult admission, so it paid for itself with that purchase, and all other coupons in it were a bonus at that point. And another bonus – no matter how hot and sticky it is outside, its nice and cool down in the caverns.
        http://www.squireboonecaverns.com/cave-tours/Default.aspx

    9. Not going anywhere this summer, but a friend from Australia is coming to visit for a week in June, which will be super fun!

      Hoping to get back to Japan to visit my Marine before the end of the year.

    10. “There’s a Christmas tree somewhere in London with a bunch of presents underneath it that’ll never be opened. And I thought, if I survive all of this, I’d go to that house, apologize to the mother there, and accept whatever punishment she chose for me. Prison… death… didn’t matter. Because at least in prison and at least in death, you know, I wouldn’t be in f-in’ Bruges. But then, like a flash, it came to me. And I realized, man, maybe that’s what hell is: the entire rest of eternity spent in f-in’ Bruges. And I really really hoped I wouldn’t die. I really really hoped I wouldn’t die.”

    12. London, Copenhagen, Amsterdam, and Rotterdam

      Looking forward to their upcoming jazz festivals!

  17. I love maxi dresses and will wear them until I die, whether they are fashionable or not.

    Silly TJ:
    I want to Olivia Pope my work wardrobe. I am finishing law school and will start working soon. This is exciting for me clothing wise because I will be build my professional wardrobe from the ground up, after reading this blog for years.

    Do you think I will regret styling myself after the Olivia Pope character (e.g. creams, tans, whites, etc)?

    For reference, my skin color is the basically the same as hers. My body type is generally the same, except I have the sedentary version. I would still buy some dark suits for court. My firm is essentially business casual.

    1. I don’t think you can go wrong Olivia Pope-ing your work wardrobe. I love the idea of plenty of soft silks, pale colors and wide leg trousers.

      My only caution is that Olivia’s style is very draped and — oversized is the wrong word, it all fits her correctly, but it’s all *perfectly* tailored so that the excess fabric looks intentional, not like she’s just buying a bunch of clothes that are too big for her. So I think you would have to carefully choose pieces that don’t swallow you up, but make it clear you are achieving an intentional look.

      My skin tone is pretty similar to KW/OP but one of the reasons I think OP’s wardrobe works so well is that KW is not just slim (obviously so) but she’s also not particularly curvy. I think curves can throw off some of the lines of the look for some of her staple pieces (like a really high neckline if you have a bust, even a not-so-big-one, can be unflattering). Color wise, as long as you’re not clumsy and constantly spilling food/drink/makeup/etc on yourself (like me) I think creams, tans and whites can make for a lovely work wardrobe. Of course, don’t make it obvious you’re trying to dress like someone else – make sure that you pick clothes that make *you* look good.

      Also, Everlane’s new silk blouses made me think Olivia Pope in their color choices – so maybe check them out?

    2. One thing I have noticed about her FABULOUS look is that it involves a long white wool coat for winter (at least in season 1, which is as far as I’ve gotten). It’s beautiful, but if you decide to go that route be prepared to clean it often. I have an ivory coat and it needs to be cleaned usually 2x per winter. While it’s being cleaned, you also need a backup. Then there’s the worry about traveling with it. Not to be discouraging! I’m actually thinking of replacing mine with an even whiter coat when it bites the dust, because I feel like the annoyance might be worth it. And a coat is a real wardrobe anchor, unless you’re somewhere that doesn’t have winter!

      I’m also a big fan of white shirts and find that not to be a big deal as long as stain remover is always on hand.

      1. I do LOVE that white coat of hers, but I could not deal with that. My coats are constantly covered in pet hair and I am unwilling to do the amount of lint-rolling necessary to have a white coat.

        For a coat, I will aim for camel.

    3. Can I just say that I’m SO jealous that you could pull off Olivia Pope’s wardrobe? True white and tans looks terrible on me.

    4. This is one of my most favorite comments ever. I am obsessed with her clothes and I, like Anon in NYC, am super jealous you can pull off similar styles. I don’t think you’ll regret imitating her, by the way – her clothes are basically really well tailored, classic pieces that are flattering to her coloring and body type.

      I actually think this is a smart way to go about shopping – picking someone who’s style you envy who has similar coloring and a similar body type. Alicia Florrick on the Good Wife is probably going to be my work style inspiration, except slightly more casual.

      Also, check this out! http://www.vulture.com/2013/02/scandal-kerry-washington-olivia-suits-every-outfit-season-2.html

      It can be your guide to shopping for new pieces,.

  18. I found not 1 but 2 suits that do a great job camouflaging the belly but giving me freedom to move around at waterparks or whatever. Unfortunately there’s only room in the budget for one. So I got the two-piece and now am jonesing after the 1-piece. It’s a blue tank suit by Bleu Rod Bettie, side ruching, a square front panel with blue & teal stripes. Can any of you blackbelts in google-fu help me find a size 12 for less than retail?

    1. It is the Sunset over Sahara suit. Dillard’s, Nordstroms, and Everything but Water all carry it for around $100. h-elllllllllllllllllp

          1. Found it on Bon-ton for $28 less :) and $10 shipping :/, but I still come out ahead

  19. Hey ladies, I need some advice. I’m a 2L in a big-city, nowhere-near-T14-but-decent law school. I have a 3.3 GPA but I have excellent references and I’m on Journal (and my note is getting published). Last semester I took a course with a federal circuit judge and got an A in the course. That federal circuit judge now seeks a post-grad clerk (starting fall 2014) and he advertised specifically at my law school. I’m debating whether to apply.
    Pros: the judge knows me and gave me an A; it would be a federal circuit clerkship (!!!!!)
    Cons: I feel like it’s ridiculously unlikely I’d get it (given my GPA) and it would require me to move pretty far from my current big city (where my DH is gainfully employed).
    My career counselor says I’ll never get it and I shouldn’t apply, but if I do apply, I need to be prepared to accept the job because I’m not allowed to turn it down (per school policy). I’m hesitant to apply because it requires three references, and I feel bad asking my references to write letters for a job that I’m not even 100% sure I could take; I don’t know if DH & I could afford living apart for a year or how that would work. Any advice? Thanks.

    1. Go for it!!

      Think about it this way: what’s the worst that can happen? You apply, you get references, and you don’t get the job. Big deal. You might feel bad asking the references to go to the trouble but think about it as an excuse to have one-on-ones with those professors, get on their radar and let them get to know you a little bit better. Plus, you can use them for references in the future.
      If you apply and get offered the position then you’re in a great position- federal circuit clerkship! I’d say to jump on that. In the long run, one year long distance is not a big deal. You may take a hit financially but you can make it work- think of it as an investment in your future, just like law school. You can sublet, get roommates, brown bag lunch, DH can move into a smaller place if necessary. There are ways to make it work.

      Just my two cents. good luck!

      1. OP here — thank you so much for all of these thoughtful responses. I talked with my DH last night and his reaction was “what the heck is wrong with you?? APPLY!” so guess I know how I’m spending my weekend!!

    2. Apply. You won’t know if you could get the job unless you apply. If you get it, you’d be nuts not to take it.

    3. Apply! Don’t feel bad about the recommendations, because you can use them for other clerkship opportunities that come up if this does not work out.

      I understand the hesitancy moving away from DH for a year. I am about to do just that and while being in a long-distance marriage is daunting, it’s an investment in your marriage. Your marriage is only stronger with two good careers in it. The financial hit you may take doing to clerkship may be compensated for with a clerkship bonus at a law firm in the city you want to work in! It will add prestige to your resume forever.

    4. How can the school require you to accept post-graduate employment? I can understand internships that are run through the school or whose application process is through the school – but post-grad? How can they possibly “require” that you accept a post-graduate position, no matter how prestigious?

      I’d apply, it really can’t hurt. Though I guess I’d be concerned about the whole “required to accept” thing.

      2. My school had a policy similar to this. It’s not like they can come after you legally, but there was an understailnding that the school / career office had spent a significant amount of time cultivating those relationships.

      3. I think most, if not all, law schools have this policy for clerkships. You’re required to accept the first clerkship you are offered, if you are offered one. It makes application strategy kind of intense.

        I was told it’s out of deference to the judges, and because all schools have these policies, if you turn a clerkship down the judge is highly unlikely to recruit at your school the following year. I don’t know if this is actually true, but the clerkship policy is fairly uniform.

      4. My university has this – part of our reputation is based on our placement years, which pretty much no other elite UK unis have as standard (Bath, if you’re interested).

        Because there has been so much hard work in cultivating the relationships, if we get offered a placement from one of the organisations on the main uni list, we have to take it – the latest step we can reject is right after an interview but before any offer, saying ‘thank you for the experience, but I don’t think you’re right for me; please take me out of consideration.’

    5. Your career counselor reminds me of the college counselor in Legally Blonde, when Elle says she wants to go to Harvard Law. “Harvard won’t be impressed that you aced… History of Polka Dots.” Anyway, tell your career counselor to shove it. Or just say it silently to yourself and then quit listening to her.

      First, it sounds like you need to decide that you can absolutely take the job if offered to you. You’re right that you should not ask your references to write letters for a job that you might turn down (unless you don’t have a problem with the inevitable bridge-burning that will result in you making them look dumb for recommending you).

      So, in order to determine whether you can absolutely take the job, you and your DH need to do the math on whether you can afford that arrangement for a year. Find out about living options in the clerkship city and what your least expensive option is.

      If it is financially possible and will work with your DH, APPLY FOR THE CLERKSHIP. Those clerkships are awarded based solely upon who the judge likes. That’s all. Yes, they typically like law review editors with a 3.98, but they also like people with whose fathers they play golf– or, as appears to be the case here, people they know from classes and remember as capable, professional students. If you know for sure that you can accept the job if it’s offered to you, go for it! You can’t get it if you don’t apply. So apply!

    6. By “afford living apart” do you mean in dollars or could your relationship take it?

      1. Mostly I mean dollars, because we’re in the process of buying a home. Also, I have no idea how much federal clerkships pay, I don’t know anyone in the state that I’d be required to move to for the clerkship (meaning: not really interested in roommates at this point), and how much it would cost to visit DH (and whether I would even have time). Finally, I am concerned about my happiness taking a nosedive if I live apart from DH for a year.

        1. these are all valid, but somewhat short-sighted concerns, IMO. I don’t mean that in a mean way. But it’s really only a year and you would have the prestige and the career benefits forever- for yourself and for you and your husband’s future.

          You can pretty easily find out how much federal circuit clerkships pay and how much it would cost to visit DH on google. Whether you would have time depends on this particular judge and how he/she likes to work- you might not have tons of time off, but DH could come visit you or you could swing a few weekends. That’s a question for the judge’s former clerk after you get the job and before you accept- tell me what you hours are like. Decide based on that.

          As for not knowing people in the other state- its rough to move to a new place not knowing people, but sometimes roommates can help you meet people. And you can find roommates on craigslist, you don’t need to know someone in advance. Or find a cheap place by yourself, or rent a mother in law from a family- there are lots of ways to save on housing costs.

          Happiness- only you can say if living long distance from your H for a year would be unbearable. IMO, it would suck, but it would be worth it. That job could open doors for you to find a permanent, long-term position in the city where DH lives too- thus enabling you both to have good jobs close together for the long term, which is more important than one year, IMO.

          1. Not in law, but just wanted to add, the year will go by incredibly fast, especially if you are working a lot. I had an enforced separation from my husband when we were engaged for 10 months. Yes, it sucked. But I am so glad I didn’t make a rash “I can’t live without you” decision and screw things up for myself (and ultimately him). If your relationship is already shaky, you’re right, it won’t be great to be separated. But I can tell you from later-life experience, and this may sound harsh, but relationships where two people have to constantly be together to keep things from falling apart, and can’t tolerate a brief separation for a good cause, usually don’t last anyway. Hopefully, 10 years from now you’ll be looking back on that year and saying “it was tough, but it was worth it.”

        2. Hmm.

          If you’re in the process of buying a home now (when you are a 2L with presumably no income), then aren’t you buying it based on his income (since that is what the bank will look at)? So conceivably you taking a lower paying job 1.5 years from now for a year shouldn’t be a big deal, no?

          How far is clerkship city from your current city? There’s a big difference between a 4 hour flight and a 1 hour train trip.

          Have you talked to DH about this yet?

    7. This is a no-brainer: you should apply. If you get the job, you should take it. For someone with the pedigree you have just described, a federal circuit clerkship will change your professional status in very significant ways. Clerkships open the doors to elite law firms, government jobs, public interest jobs, and more. They connect you with power brokers in your legal community, and give you a built-in network with the judge’s prior clerks.

      It is not easy to live apart from a spouse, but it is ONLY a year. Most firms offer clerkship bonuses as well, so if you’re interested in BigLaw, you can use the clerkship bonus to help cover the cost of the clerkship.

    8. My brain is exploding.

      Apply. Regardless of the school, career Services are entirely peopled with idiots, and apparently your school is no exception. Put together the best goddamn application you can, with glowing letters of rec and networked connections and see what happens. Your polished app may blow the fancy school apps out of the water. The fact is that your non T-14 school is not going to give you the career options you want in this still difficult economy, but a federal circuit clerkship will propel you into same candidate mix as the graduates at the top school in your city forever. It’s just one year, and you’ll have invaluable work experience and connections out of it. Your DH’s life is not on hold even if you live in a different city for a year. For heaven’s sake, you are two separate people. You’ll miss each other terribly, and it will be tough, but it will be SO worth it. It saddens me that he refuses to be supportive of your application. How could he not want the best for you? He should be supportive of your application and make it work for a year if you get it. So, with love I say, stop making excuses and being afraid of failure and rejection. Yes, you might not get the job. It’s possibly even likely you might not get the job. BUT the actual failure would be not giving it your best shot because there’s a chance that you could get the job. Lean the fudge in as hard as you can to an opportunity that could exponentially increase the trajectory of your career.

      1. This. +1,000,000. I went to a T-35 school, had decent grades, senior editorial board on law review, and DIDN’T even submit one single clerkship application. I think it was a combination of thinking I was just outside of the usual section criteria plus some laziness, with a lot of not understanding how clerkships are viewed and compensated in the legal community. I really kick myself for not even putting myself out there and having the opportunity to be rejected, rather than never knowing if it would have worked out and been a good step for my career.

        If you have a shot at a circuit court clerkship, at least give yourself the opportunity to know if you can get it. And then when you do, take it! I have friends who did not fit the traditional clerkship benchmarks that got them (including a circuit court clerkship) based on various contacts with the judge. Maybe your judge loved your work, knows you fit in well in his/her office, and would be happy to have you back. Do it.

    9. My federal circuit clerkship was the best job I have ever had. Amazing learning experience and the opportunity to work with a fantastic mentor and friend.

      People also told me that I had a long shot. I had very good grades and other things going for me, but I also went to a T-40, no Law Review, blah blah blah. But at the end of the day, my Judge and I hit it off right away and he gave me the clerkship on the spot.

      Apply. Good luck!

      1. I’m not a lawyer, but have been in a similar situation. I posted for a presdigious secondment that was 12 hours away by plane from my husband and 2 very small children. After talking with my husband about the opportunity and what it would mean for my career, I put in the best darn application I could and figured fate would work it out. While waiting for fate to work its magic, we figured out visits, childcare, living situations just.in.case. When I got it (yippee!), everything was in place and I just had to get over the whole picking-up-and-leaving-my-family thing. But to be completely honest, the high of getting the spot lasted through the first few weeks, then I was so crazy-busy learning that I didn’t have too much time to dwell on what I was missing, then soon I got into a new routine and it was pretty easy. Well, easy for me. I put a hurt on my credit card. And there were some nights that I went to bed crying, wondering what in the h€l| I was doing, leaving my family for work. But we all ended up better for it- my kids were young enough that they’re not scared forever, plus they were able to live with my sister in London for 4 weeks. My husband had some time alone with the kids and really found his groove. And for my career, it has opened so many doors and quadrupled my internal network. So when I look back, the end result makes that time period seem so brief, and the experience is there forever. APPLY NOW.

    10. Apply, but most of the judges who taught at my law school wouldn’t take former interns but former students-yes? The bigger hurdle may be getting past current clerks to get an interview. My co-clerk and I did the résumé screening and pulled out interview candidates. If THEY think your resume is un-impressive, your best shot may be leveraging your relationship.

  20. Ladies, I need a kick in the pants for some motivation. I graduated from college two years ago; for the last 10 months I’ve been back at my alma mater working as a research assistant for one of my old professors. My boss is great and it’s good experience, but I’m working on soft money so the pay isn’t always reliable and we both went into this knowing it would be a temporary job for me. I’d like to find a job on the other side of the country (I’m in FL now, would like to be in SoCal.)

    I’ve just seen my dream job in my desired location advertised for the third time and need to motivate myself to actually write the darn cover letter and apply. It’s a field that I focused my research on in school, and although my current job doesn’t cover the same subject, it’s a similar general type of work (statistics/ data analysis), so I think my skills should transfer well. I even have a college acquaintance who knows a current employee of the company, according to LinkedIn. I’ve been procrastinating asking for an introduction because I feel so awkward about it, even though I do really want this job.

    The job also only temporary, but I’m hoping I can get a feel from the current employee whether it might turn into something permanent. I don’t have all the experience or skills the job calls for, but the subject matter is such a perfect fit for me that I think I might have a shot.

    It’s just so easy for me to get caught up in all the other things going on in my life that I can put off applications without even trying. I think partly I’m hesitant because of an unsuccessful and emotionally-grueling job search last year–I was working retail and applied for 90+ jobs with only one phone/Skype interveiw to show for it before my current job landed in my lap unexpectedly. I’m afraid to start that again, even though I’ve been reading job listings for months and have a list of ones to apply for. I still feel like I’m not really qualified, even though my experience and skills are MUCH better than they were a year ago. I find myself jealous of friends who had supposedly less-practical majors and now have several job offers to choose between. (I majored in econ and minored in math, but it seems like my theology & music major friends have better career prospects, largely because our university is much more well-connected in these areas.) I know this jealousy is stupid, since I’m not even sending in applications, and at least theoretically I have a higher earning potential than they do. I’ve been in counseling since last summer, which helps a lot, but I need a little bit of extra motivation to get this done this weekend. Any advice?

    1. I was in your position, and what I found most helpful was to set small, doable goals. So, when having trouble getting off my butt and writing a cover letter my goal wouldn’t be “write that cover letter” but “make a list of the skills I have that would be a good fit for that job,” then I’d do something else, and “write a sentence for each skill,” then maybe the next day I’d “make a list of paragraphs I want in this cover letter” and an hour later “string together sentences to write the first paragraph.” I did a lot of my cover letter writing while I was washing dishes, because it let me muse and play with my wording and then I’d dry off my hands and type it out. That might just be me, though.

      I also found that once I had one cover letter written the rest were a lot easier. I basically just had a lot of paragraphs highlighting certain skills, and I’d plug them in and change the wording to make it more applicable to each job I applied to. So make sure that you keep any rejected paragraphs or sentences from this cover letter to use in others. Keep in mind that a lot of job postings first go through a computer matching system, so try to lift as many phrases wholesale from the job posting as possible.

    3. A lot of times we expect something to be so hard and frustrating to do (like writing a cover letter or filling out a long job application) but once we get started, it’s actually not that bad, and we feel great to have accomplished something important. So stop wallowing in that icky, sad place and get off your butt and do it! Also, don’t assume you don’t have enough experience. That is a subjective assessment that may or may not be true! Every college grad can bemoan not having enough experience, but many of them eventually end up on a career path (it may take a couple bum jobs first but that’s all part of the process). Do it! This is your life. No one else can do these things for you. Another attitude/mind game that might help to pretend that applying for this job is your job. In that sense, I mean, pretend like you are doing it because someone else requires it of you and it’s just a task you have to get done in a couple hours flat. Sometimes I would do things at jobs in the past I would never feel comfortable doing on my own — but because it was a requirement I just got out of my comfort zone and did it. I wanted to live up to what was expected of me. Have that mentality now. This is something you just have to do, like a homework assignment or a test. Done is better than perfect, so get it done.

  21. What other blogs does everyone read? I feel like we’ve discussed this before, but I’m curious.

    I’ve really been enjoying Girls of A Certain Age, even though I think I’m a little young to be the target audience, and otherwse, I just read a ton of healthy living blogs (though if I’m being honest, I partially hate-read some of them…, because..well…some of them are ridiculous).

    1. The only ones I read consistently are Capitol Hill Style, this site, How Sweet Eats, and Get Off My Internets. I’m in the market for more, so I’ll definitely be watching this thread!

    3. The Pioneer Woman
      You Look Fab
      Putting Me Together
      Birchbox
      Recipe Girl
      The Vivienne Files
      Tall Snob
      The Beauty Department
      Outfit Posts

    4. Home/Design:
      Design*Sponge
      Simply Stated (a Real Simple blog)

      Fashion/Style/Beauty:
      9to5Chic
      Atlantic-Pacific
      Capitol Hill Style
      Extra Petite
      Liberty London Girl
      Searching for Style
      The Beauty Department
      The Terrier and Lobster
      Tomboy Style

      Food:
      Smitten Kitchen
      Sprinkles Bakes

      Misc.:
      Kanye Wes Anderson (Tumblr)
      Love Taza
      Paris in Four Months

  22. Errrrrrrrrrgh, I just looked at the clock and realized that (a) it’s 6:30 pm and I sort of forgot to ever get lunch; (b) the fun plans I had lined up for tonight are vanishing into the yawning jaws of a brief that still. isn’t. anywhere. close. to done; and (c) I am going to be in the office for a long, long time tonight.

    I believe I just decided that frozen yogurt is a perfectly acceptable dinner option.

    1. I had frozen yogurt for lunch yesterday, so I think you can have it for dinner. :p

      1. :-)

        I did, and it was every bit as delightful as I was hoping for. Sometimes you just have to walk away for a bit, pretend that the gummy-bear garnish on top of your dinner is balanced out by the fresh mango, and read a cheesy novel.

        And now back to work.

  23. Question for all of you:
    Anyone done online dating and successfully met someone? I have done it and met someone, but I can’t get past the sense of embarrassment I feel. I feel somewhat embarrassed to tell people how we met because meeting on the Internet seems odd. Any advice?

    1. I haven’t done it myself, but know several people who met their spouses/SOs online. I don’t think there is much of a stigma to it anymore, no need to be embarrassed.

    2. I met my current boyfriend of two years on Match . We moved in together a few months ago & it’s honestly the best relationship I’ve ever been in.

      My close friends/social circle know how we met, and honestly, it’s so not a big deal these days. My success story actually inspired a few of my single friends to try it out, and some of them are now online dating success stories too. Most people have either tried online dating or know someone who’s tried it, so a lot of the stigma is gone.

      For work or situations where I want to keep it simple, I just say that we met through friends. Once we met, it turns out that we knew a lot of the same people, but due to different schedules/social circles, we probably would have never crossed paths without Match.

      Honestly, the only comments/reactions that bother me are the, “But you’re too pretty to have done online dating!”. That might sound like a humblebrag, and I definitely don’t mean for it to. I just feel like they’re inferring that something “else” must have been “wrong” with me because I didn’t meet someone “offline”. Fortunately, I’ve only gotten that a handful of times.

    3. I’ve told the long winded version of this story here before, but my friend and I decided to take the plunge on eHarm together. She met her husband within six weeks of being on the site, they fell hard for each other, and they were married within eight months. He’s a great guy, and now they have a beloved child and a happy marriage. They never would have crossed paths but for eHarm. At first she was a little embarrassed about how they met and said they met “through friends,” but it’s such a great story that it eventually became the official version and we all think it’s awesome. I met several great guys and a lot of duds through the site as well, and am still friends with a few of them.

    5. I met my fiance on Match. Whenever someone asks, I just smile and say, “We met on Match.” No one cares, I promise.

    6. Getting contact information for someone on the internet, meeting them in person, dating them in person, and maybe falling in love with them in person is a LOT less weird than what we do on this site every day (sharing our problems and getting advice from total internet strangers).

      You don’t need to feel embarrassed telling people you met through [dating site], but if you can’t get over it, you can just tell people that you met at a coffee shop or park or wherever you actually met in person for the first time.

    7. I had a couple of boyfriends from online dating. My husband and I met the old-fashioned way (at church). Online dating and putting myself out there kept me from getting rusty, honestly.

    8. It’s so much less weird to say, ‘here is a person I pre-screened for shared interests and had written communication with before I proceeded to date him/her to establish our compatibility’ than ‘here is a person I met at a bar/supermarket/party and knowing nothing about him/her (including whether or not they were even literate) decided to ask or agreed to be asked out, based entirely on looks.’ Yep, the internet daters are the weird ones. :)

      1. I don’t think those relationships are based so much on looks as they are on chemistry, pheromones, and juju upon meeting. I had all that with my husband of 14 years. Rawr!

  24. Embarrassing fit question from a newbie to business attire. When I wear stretch wool pencil skirts or sheath dresses, the material stretches across my front in such a way that it makes my, um, pelvic region quite pronounced. I have a small waist and larger hips, so I always tended to just size up to avoid this problem, or avoided these styles. Easy enough.

    Recently, though, I was suit shopping and wanted to try a Theory suit at Bloomingdales. The sales associate all but scolded me when she saw me try on the sized-up skirt. I explained the issue and tried on a smaller size to demonstrate the problem. It sort of clung to my upper thighs, making a rounded outline of them and the “middle area,” if that makes sense. She then went on about how that fit was perfect and that it would stretch since it’s stretch wool. I was adamant that I felt uncomfortable and didn’t want to spend that kind of money on what seemed to me to be a poor-fitting cut.

    My question is multi-part, I suppose. First, does anyone else have this problem? Is it, as I suspect, just because these garments are cut for less-hippy women? Is this sales associate correct that the suit would actually stretch appropriately? Theory has always been a bit out of my reach, so I’m just not familiar with it. Thanks for any insight!

    1. That stretching is a sign that the garment is too small. You were right to size up to fit your widest area. Theory is definitely cut for straighter figures. For a poper fit you’d probably have o buy a larger size and alter h waist for a proper fit.

    2. Yes, I get them in the wrong clothes too. They’re called crotch whiskers. Size up and get it tailored. I also don’t wear Theory at all, and don’t wear pants as I have yet to find non-crotch whiskering trousers and don’t want to go through the trouble and expense of altering trousers. I wear Classiques, Elie Tahari (not the other Taharis), and Boss Black.

      1. It’s actually not quite the same effect as the “whiskers” (though I’m painfully familiar with those too). But I hadn’t thought about it being the same cause (duh moment).

        I actually think the model in the recently-featured Ann Taylor suit has a little bit of it going on. The best way I can think to describe it is as a “mound.” It might just be her stance, or maybe I’m imagining things. I’ve become hyper-aware of it after noticing it as a problem for myself.

        Thanks, all!

          1. Someone else posted here before with this same problem so you are not alone.

          2. My apologies for the recycled question! I haven’t quite mastered the search function on this site.

        2. My experience with Theory skirts is that they are designed for a no waist, no hip situation – pencil straight. When I get into their skirt size that fits my hips/legs, I could smuggle a ham in the waistband. Randomly, however, their sheath dresses don’t seem to have this problem, and their pants are fine, too.

    3. In answer to the first part of your question: pencil skirts don’t work for me either.

      1. What other kinds of skirts are there that go with suits? I’m similar in that pencil skirts aren’t great on me – but I can’t find any suits NOT with pencil skirts!

  25. I have made it to the next step in a job selection process for associate general counsel for a national nonprofit religious organization. I am required to submit written salary requirements that contain actual numbers. I am attempting to research this but the surveys and reports that I have actually found are from professional organizations and are content available to members only (even tried to join for $300 but I’m not in house yet so I don’t qualify). Can someone ball park an associate general counsel position at a nonprofit in the Midwest- large city but not Chicago? I have a gut feeling but want to articulate a basis for it.

    1. lawshucks dot com has a list – I don’t think the site has been updated for some time, but it should give you somewhere to start.

  26. Dress help, anyone? Mindy Kaling is on EW’s 10 best TV characters (from April 9th). I am dying over the beautiful fuscia dress she is wearing. Any ideas on where to find something similar? TIA!

  27. A quick thank you to whoever recommended Baggage Reclaim for those recovering from break-ups. There’s nothing more freeing than blocking your ex on Twitter and locking down your account, and it was BR that gave me the courage to get to that point (not to mention not respond to his e-mails) without worrying what he’d think of me …

    1. You’re welcome. I was the original poster, who recommended it to someone else, who recommended it to you (I think). It really helped me through some bad times and gain self-esteem.

  29. So–my mom and I don’t really get along. I think she’s super annoying (not as a mom, as a person. The world agrees with me.) We’ve never been close, all decisions she makes drive me insane, we have literally nothing in common. We’ve gone, oh, i don’t know, six months without talking before…and when we do, we have nothing to say. Now I”m pregnant, and she always emails me, telling her to call her so we can “catch up.” When I do, we have nothing to say- we either talk about the baby (which is always her subtly grousing about how SHE was a stay at home mom, couldn’t imagine it any other way, but I guess people have different priorities these days…could never have someone raising her babies…maybe we should build an in-law apartment for her). That will literally be the day both my husband and I die. This woman is last on our custody list, and she’s AFTER my sister with mental health issues (I think mom has some diagnosis ones as well).

    Do I just placate her with these calls, and make my pregnant self a stiff mock-tail to get through them? I should add…my dad and I (parents divorced) are close, I’m closer with my mom’s mom than I am with her… it’s just a personality thing. I’ve always maintained that she’s stuck as a 17 year old girl…and even as a teen, she was a 17 year old I wanted nothing to do with.

    1. Easy example: I live in Boston. After the bombing, she called and DID NOT EVEN MENTION IT. Just wanted to talk about her job. GAH!

    2. I only call my mom on her birthday and Mother’s Day, but we exchange daily e-mails. It’s the best way to communicate with her, because I can ignore (and not respond to) her inevitable religious or political rants. She loves getting daily e-mail, and that seems to keep her happy enough.

    3. I have no advice, just sympathy. Lots of women say that having kids brought them closer to their moms. In my case, it pushed us further apart, because my feelings about my kid were so different from what gets and been & I couldn’t deal with that. Small ray of hope is that after years of disagreeing with my parenting, she’s finally starting to be emotionally supportive.

    4. Annoyed Child – Regarding your mom, she’s probably realizing that your estranged relationship means that she won’t get to be the “grandma” that she pictured herself being. I can only advise strong boundaries – whihc may mean telling her outright that you and your partner don’t expect to have family memebers move in. Perhaps the daily emails suggested upthread would help, and just tell her you’re too tired to talk on the phone except every few months.

      Regarding the guardianship, please reconsider your sister and your mom and take them off your list entirely. Whe my kids were born, my sweet brother was married to a woman who I thought was mentally ill. She continually talked about the potential for hubby and me dying and that she (who was infertile) would be very happy to raise our kids. Gave me the creeps. So Hubby and I made our wills and named our guardians. I had a close co-worker swear that – if DH and I both were to die – that she would go to the judge or hearing or whatever and tell the judge that SIL was unfit to be a parent and that we expressly listed her as an unfit guardian in our wills for a reason. Anyway, this was a long-winded story to say that anyone with mental health problems shouldn’t be listed as a potential guardian. If you run out of suitable family members, look to friends. Much better than a narcissistic mother or mentally ill sister.

      And congratulations on the new baby!

      1. How do people here handle guardianship issues? There will be no “estate” when I go–less than $50K–so it doesn’t make sense for me to do a will and trust, but being a single mom, and knowing that a court’s first idea would be to send my kid to his dad, who is never in communication with us, even if I try to initiate, and then to my sisters, with whom there are lesser issues, I really want to find a way to get it down in writing that these friends are prepared to take him if there is ever a need. How do you do that without paying hundreds or over $1k for a will?

        1. A will is not that expensive to have prepared. That said, if it’s a will that just leaves everything to your kid and names a guardian, you can probably go on your state’s bar association website and find some resources/forms. The important thing for laypeople is making sure that the will is properly signed/witnessed/notarized according to your state’s requirements.

          But, if I were in your shoes, I would talk to an attorney about the guardianship matter to see if you can actually appoint someone to be your child’s guardian while the biological dad is alive.

          1. OK, so how do I find a good attorney? The 2 times in my life that I needed one, I’m convinced that I could’ve done much, much better.

          2. So it sounds like the ideal situation would be to find a lawyer who is very good at family law matters and is competent at estate planning matters (churning out a will with a designated guardian is *not* hard — you can get any legal assistant to fill in the blanks if you have a good form), or a law firm that handles both types of matters.

            I’m not a family law attorney so I don’t know if this is THE organization to go to for family law counsel (analogous with the American College of Trust & Estate Counsel), but from based on my google search, I would check the American Academy of Matrimonial Law’s website for their listings in your state. If you can’t afford the rates for someone on the AAML website, ask that person if they have any recommendations for someone in your area who maybe has a lower billable rate but still has a good reputation.

        2. You can get a much better deal than that, but more importantly, as a single parent, you need life insurance to provide for the care of your child should something happen to you. People may be willing to care for your child but taking that responsibility without any assistance is tough. You may want one person in charge of the day to day care, and someone else in charge of the money.

          I think we paid $500, and we got wills, POAs, trusts, Health care POAs etc… for both of us…

          1. +1000. This is really important and you should see what you can go without to put the money together to get it done. ALL parents need to prioritize their estate planning, but for single parents, it is especially true. We got all our paperwork done for $500. Not creating a legal plan of action for your child will more or less ensure he will end up with people you do not want taking care of him, if something happens to you. I also don’t know if you can bypass the bio-father’s rights – unless you can get him to relinquish parental rights, which has other consequences. This is all definitely stuff you need to talk to a lawyer about.

          2. I’m planning to report his dad as a tax cheat, because he’s been claiming us as dependents even though we live in another state & don’t see him even when we’re in his state. He’s done this a couple times. The deduction he gets is way more than the paltry “support” he pays (around $100/mo) I thought he’d given up all rights to the kid when we lived where child was born, but I’ve been told since then tha the doc from the court isn’t specific enough.
            How do I find a decent lawyer for a good price?

      2. My mom isn’t on our guardian list. I just meant in the grand scheme of “anyone in the world i’d want raising my child if DH and I died,” she’s on the bottom of people I’d consider. We haven’t asked anyone yet, but our order is: my dad (now single, lives near my single young brother), then DH’s parents (who are 10 and 16 years older than my dad, and live across the country, so this would only really be an option in the next few years while they’re still youngish), then my brother (theoretically, if my dad couldn’t do it, it’s because he’s too old…which would mean my brother is no longer 23!).
        After that is where it gets dicey–I’d like to ask my mom’s sister and husband (my aunt and uncle who are only late 40s, and couldn’t have kids. They own a nice family sized home in my old town, have decent income (we have mega life insurance, but it’s nice to know they were stable BEFORE), and would do a just fine job. I’m hoping we can ask them and put them on the list without my mom knowing, because it would destroy family politics.

        My mom isn’t financially stable now (so a sudden influx of children + big life insurance check may be mismanaged), and I don’t agree with her child-rearing tactics in the slightest. Nor do I think she’d raise my kid in line with my wishes, even if they were spelled out on paper.

      3. I can’t believe no one called out the statement that “anyone with mental health problems shouldn’t be on a guardianship list.” Really? All people with mental health problems are incapable of raising children? That’s absurd and so ableist.

    5. I could have typed a very similar email about my mom. Seriously. At the risk of outing myself, I always tell people that my mom is “Not a bad mom, just a bad person. I don’t want to be friends with her, even though I’m her daughter.” Anyway, we had a tense relationship (at best) before I had my child. And when I was pregnant, I was so worried about my toxic relationship with my mother that I was pretty upset when I found out I was having a girl. Thought about going to counseling for the issue, etc. I didn’t end up doing that, but maybe it’s a good idea for you? Might help sort through things. The psychologist I met with seemed to think this was definitely worth counseling (of course).

      Anyway, now that my daughter is here, my relationship with my mother is at least 10x better. I know the same thing happened for my sister when she had her child. There is something about having a child that makes you appreciate/tolerate your mother more. And, more importantly, the child gives you common ground to talk about so that every conversation isn’t each of you painfully annoying the other with things you don’t have in common. You just talk about sleep and poop and crawling and baby food.

      I will note that my mother and I did have it out once while I was pregnant about a parenting issue of mine that she disagreed with. At the end of the day, she calmed down and called me to apologize a few days later with the recognition that it was “my turn to parent and make the decisions.” Things have been pretty smooth since, and I think that blow-up was a necessary way to clear the air and set the boundaries. Of course, I can’t guarantee this will happen for you, but just a note of optimism that it Might Get Better.

      1. My relationship with my mother before I had kids was nonexistant. It wasn’t necessarily a “bad” relationship – I just felt like I had nothing to say to her ever, and I had been super close to my dad growing up. In fact, at the end of my freshman year, when I said my parents were coming to visit, my closest friend said “Is it your dad and stepmom or something?” – they honestly thought my parents were separated or my mother was dead because I talked about my dad all the time but never my mom. But once I became a mother, she just stepped up and helped me with all the things I didn’t even know to ask her to help for – taught me to breastfeed, drove me to doctors appointments, took care my baby so I could sleep, put food in my hands when I hadn’t even realized I was hungry, and talked me through making parenting decisions without ever telling me that what I was doing was right or wrong, just helped me find “my” way. And now I love and respect her so much, we are really good friends. Once we both became mothers and “equals” so much changed – I really do see her as a peer and I respect her opinion because she knows where I’m coming from, and now I understand why all the things she did when I was younger that I hated came from a place of love, and just trying to keep a balance of a roof over our heads, food on the table, and spending time with us.

        It may not happen for you, but for several of my friends who didn’t have great relationships with our mothers when we were younger – its all changed now that we’re both adults and mothers and more peers than authority figure vs child. And when I was at my breaking point because the baby hadn’t slept for more than 1 hour at a time in the past 60, my mom will understand like no one else and listened to me incoherently sob, then somehow swept in and made it all ok, with an army of aunts to help out too right behind her.

        1. How lucky you are to have such a great mom! She sounds a lot like the way I aspire to be as a mom.

  30. Is anyone else having trouble with Nordstrom’s site right now? I am experiencing general browsing problems, and I can’t move things out of my shopping cart. Just wondering if it is related to a recent install on my computer, or if the site itself is having reported problems. I did do a Google search, but didn’t find anything helpful (and some of the results pages slowed down my machine significantly, so please don’t try to replicate!). Is this just me or is anyone else having trouble?

    1. Did it get straightened out? I sincerely hope you’re in a different time zone, browsing Nordie’s at 7:30 Sat morning sounds like something’s going on that isn’t good. Hope that all gets worked out too.

  31. My birchbox came with a free subscription to Women’s Health Magazine and I have the option of getting it for the year or getting $10 back. I never read it and it always sounded kind of like a cheesy magazine about ab crunches to me. I am not diet and exercise obsessed. Actually, in my dream world I would never exercise and would subsist entirely on baguettes and brie. Is this magazine just going to just clutter my mailbox or is there good stuff in there?

    1. It’s by the same folks who write Men’s Health and I think the style is somewhat similar. I got it for a while and liked it because it had some good lifestyle articles and some recipes. The fitness material was also decent. It’s more substantive than Fitness magazine, but not as hard core as say Oxygen or Muscle and Fitness Hers.

    2. Check out their website – it’s a pretty good straight-across match for the content you’ll find in the magazine, so you should get a sense pretty quickly whether or not you’d read it. My guess is, though, that if you’re not super-interested in reading about various types of exercises/workouts, workout gear, and nutrition stuff, you’ll be further ahead with the $10.

    1. I don’t think Dillard’s does that. The only thing I ever get are 10% off coupons from my Dillard’s reward card, which is pretty lame.

  33. Does anyone have any recent experience using Nordstrom’s personal stylist program? I just got back to the U.S. after living in a developing country for the past two years and haven’t done any major shopping during that time. Would be grateful for any suggestions and am in the DC area if that matters. TIA!

    1. There are actually lots of posts (or at least a fair number of posts) on this subject on here. do a google search site:[this site] Norstrom’s stylist or possibly Pentagon, because if I remember correctly there were some very good reviews of one of the stylists at the Pentagon Mall. I haven’t used one of their stylists yet – but I get the impression that they can be helpful, but that you also have to have a strong backbone about what you do or don’t want.

      If you’re looking for any specific types of items, submit a question on my blog! I’m always looking for more topics.

    2. I used a stylist at pentagon city mall and had great results. She was very helpful and honest with me about what worked and what didn’t. I used one for a family member at the Columbia MD location and had a terrible experience.

    3. I highly recommend Candace at Tyson’s Corner. She helped me pick my wedding dress.

  34. It seem I work harder than anyone on my team (I lead the team), and harder than other lawyers at my level and a couple years more senior to me. I am consistently the first person into the office and the last one out, and the only person working on weekends. I don’t believe (although it’s possible) that I work longer hours because I’m slow – I take on more trials, take more client meetings, take time to train new staff and I try harder to produce work product that requires less correction by senior lawyers. I don’t believe I work longer hours because I have no life – I have a lovely husband that I would love to go on more dates with, out-of-town parents and sisters I would love to visit more on the weekend, hobbies I would like to enjoy more often, and awesome friends who are probably going to stop calling me soon.

    I’m proud of my good work. I’m also pretty tired and starting to get resentful. Am I sucker?

    1. How do you know the others are off enjoying their hobbies and getaways with their spouses?
      It’s entirely possible that they take work home with them, or spend hours every day while they’re obstensibly on vacation working.

    2. How do you know the others are off enjoying their hobbies and getaways with their spouses?
      It’s entirely possible that they take work home with them, or spend hours every day while they’re obstensibly on vacation working.

      1. Based on self-reports from other lawyers they are not working nights or weekends except very occasionally – although it’s possible they are not being honest.

        I know how much my team works because they report to me and I review their productivity/hours.

        1. And how are their hours? Are there several people falling short that could use more work being sent their way? Are you delegating enough? Or is everyone working at close to target and you are just really busy? There’s that saying that getting ahead in the practice of law is like a pie-eating contest where the prize is more pie.

    4. No, but (not to be mean) I think you’re a workaholic. It’s great to be proud of your work but take a hint from your coworkers – you’re arriving too early and staying too late; therefore, must have taken on too much work – or get a job that is more demanding so you can be working with people who have a work ethic like yours.

      1. +1

        It seems like you’re the outlier when it comes to firm culture re: hours and workload. If you don’t want to work that hard, it doesn’t sound like you have to. Maybe try dialing it back for a while and see how you like it!

    5. These all seem like choices you have made — you said you take on extra work, and you clearly derive a sense of purpose from your work. Unless you are experiencing a ton of pressure from superiors that you do not think your colleagues are getting, I don’t understand why you would label yourself as a sucker. You work a lot, and you prioritize work over other things. The only person who can change that is you.

    6. There’s no reason to resent your coworkers because you voluntarily take on more work than it seems you have to. Tired and want to spend time with your husband? Do it! Actually love being the first to arrive and the last to leave? Do it! This is your life and you make your own choices.

  35. I have a $10 coupon at Madewell that I’m not going to be able to use before it expires tomorrow, but thought someone here might want it. The code is MSP4393PL

  36. So I am a petite, usually size 2, and based on Everlane’s size charts, I ordered a small. It’s not figure-hugging, but I don’t think I’d want to size down because then buttons would be tight over the bust. And I don’t have a large bust. But the arms are long!

    Advice: Keep and only wear with sleeves rolled up? Or send it back?

    1. Consult with tailor about shortening sleeves and then decide? I wouldn’t keep a blouse I could wear only with sleeves rolled, but I might pay a bit to alter it.

  37. Ladies – I need advice on how not to worry. Just heard from my mom that after some bloodwork came back (they didn’t tell her with what) she needs to make an appointment for a CT scan “first thing Monday morning for sure.” I don’t know how not to panic and frantically Dr. Google.

  38. Ladies I need advice on how to keep calm and not panic. My mom went to the doctor earlier this week, some bloodwork came back Friday (they didn’t say with what) and they told her she needs to go in to get a CT scan “first thing Monday morning.” I am terrified but I know there’s no sense worrying until I know what there is to worry about – but I can’t stop Dr. Googling. Tips?

    1. Damn – both of those were me and I thought the first one hadn’t posted. Sorry!

      1. I’ve been dealing with health issues and am a googler myself, so I get this.

        Whatever is going on with your mom is already in play. Googling now will not make ANYTHING about the situation better. All it will do is make you more anxious, because really, google results never say “relax, it’s just a sliver.” If whatever is going on is Bad, all googling now will do is prolong the Bad Time. It started today instead of whenever you get the (potentially) bad CT results.

        Take a walk. Breathe deep. Call your best friend. Hug an animal or small child. Do whatever you can to feel connected to yourself and to this moment. If that is too hard, and you MUST do something to Be Ready For Bad News, get your laundry and errands done, house clean, bills paid, work projects in order, etc, so that you can drop and go to your mom’s side later if you want.

        Hugs.

    2. This is hella lot easier said than done, but try one or more of these:
      – attack a home project that involves either purging or cleaning (preferably scrubbing) and take out your emotions on this (just make it a small enough project that you don’t add to your distress by having to leave it half-done when you run out of time)
      – plan ahead: cook and freeze for yourself or your mom (if she’s local) or catch up on laundry or mending
      – exercise
      – sit down and read (or watch) something soothing and escapist
      – prayer doesn’t work for me, but ymmv
      – have a stash of soothing activities in case you have to deal with insomnia
      – ditto re getting yourself ready for work tonight tomorrow morning
      Good luck. I hope it turns out to be something very low-key and manageable. (spelling ok on that last word?)

    3. If it was me, I’d have a hard time focusing on anything not related to the person I was concerned about. Maybe you can spend a lot of time coming up with a great Mother’s Day present for her. When you call her tomorrow, try to focus on her fears and figuring out how you can help alleviate them.
      I hope you report back on what it was.

  39. … is having an amazing 25% off Friends & Fam sale. Code is on their website. If anyone’s been ogling a luxury item, now might be the time to pull that “add to cart” button. Happy shopping :)

  40. I’m sure this has been discussed to death, but what shoes would you wear with a navy pantsuit in the summer? Black patent? I just bought 2 new navy pantsuits, one solid and one pinstriped, and I rarely wear navy. The pinstriped is a dark navy with a grey stripe, and the solid is a slightly lighter color navy. I will likely wear a purple, green, light blue, or cream top with them. Maybe coral with the solid one.

    http://www.talbots.com/online/browse/product_details.jsp?id=prdi30541&rootCategory=cat70008&catId=cat80022&sortKey=Default&section=Regular&conceptIdUnderSale=cat70008

    and

    http://www.talbots.com/online/browse/product_details.jsp?id=prdi29430&rootCategory=cat70008&catId=cat80022&sortKey=Default&section=Regular&conceptIdUnderSale=cat70008

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