Love to get unsolicited AI-generated parenting advice from the communication platform kiddo’s school district has invested in.

A few months after moving into our current home, we found ourselves needing to buy our own lawnmower for the first time. We learned that electric lawnmowers were a thing and figured that taking that route might be the most responsible thing to do from an environmental perspective, especially once we realized we could buy a string trimmer from the same company and use the same batteries for both. Both purchases have served us well, but our first battery didn’t last as long as we’d hoped, and with a second one currently on the fritz, I’m starting to suspect that the amount of e-waste that we’ve generated so far is outweighing any environmental benefit that we’ve created by not using gasoline to mow our lawns.

Kerbal Space Program has prepared me to answer kiddo questions about basic orbital mechanics, but she is (rightly!) more concerned with why there hasn’t been a woman on the moon yet.

Kiddo, while we’re listening to a “Curse of Strahd” actual play: “Would Castle Ravenloft be as scary if it were called Castle RAISINloft?”

I like what this movie is trying to be, but it’s so committed to gags, a breakneck pace, and a certain amount of self-defeating essentialism that I don’t think it ever gets there.

Ce n’est pas souvent qu’on tombe sur un livre en français en visitant la bibliothèque ici au Kentucky, et j’ai donc du emprunter celui-ci. On l’a lu ensemble en famille. C’est une jolie idée avec du joli art.

I didn’t grow up watching The Muppet Show, so I can’t say how it compares to the original, but it was a fun way to spend a “freak ice storm, school is cancelled” afternoon with kiddo. In fact, kiddo wants to start watching the original stuff, so maybe we’ll be comparing with the original after all!

Greenhalgh family dinner conversations: “You know, if you ignore the salmon and the mustard, this dish is practically pecan pie.”

Look, I know I’m always complaining about my university employer’s schedule being out of sync with local schools, but I want to point out the absurdity of it being easier to deal with kiddo’s school suddenly cancelling for snow because I’m on Spring Break.

Ce tome n’est pas moins mignon que les précédents, et il y a des cases qui nous ont bien fait rire ! Pourtant, alors que les trois premiers tomes ont été une seule trilogie bien conçue, ce tome ressemble plutôt aux suites qui arrivent après un succès médiatique, qui sont peut-être bons mais qui n’ont pas forcément la même qualité ou plan organisateur.

Après avoir fini les quatres tomes « Bergères guerrières », on revient maintenant à Brume, relisant le troisième tome avant de commencer le quatrième qu’on vient de recevoir.

On aime bien cette série dans notre famille ! Elle est mignonne, bien dessinée, et marrante.

Comment dire que j’ai tant aimé une bd qui a fait pleurer ma fille ? C’est vrai qu’il y a des moments tristes à la fin de cette série impressionnante, mais je suis content qu’il y ait des œuvres pour enfants qui osent ne pas tout résoudre. En plus, l’histoire continue à être intéressante et l’art jolie.

For the past three weeks, we’ve been doing “daddy translates a French kids’ comics series” at bedtimes. We just finished the last volume, and it did not end the way kiddo wanted, so we had a conversation about fanfic and fixfic.

Kiddo and I often play a little bit of Switch together right before or after dinner. Last night, she was humming what my spouse and I both thought was a nonsense melody that she was making up—but that immediately reminded both of us of the Romanian dance song Dragostea Din Tei as featured in the classic internet meme Numa Numa.

It turned out that kiddo was humming Dragostea Din Tei—the adults had both forgotten that a version (or sample? I dunno) of the song features in Mitchells vs. the Machines, but she’d watched it recently on her own, and that’s what she had in her mind when singing during Switch time.

All parents should introduce their kids to D&D so that all parents can hear their kids say things like “I don’t think it’s worth it to have the spider fall in love with me.”

Cette série continue à être jolie et intéressante. J’ai déjà dit combien je trouve l’histoire innovante (alors que des contes d’aventure pour enfant, il y en a des milliers qui se ressemblent), mais je le répète ici.

Local schools have been out for so long that I occasionally forget that they have had class since winter break.

I don’t think a kid’s version of the show can compete with the sweary semi-sadism of the original, but I’m glad there was a series I could use to introduce a currently-too-young-for-all-that kiddo to the concept. Plus, the kids were cute and funny and most of the tasks genuinely enjoyable to watch.

J’aime beaucoup le dessin dans cette série. Le scénario est fort intéressant, lui aussi, mais il y tant d’histoires de ce genre qui se ressemblent toutes, et je suis content de combien ce monde imaginé ne leur ressemble pas du tout au niveau visuel.

One of the best things I’ve done recently in terms of feeling good about myself as a parent is draw my attention to how often I “show up” as a parent rather than insist on evaluating “how I do” when I show up. (This reflection brought to you by two weeks of snow days).

One of our favorite Eurovision 2024 songs was Finland’s “No Rules!” When tomorrow was announced as our tenth snow day in a row, spouse decided to Weird Al it as “No School!”

Kiddo got excited when the number 67 came up in the D&D actual play podcast we’re listening to. I thought at first that it was a “six seven” joke, but it turns out she liked that it sounded like 6d7.

Mon épouse s’intéresse à cette série depuis un an, et on a donc commandé le coffret complet en faisant notre grande commande de livres français il y a quelques semaines. C’est une histoire intéressante, j’aime bien l’art, et ça fait rire notre fille.

Kiddo has decided that she can get away with ignoring requests so long as it’s because she’s reading something. The most annoying part of it is that she’s right that we’ll grant a lot of latitude for that in particular.

Kiddo objected to my using the word “enshittification” in a family conversation just now—not because it contains a swear, but because it was too complicated a vocabulary word.