The phrase, “where’s the beef?” has special meaning to me. My parents glow with pride as they recount stories of how, at the tender age of three, I would inhale a king-cut portion of prime rib and french fries, then look towards my father’s plate and steal his. One of my mother’s greatest fears in life is that she will Read More...

We live near protected wetlands, which has its positives and negatives. On the positive side, we’re surrounded by nature. On the negative side, well, we’re surrounded by nature. And specifically, apparently, by a coyote breeding ground. I was never properly educated on how to deal with wild animals – I grew up in Northern New Jersey, where the closest thing Read More...

Living in Massachusetts requires a person to make certain… “sacrifices”: the beaches are rocky, the sports fans are crazy, and, yes, the winters are long. A friend of mine from high school had given me a recipe for Spaghetti & Meatball “Stoup” (“thicker than soup, thinner than stew”) that quickly became one of my favorite go-to meals when it was Read More...

My daughter was never one for sleeping. Up until she was 20 months old, it was standard protocol for her to be awake every three hours, and the notion of “sleeping through the night” was a completely laughable theoretical concept to me. She finally started to get the hang of it around 24 months, and I think she’s been making Read More...

Let me start off this post by saying that I absolutely adore the B. Toys brand. We own – and love – a ton of their products, and the Battat Grocery Cart and B. Woofer Guitar easily make our “Top Five Best Toys” list. But one toy we are NOT a fan of is the B. Toys B.eauty Pops Snap Read More...

Everyone jokes about how the quarantine due to COVID-19 is making them crazy, but today, I actually saw hard evidence of this – in my backyard. We live in an apartment complex that shares a common front lawn. Most days, it’s filled with people playing ball, riding bikes, or walking dogs. But COVID-19 has obviously stopped all of this, and Read More...

I’ve never been a real fan of cooking. Even as a kid, my mom – who’s a phenomenal cook – would try to get me into the kitchen, but I just never had any interest. As a result, I also unsurprisingly never inherited any real skill either. When I became a mom, that interest level reached record lows. And it Read More...

Even before we all went into quarantine thanks to COVID-19, my mother was dying her own hair. She did this due to being both extremely cheap and extremely cautious, only using semi-permanent hair color that she believed would do her less harm than whatever a beauty salon would do. That all changed a few days ago. Let’s back up for Read More...

As I’ve mentioned before, my daughter’s pretty allergic to eggs. And as you’ve probably figured out by now, I’m pretty obsessed with dessert. This combination doesn’t usually mesh well, which typically leaves me really depressed and her really hungry. I found a recipe for vegan chocolate cake in an old issue of All Recipes magazine and have made it a Read More...

My daughter is pretty observant – a trait that she most definitely gets from her father and not me. And even though she’s not in school yet, COVID-19 has impacted her world in ways I never imagined. Take toilet paper, for instance. From the moment she started potty-training, B had a fascination with toilet paper. At first, we let her Read More...

I’ve finally come to the realization that there is no limit to the ways in which a parent can mess up his or her child. You can anticipate things all you want, but at the end of the day, your prevention of one problem comes at the expense of allowing another one to pop up and go unchecked. ** Disclaimer: Read More...

I can count the number of times we’ve left our house in the past month on one hand, and it’s starting to show. As you may recall from a previous post, we do all of our shopping for groceries online. And since my last post, it has become increasingly difficult to actually accomplish that goal. So when I manage to Read More...

Since my last article on grocery delivery options during COVID-19, the situation has gotten a lot worse. Time slots on Amazon Fresh and Whole Foods have become next-to-impossible to find, and if you’re the fortunate soul who actually DID see one become available, there’s still a good chance you’ll lose it during the checkout process. ** Disclaimer: article may include Read More...

As you know, we’re currently in the middle of COVID-19. Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you’re well-aware that we’ve all been given strict social distancing orders and aren’t supposed to leave our house. So naturally, if there’s ever going to be a flood fiasco in our apartment, it would absolutely happen now. Let me walk you through this. Read More...

Breakfasts were always a big deal to my husband. Personally, I’ve never been a fan, but he always had large morning meals as a child and it stayed with him into adulthood. Having a child who’s allergic to eggs has made breakfasts a little more difficult, but certainly not less entertaining. In fact, more times than not, it’s a comedy Read More...

Today, we reached Day 39,830,968 of quarantine thanks to COVID-19. OK, so maybe it hasn’t been quite that long, but it’s certainly felt that way and we’re all pretty much losing our minds over here. In an effort to hold onto the tiny shred of sanity we had left, we decided to actually LEAVE THE HOUSE on Saturday to go Read More...

One of the most frustrating things about recipes is how untrustworthy their serving sizes are. That’s especially true when it comes to desserts, though I’ll admit that my idea of an adequate quantity is drastically higher than what the USDA recommends. Either way, I had found this super-easy recipe for no-bake chocolate truffles a few years ago and love it Read More...

Out of all the toys we’ve ever owned, none of them frustrates me more than our Little Tikes “Perfect Fit” (hahaha) 4-in-1 Trike. My daughter received this when she was nine months old because it would supposedly “grow” with her and become a standalone bike with training wheels. It wasn’t cheap, but it seemed like a worthwhile investment. ** Disclaimer: Read More...

I’ve decided that one of the worst things about becoming a parent is that – just when you’ve finally gotten rid of all of the unnecessary people in your life – you now have to meet a whole NEW set of folks, most of which are totally weird and who you’d otherwise never want to associate with in any way. Read More...

Besides the obvious stir-crazy aspect of being stuck at home 24/7, the worst part of COVID-19 for us has (thankfully) been combating internal anxiety of not running out of food. While I’d like to say that running Mindless Mom is my full-time job (outside of being an ACTUAL mom), the reality is that I really spend far more time looking Read More...