The Pomegranate

Stop Telling Young Parents to Enjoy Every Minute The good moments will linger. It's okay to forget the bad ones.

"'Enjoy every moment!' I said sarcastically to the dinosaur stuffies on the floor. “You’re gonna miss this!” (They did not respond, for they are not sentient.)" www.the-pom.com/p/stop-telli...

Stop Telling Young Parents to Enjoy Every Minute The good moments will linger. It's okay to forget the bad ones.

I wrote about how saying, "it goes so fast! You're gonna miss it!" and the like is unhelpful to new parents, and what I'm going to try to say instead. www.the-pom.com/p/stop-telli...

The Beach Is Magical All By Itself Let your kids find their own seashells.

My tirade against Instagrammers who do Beach Stuff for their kids continues

THIS: “…parents and kids can only thrive when we aren’t in a mode of constant scarcity…”

I’ve (gratefully) missed most of the ‘90s summer promos, but another reason I know it’s not possible is that Lynette Jennings & Aleene’s Creative Living aren’t on the air anymore. 📺

Wait Until the Kids Are Bigger to Travel It's worth the wait.

"What an incredible privilege it is to be able to travel with our children, I would repeat to myself over and over again every summer, as traffic jams, flight delays, motion sickness and just plain overstimulation led everyone in our family to tears." www.the-pom.com/p/wait-until...

Do the Hard Things In Public Give your community a chance to step up for you. They’re more willing to help than you might think.

"The woman seated across the plastic table was one of my own students in the Intro level class, and her children– older than mine by several years– ate their food like human beings, not shrieking warthogs. She smiled warmly at me, unfazed by the noise and mayhem." www.the-pom.com/p/do-the-har...

@thepom.bsky.social is my favorite when it showcases different opinions! Earlier this year @laureneahmed.bsky.social posted an almost completely opposite take, and having read this one I find that they both resonate. (More)

Wait Until the Kids Are Bigger to Travel It's worth the wait.

One of my favorite things about @thepom.bsky.social is that we aren't a hive mind; everyone has different perspectives, so we get great essays like Lauren's "I Love to Travel With Kids Who Are Too Young to Remember It" and @sarahradz.bsky.social's piece today. www.the-pom.com/p/wait-until...

Stop Trying to Make 90s Summer Happen Thirty years later, the world my kids live in is unrecognizable from the one of my youth.

"These 90s summers I so cherished hadn’t vanished because we’ve failed to see the value in rest, relaxation, and unstructured time. They’d simply ended because the world my kids live in is utterly unrecognizable from 1995." www.the-pom.com/p/stop-tryin...

I Don't Mind If My Kids Swear I think it's healthy.

"I like to think that by being open with all kinds of vocabulary with my kids, I've opened the door to communicate freely about other things, including the things I was always too embarrassed to talk to my family about when I was young."

www.the-pom.com/p/i-dont-min...

Stop Trying to Make 90s Summer Happen Thirty years later, the world my kids live in is unrecognizable from the one of my youth.

The summer Lauren describes from her childhood not only no longer exists, but was never supposed to be aspirational in the first place. Today at @thepom.bsky.social: www.the-pom.com/p/stop-tryin...

I couldn't agree with this more. Ugh, the idea of planting store-bought crap instead of teaching your kid to marvel in nature. They'll be chasing that fake thrill forever, when you could be setting them up to find perfect and imperfect wonder all around them. Naturally, for free, on their own.

Summer Camps Are Not Just Childcare (Guest Post) a guest essay by Shannon Sanders

Now that camp season is underway, boosting this post I guest-wrote for @thepom.bsky.social.

My house is filling up with space-themed crafts and kids’ hand-drawn anti-lanternfly propaganda. Everyone’s sleeping pretty great How’s it going in your house?

www.the-pom.com/p/summer-cam...

The Beach Is Magical All By Itself Let your kids find their own seashells.

"Let me tell you something about the ocean. Did you know that there is a shark that lives for 400 years? It’s called the Greenland shark and there are Greenland sharks that have been swimming around since the Pilgrims arrived in America." www.the-pom.com/p/the-beach-...

Great piece by @laureneahmed.bsky.social

"...we don’t need to curate a specific experience just because the temperatures outside are climbing... childhood is fun because it’s childhood, not because we spent it at the pool versus the YMCA day camp."
@thepom.bsky.social

We aren't taking pitches at this time but we will definitely let you know when we put out an open call! (And yeah... we hear you. 🤪😑)

Do the Hard Things In Public Give your community a chance to step up for you. They’re more willing to help than you might think.

Today at @thepom.bsky.social I wrote about struggling through non-kid-oriented events while my children are climbing on me, and why I'm determined to keep doing this. www.the-pom.com/p/do-the-har...

If you pay $7 you can read the article someone on the internet told me was ABUSIVE of my husband (although y one fair I do not think they paid the $7 to read the article)

I Want A Third Kid, But My Husband Doesn’t What now?

Last week, Lucy wrote about the possibility of having another kid-- and how she and her spouse feel about that, respectively-- for our paid subscribers. What do you do when the person you love doesn't quite see eye-to-eye with you on the size of your family? www.the-pom.com/p/i-want-a-t...

I love everything I read from the writers over at @thepom.bsky.social and boy do I wish I’d read things like this when my kids were little. Just refreshing in its common sense. Anyway, this piece really spoke to me—PLEASE feel free to correct my kids if needed!

Dad Humblebrags No big deal.

Not to brag but I'm celebrating the dads today on @thepom.bsky.social
www.the-pom.com/p/dad-humble...

We're getting ready to feature a new guest writer on The Pom tomorrow, just in time for Father's Day-- any guesses as to who's writing for us this month?

My Kids Don't Sleep, But Neither Did I I'm doing everything right. I promise, it's not me. ...Is it me?

My kids are tough, tough sleepers. I have tried everything (yes, including Consistency). I don't know where this inability to rest comes from. Except... maybe I do. I wrote about generational insomnia and the mom I want to be for @thepom.bsky.social today. www.the-pom.com/p/my-kids-do...

How I Used My Decade of Maternity Leave to Become a Published Author Let's talk about the gap in my resume.

I had a lot of anxiety about quitting my teaching job to stay home with my kids. Today for @thepom.bsky.social I wrote about how I slowly set up the building blocks for a writing career in tiny chunks of time I scraped together between diaper changes.
www.the-pom.com/p/how-i-used...

"Talking about your husband as an achievement robs everyone of autonomy and, more importantly, shifts accountability from the structural factors making families’ lives harder back onto the very same women most oppressed by this system." - Lauren Ahmed in @thepom.bsky.social

Someone Told the Trads About the Mental Load Talking about your husband as an achievement robs everyone of autonomy

ICYMI: editor @laureneahmed.bsky.social wrote a bonus piece over the weekend about the disturbing trend of relationship bragging in household labor discussions, and why this is not only insufferable, but dangerous. Read for free here: www.the-pom.com/p/someone-to...

My Pandemic Baby Is Turning Five Looking back on 2020.

My pandemic baby is turning 5, and this one goes out to my fellow 2020 parents, especially those who had babies born that Spring when things were so wild and unpredictable. We did it!

One of My Toddler Parenting Choices Has People Thinking I’ve Gone Mad. I’ll Stand By It Forever. I frontloaded so much annoyance for myself. The rewards were huge.

My article for @thepom.bsky.social got picked up by Slate! Love sharing a hot take with a wide audience, what could go wrong 😄
slate.com/life/2025/05...

My Pandemic Baby Is Turning Five Looking back on 2020.

Oh my gosh this essay by @clhubes.bsky.social for @thepom.bsky.social absolutely clutched me by the heart
www.the-pom.com/p/my-pandemi...

One of My Toddler Parenting Choices Has People Thinking I’ve Gone Mad. I’ll Stand By It Forever. I frontloaded so much annoyance for myself. The rewards were huge.

Our own @kristenmulrooney.bsky.social is published in @slate.com today! slate.com/life/2025/05...