Lisa Lombardi

Yes, we love them, but man, it’s everywhere.

From a new parent self-care move to a trick borrowed from puppies.

From dramatic onyx to the most calming neutral around, these are the colors we want to bookmark for our kids' spaces.

We sourced our pool of experienced parents for the buys that saved them over the years.

Last year, back-to-school felt more like back-to-schoolish. My younger son was fully remote (so, fully in his pajamas), while the older one started with a hybrid schedule so complicated I needed a whiteboard to attempt to keep track. In survival mode, we missed out on the rituals: the in-person backpack shopping, the running to Staples for one more yellow folder or glue stick.

This piece was created for Cubby, our weekly newsletter for families at home. Want more? Sign up here for a weekly splash of fun and good ideas for families with kids. One night before the pandemic, I picked up my middle-schooler at a friend’s house and saw an amazing sight: the friend’s brother was folding napkins and setting the table.Kids can do things! I thought. It was a moment of revelation.

What Cara Shultz misses most about her pre-pandemic routine isn’t the bars or parties: It’s the grocery shopping. After dropping off her 4-year-old son, Jack, at preschool, the New Jersey mom and YA author would often head to Trader Joe’s for a few essentials — and a sliver of peace. “They would play ‘80s Madonna and I would leisurely stroll the aisles, checking out the seasonal muffins,” Shultz says. “It was my ‘me time.

Last spring as the world shut down, I snapped up masks, Purell, and something expensive and seemingly frivolous: an outdoor sectional. I’m not kidding when I say that impulse purchase saved us. It got me through the long, lonely first months of quarantine, the worry about my kids’ emotional health, and the heartbreak when I suddenly lost my dad in early summer. It’s like we magically got a bonus room in our cramped house.