Dear Wide Awake on the Wasatch Front,

My roommate is a pretty light sleeper, and the thing that he does is have white noise playing on a speaker. He just uses a box fan noise like this one that plays for two hours as he's falling asleep and into the night, though I looked on Spotify and they have other sounds and fan noises, so you can check whatever works best for you. If you wanted, you could do that or just use an actual fan (which is what I use to fall asleep to). If limiting light helps, you could get a sleep mask or something similar so that light and sound are muffled. My dad also suggested try sleeping cold or hot and see if that affects it. Our body likes to sleep cool, so it might help to have a consistent temperature of your room.

You could also look at ways to improve your sleep hygiene as well (this link or look up other ways), which will help your body regulate and prepare for sleep.

Best of luck!

Inklings

Dear Sleepy,

I don't have any suggestions for sleeping more deeply, but if the trouble is the earbuds, I can certainly recommend these sleep headphones. They're not the most fashionable accessory out there, but they have been life-changing for me!! I have a hard time falling asleep unless I'm listening to a podcast or something, and these make it much more comfortable :)

Sincerely,

Cerulean

Dear G.A.,

I'm really excited to show Carl Jr. ALLLLL the Disney movies. But we're holding off on TV until he's two (or if I'm dying when I'm pregnant again during the first trimester.)

• Anastasia
• Beauty and the Beast
• Coco (genealogist dream movie)
• Emperor's New Grove
• Hercules
• Lion King + sequels
• Moana
• Monsters Inc + prequel
• Mulan
• Oliver and Company
• Robin Hood
• Sword and the Stone
• Tangled
• The Incredibles + sequel
• Toy Story + sequels
• UP
• Zootopia

• Disneyland (a given)
• California to visit my parents
• The zoo (he's now obsessed with animals [especially birds] and tries to find them every time we go outside)
• Taking him to Bear Lake again this summer (he loves the water)
• Other temple grounds to walk on and explore (he loves the water features of the Bountiful Temple)
• Snowbird (again) this summer so he appreciate the mountains
• my mission state so he learn what the South is really all about!

I've already read many many books to Carl Jr., but his favorite books are the ones with flaps in them. I hope our local library gets the "See Spot" books with flaps in them. They only have one right now! I'm excited for him to get into Harry Potter and the Hunger Games. But right now we're doing "1000 Books Before Kindergarten." I think we started actually counting sometime in early March(?) and now we're at 418. (as of 4/24) But I know we read him well over 1000 books before he turned one. Some of his favorite books are:

• Chicka Chicka Boom Boom (but not Chicka Chicka 1, 2, 3, that book is crap) 
• Brown Bear, Brown Bear
• Hand Hand Finger Thumb
• I Love You Stinky Face
• Love Block (flap book)
• Noahs Ark (flap book)
• any book he can bite without us noticing

I think one of the experiences that I really can't wait to do with Carl Jr. is how to do family history. It's weird since he's only 15 months and I can't really think super ahead. But teaching him who he's named after is something I'm really excited about. I can't wait until he gets to learn how to do family history and that he'll be more excited to go to the temple and do baptisms for the people he found. I feel like him doing family history is going to protect him from the fiery darts of the adversary in this crazy world of ours. 

"Do you young people want a sure way to eliminate the influence of the adversary in your life? Immerse yourself in searching for your ancestors, prepare their names for the sacred vicarious ordinances available in the temple, and then go to the temple to stand as proxy for them to receive the ordinances of baptism and the gift of the Holy Ghost. As you grow older, you will be able to participate in receiving the other ordinances as well. I can think of no greater protection from the influence of the adversary in your life.” - Richard G. Scott (source)

-Goldie Rose

Dear Grandma,

I am so excited for ALL the things! My nieces are 1, 3 & 6 and they are so cute and I love everything about them! I can’t wait to have my own kids. Every time they visit I just want my own kids so so bad!

I am so excited to buy baby clothes in the future. I am going to buy so many baby clothes. I'm also so excited to play all the games. Hide & go seek, tag, hopscotch, jump rope, dress up etc.

Mostly I am just so excited to have daughters because my nieces are perfect.

Peace,

Tipperary

Dear Granny,

I haven't really planned out things to do with any potential children with one notable exception: math (this is literally the only thing I've truly thought about pertaining to future kids). Any children of mine are going to get lessons on set theory before they even start kindergarten. They shall be introduced to the beautiful art of mathematics, and encouraged to explore their creativity and have fun with it! It is seriously my pipe dream to be teaching my kids calculus (or network theory, or knot theory, or whatever other branch tickles their fancy) while they're still in elementary school. 

The reason why I get excited about this is because math is so cool, fun, and beautiful, but often those aspects of it get lost in school. I want to introduce math to my kids in a way that shows them how amazing it is and allows them to expand their overall horizons. To be clear, I wouldn't expect them to go into math--it's the exact same principle for Harry Potter, or cooking, or games; it's not like sharing your love of something means you pressure your child to incorporate it into their career. Regardless of how much my kids do or do not want to pursue math professionally, I want it to be there to add joy and wonder to their lives. 

~Anathema

Dear "My, what a big attic you have!",

I have so many books that I want to share with my kids. I'm a big fan of kid's books in general. I think my favorite children's books that I'm excited to share with them are Blueberries for Sal, Dinner at the Panda Palace, Because a Little Bug Went Ka-CHOO!, Tacky the Penguin, 4 Pups and a Worm, The Monster at the End of this Book. I'm also definitely excited to share my favorite children's authors with them (Roald Dahl, Shel Silverstein, Dr. Seuss, and Bill Watterson). I've linked the videos here instead of just the copies of the books so that you can enjoy them too! The only one I wasn't able to find a video for was a slightly more obscure one Who Will Be My Pet?. Even on Google, it has the right picture, but the wrong summary. It's about a boy who keeps buying animals that keep running away. I'm sure there are many more books I'll be excited to share, but these are some of my favorites.

-Inklings

Dear Grandma,

I'm not sure whether I want children or whether I'll have the chance to have them, given my slow descent into spinsterhood, but I can't wait for my siblings to have kids so I can be the fun aunt!

Of course, with children that aren't mine, I may not get to be the one to introduce them to my favorite books, movies, etc. But one of my aunts didn't have any children when I was growing up, and I have many fond memories of time spent with her. We would have board game nights and Disneyland trips and Jamba Juice outings, and as the second of four children, it felt so important to me to occasionally have time with her just to myself, and to feel spoiled and special. My bond with her was wonderful.

So assuming I don't have kids someday, I would love to play that role with any nieces and nephews I might have. In particular I'd like to be the fun Disney aunt, sending them toys and taking them to the parks.

Love,

Luciana

Dear friend, 

Okay, so I actually think about this ALL the time. 

Pebble and I are both really academic people who dreamed about being professors and raising little genius babies. While we may not end up on that career path, I still think we're very invested in creating some bright little kidlings. Anathema's answer made me laugh and reminded me of Pebble. He learned about mathematician Paul Erdos, and found out he used to call his students 'epsilons'... so Pebble has committed to call our children epsilons. That's pretty cute. He thinks his kids are going to know how to calculate limits by the 5th grade, and he may just be dedicated enough to make it happen. I'm a little more interested in raising kids who are intersectional feminists and can argue the pros and cons of structural functionalism and conflict theory, and know the names of important women and people of color in world history. 

In pursuit of our dream of genius babies, we plan to stock a good family library and read to our children constantly. I actually have a really long list on Amazon called my "Baby Bookshelf" where I save every book I want to buy my children. I was an avid reader as a kid. At one point, I told my mom I had nothing left to read, and she took every age-appropriate (or slightly older) book off the shelf and asked me if I had read it, and I could honestly say I had read every book on the shelf. Reading to your kids is SO IMPORTANT for their development, and I am really excited for it! Obviously we have to start them off with some of the cute kids classics - my favorites include: 

Click Clack Moo, Cows that Type  (tbh love this book it's so quirky and hilarious)

ALLLL the Curious George Books (we can talk about the problematic colonizer narrative later, the monkey is cute darn it!) 

Stand Tall Molly Lou Melon (my grandma gifted me this as a kid and I just love it so much)

Love You Forever (a classic and always makes me cry)

Then I also have books like Antiracist Baby, Baby University collection, 50 Fearless Women Who Made American History, and Little Leaders: Bold Women in Black History. 

I also really want to foster a loving, supportive, and open relationship with my kids. I want to have kids who are as emotionally intelligent as they are cognitively intelligent. It's really important to me that I teach them to communicate their feelings, be kind and compassionate toward others, and be proactive and independent learners and workers. This is the part that I think will be the most difficult and will require a lot of learning and flexibility and patience on my part. Every child is different, so I don't really have a plan how to do this yet. But it's an important goal for me. I want my kids to be the ones who stick up for others at the playground, hang out with those who need friends, and know their worth. 

We also really want to be an adventurous family! Pebble is obsessed with fishing (like, OBSESSED) and talks about using those baby backpack carriers and taking his babies out to fish and "learn the ways of the river." I'd rather they don't get a hook in their tiny ears, but I'm down with the idea of being outdoorsy with kids. My dad took us hiking growing up all the time and I want to continue that for my kids. Definitely think I want to take them to all of the national parks in Utah for sure. I've had a dream of having a National Parks bucket list and hitting all of them in my lifetime. That's a LOT to do, but technically possible with a few road trips. 

Anyway, I'm probably one of those people that talks about parenting without actually having kids or knowing exactly what it's like, but I have a decent amount of kid-caring experience. With all of my fancy goals I've discussed, I think one of the things I'm into right now that could help me achieve them is Montessori parenting and education. I don't particularly care to be a by-the-book Montessori parent, but I think a lot of the principles are really great, particularly the way it supports autonomy and independence in kids. 

I am excited to be a parent and watch the growth and development of brand new people from start to finish. I think it is an amazing privilege to be a parent, and while I'm selfishly interested in the ways it will make me a better person, I just feel like I want to love and teach my own children. There's a bond there that I think is really beautiful, and while pregnancy and birth sounds like literal hell to me, I can't wait to have kids that I can talk to, teach, and help them grow into people that can go on to make their own mark on the world. Is it not just the coolest thing to be able to literally create life and - given the privileges and stability I have been blessed with - nurture it? 

I love infants, I love little kids, I even really like teenagers (and I learned a LOT in my adolescent development class). I hope I will be a good mom. 

Cheers, 

Guesthouse

Dear Señor Frowg,

You know I can. But you also do not know what you're in store for. A note for the reader: I do know the person who asked this question, so hopefully these frogs are not too unsolicited from you. I have another friend who I send all frog posts to, since they love frogs. I also have recently also joined this Frogspotting Facebook page, so I have since found a lot of nice pictures. All of the pictures below are either from this page or from some Instagram pages (sited).

My favoribbit things are: 

This webseries about Frog and Toad in quarantine, and obviously the Frog and Toad books.

This ballet. (I cannot describe it, you just need to watch it.)

"Life of a Phrog" is a nice little animated mocumentary about frogs.

The same guy made another nice little story about frog friends. A lot of his videos are frog-raletd. Here is his channel, which actually has a good bit of nice frog content.

Here are some frog videos:

https://www.instagram.com/p/COYrK4NFevt/

https://www.instagram.com/p/CNpL9VoFLjF/

https://www.instagram.com/p/CNVw4J9lMsQ/

https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=151712553496827

And now, the pictures/memes:

(this is an actual blanket that you can buy for $150, and similar blankets and things, link below)

(not technically frogs but close enough, this artist does a lot of cool stuff)

For the sources, I decided to list the sources rather than link them, so here are the Instagram sources (in approximate order of frog activity):

Lots of frogs:

https://www.instagram.com/frog.lov/

https://www.instagram.com/turnthefrogsgay/

https://www.instagram.com/doot_doodles/

A few frogs:

https://www.instagram.com/aniimade/ (this is where the videos come from, though they just repost and site other people's comics)

https://www.instagram.com/thenighthermit/

https://www.instagram.com/_wholesomewhore/

https://www.instagram.com/strikegentlyco/ (This is the shop that you can buy things like "War of the Frogs" blanket

Here is their shop: https://www.strikegently.co/search?q=frog

https://www.instagram.com/aniimade/ (though they just repost other people's comics)

https://www.instagram.com/annalaura_art/

https://www.instagram.com/ohmyannabethh/

https://www.instagram.com/underdonecomics/

https://www.instagram.com/petmemes_daily/

Not very often frogs:

https://www.instagram.com/ominouspositivitymemes/

https://www.instagram.com/a_human_bean_/

https://www.instagram.com/geeky_or_nerdy/

https://www.instagram.com/p/CMFzGa7r1_I/

https://www.instagram.com/tarantxla/

https://www.instagram.com/memeformathematicians/

https://www.instagram.com/silenabaeregard/

https://www.instagram.com/dainty.bagels/

https://www.instagram.com/thestonedstarfish/

https://www.instagram.com/habbenink/ (this is the page of an illustator and professor at BYU)

Zelda and Pikachu (this channel contains a lot of nice little Zelda art)

https://www.instagram.com/lady_tea/

Yes, I know this was quite a lot, but I hope it made you hoppy.

To the reader, if you are interested in more frog content, I would suggest following those pages (especially joining the Facebook group), or shoot me an email and I can send you the good frog things.

-Inklings