How to Use take/make a stab at in a Sentence

take/make a stab at

idiom
  • Every once in a while, take a stab at cleaning the inside of your air fryer.
    Clare Mulroy, USA TODAY, 4 Aug. 2022
  • Bottoms’ stars are all in their mid-to-late 20s, and the film doesn’t even take a stab at trying to age them down visually, but that kind of enhances the humor.
    Emma Specter, Vogue, 13 Mar. 2023
  • Bills that at least would begin to make a stab at it always seem to fail in the California State Legislature.
    Dallas News, 30 Aug. 2022
  • About a decade ago, their educations complete, the sisters decided to take a stab at a career in music.
    David Bauder, Star Tribune, 2 Mar. 2021
  • Devenanzio pairs up with longtime friend and fellow Challenge vet Nany González to take a stab at winning season 38's $1 million grand prize.
    Dana Rose Falcone, Peoplemag, 12 Oct. 2022
  • Tijuana isn’t the first government to take a stab at banning songs that glorify violence and drugs.
    Whitney Eulich, The Christian Science Monitor, 21 Dec. 2023
  • The extreme conservatives who did take a stab at condemning Dank Brandon could barely muster a reason to be angry.
    Miles Klee, Rolling Stone, 7 Oct. 2022
  • However, multiple directors and writers came and went throughout the process, with Miller even teaming with comic book scribe Grant Morrison to take a stab at a script.
    Aaron Couch, The Hollywood Reporter, 12 Feb. 2023
  • Her past doesn’t excuse her violent and negligent behavior, but does take a stab at explaining it.
    Anne Cohen, refinery29.com, 24 Nov. 2020
  • Losers can be elected as guessers who take a stab at identifying a roommate's famous family member.
    Erin Jensen, USA TODAY, 11 July 2022
  • This paper attempts to take a stab at peeling pack the veil and gaining a more fundamental understanding of the phenomenon.
    Razib Khan, Discover Magazine, 27 July 2010
  • To keep your feet on solid ground, here are some analog experiments—custom-designed for your zodiac sign—to take a stab at during this trying time period.
    The Astrotwins, ELLE, 1 Apr. 2023
  • Other top tips, which could double as new year’s resolutions: Make a plan to ask for a raise, replace eating out with meal prepping, investigate investment strategies, and take a stab at some no-spend days.
    Jane Thier, Fortune, 17 Jan. 2023
  • Knowing that Bernstein was dating Nora Ephron, whose parents were screenwriters, Woodward suggested that the couple take a stab at writing a screenplay themselves.
    Washington Post, 9 June 2022
  • Parker Posey wants to take a stab at another Scream movie despite her character's grisly — and seemingly pretty definitive — death in Scream 3.
    Jessica Wang, EW.com, 18 Apr. 2023
  • Perseverance will make a stab at that, but human rock hounds, capable of traveling far over difficult terrain, climbing, digging, doing delicate work and intuitively following up clues, can do that job vastly better.
    Robert Zubrin, Scientific American, 25 Mar. 2021

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'take/make a stab at.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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