Family Looking Up: Recent Episodes
Family Looking Up
We're about all things family and home. If you're a mom, and on the verge of jumping off the dryer or overdosing on Diet Dr. Pepper, visit us weekly for some laughter and hope. Learn from our fails and the successes of others. Motherhood is the busiest, messiest, worst paying job that we love...most of the time. We want you to know you're doing better than you think. When life gets you down, know that your family is looking up!
After almost five years, it is time for us to say goodbye. We have loved our time together with Family Looking Up and are sad to say goodbye. In this episode we laugh about all the behind the scenes funny moments and talk about the great journey these last five years have been for us! Thanks for listening and supporting us and being a part of our mom squad!
Join us as we walk down memory lane for the past 5 years recounting stories and moments we have shared together.
It's Valentines week and we are sharing our favorite Valentine ideas. What has worked and what we want to try. We laugh about the ridiculousness of the holiday and share how we make the day special for our kids.
Big things are happening for us in 2023. In today's episode we laugh at the goals that are working for us, and discuss our lastest trends in intermittent fasting and sourdough bread making.
I don't know about you, but we need a vacation with a capital V! As mom's of lots of kids, wives, and ultimately just girls, we talk about girl trips, couple trips, and family trips. We share our favorite places, favorite memories, and do a little 'outside the box' thinking of how to make it special.
If you're in the mood for some inspiration on fun times in YOUR future, this is the episode for you! Enjoy!
Jenedy Paige joins us today to discuss how she overcame adversity through God when she lost her son to drowning. It's an inspirational story that will leave you feeling inspired.
Join us for this fun episode where we each get brave and share our most unpopular opinions. No worries, nothing heavy here. Just a lot of laughter!
Join us as we talk with the one and only Brooke Romney about how to teach our family manners without all the drama! Plus hear about our newest favorites in Christmas movies!
Our complete holiday gift guide is here! Listen in as we talk about every age and stage.
Linda McGurk, one of our favorite return guests is back! She is sharing more of her Swedish culture, this time about a concept known as Friluftsliv. She has written a book about it and is here to teach us about how outside activities can bring us peace and contentment.
Linda McGurk, one of our favorite return guests is back! She is sharing more of her Swedish culture, this time about a concept known as Friluftsliv. She has written a book about it and is here to teach us about how outside activities can bring us peace and contentment.
We're excited to bring you a fascinating episode from Jessica Downs, a clinician who specializes in EMDR Therapy. In this episode she teaches about Polyvagal Theory and how it can help each of us understand the cues our body is giving us to find more peace and happiness in our day to day lives. Enjoy!
We're excited to bring you a fascinating episode from Jessica Downs, a clinician who specializes in EMDR Therapy. In this episode she teaches about Polyvagal Theory and how it can help each of us understand the cues our body is giving us to find more peace and happiness in our day to day lives. Enjoy!
Lisa Valentine Clark, host of The Lisa Show, actor and comedian joins us this week as we discuss how to prioritize kids when life throws you curve balls. Lisa is the mother of five who's husband died in 2020 of ALS. She gave some incredible advice on ways that each of us can be the mom we want to be even when life doesn't play fair. Enjoy!
Join us this week for a HUGE announcement and a hillarious conversation about halloween plans and our own mom fails of times we didn't mean to be a witch! Enjoy!
Join Us this week as we explore ways that we connect with our kids. We talk about what connection is and isn't and how easy it can be. Like all things, we usually make it harder than it needs to be. Mom's are genius at having mom guilt over things they are actually doing just fine at. This episode will ease the guilt, make you laugh, and inspire new ideas for your family!
They may sound like two totally separate and things, but they are actually connected! Stay tuned to hear how!
Join us for a continuation of last week's back to school episode where we discuss routines, homework, and laugh until it hurts!
With the beginning of school comes the beginning of routines, chores, hopes and dreams! Join us as we talk and laugh about our ideas, families, struggles and successes on this episode of Family Looking Up!
On this episode of Family Looking Up, we are chatting with Richard and Linda Eyre all about Grandparenting and a new course they are getting ready to launch. However, don't be fooled by the title, there is so much in here for parents as well! We loved our discussion and hope that you do as well.
On this episode of Family Looking Up, we are chatting with Richard and Linda Eyre all about Grandparenting and a new course they are getting ready to launch. However, don't be fooled by the title, there is so much in here for parents as well! We loved our discussion and hope that you do as well.
Summer is finally through and we are back! In this episode we talk about what our summers looked like, things we learned and things we are looking forward to! We hope you enjoy!
In this fantastic episode of Family Looking Up, we explore the four types of parenting styles with Dr. Amy Stoeber (a licensed psychologist, trainer and parenting consultant). Dr Stoeber outlines the four types of styles and gives tips and insights on how we can become more well rounded in whatever type we naturally gravitate toward.
Trey and Lea Morgan have been married for 33 years. They run the Instagram site @stronger_marrriages and travel the country strengthening families one couple at a time.
Today they are talking with us about 6 underrated tips for strengthening and sustaining a happy marriage. Listen in for fantastic ideas that are doable, down to earth, and proven to strengthen relationships!
This week's episode is one that we are thrilled to release for you! Linda McGurk is the author of "There's No Such Thing as Bad Weather: A Scandinavian Mom's Secrets for Raising Healthy, Resilient, and Confident Kids". This book was not only eye opening, but exciting and astounding! We hope you love this interview with this Swedish mom of two and acclaimed author.
This is an excellent episode from one of our podcasting friends, JoAnn Crohn of No Guilt Mom. Not only is JoAnn a mom, but she also taught school and knows a thing or two about helping kids make friends. In this episode she talks about her newest book "Me and My Friendships". She is equally delightful and down to earth. We hope you enjoy!
Our guest this week is a mother of 6 and a life coach on a mission to help teens and tweens to embrace confidence and self love so that when hard times come, they will be ready. We hope you enjoy this episode and end it feeling empowered to help your child as well!
Jerry Kolber, producer of National Geographic's series "Brain Games" and current podcast host of "Who Smarted," talks about three ways to make learning more fun and easier for moms.
Happy summer Mom-Squad! We're dropping one of our fav re-releases from years past that is sure to make your week. We hope summer is going well for you and hope that you enjoy this listen!
Jenny Layton (professional organizer) and (actual) mother, joined us long ago to tackle how to get organized for summer. There is never a better time to take this one on than now! Summer is upon us moms! It's GO TIME! We. Must. Get. Organized. Or. Die!!!!!
Recently, the three of us have been discussing how often we are surprised by kids manners (or lack thereof). It occurred to us (in horror) that it was incredibly possible that other parents may be shocked by our kids manners. We decided it was time to discuss the issue of manners and what happened to them in our world. We brainstorm, discuss, laugh, and come up with a game plan for how we are using this summer to bring back MANNERS! We hope you enjoy!
Dawn Madsen, also known as The Minimal Mom, blew us away with her ideas on why we should even WANT to minimize (I was sure I wouldn't agree. Wrong again!) Second, how to even get started. Lastly, she got specific about 3 ways to simplify/store toys. Brilliant! It changed some integral ways that I was viewing toys and helped our homes forever!
This one is a must listen for moms!
One of our favorite guests, Kam Price from @Our Family Passport is with us today! Kam always comes loaded with such fantastic knowledge that will save you thousands and make travel this summer possible. Enjoy this episode, take notes and get on with the dreaming!
Join us this week for a fun episode with just the three of us talking about the day today fun things (as well as functional things) that we want to do with our kids to make great memories this summer. In this episode we brainstorm ways to hold off insanity while trying to enjoy the best parts of summer! Enjoy!
Our guests are parents of 5 kids and are here to give great tips and tricks to making family travel possible at every income. If you are ready to make memories this summer but just don't know how to afford it and actually enjoy it with all those kiddos, then this is the episode for you! Enjoy!
You're in for a treat this week with guest Miranda Anderson @livefreemiranda joining us to talk about finding happiness and adventure in your life (no matter the stage). This is a fun interview that is perfect to listen to as summer is beginning! We loved Miranda and know you will too!
It's Mother's Day this week and you know what that means! It's our favorite season of laughter! Years ago we decided that the greatest gift we could give all the moms out there was a good 'ol dose of non-perfection, knee-slapping, slightly-peeing LAUGHTER! So, instead of feeling guilty this mothers day that you are human, sit back and listen to these brave sister mothers share their funniest mom fails!
Our guest, Joya Van Der Laan is a Family Nurse Practitioner, a Functional Medicine Specialist, and an autism mom. She is joining us this week to discuss helping parents of autistic children. She discusses three main areas that all parents can focus on:
-
Food as medicine (can be helpful or hurtful)
-
Targeted, individualized, and Intentional supplementation
-
Knowledge and curiosity is key
She also points parents toward many free resources!
All parents have had the moment when their child tells a super obvious lie (because they're not good at it.. at ALL) and they wonder "has my child turned into a liar?? Is this the fast track to rebellion??? Juvenile detention, here we come!" The truth is that all kids go through a lying phase. Most don't end up in the clink because of it. However, nipping the lying in the bud is really important. Our guest, Kimball Lewis is the CEO of Empowering Parents and is here to share 3 easy things parents can do to keep the lying at bay! Enjoy!
If the thought of summer coming and kids being home all day, fills you with impending doom about The number of child / parent hostage negotiations that take place day in and day out, then this is the episode for you! listen in as the three of us discuss our new ideas for summer negotiations coming up, how to keep control of a hostage takeover, and how to love the time that we have to be together this summer!
We have an incredible episode this week with author Michaleen Doucleff. In Hunt, Gather, Parent, Doucleff sets out with her three-year-old daughter in tow to learn and practice parenting strategies from families in three of the world’s most venerable communities: Maya families in Mexico, Inuit families above the Arctic Circle, and Hadzabe families in Tanzania. She sees that these cultures don’t have the same problems with children that Western parents do. Most strikingly, parents build a relationship with young children that is vastly different from the one many Western parents develop - it’s built on cooperation instead of control, trust instead of fear, and personalized needs instead of standardized development milestones.
Our good friend and fellow podcaster, Hillary Hess, joins us this week to discuss connecting to our kids through cooking. We touch opon getting kids ready to go to college, nutrition, and meal planning at every ability level. This is an episode you won't want to miss!
This week Nina Cruz teaches how to better communicate and relate to our children as we reflect on our own parenting styles. She teaches the value of conscious parenting and how to implent it in our home.
This week we talk all about connection. Our two fabulous guests, Hollie Henderson and Josh Brazier talk about the importance of connection in our families, road blocks to connecton, and how we can improve our interactions with our kids. It is a great episode for all ages.
For this spring release, we talk traditions that center on kids birthdays, Valentines, and St. Patricks Day. It's one of the things we love to talk about since all of us have different ideas on how much or how little to do.
Dana K. White of "A Slob Comes Clean" is with us today! Dana has come on once before, and has remained in our memory of one of the funniest guests we have had!
Dana, a self confessed former slob, is brilliant at translating organization for the brains of the unorganized SO THAT WE CAN UNDERSTAND! She's genius, fun, and funny! Enjoy!
You know we each love books, so between the three of us we go through our fair share! On this episode we discuss our latest reads - all the good and all the bad. We do a lot of laughing and hope you can laugh along with us.
One of our favorite guests, Kathi Lipp, joins us for this episode discussing the importance of creating a space for God in our lives. Kathi talks through the things that keep us from doing so and how to overcome them in easy reachable steps. We hope you find this episode to be a helpful and hopeful message!
Parents never set out on their parenting journey with the goal of making man babies that take from, rather than give to, the world as a whole. We all want to raise little boys into good men who know how to treat others and leave the world a better place than they found it. Bethany Jett is a mom of boys who knows a thing or two about how to raise boys to be good men. We loved her and hope you enjoy this episode!
The "Sandwich Generation" is a term given to middle-aged adults (often in their 40s and 50s) who are caring for both elderly parents and their own children. Being a caregiver to both parent and child brings creates a juggling act with its own set of struggles. Our guest today not only lived this reality herself, but now counsels those who are currently dancing this particular dance. This is an episode filled with personal stories, wisdom and empathy. We hope you will enjoy!
We are thrilled to welcome back Dr. William Stixrud and Ned Johnson, to discuss their new book “What Do You Say? How to Talk with Kids to Build Motivation, Stress Tolerance, and a Happy Home” . These authors always have incredible insights backed by science that helps parents to understand, better, how to communicate with their child. We hope you enjoy!
This weeks interview was SO energizing and inspiring! Chanelle is an author, a health and life coach, and a mom and wife who is with us this week to talk about the power that our mornings CAN have. We were full of questions and excited by the answers that she shared with us! We hope that you love this episode and find as much inspiration in it as we did!
Sunny Lawrence, wife of James “the Iron Cowboy” Lawrence is with us this week. James completed 100 triathlons in 100 days. To achieve this incredible feat, James needed a wife willing to do hard things alongside him. Sunny is sharing ideas with us to help us achieve our goals, no matter how big they seem. Enjoy!
For most women, guests coming for the holidays, means a full-on panic attack. The sirens (aka moms voice) wails as martial law is declared upon the household until the house looks like the cover of a “Better Homes And Gardens” Magazine.
Today we have Dana White of “A Slob Comes Clean” with us to give us Non-U.M. (Non Unicorn Mom) tips to get our houses back after holiday guests.
Dana shared 10 very easy and practical steps that we can take for cleaning for the holidays. To hear what those steps are, click on the link above to listen to the interview. The greatest of slobs will come away from this fun interview feeling that they have hope rather than a sinking feeling that they may just need to burn down the house.
Join us as we have a fun and lively conversation reviewing the books we read in 2021. We cover all the must reads as well as must not's. AND we hope you have a wonderful Christmas!
Motherhood and chaos are so deeply linked that often we think they are inseparable. Our guest this week is Heather Steinker. Heather is one of the few human beings put on this earth with what we like to call "chaos common sense". Heather is an expert at finding ways to multi task common duties to bring some control and order to our everyday chaos.
Have a listen and let us know what resonated with you!
We love to join you for the yearly Christmas episode! On this episode we talk traditions, our thoughts about the season in 2021, and how we are going to try to make it more meaningful. Most of all, we want to say a great big THANK YOU to you, our Mom Squad! Here's to another Christmas together!
One thing that most parents would all agree on is the importance of helping our kids to make the best kind of friends and to learn to be a good friend. I know that it is something that the three of us have all been concerned with!
JoAnn Crohn, podcaster, M.ED. Educator, mom, and friend of ours has recently written a fantastic book called "Me and My Friendships: A Friendship Book for Kids".
This is a must listen for all parents. We love JoAnn and we love the message of this book. In an age when sarcasm and meanness is glorified in media, in politics, and on social media, this book and the principles of kindness, listening to others, and empathy are a welcome change! We hope you enjoy.
It's here Mom Squad!! The Christmas season is upon us and we are thrilled to bring you our 2021 Gift Guide! These are products for every member of your family that we have either recently discovered or tried and true favorites of ours. This is a lighthearted conversation we hope you enjoy!
We are thrilled to bring you our good friend Whitney Archibald for this special episode on Thanksgiving! Whitney is the host of the "How She Moms" podcast. This week she shares SO MANY fantastic ideas parents can implement to teach gratitude and to feel more gratitude. So many of her ideas were things we had never thought of and have already started implementing in our own homes. Whitney is the mom to 5 and is full of creativity and has a special talent for gathering others ideas as well. We hope you truly love this episode...maybe you're even going to be grateful for it 😂😂😂. Enjoy!
It's just the three of us this week sharing hilarious experiences, thoughts on the HappyHallowThankMas 2021 experience, old traditions we can't wait for and new ones we are excited to implement. We hope you enjoy!
Have you ever felt like you aren't doing much in your mom life? Jamie Ivey, author, host of "The Happy Hour With Jamie Ivey, wife and mom is here to dispel that notion. Jamie is vibrant and real and puts a new spin on some incredibly important life mom facts.
Are you struggling to know how to best help your kids to enjoy rather than just suffer through school? Aimee Buckley has some terrific strategies to help parents whose kids are just struggling to make it through the dreaded nightly homework and other demands of school. With a wealth of personal and professional experience she offers some doable tips to help parents everywhere!
The host of the Fancy Free podcast, a podcast about sharing our embarrassing stories and laughing at ourselves together, is with us today! Joanne Jarrett is fun encompassed and came on our show this week to talk about how to find your people through laughter. Have a listen and a laugh while folding laundry, driving kids, or running!
Join us this week as we think back on our own wedding day successes and disasters. We landed on this topic as we discussed how one of our own kids are actually tying the knot! It is a fun- filled look back at our own wedding days as well as a contemplative discussion of what we hope to better handle for our own kids than we did for ourselves. Enjoy!
Any parent who has a child struggling with bedwetting knows how helpless and frustrating it can be. Dr Steve Hodges has discovered what he believes is the cause behind bedwetting (and you will never guess what it is)! In his practice he has cured many bedwetters and met with us this week to discuss his findings. This is a fascinating episode you won't want to miss!
On this episode of the family looking up podcast, we talk with Bill Brady. Bill was a founder of the Gabb wireless cell phone and has just started a new family friendly phone called Troomi. Bill talks with us about how parents can embrace technology while helping their kids stay safe. This was a fantastic interview you won't want to miss!
Mom Squad, this is a must listen! We had such a fantastic time talking with the fabulous, down to earth, hilarious Jammie Baker. She was incredibly uplifting and informative. This listen will inspire you to be the best you!
Join us this week as we talk with Sophie Brickman about her new book looking at the latest findings on which technical advances help and which hurt our journey as parents as well as our kids journeys through this life.
Join us this week as we celebrate our 200th episode! It's just the three of us answering our Fab Four Questions among so many other things!
Our fantastic guest this week, Dr. L. Carol Scott, spoke to us about the deep connection our early childhood development has on our present relationships. She was incredibly knowledgeable, referred to fascinating studies, cited her own personal childhood, and was incredibly hopeful. We loved our discussion with her and count her as one of our most fascinating interviews to date. We hope you enjoy!
Most married couples have struggled - at one time or another - to keep date night alive and, well, fun. Often times date night ends up as the trip to the grocery store, or some other wholly UN-fun task that really just needs to get done. Brandon Porter is joining us this week to share tips and tricks that he and his wife have employed to overcome the most common obstacles that couples face. Listen in this week for some good laughs, creative ideas, and helpful information that can help resuscitate date night at your home!
We choose our favorites during the year to re- release for summer. This one was top notch! Lynn Jimenez walks us through the tough decision of when parents should intervene and when they should let things play out. Enjoy!
Mom's around the world feel the burnout that comes from summertime cooking exhaustion. Our guest this week is full of fresh and easy ideas to give new life to our summer kitchens again!
This week's episode is one that we are thrilled to release for you! Linda McGurk is the author of "There's No Such Thing as Bad Weather: A Scandinavian Mom's Secrets for Raising Healthy, Resilient, and Confident Kids". This book was not only eye opening, but exciting and astounding! We hope you love this interview with this Swedish mom of two and acclaimed author.
At the core, every parent aims to raise a child that can self-motivate and can fly once they are old enough to leave home. No parent wants to raise a child that is either so full of anxiety that they can't bear to leave home or a child that is so apathetic to life in general that their biggest concern is their status in Fort Night.
Dr. William Stixrud and Ned Johnson are with us this week discussing their book "The Self Driven Child" and the research behind it. It is a fascinating and compelling discussion that we hope you enjoy!
We're so excited to have this weeks guest, @christidaviscoaching on the podcast talking all about how we can build better relationships with our teenagers. We can't wait for you to listen to this one. We love teens, and we love the tips Christi shared with us!
We also threw in a bunch of great book recommendations and a bunch of laughs, so make sure to tune in! Happy listening!
Join us this week as we talk with professor Tammy Hill about how mom's can find their passion in this life by finding their why.
No mom in the history of forever went into summer with the goal of loosing her sanity. Explain why then, so many come out the other end without any sanity left and both eyes twitching? We have 15 kids between the three of us and have usually all lost our sanity by the end as well. BUT! That doesn't stop us from earnestly believing that MAYBE this will be our year!😂
In this episode, we talk about what has helped in the past and what game plan we are each praying will work this summer! Enjoy!
In this week's episode, the three of us talk about the biggest parenting struggle we are each experiencing. We were all SHOCKED that each of us chose the exact same thing! Tune in to find out what our biggest struggle is to date and some ideas that we have for helping it.
Has COVID upped the gaming time spent in your home? If so, you are in good company! Most parents in the world are fretting now that summer is beginning about how to wean kids off of screens and out the door.
Jason and Lisa Frost, the creators of "Wired Humans" joined us this week to discuss 3 Tips To Conquer Gaming Addictions. It's an episode we loved and hope you will love as well!
Who's ready to travel?!? If you're like us, you're always trying to balance travel with kids. Most of the time, parents decide that traveling long distances from home and bringing children along are two things that DON'T belong together.
Kaitlyn Jain is with us this week to show that kids and travel not only can belong together, but that they can be deeply enjoyable. Kaitlyn and her husband started traveling with their kids when their first was only a few months old and they haven't stopped since!
Summer is coming faster than we can believe, and with it comes more adventure and more risk of injury. We are all about having adventures with our kids and we believe that knowledge is power. The better we understand the risk, the better we can prevent serious injuries.
Shannon Tripp talked with us in this episode about how to prevent the top 5 injuries that lead to kids ending up in the E.R.
Shannon is full of enthusiasm for educating moms and giving them the power to know what to do in a scary situation. We loved this episode and hope you will as well!
Happy Mothers Day Mom Squad! As mom's, we decided that the best gift we could possibly give to moms around the world is laughter. This is a guilt free zone where all moms can relate and laugh at the hilarity that is, so often, motherhood! Grab a snack and enjoy a good laugh! You deserve it!
Mom rage is something that many, if not most, moms deal with (to some degree) in their motherhood journey. One thing that I have found through interviewing so many parents is that everyone - without exception - has one emotion or another that they wish they could contain better. That emotion may be frustration, sadness, anxiety, rage, or any number of feelings.
Natalie Hixson, a mom who knows what its like to deal with mom rage, is with us this week teaching us how to properly deal with negative emotion and burnout and learn to be the happy moms our families need.
One of the topics we are asked to talk about the most is what to do when parents disagree with each other on how to parent. Kimball Lewis, CEO of Empowering Parents is with us this week talking about how parents (married or divorced) can find common ground when there seems to be none. He teaches some incredible lessons on how to find your way forward and co-parent kids -- even when those kids are going through tough times.
Trey and Lea Morgan have been married for 33 years. They run the Instagram site @Stronger_Marriages and travel the country strengthening families one couple at a time.
Today they are talking with us about 6 underrated tips for strengthening and sustaining a happy marriage. Listen in for fantastic ideas that are doable, down to earth, and proven to strengthen relationships!
Anyone who has brought a baby home knows that there are so many adjustments that must be made -- despite the fact that most of them rarely get discussed.
Catherine O'Brien is a Psychologist and Therapist who is shining a light on the importance of discussing those adjustments and focusing on how to keep mom, dad, and marriage strong and healthy in the process. She helps moms find peace and calm.
Living in a society that values perfection, it can be easy to slip into a mindset of feeling constantly inadequate. This inadequacy ultimately leads to feeling hatred toward our bodies. Julie Newbry is a mom, a wife, and a coach that has dealt with feelings such as these and offers tools to help others with the same struggles. If you sometimes feel like your body or your thoughts are your worst enemy, this episode will give you fantastic tools to turn that mindset around to help you start to see things in a different light.
Are you going crazy trying to get your kids to eat? Maybe eating isn't the problem, but eating good things is. Wherever you are at in your parenting struggles with kids and food, this episode is incredibly insightful and helpful!
Amy Palanjian is an expert at helping families find an easier way to enjoy wholesome, delicious meals together. Previously, Amy has worked as the Lifestyle director of FamilyFun magazine, and as a food editor with Better Homes and Gardens. Today, Amy is the founder of Yummy Toddler Food.
In this episode with just the three hosts, we explore our best tips on raising independent (non hobo, basement living) kids. We laugh, talk about the things we've learned along the way, and ... well...laugh! We hope you enjoy!
This interview with the CEO of Empowering Parents, Kimball Lewis, is a must listen. Empowering Parents is a company focused on providing content information based on child defiant issues.
So many parents are dealing with major behavioral issues of kids ranging from ages 5-25.
Kimball focused on discipline tactics, consequences that are effective, and communication that makes an actual difference.
This weeks episode is a follow up to last weeks episode. Both episodes focus on addiction recovery from two different standpoints. The first was from the standpoint of a teenager who dealt with porn addiction and was able to recover and find healing. This week we are talking to Tiffany Vincent, a mother who helped her son through drug addiction. Tiffany has recently written a book about her journey in an effort to help other parents in the same situation.
No parent ever wants to deal with their child becoming addicted. Unfortunately, in the world that we live in, addiction is becoming more and more commonplace.
Ashlee Ayre is 18. She has dealt with and overcome addiction. She shares with us how "the good girl" can easily fall into addiction. She shares the warning signs and red flags that parents can look for. Most importantly, she shares what parents can do if they see their child becoming addicted. This was a powerful interview that EVERY parents should listen to.
Being a caregiver to family members is a huge undertaking, and one that affects thousands upon thousands of people in our communities. Whether you are a caregiver yourself, are looking at the possibility of becoming one in the future, or just want to learn more to support caregivers around you, this episode is packed full of information and insight.
Our guest, Aaron Blight, is an international speaker and consultant on caregiving, aging, and healthcare. He is the Founder of Caregiving Kinetics and has been recognized as a “Top 100 Healthcare Leader” by the International Forum on Advancements in Healthcare.
In a continuation of last weeks' fun episode of personal goals, this week the hosts talk about marriage goals for 2021. They mix the serious in with fun banter and hilarious moments. Enjoy!
In this episode the three hosts talk personal goals for 2021. It is full of humor, silliness, contemplative thoughts, stealing each others goals and SO much more!
If you're in the mood for a good laugh, tune in and enjoy!
We love teens and all of the energy they can bring! Our guest this week is Evgeniya Andrianova who, like us, sees potential in teens. She has written a book aimed at helping teens discover their potential and do more than dream - actually make the world a better place!
Evgeniya is originally from Siberia, but has lived in many countries around the world. She has spent most of her adult life working in the corporate world, and has translated the strategies she learned there into steps for helping teens achieve their dreams. She is fascinating and we love her message!
Mindfulness is a buzzword that we all hear about, but how many really know what it is, why it's important, and how on earth the everyday mom is supposed to achieve it whilst juggling baseball, PTA, and dance class!
If you feel frazzled (after the most frazzling year imaginable), listen in to hear Hunter describe why mindfulness is so much more than just a buzzword.
What does motherhood look like for you? Do you feel like you have had opportunities to prepare for the challenges coming at you now? Are you struggling with a part of motherhood that you just don't know how to fix?
Meet Diana Ballard, host of the Mom Training Podcast, who's on a mission to equip moms with the tools, strategies, and support they need to be the mom they want to be. Listen in for a fantastic discussion!
Stacy Taniguchi took several years to build his list of 100 goals. His list began as a teenager, while living in his native Hawaii, inspired by life magazine's motto: “To see the world, things dangerous to come to, to see behind walls, draw closer, to find each other and to feel."
Stacy decided that he didn't want to simply exist. He wanted to thrive. Throughout his life he steadily worked toward those 100 goals until recently accomplishing the last of them.
If you are interested in being inspired to thrive in your life, we know this episode will fit the bill. Enjoy!
I don't know a better person in the world to talk about setting and fulfilling goals than an olympic medalist. This episode is a treat! Noelle Pikus Pace, Silver medalist in the 2014 Olympics, wife, mother of 4, and one down-to-earth-momma is with us today! She talks about identifying your dreams, finding a way to accomplish them, and actually doing it. We loved this interview and know you will too! Get ready for some serious inspiration as we head into 2021!
A very merry Christmas to you all! In this episode, we tell some great stories, talk about Christmas Covid style, laugh a lot, and feel all the feels. We hope you'll join us!
For the past 40 years, Denmark has been considered the happiest country in the world. That's pretty impressive, especially considering the United States doesn't usually make it into the top 20.
Our interview this week is with Jessica Joelle Alexander, author of the Bestselling book, The Danish Way of Parenting: What the Happiest People in the World Know About Raising Confident, Capable Kids.
This interview with Jessica was SO GOOD! There is so much to learn from Jessica and how the Danes parent. From the importance of letting our children play, reframing difficult situations, teaching empathy, to experiencing Hygge, this episode is packed full of so many good parenting gems.
If you feel like you'd love to add more meaning to the Christmas season, then this week's episode is what you're looking for! "Christmas Jars", written by Jason F. Wright, has sold more than half a million copies worldwide and was a New York Times best-selling novel. The film was produced by Muse and BYUtv and was released in theaters in November 2019.
In this episode, Jason visits with us about the incredible experiences he has had, as well as countless others, with their own Christmas Jars. He talks about how powerful it is to give selflessly and how we can each incorporate Christmas Jars into our families traditions!
This is our Christmas gift guide part 2!! In last weeks episode we went over the best classic gifts (the ones that are built to LAST) that we've ever given our kids. In this weeks we focus on fantastic gifts for friends, neighbors, spouses and, of course, for you!!
It's one you won't want to miss!
One thing that all parents hate is to finally think of a great gift, only to have their child lay it aside 10 minutes later (never to pick it up again) OR to have it break before Christmas day is over! We've all been there....many times!
In this episode the three of us put our heads together to think of the best classic gifts we have ever given that are built to LAST and that have held our kids attention for YEARS!
This is an episode you won't want to miss!
It's the time of year when all parents wonder if they are actually teaching their kids to have more gratitude. We all certainly hope that we are!
Adriane Thompson of the amazing blog "Raising Kids With Purpose" is with us this week talking about 10 really fantastic ways to create a more grateful home.
We hope you find inspiration that will bless your home!
Mom Squad, we have such an amazing episode for you this week! Potty training is the #1 most asked for topic from our listeners. We have searched for over a year for an absolutely fantastic expert to talk with us about the world of potty training. We were elated when Monica Ferrie, co founder of "Toilet Training Educators" agreed to talk with us!
Between the three of our co-hosts, we have successfully potty trained 14 kids. But we were BLOWN AWAY by Monica's knowledge and insights. Honestly, this is the best help on potty training we have ever heard! Enjoy!!
It seems (to most parents) a dream within a dream, but is it really possible to get kids to do their homework without all the drama? According to our guest JoAnn Crohn, it is!
JoAnn is a mom, a former teacher, the founder of NoGuiltMom.com, and author of the book "Drama Free Homework".
JoAnn helps moms find happiness and use the most effective parenting techniques. We are thrilled to have her join us this week so she can share the classified intel!!
If you are looking for great books, movies, television, or music to be entertained by then look no further! In this episode we divulge all the entertainment that has been getting us through 2020 and all the reasons why we love them in this Mega Media Madness episode!!
Can two words be more perfectly matched than “sleep tips” and “desperate mother”? I have never uttered more fervent prayers to God than in the moments between 1am and 5am as I was trying to put a baby back to sleep.
Tara Williams, founder of Dreamland Baby, talks with us about sleep tips and about creating a safe sleep experience for babies. She covers the ABC's of Safe Sleep as well as other tips from the American Academy of Pediatrics.
In this fantastic episode of Family Looking Up, we explore the four types of parenting styles with Dr. Amy Stroeber (a licensed psychologist, trainer and parenting consultant). Dr Stroeber outlines the four types of styles and gives tips and insights on how we can become more well rounded in whatever type we naturally gravitate toward.
Don't we all want to create more resilience and sense of belonging in our children? Today our guest, Lisa Lisson, talks to us about how using our family history can help our kids overcome hardships and gain a better understanding of who they are.
Lisa is the author of the blog, Are you My Cousin. In this episode, she describes how to start researching our family history and fun ways for our kids to get involved.
It's an episode full of laughter that we bring you this week! We talk about all sorts of interesting and funny things that everyone can live without knowing...just not happily😂😂
Join us in a good laugh with some Diet Dr. Pepper!
For many parents, having a good nights sleep is a thing of the past... or is it?
Christine Lawler is a licensed Marriage and Family Therapist as well as the founder and owner of the sleep consulting company, "The Peaceful Sleeper".
Christine believes that good sleep is essential to happiness. She makes it her goal to take the overwhelm in being a mom away and bring back the magic that is motherhood!
We are in disbelief that we are approaching our third anniversary as a podcast! This year, one of the big things we would like to implement is using questions from our listeners to determine better which experts we have on the show.
This episode is answering a fantastic question from one of our Mom Squad named Anna Varli. Anna is a mom of 2 kids and struggles with something all parents do: wondering when to step in during kids squabbles and when to back off.
Lynn Jiminez is our expert for this week. Lynn is a mental health therapist and the owner of Connect. Flow. Grow. She teaches parents and children techniques to better connect and bring less contention into the home.
With the 2020 school year upon us, many moms are taking on something they never intended or expected: Homeschool!
For those of us who are new to the world of homeschool, buckle up! There are so many amazing resources and perks available to us that we probably never knew about. Alternatively, sometimes the sheer number of choices of things such as curriculum, schedule, and implementation methods is overwhelming.
Jen is a pro at homeschooling and is here to take the overwhelm away and replace it with excitement!
We are SO excited to be back with new episodes this week! We're leading off with a fantastic interview with Ceri Payne; a mom, a business owner, a former teacher who is helping us to know how to move our goals and businesses forward during this uncertain time when many of us have kids home and under our feet.
Join us for new stories, laughs and insights!
Lindsay Nielson from @thelindsayreport visits with us today about the mental game of this life. Dealing with frustration, disappointment, chronic illness, and mundane tasks are a part of our life experience. Lindsay identifies 6 key phrases that we can use as we live the path we are on that will help to keep putting one foot in front of the other and enjoy the life God has given us! (Originally aired as episode 97).
Mornings, after school, and bedtime--- these are by far the hardest times for moms to navigate. Help is here, Mom Squad! On today's show we bring you one of our favorite mom helpers out there: Whitney Archibald from “How She Moms” (www.howshemoms.com). If you are not familiar with her website, then just know that your life just got better. Whitney's motto, on the website, is “Different moms solving the same problems.” The premise is that all parents have the same problems we are trying to solve, so why not look at each other's ideas as potential solutions for our own? Whitney came on Family Looking Up to talk about her blog post “Routine Experimentation” which delved into different moms’ ideas on how to deal with morning, after school, and bedtime routines. One thing that I loved about this interview was that the ideas covered a wide spectrum of what works for different kinds of moms. If you are a “by-the-book-no-frills” kind of mom, we've got you covered. If you're a “snuggly-huggy-lovey-dovey” kind of mom, we've got you covered. If you're somewhere in between bear-hugs and high-fives we’ve STILL got you covered!
Whitney described figuring out what kind of routine works for you as “mom detective work”. Look at problematic areas in your day to day routines with your kids and start trying to solve those problems by implementing different routine ideas to see if they help. So many of Whitney's ideas were pure genius! Our very favorite idea solves the never-ending mom problem of sorting socks and having socks that never have matches! She implemented a terrific “sock dispenser” that she keeps in each child's cubby in the mud room. Listen in to hear the full description of how she makes this brilliant little contraption work! Here's a visual to give you PVC pipe envy:
Listen in for so many more genius ideas! In addition to all of that terrific material, listen to hear Beth, Andrea and Camille talk about skinny girl problems... it's actually more like Camille and Beth throwing Andrea under the bus because of our insane jealousy of her metabolism. If you haven't figured it out by now, Andrea is a SAINT for what she lets Camille and Beth say! And most of all, you do not want to miss Whitney telling us about her brilliant Mom Fail, which she calls, “Street Pizza”! It’s one of the best I've ever heard!
Liz Edmunds, author of two books and star of the TV show, "The Food Nanny", visited with us today about the quickly disappearing tradition of family dinner. She shared her enthusiasm for her mission to bring it back to families across the world and explained why it’s worth fighting for. Her passion, heart, and down to earth attitude make this an episode you won't want to miss!
(Note this episode originally aired as episode 12 back in 2017)
In this episode, the three of us take it easy and just let the conversation roll! Some of the things we covered were:
Weird things we do when we get older, things we have learned about ourselves from COVID, embracing our changing bodies, and so much more! Join us for friends chat!
Nicholeen Peck is a mom of four and a well know speaker on the topic of teaching children self government. In her words, self government consists of "being able to determine the cause and effect as it relates to your own actions and behaviors".
In this episode she talks with us about steps we can implement to effectively communicate with our kids. We hope it's an episode you will enjoy!
We've talked a lot about the perfectionistic world that we live in and parent in. This is one of our favorite episodes on parenting and on not allowing the perfection perceived in society to dictate how we see our kids.
We hope you enjoy this witty and fantastic interview with the spectacular Jill Savage!
Why is allowing emotion important? Well, the answer lies in the idea that there is a difference between pain and suffering. When we learn to allow emotion, rather than spiraling thoughts we are able to experience the pain of situations without the suffering aspects.
Join us this week as we talk with EmyLee McIntyre about how to train our brains to feel the emotion without allowing the spiraling that leads to more suffering.
I don't know about you, but we need a vacation with a capital V! As mom's of lots of kids, wives, and ultimately just girls, we talk about girl trips, couple trips, and family trips. We share our favorite places, favorite memories, and do a little 'outside the box' thinking of how to make it special.
If you're in the mood for some inspiration on fun times in YOUR future, this is the episode for you! Enjoy!
All parents have one similar problem: too much to do in too little time. Is there any parent among us that feels like they have this completely under their belt? I think not.
Time mapping is a tool that can help parents to accomplish what matters most.
Join us with our guest Lisa Andersen as we learn all about time mapping and how it can help each of us!
There is power in feeling gratitude. Studies have shown that your brain releases serotonin and dopamine when gratitude is felt, which leads to an immediate sense of happiness.
Nancy Davis Kho, a freelance writer, podcaster and author took this idea of gratitude to a whole new level. Instead of just feeling gratitude she decided to express it. There is even more power in expressing gratitude to others.
We hope you enjoy this funny and uplifting episode and find more gratitude and happiness in the process!
We are big fans of personality profiles. We have found many of them to be an insightful look into our own motivations as well as those of the people closest to us. Not only does understanding that help us to be kinder to ourselves, but it also helps us to be kinder to those around us. One of our favorite resources is Gretchen Rubin's book "The Four Tendencies: The Indispensable Personality Profiles That Reveal How to Make Your Life Better (and Other People's Lives Better, Too)"
In this episode Beth, Andrea and I (Camille) explore this book, rate ourselves, and (hopefully) shed a little insight to those listening as well. Enjoy!
Positive parenting skills are definitely something that most parents would like to incorporate...unless that means that mom is super positive and kids are holy terrors. "Not so!" Says our guest Stephanie Creighton. Stephanie began this interview by assuring listeners that
- Positive parenting is NOT perfect parenting.
2. Positive parenting is NOT permissive parenting.
It is developing skills to create a relationship of mutual respect that leads to more positivity and peace. If this is something that you are interested in then listen in for 10 steps to help you become more positive in your parenting.
Every human was made to be attached to other human beings. Attachment Theory describes the bond between parent and child that influences subsequent behaviors and feelings in that child's life.
Valerie Hamaker is with us this week discussing attachment theory. She talks about the attachment categories, how we can help our kids attach well, and what we can do with those children who didn't attach well in the beginning.
Alan Gratz is a New York Times Best Selling Author. He has authored a number of books, including Samurai Shortstop, which was named one of the ALA's 2007 Top Ten Best Books for Young Adults, and The Brooklyn Nine, which was among Booklist's Top Ten Sports Books and Top Ten Historical Books for Youth in 2010. A native of Knoxville, Tennessee, Alan is now a full-time writer living in western North Carolina with his wife and daughter.
In this episode we talk with him about his books, his insights into children and young adult literature, and how parents can encourage reading. We hope you enjoy this fantastic episode!!
All marriages have their up's and down's. Dr. Lynyetta Willis is with us this week talking about the down's and how to get them back on an upward path. She refers to these "down" times as "stable misery". In this episode she walks us through 5 steps for turning "stable misery" into joy again.
Lynyetta is full of energy and insight. We hope you love this episode!
Happy Mothers Day Mom Squad!!! We wanted to bring you the gift of laughter this mothers day so we called on our Mom Squad to bring in the funny, and boy did they!
Caution: This episode should not be listened to with a full bladder, while running in public, or while using knives in the kitchen (or anywhere else for that matter). Enjoy!!!!
Did the COVID-19 pandemic affect your financial well being? It did for millions across the globe. Ericka Young, from Tailor-Made Budgets is with us this week talking us through the most important financial steps we should be taking right now to shore up our financial defenses.
So how are you actually doing? We have all made it to the last week of April in quarantine and each of us are dealing with the isolation in our own ways. The three of us join up in this episode to talk about how we are each coping and NOT coping. We talk about what things we are learning, what things we have no desire to learn about any more, and what things we will always be grateful for.
Stay tuned for some laughs and some serious relatability!
Are you so over the idea of a quarantine? Yasss! Well, it's a slow death for all the extroverts out there. How about using this time to lay the groundwork for a killer come back party when all this ends?!
Darcy Case is with us this week. Darcy is the definition of a party host that slays it every time. She has some on fleek tips for making YOUR party snatched! (That means really good) 🎉 🎊
When our children act out the one thing parents aren't likely to do in the moment is to simply listen. At that point parents have usually reached their boiling point and time out, yelling, and a loud list of consequences are likely the punishments of choice to end the situation.
Patty Wipfler is a mother as well as the founder of a non-profit organization called "Hand in Hand Parenting". She is with us this week teaching about the powerful tool of simply listening. In this episode she discusses her book "Listen: Five Simple Tools to Meet Your Everyday Parenting Challenges".
During this stressful time of quarantine it's more important than ever to find ways to get outside as a family. John Muir Laws has spent his career helping kids to do just that. He's with us this week to talk about the amazing effects nature has on children. Tune in for inspiration, fantastic ideas of how you can help your kids, and a good laugh. We hope you enjoy!
If you feel like you are living a hectic and harried life, full of pressures to be things you aren't, then this episode will speak to you! Too often parents are pulled in too many different directions. Trying to live up to the persona we think we should be, or even just want to be, is exhausting. This episode gives you permission to decide that being you is enough, and gives you the tools to say "no" to things that are imposed and "yes" to things that actually have value.
If you are done with feeling anxiety over COVID-19 (or anything else in your life) and you just need a good laugh, then this is the episode for you!
We decided that what mom's need most right now is just to laugh so hard they cry. During this episode of Family Looking Up we play the game "Table Topics" and laugh until it hurts!
We hope you laugh with us!
Randa Canter is a mother of 5 amazing kids, one of which, Parker has Spina Bifida and is in a wheelchair. As Parker started kindergarten his kindergarten teacher approached Randa asking what she could tell the other kids to help them understand Parker. Randa's book "Uniquely You" is her response to that question. This interview is a fantastic look at how to help your kids embrace rather than shy away from differences in others!
In a world focused on perfection, those of us who are flawed really have it rough! Unfortunately none of us are going to reach a state of perfection while in this life, so it makes sense that we are going to need to learn to be a bit kinder to ourselves when we make mistakes .
This weeks guest is Jonathan Aslay, author of the book "What the Heck is Self Love Anyway ." Jonathan teaches us 5 ways that we can start implementing a bit more kindness toward ourselves...even when we are flawed.
We hope you enjoy this episode!
It is an easy thing to fall into negativity in the challenges each of us face. Often, we don't realize how much our perspective on a situation influences the outcome of the situation.
This is especially true in parenting. Brad Barton is with us this week talking about positive parenting and the power that minor adjustments in our perceptions bring to the realm of parenting.
This is an episode that will lead you to laugh and to ponder the perceptions (for good or for ill) that you have in your parenting situations. Join us and enjoy!
Most parents have at least one strong willed kid. Sometimes these kids bring some interesting challenges to unsuspecting parents. Larry and Kami Kerby from "Parenting Rocks" are with us this week sharing lessons they've learned from Parenting With Love and Logic as they have dealt with strong willed kids in their home and in their practice.
This episode is filled with lots of laughter, insight, and encouragement in your parenting journey!
"Parenting teenagers" is often spoken in dreaded tones. Though it is true that some teens are harder than others (like any child in any phase) parenting most teens can be an exhilarating roller coaster ride that is both fun and challenging. Watching this age group develop and fly is an amazing experience. This week Beth, Andrea, and Camille talk teens. We discuss the hard things as well as what we've learned from our teens. It's a fun and enlightening discussion that we hope you enjoy!
Triggers. We all have them no matter how much we wish we didn't! How does the saying go? To trigger is human, to parent is divine. Something like that.
Amber Lia, author of "Triggers: Exchanging Parents' Angry Reactions for Gentle Biblical Responses" and "Marriage Triggers" is with us this week helping us to identify exactly what our triggers are and giving us the tools we need to respond in more loving ways than we initially feel.
We hope you enjoy (rather than feel triggered) by this episode!
Motherhood is hard. We've talked openly about the fact that mothers are put through similar torturous tactics as those employed by terrorists (namely sleep deprivation, solitary confinement, and brainwashing. If you don't believe the last one you clearly have never engaged with a three year old who isn't getting their own way). We solidly believe that the surest way to get through it in one piece (probably a much bigger piece than you hoped) is to engage the art of laughter. This week we bring you the hilarious Jenna Kim Jones: mother to two young terrorists toddlers, comedian, podcaster, and just all around awesome person. Enjoy laughing through this one...that is the point after all.
At the core, every parent aims to raise a child that can self-motivate and can fly once they are old enough to leave home. No parent wants to raise a child that is either so full of anxiety that they can't bear to leave home or a child that is so apathetic to life in general that their biggest concern is their status in Fort Night.
Dr. William Stixrud and Ned Johnson are with us this week discussing their book "The Self Driven Child" and the research behind it. It is a fascinating and compelling discussion that we hope you enjoy!
A challenge that everyone can relate to is that one person in your life that drives you crazy no matter how much you wish otherwise. All of us have certain personalities in our friend and family sphere that we struggle with. Chantel Allen is with us this week giving us some simple tools we can use to better handle the frustrations we feel in those situations. This is a fantastic interview you won't want to miss!
This is the third installment of our "Ages and Stages" series. The first two were episode 90 "Helpful and Hilarious Advice For The Baby Years" and episode 105 "A Guide To Help You NOT DIE Through The Toddler Years".
The school years are full of ups and downs, triumphs and tribulations. They're bumpy for your kids too. The three hosts of the Family Looking Up Podcast (with a combined 15 kids between the three of them) share their thoughts, hilarious fails, and a nugget or two of wisdom they gleaned along the way. This is an episode you won't want to miss!
John Lanza and his wife had a desire to help their kids to be money smart. John’s background was in entertainment and so they came up with the audacious idea of taking something relatively boring like financial literacy and make it fun.
They wanted to teach their kids about how to use their money wisely, how to save, and how to be able and willing to be charitable toward others. The result was their company “Money Mammals” with Joe the monkey, a few friends, and some fantastic songs that help to teach kids on many levels all about how to be money smart.
Join us as we talk with John about his company, his philosophy, and have many great laughs along the way!
Monica Tanner(from the "On The Brighter Side Podcast) is with us today giving us some ideas on how to strengthen our marriage. The catch is how to do it without even involving our spouse! There is some great food for thought here, perfect for the new year!
Beth, Andrea, and Camille talk Christmas, the best of and the worst of in Christmas Music, and best memories from Christmases past. Join us for a Merry Christmas chat!
Is the art of meaningful conversation dying? You bet it is. Conversation is yet another casualty of our digital world. Did you know that there is a section of Wiki How devoted to teaching the basics of creating meaningful conversation?? I’m not joking!
Ellen Martin, a wife and mother of 5 boys, with a Masters of Arts in Christian Education and Master of Divinity from Asbury Theological Seminary, has been troubled by this communication trend as well. As a former Children’s Pastor, she loved children’s sermons. On her website she explains that she loved working with kids “because I got to make ‘adult’ things make sense to kids. With five kids of my own, I’ve had lots of conversations with kids, not just discipline and life management, but conversation.”
Ellen began work on a book she recently published, called “A Life Shared: Meaningful Conversations With Our Kids.” As we visited with Ellen I was struck by her wisdom and insight as she navigated our questions and concerns regarding meaningful conversation. It was clear that she has had years of experience in this field and has very normal kids and a very normal life full of challenges and trials.
Chris and Brittany Kurtz, founders of the "Do Good. Be Kind." movement joined us this week.
We originally interviewed Chris in episode 13. Now, two years and 98 episodes later, we met up with Chris and Brittany to talk about the movement of “Do Good. Be Kind.”. About the takeaways they have gleaned after speaking at hundreds of assemblies and with thousands of people. Specifically, we talked about how individuals, families, and our children can benefit from this powerful message.
There is power in feeling gratitude. Studies have shown that your brain releases serotonin and dopamine when gratitude is felt, which leads to an immediate sense of happiness.
Nancy Davis Kho, a freelance writer, podcaster on Midlife Mixtape, and author took this idea of gratitude to a whole new level. Instead of just feeling gratitude she decided to express it.
She has written a book called "The Thank You Project", which is a culmination of thank you letters she wrote every week over the period of one year to those whom she felt had impacted and shaped her.
She joined us this week to discuss the book, her experiences, and the power of gratitude.
Did you know that ⅓ of all college freshmen transfer to another college after just one year? For parents investing time, energy, and money into the decision of where to go to college, this statistic can be distressing.
If your child is one of the 4.2 million high school seniors applying to college this year, this interview is one you won’t want to miss.
Helping kids choose the right college (the first time around) will save you and them a lot of heartache and money.
In this week’s episode, Beth, Andrea and Camille each share a struggle that we have had in our personal life, our marriage, and in our parenting. We talk about the struggle, and then we share some of the answers and solutions that we have found to be helpful. We hope that as you listen you will be able to relate, to empathize, and to receive comfort in your struggles. We truly are all in this together. Thank you for allowing us to walk life’s journey with you!
Today we are focusing on teaching our kids leadership skills. It’s one of those things that some kids come with and some don’t, but if it isn’t intrinsically within them is it worth teaching it to them? At its simplest a leader is defined as the inspiration and director of the action. Perhaps we don’t care at all whether they inspire or direct other people, but what about whether they have the ability to stand on their own and not follow the crowd when they feel strongly about something? In this world, there are so many pitfalls to avoid. Teaching children leadership skills will help them learn to inspire and direct others to a better, safer, smarter, happier or simply different path.
Ahhh the toddler years. A time when mom’s are the reason for a tiny person's supreme happiness and, moments later, the epitome of evil who has ruined said toddlers life. And all of that is within the first 30 minutes of any given day. As mom’s of MANY former and current toddlers we want to offer you some survival tips to help you NOT DIE as you navigate this ever-changing and incredibly treacherous path called the toddler years.
On this week's episode Beth, Andrea, and Camille talk about all things toddlers. We laugh A LOT about the ups and downs of daily life with those adorable and angry little elves, we try to offer up some valuable advice for navigating these years, and we talk about the products that were game changers and worth every penny to purchase. We hope you enjoy this funny and uplifting episode!
In many ways being a parent is the scariest occupation out there. Nevermind the teething, potty training, and tantrums (all scary in their own right), but how about the idea that every day of a childs life parents are either preparing that child to eventually launch from home or they are enabling dependence so the child fails to launch. Talk about paralyzing pressure!
This week we have Lisa Bishop on our show discussing this issue of raising kids so that they can actually leave home and launch. Lisa has worked as a family therapist with many clients who are struggling with this issue, either as the parent or as the child.
Mom guilt is as much of a reality to moms as dirty toilets in a house full of children. Fun fact, both of them have a lot in common! They both stink, they both make a mom feel terrible about herself, and it takes some work to get rid of each of them. However, closing our eyes to them, to pretend they don’t exist, eventually leads to hazardous mental and physical conditions. No woman ever wants or deserves a mental state that resembles a neglected bathroom, but that’s what she gets if the mom guilt isn’t checked and combated.
You know those people who just seem to get you? They truly understand when you are hurting? They know how to help you? They know the right things to say? Well, I AM NOT ONE OF THOSE PEOPLE! That is not a gift God gave me. I am ashamed to admit I am severely lacking in the empathy department. It is a skill that I truly admire in others, but seem to fall remarkably short in.
If Camille were here to write this post, you would get some great advice and anecdotes about how to use the skill of empathy in your life. Unfortunately for you, but lucky for Camille, she is traveling through Ireland right now. So rather than try and preach hypocrisy, I will let the experts take over.
Enter Figs O’Sullivan
Enter our guest this week on the podcast Figs O’Sullivan. Fig is a licensed Marriage and Family Therapist in San Francisco. He is a certified Emotionally Focused Couples Therapist, and the creator of the Empathi Method. His practice emphasizes the use of empathy to build your relationships.
Here is what we talked about:
- The “issue” we are struggling with our spouse, usually isn’t the real issue.
- There are four people in each relationship: Our vulnerable self, Our protector, The vulnerable self of our spouse, The protector self of our spouse
- The underlying cause of marital disagreement is that we love each other- its an emotional bonding issue.
- When two people love each other they get their feelings hurt.
- Connection is the best comfort
- Empathy is staying vulnerable and feeling with our spouse who is hurting
- The challenge with the boomerang cycle in marriage: We throw the boomerang (something that verbally or emotionally hurts our spouse) and it comes back to us and we get hurt also.
- When our feelings and experiences become valid, people can repair.
Mom Squad Challenge: Describe at least one disconnect you get into with your spouse as a systemic problem. How did it start? What was done? How did it affect you? See the problem as a “we” problem, not a “me or you” problem.
Visit Fig's Website: Empathi to find out more about him and purchase his great courses. Use Promo Code: Familylookingup to get 50% his Learning To Love Better Course
Your Friend
Andrea
Do you stress about how to educate your kids about money?
How young is too young? Do you give an allowance or not? How do you handle money when teens are earning some of their own?
The questions never end. If parents choose to let societal norms teach for them they are guaranteeing that a steady diet of debt and instant gratification will prevail.
Ericka Young is with us this week talking about how to successfully teach financial literacy to our kids. She shares 6 tips for success with our kids.
A celebration and thank you to our Mom Squad for sticking with us for the first 100 episodes! Beth, Andrea and Camille discuss what they have learned and how they have changed over the course of 100 episodes. They also share insights about each other, out each other on our likes and dislikes and talk about behind the scenes laughs and insights.
Have you ever had a friend or family member that you were worried about and just didn't know how to reach out without making matters worse? It is a terrible feeling to be worried about someone and simultaneously feel paralyzed by a lack of knowing how to help.
Tawni Beardall from the podcast "Becoming For Teens" joins us today with her own incredible story and practical tips that will help us move past fear and help those we love!
Author and Medical Doctor, Saundra Dalton- Smith talks with us today about the 5 areas of rest that most parents are completely deficient in.
-Physical Rest
-Mental Rest
-Emotional Rest
-
Social Rest
-
Spiritual Rest
She explains each of these, the effects on our person when we are deficient in them, and how we can begin to find that rest!
Parenting adult kids is NOT easy. Empty nest parents are constantly faced with choices of what to say and what not to say to the “adults” who they have loved and taught from their infancy. Not to mention that even though those “adults” are of age, that doesn’t mean they have nearly as much life experience and wouldn’t benefit from some sound advice. However, when these empty nesters innocently insert their opinion into their adult children’s lives, they are often met with insult and frustration.
In todays episode, renowned author Jill Savage shares 6 lessons she has learned to help navigate this new season of parenting.
This is one of our all time favorite episodes! If you want to feel hopeful and amazed listen in to this episode.
Sherrine is the mother of six whose oldest son, Dayton, is non-verbal and has severe disabilities.
We covered many topics that can help YOU and YOUR FAMILY:
how it feels to have a child with disabilities
the benefits of inclusion for kids with disabilities
how to teach our kids to be loving and kind to those not like them
how to help the caregivers of kids with disabilities
Sherrine’s decision to have five more kids after Dayton
how humor helps with trials, and how trials shape our lives
Jenny met with us again for this episode, as we start this next season of productivity. She talked with us about how to switch gears and change habits to truly be productive. There are some major pitfalls that women, in particular, fall into. Taking on WAY too much and getting discouraged is one of those pitfalls. She shared a bank account metaphor: We only have so much time and so much energy in our account. If we overspend we are in the red and that doesn’t help us or our family. We need to be aware of our bank account balances.
Jenny broke down the different kinds of tasks that we all have bearing down on us: fires, regular tasks, projects and priorities.
One of the things that Jenny teaches in the episode is how to set up a routine for the tasks that are regularly there. Setting up routines for these saves time and energy in our bank account so that we can give more to the things that matter most to us. To find out more about Jenny visit her website at: https://thehappygal.com/
Raising boys is not for the faint of heart. Boys come into this world with their own set of challenges and their own set of amazing abilities. The goal is to learn to enjoy them for who they are and to harness all of their energy for their good.
Monica Swanson is the mother of 4 and the author of a blog, a podcast, and a book all about raising boys. Listen in to hear stories, tips, and tricks for raising boys into men.
Devrie Pettit, MS, RDN meets with us this week to discuss Intuitive Eating. Whether you have a grasp on what that terminology means or you have only heard it in passing, this episode will enlighten and make you think about how you view food, diets, and body image.
We live in a society saturated by a frantic and desperate desire to lose weight. One that defines a persons value based on their pant size. One that leads its members to seeing food based on whether or not it will "make you fat" or not. Intuitive eating is a mode of behavior and thinking that runs contrary to all of those societal trends and norms.
Listen in to learn the basics of its theory.
Getting children to sleep is one of the hardest parts of parenthood. Dr. Melisa Moore is a clinical psychologist in the sleep center at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and is board certified in behavioral sleep medicine. She sees patients, teaches, and conducts research in pediatric sleep, and is also a sleep expert on the Pediatric Sleep Council’s website which is babysleep.com.
Here's What You'll Learn During the interview we covered a vast array of topics including:
- Normal sleeping behaviors for various ages
- Establishing a healthy bedtime routine
- Ways to avoid children becoming too dependent on their routine
- Age to start a bedtime routine
- Advantages of sound machines, alternatives for them, and cautions when using them.
- Babies using pacifiers
- Tips for getting kids to fall asleep on their own
- Sleep training by having your child “cry it out”
- An appropriate age to let your kids cry through the night
- The family bed
- Teaching your child to fall asleep independently
- The Problems with screen time before bedtime
- Use of Melatonin in children to help them fall asleep
- Making the transition from the crib to the bed
- Disciplining at bedtime (Use of bedtime passes)
- Transitioning kids out of the family bed
- Dealing with kids waking up during the night
- How to handle night terrors
- Correlation between adolescent sleep and physical functioning
- Suggestions for getting your teens to go to sleep
- Napping and teenagers
The really difficult thing about parenting is that you don’t really know if how you parent is truly effective (producing the end result you hope for) until it’s nearly too late. Not only that, but sometimes you can parent the heck out of a child (in the most effective way imaginable) and that child still decides to use his/her agency to rip your heart out and turn your life upside down. Such is the life of a parent.
Dr. Goddard has worked for many years as a professor of family and human development in both Arkansas and Alabama, has authored many books, and has created several programs, one of which is on being an effective parent.
According to Dr. Goddard there are 4 keys to use in becoming an effective parent. Join us to learn those keys and to laugh in the process!
This generation of parents is on the forefront of dealing with the topic of technology in a way that no previous generation has had to. Studies are only beginning to come out that show what effect smart phones actually have on children.
Ken Ball is a retired school teacher, a husband, and a father who started his own company "Together Unplugged" to help families retrain their brains on how to interact and communicate with each other. He shares the latest statistics, his own personal classroom observations, and wisdom about the effects of smart phone use on children in this fantastic episode.
Mridu Parikh is a productivity speaker and coach who met with us and taught 3 easy steps to being able to focus and increase your productivity each and every day. She says that even if people are afflicted with a “distracted brain” there is still hope. Brains can be re-trained to be able to focus. Mridu created an acronym (ACT) that she uses to teach her clients some easy tools that have an incredible impact on re-training their brains and increasing their productivity!
To hear all of the details about the ACT methods that Mridu taught us, click on the link and listen to the episode. It’s lighthearted and incredibly valuable.
Tracey is the author of Be the Mom, in which she shares advice on how to avoid what she describes as the seven most common “mom traps.”
Tracey identified the seven most common “mom traps” in an effort to help her daughter as she embarked on the journey of motherhood. The book is written in an encouraging tone that makes you feel like there is a possibility of learning to avoid these “traps” as we learn to recognize them for what they are. The problem isn’t us. It’s our attitude.
To say that Tracey is fun and easy to talk to is like saying that the Rockies are “biggish”. I cannot begin to say how much we LOVED our conversation with her. Her laugh and wit are infectious (And if you listen closely, so is her accent. Beth unknowingly switched into a Kentucky drawl halfway through the interview!)
In our society, the role of father is often demeaned as "not necessary" and VERY optional. On this fathers day we speak with Jason Kreidman from "Dad University" about the importance of fathers and the unique gifts that dads bring to the family. Jason helps us to see how moms can better appreciate the differences that dads bring and how moms can better include dads in family life.
According to a 2017 survey taken of college counseling centers by Inside Higher Ed, “over the last decade, anxiety has overtaken depression as the most common reason college students seek counseling services. Not only that, but there has been “a doubling of hospital admissions for suicidal teenagers over the last 10 years.”
OUR expert on this subject, for this episode, is Haylee Bladen. Haylee agrees that there is a definite rise, not only in teens being diagnosed with anxiety, but teens having clinical anxiety. She has created “Whole Kids Emotional Wellness”, a counseling center where she, her husband, and a host of other counselors provide counseling and life skills for teens, schools, and much more.
As a parent of multiple teens whose emotional stability is, at times, all over the map, what can I do to help my teens to deal with the anxiety they may feel? Haylee talked us through 5 Anxiety Busting Tips that we can teach our kids to help them deal with anxious feelings that are bound to rear their ugly head. If you would like a detailed explanation of each of these, just click on the link above to listen to the interview.
Cindy Kaplan is a certified Parenting Coach and talked with us, in this episode, about the battles that we may not need to be fighting. This interview was an eye opener in many ways for me. She talked about the idea of gaining clarity in our parenting to be able to decipher what things we needed to be solid on and what things were truly not worth the battle. According to Cindy, we become clear by deconstructing all of the societal and family beliefs and standards that we have simply drunk in without knowing what we have absorbed. Then, and only then, we are able to really tune into ourselves and be clear on what really matters to us most as well as really see what and who makes up our family. Rather than thinking “Who are the children we want to have?” we can ask “Who are the children we actually have, and what are their actual needs?”
Cindy does an amazing job outlining how we can gain that clarity and WHY it’s so important to do so. She also talked about these points:
- Why looking at our “triggers” in parenting is crucial
- The possible causes of children not meeting our expectations
- What the key is to stopping a power struggle with your child
- The difference between boundaries and rules and why it’s important
Dinnertime is incredibly hard for most moms. We get that! We have done several episodes on family meal time, ways to include kids in the kitchen, and hacks for making things easier. All of these have given such terrific and incredible information, but I don’t think any of them have been as good at giving a guilt free look at the normal mom.
Leigh Anne has raised her family and clearly knows the burden it is for moms. I was so impressed by her “down-to-earth” approach to making dinner, her understanding that every mom is at a different level, her assurance that it’s perfectly normal to not be a foodie, and her tips for making dinnertime less of an ordeal in a mom’s busy day.
She’s a mother of four and has been a food blogger for nearly a decade. Her blog offers tips and resources to help make cooking easier. Also, prepare for some serious laughter in our intro where we talk about Beth’s expansive and articulate vocabulary and where we play “Never Would You Ever”.
What dreams have you had that have never been realized? Maybe you have secretly held them close to you for years, maybe not. Do you have dreams that you would like to pursue, but you don’t know where to begin?
CrystaLee Beck is a business owner and business coach, she is the co-founder of The Mama Ladder International where she helps to empower mom entrepreneurs. She visited with us about moms, about dreams, and about how moms can actually take the steps to pursue and succeed in those dreams!
CrystaLee identified the 3 components that a successful business needs to have if a mom is thinking of pursuing it.
- She needs to have some skill in that area. Seeing their own skills is something that a lot of moms struggle to recognize. CrystaLee identified several ways moms can overcome this obstacle and be able to recognize their own skills and gifts. Listen to the interview for a full description.
- It needs to be something that she is passionate about. A LOT of work is going to go into a successful business. She had better feel it is worth it!
- It needs to be something marketable.
Listen in to hear all the terrific tips and ideas!
This Mothers Day we want to celebrate moms as they really are! We also want to LAUGH! Laughter is the greatest gift we could possibly give our Mom Squad on this special day. As we have lived the mom life we have found that all moms have FAILS every day, but having FAILS does not equal FAILURE.
In fact, any woman who is willing to live life and take on mothering (no matter how it comes to her) is a SUPERHERO!
This job is not for the faint of heart. It is for those who are willing to lay their hearts on the altar. Those willing to try their patience WAY past breaking point (often several times a day). Those willing to “herd cats” everywhere they go, to look like an idiot in public on a VERY regular basis, and to try to teach the most ferocious creature on earth (the toddler) how to go wee wee in the potty. Those also willing to hug and kiss every owie, to listen, to love more than they thought humanly possible, to read, to sing, to encourage, to uplift, to cry when things go wrong, and to soar as they watch those little ones fly!
Here’s to MOTHERS with ALL gifts and ALL struggles.
We hope you enjoy this week’s episode where some of our Mom Squad called and emailed us to tell of their best and funniest Mom Fails! THIS is real momming, not the glossy June Cleaver version. The down and dirty, trying our hardest, messy, “How is there only one shoe??” , “I’m losing my mind but still here and still making dinner” - version. We hope it brings you laughter and perspective as you celebrate your best achievement: Being a mom.
If you would love to travel more with your family but just don’t know how to make it happen, then this episode is for you!
Jessica from “Flying With Four” is with us this week discussing how she (a kindergarten teacher) and her husband have found ways to take their four kids (ages 9-2) on multiple trips inside and outside of the country each year without breaking the bank or their sanity!
If you would like to hear her ideas on the differences between lodging such as Airbnb, VRBO, and hotels, we’ve got you covered.
How about the 5 things she never goes on a trip without? Listen in!
If you’ve ever wondered which credit cards give the best mileage perks or which hotel chain has the best member benefits, she spills all.
We know this episode won’t disappoint!
Dana Suchow is an eating disorder survivor who resides in New York City. “Since overcoming Bulimia, Binge Eating Disorder and exercise compulsion that resulted in permanent injuries, Dana Suchow has become an expert in the field of body image and eating disorder prevention. Offering a nonclinical and holistic approach, Dana works to teach parents how to put their child on a path towards body love, empowerment and self acceptance!” Dana essentially decided that she wanted to protect children from the pain that she experienced, and decided that educating adults about how to help children love their bodies was the best way to achieve her goal.
She shared many tools with us that will help to create body confident kids. To hear a full explanation of each of these and more listen in to the episode. Here is a brief taste of what we discussed:
- How to compliment your child in a way that doesn’t emphasize appearance
- We must get rid of the idea that thinness = health
- How to diversify media that your kids see. What is presented to them powerfully affects their perceptions of worth.
- Why it is so crucial for parents to heal their relationship with their own bodies, and how they can begin that process.
- How a parent can diet without hurting their kids.
- The effect of shaming YOUR body, on your kids.
- What to do if you recognize body shaming warning signs in your kids or in yourself.
Would you like to learn the top 3 ways to easily start saving money today? We’ve got you covered! Melissa Blandford is with us and is here to teach us how to secure our financial future no matter where we are today!
Melissa and her husband successfully dug out of $30,000 of debt and have stayed debt free despite life continuing to happen, children being born, and Melissa starting a financial coaching business!
If you would like to know how to stop living paycheck to paycheck, how to stop wondering how you are going to afford your minimum payments, and how to finally be the one controlling your money, then listen in!
Jessica Smartt is the author of the book “Memory-Making Mom: Building Traditions That Breathe Life Into Your Home." . Jessica wrote the book because she knows the deep importance of traditions for families and for children. Traditions give children a sense of “belonging” within their family. Jessica wanted to share this knowledge with other moms and wanted to let them know that traditions are not as hard as we sometimes make them out to be.
If you want to be uplifted, and join us in laughing at how our kids think their life is SO HARD and you want some doable ideas for making your family stronger, listen in to this episode!
This week it's just the three of us talking about our favorite things in life right now. We hit topics ranging from favorite products, to movies, recipes, music (Beth even sings), books, to our favorite episodes of the podcast.
We hope you will enjoy the episode! Check out our webpage at www.familylookingup.com for all of the links to our favorite things!
On this weeks episode we interviewed Stephanie Sikora about reducing stress through home organization. You may ask if organization LITERALLY reduces stress. I honestly don’t know if it does for everyone on the planet. All I can do I answer truthfully that for me, YES! IT! DOES!!!!!!!!!
Stephanie explained that clutter literally triggers a stress response, and that stress seeps into all aspects of life. De-cluttering will actually lessen a persons stress response.
To listen to all of Stephanie's tips and tricks and become a walking talking organizational genius (not unlike myself), just click on the link and listen to this terrific episode.
How does that Frank Sinatra song go?
“Regrets, I've had a few, but then again, too few to mention”
Dr. David Schramm is a researcher and an assistant professor of Family and Life at Utah State University. As he was in the middle of raising his children, he conducted what he called a “selfish study”. As he was pondering dilemas like the one I illustrated above, he decided that the best experts on the subject of raising kids would be empty nesters who had raised their kids (and survived)! Dr. Schramm wanted to be the best dad he could possibly be, so he interviewed nearly 400 empty nesters from across the United States and asked them questions pertaining to what they felt they succeeded at and what they regretted as they looked back at their parenting. The results were fascinating. Listen in to hear all the insightful details!
One thing I could be much better at is taking family pictures more often. Either the hassle, the money, or the 20 pounds I’d like to lose always seems to get in the way. This weeks’ podcast interview with Kristen Duke @capturingjoy was enlightening to me and I think it will be for you as well. She talked with us about all the essential tips and tricks for taking amazing family pictures. She hit topics like how to choose clothes (what clothes are the most flattering on camera), how to choose a color combination for your pictures, what time of day is the best for pictures, how to choose a location that will stand out, what things you should consider when taking pictures at home, what you can expect a session to cost and so much more!
Moms, if you could name the sinister voice inside your head that is constantly comparing yourself to other moms, who would it be?
Cruella de Vil?
Miranda Priestly?
Ursula?
Or the Wicked Witch of the West?
My sister-in-law Wendy named hers Bellatrix (an evil witch in the Harry Potter series). Of course Bellatrix and her crew of dark thought-provokers don’t stop with comparisons to others, they create havoc in our mind and insecurities in our hearts that drag us down. Their specialty, though, is toxic comparison. As Theodore Roosevelt said “Comparison is the thief of joy.” Never has a statement been more true.
We visited this week with Sara Payne about 3 steps moms can take to avoid the comparison trap. Sara is a mom of four, a wife, a podcaster, and a life coach. She talked with us about why women struggle so much with comparison. It all boils down to women not understanding our real value.
If you are human it’s pretty much guaranteed that you have a list of life changes that you would like to make. Unfortunately, It is also guaranteed (due to your human-ness) that you have probably tried to make MANY changes already and a multitude of those efforts have fallen by the wayside. Any exhausted parent might say that’s why trying to change is clearly a waste of time. “You are what you are” right?!? I, for one, certainly hope not. If I am stuck forever as who I am today, I may just go overdose on whipping cream as I wallow in self despair.
The life changes that we want to make can be simple things like cutting down on TV, learning how to make the bed in the morning, cutting back on sugar, or watching some YouTube tutorials to learn how to create a “messy bun” with your own unruly hair.
Sometimes the changes are far more important and deal directly with who we are becoming as a person. Topics here could range from conquering actual addiction, to finding a way to genuinely care more about others or becoming more patient with your kids. These are the changes that mean the most and yet seem to be the most impossible to hang onto.
Ralph Waldo Emerson said “The only person you are destined to become is the person you decide to be.”
So, we have to decide to make the leap and implement the life change, but where do we start?!?
Enter Kristin Brown
Kristin is a podcaster, writer, and photographer who loves talking about living with purpose, contentment, and creativity. She shared with us 4 steps to making life changes that actually stick.
Brenda Garrison, author of the book “Love No Matter What: When Your Kids Make Decisions You Don’t Agree With”, joined us this week to discuss what to do when our kids are old enough to start making BIG decisions that you don’t agree with; such as choosing the “bad boy” to be their boyfriend, using drugs, being sexually active, dropping out of school, or making poor money decisions? Things get real serious real fast when our kids are old enough to make decisions that will forever impact their lives and ours. What is the right decision in those situations? How are we really supposed to love them then, no matter what?!?
Brenda discussed the 2 big mistakes parents make in this situation and 12 ideas parents can use to restore their relationship with their child.
This is an episode full of hope and ideas for moving forward in your relationships with your kids. Listen in!
Happy Valentines to all of you who have perfect relationships!
Newlyweds don’t count. They don’t even live on this planet...temporarily.
Those of us with normal relationships know that life is filled with relationship highs and lows. The hope is that we create more highs than lows over time. The imperative word being create.
So, you may wonder, exactly HOW do we create those bonding moments and how do we safeguard our relationships before they are in trouble?
Georgia Anderson, from Know How Mom, is a Gottman trained specialist in strengthening marriage. She joined us to talk about the 7 Principles for making marriage work.
Not only did Georgia share these 7 Principles, she also shared:
What the three most important things are that we can do to manage conflict!
She also shared several free resources that married couples can use to strengthen their marriage!
We hope you’ll listen in and find resources that will help you to better understand, better love, and be better loved by your spouse this week and forever more!
If you are anything like me you are exhausted. Parents finding rest is an impossible dream. I honestly don’t remember the last time I really had enough rest.
Having said that, there is more to rest than just sleep. Shaunti Feldhahn is here to talk with us about finding rest, peace, and balance in the busy world that we live in.
Shaunti received her graduate degree from Harvard University and was an analyst on Wall Street before unexpectedly becoming a social researcher, best-selling author and popular speaker. Shaunti’s findings are regularly featured in media as diverse as The Today Show and Focus on the Family, The New York Times and Cosmo. She (often with her husband, Jeff) speaks at 50 events a year around the world. Shaunti and Jeff live in Atlanta with their teenage daughter and son, and two cats who think they are dogs. Today we are going to be focusing on Shaunti’s book Find Rest: A Women's Devotional for Lasting Peace in a Busy Life.
Being a social researcher led Shaunti to look to science to help fill in the blanks of how to actually find the rest (if the answer wasn’t to stop).
Being a woman of faith led her to look to God.
As she started actively looking to both of these sources for guidance she began to see some very interesting correlations between the answers they were each giving. She ultimately found that patterns in science and scripture boiled down to the same 8 elements of finding rest.
Tune in to hear the 8 elements of finding rest and how they can help you too!
Hillary Hess is the mother of seven kids. That’s as real as it gets, people!
She came on the scene to help us see how to EASILY include kids in cooking in a way that won’t lead to mom having a nervous breakdown before dinner is served. Hillary graduated with a BS in Home Economics with an emphasis in Home and Family. She runs a website and podcast called “Helping of Happiness” where she shares ideas about mothering, teaching, traveling, and cooking. She is a wonderful cook and definitely NOT a “UM”....EXACTLY the kind of person we desperately need to help us!
She shared 10 tips for teaching kids to cook.
To access the full list as well as many links to resources and books, visit our website www.familylookingup.com.
Tanya Lindquist is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker, a wife, and a mom. She specializes in kids with anxiety and other big emotions like depression. She runs a website called “Family Ninjas” that’s dedicated to providing families happiness and mental health tips. She is also the author of a book called “Duke’s Journey of Courage: A Children’s Picture Book for Learning Skills to Cope With Anxiety”.
We talked with Tanya about what childhood anxiety looks like, how to help your kids to learn coping strategies, what those strategies are, and how to get more help if needed.
For a detailed description of what we discussed, as well as all the links to websites and books referenced, visit our website www.familylookingup.com
If you were asked to describe an extraordinary mom, what words would you use? Patient, devoted, intentional, energetic, creative, authentic, fun...the list could go on and on.
I’d bet that the list wouldn’t include words and phrases like: flustered, hanging on to sanity by her fingernails, trying and sometimes succeeding, pretty average and utterly exhausted.
Next question: Which words would you use to describe yourself?
If you’re like me, 99% of the time I would be perfectly portrayed by the second description, and for good reason. Not to disparage myself too greatly. For 10 or 15 minutes a day week month I am totally extraordinary. Usually, though, I feel like I’m one stomach flu away from the loony bin.
Well, according to Jessica Dahlquist of the “Extraordinary Moms” and “Everyday Extraordinary” podcasts, all moms are extraordinary...even me. She says that “We need to take on the badge of extraordinary because of what we’ve signed up for in the first place.” Motherhood is not for the faint of heart and should be celebrated in all of its x-ray needing, potty training, baby giggling glory!
Jessica has been on a mission to help moms see their greatness. She, like us, believes that moms are doing better than they think. She believes that “Every person has a story, and (she) loves helping them identify the value they are making in the world.”
Through hundreds of interviews on her podcast, Jessica has identified four common traits that extraordinary moms have.
We explore those four traits as well as plenty of other things in this episode!
When you read the words “grocery shopping” do you feel anxiety, boredom, the serious beginnings of a headache, frustration, excitement, desperation, or not really anything? Women run the gamut of emotions when it comes to this particular duty.
One of the BIGGEST stresses about grocery shopping for me is the budget . 😰
The eternal struggle of how to feed my family something a step UP from dog food while not breaking the bank. Oh, yeah. Every. Single. Day.
How can we eat healthy food, instead of beige-yellow processed junk, so that we don’t all have to roll into WalMart (to buy bigger pants) without breaking the bank?
Is it really even possible for me to feed six kids and NOT BREAK THE BANK? Answer: No. No it is not. The bank broke when my water broke.
C’est la vie. Apparently it’s not all about me. Whatever.
ENTER ERIN CHASE
Apparently, smarter people than me (shocking) have figured out a way to solve all of these problems! One of these brilliant people is Erin Chase, creator of $5 dinners.com. IMO, she should get the Nobel Peace Prize for what she’s done for families. Erin has shared her brilliant ideas on The Today Show, Rachel Ray, The View, and many more. Somehow we talked her into spending an hour with us to break down the science of affordable grocery shopping---yes, it’s a thing--- for our Mom Squad (insert applause). 👏👏👏
Years ago, Erin needed to save money for her family, and she decided the place where she could cut costs was groceries. Through strategic grocery shopping, meal planning & couponing methods she learned to cut her grocery bill in half. She is now on a mission to help others do the same. Yay Erin!!
So let’s get into the nitty-gritty of how we actually cut the grocery costs without cutting the children out of the family. We hope you enjoy!
Pregnancy.
I love you. I hate you.
I think that pretty much sums up my feelings on the subject.
I absolutely LOVE the end result of pregnancy…
the baby, obvi.
My Disclaimer
If you are one of those unicorn moms who actually feels better during pregnancy, you have my serious respect, deep jealousy, and slight to moderate hostility. You must understand that you are NOT NORMAL though.
You. Are. A. Unicorn.
For the non-unicorn moms
Growing a baby within me...not a problem. Not a problem unless I don’t enjoy extreme nausea, dry-heaving at the mere mention of any food, actual vomiting ALL DAY LONG, heartburn from water or lack of water, peeing a thimble amount of fluid if I laugh or sneeze or cough, feeling like I have no control over my emotions (Is it normal to cry at cartoons and commercials because their storylines have such DEPTH and character development?), and then turning moments later into a crazed psychopath because someone left their sock on the stairs or didn’t flush the toilet or they expect dinner...again), feeling like my brain is LITERALLY disintegrating since I can’t remember ANYTHING, including my other children’s names. I actually don’t love these parts of pregnancy...too bad for me. It would be a cake-walk if I did. And then there’s the pain.
How can a tiny being hurt me that much??
I have six kids. I have spent 4.5 years of my life pregnant (more actually, when you include miscarriages). I ALWAYS get Sciatica (pain that radiates down your hips and bum and feels like someone has stabbed you with a knife that is on fire) when I’m pregnant. Sciatica and I are the closest of friends (we’ve named our kids after each other). I spent the first three pregnancies hobbling and crying real tears. By the time I was pregnant with my fourth we lived next to my brother-in-law, who is a physical therapist. This man will go straight to heaven when he dies because he SAVED me while I was pregnant. Therapy was my antidote to pregnancy pains. If I had not been related to a physical therapist I never would have known that gestating mommas need therapy and could be helped by it!
Enter Brandie
In our episode this week we talk with Brandie Nemchenko, a pregnancy chiropractor with over fifteen years of experience in treating thousands of pregnant woman. As someone who has experienced years of pregnancy pain, I LOVED so many of Brandie’s comments. My very favorite of which was “Severe pain in pregnancy is NOT NORMAL, it’s COMMON, but NOT NORMAL”. How often do we, as pregnant women, think that all of our suffering is normal so we do nothing about it?!?
What You Don’t Expect When You’re Expecting
Brandie has just written a book called “What You Don’t Expect When You’re Expecting” that we discussed in our episode. Brandie is incredibly down-to-earth and really understands what women deal with in pregnancy. She talked with us at length about:
-
The most common physical complaints for pregnant women
-
Ways to prevent common physical complaints during pregnancy
-
The advantages to a “healthy” pregnant woman from visiting a chiropractor
-
The importance of recognizing and getting support from others while you are pregnant
-
Why connecting with other women, and helping each other is vital
This episode is insightful, full of hope, encouragement and laughter. As Brandie said, “Pregnancy should be one of the most special times in your life and remembered for the joy not the pain.” So, whether you are a unicorn mom, or part of the countless masses of pained momma’s that dream of unicorn status, we hope you will enjoy this episode!
It's Christmas today!!!!! Merry Christmas Mom Squad! What a year it has been. If your house is like mine, we've been up since the crack of dawn (insert yawn). I look like a junkie with mascara caked under my eyes and my family room looks like a wrapping paper company exploded.
Christmas breakfast has already been made and cleaned up by yours truly (Am I a saint? Why, yes. Yes I am. Thanks for pointing that out). Currently there are kids playing with toys, teens reading new books, and a husband getting frustrated because the toys are not working correctly. All's right in the world! Now is the perfect time for mom to go listen to an episode of Family Looking Up! We decided to add some new content to episode #6 titled, "How to Have the MOST Stressful Christmas EVER!" We hope you will enjoy the episode. I have included the show notes from that episode below.
On todays episode we have Tracey Eyster who is the author of Be the Mom, in which she shares advice on how to avoid what she describes as the seven most common “mom traps.”
Here’s what I LOVE about Tracey (other than her accent). Usually when I learn about “mom traps” I feel a LOT of guilt because it’s pretty clear that I have “stuff” that I’m dealing with. Tracey isn’t advocating perfection in motherhood. She knows it’s hard. She says that moms are too hard on themselves. They take on motherhood thinking that they’ve “got this” and when things seem REALLY hard they think that maybe they weren’t cut out for motherhood. She says that’s not true. “It’s normal to have ‘yucky feelings’ and be stressed as a mother. It’s not that motherhood is hard, it is just that motherhood brings out all ‘your stuff’.”
Tracey identified the seven most common “mom traps” in an effort to help her daughter as she embarked on the journey of motherhood. The book is written in an encouraging tone that makes you feel like there is a possibility of learning to avoid these “traps” as we learn to recognize them for what they are. The problem isn’t us. It’s our attitude.
To say that Tracey is fun and easy to talk to is like saying that the Rockies are “biggish”. I cannot begin to say how much we LOVED our conversation with her. Her laugh and wit are infectious (And if you listen closely, so is her accent. Beth unknowingly switched into a Kentucky drawl halfway through the interview!)
I just got home from traveling to hear my nephew speak in church. He is embarking on an 18 month service mission for his church and was asked to speak before he begins. As I was about to listen to this 18 year old boy speak, I expected the depth of...well, an 18 year old boy; a little life experience, definite bravado, some joking with a touch of God-loving faith mixed in...he was about to dedicate a chunk of his life to serving God, after all.
What I got was something very different and very special.
He didn’t sound like an 18 year old. He sounded MUCH wiser. The reason behind this is because of what has happened in this boy’s life. At the age of 12 he was in a terrible bicycle accident which led to a compound fracture in his leg. Medical mistakes led to compartment syndrome which means that the tissue and muscle in his leg were cut off from blood supply and began to die. He nearly lost his leg during this ordeal. Twenty two surgeries and six years later he still has his leg, but is in constant pain each and every day. As he stood and spoke about service and love he spoke with wisdom far beyond his years. I commented to my brother that it’s sadly ironic that we do EVERYTHING within our power to avoid trials like this for ourselves and our children, even though going through these trials are the very thing that makes us more than we ever could have been otherwise.
With that in mind, this week’s episode is probably my favorite that we have aired so far! Our guest, Sherrine Hayward, is incredible in a way that you just can’t be if you have not walked through trials that shape you into something more refined and more wise than you ever could have been without them.
To introduce this amazing lady to you, I want to include an excerpt of a letter Sherrine sent to us describing herself and her son Dayton:
“I am the mother of six children. The oldest is Dayton, and you may recognize him from the Mormon Message, Dayton's Legs.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bwwxBjpvDVQ
I have five other children younger than him. My children range in ages from 21 to 4 years old. We have always included Dayton in life. Dayton is nonverbal and I care for all of his physical needs. But he communicates with eye blinks. And, we do everything together as a family. He hunts with his dad and runs with me. I race with him and he and I completed an IronMan with my friend. It was an incredible experience. SO hard and not something I ever thought I could do.
Now I am not anything special. Believe me. But I believe in full inclusion in every way. ALL people deserve to be given life. One of my best friends told me once that the only requirement a person needs to have to be fully included is to breathe. I believe this with all of my heart. I think many moms of kids with disabilities are afraid to reach out. They are afraid to include their kids in life. It is hard. But it is so beautiful and they wish for it. It is possible to include these children. Belief in them is all they need and that the world needs.”
I was so touched by Sherrine’s story and her interview is the perfect lead-in to Christmas.
If you want to feel love, encouragement, and wisdom then listen to this interview.
If you want to teach your kids how to love those with challenges, then listen to her wonderful advice.
If you want to know how to be kinder and more loving….more Christian, then listen to this interview.
The thing that stuck out most to me from Sherrine’s letter that I shared above, was the phrase “Now, I am not anything special.”
????
How often do we see ourselves as “not anything special” when we are, in fact, a ray of light in a world full of darkness? To all the moms out there who are “not anything special”, you are doing so much better than you think.
You have sacrificed to be a parent and that alone is a selfless, serious business.
Just because life is not easy and just because we are walking hard paths does not mean that we are doing it wrong. In fact, it probably means that we are doing it right and being stretched into something amazing. As Sherrine said “I would never wish a child with disabilities on my enemy, but I would wish it upon my friend. It is such a blessing!”
I want to thank Sherrine for sharing Dayton with us, and for reminding us that hard does not equal bad. Holland is beautiful!*
*See our website www.familylookingup.com
for more resources including the poem *"Welcome to Holland"
I feel like I have a split personality during the Christmas season. At the first of December I am Andy Williams singing,”It’s The Most Wonderful Time of the year.” I blast the Christmas tunes, pin every beautiful dish from Pinterest, and string lights on every wall in my house. By mid-December something changes in me. I am starting to feel the stress and THE GRINCH starts to come out in me. The toys, the parties, the bags! The food, the shopping, the tags! I start to hate the whole Christmas season. But unlike the Grinch, I do know the reason! There is a lot of pressure on moms to make Christmas the most magical, perfect time of the year.
Our guest this week, Kathi Lipp, author of “Get Yourself Organized for Christmas: Simple Steps to Enjoying the Season,” said the problem is not Christmas. The problem is the expectations we PUT UPON OURSELVES. It is possible to truly enjoy this season that was meant to bring families together and celebrate the birth of our Savior. In this FUN conversation, Kathi provides doable tips to stay sane and get organized for Christmas.
- How to deal with expectations for the Christmas holiday
- First things first: figure out what is MOST IMPORTANT to our family and the people that we are celebrating with
- Ask ourselves what about Christmas is MOST important to me
- Gathering Christmas stuff to determine what is needed
- Allow others to help
- When to start planning for Christmas
- Get dates on the calendar early for holiday celebrations
- Make a holiday mission statement
- The value of a Christmas binder
- Keep ALL Christmas items together
- How to set a Christmas budget
- Plan gifts as early as possible and then BE DONE.
- How to blend different holiday traditions within your family
- Planning December meals
- Kathi’s favorite Christmas hacks
- Online resources to get organized for Christmas
Mom Squad Challenge: Get the all your important holiday dates on the calendar!
kathilipp.com
How do grandparents figure out grandparenting? They do what they did to figure out parenting: stumbling forward doing the best they can to love all the adults and kids in their lives. We have received numerous requests to do a show on grandparenting from our many listeners trying to navigate this exciting yet dicey road.
We have gone to the experts to bring parents and grandparents a “survival guide” in this episode! Richard and Linda Eyre are among the most popular speakers in the world on parenting and families. Their clients and audiences range from The Young Presidents’ Organization (YPO) and major corporations and associations to a wide array of school, civic, church and community groups. They’re also N.Y. Times #1 Bestselling authors of 30 Family and Parenting books, two of which, just released, are on Grandparenting!
The Eyres offer solutions to help grandparents AND parents in their crucial roles. Below are some of the things we discussed:
-
How do grandparents navigate situations when there is conflict between what you as a grandparent want and what your kids want in relation to the grandkids?
-
All grandparents have to deal with trying (or not trying) to bite their tongue when they don’t exactly agree with how their kids are parenting. (Cue the inner voice saying “Can’t you just say ‘No’ for once and be done with it?!?) What are grandparents to do? The question really becomes “To bite or not to bite...that is the question.
-
- Richard warns about going to either extreme: saying too little OR saying too much. Communication is the key to finding that balance. One thing that has worked really well for the Eyres is a pact that they have made with their children. Both sides acknowledge that grandparents have wisdom and advice that could help the parents. The pact is that the grandparents will share their advice and the parents agree not to be offended. In return the grandparents agree that if the parents don’t take the advice that they won’t be offended. The Eyres have found that this pact has reduced conflict and bad feelings.
- Richard stressed above all, that the most important thing for grandparents to remember is that the parents are in charge. Sometimes that’s hard, but it’s the truth.
-
Family Culture. Every family has a culture whether that has been developed consciously or unconsciously. It’s crucial to recognize your family culture and develop it. The positive aspects of that culture are going to spread into your children’s homes and become even better. There have been studies done that show how important a child’s connection to their family heritage is to their own success and resilience in life. Linda referenced an article in the New York Times that showed that post 9/11 kids who knew the most about their family narrative had the most resilience in their recovery. If you would like to read that article, here is the link: https://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/17/fashion/the-family-stories-that-bind-us-this-life.html
-
What are some ways that grandparents can share these family narratives? Richard and Linda shared three of their favorite activities. Listen in to hear an in-depth explanation of these ideas.
-
- Turn these family stories into bedtime stories that can be read to the grandkids at night.
- Put a family tree up in a conspicuous place where kids can see how they are connected to the names they hear.
- Create a “Grandma Hazel Day”. Hazel is Linda’s mom. Each year they have a day to celebrate her by doing things that she loved such as play football, work hard, and eat Hershey’s bars.
-
What kind of Grandparent do you want to be? Each grandparent has a decision to make about what KIND of grandparent they WANT to be. Linda and Richard have created four groups that grandparents fall into.
-
Disengaged: These grandparents have the mindset of “I have raised my kids and now I’m done.”
-
Limited: These grandparents love to see their grandchildren in limited doses and on their own terms.
-
Supportive: These grandparents know their kids need all the help that they can get and they want to be there for them.
-
Proactive: These grandparents know that their children are the stewards over the grandkids, but they know that they have something special to offer as well. This is a multi-generational approach and requires a lot of communication with the best end result.
-
What about those who feel overwhelmed by the idea of being the proactive grandparent?
-
- Don’t give up, even when it’s hard. Kids are forgiving and they know when you’re really trying and making the effort. That is the most important thing you can communicate to them.
- Grandparents can give unconditional love to the grandkids, often more easily than parents because they aren’t in the trenches.
-
What are some actionable ideas about how grandparents can connect to grandchildren?
-
- Don’t just think of grandparenting as Collective. If large groups at once overwhelm you, remember that most of the really important stuff happens one on one.
- Take grandkids to lunch. While you are talking, take notes so you can remember the details of their lives, their thoughts, and feelings. They know when they see you writing it down that you care enough to remember.
- Have a Grammy Camp. Bring the kids over according to age groups and have some bonding time.
- Share your loves, interests and talents with them. Let them see you as more than just grandma or grandpa.
- Ancestors Day. Have grandkids come over and dress up as ancestors and have them act out a scene from that person’s life.
-
What are some helpful ideas about how grandparents can handle Christmas?
-
- Give the grandkids financial parameters and have them make a wish list on Amazon. It makes it easy for you to get them something they actually want, and it’s still a surprise because they don’t know which item they will receive.
- What are some helpful ideas about how grandparents can handle birthdays?
-
- Richard writes a handwritten letter on each of the kids’ half birthdays. That way he knows it won’t be overlooked by everything else they are receiving. He tells them all the things that he loves about them.
- Linda sends a little money with a letter telling them her favorite memories of them.
MOM / GRANDPARENT SQUAD CHALLENGE
RICHARD: The best way to become a better grandparent is to become a better marriage partner. Find a way to be a better partner this week and see how that skill translates into becoming a better grandparent.
LINDA : If you don’t know how to text, learn how this week. This is the best way to contact grandkids (especially teens). They’ll answer right away! This week text your grandkids (who have cell phones). Tell them you love them, joke with them, or invite them to lunch!
We want to thank the Eyres for spending time with us!
To learn more about Linda and Richard Eyre, visit www.valuesparenting.com
Or visit @RichardLindaEyre on Instagram or visit Linda’s grandmothering book site which contains recipes and more at www.grandmotheringbook.com
LINKS TO BOOKS WE DISCUSSED:
Being a Proactive Grandfather
Grandmothering
Life in Fall
I Didn’t Plan on Being a Witch
Whenever I hear about families that are creating humanitarian kits for kids in South America, sewing quilts for people in Africa, or serving at the local soup kitchen, I always say, “I want our family to be one of THOSE families.” But, when it really comes down to it, I feel overwhelmed and never really know where to begin. This week we bring back Merrilee Boyack! Merrilee has a passion for serving. She and her family have made helping other a priority in her family. This culture of service has had a lasting impact on her children. Merrilee has noticed how giving can unify a family, build leadership skills and build self confidence in children. Here is what we talked about in this incredible and inspiring interview:
- Where Merrilee learned to serve and why she implemented it in her own family.
- The effect service can have on our families
- How to START teaching our kids to serve
- Simple ways to teach little kids to serve
- How to help introverted kids to serve others. “The quiet servers”
- What to do when our kids don’t want to serve
- Leadership skills are built when our kids plan to serve
- How to plan service into family time
- Doing service with immediate recognitions versus silent service
- The importance of teaching kids WHY we serve
- Celebrating vs rewarding children for time spent serving
- Inviting extended family members to get involved
- Where can our listeners find out more about you and purchase your books?
Mom Squad Challenge:
- If you have young children: Have a family meeting and pick one service you can do within your family
- If you have children 8 and older: Have YOUR CHILDREN PICK one thing you can do in the community
- If you have adult children and extended family: Pick one thing your extended family can do to change the world
Resources:
www.merrileeboyack.com
Merrilee's Book: 52 Weeks of Fun Family Service
YAY! We have so much to celebrate this week! We are celebrating our ONE YEAR ANNIVERSARY! We started this crazy podcast one year ago. We have loved learning from our many experts, laughing at our many mistakes and challenging ourselves to do better. We are so grateful for our amazing Mom Squad. You all continually inspire us. In this week’s episode, in addition to celebrating our podcast anniversary, we also talk about one of our favorite holidays...THANKSGIVING. This episode is full of laughter and holiday hacks. Here is what we talked about:
- Our anniversary episode
- How to win our “I’d Marry That Basket” (see instructions below)
- The highs and lows of our first year of podcasting
- Sharing our episode on social media
- Thanksgiving is about being with friends and family
- Ideas to encourage gratitude in our families
- The great pie making event
- A typical Thanksgiving day for our families
- Our favorite Thanksgiving traditions
- Our Thanksgiving hacks
- Black Friday craziness
Mom Squad Challenge: Encourage your family to WRITE and MAIL a thank you note to a different person every day for a week.
How to win our “I’d Marry That Basket”
- Post your favorite episode of Family Looking Up on your Instagram or Facebook Feed. Be sure and tag us and use the hashtag #FLUgiveaway
- Make an instagram story with your favorite mom fail or mom success. Again, make sure to tag us and use the hashtag #FLUgiveway
- Every day we will reveal a new item in our “I’d Marry That Basket.” Repost our post and tag us and use the hashtag #FLUgiveaway.
The winner will be announced November 19th.
Does it seem right that when you have children you suddenly lose your sleep, your free time, your sanity and YOUR BODY? In my naive mind, I thought I would say good-bye to my pre-baby body for nine months while I was pregnant and then life would go back to normal. HA! I am still searching for that body. I hope someday I find it.
Maintaining a healthy weight and healthy lifestyle is a constant battle in the busy lives of mothers. Too often we are trying so hard and it is easy to get discouraged when the number on the scale is not reflecting our hard work. This episode is going to help women accept their bodies NOW. We don’t have to wait for that “someday” when we finally fit in our skinny jeans from college. In this episode, we talk to Amber Brueseke. She is a certified personal trainer, a fitness instructor, a registered nurse and most importantly a mother of four kids. She gives great advice about improving your body image, setting attainable health goals and how to avoid letting the scale rule you. Here is what we talked about:
- Amber's family
- Why Amber started the website Biceps After Babes
- Having a positive body image
- The importance of taking care of yourself to set an example for your kids
- Things you can do now to love your body
- Identify your thoughts and change the story in your mind
- Indifference, when it comes to loving your body, is not a bad thing.
- How to maintain a healthy lifestyle without letting it control you.
- What the number on the scale means to you.
- Defining success in different ways, not just hitting the prepregnancy weight.
- Setting behavioral goals. Setting a goal that you can control.
- Where to start when starting a health plan
- How to maintain LONG TERM healthy habits
- What are Macros. (carbs, fat and protein)
- The first step is establishing small habits you can add to.
- It is a journey and everyone’s journey is unique
Mom Squad Challenge: Choose ONE health or fitness goal to work on for the next four weeks. Write it down. Practice it.
Resources:
www.bicepsafterbabies
I am a planner. When I am entering a new situation, I like to know what is happening, visualize the outcome and plan for all variables, So, needless to say when I was pregnant with my first child, I PLANNED. I read numerous parenting books and observed what other parents did (and of course, I told myself I would NEVER make the same mistakes they were making). Well, it turns out that no matter how much planning AND praying I do, these little humans come with their own personalities and ability to choose. I can’t control all aspects of their lives- DANG IT! So even though I had visions of all my kids being great piano players...some are- some are not. I was sure all my kids would be great athletes...some are, some are not. I put my kids in singing groups to ensure they would be beautiful singers...NONE of them are. And most importantly I wanted my kids to always be kind and obedient...sometimes they are, and a lot of time they are not. Letting go of the “perfect son or daughter” and my “perfect parenting” that I had in my head can be frustrating and disappointing.
In this episode, we talk to Jill Savage. Jill is the founder of Hearts at Home, a non profit organization that focuses on educating and encouraging moms. We discuss letting go of that “perfect kid,” ideal and loving our kids for who they are...flaws and all. Here is what we talked about:
- The difference between striving for excellence and striving for perfection.
- Setting unrealistic expectations.
- Indicators/Warning Signs that you are expecting perfection.
- What is “Perfection Infection” and how to recognize it.
- The antidote for “perfection infection”
- Using compassion with your kids.
- Ways to show more compassion to your kids.
- Using LOVE to combat perfection.
- Three steps for “keeping your love on.”
- Helping your kids to feel accepted.
- The importance of evaluating what you are trying to change in your children.
- Acceptance doesn’t mean that you always agree with your child.
- Perception is being able to perceive the INDIVIDUAL needs of your kids.
- How to know when it’s time to let your child quit and when they should persevere.
- How to help kids to see their own unique worth.
Mom Squad Challenge: When you see someone on social media or in person and you start the comparison trap, just say to yourself “she has a backstory I don’t know.” This will help you to keep proper perspective and to pursue conversations you might not have had otherwise.
There is a scene in the Disney animated version of Robin Hood that often comes to mind. (Please watch it with your kids. It’s important to their development. And yours. I promise!) All of the characters are animated animals. Prince John and the Sheriff of Nottingham have just discovered that Robin Hood is at their tournament and they are trying to catch him. At one point, Prince John’s guards (charging Rhinos, naturally) storm into a tent where Little John is hiding, carrying the tent across the tournament field. Little John’s head pushes through the top of the tent and he sees that he is at the front of a stampeding tent powered by rhinos that can’t see where they’re going. He exclaims, “Who’s driving this flying umbrella?”
How many times have I asked myself that question? I’m at the front of the family, my head is out where I can see the trajectory of my path, but something else is choosing the speed and direction under the surface. I should be happy---this is what I wanted! I’m taking care of everyone and it looks like we’re….fine…but I’m so angry, ashamed, TIRED, sad, anxious or enraged.
We all know that pregnancy does a number on our bodies. But we forget that our brains are part of our bodies too, and OF COURSE they are affected as well. At least 20% of new moms experience Postpartum depression. Even when baby and mom seem “fine”, there could be a lot going on under the surface that is confusing and a little scary. And don’t forget perinatal depression (DURING pregnancy), which can really take the shine off that “glow” all prospective moms are supposed to have.
Remember: WE’RE HERE TO GIVE YOURSELF PERMISSION TO GIVE YOURSELF A BREAK! This week we talk to Erin Shepard and Kate Jones about perinatal depression, postpartum depression, and the many aspects of women’s mental health. Listen for yourself or for someone you love. Here’s what we talked about:
- What is perinatal depression.
- Mood disorders triggered by pregnancy.
- What does perinatal mood disorder look like.
- Red Flags to look for in perinatal mood disorders: intensity of your mood, do your symptoms immobilize you, what is the duration of these feelings and how often are you feeling these strong feelings.
- The importance of talking about the different signs of perinatal depression.
- Treatment for postpartum depression.
- Risk factors that increase the chance of postpartum depression.
- Taking a holistic approach to treating women’s mental health.
- Creating a women’s wellness plan. (See SNOWBALL visual below)
- Treating symptoms during pregnancy will help prevent postpartum depression.
- The many emotions perinatal depression can present itself as: rage, anger, guilt, anxiety, shame, and sadness.
- Recognizing inconsistent emotions in yourself.
- The importance of a preventative plan.
- Barriers to treatment.
- The lifespan of a mother’s mental health.
I honestly believe there were lines that we could get in before we were born. One of those lines was for potential parents and it was labeled "Those Who Want To Spend Your Life Running Around Like a Chicken With Its Head Cut Off Line Up Here." The other was probably something like "Living With Purpose and Having Your Junk Together, Line Up Here." I don't know if I was attracted to the chicken theme, the headless theme, simply illiterate, or just plain dumb, but I CLEARLY joined the wrong line!
Laura Hintze, our guest today, on the other hand, was far better at either choosing correctly or line jumping before it was too late. She's here to help all of us who feel like human pin balls, running from one fire to the next, only to feel at the end of the day like nothing that you wanted to accomplish had happened to find some order and peace in our lives.
Living each day with purpose and with a plan allows for:
- You get done the things that you wanted.
- You make sure the important parts of your day actually happen.
- Scheduling allows for free and family time to take place instead of getting shoved aside ... again. This eliminates so much of the dreaded mom guilt that we all deal with!
True story...one day, on a mom fail DAY, I allowed my sons to play video games for HOURS. Finally after I finished whatever project it was that had distracted me from paying attention to my boys, I told my boys to get off their devices. As soon as my boys got off, it was like a fog had been lifted from them. They told me they were starving and had to go to the bathroom. They had been so sucked into their devices that they had completely stopped paying attention to their basic needs. My boys could literally could spend their ENTIRE day playing video games on their devices if I didn’t regulate what they were doing. I HATE regulating screen time! I am constantly looking for ideas to regulate their screen time. I was so excited to find Andrea Davis and her website, “Better Screen Time.” Andrea is the mother of five children. Through both research and her own family’s experiences she has created a great resource for parents to learn about managing screen time and cell phone use. In this week’s episode we get the opportunity to learn from Andrea. She talks to us about strategies for regulating screen time and helping our family buy into regulating their own screen time. Here is what we talked about:
- What family life event lead Andrea to create her website, “Better Screen Time.”
- Andrea’s tree frog experience and how it relates to screens in our home.
- How to get your family to buy into controlling their screen time use.
- Taking back cell phones when you feel like your child isn’t ready.
- The value of teaching our kids the WHY.
- What a Family Tech Think Tank is.
- How to start a family tech think tank
- How to get the whole family to buy into a new screen time plan.
- Topics to discuss with your family about monitoring screen time.
- Teaching kids to come up with their own consequences.
- Managing the amount of time your kids are on screens.
- When is a child ready for a cell phone.
- When and how to transition a child from a flip phone to a smartphone.
- Teaching kids the dangers of social media.
- What “technoference” is and how to avoid it.
Mom Squad Challenge: Schedule a time on the calendar when you can have your first Family Tech Think Tank.
This week’s episode is SO MUCH FUN! We talked with four normal (amazing) moms who shared some of their funniest and most outlandish mom fails with us. This is an hour of stomach-clenching, tear-streaming, head-shaking laughter that you are sure to enjoy!
We love mom fails because ALL MOMS have them but our society is so aimed at perfection that no moms WANT to admit and share them. Instead, they are hushed. And shamed. Instead of moms having a cathartic laugh at all the imperfections, they feel underqualified and overly flawed.
We believe in being the best moms that we can be, but we also believe that there is a HUGE difference between a mom who is trying and a mom who is perfect. Perfection doesn’t actually exist (outside of social media)! Real life equals successes and failures with a goal to learn from the past and do better on the next go round...maybe….it might take a few go rounds. So let’s enjoy life’s imperfections and let’s have a good laugh at those times when we mean to soar but instead we trip on our own feet, hit the wall, and fall down the stairs into a laundry basket full of dirty socks!
In addition to the great mom fails in this episode, listen in to also hear:
- Why no one wants Beth, Andrea and Camille to watch their kids anymore.
- Why you can say whatever you want if you preface it with “Bless your heart…”
- How Andrea got her boys to start BEGGING to mop the floor. Whaaaat????
Bios
Natalie Haddock: Natalie is pretty much the greatest and she hates writing bios. Ok. Fine! I’m the mother of 4 boys. Miraculously they’ve only had 1 broken leg and 1 set of staples among them, so I guess that makes me a pretty good mom. I’ve been trying to lose the last 10 pounds for the last 6 years and still haven’t figured that out.
Melissa Parr: I’m currently a stay at home mom with two adorable and sassy little girls. I, quite recently won a year-long potty training battle and am teaching my baby to crawl (which is harder than it sounds because her head is twice the size of her body). I love dancing, reading historical fiction, and eating chocolate chips dipped in peanut butter when there are no “official” snacks in the house...every single night.
Biz Hancuff: I’m a wife and mother of three beautiful, smart, funny, amazing, sassy, smelly, stressful monstrous children...who I adore. Like most of you, I’ve had many different jobs, none of which even came close to preparing me for the job of mothering. It’s joyous and nightmarish in one breath. It’s beautiful and ugly simultaneously. And it is exhilarating and exhausting all at once. It’s an experience unlike anything else...one I would not trade for the world!
Danna Parker: I’m a mother of three smart and fun boys. I love working out, especially zumba and power tone classes. I love the great outdoors and enjoy spending time with my family on hikes, paddleboarding and boating.
Advice given:
- Just be you. Embrace who you are and just do mothering how you do it! If you are doing mothering authentically to who you are, you’re doing it right. - Biz
- Stop yelling at your kids...just whisper. It’s proven to be more effective at getting their attention. - Danna
Overwhelmed. Too busy. Too much stuff. Who else is feeling this? I don’t know about your family, but my family is constantly running from one activity to another. Quality family time seems to be a precious commodity now. This week we are talking to Jillian Johnsrud of the popular website, “Montana Money Adventures.” Jillian coaches people to live an intentional life. Her popular website provides resources to reduce spending and increase freedom. Jillian and her husband were forced to live a minimalist lifestyle when they adopted three foster kids and had a child of their own in one year. With the foster kids came numerous state appointments and challenges forcing them to simplify their life. At one point Jillian even removed all colored clothing from her wardrobe to reduce the choices she had to make every day. As their family has grown they have become really good at evaluating their family life and eliminating those “good” activities in order to make room for the “great” activities. The lessons in minimalism Jillian has learned are applicable to all of us who are running around, like chickens with our heads chopped off, trying to keep up with the many activities our children are involved in. If you’re looking to reduce stress and increase time with your family you are going to want to listen to this one! Here is what we talked about:
- Big family minimalism and why Jillian’s family found the need to implement it.
- Jillian’s year of “easier not harder.”
- Taking out the extras in family time.
- Learning to let go of the unnecessary things in family life.
- Making a “quit list.”
- How to get kids to agree to cut out activities.
- Evaluating the cost of a busy life.
- Evaluating family priorities.
- Cross training your life (doing something that is intentionally difficult.)
- Teaching kids to do hard things.
- Helping kids exercise their “struggle muscle.”
- Having the courage to take out good things to be replaced with GREAT things.
- Creating time for connection.
- Investing in the learning curve of living together. Learning to enjoy time together.
- Minimizing your STUFF.
- Labeling THINGS as hard working or lazy.
- Teaching your kids to reduce their possessions.
- Where to begin living more of a minimalist lifestyle.
Mom Squad Challenge: Try to opt out of all your family activities for two weeks and see what really is adding value and enriching your life. Add those enriching things back in and hopefully have more confidence to cancel all the other stuff.
Resources:
To find out more about Jillian, get all her resources and join her email list visit her website: www.montanamoneyadventures.com
Favorite Parenting Book: The Five Love Languages: The Secret to Love that Lasts by Gary Chapman
Favorite Book: Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less by Greg McKeown
I saw a meme the other day that said “I don’t do the KEEP CALM AND CARRY ON thing. I do the spontaneously combust and go totally mental thing. Just FYI…” It made me laugh and think that most parents INTEND to do the keep calm thing, but END UP doing the spontaneously combust thing instead. Why?!? Well, today we bring you HOPE and HELP from none other than Ralphie Jacobs of “Simply on Purpose”. If you’re not familiar with Ralphie’s instagram site where she teaches parents, then you are in for a treat! In addition to all the great tips we receive from Ralphie, listen in to hear our segment called “What?!? What could that hurt??” to hear more funny stories of parenting fails where we GREATLY underestimated the impact of 1 bad decision!”
Ralphie lives in Austin Texas with her husband and their 4 amazing daughters. She graduated in Early Childhood Education from Utah State University and has worked as a preschool teacher and creator of children's organizations and curriculum. Ralphie quickly learned that the best way to impact a child's life for good is to teach parents, so she founded the Instagram feed @simplyonpurose where she writes about parenting, family culture, and living with purpose. She travels the country teaching workshops on positive parenting.
In this week’s episode Ralphie shares how she decided to dedicate herself to helping parents through teaching.
She also spent time laying the foundation of staying calm by teaching us the importance of respect. Most people think of respect in relation to a parent/child relationship as children needing to respect their parent. While this is true, it is just as important for a parent to respect the child. It is through modeling respect that children will learn HOW to respect.
“You do not want to teach your children that the way to gain respect is to lash out at people lower than you on the totem pole.”
5 coping strategies to help parents stay calm...even when they’re triggered:
- Don’t take it personal.
“With parenting we have to check our ego at the door. When we yell, we are taking it personally. It is a personal affront. What’s actually happening is purely developmental.”
- Learn how to stay curious.
- Be consistent (have clear expectations).
- Walk away...especially if you are the one who’s triggered!
- Use time to your advantage.
- Change the don’ts into do’s.
- Stop the threats.
- Switch a negative into a positive.
- Wrap what you are saying carefully.
“The number 1 reinforcer for a child is parental attention.”
THE FANTASTIC FOUR QUESTIONS:
- Favorite parenting book: All of Dr. Glen Latham’s books. Here are a few Ralphie mentioned: “The Power of Positive Parenting”, “Parenting With Love”, “Christlike Parenting”.
- Favorite fictional book: “Blackmoore” by Julianne Donaldson.
- Advice you wish you had been given before you had kids: Remember that little things really are little things. Don’t sweat the small things. Sit back and enjoy the chaos.
- Mom fail: Listen in for an awesome story about a time Ralphie was distracted in a place and at a moment that turned out to be very unfortunate!
MOM SQUAD CHALLENGE
Look for the good in your child. Change the ratio of positive to negative interactions with your child to an 8:1 ratio. (Eight positive interactions for every 1 negative interaction). The most effective way to get rid of the “junk” in your childs behavior is to pay attention to the good. If you pay attention to the good, statistics say that 80% of the junk will go away.
We want to thank Ralphie for spending time with us and sharing all of these insights! You can find out more about Ralphie and listen to all of her parenting lessons on instagram @SimplyOnPurpose.
Assertiveness? Who else is a little afraid of that word? In this week’s episode, Dr. Julie Hanks talks to us about the value of being assertive and how it is a benefit to both you and your family. Julie is the owner of Wasatch Family Therapy. She is a licensed therapist and the author of both The Burnout Cure: An Emotional Survival Guide For Overwhelmed Women and The Assertiveness guide for Women: How to communicate your needs, set healthy boundaries and transform your relationships. If you feel like sometimes your needs aren’t met in your relationships whether it is as a mother, spouse, friend or co-worker, you are going to want to listen to this episode! Here is what we talked about:
- What it means to be assertive.
- Common misconceptions women have about being assertive.
- How to act on your own needs without feeling selfish.
- Why it’s important for women to learn to express their needs.
- The three different communication styles.
- The “Lantern Stance” style of communication and its benefits.
- The five skills to improve your assertive communication:
- Using self-reflection to impact your ability to be assertive in the present.
- Using self-awareness to understand what you think, feel, want, and need.
- Self-soothing to connect with your current emotions.
- Using self-expression to express what you are feeling.
- Self expansion: allowing yourself to be changed.
- The importance of modeling proper assertive communication for you family.
- The value of practicing self-compassion.
- How to learn to say “no” and be ok with it.
- Why it’s important to learn to say “no”.
- How Julie used the five skills to assertive communication skills to turn a heated discussion into a relationship building experience with her daughter.
- Learning to be curious in your parenting instead of shameful.
Mom squad Challenge: Practice Self Compassion. If you’re suffering, treat yourself kindly instead of beating yourself up. We all have times where we’re feeling something we don’t want to feel. Give yourself a break and tell yourself it is ok.
This week’s show is all about saving lives! Dr. Greg Hudnall is with us and shared some incredible insights in how we, as parents, can help our kids, our kids friends, and community members to keep hope alive and prevent suicides. Dr. Hudnall is a former high school principal, student service director and associate superintendent with the Provo City School District. He has been involved with suicide prevention for the past twenty years and has personally been involved with over forty-five suicides as a first responder or consultant
is considered one of Utah’s leading experts in community and school-based suicide prevention, intervention and postvention.
Listen in to hear the specific, and easy things you can do to begin making a difference today for those you love. Also, you can hear our thoughts on traveling with kids, including a story of Beth’s daughter having her face caressed by many members of a tour group….every girls dream. Aaaaaand...find out what Dr. Hudnalls 5 year old screamed for all to hear as he carried him out of church one day. This is a must listen!
Suicide is a heavy topic, one often avoided. Unfortunately, the lack of knowing exactly how to prevent suicides led the Provo City Utah School District to average one to two suicides per year during the late 1980’s and early 1990’s. Dr. Hudnall began his journey toward suicide prevention in that district as a principal. Provo was not unique in its high suicide rates. Students across the nation were struggling with this devastating problem...many still are.
Through a collaboration effort with many different experts, Dr. Hudnall created the Hope4Utah Foundation and Hope Squads in over 300 schools in Utah and several states nationwide. According to the Hope4Utah website, a Hope Squad is defined as “... the eyes and ears of your school. They are comprised of students who are trained to watch for at-risk students–provide friendship, identify warning signs, and seek help from adults. HOPE4UTAH works with school advisors to train students who have been identified by their classmates as trustworthy peers to serve as HOPE Squad members. Through evidence-based training modules, HOPE Squad members are empowered to seek help and save a life.” The decrease in teen suicides across Utah has been dramatic since in implementation of Hope Squads.
Suicide prevention is a community issue. No one person can solve the problem. Students, teachers, principals, and therapists all have a significant role to play. They cannot be alone in this endeavor. Parents are an integral part of this equation. Dr. Hudnall recently released a book called “Hope Squad: The Successful Suicide Prevention Program For Youth.” This book outlines what specific things parents, educators, and community members can do to immediately begin helping to prevent suicides. Below are some of the topics (called LIFE SAVERS) we discussed in this episode that are found within the book.
- How to begin a conversation with someone about suicide.
- Talking about or making plans for suicide.
- Expressing hopelessness about the future.
- Displaying severe/overwhelming emotional pain or distress.
-
The warning signs of suicide:
-
- Showing worrisome behavioral clues or marked changes in behavior, particularly in the presence of warning signs above.
- People who talk about suicide won’t really do it.
- Anyone who tries to kill him/herself must be crazy.
- If a person is determined to kill themself nothing is going to stop them.
- People who commit suicide are people unwilling to get help.
- Common misconceptions about suicide:
- Protective factors and resiliency:
The following protective factors are personal characteristics that are critical to helping your child, and those characteristics that also help children build resiliency.
- Effective behavioral care.
- Family dinner
- Create opportunities to make and keep friends.
- Connectedness
- Self esteem and a sense of purpose or meaning in life.
- Cultural, religious or personal beliefs that discourage suicide.
It's just us on the episode today! We asked our Mom Squad to ask us questions that they have been DYING to know the answer to and today we are answering them.
Who are we?
How did we meet our husbands?
How did this podcast start?
What goes into starting and running a podcast?
Why are we so amazing? Ok no one asked us that :)
We talk about how Family Looking Up got started, why we put in the hours to keep it going, and a little about each of our personal lives and families.
Mom Squad! This week's episode is for you! We have Chanelle Neilson, from the Moms Who Know podcast, talking with us about why moms need to take care of themselves, why moms don't, and why it is SUCH a big mistake!
Listen in to hear a great story about how Chanelle found out she was pregnant with her fifth child (a major surprise), at age 38, and how Chanelle began her writing and podcasting career in China....whaaaat?!? Plus find out Andrea's best tip for breastfeeding moms.
Chanelle Neilson is the host and creator of the Moms Who Know Podcast. She is the author of Parenting with Purpose, which has been translated into Chinese. She has worked in the fitness industry for 20 years and is a certified yoga instructor. She loves sunshine, healthy living, and dark chocolate. Chanelle is the mother of 5 kids and is married to her best friend.
"When we take care of ourselves we can take BETTER care of everyone else." - Chanelle Neilson
A major part of being able to care for ourselves is connected to our ability to let go of our responsibilities ... at least temporarily. This is nearly impossible for some moms! Why?
- Part of this is caused by mom guilt...an affliction known to many.
- Part is a control issue. We, as moms, want things to go a certain way. If we're not there, doing things our way (the right way), we worry about it getting done wrong...if at all. We have to be willing to let go of the control over those things to properly take care of ourselves.
5 Areas of Self-Care
- Physical
- Mental
- Nourishing your body
- Relaxation
- Social
Chanelle explored each of these areas, why they are so important, and how moms can easily implement them.
- PHYSICAL:
- Exercise is definitely one aspect of physical self care that is important.
- We should listen to our bodies. The needs of our body change from day to day, but those needs MUST be met. Perhaps one day you need a good, hard run, but on another your body may need rest, or a really good yoga stretch.
- Sometimes a physical need may not have to do with our bodies at all. Perhaps we desperately need order and loveliness in our home or garden. It could be the need to help our house or garden look better.
- How can we be aware of our physical needs?
- It takes time to learn to slow down and listen to what our body is saying about its needs. It becomes easier with practice.
- In the chaos that is motherhood, we need to be able to FEEL and THINK.
- MENTAL
- A huge part of mental self care has to do with incorporating things into our life that stimulate us, such as podcasts (shameless plug!), books, puzzles, etc.
- Sometimes mental self care can mean taking a mental break. We live in a world where we are constantly needing to process information. Sometimes the goal needs to be finding peace.
- We may need to turn off the TV or music in the background in order to create and hear the peace.
- "Turn it all off once in a while and have silence and see what comes up in your mind. Mental self care might mean putting more in and it might mean letting more out and giving yourself space."
- NOURISHING YOUR BODY
- Feeding our bodies needs to be done with care and consideration.
- Chanelle talks about the benefits of an 80%/20% rule when it comes to food and indulgence. Essentially that means that 80% of the time we should choose healthy choices. That gives us the freedom to indulge 20% of the time without guilt. This rule lends itself to a huge mental shift where food is concerned so that we can nourish our body AND our souls.
- RELAX
- This area is more commonly thought of as PAMPERING.
- If moms have the time and money to have manicures, pedicures, and massages, then that certainly is one way to pamper ourselves. If not, here are some ideas on how moms can pamper for little or no money:
- Hot bath with epsom salts or essential oils.
- Foot bath with marbles at the bottom so you can move your feet around on them and accomplish a foot bath along with a massage.
- Ask friends over for a night of pampering and do any above along with facial masks, eye cucumber treatments, soothing music, etc.
- SOCIAL
- The most important part of social self care is to be with people that FILL you! Notice how your friends make you feel. If you feel worse about YOU after being with them, that's a good indication that being with them is not good social self care.
- Stay at home moms can be very lonely which strains not only themselves, but their relationships with their children and their husbands.
- Here are some ideas for social self care:
- Call friends---old and new---and connect.
- Make play dates for your kids and spend the time connecting with their moms.
How can busy moms fit self care into their lives?
- It's all about making tasks a habit!
- Morning routines
- Night routines
- Daily effort works better than weekly to truly nourish moms and make them better able to nourish others.
MOM SQUAD CHALLENGE:
Chanelle is issuing a challenge to all of her podcast listeners and would like to include our listeners in it!
The Fill Your Own Cup Self Care Challenge! August 20-25. Spend 5 days focusing on a different aspect of self care for you!
To participate go to www.momswhoknowpodcast.com/selfcare
TO LEARN MORE ABOUT CHANELLE:
www.momswhoknowpodcast.com
Apple Podcast: Moms Who Know
facebook.com/momswhoknowpodcast
Note: This is a continuation of episode 22.
Today we have Niki Olsen…AGAIN! She is a Licensed Clinical Mental Health Counselor. She has spent over 16 years working with youth and families specializing in a modality called Mind Body Bridging which can help a variety of issues. She is married with two little girls in elementary school. She currently lives in Utah but is originally from Oregon. Niki loves to be with her family, and in her free time can be found exercising or sleeping.
We are focusing on using the technique known as “Mind Body Bridging” to help manage our stress. Everyone experiences stress in their lives, but sometimes stress becomes so overwhelming that the stress then interferes with our ability to function. We will identify the cause that impairs our functioning and creates a dysfunctional Mind and Body state. We will also experience ways to help manage this dysfunctional Mind Body State.
This is the second part of our mind body bridging interactive episode. To listen to episode 22, the first part of this interactive episode, click here http://familylookingup.com/2018/03/27/stress-management-interactive-post-with-nikki-olsen-episode-22/
Listen to this episode when you have time to participate in the activities with us as you will be pausing the episode to complete some writing exercises. You will need three pieces of paper and a pencil.
We will be focusing on:
- Becoming aware of the Identity System that creates the overwhelming stress.
- Mapping out our thoughts.
- Coming to our Senses to decrease body tension and mind clutter.
- Identifying depressor thoughts and mapping them out.
- Identifying fixer thoughts and mapping them out.
- Understanding how depression and anxiety are natural results of these thoughts.
- Discussing the harmful cycle of depressor and fixer thoughts that occurs when our Identity System is awake and in control.
- Learning how to cope with these thoughts and end the harmful cycle.
If you would like to learn more about Mind Body Bridging, please visit their website at MBBcharity.org. There you will find scientific studies, more in-depth information on the theory and ways to become trained if you desire. You may also contact Niki at nikiolsen12@gmail.com for more ways to become trained or certified on the theory. If you would like to continue your personal Mind Body Bridging learning, we have linked many of these books on our show notes at www.familylookingup.com to purchase.
We want to thank Niki Olsen for her time, insight, and understanding.
Every parent wants their children to grow up and be independent, responsible adults, right? But how do we do this? This week we have the opportunity to talk to Merrilee Boyack. Merrilee Boyack is an estate-planning attorney. She is also a professional lecturer and speaks all over the country. Merrilee has been featured for many years at BYU Education Week and Time Out for Women, and is a published author. Her current passion is working with Family Watch International as President for Utah. She is working to protect families and children at the international level at the United Nations and in supporting governments around the world to institute measures to protect families.
This week we enlist the help of Merrilee Boyack to teach us her “Master Plan” for teaching kids the life skills they need to be prepared to leave our homes and live on their own. Here is what we talked about:
- Merrilee’s family
- Why Merrilee decided to write a book about teaching life skills to kids.
- The three basic parenting principles.
- Principle #1: You are not responsible for making your children happy all the time.
- Looking at your child’s frustration and unhappiness as learning opportunities.
- Principle #2: The best self-esteem for children comes from being able to do things on their own.
- Self esteem comes from doing things kids know are important.
- How parents can give up control to allow kids to learn important skills.
- Principle #3: Remember that we are the parents and we are in charge.
- Making marriage the center of the family instead of the children.
- Merrilee’s “Master Plan” for teaching kids life skills so they will be ready for adulthood.
- How to implement the “Master Plan” without total rebellion from the family.
- The importance of giving children ownership over their own life skills.
- Best time of year to work on life skills.
- How to approach teaching life skills to teenagers.
- Involving other people in teaching your kids life skills.
- Rewarding your children after mastery of a skill.
- Helping kids find their own desire to master skills.
Mom Squad Challenge: Come up with your top three goals for ALL your children. Write them down and post them somewhere. Figure out the first steps necessary to reach those goals.
Recognizing Gifts in Yourself and Others/ Guest Eric Richards
Eric Richards teaches at Utah State and speaks all over the country and is known for his constant smile and his popular ‘brotherichards’ Instagram/Facebook accounts. His upbeat CDs at Deseret Book are best sellers. Some random facts: He can clap with one hand. He’s part White, Black, Polynesian, and Native American. He’s left-handed. He eats chocolate every day. He grew up as an only child; his mom is an only child, and his grandma was an only child, so…his family reunions were pretty small.
On the podcast today we talked to Eric about recognizing what talents and abilities each of us have. He argues that we all have at least one and we can use that to make the world better. Whether your gift is an incredible voice or the ability to recognize that someone is sad, those gifts were given to you and should be used. We also discuss finding gifts and abilities in all of our family members.
Mom Squad Challenge: Write a list of 10 gifts that each of your children have.
Eric’s Favorite Parenting Books: The 7 habits of highly Effective Families- Stephen R. Covey
Raising up a Family to the Lord- Gene R. Cook
Favorite Fiction Book:
You Are Special- Max Lucado
Eric’s Parenting Advice:
“Mucho Take it Easy”
-Nacho Libre
Holly Thurgood is a stay at home mother of seven. She is a trained Parenting With Love and Logic Facilitator. Parenting with Love and Logic is a parenting philosophy founded by Jim Fay and Foster Cline. Parents who use the Love and Logic approach can help their children to be accountable for their choices. This philosophy encourages parents to disengage from confrontation and allow the kids to come up with solutions for their own problems. It also gives parents strategies to get children to complete chores without nagging and fighting. Sounds pretty amazing, right? Holly’s fun personality and hilarious examples made this interview both fun and informative. Here is what we talked about:
- Why Holly first sought out the Love and Logic parenting philosophy.
- What Love and Logic parenting is.
- Putting an end to arguing, backtalk and begging.
- Teaching responsibility without losing love.
- Setting limits without waging war.
- How to use strategic training sessions to eliminate specific bad behaviors.
- How to avoid power struggles.
- Guiding kids to own and solve their problems.
- How to get kids to complete chores without being asked or being paid.
Mom Squad Challenge: Instead of arguing with your kids or trying to solve their problems when they come to you, just come up with a phrase you say that disengages you from the situation and lets them work on solving their own problems. For example, when they are upset about a situation at school, just listen and say, “That’s too bad.” You don’t need to say anything else.
Holly’s favorite Parenting Books:
Smart Money Smart Kids
Parenting With Love and Logic
The Child Whisperer
Growing Up
Favorite Fiction Books:
Harry Potter
Pride And Prejudice
Jackaroo
Wednesday Wars
Advice Holly wished she had had before she became a parent: We are enough just the way we are, no matter how we are doing it. Plan on a lot of mom fails and know that that is normal!
Sam Passey is a stay at home mother of six children. She has developed a weekly cleaning routine that allows her to deep clean her entire house every week in less than an hour a day. In this interview we talk about her cleaning system and how you can implement it in your own home. So if you are a slob, like us, there is hope for you if you follow her plan. Here is what we talked about:
- The importance of making cleaning a priority in our home.
- Sam’s cleaning routine.
- How to schedule a weekly cleaning routine.
- How much time it takes to deep clean an entire house.
- Cleaning with little kids around.
- How to teach your kids to clean.
- Simplifying your cleaning routine so it is manageable in the beginning.
- How to make cleaning more enjoyable.
- Suggested cleaning supplies. (links below)
- How to stay motivated and encouraged with tasks that never get done (laundry, dishes, etc.)
- Rewarding yourself for getting your cleaning done.
Mom Squad Challenge: Write down a cleaning schedule that you would like to achieve. Include what you want to clean and when you are going to clean it.
In this episode we had the privilege of talking with twin sisters, two moms who have had extensive experience working on capitol hill and in the white house. They now run a website called The American Moms, where they teach all about civics, civility and raising our kids to be big proponents of both.
BIOS:
Andrea Reeve worked on Capitol Hill in Washington DC. During her time there she served two U.S. senators as their press secretary, where she acted as their mouth piece to reporters and the public. Andrea is now living across the country in the other Washington state with her husband and three daughters.
Brittany Richman worked in the Office of Presidential Speechwriting at the White House. She and her husband now live in Rapid City, South Dakota, where she teaches her three kids all about those faces carved into Mount Rushmore, just a few miles from their home.
Here are some of the topics we discussed:
- What led each of them to their career in politics in Washington D.C.
-
What led to them leaving Washington D.C., getting married, and having children.
-
How they each adjusted to the role of stay-at-home-mom after such prestigious careers.
-
How the website The American Moms was conceived of and what its purpose is.
- Why civility is as much of a component as civics on the website. Why they feel civility is lacking in our society and what we, as parents, can do to counteract this in our children.
- The six ideas of how we can make the 4th of July mean something to our kids.
If you would like to know more about Andrea and Brittany and The American Moms website visit www.theamericanmoms.com. You can also visit them on Instagram at @theamericanmoms where they post daily fun, insightful, and positive messages aimed at civics and civility.
We were honored to speak this week with Heidi Tucker. She is an award-winning author and speaker. Her passion for writing and speaking about light and hope has inspired thousands. Heidi is known as a great storyteller who believes that every story not only teaches a gospel principle, but can make you feel it. She has inspired many to rise up, cling to their faith and position their hearts to recognize God’s hand in their life.
Heidi Tucker won a 2018 Illumination Book Award for her new release Servie’s Song. She also won a similar award for her first inspirational book Finding Hope in the Journey in 2017.
When Heidi isn’t writing her next book, or speaking at a conference, you’ll find her spending time outdoors with her husband, four grown children and eight grandchildren. She loves sunflowers, hiking and ice cream … not necessarily in that order.
Here are some key points of our discussion:
- Heidi talked about her family and her journey as a mother.
- Originally a business major, she tells how she was led to the surprising decision to write books.
- We discussed why and how Heidi compares life to a culmination of hikes, and how this analogy is helpful to mothers and fathers in their own journeys.
- Heidi discussed some of the trials she has had in her own life and how she has discovered that there is always hope in every journey.
- She discussed the patterns of behavior we need to follow to be able to see the hope that is there.
- We discussed the link between knowing about our heritage and receiving an increase of hope in our own circumstances.
- Heidi told the story of how she came to write the book Servie’s Song, the true story of one mother living in Zimbabwe. Servie's Song takes you on an emotional journey of tragedy and heartbreak to an inspiring path of hope.
Mom Squad Challenge: Better your communication with God. Find a space that you can dedicate to opening yourself up to two-way communication with Him.
You can find out more about Heidi at www.thepickledsunflower.com
Father’s Day was this week. Did you make the dads in your life feel special? We wanted to celebrate all the fathers out there. We brought Kirby Heyborne on the podcast to lighten things up. Kirby is a husband, father, comedian, actor, and audio narrator. With Kirby’s hilarious sense of humor we talk about lessons he has learned as a husband and father and discuss parenting tips that have worked for him. Stick around after the interview because we decided to put our own husbands on the hot seat and talk about dad struggles and get a perspective on parenting from the viewpoint of fathers. Here is what we talk about during this fun interview:
- Kirby’s family and career
- How husbands and wives can connect during their busy lives.
- How to keep a positive attitude during the rough times of fatherhood.
- Kirby’s wife’s three finger approach to keeping Kirby in line.
- Kirby’s dad fail.
- Lessons Kirby has learned from acting that he has applied to his parenting.
- How to keep focus on your family during the busy career life.
- Living a life with high morals when you are working in the movie industry that does not value high morals.
- The importance of finding ways for a father to connect with their family.
Things we discussed with our husbands:
- The biggest challenges in fatherhood
- Things our husbands do to survive the rough times of fatherhood
- Dad fails
Mom Squad Challenge: Laugh with your husband. Make him feel like he is the funniest man alive.
Don’t we all want to be happy? Although we cannot control our happiness 100% we do have some control. How happy we feel is 50% genetic, 10% circumstance and 40% up to you! Today we talk to Hank Smith, professor, speaker, and author. We discuss his book, “Be Happy: Simple Secrets to a Happier Life” and talk about the ten things that we can do to make our lives a little bit happier.
Summer is here! Does this create excitement or fear? I always have a mix of emotions. I’m excited to have a more relaxed schedule, and do some of the things that we don’t have time for during the school year. But, anxiety creeps up in me as I think about how to keep my kids busy ALL DAY. This week we talk to Jenny Layton, a professional organizer, mother and speaker. She is going to put all your fears to rest. In this conversation all about summer with kids, Jenny gives us great advice about setting expectations for the summer and being purposeful in our summer activities. Listen to this episode to create your best summer yet. Here is what we discussed:
- How to organize our summer so we embrace the summer season.
- Recognizing those family seasons (summer and holidays) and personally productive seasons (fall and spring)
- Designing experiences that are of interest to your kids.
- How to organize your bucket list and summer activities.
- Helping kids find balance and mindfulness in their own lives.
- Teaching your kids valuable life skills during the summer.
- Being purposeful in your parenting during the summer.
- Scheduling your fun and educational activities.
- Setting summer expectations.
- How to manage screen time.
- Suggestions for when your kids say they are BORED.
- Strategies for keeping your house clean with everyone home for the summer.
- Finding time for ourselves during the summer months.
- Creating a Power Hour.
Mom Squad Challenge: Choose something from the areas we discussed and implement it in your life. Take some time to think about what we talked about. The thing that seems to be nagging at you..start there.
Resources Jenny Layton's Website www.thehappygal.com
Link to Top 10 Tips for an organized Life: http://www.thehappygal.com/innercircle/top-10-tips/
B.O.R.E.D. printable: http://www.thehappygal.com/organize-your-summer/
OurPact App: https://ourpact.com/
Let’s go on a trip! I always say I want to travel, but just don’t make the plans to make it happen. This week we talk to world travelers Kam and Shani of the popular travel blog and instagram account “Our Family Passport.” Their goal is to encourage other families to take a “time out” together and go and explore the amazing world. They travel together as a multi-generational family with ages that range from the very young to the grandparents. In this conversation, Kam and Shani share their travel tips they have learned from their own traveling experiences. You will feel inspired to get that trip planned and on the calendar. Here is what we talked about.
- Where their enthusiasm for traveling first started.
- Finding balance between family members with different interests when traveling.
- The ages of their children when they first started traveling.
- Places that would be difficult to travel to with children.
- How their travel blog first started.
- How to coordinate family schedules so they can travel together.
- How to choose a destination.
- Strategies for appealing to everyone’s interests when traveling.
- Tips on budgeting for travel.
- Traveling credit card recommendations
- Tips for finding cheap airfare.
- Why it is important to travel with kids.
- How to pack when traveling with kids.
- How to prepare kids mentally for a long international trip.
- Helping your child adjust to time changes and a busy traveling schedule.
- The importance of not over-scheduling when traveling.
- Recommended time to spend at each destination.
- Taking pictures and documenting your travels.
- Resources found on the “Our Family Passport” travel blog.
To Learn More From Kam and Shani: Visit their website: Our Family Passport
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ourfamilypassport/
Instagram: @ourfamilypassport
Feeling overwhelmed with your home, family and life? ME TOO! Luckily this week we talk to Angie Calderwood. She is a professional organizer, designer and loves to inspire others to get organized and find a proper place for everything in their life. This episode is full of practical tips to get our homes, families, and life organized. Here is what we talked about:
- How Angie become a professional organizer.
- Why it is important to be organized.
- Angie’s shift in mindset that organization is more than arranging physical clutter, it is a way of life.
- What to do when you are not a naturally organized person.
- Organization can be a learned skill for everyone.
- Where to begin organizing your house.
- How to organize an area without making a bigger mess somewhere else.
- Strategies for decluttering. Getting over the emotional attachment to our possessions.
- We walk through the process of deep organizing an area.
- Why it is important to work on a project from start to FINISH.
- How to maintain a clean area after we have invested time to organize it.
- Angie’s best tips for mothers to get organized.
- The family car tends to be an extension of the house. Angie discusses strategies for keeping your van clean and organized.
- Keeping your life and house organized during the summer months.
- Teaching our kids to keep their room clean.
Mom Squad Challenge: Take a few minutes and sit down in your home. Close your eyes and imagine what you want your home to look like, feel like, and even smell like. You can envision what your ideal is. Think about who lives in your home and why you want to make living an organized life something that benefits your entire family.
Angie's Website: aproperplaceorganizing.com
Every Tuesday morning we wake up to a new episode of Family Looking Up with an amazing guest on the podcast. They share their knowledge and experiences with all of us and hopefully give us some ideas of how to make our families a little better. At the end of each episode we ask them for a “Mom Squad Challenge.” These challenges are meant to give us something plausible we can think about, work on, and apply to our lives each week. This is one of my favorite parts of the episode. Instead of just hearing information and then moving on, we have the chance to make small changes for the better.
In this episode Andrea, Beth, and Camille talk about some of our favorite “Mom squad Challenges” from past episodes and what we have done to apply them to our own lives. We share the challenges that have made positive impacts in our lives and the ones that we completely failed at.
Hey Mom squad! This week is Mother’s Day. YAY!!!! We wanted to celebrate YOU this week, so we brought on three very special guests. This week we talk to Calee Reed, Hilary Weeks and Shawna Edwards. All three women are talented musicians. And all three women have written beautiful songs about motherhood. This week we get to talk to these fun ladies about their families, their mom fails, their musical talent and the inspiration behind their beautiful songs. Get ready to learn, laugh, and cry.
Our first interview was with Calee Reed. Calee is a mother of five kids. She is a Christian singer and songwriter. She travels the country spreading her message of faith and hope through music. Here is what we talked with Calee about:
- Calee’s blended family.
- Advice Calee would give to new moms.
- The hardest part of being a mom.
- Lessons Calee has learned from her experience as a mother.
- Calee’s hilarious mom fail.
- Where Calee learned to sing and her family’s musical talent.
- Where Calee gets inspiration for her songs.
- When Calee first started writing songs.
- When Calee finds the time to write with her busy, young family.
- The inspiration behind “She Put the Music in Me.”
Hilary Weeks is a mother of four daughters. She is a Christian Billboard chart-topping singer and songwriter. She is a frequent performer at Deseret Book’s “Time Out For Women.” In our fun conversation with Hilary we talked about the following:
- Hilary’s family.
- Lessons Hilary has learned from motherhood.
- Lessons Hilary learned from her mother.
- What did your mom do really well?
- Hilary’s funny mom fail.
- When Hilary first started writing songs.
- The inspiration behind the song “Stand Still.”
Shawna Edwards is an accomplished pianist, and an award-winning writer and songwriter. Her most well-known songs, “Do You Have Room?” and “The Miracle” have been performed all over the world. She is a mother of 5 and grandmother to ten grandkids.
- Shawna’s family.
- The joys of being a grandmother.
- Shawna’s creative birthday gift to her grandkids.
- The hardest part of being a grandma for Shawna.
- Things Shawna learned from her mother.
- Shawna’s mom fails.
- What made Shawna start writing music just ten years ago.
- How has music impacted Shawna’s family
- The inspiration behind Shawna’s song “More than Enough”
This week we had a great conversation with Carrie Moore. Carrie spent 25 years as a journalist and editor at The Deseret News in Salt Lake City winning national, regional, state and local reporting awards from a variety of media organizations. She has been an adjunct faculty member at Brigham Young University since 2005 teaching media writing, and recently spent five years in the healthcare field working in pastoral patient care as a board certified chaplain. She serves as executive director of The Bradley Center for Grieving Children and Families, a local non-profit organization. This week we get to talk to Carrie about the process of grieving, how we can help our children through the grieving process, and how to help others who are grieving. Here is what we discussed this week.
- Carrie Moore’s background and the story behind the beginnings of the Bradley Center.
- The purpose of the Bradley Center.
- The benefit of talking through grief.
- Events that lead to the formation of the Bradley Center.
- The need for connection when going through grief.
- How to help children get through the fear of talking about death.
- The danger of isolation when grieving.
- How to talk to kids about grief.
- The value of a belief system when talking about death.
- Death and grieving are normal.
- Grief is a process, not an event.
- Why it’s important for parents to grieve in front of their children.
- People react differently to events even in the same family.
- How perceptions affect the way children grieve.
- How to grieve in front of your children without scaring them.
- Principles to help kids deal with grief of all kinds.
- How to maintain connection to the deceased family member.
- What to do when you have children who don’t want to talk through their grief.
- Grief takes time.
- Grief can cause a physiological response.
- Things we can do to help others when they are grieving
- How to turn grief into hope.
Mom Squad Challenge: Call someone you haven’t talked to in a long time and invite them to lunch.
Website: bradleycentergrief.org
For an in depth list of books for grieving children visit our website at www.familylookingup.com
This week on Family Looking Up we were joined by Saren Eyre Loosli, founder of Power of Families, co-founder of Power of Moms, daughter of Richard and Linda Eyre, and mother of 5. Saren holds a B.A. from Wellesley College and a Masters in Education from Harvard. She’s consulted and conducted training for numerous non-profits including the National Institute on Out-of-School Time, YMCA and One-Heart Bulgaria and has traveled to Africa and South America with Choice Humanitarian.
~ We discussed what entitlement is and why it is detrimental to the overall happiness and success of our children’s lives.
~Saren shared great insights on what we can do, as parents, when we hear “My friends have this” or “ My friends don’t have to do that”.
~We discussed a question that one of our listeners asked: "How do you raise entitlement free kids without being a “no mom” (always quick to say no to your kids)?”.
~Gratitude is a great antidote to entitlement. Saren discussed ways to teach gratitude to children. We also explored the topic of teaching them the right principles that help them to FEEL the right things instead of just DOING the right things.
~Many take their children into 3rd world countries to open their eyes to their blessings. Not all parents can or want to do that. We talked about other options parents can explore without going to Ghana.
~Saren had some terrific advice and insight on chore systems for children. We discussed the pros and cons of them, why they are worth the trouble, and how to implement them. We also discussed how defeated we all feel at our inability to be 100% dedicated to those systems, and why it’s okay to not be perfect.
Mom Squad Challenge
Take 30 minutes this week to sit down with your kids and talk about the things they need to be responsible for in your home. Include in the discussion, what you do in the home so they can understand how much you help them. If you don’t already have a simple
chore system in place, this would be an ideal time to start one.
To find out more about Saren Loosli, visit www.poweroffamilies.com .
When you visit the website, you’ll find many books and resources available to you at no cost. It is a fabulous resource!
Power of Families is also on Facebook and on Instagram as @poweroffamilies.
We want to thank Saren for her willingness to share her insights, experiences, and resources with us at Family Looking Up!
Rachel is a mother of two miracle babies via adoption and IVF, a former high school English teacher, and a podcaster at 3 in 30 Takeaways for Moms. This week we had a conversation about resisting the need to constantly entertain our children, but instead creating special “highlights” with them. Here is what we discussed in this week’s episode:
“In motherhood, the hard Moments outnumber the perfect moments, but the perfect moments outweigh the hard moments.” Saren Loosli
- Rachel’s journey to motherhood.
- Rachel’s experience with her son’s open adoption.
- The anxieties associated with adoption.
- How to cope with the reality of motherhood that doesn’t always live up to the expectations of motherhood.
- The explanation of a family “Highlight” and how they help moms create meaningful experiences with their kids without feeling overwhelmed.
- How we can keep things easy and maintainable while still creating memories. Everything doesn’t have to be “pinterest worthy.”
- Why it’s important to stop taking so many pictures of our kids and experience the moment.
- Examples of Highlights from Rachel’s family and how to apply them to our own families.
- It’s the simple moments of connection that matter the most to our families.
- The value of scheduling Highlights for our families.
- Looking for opportunities to seize a moment with our child to create a Highlight in their life.
- The importance of looking for the “flecks of gold” in motherhood.
MOM SQUAD CHALLENGE: Seize a Highlight moment. Look for a time when you can jump in and make a memory with your kids.
Melanie Dale is the Author of It's Not Fair: Learning to Love the Life You Didn't Choose. She also has a podcast called Lighten Up with Melanie Dale, and a blog Unexpected.org.
Today Melanie Dale talks about loving the life you didn’t choose. We have a great discussion about how we deal with challenges, find joy in our circumstances, find support from others, support others, and laugh through it all.
One part I really enjoyed is when we talked about keeping your relationship strong while going through hard times. Every week Melanie and her husband schedule time to talk. Two questions they ask each other each week are
- How have you felt loved by me this week?
- How can I love you better?
This episode is perfect for anyone who has ever had any struggle in their lives...and we have all had PLENTY! Listen to this episode for some advice, motivation, tips, and laughs.
Melanie’s Mom Squad Challenge:
One of the best ways to help you feel more grateful is to serve others. This week Melanie challenges us all to be intentional, look around your community, and take your family out and serve.
This week we had a great conversation about sibling rivalry with Dr. James Crist. Dr. Crist is the Clinical Director of the Child and Family Counseling Center in Woodbridge, Virginia He has worked with the center since 1990. As a Licensed Clinical Psychologist, he works with a wide variety of clients, including children, adolescents, adults, and families. He is the author of seven self-help books for kids.
This is what we covered in this week's episode:
- Why sibling rivalry is common.
- The average amount typical kids fight.
- What “normal” sibling conflict looks like.
- The advantages of a “consultant parent.”
- What a consultant parents looks like.
- The advantages of giving kids time to resolve conflict.
- Why kids are more likely to fight when they are closer in age.
- Differences between kids that affect sibling interactions: temperament, interests, age, resilience, intelligence, and mental health disorders.
- How parents address the individual strengths of their kids, without fueling the rivalry by making the other child feel inferior.
- Ways to encourage positive relationships between two siblings struggling to get along.
- The importance of validating your child’s feelings.
- The affect birth order has on sibling interactions.
- Sources of sibling conflict.
- The difference between sibling rivalry and sibling conflict.
- How to help kids deal with jealousy amongst themselves.
- Advantages and disadvantages of having kids share a room.
- Common ages kids start sibling conflict.
- What to do when kids physically fight.
- Strategies for teaching kids to solve their conflict on their own.
- When you may want to look for professional help to resolve sibling rivalry.
- How to use family meetings to improve family relationships.
- Family rules to implement to avoid conflict.
- The power of looking for the positive in your children.
- Five ways to forge a friendship.
Mom Squad Challenge:
- Listen More. Talk Less. When we listen more we are teaching them they matter and their opinions count.
- Avoid the impulse to tell your children how to solve their problems. Ask open-ended questions and let them come up with the solution.
Resources:
www.jamesjcrist.com
www.loveandlogic.com
Note: This is part one of this interactive episode. Part two is episode 40.
Today we have Niki Olsen...AGAIN! She is a Licensed Clinical Mental Health Counselor. She has spent over 16 years working with youth and families specializing in a modality called Mind Body Bridging which can help a variety of issues. She is married with two little girls in elementary school. She currently lives in Utah but is originally from Oregon. Niki loves to be with her family, and in her free time can be found exercising or sleeping.
We are focusing on using the technique known as “Mind Body Bridging” to help manage our stress. Everyone experiences stress in their lives, but sometimes stress becomes so overwhelming that the stress then interferes with our ability to function.We will identify the cause that impairs our functioning and creates a dysfunctional Mind and Body state. We will also experience ways to help manage this dysfunctional Mind Body State.
This is our first interactive episode! Listen to this episode when you have time to participate in the activities with us as you will be pausing the episode to complete some writing activities. You will need three pieces of paper and a pencil.
We will be focusing on:
- Becoming aware of the Identity System that creates the overwhelming stress.
- Mapping out our thoughts.
- Coming to our Senses to decrease body tension and mind clutter.
- Becoming aware of the Requirements in our lives that trigger the Identity System (dysfunctional mind and body state)
- Labeling these thoughts to free them from the Identity System
If you would like to learn more about Mind Body Bridging, please visit their website at MBBcharity.org. There you will find scientific studies, more in-depth information on the theory and ways to become trained if you desire. You may also contact Niki at nikiolsen12@gmail.com for more ways to become trained or certified on the theory. If you would like to continue your personal Mind Body Bridging learning, there are also different workbooks to purchase.
Brad Wilcox grew up in Provo, Utah except for childhood years spent in Ethiopia Africa. He served his mission in Chile and later returned to that country to serve as a mission president for the LDS church. Brad is a professor at Brigham Young University and the author of Growing Up and Where do Babies Come From?
Is it just me or is “the talk” up there on the list of things you dread as a parent? I try to be cool and normal and then I panic...every time! Brad is here with some tips. Today he encourages parents to step up to the plate and have open conversations with your kids. Brad suggests that by talking openly with your children you are strengthening the relationship. Some helpful suggestions he had include:
-Start early. However old you were when you first heard about sex take 2 years off of that. Kids are being exposed earlier and earlier and the conversation, if possible, should start at home.
-Ask your kids probing questions. Find out how much they know. Ask them where they heard something or what they think if means.
-If Mom and Dad are available, both of you should talk to each child regardless of their gender. We want our kids to know that it is not a secret. Mom knows, Dad knows, and now they know too.
-”The talk” is not a one time event. Keep an open dialogue going with your kids. If they ask you a questions, answer honestly. Frequently check in with them to see if they learned anything new or have any questions.
-Many families encourage their children to wait until they are married before they have sex. Do your best as a parent to foster healthy thoughts and ideas about sex. It isn’t bad or gross. It is just a matter of timing. At some point you switch from “no no no” to “go go go” and you want them to feel ready for that.
Brad’s Mom Squad Challenge:
Stand in the shower and practice saying all of the anatomically correct terms. He feels that we should be able to say them without hesitation or embarrassment to our children. All by yourself in the shower is a perfect place to practice!
This week on Family Looking Up we are exploring the topic of fathering with Carey Casey, CEO of the National Center for Fathering (NCF). Carey is the author of Championship Fathering: How to Win at Being a Dad and it’s sequel Championship Grandfathering: How to Build a Winning Legacy. He was also general editor of the book 21-Day Dad’s Challenge: Three Weeks to a Better Relationship With Your Kids. Since 2009, Carey has served on the White House Task Force on Fatherhood and Healthy Families. Carey also served for five years as co-pastor of Lawndale Community Church, an inner-city church on Chicago’s west-side. At Lawndale, Carey helped empower the community with health care, housing, education and economic growth. Carey has also served as a lecturer at the World Congress on Sports, the college football Senior Bowl, the National Association of Basketball Coaches Convention, at the Final Four, and the Super Bowl. Carey and his wife Melanie live in Chicago Illinois. They are the parents of four children and have nine grandchildren.
This week we are talking to Kristen Jenson. Kristen is the author of the Good Pictures Bad Pictures series of read-aloud books including the best-selling Good Pictures Bad Pictures: Porn-Proofing Today’s Young Kids. She is the founder of ProtectYoungMinds.org, a website dedicated to helping parents empower their kids to reject pornography. Recently, she was invited to testify before the Washington State Senate Law and Justice Committee on the public health crisis of pornography. In this episode we address the important topic of educating our kids about pornography and giving them the important tools to deal with it when they find it. Here is what we talked about:
- Why Kristen wrote her two books
- What things are discussed in Kristen’s books
- How to teach kids WHY we don’t look at pornography
- The importance of teaching kids how addictions work
- The appropriate age to start talking to your kids about pornography
- Why it’s important for parents to START the conversations with their children instead of waiting for children to come to them
- How having difficult conversations with your children can build your relationship with your child
- Whether its better to have a conversation about pornopraphy with the entire family, or as a private and special conversation
- The importance of ongoing conversations with your child and making the time for them
- Why connection with your child is one of the biggest factors in prevention
- How to create a safe place for your kids to talk to you
- The value of putting internet filters on devices
- When accountability software is useful
- How to help children build their own internal filters
- What accountability software is.
- The C.A.N. D.O. Plan for kids to follow when they see pornography
- The difference between the “thinking brain” and the “feeling brain”
- Strategies for replacing bad thoughts
- How to teach your kids to empower their “thinking brain” to control their “feeling brain”
- The changes that occur in a brain of a person with an addiction
Mom Squad Challenge: 1.Talk to your kids and name their private parts using the anatomical names. Teach them that those parts are good parts, not shameful. However, they are private and need to be kept private. 2. A. Give them a definition of what pornography is. B. Help them understand that it’s dangerous and why. and C. Give them a plan.
This week we have an episode for ALL parents. We are discussing the issue of SLEEP! Yep, do you remember what that is? We are talking to Dr. Melisa Moore. Dr. Moore is a clinical psychologist in the sleep center at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and is board certified in behavioral sleep medicine. She sees patients, teaches, and conducts research in pediatric sleep, and is also a sleep expert on the Pediatric Sleep Council’s website which is babysleep.com. If you are having sleep issues with your baby, toddler, or teenager, you will want to listen! Here is what we talked about:
- Dr Moore’s background
- Normal sleeping behaviors for various ages
- Establishing a healthy bedtime routine
- Ways to avoid children becoming too dependent on their routine
- Age to start a bedtime routine
- Advantages of sound machines, alternatives for them, and cautions when using them.
- Babies using pacifiers
- Tips for getting kids to fall asleep on their own
- Sleep training by having your child “cry it out”
- An appropriate age to let your kids cry through the night
- The family bed
- Teaching your child to fall asleep independently
- The Problems with screen time before bedtime
- Use of Melatonin in children to help them fall asleep
- Making the transition from the crib to the bed
- Disciplining at bedtime (Use of bedtime passes)
- Transitioning kids out of the family bed
- Dealing with kids waking up during the night
- How to handle night terrors
- Correlation between adolescent sleep and physical functioning
- Suggestions for getting your teens to go to sleep
- Napping and teenagers
- National Baby Sleep Day.
Mom Squad Challenge: No electronics in the bedroom. If moms can’t do that, put your electronics on the other side of the room. For children: No electronics in the bedroom!
Resources:
Baby Sleep day: On March 1st from 9am-8pm EST is Baby Sleep day. During this time the Pediatric sleep council, a team of pediatric sleep experts from all over the world will answer parents sleep questions via facebook at www.facebook.com/pedsleep/
www.Babysleep.com The pediatric sleep council’s website. All information on this website supported by research. You can find answers to frequently asked questions and video clips.
The National sleep foundation: https://sleepfoundation.org/
Jodi Mendell’s Book: Sleeping Through The Night
Social media is full of the good, the bad, and some ugly. Today we talk with instagram super influencer Collin Kartchner about the effects that social media may be having on you and your children.
In an ever advancing world we may struggle to keep up with everything happening on social media. One thing that is becoming more and more clear is the consequences of misusing social media. In this episode we discuss how access to a virtual world and prolonged amounts of time spent on it each day may be leading to depression, anxiety, feelings of worthlessness, and in some cases self harming or even suicide. Collin is starting a new dialogue and hoping to get the word out to parents that it is time we take control. We are responsible for monitoring use of social media in our homes. We can have a discussion about how the images and posts we--and our teens--are looking at how they are making us feel. His message is that we are good enough. We don’t have to look to a virtual world for approval.
The “Mom Squad Challenge” this week is to take an honest look at how the things and people you are following are making you feel and have that same conversation with your children. If something does not uplift and bring you joy, delete it from your feed.
Today we are talking to Angela Ferrari. Angela grew up in the mountains of western Maine. Living in a rural setting, she developed a talent for finding creative ways to play and captivate her imagination. She is a talented writer, illustrator and produces the Story Spectacular Podcast. Her Story Spectacular podcast is filled with stories, vivid characters, songs, jokes and fun facts for kids. In this episode we talk about ways for parents to live a creative life and encourage creativity in their children.
Topics Discussed:
- How Angela became a Children’s Story Podcaster
- What Story Spectacular is all about
- The benefit of story podcasts for kids
- How to find people to help you fulfill your dreams
- How we can support our kids in their creativity
- Why Angela chose to write children’s literature
- Ways for moms to awaken their creativity
- Maintaining the fun when following your passion
- How routines help accomplish your tasks
- How audiobooks benefit troubled readers
- How much to push your kids in their creative interests
Mom Squad Challenge: Start Something New! Carve out 40 minutes for yourself and give yourself permission to start something new.
Family life can get very busy. Sometimes it feels like we are playing tag team with our spouse instead of being a married couple. Today we talk to Melissa Hunt from the very popular website The Dating Divas. She give us great creative advice about getting over the excuses we have for not dating our spouse. If you are looking for ways to keep the marriage fun and excitement alive, you are going to want to listen to this.
What we cover in this episode:
- How the Dating Divas got started
- The Mission of the Dating Divas
- Why it is important to work on the relationship with your spouse
- The challenges that prevent us from dating our spouse
- Finding time to date
- Dating when money is tight
- The importance of a formal invitation for a date
- The importance of being intentional in your marriage
- Tips for planning your dates
- How to date when you have kids
- How to take the first step to start dating again, if you are struggling in your marriage
- The problem with bringing expectations to the date
- Ways to make your spouse feel special everyday
- Developing a habit to date
- Ways to make Valentine’s Day special, fun and take off the pressure
Mom Squad Challenge: Put three date nights on your calendar!
If you would like to find out more about The Dating Divas, visit their website at www.thedatingdivas.com or email Melissa Hunt at: melissa@thedatingdivas.com
How do we help our teenagers? This common question is explored by School of Family Life Associate Professor Laura Padilla-Walker. She focuses on two ideas crucial for a teen to develop as they head into adulthood: fostering self-control and self-esteem. We explore ways for parents to be positive and patient in helping teens to develop these bedrock traits.
For years as a business consultant, Chris was putting the signature, “Do Good. Be Great.” on his email signature. One day, he received the dreaded call from his son’s school saying his son had been bullied. As he thought about the struggles in our world and specifically the struggles in his son’s life, he thought, “We have enough people striving to be great. What if we simply strive to be kind?” He changed his email signature to Do Good. Be Kind. and from there his powerful message was born. He now travels to schools and businesses talking about this important message. In this episode we have a conversation with Chris about his message, the importance of kindness, and how we can pass that on to our children.
Things talked about in this episode:
- What is Do Good. Be Kind.?
- Everyone has their own definition of what it means to Do Good. Be Kind.
- The three pillars of kindness: Kind to yourself, Kind to others, Kind to the world
- This is not an anti-bullying movement. Do Good. Be Kind. is about being proactive about being kind.
- When you are kind to yourself, it flows into being kind to others.
- Little daily reminders can make a big difference in how we treat people
- Do Good. Be Kind. is not about being perfect. It’s about striving.
- Simple ways to make a big change in the community around us
- Strategies for ways to be kind to ourselves and how to teach it to our kids.
- How patterns of habit influence how we feel about ourselves.
- How to teach our kids to proactively look for ways to be kind to others
- Find your values. Recognize the things you say versus the things you do.
- Teaching our kids to recognize there is a backstory to everyone’s life.
- How to teach our kids to be kind to the world around us without making it a political statement
Mom squad challenge: Dedicate 5 minutes of your day for positive affirmations. Give yourself credit for the things you do.
To find out more about Do Good. Be Kind. visit dogoodbekind.life #dogoodbekind or email Chris at: mystory@dogoodbekind.life
We were lucky enough to talk to personal trainer Megan Smith! You can find her on Instragram @Muncher_Cruncher or on her website www.munchercruncher.com. We talked to her about how to get started in the wide world of fitness. She suggested a few things that were really helpful
- Find the why. Why do you want to lose weight or start working out? Decide why you want to make changes and continue to remind yourself of that reason.
- Do what you love. You will never stick with it if you don’t enjoy it. Find a form of exercise that makes you want to get out of bed in the morning.
- Reward yourself. Not all rewards are created equal. Find something that motivates you. Set small attainable goals and reward yourself when you accomplish them.
- Don’t compare yourself to others. Easier said than done. Progress can be slow and every body responds differently.
She challenged us to cut back on sugar this week. That doesn’t mean to cut it out completely, but to be more aware of how much sugar we are eating and to reduce that amount.
Megan gave us some really great advice on how to get started and stay motivated. I hope you enjoy the episode.
This week we have a conversation with Coach Carl Mattei. Carl is the coach of the nationally ranked Regis Jesuit high school girls basketball team located in Aurora, Colorado. In our conversation we discuss how parent involvement has changed over his years of coaching and what we can do as parents to have positive interactions with coaches and encourage the best in our youth sports.
Things Discussed in this Episode:
-
Carl’s background in coaching
-
How has parent involvement changed throughout his coaching career
-
How the introduction of the cell phone changed parent-coach interactions
-
What is motivating the increase in parent involvement and parent paranoia
-
Common problems coaches have with parents
-
Carl’s worst experience he has had with a parent
-
The increasing cost of youth sports
-
The best way to discuss an issue with your child’s coach
-
What parents can do to be a positive influence on our kids in sports
-
Things our student athletes can do to improve the team atmosphere
-
Final advice Carl has for parents to encourage positive interactions and a positive team atmosphere
Camille’s book recommendation: The Bonds That Make Us Free by Terry Warner
Mom Squad Challenge: Prepare your athlete! Have your children properly fed, well rested and make sure their homework is done. Coaches want their athletes ready to go when they are in the gym. So many things affect the team when the kid is exhausted or hasn’t eaten properly.
This week we had the privilege of interviewing Lindsay McCarthy, co-author of Miracle Morning for Parents and Families. We talked about the different elements of a “Miracle Morning” and how they can help improve your life each day.
To have a miracle morning you should wake up earlier than your normal time and do S.A.V.E.R.S. These include time for Silence, Affirmations, Visualization, Exercise, Reading, and Scribing. Each of these give you time for meditation, goal setting, self improvement, and focus.
After starting to practice miracle mornings Lindsay involved her two children. They renamed the practice C.H.A.R.M.S for her children. This includes Creativity, Heath, Affirmations, Reading, Meditation, and Services. She has made this a daily expectation in her home for the children, herself, and her husband.
In the book she also shares some parents skills. One that we discussed was being more playful with your kids. She encourages us to take time to play whatever they want to play; really focus on the child without distraction.
MOM SQUAD CHALLENGE: Lindsay encouraged us all to try to have a “Miracle Morning.” It counts even if we just start with just one of the S.A.V.E.R.S each day, or do each one for one minute. Find out more about the Miracle Morning for Parents and Families at gratefulparent.com.
We all have them. Those hot topic conversations we either avoid, or perhaps we feel like we are on a fighting carousel going around and around on the same topics year after year. Today we talk with Sloane Fife about 5 strategies for dealing with those hot topic conversations with your spouse. Join us for an insightful look at what each of us can do to get off of that carousel!
Today we are talking to Michael Whiteley. He is the CEO and Founder of Bear Butt (an outdoor equipment company that currently sells hammocks, but will soon be expanding its merchandise.). Here is Michael's story:
The Bear Butt Story:
Michael and his wife started The Bear Butt company two years ago. They have done 4 million plus sales since then. When they started it two years ago he had just finished a mission for his church. One of the things he learned on his mission is he did not want to have a job and he wanted to gain tools that he could use to help serve people. He felt like a job wouldn't allow him to serve people like he wanted to. He met his wife right after his mission. He told her what he wanted to do. Michael told her he was going to go back to school because he had started and he always said he was going to finish because that is what he is "supposed to do." She told him school had nothing to do with his dreams and goals. After they talked, he made the decision not to go to school. This decision was very disapproved by his peers and family. Around that time, she found out they were going to have a baby. So at this time, he had no job, just dropped out of college and was about to have a baby. He spent $5000, that he put on a credit card, on an online course that taught him how to sell things on Amazon. Again. his wife supported him. He considers this course his college. It taught him how to start a business and how to sell things. The first product they started to sell was called Suds of Beauty. They sold African Black Soap. It was a one pound bar of soap from Africa that looks like poop and its very ugly and smelly. Again, his parents and in-laws were questioning his decision. Right off the bat they were selling soap. It was actually successful, so he realized he could sell. He could grow a company and grow a brand. That's when they thought of Bear Butt and they started selling hammocks. The process took off rapidly. They were very successful as they focused on costumer service. Still during this whole process their family was telling him he needed to go to college, get a job and he needed a back up plan. They kept feeling like they could do this so they continued with their company. It wasn't until after 8 months, that his dad went on a walk while he was at work and he saw two college kids sitting in a Bear Butt hammock right in front of his office. He sent Michael a picture and was impressed that people were actually buying his hammocks. Finally his dad had the courage to talk to Michael about his business. From his family Michael always heard, "hey go back to school!" "Hey, go get a job!" "Hey are you ok?" but it was never, "Hey, tell me about your business, what are you doing?" When his dad saw those kids in the hammocks, Michael finally showed him everything he was doing in the company and his dad believed. He was proud of Michael's choice. Michael's current Bear Butt business is contuing to grow their brand. As of February first they are launching three new products: backpacks, jackets and sleepingbags.
Why do you think parent's struggle with supporting their kids' BIG dreams?
People love their kids and don't want them to fail. Michael's parents were worried about him failing. Parents lovingly stunt your growth.
What do you do when your kids come to your with a dream you don't support?
Michael wouldn't ever assume that his kid's dream will automatically fail. As long as their dream is good morally and will help them grow or help the world grow, he would fully support his kids?
Where does your drive come from.
Michael attributes his drive to his conversion to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. When he joined the church, he learned about who he is. It brought a purpose to him that he is supposed to be doing things. It gave him the courage to do it, because he new he had a Heavenly Father that would support him.
Did you have any mentors during this time?
Michael's only other mentors was his $5000 course he bought. His biggest supporter is his belief in God. He trusts that God will lead and guide him.
What did you do to improve yourself?
Michael agrees you have to do your part. He loves learning and education. He thinks college is a little flawed. He read 100 books in 6 months. He even read one that taught him how to read really fast. Something people don't do very well is they read something, but then they don't apply it. He decided he would read something and he would find two golden nuggets that he loves and he would apply it. He attributes his success to this attribute. Whenever he finds something he likes, he immediately implements it in his life.
Where did you get the idea to get up early?
The second or third book he read was The Miracle Morning, by Hal Elrod. That book changed his entire days which changed his life. He has taught several people to follow the same habits. He used to wake up 3 am. Now he wakes up at 4 am.
Micheal agrees he was blessed with high energy, but one of the keys to being successful is working hard. We have to do our part. You don't have to have a skill for it, you just have to do it.
What are some common themes you found in your 100 self help book?
There is not one thing, but a few things he learned: When Michael was reading about successful people, he realized many successful people were not very good in their personal life. He wanted to be part of the change to be a successful businesss owner and also a good person. The other thing he learned was every successful person all worked hard and had some sort of sacrifice that they had to do to achieve what they wanted to do. Michael says if you have a purpose and passion, it makes working hard easier. It's still hard and takes sacrifice but it is a lot easier.
How are you going to handle what are you going o do FOR your kids and how much are you going to let them struggle?
Michael jokingly says he wants a buy a farm so his kids can learn to work. He wants to teach his kids they need to hustle and drive.
What do you wish you would have done earlier?
His first regret is he wishes he would have converted to the LDS church earlier. He also says he would have loved the opportunity to learn other skills that school wasn't teaching him. He wished he would have read more self help books to learn leadership skills and selling things when he was younger.
What advice do you have for overcoming the fear of failure?
When Michael's company hires people, they are still a growing business so they don't have a lot of money to hire people, so they usually hire people with not very many skills but are good people and have passion. They tell them that they need them to work and they are going to make a lot failures. They support them in their failures because then they are going to learn. He has learned from his mistakes. He thinks you can't be successful without making mistakes. He also thinks having a faith in god gets rid of fear. Faith overcomes fear because you have a trust in God and everything will be ok. Michael has come to realize that risk means growth.
How do you and your wife support each other?
Michael said they support each other in their goals. When you support each other it brings in acceptance in who they are and brings congruency in their relationship.
Michael believes that having a child is a financial blessing. He believes God wants you to have kids, so God will financially support you to have kids.
Do you have any final advice as we are trying to raise kids who are fearless in following their dreams?
Michael says you can be anything you want to be. Whenever they have a crazy idea as long as its good, if you always support them and encourage them to be what they want to be, not GIVING it to them, it will be very important in their development process as the world tells them not to follow their dream. They will have the strong motivation to live what they want to because you have told them they can achieve whatever they want to achieve.
Mom Squad Challenge: Ask your kids where they see themselves in 5 years and whatever they say, completely support them in it until they change their mind.
Christmas should be a time of happiness, joy, generosity, and excitement, but often it is associated with of anxiety, stress, and sometimes depression. Some people worry about money, family, the commercialization of the holiday, and the need for the “perfect Christmas.”
Today we discussed some ways to make your Christmas a little less stressful and some new traditions you may want to add to your families holiday season.
We talked about the importance of traditions with Niki Olsen on episode one and Christmas is a great time to start those. We want you to remember that circumstances change and we have to be flexible with our traditions. We also have to make sure that the traditions are manageable. Don’t do so many traditions that you don’t enjoy the holidays.
Some traditions that Camille does and loves are “Christmas Adam” which is celebrated on December 23rd. She also loves to get her family a puzzle to work on together, and they always watch While you were Sleeping, A Christmas Story, It’s a Wonderful, and A Christmas Story. Me and Andrea also added National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation (not appropriate for young children) and Elf.
Andrea loves to go on hayrides and sing Christmas carols, doing the 12 Days of Christmas, and making homemade eggnog (recipe below).
Beth loves doing secret Santa for a family in need. We also do a Christmas Eve breakfast where we invite people over who don’t have family in town. All three of us enjoy acting out the Nativity on Christmas Eve and getting the kids Christmas Eve pajamas.
Although Christmas is fun and full of traditions we have some hacks that may help it feel a little less stressful. Some helpful hacks are to plan ahead; write everything down so you know what you need and want to do. An app that Andrea uses to track gifts is called the Christmas List. You can find it at the app store. She also plans all of the things that Elf of the Shelf will do for the whole month. Camille suggested being intentional about your traditions that you bring into your family. She also started giving her kids only one gift and then they do a big family gift. There are a ton of printables on Pinterest that you can print for free. A major theme was that the more you make it about others, the better the holiday is.
I’d Marry that: Food Edition
Egg nog ice cream, peppermint cool whip, oreo truffles, chex party mix, giant ginger cookies
Giant Ginger Cookies
4 ½ c flour
4 t. Ground ginger
2 t. Baking soda
1 ½ t. Cinnamon
1 t. Ground cloves
¼ t. Salt
1 ½ c. shortening
2 c. sugar
2 eggs
½ c. molasses
¾ c. sugar (for rolling dough in)
Combine all dry ingredients. In a stand mixer put shortening and 2 cups of sugar and beat until light and fluffy. Beat in eggs and molasses. Add flour mixture.
Shape dough into large balls. Roll the dough in sugar. Place 12 cookies on an ungreased cookie sheet.
Bake in a 350 degree oven for 11-13 minutes or until bottoms are lightly browned and tops are puffed. Cool on cookie sheet for 2 minutes. Transfer to wire rack and let cool.
Oreo Truffles
- 1 package (15.25 oz.) Oreos (any flavor, double stuffed or regular both work)
- 1 package (8 oz.) cream cheese, softened
- 12 oz. white melting chocolate (*Not chocolate chips, but high quality melting chocolate- I used Baker’s bars)
- 6 oz. semi sweet melting chocolate for topping (Or sprinkles, or Oreo crumbles)
Place the Oreos (filling & all) in a food processor (in batches if necessary) and process until fine crumbs are formed and large chunks are gone.
Mix in the softened cream cheese until very well combined and the dough becomes sticky.
Roll about 1- 1 ½ tablespoons of dough into a ball and set aside on a plate or in a container that you can fit in the freezer. Freeze the balls for at least 30 minutes.
Baker’s chocolate bars melt really well in the microwave and are ideal for dipping. (Chocolate chips, not so much.) Place the white chocolate in a small microwave safe bowl and heat for 30 seconds at a time, stirring in between, until melted.
Andrea's AUSTRIAN Eggnog (not Danish)
1 gallon milk
5 small cartons whipping cream (whipped)
16 egg yolks
5 cups powdered sugar
2 tsp vanilla
Beat powdered sugar and egg yolks together. Set aside. In a large pot (if you have a large double boiler, use it! I make mine in a large electric roaster with an inch of water under the cooking pan.) Heat milk until almost boiling. Then add egg and sugar mixture. Cook until eggs are cooked (I have no idea how hot this is-- this is a FAMILY RECIPE PEOPLE!) Cool. Add vanilla and whipped whipping cream. Mix all together. DRINK AND ENJOY!
Today we are talking to Gretchen Smoot. Gretchen Smoot holds a BS in Business Administration and Economics from the University of Florida and an MS in Economic Development from Utah State University. Since 2006 she has worked in the real estate industry in Utah . She has been with Century 21 Everest Realty Group as the Director of Finance since its inception in 2009 as it has grown to be the largest Century 21 office in the world for the past three years. She and her husband have four small children and enjoy spending as much time as possible in the mountains of Utah. She volunteers extensively within her religious community and is passionate about finding ways to help others! A favorite quote is "No one ever injured their eyesight by looking on the bright side".
Growing up Gretchen’s husband’s parents did not talk about money. They wouldn’t ever talk about money and then all of a sudden they would make large purchases. One day, while they were dating, Gretchen was going over bills, her husband realized people had to pay for power while she was paying my bills. This was the complete opposite of what Gretchen grew up with. Her family growing up was broke. They had a large paper route every single day. EVeryday they would throw papers after school while they were doing homework in the car. There wasn’t money for big expenses. Then her parents got divorced, and the money problems continued. That is when she decided she didn’t want to have those money problems when she was older.
She and her husband have learned to work together to balance their finances. They decided early in their marriage that they weren’t going to go on vacation without the cash to do so. Her husband is the spender in their marriage. Her husband taught her to be ok with spending money and she taught him it is ok to not spend money.
How to create a budget
Many people do not know what their net is each month (meaning how much money is in their bank.) You need to know what deductions are going out. Are your withholdings right? Are you on the right health plan? So you know when the dollars come in they are truly yours. Next look at your fixed expenses (mortgage, utilities, etc.) Then find out what is discretionary. The rest left over is your debt reduction. You have to plan for your known-unknowns (car registration, christmas, birthdays.) People don’t tend to plan for those things. She has built into her budget an average for those things. If you want to increase the amount you can bring into debt reduction, then there are three things you can ask: 1. Can you bring in more money? 2. Can you change your fixed expenses (refinance your car, refinance your home) 3. Can you change your behavior in terms of your discretionary spending. IF you can change it from “this is my budget” to “this is my financial plan” it makes it a lot more fun.
So many people think of the word budget as a negative thing. Gretchen tied what they were doing to a monthly reward. She recommends making a visual to track your progress.
Gretchen and her family had their struggles financially, but seeing a budget as a financial plan helped to take some of the stress out of them because they knew every dollar had a home, and those homes were very purposeful to help them accomplish the goals they wanted for their family.
Gretchen reviews her family budget at least once a week and they review their budget together once a quarter. Camille mentioned that when she uses a budget she feels like she has more freedom because it gives her freedom to spend.
In the United States the number one reason for divorce is money. Some people will have financial infidelity, meaning they are not being honest with their spouse about their money. It is important to talk about money amongst couples. Set your goals together.
It is important to allow yourself not to be perfect. It is a budget and not a commandment. Give yourself an opportunity for wiggle room. Allow yourself to make mistakes, and know that it is not going to happen overnight. It is a long term process.
Gretchen recommends finding a program that works for you. She uses Excel. The LDS church has a great and easy tool for how to use a budget. You can find that at https://providentliving.lds.org/self-reliance/finances/financial-calculator?lang=eng. Gretchen also recommends Dave Ramsey and using loan calculators.
Kids and Money
Gretchen wanted their kids to have a healthy relationship with money. They wanted their kids to know that money is not bad. Money can be a great tool to bless and help others if it is used properly. They provide all the necessities for their kids (clothes, backpacks, etc.) Anything that is extra their kids have to provide for themselves. If the kids are invested in it, they care more about it. She wants to help her kids see that money is a tool to do things you love.
Gretchen’s kids do chores, that they do not get paid for. If they want to earn money they do additional chores. She does not give them an allowance. She pays her kids according to what is age appropriate for the kids, what fits in her family budget, what they trying to earn for, what is their motivation, and how hard they are working. She pays the kids every week. She tries to explain that they don’t get paid every time they work because that is the same way mom and dad get paid. Their cash is stored in an envelope with a ledger that tracks the money. It helps them understand the tangible value of money. If the kids forget their envelope at the store, they don’t get to buy what they want. She explains it to them by saying, “mom and dad don’t take out loans, and we don’t want you to take out loans.” It is a way to teach them to be prepared and to not take out loans.
They have tried to teach their kids that just because you earn a dollar it doesn’t mean you spend a dollar. They require their kids, for every dollar spent, 10 percent goes to tithing (giving) 10 percent goes to savings, and they can spend the rest. As long as their choices aren’t harmful or inappropriate, they are allowed to spend their money any way they want.
Mom Squad Challenge: Physically sit down and write down a goal for your financial life.
We are talking today to Molly Claire. Molly Claire is a certified Life Coach specializing in motherhood and offers special programs for newly divorced moms. She focuses on the unique challenges moms face from time management and productivity, to the worries , guilt and overwhelm that can wreak havoc on personal well-being. Molly's emphasis on mindset and the way it impacts every aspect of our lives offers a coaching process that helps her clients make eating changes from the inside out.
We start the episode by asking Molly to explain the CTFAR model:
Everything we do in our life come all stems from the way are thinking about our life. The way that we think creates feelings, and our feelings drive our actions, and our actions drive our results. For example: thing to lose weight. Lets say you have the thought, "I will never lose weight." When you think that, it causes you to feel hopeless. When you are feeling hopeless you end up eating more and work out less. Which proves that original thought. Molly uses that model to find out why we are feeling frustrated. We need to get a new perspective to create new feelings in our life.
First trap of Motherhood: Mom Autopilot
Mom Autopilot is an automated state that we run on. It all starts when we brought home the our first child. All of a sudden we are responsible for every need of another human being. What happens is the mom autopilot helps you get through sleep deprivation and colic, however over time it becomes not so useful. Beasue we get in the habit of taking care of things for our kids that they don't need us to do. We might put more things in our to-do list than we need to. This isn't just with our kids. This is in our communities, in church. Wherever people ask things of us and we take it on immediately. The way this shows up in motherhood is taking on the problem of solving our kids emotions. Think about the last time your kids come to you with a problem.
One of the other traps is the trap of believing that we are responsible for making our kids happy. When we can shift into a place that it is totally normal for our kids to have emotional ups and down and it is not our job to fix it, then we can allow that space for them to be upset and we don't have to be upset. If we can let people have their emotions then we can respond to situations better. Kids are going to have negative emotions about half the time. We can choose how we feel.
Trap: Attaching your kids success to our happiness
We feel good when someone compliments our kids. As moms we feel with many more negatives then positives. Motherhood is a thankless job. We have to be our own cheerleaders. It is easy to get a feel good when someone says something good about our kids. We make it mean that we are doing a good job when they have a success. The problem is when our kids do something terrible, then we feel like a failure. We feel inadequate. Separate our how you show up as a mom. For example: It is important to me to teach my kids to be kind to other people. But my kids decide what to do with that teaching, whether they actually are kind or not. So we need to draw the line between what is our responibility and what is our kids responsibility. When we can let go of taking credit for our kids success we can let go of taking credit of their failures and allow them to take credit for their own success. We can let go of trying to control them, because control never works anyway. Kids will take more ownership of it. We can't create success for our kids anyway, When we see failure as part of success it makes it so much easier. The founder and CEO of Spanx attributes her success to her dad. Everyday he would say, "what did you fail at today." We don't have to think of failure as a negative thing. When we can think about it that way with our kids it is not as upsetting. The more failures they have, the more success they can have. It is so freeing. It will also help your relationship with your kids. If we are taking ownership of their failures, then we will be desperate to have them not fail or cover it up. They will feel that. If you feel really loved, it is much easier to love your kids despite what they do if you aren't worried about their failure.
Trap 6: Victim Mentallity
Think about so much is asked of us as a mom. We start having a dialog in our head that we have do so many things, and it is not fair. Falling into a victim mentality is when we act as if, and think as if, we don't have a choice. But we can realize, we always have a lot of choices. Recognize your choices and the more you do that, you will feel less like a victim. This helps us realize the WHY of why we became a mom.
To learn about the rest of the mom traps, read Molly's book: The Happy Mom Mindset
To learn more about Molly, visit her website at Mollyclaire.com
Mom Squad Challenge: Remember to recognize your choices. Think today about where you are succeeding. It is easy to recoznize our failures, but today ask yourself where am I succeeding and focus on that.
Beth's book recommendation: The Shepherd's Song by Larry Barkdull
Ideas for After school Snacking
First, find out if they are eating school lunch. You can also let them snack after school and then move dinner back. Another option is to eat dinner early around 4 and eat a snack around 7. Lastly, Cheyna suggests packing your kids with a 200 calorie snack and have them eat it before they get home
After school Snack Ideas
Serve your kids lower calorie snacks if dinner is close. If your kids are eating carbohydrates their body will digest them very quickly. Peanut butter is a great snack that will last a long time.
Other great snack ideas
High calorie snacks (peanut butter, no bake cookies, peanut and banana sandwiches, string cheese) will stay in your kid's system longer. No bake cookies are a great option. Beth's family calls them "Grandma Millward Cookies."
Grandma Millward Recipe
1/2 c milk
1/2 c butter
2 T coco powder
2 c sugar
Place everything in a saucepan and Cook to soft ball stage
Take off heat and add:
1/2 c peanut butter
Mix all ingredients until melted
Then add:
3 c oats (either instant or non-instant)
1 t vanilla
Place by spoonfuls on parchment paper and let cool.
Dealing with a picky eater
Don’t make food a bad food or good food. Keep all food the same! Cheyna recommends the book, "Feeding with Love and Good Sense," by Ellyn Satter. She recommends you don’t push food on kids. Sometimes kids get labeled as a picky eater and they live up to the name. When we force kids to eat a food, it becomes a battle. Kids can go 1 or 2 years without eating a food before they will eat it again. Some research shows it can 20 exposures before a kids wants to try it. Keep putting the food on their plate and let them choose what they will eat. At the dinner table, give them 1 or 2 things they will eat. If they won't eat anything for dinner, you can give one other small option (maybe a piece of bread.)
Snacks for teenagers
You want the snack to be high in calories. Offer them a fruit with a protien and fat (for example, cheese and trail mix, some chocolate, yogurt, and no bake cookies.). Great idea: Have a sandwich bin in your fridge, with all the fixings to make a sandwich. So when your teenagers come home hungry and are looking for something, they can quickly fix a sandwich.
Drinks
Cheyna discussed diet soda vs regular soda Artificial sweetners gives your body a false sense of sweetness. There has been a link between artificial sweetners to larger waiste circumference. If you have diabetes it would be better to drink diet, but she recommends non- diet drinks.
Milk
Recently there has been debates whether milk is good for you. Cheyna highly recommends drinking milk. Your body can only absorb 300 mg of calcium at one time, milk has 330 mg per one cup and 8 grams of protien and is fortified with vitamin D ( vitamin D needs fat to be absorbed,)
Weight loss
We asked Cheyna if it is calories in and calories out that determines your weight loss. Cheyna explains Macros: Macros are the three different food groups that provide calories to the body. 1. Protien: signals you are satisfied first. So add protiend to kick your hunger early. 2. Fats: stay in stomache longer (stomache won’t empty as quickly.) 3. Carbs: digest quickly. You can manipulate your macros so you don’t get hungry as quickly
Social Media and Body Image
Social media lumps heatlh and beauty together. We need to separate those two. When your doctor says you need to lose weight, he/she is not saying you are ugly. We need to give an example to our kids that we are working out to be HEALTHY. If we want to lose weight and be healthy, we need to be consistent with exercise and eating healthy. There is not one specific bad food.
“If you don’t take time to be healthy you will be forced to make time to be sick” Unknown
We need to keep up on our health, but not be obsessed. Social media can be positive, it celebrates all different body types. We need to celebrate our different body types too.
Another book recommendation: Intuitive Eating: A Revolutionary Program That Works" by Evelyn Tribole and Elyse Resch
Cheyna's Mom challenge: Really think when you are about to eat something, if you are really hungry, and if you are, think about what you really want to eat. Plan your meals. Sit with your family and plan together what you are eating.
This week on Family Looking Up we talk with author and Professor Josi Russell about literature and its impact on children and families. We explore ways to help all family members to enjoy literature more and how to help use stories to teach and create meaningful conversations with our families.
Josi Russell is an Associate Professor of English at Utah State University where she teaches Literature and Creative Writing. She is a writer and has five published novels, one of which, The Caretaker, was a finalist for the Utah Book Award and for the Whitney Award.
Josi’s number one tip for what parents can do to help kids have a positive reading experience and learn to love reading? Parents need to read. She said kids will love what you love in many instances and letting them see you read and enjoy books is the very first step.
What if parents and/or kids really hate sitting down to read? Are audiobooks an acceptable replacement for the reading experience? Josi said that she believes in immersing kids in story and if that is through audio books then that’s fine. “What you are trying to accomplish here is a love for story and a love for narrative. I would say give them all the options you can including audio books, picture books, chapter books, novels, anything you can to foster that love of narrative. Once they get that they will find their own most comfortable path.”
The Scholastic 2017 kids family reading report was referred to which showed that children who are read to hear millions more words than children who aren’t due to hearing words that are not in the everyday vocabulary of their parents. As far as audio books are concerned, this would apply to reading or to listening.
When dealing with a parent who really dislikes reading, she tells them to find the type of narrative that they enjoy whether that be sports stories, oral stories, family stories and communicate those to children to help them develop a love of story and the world of the mind.
Josi said that if you can get kids to love story, then they will find the series that they love to read. There isn’t one magic series for everyone because we all have very different intelligences. If you help them to have a love of story then what they need in school will follow because they already have that passion and a confidence.
Speaking of reading out loud to children, she said that it is the best thing that you can do with children. First because of the literacy and second because it brings closeness with your child which they crave and need. Read for fun rather than reading for a literacy goal. If they enjoy the book with you then the literacy goal will intrinsically follow.
When picking great literature to read with your family look for “family strengthening themes.” Those are the “big ideas” or themes “that will strengthen your family and give your kids a road map beyond what they see already around them. Beyond the mirror, it gives them a window into new experiences and things they may face. Some of those themes are the great themes of literature, such as sacrifice, where a character gives something up for another character.” Forgiveness, change, and redemption were others Josi talked about as wonderful themes to look for.
How do we deal with finding books that we find appropriate for our kids? First, we read the books ourselves to find what we want them to read. Other than that, it’s hard to find good lists that mirror what we really want our kids to be exposed to. Talking to friends who we trust and trying the books they recommend can be a very good resource for finding good literature. At the end of these show notes there are lists from each of us at Family Looking Up as well as from Josi Russell on favorite books divided up by age. One other resource available to parents is Amazon reviews. A lot of content information can be gleaned as parents read reviews of books sold on Amazon.
How do we help kids deal with coming across content in literature that they are uncomfortable with? The best thing that parents can do to help? Be talking with your kids about the books they are reading. Be used to having literary conversations with our kids about the books they are reading.
If we are having those literary conversations and find out about things they are uncomfortable about reading, then sometimes we need to advocate for our kids in appropriate circumstances. We wouldn’t want our kids to watch a sexually explicit movie, but we oftentimes hold literature to a different standard. We need to be in tune with how a book is affecting them and still be the parent.
In Josi’s book Caretaker, there is an overarching theme of family and sacrifice that follows the lead character, Ethan Bryant. In her writing Josi has been inspired by the good people that Josi has met in her life. She is also inspired by the big questions of “what would you do if you were in this circumstance?”
Josi’s books are very family friendly. She has made a conscious choice to keep them that way because she says that stories are powerful and in our society we do not recognize the power that stories have. Going through life and encountering stories that seemed to have more power to her than to others. She saw how she would be devastated by certain stories that would stay with her for a long time. This led her to understand as she writes that she has a strong respect for the power of story and if she is giving the world a story, she wants it to be one that matters and that anyone can read and come away with something positive from it.
To learn more about Josi Russell go to www.josirussellwriting.com. All of her books are also available at Amazon.com in E Book and print version. The first two books in the Caretaker Chronicles, Caretaker, and it’s sequel, Guardian, are available in audiobook as well.
To see our favorite book lists, as well as Josi's favorites, visit our website at http://www.familylookingup.com
Thanks for joining us on our very first episode of Family Looking Up. We want to help lift and encourage by discussing all things family. Today we talked about parenting, specifically raising more resilient kids with more teaching and less punishing.
We talked with Niki Olsen, a Clinical Mental Health Counselor. She has spent over 16 years working with youth and families specializing in a modality called Mind Body Bridging which can help a variety of issues. She is married with two little girls in elementary. She currently lives in Utah but is originally from Oregon. Niki loves to spend her free time with her family, exercising, and sleeping.
We started our interview by discussing four conditions that have been identified as a common set of factors that predispose children to positive outcomes in the face of significant adversity. These include facilitating supportive adult-child relationships (teaching v.s punishing), building a sense of self-efficacy and perceived control (effective consequences and praise), providing opportunities to strengthen adaptive skills and self-regulatory capacities (giving children independence now leads to becoming successful adults), and mobilizing sources of faith, hope, and cultural traditions (giving kids a sense of belonging and identity).
Research has shown that children who have these things in their lives tend to be more resilient. The skills she taught also can help us stop being mad and frustrated at our kids and give them (and us) space to feel all the feelings and still teach our kids and get the results we want.
We finished by talking about not comparing ourselves to other moms. Niki pointed out that every family has their own issues. Don’t compare your worst to their best!
Mom Squad Challenge: Practice reflective listening with your kids. Instead of responding or reacting, just listen and repeat back to them what they are telling you. By doing this, Niki teaches that the child is more likely to talk to you and tell you more than if you react.
Books Niki loves:
The Child Whisperer by Carol Tuttle
Common Sense Parenting by Ray Burke Ph.D, Ron Heron, and Bridget A. Barnes M.S
How to talk to your kids about Sex by Richard and Linda Eyre
Where did I come From (I really don’t like it, but Camille loves it) by Peter Mayle and Arthur Robins