Thriving In Motherhood Podcast | Productivity, Planning, Family Systems, Time Management, Survival Mode, Mental Health, Vision

Our family has been using audiobooks for years and they have become an integral part of our routines. Today, I'm sharing why we love listening to audiobooks in our home, how we listen, how to develop the skill of listening to audiobooks, and our favorite audiobooks to listen to by age. Why Audiobooks? Audiobooks have been our trusty companions for years, adding a touch of magic to our quiet time and car rides. Here's why we love them: A daily break for me. Empowers the kids to explore incredible stories independently. Encourages my kids to work on projects longer because they can listen while they work (or clean!). Introduces challenging books in an accessible way, fostering an excitement to read the actual book. How We Listen: Our audiobook journey started with a CD player from Goodwill. We burned CDs with our favorite MP3s or borrowed them from the library. Over time, we upgraded to basic Kindles snagged on a Black Friday deal. With a passcode in place, the kids can only use it to enjoy audiobooks. We use the Libby and Hoopla apps for library access, making audiobooks an affordable choice. Developing the Skill: We started with audiobooks during my pregnancy with our third child. Sick on the couch with a three and a one year old, we used the CD player to listen to stories while the kids played with playdoh or did quiet activities near me. This started to train the skill with me in the room. Once the kids stopped napping, we rebranded the time to "Rest and Read Time." Since none of our kids were actually able to read yet, we started with audiobooks. Road trips and errands turned into shared listening sessions, which got the younger kids excited about audiobooks. Our Favorite Picks By Age: Ages 3-5 - Start with story telling adventures with music. Alexander's Amazing Adventures Focus on the Family: The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe Scripture Scouts Ages 4-6 Mr. Poppers Penguin Little House in the Big Woods Little House on the Prairie Little House on the Banks of Plum Creek Winnie the Pooh Stuart Little Trumpet of the Swan Magic Tree House Boxcar Children Chronicals of Narnia All of a Kind Family A to Z Mysteries Calendar Mysteries Fairy Tales: Jim Weiss Collection 7-10 - Classics start Little Women Little Men The Penderwicks The Secret Garden 5 Little Peppers and How They Grew My Side of the Mountain The Far Side of the Mountain The Moffats Series Pinky Pie Series The Shakespseare Stealer The Birchbark House Story of the World Anne of Green Gables Harry Potter 1-3

This is my seventh year creating a vision for my year. It is always a new experience, and I'm amazed at what comes out of this exercise. In today's episode, I'm sharing what I've learned in 2023 and what I'm focusing on, changing, and working toward in 2024. Here are a few areas from my 2024 vision: Investing More Into What's Working: Road trips Family adventures (beach, historical sites, new experience) Vegetable gardening Having friends over for dinner Hiking and time outdoors Relationships with our siblings and parents Projects: Rock climbing wall Write and publish a book Plant fruit trees and berries Start a medicinal and culinary herb garden Fix our fence Back to Basics Home management and our weekly rhythm Taking care of myself My relationship with God Every year what my vision works like is a surprise. It is unique and fits for the season I am in. I continue to share what my vision looks like as an inspiration for you to see that there is no wrong way to create one. I don't try to stick to a specific formula. I try to include God in the process and just see where I am for my learning and growth. If self care and creating good habits are part of your vision for 2024, Mom Matters Too is the place for you. Learn more HERE. And if you need help creating your vision, check out my Create Your Vision Mini-Course.

When it comes to goal setting, moms need different strategies in different seasons of motherhood. In this week's video, I'll be sharing what works in setting goals for the pregnancy and baby phase, when you have children under six, when you have school-aged kids and a full schedule, and when your children leave home. There are also principles that apply to all of us, no matter what stage we are in. Tips for Goal Planning in Every Season of Motherhood: Survival Seasons (pregnancy, postpartum, baby stage): Create goals around who you want to BE. There is plenty you are learning how to do in this phase of motherhood. When You Have Children 6 and Under: This is an exploring phase to figure out what type of motherhood you want to create and what you like to do. Do projects, try new things, and start something that scares you. Keep two lists - things you can do when your kids are sleeping and things you can do when they are awake. When You Have School-Aged Children: When schedules are full, and you feel like there isn't room to add more, ask yourself, "Where do I want to see progress in my life this year?" and be intentional about improving and going deeper on what you've already committed to. This progress will create excitement and energy. Empty Nesters: This phase can feel a lot like becoming a new mom - disorienting if you don't know how to fill your days. This is a good time to set goals to explore and figure out what matters to you or do things you've always wanted to do but haven't gotten to you. It's important to remember that as a mom, goals can include things you do with your kids, too. For a long time, I thought that for a goal to count, it had to be something I did away from my kids during alone time. So not true! I love to have a whole list of things I can work on when my kids are with me. Some things are more mindless activities that I can do next to them while they play, like wood carving or crocheting. Others are things we can work on together, like growing a garden. As you are figuring out your goals this year, make sure at least one thing can be done with your children. It's good for everyone to see mom working on goals! If you're ready to achieve your goals, tune in, grab a pen, take some notes, and get excited about the progress you'll make in 2024!

At the start of this new year, I realized I needed to make some changes to how I'm using my phone. In this week's episode, I'm outlining the problems I was having with technology and how it impacted my daily life, the parameters I've set for myself with my phone, and how I've set myself up for success. 5 Reasons to Reduce Phone Usage: Often, when things are out of balance, or we're not in our usual routines and rhythms, it's easy to fill the lack of structure and numb our feelings with screen time. This just makes things worse. I find that when I have things I want to do on my phone - whether it's an audiobook, podcast, course, project, etc. - then it is easy for me to come up with lots of excuses for the kids to keep playing, not involve them in helping out around the house, or for me to step away and finding ways to spend less time with them. These are great resources, but I want a break from the pull to step away. When I did my yearly review, I was surprised by the stories I was telling myself vs. reality. I was shocked at how much we did with family experiences and relationship-building with our family and people close to home. I want to be more aware and let reality count. I've been on my devices a lot more the last quarter with business and Christmas prep, which then turns to wasting time because our phones are masters at rabbit holes. I've gone down great rabbit holes I've learned a lot from, BUT it was still many hours on a screen and disengaged. I want to course correct and be more engaged at home. I want to give more attention to intentional rhythms with my younger kids specifically, which means firmer boundaries around screens for all of us. How I Set My Phone Up To Be…Just a Phone! I deleted all the apps off the home screen on my phone except for phone, text, calendar, and camera. I deleted and disabled Google Discover and Search, so I have zero ability to check email or look things up. I put my phone in greyscale mode. It looks horrible and makes it very unappealing to use for much besides phone calls. I got a flashlight to replace using my phone as a flashlight at night and in the early morning hours. I can't get sidetracked with it if it isn't in my hand. I got a pocket-sized notebook to carry around with a pen. I've replaced grabbing my phone with grabbing a notebook to write down a note or to-do item.

One of the skills in the structure pillar of the Three Pillars of Thriving is automation - making a decision once and having it happen over and over again. We can apply this principle to our weekly schedule. When we sit down and create a template of when we do things every day throughout the week, we can refer back to it with many decisions already made. Every quarter, I like to sketch out our current weekly rhythm or schedule. For years, I've done this on a piece of paper, but now we've added a two-page spread every quarter into the Thriving in Motherhood Planner for easy reference! In this week's video, I'm going to walk through my process for setting up our weekly schedule. This exercise is called an "Ideal Week" - which I really struggled with as a stay-at-home mom with lots of young children. It seemed like there was nothing ideal in my life, starting with the lack of sleep! I've adapted the concept in an empowering way for me as a mom, and it doesn't require me to have it all figured out yet. How To Set Up Your Weekly Schedule Step 1: Write down your anchors. For me that's our three meals during the day and quiet time. These happen no matter what. Step 2: Write down what's on the schedule. Church activities, music lessons, sports practices, library story time - what are your recurring appointments for the next few months? Step 3: Write down your essentials (there can't be a lot of them) for you and your family. Pair these essentials with an anchor. For us, that is scripture study at breakfast and my morning routine before everyone wakes up. Step 4: Write down what your days currently look like. Write down things as they are (in pencil). This isn't supposed to be ideal but reality. Step 5: What is working well? What isn't working? Use this to make 1-2 tweaks that involve your kids and another 1-2 that involve you. Step 6: Write down the essential things in the "puzzle pieces" section you want to have happen every night, but maybe not at the same time. For me, this is a time to record a podcast episode, have a date night, or have someone over for dinner. This is something that is going to develop over a period of YEARS, but making a few tweaks every quarter adds up to big things! I started with just figuring out what our mornings look like with young kids. Each day had a different activity: library, grocery shopping, nature walk in the woods, meeting friends at the park, and home projects. As we started homeschooling, we built morning routines to get to everyone's schoolwork. We made bedtime routines for the kids to get the next element figured out. Then, I focused on developing a good morning routine for myself and the kids (the 6 am - 9 am window). This included getting the kitchen cleaned up after breakfast as well as getting us ready for the day. We then added some structure to our afternoon hours, getting dinner ready ahead of time and resetting the house. Finally, I added some structure to the household management and cleaning and assigned certain tasks to certain days. Now, I'm working on creating a bedtime routine that gets me set up and even ahead for the next day.

In this week's episode, I'm sharing the #1 thing moms need to do for 2024 - and I can't think of any exceptions. In my 10.5 years of motherhood, this is the thing that has helped me in EVERY season, from hard pregnancies where days creep by to full schedules with lots going on in life and business. Every mom needs to create a vision for the year. There are an almost endless number of paths each day, but with your vision as a guide, you can walk in one direction and get to a destination you want to end up at. You can go to bed confident with how you spent your time and energy and wake up excited for the day ahead. Here are three steps to start creating your vision for 2024: Start a technology fast. Determine what you will and won't do for the next 14-30 days. The goal is not to have outside influences present - even good ones! This will help you get mental clarity about what matters to you in this season of life. Make it so the only factors in your life are your own thoughts, your spouse and children, and inspiration from God. Reflect on 2023. What went well? What didn't go well? What did you learn? What are you most proud of? What do you regret? Create your Vision for 2024. What do you want to do or experience? What projects do you want to work on? What habits do you want to develop? Who do you want to become? What household routines do you want to put in place? What matters for your family this year? As you begin to create your vision, remember this important principle: you have to go slow to go fast. This was a principle I learned as I recovered in the post-partum periods that if I wanted to get back to normal life as quickly as possible, I needed to do as little as possible to let myself heal. When it comes to productivity, we need to slow way down and create space in our lives to think, dream, prioritize, and plan so that we are ready to hit the ground running in the RIGHT direction. The direction that matters to YOU. If you want to learn more about creating a vision for your year, check out my Create Your Vision Mini Course. Inside, you'll discover: The steps to create your vision for the year The secret to making goals you are excited to accomplish How to eliminate stressing about time management and productivity - permanently! How to see the good you are already doing in your life to build momentum towards creating what's next for you You get IMMEDIATE access to the Create Your Vision Course when you purchase a Thriving in Motherhood Planner, or you can get the course on its own for just $15. If you're feeling overwhelmed, bored, lost, or crazed by motherhood's demands, creating your vision will make all the difference. It has a compounding effect that will allow you to create a unique life that is better than you could have imagined.

I have spent a lot of time inside with young kids who have loads of energy (even though we get out as much as we can). We've been in tiny grad student apartments and smaller houses without clear places to physically move their bodies for all 10.5 years of motherhood. As we get into winter, I start to feel a sense of panic about what we will do for months with shorter daylight hours, colder temperatures, and lots of need to move our bodies. In this week's episode, I'm sharing how we've set up our home (even when we lived in tiny apartments) so the kids have places to play hard inside, as well as activities I have to direct the energy when needed. Setting Up Inside So Kids Can Play In The Winter: Create a few intentional places for big movement. Even in our small apartment, we had a picker triangle and a small trampoline. We've added a pull-up bar in a doorway. Have self-directed activities like yoga or calisthenics cards and teach your kids how to use them. Have a list of activities you can refer to when things are going crazy (usually afternoons in our house). Here are a few of our favorite activities from my list: Tape pennies on shoes for tap shoes Skate on the floor with socks - bonus with wash clothes and Force of Nature for a mopping party. Have an indoor snowball fight with rolled-up socks or indoor snowballs. Wheelbarrow walk - hold your child's legs and have them walk around on their hands. Get my personal likes of 25 activities HERE. I don't want to entertain my kids - I want to set up an environment where there are a lot of options for movement. Having these things in place allows us to stay active in the winter months and keep my kids happy and busy. I'd love to hear your best inside activities with kids!

If you had told me ten years ago that I could be a full-time stay-at-home mom, living 30 hours away from our family, homeschooling my four children, and running a business in small pockets of time, I wouldn't have believed you. In those early years, the days ran together in one big blur, our cinder block student housing had stuff strewn around the floor, and I felt horribly guilty if I put my baby down, let alone did something I was interested in. In this week's video, I'm sharing my brand new 5-step PEACE Method Planning system for your week that has transformed my life from surviving the days to waking up excited. Many other productivity strategies work when you have uninterrupted blocks of time, but that is rarely the reality as a stay-at-home mom. This method is different because it takes thos interruptions into account and allows you to create a schedule that works. 5-Step PEACE Method Planning System: P: Purpose - what matters most to you? E: Energy - review the previous week for wins to build momentum and energy. A: Appointments - Write scheduled items on the calendar. C: Choose 3 - write down your big 3 for the week. E: Everything else - Write other "have to-dos" in context-based to-do lists for the week. This method is easy to start doing and doesn't need to be implemented all at once. Even doing one thing will increase your peace and confidence in how you use your time. You are building a foundation here that will be an upward cycle, and who knows what you will create! Let me know which one of these five steps you're already doing well and which ONE you are going to try this week.

How do you feel about chore charts? I like the idea of them, and I don't mind creating them, but when it comes to having a marker or stickers handy to actually fill them out, we drop the ball pretty much every time. This week, I'm sharing a new discovery I made that is simplifying our family cleaning routine: chore boards. This completely self-contained system allows me to clearly communicate each and every step that needs to be completed in a job, like cleaning the bathroom. In business, there is a crucial principle of writing standard operating procedures so that someone besides you can do a task and you can scale over time as you systemize. It's the same in our families. As my kids are getting a little bit older, I'm ready to delegate a bit more to them in things that it takes to run our household smoothly. We have lots of great habits in place (they all have jobs to keep the kitchen clean, they know their personal habits, and they each have a zone they know they have to pick up), but I need to have a better system to offload regular dusting, vacuuming, and bathroom cleaning. I was thinking of making chore lanyards for them, and while doing some online research, I stumbled across something even better: chore boards. I got so excited I purchased 10 of them so I could write the process for cleaning a bathroom, deep cleaning the family living space, as well as personal daily habits and weekly chores. Now I can give a child a job and a board with a clear step-by-step plan to execute it and then have a clear checklist to inspect it with. Expectations communicated!

Every month, I write down the books I read or listened to. Today, I'm sharing my 12 favorites that I read this year from a wide variety of topics and subjects. Reading lots of books has allowed me to actively learn while being a stay-at-home mom. When designing a planner for my needs, keeping track of the books I read or listened to each month was an essential piece. Why? Two reasons: it helped me to read more because I wanted to be able to write things down AND to remember all that I've read, learned, and enjoyed. A Books Read section is still in the official Thriving in Motherhood Planner in the monthly review. You can get your 2024 planner today and have it arrive by Christmas! Here are my 12 favorite books of 2023: How to Break up with your phone: https://amzn.to/3sDNw8J The Coddling of the American Mind: https://amzn.to/49L62g8 What Happened to You?: https://amzn.to/3unnc3b Habits of a Household: https://amzn.to/3GchGmo Love Life and See Good Days: https://amzn.to/3sy10Tv Grace Where you Are: https://amzn.to/47Dwcj1 Good Inside: https://amzn.to/3uo8bOu The Richest Man in Babylon: https://amzn.to/49BzWDk My Side of the Mountain: https://amzn.to/3SPyXJR On the Far Side of the Mountain: https://amzn.to/47m0zKX The Anatomy of Peace: https://amzn.to/49InIZA The Outward Mindset: https://amzn.to/3MRUxK5 I'd love to know your best book recommendations from this year to add to my 2024 reading list!

In this week's video, I'll take you on a virtual tour of our homeschooling setup for this year. As a homeschooling mom of Kindergarten, 2nd grade, and 4th grade kids, I've tested a variety of resources and materials over the years. So, if you're a fellow homeschooling parent looking for inspiration, you're in the right place! We've made a few tweaks to how we are doing school this year. Now that I have three school-aged kids, we are shifting to more of a family school focus with a few individual subjects, instead of primarily individual studies. Here is what we are focusing on this year: Family Subject Resources Science: Science in the Beginning Picture Study Addition Facts That Stick Subtraction Facts that Stick Language Study History - Story of the World Picture books from the library on a variety of subjects Individual Study Busy town Eye Found It Game Spot It All About Reading Rightstart Math Minimalist Math Curriculum Research Parent/ Right start Hoffman Academy (Get 10% off with code LEARN) Good and the Beautiful books/reading for 4th grade The Great Illustrated Classics Organizational Resources Backpacks with pencil and planner Hooks for backpacks Notebooking pencils Pencil sharpener Kids watches How to stitch a notebook I'm often asked what the secret is to being consistent with homeschooling. I've found that consistency in homeschooling is easier to achieve when you have a reset space that makes it easy to do the thing you want to do. I want to do all the things in our homeschooling day - math, science, history, music practice, nature study, language study, etc. - so I often would pick just doing one more thing instead of cleaning up. What I've discovered this semester is that if we just do a little less each day and leave time and energy to reset the space, it is SO MUCH EASIER to get into schoolwork the next day. So instead of doing lots of school a few days a week and getting frustrated and burned out by the amount of effort it took to keep going, we do a more measured amount each day and leave time to reset for tomorrow. It has made all the difference in our consistency.

Have you ever felt like it's too late to be the mom you hope to be and you'll be a good grandma instead? In this week's video, Stephanie Stutznegger shares how she has radically changed her life in the last year as she got clear with her vision, took lots of baby steps, and celebrated each month in the Thriving in Motherhood Planner and Soaring Mothers Society. Stephanie lives in Northern California with her husband, Jeff, and their four kids. They love being outside together and doing woodworking projects. They have a backyard full of chickens, ducks, a beehive, a newly finished treehouse, and a suspension bridge over their creek, connecting them to her brother and sister-in-law's house. Stephanie loves being a wife and mother, and she's grateful to be part of the Thriving in Motherhood community. Stephanie's favorite type of day is dishes piled high from cooking three meals, children laughing in the backyard, the doors and windows open, and fresh cookies in the oven. Last fall, Stephanie shared that she was feeling discouraged and like she had missed her opportunity to be the mom she wanted to be. As she watched two of her children play in the backyard, absolutely overwhelmed by the spaces inside and outside her home, she decided if she couldn't be the mom she wanted, she would be a good grandma. Stephanie began thinking about what makes a good grandma's house: curated rooms of meaningful, special things, favorite blankets, and books to read to make it cozy, and good smells from food baking. She realized that she didn't have to wait to be a grandma to give her family this life now, and a fire lit that carried her through a year of massive decluttering and baby steps, including building family systems to support their goals. It's easy to get caught up comparing our houses to the best of what we see online or the "right way" to declutter, organize, or decorate our homes. But as Stephanie worked through the spaces in her home, she carried the mantra, "Think like a grandma," and let her home become its own unique space with the goal to make space for relationships. She changed her thinking from what her space should be to what it could be. Stephanie shows up at our monthly Soaring Mother Society meetings with progress and renewed momentum to keep going as she continues to take action in making her vision for her life a reality. This week's conversation includes so many amazing stories and learning moments in Stephanie's life - from her oldest child speaking late and going on a 10-year learning journey of working on speech to lessons learned in raising chickens to her specialties of budgeting and making chocolate chip cookies. It's a refreshing chat with a mom going through the realities of everyday mom life, too!

Do you struggle with manners in your family? Do you wonder if they are outdated and even worth teaching? In this week's episode, Brooke Romney shares her simple system to effectively make manners part of our everyday lives with kids. Brooke Romney is a writer, speaker and leader of an online community who helps moms of teens and tweens to create meaningful, healthy, and enjoyable relationships with their children through practical application, education, and community. Her goal is for every family to feel confident and connected. The mother of four boys ages tween to adult, Brooke knows parenting perfection isn't real and takes an honest and hopeful approach with her audience. Her best-selling book 52 Modern Manners for Today's Teens (Volumes 1 and 2) provides weekly tips to help parents and teens navigate the complexities of today's world. The follow-up 52 Modern Manners for Kids features tips for kids and tweens aged four through 12. Brooke and her family live in Utah. You can find her on Instagram HERE. You'll love Brooke's emphasis on manners that will allow our kids to be aware, kind, and connected. She also shares a glimpse into her own motherhood journey and how she went from being stuck in perfectionism and overwhelm to truly enjoying motherhood and being present and engaged in her own family. In our conversation, Brooke outlines five ways to teach manners to kids: Focus on one manner a week. You can talk about it directly or leave it out for kids to read so they have some autonomy in learning. Bonus tip - add your manner time to something you are already doing well, like Friday movie night or a weekly family night. Teach the why. Kids are smart and understand. Role Play! It is a way to practice at home and a fun way to prepare. When you are reading books or watching movies together, talk about when the characters are using the manners you've learned about or when they don't. What are the consequences? What's the impact on those around them? As a parent, look for when you are seeing the manners you've been talking about and reinforce them with a thank you or share around the dinner table when everyone used their manners. Expect that kids won't get it right away. That's okay! Think of it as planting seeds that will start to grow when they are ready. This is a proactive approach in parenting to give our children the best chance of success in navigating relationships. When our children know what to do or how to act appropriately, it empowers them and builds their confidence over time. A great resource to make this simple is Brooke Romney's 52 Modern Manners for Kids book (and her two books for teens). She designed it to stand upright to easily sit on a counter so everyone can read it easily throughout the week. The manner and the why are on the front page, and role plays are included on the back. Talk about setting up the environment to make it easy to do the thing you want to do! You can find Brooke's books here: 52 Modern Manners for Kids 52 Modern Manners for Today's Teens Volume 1 52 Modern Manners for Today's Teens Volume 2

This week on the podcast, I'm answering a fabulous question about how to use nap time well. Maybe you can relate to hitting the quiet moment of the day and feeling exhausted and wanting to take a nap yourself, but also wanting to be consistent in what you want to do. It can be hard to figure out what to do when it feels like everything needs to be done while also lacking motivation because you are exhausted. In this week's episode, I'll be sharing strategies and tips so you can feel confident about using nap time in a way that is intentional and productive for you. How to overcome lack of motivation: Keep the time frame short: I just need to make choices for TODAY. I can do anything for a short period of time. Write down what you want to be doing: A weekly or daily rhythm or an ideal week plan is a great way to ensure you know what you want to do and when. If you already know what you want to be doing, then it is easier to take the steps to do it than if you have to figure it out every day. Every night, write down your big wins for the day: Celebrating yourself builds motivation and makes it easier to keep going. Weed out "should" statements: Make it your mission only to do things that really matter to you, not just things you think you "should" be doing. Ask God for help: Pray for an increased capacity and for God to help you carry the load. I'm amazed and astounded by how much can happen in a day, even when I don't feel like it, when I pray specifically for this and then act, expecting help to come. Made to Soar: The Next 90 Days is a program I've created to help you build family systems and automate the essentials so you can enjoy what matters most to you. You need a strategy, and not typical time management and productivity tips either. A strategy tailored specifically for the life of a mom with kids at home - full of interruptions, needs, bedtime stories, messes, traditions, silliness, and toddlers. A strategy that is 100% customizable with inspiration from God for your unique family, circumstances, and dreams. A strategy that is easily repeated because the reality of motherhood is that things are always changing. A strategy that enables YOU to become a Soaring Mother It's these very systems and skills that have enabled me to homeschool my four kids, run a podcast and business, establish traditions for our family and adventure with them, nurture my marriage, have soul-filling friendships, enjoy many hobbies, and feel the joy of this wonderful life. Made to Soar: Your Next 90 Days is the antidote to overwhelm. It is designed to help you get clarity on your vision and align your actions, current to-do list, and family systems so you can create a life you love to live. Learn more and sign up for the waitlist HERE.

This week's question is about how we do Poetry Tea Time in our family. This is an idea I got several years ago from Julie Bogert @bravelearnerhome, and we've incorporated it into our weekly rhythm. In this week's episode, I'll share how we set it up to make it easy to do at our house, when we hold our tea time, the books we use, and our favorite snacks that everyone looks forward to. The What, How, and Where of Poetry Tea Time: Poetry Tea Time is basically eating food and reading poems together. Each child picks a poem and either reads it aloud or hands it to me to read. Getting set up is crucial. The easier you make it, the more likely it is to happen. I made a trip to Goodwill and got mugs and tea cups. You could also have a special tablecloth and candles. Often, for us, just sitting down with a snack and a clean table is victory enough. Keep the snacks simple and delicious. My oldest loves going out to gather lemon balm or mint leaves and steeping them in water for our tea. Other common tea-time snacks are green smoothies, popsicles, popcorn, banana ice cream, energy balls, and chickpea chocolate chip cookies. Recipes can be found here. We typically build this into our routine in the afternoons after quiet time. One of my favorite things is to pair this with cleaning up the house right after because everyone is fed. Then we can go outside for the rest of the afternoon until dinner (assuming I prepped an Instapot meal ahead of time). We go out and in of doing this. We just begin again when we top. Books we use: Ambleside Online Poetry Anthologies Poetry for Young People Series (Emily Dickinson and Robert Frost are great starting points) Children's Book of Virtues The Book of Virtures Anderson's Fairy Tales When We Were Very Young Now We Are Six Children's Anthology of Poetry Edited By Elizabeth Hauge Sword A Family of Poems by Caroline Kennedy

In this week's episode, I'm answering a question from a mom in our Thriving in Motherhood Community about possible routines (besides sitting in bed together, playing with toys, and watching movies) that you can have with severe morning sickness during pregnancy when you have other little kids at home. I've had four really challenging pregnancies, the last three with kids at home, and in this episode, I'll share what worked for us during those hard months and principles you can apply to make the best of an honestly challenging situation and feel some joy along the way too. Routines for Mom: Monthly reviews in the Thriving in Motherhood Planner: These monthly reviews are ESSENTIAL. It helps you reality-check what is actually happening. I told myself, "All I do is lie on the couch, grow a baby, and hang out with the kids." Not a helpful story. Once I started writing down what I learned and discovered, accomplished, places we went, significant things for our family, and books I read or listened to, I had a more accurate picture of my life, and it was much better than I thought. Ask the questions in the Thriving in Motherhood Journal: These questions are so important for changing the focus of your days and what you think about them. Here are four to get you started: What am I grateful for? How have I seen the hand of God in my life today? What were my big wins today? What were my magic moments today? Have something you are excited about: It can be as simple as a story you like reading to your kids (I recommend Winnie the Pooh), a date with your husband, or getting together with friends. Have a simple, creative project that you can see progress on: I crochet a blanket for each of my kids - single crochet 10 up, 3 in the hole, 10 down, skip two, 10 up, etc.- in the evening. It keeps my mind focused on not thinking about how I don't want to face the next day or even a rough night. And I get to make progress on something for the baby that connects me to why I'm sick and feel a little bit of excitement and love in this season of sacrifice. Use this slower season to be intentional with your input and get clear on your vision: I've never totally stopped making progress on the things that matter to me because I always knew my next little baby step and could keep moving forward. Making progress - even sllooowww progress - does wonders for the soul. Look and pray for ways to serve others: It might seem impossible when you are struggling yourself, but even a phone call can make someone's day, and it will lift your spirits too. Routines for your Family: Listen to audiobooks/musical stories: We invested $5 in a CD player from Goodwill during my pregnancy with some audiobooks or musical stories for the kids to listen to. Each day, when I needed some space, they would set it up across the room with some play dough or coloring and listen. This gave me a bit of a breather. As my kids got older, we graduated to a Kindle, but the only thing they have access to is the library audiobook app, and it's password-protected. Go outside: During my pregnancies, we often lived outside at the playground by our house, or the kids spent a lot of time in our yard during my last pregnancy. I took a blanket to lay on and, if I was feeling a little better, a project (I carved wooden animals and made leather shoes - again coping with misery with creation). For two of my pregnancies, we had friends who would meet us outside or even help us get to the playground, and it was wonderful. Bring water and snacks for you and the kids to last for hours. I think that's why my kids play outside so much because once we were out, I wasn't mobile again for a long time. It wasn't my most graceful season - I threw in every bush on the way to the park and surrounding areas by the end of pregnancy - but we survived! Pray for help or to know who to ask for help: I had many miracles in this department. I'll share three: I was talking to a friend from college, and her roommate and mutual friend didn't have to work for a week when Andrew was traveling. She flew out and took care of me and my kids. She made us food and cleaned my microwave. It was good for the soul as much as the body. On a really rough night, I needed to go to the ER, and a friend who had just moved out to Indiana for school took me so Andrew could stay with the kids and get some sleep before a huge day with his graduate studies. It was after midnight before I got home, and Andrew was gone all day. We were both under a lot of stress, and things felt strained, and I was in the depths of despair. That was the day of angels. I had people unexpectedly show up at my door all day. First, a mom with six kids whose youngest was my oldest's age felt like she should just stop by on her way to preschool drop-off, and she sat with me for a bit and just listened. Then another knock on the door came, and a friend with older children came by, and power cleaned my house. Then a homeschooling mom stopped by, and she and

It's here!! The 2024 Thriving in Motherhood Planner is ready to make its way into your hands to empower you in creating a life that you are excited to wake up to each day. In this week's episode, I'm sharing the story of the planner, the overview of how the whole system works, and all of the changes and updates that have been made for next year's planner. I am very excited about the details we've added and the revisions. It is the best version yet! What makes the Thriving in Motherhood Planner unique? It's not just about getting things done - it's about getting the RIGHT things done. This is unique to every single one of us. Create your vision first to help you get clarity about what matters to you and then easily refer back to it all year long. Plan your weeks, not your days. Set a weekly Big 3. Monthly review to CELEBRATE. Quarterly reviews to check in with your vision - see what works, see what you need to let go of, and know what goals to focus on. Context-based to-dos instead of a long, running list. Updates to the Thriving in Motherhood Planner: Tabs go all the way to the edge of the page! This included a full re-design of the entire Thriving in Motherhood Planner and multiple all-nighters from my husband, Andrew, the MVP of the 2024 Planner Launch. Page numbers and an index are in the back of the planner. If you write down the information you want to refer back to in your Think and Process Pages, there is now an easy way to note which page you wrote it on to find it again. This is my solution to not adding in all of the life-specific options of a budgeting page, meal planning page, kids measurements, etc., that you find in a lot of other mom planners. I personally find these stressful. You can customize what you want and need in your planner. Create your vision section overhaul, including more explanatory life domains, new vision exercises, rewriting your story pages, risk lists, and a new home management section. Weekly rhythm pages. Jot down recurring events and specify when you want to do repeated tasks. There is also a Puzzle Pieces box for those things you want to do each week, but that don't happen at the same time. Order your planner today!

Do you get to the end of your day completely exhausted but weren't able to do the things you wanted or wrote out in your time block? I got this very relatable question from a mother in our Thriving in Motherhood Community: "I put in time blocks and write my routines, and it helps to schedule around meal times, but by the end of the day, I fill in what I did instead of actually doing what I wanted to do. I'm feeling so burned out, unable to rest, and feel like there is never any time to work on projects or time for myself. Any tips on how to plan effectively so you don't get burned out?" In this week's episode, I talk about five steps to planning in a way that avoids burnout: Plan your rest and exercise first: You are going to need energy to do the things you want to do and manage a household. We established a daily Rest and Read time in our home years ago. A daily 10-20 minute power nap can give you a recharge to have an effective second half of the day. As moms, we are facing our own challenges that we can manage better when we are taking care of ourselves. I have also found recently that 20-30 minutes of intense exercise in the morning is giving me WAY more energy during the day. Things that once felt hard are easier now that I have increased energy. Put what you want to do at the top of the list: Write the three projects or tasks you want to get to this week. If you've created a vision, pull from that. If not, write a list and pick three things to do a little bit of each week. This can include things for you, your family, work, or service. A lot of time, we don't get to do the things we want to simply because we haven't clarified exactly what they are. Establish a weekly planning meeting with your spouse: Every week, establish your top priorities with each other as scheduled items. Work together to figure out how to support each other in getting things done that are important to you. That's interdependence - thanks, Stephen Covey! Let housework take a backseat while you are getting your essentials figured out: So often, when we are overwhelmed and burned out, we make the house our #1 priority and decide once it's in order, we can do other things. But then we get stuck because it's hard to make the house perfect with people living in it, and it feels like everyone is working against you. Instead, focus on the basics like daily dishes, tidying up the house a few times a week (or even once), and deciding whether you will tackle laundry one day a week or one load every day. Bathrooms survive going every other or every three weeks if you are overwhelmed (ideal no, but survivable). Make daily rest, exercise, doing things in your vision, and weekly planning the priority until they are dialed in habits. Build your time block slowly, in small steps: When you write out a time block schedule, you are often writing down a whole bunch of things you don't have systems for. It is an uphill battle all day to get to those things because the environment isn't designed to make them easy to do, so it takes a while to gather the materials and get set up, and then you have to think through every step so it is slow going. Instead, start with the thing that is on fire and create a time, place, and space for that thing. Set up the environment to do it. Slow it to make it stick. Time blocking evolves over time. Pay attention to when you do something and it works, and make a note to try it again at the same time the next week. If you want help in making progress on your home while still doing the things you want to do, check out the Simplify to Soar Club.

I got an excellent question from a mother in our Thriving in Motherhood community, Kate, about how to find activities you can enjoy with all your children. In this week's episode, I'll address how to manage the different personalities of your children and their own interests, as well as the resistance that comes when you try to get everyone to agree on what to do together.

In this week's episode, I'm answering a question from a member of our own Thriving in Motherhood community about how to handle negative attitudes with her child when it comes to certain things about homeschooling. I'm no stranger to negative attitudes in our home (from myself and the kids), but we are very intentional with addressing those attitudes. Here are seven questions we ask when one of our children has a negative attitude: Have they moved their body today? What is the reason for resistance? How can I give them more autonomy? Is the environment set up so it is easy to do the thing they need to do? Am I ready with my part, or are they waiting for me and getting interrupted from what they started to do? What skill am I trying to teach? How can I partner with my child in this and mentor? What principles or truths do they need to understand to want to change the behavior themself? These questions help me get to the root of the problem and are part of seeking to understand so we can come up with win-win solutions together. (Thank you, Stephen Covey, for the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People that we continue to return to.) When it comes to homeschooling and negative attitudes, I really love Julie Bogart's book The Brave Learner. She has so many wonderful thoughts and ideas about what homeschooling can look like to bring the magic and whimsy back into our days instead of battling over worksheets. She helps make it clear what really matters and then suggests lots of different ways that we can reach our objectives that look really different from the public school model. Listen to this week's episode for more tips on dealing with negative attitudes.

A few weeks ago, I did an episode about my morning routine. I got a great follow-up question about how to do this when you have a baby or toddler that wakes up super early. I remember that season well. A friend and I would meet up at 7:45 a.m. with our two toddlers and baby, each of whom woke up too early and went for a run and talked about how our kids wake up too early! But I've learned a lot from that season, and here are my best tips for doing a morning routine in the early years to get the brainstorming started for what could work for you. This is such an essential piece of the puzzle when it comes to not just surviving motherhood and fits into the Soul Pillar of the Three Pillars of Thriving. Here are a few things I've done that work for our family: Do your morning routine with your kids - I started doing my morning routine with my kids instead of jumping into kid things. I still do this with my youngest, who wakes up before the rest of my kids. The expectation is that I'm not available right now so she can play near me, but I will do my own routine. It didn't take too long before we got in the rhythm of it. I realized I didn't need to let my kids run the show. I'm the adult, and I can set priorities for myself in the morning that will bless us all. Implement a Big 5 for your kids - I started a Big 5 for my kids so they knew what they could be doing while I did my own morning routine. For a long time, I didn't actually care if they did those things, but if they came to me during that time, I asked them how their Big 5 was going, and they would have something to do while I finished up. They make their bed, get dressed, brush their teeth, say their prayers, and read/look at books. Keep a realistic mindset - I changed my mindset about what was reasonable and expected my kids to stay in bed until 6:30 or 7. When they woke up before that, my husband didn't mind putting them back to bed while I did my morning routine. Over time, they catch on and stay in bed until the time you have established. Use signals to let your kids know when it's okay to get out of bed - With my 3rd and 4th child, we got a clock on Amazon that is red when they need to be in bed and turns green when they can get out of bed. It has made a HUGE difference because there is a clear expectation, and I'm not the middleman - the color of the clock is. I'm sure you will find a solution of your own that works for you and your family. It will just take some time and trial and error. Keep the vision of what you want your foundation to look like, write it down, and even if it takes you all day to get those things done, that's okay! You are still building habits and getting to the essential things. It doesn't always look neat and tidy, and that is normal and to be expected.

For the first time in 10 years, I recently traveled across the country and left all my kids and my husband for six days. It wasn't as impossible as I had made it out to be in my mind. In fact, everything went great! In this week's episode, I'm sharing practical things I did to prepare everyone for a smooth week at home. Next time my husband travels, I'll be using some of these tips to make things easier for myself too.

As we transition from summer to fall, I like to pause and reflect on how the last few months went as a way to close the tabs and move forward with confidence into the next season. It can be easy to get to the end of the season and wish it went differently. But instead of sitting in a place of discouragement or looking at the things that didn't go well, we can pause and look for the lessons learned to help us be intentional about the little changes we make in our lives that make a big difference over time. You either get the results you want or the lesson you needed. So, if you want to try to do your own summer review, here are a few questions to get you started: What were you hoping summer would look like? What went well this summer? Was there something this summer that you stressed about that turned out not to be a big deal? What were some of the things that didn't go well? Look for the lessons and how to reframe. What do you want to remember in your planning for next summer? In this week's episode, I'll walk you through the process of reflecting on your summer and what you can learn from it so you can feel great about how things went, even if it was different than you hoped. Bring a pen and paper (or a Think and Process page from your Thriving in Motherhood Planner) to this actionable episode.

After a summer of different activities and routines (or maybe no routines), I get excited about settling into a new rhythm as we transition into the school year and fall. In this week's episode, I'm sharing the process I've used for years to help our family get clarity about what matters to us right now and how to make sure we make time for it in our daily life. I'm really great at thinking of the ideal in every area of life. But the reality is that things are going to change, balls are going to drop, and we let go of things as our enthusiasm and energy fade. So what matters most that you want to make a top priority and invest time and energy in? What is the thing that you can go big on this fall? This can be your vision for the fall to help you know what to say yes to, say no to and to structure your days and weeks around. Here are some other tips to transition back into family routines: Write down your schedule as it already is - not as you want it to be. Decide the one thing you want to go big on for the next few months. Pick an anchor you can pair that thing with. Go slow; make it stick. For example, when my kids were little, and we were just beginning this journey of establishing routines, I knew I wanted to go big on scripture study with my kids. We had one clear anchor at the time: breakfast. So I paired my one priority with my one anchor, and now we've been doing our scripture study with breakfast for almost eight years. Once you have established your one anchor and one routine, you can pick another priority and another anchor. We now have each meal and rest and read time as an anchor in our day that we've paired with some of our daily priorities, and we have routines that go with our anchors. We've also attached routines to weekly and monthly anchors. Start small and every few months, add on another thing as your family continues to learn, grow, and change together. If you want to learn more about getting your family rhythms established, I would love to support you in my Made to Soar: Next 90 Days program.

For years I've gotten up before the kids (or with the kids and let them play near me) while I do my morning routine to get myself in a good place. This is one of the ways I keep my Soul Pillar intact. When I don't do my morning routine, I find that it doesn't take too long before I'm irritable, grumpy, and snappy at everyone around me. Now that I'm aware of that, this morning routine is one of the first things I put back in place when we are transitioning from the novelty and trips of summer back into our school year routines at home. In this week's episode, I'm sharing exactly what I've done for my morning routine that sets me up for success. My Morning Routine: Free write about the last 24 hours: I write about anything that was meaningful and significant in the last 24 hours. This creates space in my brain. Answer questions in the Thriving in Motherhood Journal: I ask myself key questions in the Thriving in Motherhood Journal - What's one thing that could make me feel successful at the end of the day? What's one thing I could do to make tomorrow easier? What is something that might challenge me today, and how would my best self handle it? Scripture study: I read my scriptures and write down a few passages and my thoughts about them. Exercise: I usually do a Physique 57 workout. Pray + Shower: I shower, pray, and write down any last thoughts that I have when I'm completely by myself and can ponder.

I'm so excited to finally be sharing the conversation I had with Dawn Madsen of Dawn the Minimal Mom. By now, I'm sure you've heard of the concept of minimalism, but in this week's episode, we are talking about how Dawn's faith has impacted her journey to having less things to manage. We also talk about the legacy her parents left her that had nothing to do with managing stuff. For me, the biggest takeaway is hope that whatever our weaknesses and strengths are as moms, they can have a lasting impact on our children for the better. Dawn often gets asked, "What's the threshold?" when it comes to how much stuff to keep around. Her metric is that everyone should be able to manage their things - and for a two-year-old, that's not going to be very much! If you're just getting started and need a refresher, Dawn recommends starting in the kitchen and keeping just what you are currently using in this season of life. This will have the biggest impact on your days because it's where families spend a lot of time every single day, and it makes life feel like it is under control when the kitchen is clean. For more decluttering tips, check out the full episode.

I've gotten lots of questions about our Zone system that we use to have the kids help clean up our main living spaces. In this week's episode, I'm sharing all of the details of what it is, why we've set things up this way, what everyone is responsible for, how often we reset each zone, and how long it takes. Zone cleaning is a long-term game plan. It takes time, and it will require a bit of extra effort on your part to set things up. We've divided our downstairs into four zones. Each kid had their own room with a large rug to vacuum. At first, you are going to do every step of the cleaning with your kids. It takes time - even years - for the kids to get the hang of it. We also paid close attention to when someone is feeling overwhelmed by a space and simplify it so they are set up for success. The things they are responsible for match their age. The wonderful thing about this is that we are now able to reset our entire downstairs fairly quickly as we've continued to increase our kid's skills, decrease the amount of things we have to manage, and foster a team spirit amongst ourselves. Listen to this week's episode to learn more about our Zone Cleaning System and how it's working for our family and home.

As we are nearing the end of the summer and getting ready for the new school year, I wanted to share some of my all-time favorite books that inspire me in my homeschooling. 10 Books To Get You Excited About Homeschooling: Educating the Wholehearted Child Life Giving Home Home Education For the Children's Sake The Well-Trained Mind Call of the Wild and Free You Are Your Child's First Teacher Awaking Wonder The Brave Learner Teaching From Rest As I read these books, I'm searching for little bits and pieces that I can add to my vision of what our family and culture look like. This includes homeschooling, but it also goes deeper and more far-reaching than that. Homeschooling is about home. And that is a personal quest I'm on - figuring out what home looks and feels like. I've had a very transient life, so home isn't a place that I return to from my childhood. I'm still trying to figure out how to make a place feel like home, but I'm grateful for the little bits I've gleaned and incorporated into our family so far. Whether you're a seasoned homeschooler, in your first few years, or a mom with young kids too early for school, there is something here for you!

We have been road tripping since we had just one little baby, and now we are on our third year of driving across the county and back as a family of six. In this week's episode, I'm sharing everything I've learned to make our drive smoother to help set you up for success on your next adventure. We are covering everything from our favorite gear, how we pack and organize, car activities for kids, favorite audiobooks, what we prepare for meals and snacks, how we find hotels every night, our procedure for smooth rest stops, and what a typical day on the road looks like.

Do you have dreams and goals that you want to go after but haven't made much progress yet? This week's conversation with Gabe Cox (@gabecox_redhotmindset) will hopefully inspire you to start taking baby steps forward on your unique journey as we discuss the power of letting your kids see you win. When Gabe Cox was a young mom, she had a mentor share with her that her kids had asked her, "What do you do, mom?" She had nothing to tell them except what she did for her children. Her entire life was about them. Investing in and being intentional with our children and families is so important, but for Gabe, she also realized that she wanted her kids to see what going after a goal, trying, failing, and learning looked like. She wanted her kids to see what doing something hard looked like and give them permission to do the same. For her, that looks like running races, qualifying for the Boston Marathon, and writing a book. Fast forward many years, and her oldest son is working to compete in the Olympics as a gymnast. As she has watched him try and fail and learn and improve, she is now inspired by him. Here are three pillars to setting and crushing goals: See it: Create your vision! What is something that is on your heart? Write it all down - big and small goals. What is something that you could do that is a little bit outside your comfort zone? That is where you will grow. Plan it: The plan needs to fit your capacity and your season. Know that you will have to adjust and be flexible. Do it: You have to be in motion. Gabe shares that there is a place to wait on God, but He can work more in our lives when we are doing something for Him to work with.

I've been decluttering my house for years, working through all the layers of things we have. A few weeks ago, I opened a bin of extra bags, backpacks, and soft luggage and figured I could let these things go since it's been a while since I've used them. But then I remembered all the times we DID use them, how useful they were, and all the times in the future that they could come in handy. I put the lid back on the box and decided to deal with it later. As I was mulling over the content of the box a few days later, I had an epiphany about the real reason I wasn't ready to let these things go. We hold onto extra stuff when we don't have a system for how we will do things. Because I don't have a clear system for all the aspects of how we travel as a family, I hold onto more bags and travel items, "just in case" or "grab and go," without giving it lots of thought. Is this okay? Yep! But it's also a challenge for me that I'm excited to keep plugging away at. Developing more systems not only for traveling but for lots of areas of our home and life. Once we know how we'll do something - like the toiletries bags we will use when we make stops in hotels on our road trips - and what and where everything goes in it - then I can confidently get rid of the excess. There are lots of possible systems you can develop in your family and home to make things run more smoothly, but I want to encourage you that you don't need too many in place for you to be able to move forward and spend time on the things you love. Here are five systems that I recommend starting with: Laundry Dishes Meals Wake-up Bedtime If you decide the who, what, where, and when in each of these areas, you are already on your way to having your days go a lot smoother. Once these are good enough - not perfect - it's time to move on to exploring! You can learn more about that on the 5-Step Path From Surviving to Thriving and where you are on it with my free checklist. And if you need help building family systems that are unique to you and your needs, check out my program, Made to Soar: Next 90 Days.

Have you ever heard of a growth mindset vs. a fixed mindset? It's often come up in conversations I've had about parenting and helping our kids understand that "if at first, you don't succeed, try, try again." In this week's episode with Kate House of the Live By Design Podcast, she shares how this principle applies to our mindsets in motherhood. Two Fixed Mindsets That You Might Experience As A Mom I'm not worthy I'm not a priority Discovering the root of lack of worthiness comes by asking yourself "why" enough times until you discover the underlying thought for yourself personally. But once you discover the reason, you can replace it with an intentional thought like, "I'm worthy enough to feel joy." It's also common in our culture for moms to share the idea that "I'm not a priority because I'm so busy taking care of everyone else." But the reality is YOU are the only one that can actually take care of you, and if this is something you find yourself saying, you can change one baby step at a time. If you are in a fixed mindset, it's the idea that you are born with the abilities that you have, and you can't grow and change. You might be thinking things like, "I could never," "I can't do this," I won't change." In a growth mindset, you believe that you can learn, grow and change. You might be thinking things like: "I can grow and continue to learn," "I can ask for help," "I can find support", or "I can get creative." It's a continuum. We are always going to fall somewhere in between, which is incredibly liberating for any recovering perfectionist, so you never have to try to be 100% growth set all of the time.

Do you have a hard time creating a vision of what you want for your motherhood to look like? Or do you feel united in goals with your spouse? A few weeks ago, Andrew and I brainstormed a list of things we could take a risk on. We defined risk as anything that puts us out of our comfort zone - which conveniently puts us in our learning zone as well. It was a fascinating experience and uncovered a lot of things for us. What you might uncover when you write a risk list: Things that are stressing you out that you are avoiding or procrastinating on Things that you feel like you should be doing but are not Things you want to do but haven't taken action on Personal goals or dreams family goals or dreams My husband and I were really informal in our risk list discussion. We just started each sentence by saying, "We could take a risk and…". At first, we shared things that were top of mind and stressing us out. We progressed on to things we want to try with our family, personal goals we have, habits we want to develop, and things we've been talking about doing but haven't taken any action on. Then it progressed into dreams and ideas that would be a few years in the making. Once we called out these ideas as a risk, it made it seem less scary and impossible. It also gave us a chance to evaluate if we actually want to do these things or if they are just sneaky "shoulds" that we can let go of. For me labeling things like creating a bathroom cleaning schedule as a risk adds an element of fun to the situation. It becomes a challenge, something I can approach with curiosity and experiment to find out what works. If it's a risk, it's okay to try and fail. It also gets me unstuck in waiting for everything to be perfect and helps me take baby steps forward. Watch this week's episode to find out more about what we discovered from this process and what you can learn by doing it for yourself. If you feel like you don't have the time or energy to even think about doing something new or different, check out my free workshop, 3 Secrets to Do More of What You Love Without Hiring a Babysitter.

Our family recently had a week of me being out of commission for some medical things that we knew were coming. Andrew and I have been in this situation for good chunks or our marriage, so it felt like a familiar glove we slipped on for a few days. In this survival season, we departed from some of our usual standards of ideals - we watched movies every day, ate food that we don't normally eat, and let go of a lot of the routines or things the kids are supposed to do in the morning. But you know what didn't change? My mental health. I was in good spirits. I was the person I wanted to be with my husband and children. In the past, I sacrificed that all in the name of ideals. But when we can determine what our priorities are in a difficult season, we can embrace the difference and novelty of it all and focus on what matters most. Here are five things I did to prepare for survival mode: Plan for freezer meals. We like to get family-sized Stouffers or Voila to make things easy, but you could also prepare your own. Plan something to be excited about. This could be painting, reading books together, or watching a fun movie. Clean up the house. If possible, keep it picked up with short energy windows, or trust that you can reset it when you go through re-entry. Talk back to the mom guilts when you aren't doing what you normally do. Everyone's fine. Be present. Talk with your spouse. Communicate your needs and priorities and simplify. In a season of survival, it's so important to evaluate when you can't do everything, what you are choosing to do. In the past, I've chosen the projects because it's fun, and the piece of having something to look forward to was crucial to my mental health. But this time, the priority wasn't fun - and maybe that had a lot to do with it being short-term and a bit to do with us having a large family and needing to keep things a bit more stable. The true priority was just keeping things going smoothly - keeping food on the table, resetting our spaces, putting clothes in drawers, and reading lots of books with my kids. When I had small bursts of energy, these are the things I focused on and I was amazed at how well our home kept functioning. This has taken me YEARS to figure out, so I hope that a peak into how we prepare can help smooth our your next - or current- season of survival mode.

Over the last few weeks, I've shared principles about creating a summer that is positive for the whole family and how to teach kids about habits. This week, I'm sharing what our priorities are for the summer. Here are our priorities for this summer: Improve writing with a daily journal habit Review math with Research Parent's Minimalist Math curriculum Practice instruments every day and have a family concert every two weeks Go to the library and read lots of books Keep our home tidy with our daily zone cleaning Wok on family house projects Give kids lots of time to play outside and work on their own interests When we clarify and narrow down our priorities, it becomes easier to allocate our time and energy effectively. This clear sense of focus also allows us to say no to activities that don't align with our chosen priorities. Tell me in the comments, what are your priorities for the summer?

Recently, we talked about ten principles for creating a productive summer. Spoiler alert - a central part of a good summer rests on GOOD HABITS! So this week, I'm sharing how I teach my kids about habits. We have these conversations in five-minute increments after we read scriptures at breakfast over the course of the week. It's meant to be fun and silly while still teaching them important principles that we apply to their lives. These concepts have changed my life as an adult, and if my kids can understand how their brains work and learn to work with them to create habits, then they are set up for success. Here are five things I teach my kids about habits: There are a lot of things we need to do to take care of our bodies, minds, hearts, and spaces. It's each of our responsibilities to take care of these things for ourselves. Our brains are amazing! We can learn to do things automatically so we don't think so much about it. That's called a habit. To make habits easy to do, you need to set things up to make it easy to do and decide when you are going to do it. This is called a trigger. Just focus on creating one habit at a time. We use this shared understanding in our family conversations to help us collaborate and solve problems together and figure out how to do the things we want to do more easily. In the video version of this week's episode, you can see how I draw everything out on the whiteboard, or you can check out the workbook I created so you can easily walk through this with your kids.

One of our priorities since having kids has NOT been the car. My strategy has been to ignore it for six months and then pull out the shopvac and excavate. With our 70 hour road trip approaching this summer, I've been watching a bunch of sprinter van conversion videos (turning a van into a motor home), dreaming about the life of ease we would lead with a kitchen and beds in a vehicle as we drove across America. On one build for a family of five, the mom mentioned that they gave a lot of attention to storage because what doesn't have a home ends up on the floor. This was a major lightbulb moment for me!Of course our car is a mess - there are literally zero places for things to go in there. So I went on a quest, and in just a few days we transformed our van from messy to clean and organized with things I found on Amazon and the dollar store. 8 Simple Things For Car Organization on a Budget Car Garbage Can Headrest Hook Expandable Cup Holders Mini Vacuum Cleaning Putty Baskets Dromedary Cookie Sheet First, we needed to decide where everything could go in the van in order to have a chance at having it be clean. When I looked at my van, there pretty quickly became clear categories of things covering the floor. Coats, shoes, clothes Trash Diapers and wipes Water bottles As an antidote, I got a garbage can for the trash, hooks to go on the back of the headrests for coats, hats, etc; a cup holder extender for large water bottles so they aren't flying around; baskets that slide under the seats for diapers and some empty ones to block garbage from going under the seats; a cookie sheet so our dromedary water bladder can slide in and out of the car easily (we use this for washing kids off before they get in the car, rinsing dishes, or a quick drink); and a mini vacuum and cleaning putty to make tidying up hassle-free. With these tools, it's become pretty effortless to keep the van picked up and tidy most of the time. Tune into this week's episode to hear more about how I transformed our car to a very functional around-town space!

I recently got an email asking about how to create summer rhythms with kids - especially for moms that don't homeschool their kids, so their kids aren't used to having rhythms I brought this up in our Soaring Mothers Society meeting that we just had because all of these women have gone through the Made to Soar Program and understand the 3 Pillars of Thriving, are very intentional, and have all sorts of different situations with working out of the home, in the home, homeschool, and have their kids in public school. After a good discussion and sharing of ideas, plus taking my own experience of homeschooling our four kids and having kids at home with me for nearly 10 years now, I picked 10 principles for creating a fun and productive summer schedule with kids that you can use to figure out a rhythm that works for you and your family. If you've been wondering how you are going to have time to do the things that are important to you this summer with all of the kids at home, I'd love to invite you to a FREE workshop I'm hosting Wednesday, May 17 at 2 P.M. EST. You'll learn to do more of what you love without hiring a babysitter. Save your free seat in the link in the bio (and yep, there's a replay!) https://thrivinginmotherhoodpodcast.com/workshop/

Get our family scripture songs: https://cart.thrivinginmotherhoodpodcast.com/bible-scripture-songs/ As a mom, I knew if I could only get one thing into my children's minds and hearts, it would be scripture. When my oldest was two years old, I decided we would start making up songs to add to our favorite verses because the scriptures I still had memorized from childhood were put to tunes. But, after a few years, we had created a lot of songs and didn't have any sense or organization to review them. That is when I came across Simply Charlotte Mason's scripture memory box idea. It only takes a few minutes each morning at breakfast for us to review our four songs, and by the end of the month, we've sung every song that we've memorized so far. Some days, all of us are singing in unison with gusto and other times, I'm still plugging along myself when I can't get all of my kids to focus at the same time. But either way, this is part of our daily rhythms that everyone has come to expect and look forward to. I love that all day long, I hear scripture as my kids are singing our songs as they are playing, doing their jobs, or just hanging out. This was an unintended outcome of our scripture memory habit, but it brings us all so much joy. My kids also love when they recognize scriptures each week at church from the speakers. If this is something you want to incorporate into your family, start small. We started small when my oldest was two - just a new scripture every few months. Almost eight years later, my kids now bring scriptures they love from their own reading for us to memorize as a family. I love that this practice has become collaborative over time. Check out this week's video to see how we've set up the system to work for us so that we stay on top of reviewing our scriptures.

Welcome to the 5-Step Path from Surviving to Thriving for moms! I have been in survival mode so many times over the last ten years of motherhood and began to see a pattern emerge from fighting my way to thriving again and again. This is a framework that I created to help us all see clearly where we are in a hard season and know where to put out time and energy so we can navigate our days confidently. The 5-Step Path From Surviving to Thriving: Survival - circumstances are bigger than you Re-entry - catching up on all the things that you let go of in survival mode Normalizing - putting some basic systems in place Exploring - discover what brings meaning and joy into your life Thriving - establish the 3 Pillars of Thriving in your life so you can Soar! If you're wondering where you are on the path, check out this week's episode for more details.

Are you a busy mom struggling with burnout? It can be tough to find time to take a real break when your days are full with the good things of running a home and nurturing your family. That's why I'm excited to share with you a simple, yet powerful tool that can help you end your day on a positive note and prioritize your well-being. In this episode, I'll be discussing four questions from the Thriving in Motherhood Journal that will help you end your day from a place of feeling accomplished and energized about your day so that you can be ready to get up and do it again tomorrow. The four questions the journal asks are: How have I seen the hand of the Lord in my life? What were my big wins today? What was a magic moment today? What am I grateful for today? Answering each of these questions leaves me feeling great about my day! I especially love considering how I've seen the hand of the Lord in my life that day. As I've been reading the New Testament about the life of Jesus Christ, I've realized the end result of all his miracles, healings, and teachings is that he gave people hope. When I reflect each day on how God has helped me, I begin to see the endless tender mercies and miracles in my own life. This then leads me to having more peace and calm as I navigate my days in the moment. If you're looking for a way to incorporate the habit of journaling into your days and end your day on a positive note, tune into this episode to learn more about how the Thriving in Motherhood Journal can help you with all of that.

In this week's episode, we sit down with Autumn Kern, a homeschooling mother of three children, to explore the idea of bringing truth, goodness, and beauty into our homes and families. Autumn shares her philosophy behind a classical Charlotte Mason education and how it can help us cultivate these values in ourselves and our children. We also get to hear some of Autumn's defining moments in her motherhood journey and the lessons she's learned along the way. Whether you're a homeschooling mom yourself or simply interested in the power of truth, goodness, and beauty, this interview is sure to inspire and uplift you.

As a homeschooling mom of pre-K, 1st-grade, and 3rd-grade kids, I've tested out a variety of resources and materials over the years. So, if you're a fellow homeschooling parent looking for inspiration, you're in the right place! Here's a list of some of our tried and true homeschooling resources: Rightstart Math All About Reading Story of the World books and activity books Writing with Ease First Language Lessons for the Well-Trained Mind Letter Stories Ambleside Online Kindle In this week's episode, I'll be taking you on a virtual tour of our homeschooling setup for this year. During this walkthrough, I'll show you the tried-and-true tools we'll be using to teach a range of subjects, including math, reading, history, and more. By the end of the video, you'll have a clear understanding of our homeschooling curriculum for the year and, hopefully, some helpful insights that you can apply to your own homeschooling journey.

In this week's episode, I'm sharing the story of how I went from waffling between feeling bored and overwhelmed to confidently navigating my days and enjoying motherhood by creating the Thriving in Motherhood Planner. During my first two years of motherhood, I felt completely lost and bored and struggled to make it through each day as I felt guilty for all the things I should be doing but wasn't. I had also reached the place of desperate determination to figure out who I was and what motherhood would look like for my family and me. I decided the next logical step was to get a planner. In college, I lived in my Franklin Covey two-pages-a-day planner to manage my classes, the job that paid my way through, and our newlywed days of marriage. But when I became a mom, I hardly used it. Sometimes I would sit down and declare, "Today is the day I will get organized and start planning again!" But it was so discouraging to quickly see those plans derailed because of a baby's nap going too long or short. Even worse were the days when I had nothing to write down, and I'd wonder what the point of planning was. So then I tried writing to-do lists, but I would feel completely overwhelmed because it never ended, and I would run myself into the ground trying to get things checked off my ever-growing list. But as I lay in bed during my four-month recovery from an illness I contracted at the hospital when delivering my second child, I knew I needed a way to capture all the ideas I had of things I wanted to do for our family or with our kids. I needed a place that would help me discover who I was and what I wanted and actually make progress on those things in the small pockets of time I had through the day. I knew that even with my young family, there WAS time, I just spent those precious moments of independent play or surprise naps wandering around the house or checking my phone, trying to figure out what I wanted to do, and then the moment had passed. And then there were all the household management things that did need to be organized. For example, what we were having for dinner each night, so I wasn't panicking with the kids when we were all starving. Random phone numbers for returning calls about paying bills, making doctor's appointments, or talking with insurance companies. I was jotting down notes about whatever was filling my brain so I could stop thinking about it and be present with my kids. I am grateful for the hours I spent listening to podcasts while doing laundry in those early years. A particular favorite was Michael Hyatt's (now retired) show This is Your Life, where he taught business executives goal-setting and productivity principles. With the well of research about how our brains actually manage ideas and get things done and not finding a single planner out there that was truly designed for the real life of motherhood - lots of interruptions, stopping and starting, and inconsistent schedules - I decided to grab a notebook and design one for myself. First, I needed a home for my thoughts. A place for ideas and dreams I didn't want to commit to, but I didn't want to forget. A place to create a vision for my year. A place to write out my goals and projects that would make my vision for the year. Then I needed a system that would allow me to easily revisit those ideas, visions, projects, and goals regularly and decide what was most important to focus on now and what to not think about for a while longer so that I could quiet the never-ending to-do lists and be present with my kids. I needed a system that broke down those big ideas into realistic baby steps I could take each week to make things happen in small pockets of time that didn't need to be rewritten or rescheduled because of the unpredictability of life with children so I wouldn't get discouraged and give up. I needed a system with built-in check-ins to help me evaluate what season of life I was in and what needed to have my attention so that I wouldn't feel so overwhelmed by trying to do it all. I could trust that I could pick up wherever I left off if we ended up in survival circumstances. I needed a system that built in celebrating and a way to see that I was making progress so that I could build energy and momentum to move my life forward. I spent three years creating that perfect system in the quiet moments of my day, figuring out how to organize my budding vision for motherhood and make it a reality. And that system is now the Thriving in Motherhood Planner. For all the details, check out this week's episode of the podcast - or watch the video version on youtube (and subscribe to get the video every week!)

This week on the podcast, we are talking about how to design your homeschool room (well, really, any room in the house, but I'm using our homeschool space as the example). Now, this is not going to be how to make it really beautiful - yet - I'm going to talk functional. If you remember, we talked a few weeks ago about the four phases of designing a home that supports you, and I'm in step 3 in our homeschool space. 3 Steps to Design A Functional [Homeschool] Space Decide what you want to do for your homeschool and the best space in your home to do it. Remove everything that doesn't belong - leave only necessary curriculum, books, and materials Make what you do need easy to access and store items where you will use it We do a classical Charlotte Mason education and school in a few places around the house: around the kitchen table, in the kids' bedrooms (for one on one work with mom), and in our school room. I used to keep ALL of our homeschool materials in the school room (we are talking 6 years worth now), but I found that it was waaaay too hard to get to the things we needed each day. It was like having to decide over and over again what we wanted to do and when we wanted to do it. Now in our school room, each child has a shelf on it with all of their materials they use in that room: a box with two pencils, an eraser, and a pencil sharpener so that they are always able to write; a basket with their handcraft materials (currently knitting); and a few binders to organize all of their subjects. We have a shelf with resources for family subjects (nature study, history, Spanish and French, drawing, and poetry) and a globe. A table and nugget couch complete that space where we read, narrate, and write. Upstairs I keep their math and reading in our linen closet (above the towels and medicine), so it is easy to access for their independent work. Listen in as I pull back the curtains about what we're doing and how we got there to hopefully give you some ideas about how to set up any room in your house.

I love making big goals - and you've seen me do some of them here with things like the Soaring Mothers Summit. But this year, I wanted to try something that I read about years ago in Atomic Habits: making 1% Better Changes. Each month of the year, I'm picking one tiny thing to focus on, and so far, the impact has far exceeded my homes. When I'm deciding on what to focus on each month, I start with this question that is found in the quarterly review pages of the Thriving in Motherhood Planner: "What is the ONE thing that will make the biggest difference in all areas of my life?" It allows me to get honest with myself about what my current habits are and where I would like to make things better for myself. What I love about this question is that whatever season of motherhood you're in - even the super hard ones - you can find things to make 1% better instead of staying stuck and feeling like a victim. Here are the changes I've made so far in quarter one of 2023: January: Charge my phone away from my bed at night. February: Daily exercise (with a low bar of what counts) March: Track our spending in a spreadsheet The changes are simple, but by moving my phone away from my bed at night, I not only went to sleep earlier, but I also started off the day by doing all the things that matter to me before picking up my phone. Daily exercise for me is crucial to decreasing pain, and I've made a lot of improvements in that area. Tracking our spending turned into bigger conversations about how much we've saved and want to save for our kid's college, retirement and how we can tackle our mortgage more quickly. For more details of why I'm focusing on little things and the results I'm seeing, listen to this week's episode of the podcast!

For the last few weeks, I had the experience of feeling like I was running in circles without a clear direction - endlessly researching but not sure what to do next. I told myself that I had gotten to the end of the road on my vision. In reality, things weren't that dire - I just forgot what phase I was in and how to keep myself anchored. There are three phases to creating and living out your vision for the year: Caterpillar: exploring and building systems to support bringing more of what you want into your life. Cocoon: simplifying and building systems to support bringing more of what you want into your life. Butterfly: Doing more of what you want in your everyday life. The research phase is supposed to be a fun season of exploring. I had lost my way a bit, NOT because I was spending hours learning without creating, but because I had pushed out the daily practices that anchor me to God and creating my life with Him. Once I put my morning routine where I connect with God at the top of my list, it brought joy back into the caterpillar phase for me. I use my morning routine to create my life with God, so I can be anchored in whatever phase of life I'm in. For me, this looks like starting by writing the thoughts of the last 24 hours in a lined journal (this is the one I use). Next, I pull out my Thriving in Motherhood Journal and answer the questions in there. I also spend time reading my scriptures and writing down verses that stand out to me and praying. When I keep this routine in place, I feel directed in the things I am doing each day and have ideas and inspiration about where to spend my time and energy. I better understand HOW to do the things I feel I need to do. I gain clarity and see things with truth. If you've found yourself feeling a bit lost lately, tune into this week's episode, where I'm sharing more about why I was experiencing the feeling of spinning in circles and more about what to do about it.

I recently listened to a group of mothers share their feelings of overwhelm, and I absolutely identified with their thoughts. The things that they found overwhelming fell into three levels of overwhelm: Getting Things Done Our Homes and Keeping People Alive Our Thoughts When we feel overwhelmed, it can be hard to slow down and identify what is really causing our stress. Over the years, as I've peeled back the layer, I've realized that there were lots of different skill sets that I needed to develop. All three of these can come with a pretty steep learning curve (at least it was for me) when you have a child. I've learned over the years that when I find myself struggling to slow down and look at how I'm doing with my foundation, the three pillars of thriving. First, Vision. Do I have clarity about where I actually want to go next and what my next baby steps are? If not, I need to slow down and prayerfully consider what is next with God and then start moving in a clear direction. Second, Structure. What can I do to simplify the things that are overwhelming me right now? What is one tiny system or habit we can put in place to make things a little bit better? Third, Soul. What are my thoughts? Are they true or a cognitive distortion? Have I prayed for a paradigm shift to see things differently? So often, when I am overwhelmed, it is easy to fall into feeling like a victim. What I love about focusing on the three pillars of thriving is that it puts me back in my circle of influence and gets me to the root of the problem. In this week's episode, I'm sharing what we can do to address each of these areas of overwhelm and tips on how to strengthen your pillars.

Have you had the experience of committing to a hard goal but found yourself miserable along the way? Arielle shared with me that she had made it through her first semester of grad school as a mom with four young kids, but it was a miserable experience. Instead of seeing it as a failure, I shared the 5-Step Path From Curious To Committed. 5 Step Path From Curious To Committed: Curious - Identify what you would like to try or start (like grad school or a podcast). Consistent - Set a timeframe to try (podcast for one year or do a semester of grad school). Clarity - Come back to the drawing board and see how this thing fits in your life. Look at the data (podcasting is great, and I have tons of ideas to keep going; grad school was incredibly hard on my family - how big is my why?). Confidence - Now, you can either move forward or let go. Committed - Your goals can now be more specific as you are committed to the long-term process and what really matters in that field (a certain number of downloads, focus on metrics that matter in grad school). As I discussed this path with Arielle, we determined she was on step three. It is time for her to evaluate the date and decide if she wants to continue with grad school. But just because something feels really hard doesn't mean it's not worth doing. As Andrew and I have reminded ourselves many times during difficult seasons for our family, hard doesn't mean wrong. However, it has served as a signal for us to pause and take stock of what really matters to us AND how we are thinking about our circumstances. So far, quitting in the middle of misery hasn't been the right answer, but getting clear on what is in our circle of influence to make things better quickly becomes a top priority. Listen to this week's episode for more thoughts on this process and to find out what step you might be on with your goals.

Today I'm sharing how I involve the kids in cleaning our home - how we do it, why we do it, and what we use. We are going beyond picking up or tidying and addressing things like scrubbing toilets and mopping floors. (My kids are ages 9, 7, 5, and 2.5 for reference, but this is something I've done with them since they were babies) Here are the four phases of getting kids to clean at home that we use: Watch me do it. Do it with me. Do it with me watching you. Do it yourself. Working through the phases starts when my kids are crawling around on the floor and pulling themselves up on the dyer to "help" put wet clothes in. Doing it themselves emerges years later. This process is a long game, but also about more than just making sure the house gets clean. We use the time to talk with each other, sing songs, and instill values of working together, putting our "big rocks" first (from 7 Habits of Highly effective people), and contributing to our family. It's important that my kids know that cleaning at home is just part of life - no matter what your family situation or job is. But don't think that things are going perfectly in my home. My kids are still kids and get lost on their way from their beds to the kitchen to do their jobs and end up fighting with their siblings before they have food in their stomachs. Most mornings, I find myself saying, "If you are in the right place at the right time doing the right thing, you will avoid a lot of problems." This is a principle that applies to so many life scenarios, but one that I use throughout the day to remind the kids that instead of engaging in whatever the problem is, the problem literally goes away when they are in the right place, at the right time, doing the right thing. It's also one I use to encourage myself when I feel like escaping or hiding instead of sticking to our family rhythms and routines - and then reward myself with more time outside. Tune into this week's episode to hear more about what's working in our home and some tips you can use today. And, on a practical level, I have switched to using Force of Nature for the last 1.5 years for all cleaning - from washing toilets to mopping floors to wiping baseboards and door knobs - because it's safe for my kids to use. You can get 40% off a starter bundle with the code LOVEFON here.