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, l...
Nov 22, 2023•22 min•Ep 292•Transcript available on Metacast 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...
Nov 15, 2023•29 min•Ep 291•Transcript available on Metacast 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 woodwork...
Nov 08, 2023•52 min•Ep 290•Transcript available on Metacast 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 Do you wonder if they are outdated and even worth teaching?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 fami...
Nov 01, 2023•44 min•Ep 289•Transcript available on Metacast 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 ab...
Oct 25, 2023•34 min•Ep 288•Transcript available on Metacast 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....
Oct 18, 2023•16 min•Ep 287•Transcript available on Metacast 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 ...
Oct 11, 2023•23 min•Ep 286•Transcript available on Metacast 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 u...
Oct 04, 2023•26 min•Ep 285•Transcript available on Metacast 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 p...
Sep 27, 2023•20 min•Ep 284•Transcript available on Metacast 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.
Sep 20, 2023•14 min•Ep 283•Transcript available on Metacast 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 resistan...
Sep 13, 2023•21 min•Ep 282•Transcript available on Metacast 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 ...
Sep 06, 2023•19 min•Ep 281•Transcript available on Metacast 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.
Aug 30, 2023•20 min•Ep 280•Transcript available on Metacast 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 ...
Aug 23, 2023•15 min•Ep 279•Transcript available on Metacast 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...
Aug 16, 2023•13 min•Ep 278•Transcript available on Metacast 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 bac...
Aug 09, 2023•11 min•Ep 277•Transcript available on Metacast 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 im...
Aug 02, 2023•37 min•Ep 276•Transcript available on Metacast 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 the...
Jul 26, 2023•13 min•Ep 275•Transcript available on Metacast 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 a...
Jul 19, 2023•14 min•Ep 274•Transcript available on Metacast 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 procedur...
Jul 12, 2023•21 min•Ep 273•Transcript available on Metacast 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 wa...
Jul 05, 2023•40 min•Ep 272•Transcript available on Metacast 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 bo...
Jun 28, 2023•12 min•Ep 271•Transcript available on Metacast 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 yours...
Jun 21, 2023•32 min•Ep 270•Transcript available on Metacast 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 yo...
Jun 14, 2023•15 min•Ep 269•Transcript available on Metacast 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 w...
Jun 07, 2023•15 min•Ep 268•Transcript available on Metacast 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 da...
May 31, 2023•12 min•Ep 267•Transcript available on Metacast 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 ca...
May 24, 2023•14 min•Ep 266•Transcript available on Metacast 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...
May 17, 2023•14 min•Ep 265•Transcript available on Metacast 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 kid...
May 10, 2023•23 min•Ep 264•Transcript available on Metacast 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 the...
May 03, 2023•10 min•Ep 263•Transcript available on Metacast 
