My mom: Getting married young, Hawaii, and Parenting Now vs. Then

This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Fiscally responsible, financial geniuses, monetary magicians. These are things that people say about drivers who switch their car insurance to Progressive and save hundreds. Visit Progressive.com to see what you can save. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and Affiliates. Potential savings will vary. Not available in all states or situations. When did I freak you out for the first time? Mom, you can just confront him right now. This was a moment that I was dreading for years. What happened? You're bringing up a lot of stuff, Matt. You're bringing up her trauma. Do you secretly have a favorite kid? No. Not true. I think I have. It's Blake. It's you. I don't think there was ever going to be a time that you were like, yeah, take her from me. No. It was just hard to accept. The whole family thing. I didn't want it to change. All right, you guys. Welcome back to the Unplanned Podcast. This week we have a very, very special guest. Probably my favorite guest we've ever had on this podcast. It's my very own. It's my very own mom. Hey, give it up for Lori Biswell. It only took over three years of this podcast. And I do think that I need to open by addressing the elephant in the room. Where's this guy? The elephant is at the park with the boys. The elephant is at the park with my sons because my mom is happily married to my father, has been for over 30 years. They are honestly attached at the hip at any given moment at any time, except for if there is a camera on. Filming moments. Yeah. Filming moments. They can't do anything not together. Not together. Except for being on camera. Except for being on the podcast. Yeah. No, you guys are always together. We are. Often. And pretty much always. All right. And I think it's really sweet. But my dad does have, what do we call this? Anxiety, phobia. It hasn't been diagnosed officially yet. He's got like a, you guys, my family, I was raised very, I would say, sarcastic. We show our love by teasing each other. And we've really teased my dad about this. But then there comes a point where we're like, no, this is like actually serious. Oh, yeah. No, I think. What was it? What's the story, Abby? You guys were at Disney World. And then he was worried that he was going to get the camera on him at the laugh floor. You guys know at Disney World. No, here's the thing. He doesn't get to defend himself because he didn't show up. So he, and also we say this with love because I'm also acknowledging he has a real thing, which is so funny because he, I have his DNA. You cannot be more different than your dad. I know. Yeah. I have to say I'm probably a little bit closer to dad than you, though, in this regard. But yes. Yes, totally. But, you know, okay, so Disney World has this Monsters, Inc. laugh floor thing. It's like a comedy show. It's literally for kids and just for fun, people on vacations. But they do, like, put the camera on audience members. And the sheer thought of that has my dad drenched in sweat and he has to vacate the premises. I've thought about this. And I think here's where it all started. When we were, like, probably first married, there was a comedy club in Quincy, if you can believe it. And we sat in the very front row and this comedian the entire time. And he just pointed us out and said stuff to us. Oh, so he has trauma. I think it's PTSD from that comedy club. I've never even, how have I never heard this story? We've tried not to talk about it. You guys went to a comedy club? I know. It doesn't seem like it. Was it clean? I think so. Well, you know, it was, I think, mostly. Okay. Wow. So mom brings up Quincy. So we, I was raised and my mom lived her entire life in the town of Quincy, Illinois, which is, I always say small town. But I say this, like, it's a little level of fear that I'm offending people in Quincy. Do people in Quincy recognize it as a small town? I mean, probably a lot of people don't exactly because there's so many smaller ones around it. Right. But, you know, it's like 40,000 maybe. Yeah, I didn't grow up thinking it was small. But then when you leave, you're like, oh, yeah, that was small. Because we know, we all know people in, like, the littler towns around us. So that's the small, those are the small towns. Quincy's the big city compared to everywhere around it. Like, people drive in from. From other towns. From the medical stuff and for restaurants and shopping. Yeah. What can you tell us about a young Abby Biswell when she was, you know, a kid growing up in the small town of Quincy, Illinois? Wow. The good, some of the good things about Quincy is they're very good with fine arts and the music and theater. You know, a lot. She didn't necessarily play an instrument for very long. But vocally, the vocal stuff going on in Quincy. And I think those are all really big positives. Positive things in Quincy. And I think you had some great training in a lot of those things. Maybe more attention than you would have maybe in a bigger city. Big fish in a little pond. Because Abby did some sort of professional show of Alice in Opera Land, right? Wasn't she Alice? That's the biggest one you came up with. Wasn't that your claim to fame? Oh, I have so many. You were Alice in Opera Land. I was. You were, you were something, there really is a Santa Claus. What's the. Yes, Virginia, there's a Santa Claus. Yeah, you used to have that. You used to have that framed up in your house. It was on the front of Arts Quincy. Yeah. Wow. I was on the front of Arts Quincy. I was in a couple commercials. You were friends with the mayor. He used to. Yeah. You and the mayor were buddies. Mayor Kyle Moore. He gave a little speech for the mayor when he was running. A few times. Mm-hmm. I, oh. You dressed up as the mayor. The bridge lighting. I did a little bridge lighting with the town. I feel like that's like one of the really special things about growing up in a small town is that you kind of, like I said, you're a big fish in a little pond, but also like it's a small town. It's a small tight-knit community, so then like you just had so many opportunities to like, like in what situation am I going to be talking with the mayor of where we live now? You know what I mean? We just need to get Jonathan Vaness on the podcast because he's another Quincy legend. You know, I know Jonathan from when he was a little kid. Did you teach him in school? No, but I was, when I was in high school, I was a pool waitress at the country club and he was a member there as a little toddler and I can remember him walking around there and hanging out. Hanging out with him at the country club and him, he wanted to pretend like he was a pool waitress with us. That's cute. And as a little kid, I don't know him as an adult, but. Wow. It's a tight-knit community. But very nice family. Super nice family, yeah. Wow. That's awesome. Yeah. And so I was very involved in the arts, which is actually kind of funny because I feel like you and dad, I mean, certainly not dad, but not even you really were, what was your motivation then? Was it because I was so shy? Were you shy at first? I don't think you were shy. Really? No. I can remember just, I think it started with dance and you were like a preschooler and I can remember talking to some of my friends about where you should go to dance and they're like, go to Cheryl Kaiser School of Dance because she does a lot in musical theater kind of stuff. I thought, that sounds cool. Like shows and stuff. So I think that's where it started. And then when you were in second grade, is that when? Yeah, I was in second grade. The best Christmas pageant ever they were doing at the community theater. I had one line. And you took a class right before just to kind of be comfortable and got cast in the show as well as Blake, his debut as well. Little brother. It was so difficult to work with your little brother. I would never recommend it. Whenever he would misbehave, I felt personally responsible for it. He kind of fell through the cracks on the whole thing. Yeah. I was like, oh my gosh, please ignore. Do you know the first line from the show that I was, do you know the one line I had? An angel. An angel. I broke my, an angel. My wings are bent. Okay. My wings are bent. Yeah. I was named Juanita, the baby angel that has one line. That's sweet. I feel like the questions people really have for you are about your first impressions of me, your first impressions of like us dating. But to get to there, I feel like we first need to talk about the Muni, you know, that's kind of the, that's the theater in St. Louis that Abby and I met. So what's the story behind how you and Abby ended up in St. Louis for musicals? What's the story behind how you and Abby ended up in the musical theater at the Muni? I think somebody had said that they, like, I didn't even know it was a thing to audition for there. And then, cause it's two hours from where we live. Which for context, for people that have no idea what the Muni is, it's the oldest and largest, oldest and largest outdoor musical theater in North America. It's like a St. Louis tradition. It's been around for over a hundred years. They do summer theater every single summer. Like it seats like 11,000 people. Yeah, it seats 11,000 people. They have like free seats in the back where if you want to come. A thousand free seats. No, I think it's more than that. Is it over a thousand? 5,000 I was thinking. I don't know. Maybe I'm wrong. I don't think it's 5,000 free seats, but it's a lot of free seats. It's cool. It's a St. Louis tradition and it's in Forest Park where they had the World's Fair back in 1904. So back in the day when like they used to do World's Fairs all over the place, St. Louis held it. And then I think it was, yeah, not too long after the World's Fair that they converted that part of Forest Park into the summer theater. And so it's cool, you guys. Like they bring in super talented people from Broadway every single summer. And then they have a youth program for St. Louis kids and teens to get to work alongside this like high caliber of Broadway talent. And Abby and I were some of those kids and teens growing up. And that's the place that we met. So yeah, I was really an outsider of sorts coming from like not like not being local. But I have to shout out my mom because she really like saw this passion and drive in me and just like you went 150 percent like this whole like. Like nothing but support from both my parents because also like my dad couldn't just leave for the summer, you know, like that. But he was like more than he was like, go do it, like chase your dreams. And so that's what led you to having like, honestly, I think you you heard from other moms about this audition. I can't remember how we knew about the audition, but I think the first year to make it. You're right. Well, I think we like decided like the night before something crazy like that. And then the next year we kind of had a little bit more knowledge on what we were going to what to do and you know we're prepared for it but I can remember how exciting it was like when you got a call back for it and then I'll never forget that was such a fun night and we spent the night we were so happy and giddy together like we were like I don't guess we got to get a toothbrush we went to Target and we bought a little because we didn't think we were going to spend the night but I actually secretly had packed a few little things in the back of the car just like hoping yeah like some extra clothes just in case but anyway so that was super fun and so you got cast in that first show I think you were in between your eighth and ninth grade year yeah and we really didn't know at all what to expect because we were there maybe a month by the time it had rehearsals and um and the shows and then Matt Matt's mom Teresa I think did you meet her first before did you like meet my mom before you met me I think so okay I think so well yeah I knew your mom definitely from like the call well before that and stuff I can't remember exactly yeah a lot of those moms I met from there and then yeah so I can remember you guys like playing cards together uh-huh like all the kids would play cards when you weren't on stage there was a lot of downtime because we weren't necessarily in every number we were in let's just say about 90 seconds of the productions I mean it depends on the show yeah it depended on the show like if it was a show like you got to be in 90 seconds some shows like I want to say there was a show that I was in like half of the show yeah because you were the muni golden child that's not true I feel like I got blacklisted for a little bit because I went and I did shows at another theater the scandal I did I did shows at stages st louis isn't it funny though how high stakes kids theater dance sports like how high stakes it can get like politics to it there's there's politics even in kids stuff you know it's it's totally um but I what's funny laurie is I remember my mom telling me probably when I was in eighth grade like yeah this this you know cute girl and her mom invited me to come like do shows in in their small town of quincy illinois and I was like oh that's cute like I I just didn't like it was it was like a week-long camp like this boot camp is a big deal see I didn't know that I couldn't sleep the night before it started like I was so excited which yeah which anyway I looking back if I could go back I probably should have done the boot camp because I probably would have learned to act better I spent so much time dancing like it came time to act and I never really like learned how to act until maybe my senior year of high school it's never too late I think yeah brandon thompson who was the director of the theater and was for your whole time in quincy I mean I think he taught you so much and totally um stuff I don't think that you would just learn from random classes if you were somewhere else and so laurie was that your first attempt to put abby and I together when we were in eighth grade no not great when when were you trying to like do your matchmaking I feel like this sprinkling started when we were in eighth grade around my brain yeah when did you become a matchmaker I think honestly getting to get like we'd come like there were some those classes or whatever at the christmas time like around yes and so then that would be a broadway theater connection is what it's called a second time that we go to I don't know if you always were at it but like I'd get together with your mom still we'd have coffee and talk and I'm like gosh our families seem like a lot alike and um maybe I just really liked your mom a lot at first and then I was like it's important but matt seems like you know obviously you came from a nice family and um so I got to know you kind of through your mom I'd say ah okay this show is sponsored by better help this is a reminder that no matter what you're going through in your life you do not have to go through it alone and that's from a huge advocate and so is abby for therapy not only do we do couples therapy we've also both gone to individual therapy and with over 30,000 therapists better help is one of the world's largest online therapy platforms having served over six million people globally better help is an amazing introduction especially if therapy feels overwhelming for you because you can do it from the safety of your own home on your own calendar and it's completely online plus better help does a great job of finding a therapist that's a good fit for you honestly right off the jump because they do the initial matching work for you so you can focus on your therapy goals they'll just send you a short questionnaire that helps identify your needs and preferences and their 12 plus years of experience and industry leading match fulfillment rate means they typically get it right the first time but if you just want to get started with your therapy so happen to not be happy with your match you can switch to a different therapist at any time from one of their tailored recommendations you don't have to be on this journey alone find support and have someone with you in therapy sign up and get 10 off at betterhelp.com slash unplanned podcast that's better help.com slash unplanned podcast i remember i feel like whenever like i would talk about boys around my mom which i will say wasn't that much i was not the most boy crazy girl like even though i get i get accused of being a boy crazy girl i get accused of being a boy crazy girl boy crazy no you were not at all thank you not at all and not even just like you just didn't seem like yeah there was nobody i was so i was too driven i had set i had a had a purpose i had a other things that were important to you and it wasn't boys and i loved hanging out with my friends like and my friends weren't really like that either no so i feel like if my friends were more like boy crazy then maybe it would be like the girls would hang out yeah they were good influences on me it's probably the craziest of all of them which is pretty crazy you're thinking about yeah um but i remember when i would talk about other boys they would be like or my mom would be like he's no matt howard i would say that the standard and so she really got in my ear getting bigger and bigger but i was like mom he has no idea who i am he has no idea who i am and it might have been true and honestly i don't think you thought a thing about about me i'll be honest i did not pay much attention until high school sorry sorry i did you just i think you just like got more attractive i don't know i don't know we both did look at the picture of us we were we were i had like pimples on my face i don't even know what did you even see in me there's a there's a lot of humidity that night that you guys had that first picture taken should we throw the picture that the og of abby and i from when we were in mary poppins it was very humid 2013 you can't control it 13 years way too short for how thick and frizzy it was it's weird to say that was 13 years ago but also yeah that's wait that's a long time i just looked down i'm like wait i need to bring this up what oh yeah i have my mom's book also mom doesn't just do a hiatus from the podcast for three years for nothing she's an author now yep she's on her official press tour she's doing it she's doing the circuit she's going on all the big podcasts she she's was just on always here with the abby howards and now she's on unplanned no promoting her brand new book what's the first ever book that she wrote with my aunt called let's travel to hawaii mom talk about your book a little bit all right well so i don't know so jean and i my sister and i had decided i mean like i don't know 15 years ago we were gonna do a travel book and i think we first thought about it because you know we did a lot of nice traveling as you know it was a priority um yeah i mean you know everybody decides what to do with their money and i think we it was important to us to travel and so i always thought you guys did the coolest trip because because it was your your parents that would take you guys on these you know vacations to greece and italy we would go to disney every time okay because that's that was our that's our place it still is my place yeah but um otherwise we did go with we went with my mom and dad and my sister and her husband and their cousins brett and bennett and we did some really nice traveling and so whenever we would go you know i would think oh i want you know if you have more buy-in if and you're more it seems more fun if you have some knowledge about the place and so i'd always look to see if you have any more buy-in if you have some knowledge about the place what kind of books could i get for the kids or you know to learn about it and honestly they're really there just weren't anything that was quality that was out on the market that i could find about any of these places we you know that we'd go to and we went to hawaii we went to alaska and europe and some different places and i'd always look and you couldn't you couldn't find anything good and honestly to this day so you'd think at this many years later there would be some good books out now and but there there really aren't the things you can find a lot of times are just like you know write your thoughts about the day or you know but i wanted something for you guys at the time and now that was you know visually appealing but had you know good facts about the place and so that's kind of why we decided to write this book so it's it's the first in the series and um hawaii or why is that no but um florida's already in the works and um then we're gonna you know do some international or we're not sure what should we do next after florida yeah comment down below what should you see them cover next what's really cool is that this feels so fitting for a multitude of reasons for my mom first of all she was a teacher elementary teacher for 27 years and um her teaching never stopped in the classroom because i was certainly raised by a teacher i'm a teacher's child because i have memories of us road tripping to florida from illinois because we surely drove to florida and i was raised in the most years we did a lot of times and i remember like when we would cross state you know you're crossing over a lot of states when you're driving from illinois there were some times where mom would prepare for every state border we crossed a new state activity like worksheet activity like some type of learning elementary school yeah and it's summer you know we're on summer break and here we are we have crack out our oh we're now in georgia get out your peach thing and so this is very fitting for you and And the book is beautiful. We could open it up. Yeah, correct me if I'm wrong. Did you teach elementary school for 20 years? How many? Well, 27 years in education. 27 years. Wow. A couple of years where I was doing a few different things. She was a star guide? Well, for a few years. She was a behavior enforcer. At the last few years, it was a, I mean, it's kind of like. I love it. A dean for elementary school children kind of a thing. It's beautiful. I guess I'm thinking, I'm hoping, you know, even adults would think it's fun to look at it. I mean, you know, you're not going to get everything you need to know about Hawaii if you're trying to do. But I'd say it's a good overview of, you know, the main things in each place and in a fun to read way. What would be like the best age, you think, for a kid to really enjoy this book? Because obviously the pictures are cool. I think Griffin, our three-year-old, would love just looking through the pictures. But to actually read it, do you think it's more of like a third grade or fourth grade? Yeah, I'd say third grade, which is the grade I taught. Okay. Yeah, I'd say probably so. That's great. That's really cool. It's really cool. It's very, here's the thing. It's great for anyone's home library too. Just like, okay, how many times are you doing a project on a certain state or you just, I don't know. It's just so visually appealing. And here's the best Easter egg of all. Oh, yeah. Did you notice? Me and my cousins in Hawaii. Oh, that's cute. So we're trying to do a little Easter egg-y thing on each book on that same page. A picture of you guys, you and Blake and your cousins. At the, wherever it is, so. It's really cool. And also, it's just the perfect collaboration between you and your sister. Our whole family is, you're going to see this trend if you haven't already with us, very tight-knit. Like, and I think I took that for granted until honestly I was about 27. Like, I was like, this is unusual what we have here. But the fact that like you and your sister are working together, combining your skills as both moms, but teachers and a professional, like, journalist, author, or really a, writer, is what Gina is now, now authors to create this awesome resource for families and kids. And I'm really proud of you, Mom. Thank you. Were you, was your job more of the illustration and Gina was more of the writing? Almost all of it, yeah. And then my mom and grandma also helped. And grandma also helped. Was on the team with some of it. But, yeah, Gina did the writing and I did the graphic design. Let me say that I am so proud of what my mom is doing, but it would mean, like, so, so, so, so much to me, you guys. If you follow them on Instagram, purchase the book if you can. It's on Amazon, it's on Prime, we all have Prime, it's really easy, it's a quick buy. It's great to add to any library. I know a lot of you guys have kids or just, I don't know, it's a, it's just a beautiful book to add to your library. And I just really think that it would just be such a, I would be so grateful if you took the action of just supporting my mom. Because, honestly, loving my family and supporting my family is like the greatest act of supporting and loving me. So, thank you. Thank you so, so much in advance for all of you that do that. Write a review if you buy it, give it five stars, and we'll link it down below. And also follow What A Smart Cookie Publishing. And, thanks, guys. Really thankful for this community. Is it okay if we circle back to our love story through Lori's eyes? Yes, I think we need to get back to that. I feel like we've talked a lot about, like, yeah, this is what my parents said, and my parents did not want us to get married. Yeah, but you did. And we haven't really, like, talked that through with your mom. And she's right here, and we can ask her literally whatever we want. So, we were scandalous, and we wanted to get married before we graduated from college. I feel like we've talked about this a lot. But even before that, though, I feel like your mom was just like. Oh, yeah, she has a specific memory. She would drive. Can we just address this? Lori would drive Abby from Quincy, two hours away, to St. Louis all the time so we could go on dates. Yeah, I wasn't allowed to drive on highways. Like, you would, yeah. So, you weren't allowed to drive to visit me, and so you would go and stay at, like, a hotel using points, right? Let's be honest that the driving part was more dad not wanting me to drive. Oh, okay. Another one of his phobias. That's right. Your dad would drive. Because he didn't want your mom driving alone. He's got a little safety thing, you know? Well, also, in Quincy, the fastest road is 40 miles per hour. So, I had no experience driving fast. And that's maybe a stretch, 45 feet. Yeah, and I don't even think my car could have even gone 45. See, Abby, like, that's just, like, finally dawning on me, like, why the highway was so scary for you guys. Because, like, driving on the highway was just, like, part of life for me. Dude, when we moved to Phoenix, that was the first time I was like, how am I going to drive here? We drive on the highway every day. That's the reason why my grandma can't move here. That's the reason why, like, mom was worried about driving here. Mom was worried moving here because of the driving. Yeah. It is a big change. I'm talking about Vicki, too. We're talking about different grandmas, I think. Ah, okay. Everyone was worried about driving. Let's just say that. Everyone in the family. Phoenix is probably not a good example of moving to a bigger city with the driving, but. You were very supportive of the dating. I was supportive of the dating, very much. Why did you, why did you? Because I just thought, you know, it just seems like you guys have a lot of the same values. You, as I said. You got along with Teresa well. You loved your family. Yeah. I can remember going out to dinners and stuff with your whole family. I don't even know if you guys were dating then. Maybe, maybe you were. It's almost been 10 years ago. Yeah, it's been a long time. When did, when did I freak you out for the first time? Okay. Can we talk about that? Yes. You can just, yeah, let's just have this conversation right here. I can remember where we were. You and I were in the car. Okay. It was Abby's senior recital. Dance recital. The last one, as well as her graduation from high school, was all on the same weekend. So you're just feeling so emotional. Yeah. As was I. This was horrible. This was, this was a moment that I was dreading for years and years. This moment when it was like, I distinctly remember just so many times just being sad and upset about Abby growing up and dad would be like, don't waste your time, you know, thinking about the, don't think about that now. Don't waste his time now. But anyway. You've unfortunately given me that quality. I've already cried about Griffin and Augie leaving. Yeah. This was the climax. This was the big weekend that I, four years. Yeah. Was dreading. You were dreading that weekend. Okay. And then here we are in the car. And what do I say to you? You ask, could you take, could I take you to go get some flowers for Abby for either the dance recital or graduation? Yes, I can. And then you're like, hey, Lori, I've been thinking about this. Who do you think if Abby and I got married? You know, I don't know. And I was like, thinking in my head, you have got to be kidding me. This is the moment you chose of all moments. He's never been one for timing. It was just the, you know, I think I'm going to say it. I think I'm going to say it. And then you said it. And I thought, I'm pretty sure I said, this is not the time to have this conversation. You've always been comfortable. I feel like you're also extra comfortable with Matt because you literally met him when he was a child. So I feel like there's just a different level. Like when we were dating, he stayed in our house. That's the thing. It's not just like a typical dating thing because of the – you can't just like go on a quick date and come back home at night. So he would come and stay at our house for weekends. Yeah, that's the thing with long distance. It's like we were just hanging out. Like we're just – I'm like I'm at your house. You're at my house. We do all the meals together. You know, meals together. We, you know. It's like he's already a part of the family. I know. Yeah. And I also remember – and Matt, my Matt. Okay, just so everybody knows. My dad's name is also Matt. Very confusing. My Matt, your Matt. Matt Biswell and Matt Howard. Yeah, we got a lot of Matts. A lot of Abbys, a lot of, you know. Maybe we should name this baby Matt. That would be fantastic. It would be very fantastic. I can remember being somewhere. It was on a Sunday and it was like you had come for the weekend and you had to go back. You were going to go back and you're like, oh, I'm pretty sure the weather looks really bad outside. I think – I don't know about this ice outside. And we're like, there's no ice outside. And you're like, I think it's going to get bad. I think I better just not go back tonight. And so you stay another night and you're like, there's no ice outside at all. That's sweet. I loved being at your house. Like, it was just so much fun. Yeah. Played lots of games. Played a lot of games. That was a staple growing up. If I had a time machine, I wish I could just go back to that time. That was so fun. Just to be like – just to be young and in love again. Oh, wow. But like – Now you're just older than love. No, but like – Now you're just older than love. Yeah, just – I don't know. It's just like everything is so exciting. Oh, yeah. Literally everything. Yeah. Every date we went on was just like, I can't believe I'm taking this pretty girl on a date. Oh, my gosh. So fun. Yeah. Was that before – so that conversation where I told you that I wanted to marry Abby Young, was that before or after we talked about me getting a promise ring for Abby? Or did I just spring that on you guys? Did you just find out after the fact? I don't know. I don't know. She blacked out. Because she's wearing it right now. I got her a promise ring in high school. That is a real diamond. And I went and I negotiated the price down at the jewelry store. That sounds like something you would do. Yeah, I would. Yeah. I don't know. This was her high – so you probably got that first, huh? I don't know. I got that. It was in high school. Yeah, that was – Yeah, this was probably that conversation because you gave it to me in June of – after high school. I remember I was in music theory class and telling like some of the girls who were in the class to be like, yeah, I'm going to get my girlfriend this promise ring and tell her that I'm – Like, want to marry her. And I was like, what do you guys think about these? And they're like, oh, that one's cute. And then I went and bought it at the jewelry store. Thank you to Ladder for sponsoring today's episode. If I'm being completely honest with you guys, at first the gym was very overwhelming to me because I didn't really have a workout plan. I would just go in and start doing like random workouts until I actually had someone sit me down and walk me through exactly what I needed to do to hit my fitness goals. And that's exactly what Ladder does. They pair you with an expert coach and set up a workout plan for you. That can be done from anywhere. 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Yeah, we honestly, mom, this should be our formal apology. There's a lot of, maybe a lot of trauma wrapped up in why I wrote the Hawaii book. But I, that was, that was horrible. Yeah. And I can remember being at grandma and grandpa's house in Chicago and just crying and crying about it. Sad. I'm the worst daughter ever. No, you're not. We just put, I put you through a lot all at once. Yeah. You know, you actually. I was an adult. Right. For all of these things. I was, was it easier to parent me as a child than as an adult? A thousand percent. Oof. Not because you were necessarily doing anything wrong as the adult, because I'm not, like in retrospect, none of these things were wrong. It was just not how I wanted it to be. Right. So it was really all a selfish thing. It wasn't because you had done something wrong. It was all selfish stuff that I didn't want to change. Yeah, I could see selfishly that how if like Augie's like, hey dad, I'm going to move to New Zealand and like go surf. And I'm like, dude, I can't, I would have to take like a 20 hour journey to come see you, you know? So I can see how like Hawaii is not quite that far, but it's still like, you know, from Quincy, Quincy to Oahu is like a 10 hour journey. So. More than that. Cause Quincy does not have an airport. You got to drive to Chicago. Yeah. You first got to, or you take the train to Chicago and then you can take the plane. However, yeah. But yeah, that's like a 12 hour journey. Yeah. It was a big stretch. I think, um, yeah. I'm thinking about all the things that mom just had to process. Were you regretting giving the permission? She wouldn't admit it if she was. She wouldn't. She regretted. We can just say it. She regretted it. She was like, why? It was a very, to say I gave permission is still a little, like, did I ever really? I don't know. It was all. She's like, I never said yes. I don't know. I will say yes. And then I'd fight. Like, like I get upset about it again. So I don't know. I had no idea. That. And you had a conversation beforehand about like saying yes to my. You guys didn't seem like a, you know, I had no idea. That's why he was like, what are you doing? Hearing that is really funny. Cause I had no, I had no clue. Yeah. He was like, we talked about this and I'm like, I know, but I couldn't go through it. Where was I during all this? I don't know. Like genuinely. I don't know. Dance class. Maybe doing something at like the theater or something. Or maybe, no, you're probably watching Wes and Elise, the kids you used to babysit. That's true. Yeah. That's true. Um, but I'm thinking it's like so funny because like, it seems like, you know, we were just kind of out here gallivanting, making our own decisions, but also our family, we came back to visit family so much and family came out to visit us so much, even in that short amount of time that we were living there. And then when it came time to move, we were going to move back to like the mainland. We were like, we were telling our family, we're like, okay, so we're thinking between Utah and Arizona and everyone, our family is like, we'll move back to the mainland. And then when we moved to Arizona, like we could see ourselves moving to Arizona, but we never moved to Utah. We're like, okay, fine. I had never been to either place. So I don't even know if I weighed in on that. I was never been to either place before. But you were like, I don't want the cold. If we would have moved to California, do you think anybody would have followed? I don't know. I think I was secretly voting a little bit for Florida, but I don't know if that was ever in the picture. It was kind of. Yeah. Was Florida ever in the picture? Nothing was off the table at this point. What's crazy too is we vlogged all this. This is literally on our YouTube channel, like us going back and forth about where to move. That was real. It was real. It was 100%. None of it was scripted. None of it was like. It's realer than any reality TV you've ever seen. We like legitimately did not know where we were going to move. People would say, why did they decide to move to Phoenix? I'm like, ah, I think they thought it would be fun. And honestly, that's the answer I would have gave. It was not a solid reason. Like people think there's a big reason. I'm like, yeah, I think they think it would be fun. And they had some friends here. And that was. That was it. And they liked the weather. We just liked the sun. Yeah. That was really it. And you know what? Since then, since we have moved here four years ago, mom and dad, my parents moved out. My grandma moved out. My brother and his wife. And they now have a daughter. Your brother and his wife. And they now have two children. Yeah. And so it seems like. We brought out 10 people. But then again. And they're multiplying. There's a lot of other parents of some other parents that are like temporary residency. Holy cow. OK, wait. So between you and I and Griffin, Augie and. I'm not going to say our son's name. We already know what it is. And then we have your parents and then your grandma and then Caleb and Abby. They're two kids. They're two kids. And then Blake and Addie. And they're. Brielle. 15 people. We have 15 people out here. And also Addie's parents come often. Your parents come often. Abby's parents come often. So if we move back to Hawaii, our family is going to literally. Oh my. Excommunicate us. I don't think. I don't think Lori could survive that one. She has weathered so many storms. Don't do that to this woman. If we ever move back, we'll bring her back on the podcast. We'll bring her back on the podcast. Here's the thing I know about mom, though. Here's the thing I know about mom. Well, you love Hawaii. You wrote a book about it. I do. She is. She doesn't go by grandma. In fact, we get in trouble if we use that term. Our kids don't even know that you are their grandma. But she goes by honey and she will not be separated from her grandchildren. That's right. No. So I do think that even if we had decided to move to California, which would not have been her choice, she would have found a way to be there. I would go. That's true. And so would my dad. Gah is his name. We were. Yeah. So the funny story behind honey and gah is really not that funny. It's kind of just my mom's like, when you guys have kids, I'm going to go by honey. And that was because there was a kid that would call his or her. In my class. Yeah. There was a kid in your class that would call her grandma honey. And then. He's like, my honey's picking me up. And then she loved that. I was like, oh, I love that. And so she had already known that that was going to be her name. But then she's asking my dad. She's like, Matt, what are you going to be? And he's like, I'm going to let the kids know. I'm going to let the kids decide. And we're like, dad, that's what you get. That's what you get. You get a name like gah. Yeah. Because when they're one year old and they can't talk and that's, that's what they can do. And so it's honey and gah. And I remember Blake and Addie were like, we're not calling him gah. It's so dumb. And then now, sure enough, they're like, Brielle, look, it's gah. I mean, that's who he is. That's who he is. My favorite is when Griffin in full, like, like not even stuttering once goes, hey guys, this is meet my honey and my gah. This is my honey and my gah. This is my honey and gah. He introduces his friends to, to his gah. Yeah. Well, he introduces dad as his friend. His friend gah. My friend gah. Like, I don't think he knows. He's, he thinks dad is a peer of his. And dad plays with them like a peer. And frankly, dad acts like he's a peer. So, yeah. Yeah. Okay. That's the thing. You guys were really young having, getting married and having kids too. What's the trick, Lori? So you guys got married young. Why, what was the big deal? I was 20 and you were 22. Because that's the thing. We thought you guys were going to be on board when we asked permission. Because Abby was like, my parents got married when they were young. So this was totally going to be approved. Dad had graduated two years earlier. And I graduated three months earlier. I think you were 22, mom. Something like that. But it seems like a big difference. Plus dad was two years older than that. Oh. Well, I should have found myself an older man then, apparently. I guess so. It seems different though if you're in college or if you're outside of college. Like, it just seems like you're in a different stage of life. That's true. It is really weird being a married student. I don't think I knew other kids. That were married in college at the time. We were weird, for sure. But, yeah, I think most of those kids don't end up going to college. There are a lot of kids that get married young, but not usually. Eh, you know what happens. If you could see yourself now, Lori, you know, all these years later. Gosh, we're looking at coming up on a decade of Abby and I being a couple. So this was nine years ago when I first brought up marrying Abby. If you could have just, like, shown yourself when you were having, like, one of the saddest days of your life after the recital. And you could just see Griffin and Augie. Well, I know. Isn't that, like, a lot of things? Like, you're like, if I could just see how it turned out in the end, I would have been okay. But, yeah, of course, yeah. I would not have changed a thing then. But I just needed somebody to tell me that then. You need a magic ball. Mm-hmm. And I feel like the same goes for us doing social media because, like, you don't like us being public-facing. Or, like, all the things that come with that. But you do love some good PR and some good social media. Some influencer benefits. You know, on occasion. It has its perks. If it happens. If it happens. We've taken your parents on a trip before, right? Yeah, we've taken. Yeah. We've done some fun travels. Fun travels thanks to social media and some PR, some fun opportunities. So do you think that I'm similar to you as a parent? Obviously, I was like, I remember, like, you're my mom. I remember things. But I'm like, I really only have memories, obviously, of when I was way older than the age my kids are. Do you think I'm a similar parent? Like, do I think I parent my kids like you parented? I probably was a little stricter than you are about things. I'm not saying that's good. But I'm just saying maybe because of teaching and, like, needing things to be orderly and needing, you know, things to be calm, I probably – had more rules on some things than you do. And, again – And I'm not offended. I'm not offended. probably needed to let more things go and it wasn't be like not behavior wise but just like messes and it was more Blake you know than you but noise yeah messes and noise maybe because I had so much mess and noise during the day that when I came home I just really needed it to be more calm and orderly yeah let's talk about being a teacher because I feel like the combination of being a teacher and being a mom especially to littles at the exact same time had to be I know that I mean that overstimulating sometimes super overstimulating yeah and how do you think being a teacher and like impacted you as a mom thank you to Wayfair for sponsoring this portion of today's episode if you are anything like us if we have the opportunity to be outside we are going to be outside it's just a way to keep the inside of your house clean and also the fresh air is so good for us also our physical health the thing about your outdoor space is that it should feel like you it should feel like an extension of your own home I feel like we've really accomplished that in our business and that's why we want to spend so much time out there as well Wayfair is awesome because they have everything from furniture and decor to organization solutions and outdoor essentials so if you're considering completing your backyard this summer or maybe getting some new staple pieces that'll help elevate the space you should consider Wayfair Wayfair makes it easy to find what fits your style and needs that work within your budget whether your vibe is modern coastal farmhouse or eclectic Wayfair has options to help you create an outdoor space that's uniquely yours as well and if you're a personal customers of Wayfair I can also say that I deeply appreciate that their installation and assembly services are available for a fully seamless experience we are admittedly not DIYers and we are not savvy with the toolkit I love that they offer that service to just make it even more convenient for you you can shop with Wayfair verified aka your shortcut to the good stuff their team of product specialists vets everything by hand using a 10-point quality inspection so you know you're getting a quality piece no matter your budget get prepped for patio season for way less head to Wayfair.com right now to shop all things home that's w-a-y-f-a-i-r.com Wayfair every style every home Wayfair every style every home I mean you see it's I mean at school the way other kids are behaving and you want to make sure sometimes that my maybe and maybe I went overboard but like you I'm correcting things at home if you saw certain behaviors at school and maybe not behavior wise but I also was always very aware of like things you needed to know and you know like benchmarks yeah I hear this is okay if we talk a little bit about teaching I feel like there's a lot of teachers that listen to our podcast too that find this interesting teacher appreciation week it's teacher appreciation week as well that's amazing yes it won't be by the time this episode goes out I know but you should appreciate the teachers we appreciate all of the teachers yeah I think that I something I hear you that have taught for like through the years more like have some more experience say like teaching is not what it used to be yeah I just think the main thing I mean I think it's a lot of things but a lot of it is is the discipline in the schools and things that you know kids are probably not raised quite the same as they were you think it starts at home yeah and therefore at school you're getting the kids coming from those households that are not the same as they were are very different than maybe some than some of them they were in the past and um it's hard to know what to do with that then your hands are tied a lot of times and a lot of times the parents don't you know are not on your side are not on the teacher's side what's the thing that frustrates you the most about like how schools and specifically you taught at a public school like how public schools are talked about in America like now in the media like what's the thing that bothers you the most I mean I can only speak for the Quincy public schools and the Quincy public schools are great and the teachers I know are super hard working and they spend countless hours at school they love the kids in their classes and so um I think unfortunately in the news you're gonna have you know there's gonna be this random teacher in this state did this thing and this room teacher but that's you could do that for any profession that you can find somebody who's not doing what they're supposed to be doing and who's done something wrong but for the great great majority of the teachers it's not that way and so I kind of feel like they're getting a bad rap for a small amount of people that are doing something because the teachers that I know work super super hard and it's not just teachers it's it's the paraeducators it's it's the administ administrators who also get ripped on by people unfairly because I do know I work closely with the administrators the last few years and how hard that they work and you know having to juggle between what the parents want what the school district wants the superintendent wants what the about the kids and um it's it's hard I think that's frustrating too like I obviously can't know personally but just being closely related to many teachers you both my grandmas like the fact that teachers have to face criticism from parents the public like everyone and then they're also just like severely under paid and working so hard that it's just like I feel like it's their or their points were like what the heck am I doing this for and what does it boil down to it's it's tough and I think about all the time now that I'm not teaching and I'm like wow you know you can you really appreciate that when you're not in it at the moment anymore you know like that's so it's so much work and with not a lot of give back to you I guess I don't know I don't know I don't know I don't know I don't know right it's kind of like yeah well it's for the kids it is um and also mom always told me that she chose the job like being a teacher primarily because she was like it'll be the best schedule for having kids it really was and um that was great we spent all summers together obviously I went with mom to school and then went home with her to school she was my very own third grade teacher and blokes and so we were basically like always together and she was like I'm gonna go to school and she was like I'm gonna go to school and she was like I'm gonna go to school and she was like I'm gonna go to school and she was like I'm gonna go to school and she was like I'm gonna go to school and she was like I'm gonna go to school and she was like I'm gonna go to school and she was like attached to the hip when you really think about it and um I think that's something one of the many things that I like got from you was like just this prioritizing of motherhood and it just it wasn't even something I consciously thought about like it just happened where I was like we have to find something that works for having kids like so I can spend as much time with them as possible because that is like the most important thing yeah and that's what led us to honestly what we're doing now um and obviously I didn't even foresee this as being an option because I did go to school I know going to school to be a teacher because I was like well I guess this is the best schedule for kids and then so many ways I was like because that was my priority being a parent was my priority right but also I needed to earn an income so that was the best thing I need to do and I followed your footsteps nearly exactly it's kind of funny the degree paths we went down because after I got grilled by your mom on like having finances together I was like I guess I need to do like finance I gotta switch to finance I gotta figure out this money stuff so I can afford to be married the whole theater thing in the beginning was a little yeah I was like I don't want I don't want like her parents to hate me because I like marry their daughter and now we're like broke and can't pay for our food like we gotta figure this out um it is weird it's weird though like the the freaking changes like we we were so set on doing theater and so set on being performers and we honestly dropped it so easily we dropped it because we just put ourselves we put our relationship first it was I was shocked it was like at Christmas time when you're you're like I think I'm changing my major education and math changes to finance I'm like wow and you know I I don't know how to explain it but at the time it was just it wasn't natural like it wasn't that sad it wasn't that scary it was just like I guess we just so we were very young I feel like to have like we really had our priorities yeah clearly mapped out for it was like it was us before careers 100 yeah and like family marriage and it's always kind of been that way and I think it's because of the people that raised us that that made that not like anything crazy at the time okay so we talked about you being a honey I've asked mom this before but you know for the sake of the cameras and the mics okay Matt's mom says that she enjoys being a grandma more than she enjoyed being a mom yeah she doesn't mean and that sounds bad the way I'm saying it but she's saying like basically what I hear a lot of grandmas say they're like you get all the perks of the children like you get to have them like when it's fun it's not overwhelming but you don't have to deal with like you know the sleepless nights the like you know yeah the the discipline things like that um but what how what would you say that all makes sense that I mean that all makes sense but I also want to say that I loved being a parent so much that that I never thought that that would be matched or topped and so that's why I was saying before like for so many years before you graduate I was like dreading dreading dreading dreading because I didn't want it to be over and at some point like in the last I don't know four years or whatever you know before Griffin was born I was like wait a second because the things I like I liked doing so many things like doing fun things for like the holidays or you know any of those mom had so many themed dinners and so I love doing those things and I'm like and so then at some point I'm like I could actually do this all over again because I kept thinking there was like this was like the end this was the end of my fun this was the end of everything loved because you guys are grown it's over and then i'm like you know what it doesn't have to be over you can actually start all over again and do the same stuff again but just slightly different you know she's already started she's had like little parties for the kids and so cute you're raising them to be little mini they're mini honeys on their personalities in some ways like griffin loves a party he loves a theme and i think augie's gonna be the same way but he's just not able to vocalize it as much and so yeah like i'm just fun to think you know that that doesn't have to actually end in your life it can just repeat it in a slightly different way and that's what i'm i hope to do they had like a little grinch party at her house over christmas and things like that um this is not new for her though because growing up i remember we did uh dinners around the world so like we would have like a theme night and mom would try to prepare food from now i don't know how uh authentic authentic they were but we i had an italian night i got cds from the library for the music to go with it yeah we had cds for music you were you weren't you attending like a kid's college course oh mom taught kids college you taught kids college it was ratatouille disney thing oh yeah that was that remind yeah mom taught a kid's college course it was uh ratatouille i did a french and italian cooking class that had or i don't know ratatouille italian lady and the tramp mom mom never stopped teaching when you really think about it and she also always found a way to tie in disney which makes leads my next question do you identify as a disney adult yes okay but not in a creepy weird way i don't know what you consider a disney adult but i don't know i just feel like i it was news to me that this was something that was i know there's some kind of a cult disney adult culture i don't know what that is but it's weirder when like the disney adults like have to get their picture with like all the characters no i'm not that and get them to like sign their book no no no no i'm not that if you just consider disney adults an adult who loves to go to disney then yes because i will say my parents take solo trips to disney we do frequently and here's the thing i need to know like this doesn't follow dad's personality not really but he goes he would rather go there than i think you know again we had so much fun and we had so much fun and we had so much fun and we had so much fun going as a family that you know you continue doing something that you've always loved and honestly the first time dad and i went without you guys i'm like this is not going to be any fun and you had a lot of fun and it was really fun you know because you do eliminate some things not that we were doing this up until you know you're not pushing strollers you're not right although obviously you guys were going in high school we weren't doing that still but you know it is something to be just you can you can start to understand which i don't think there's any excuse for this but you can understand like why parents at their breaking point like at disney there's always some parent that's like having a meltdown at their kid i hate that adults have meltdowns and toddlers at disney i know i'm like chill out dude like you brought your kids to disney but i will say that last disney trip that we took i was so tired we were close to having a meltdown like you know you're waiting in a line for an hour just to ride a ride for 45 seconds and then you're just like oh oh here's the thing it's not an easy vacation yeah we have such good memories of driving there and that you know the dvd players in the car yeah my dad had to leave in the middle of the night because he was just too excited to wait till the morning there is an old commercial that people my age would know that like the kids are like in bed they're talking it's an old disney commercial they're like i can't sleep i'm too excited and then at the end it pans to the parents and i guess it's the dad saying the same thing to his wife like i can't sleep i'm too excited and that's literally that was my and so like it's like funny to make jokes about disney idols but there's actually just so much nostalgia wrapped up in it for our family because disney used to have that they called it fast passes but there were physical paper tickets yeah to get a quick like you didn't have to pay extra for them yeah you just had to get there first and my dad shy man about it what'd you say i haven't said competitive about it very competitive like he would like speed walk yeah sweating like running to like i have memories of him like just sprinting to splash mountain oh my gosh it's not even splash mountain anymore like sprinting yeah no but just sprinting and we got the paper tickets i can remember saying something to him about this like don't just don't stress about it don't we had to wake up at like five i want to make sure he's like i want to make sure the kids get to go on all the stuff that they want to do and like okay well yeah there was no question always with family vacations that it was it was about the kids it was about us so that was really we have so many good memories and so i say disney adult in a fond way yeah i don't know weird creepy way i don't know what the definition of that is i think they think i think the internet thinks disney adults are um obnoxious that's not me it's not that's not mom no she does have a lot of uh special disney backpacks and ears she has every single one i don't every single one most of them i have a couple she has a couple little do you know there's probably hundreds and hundreds really there's hundreds of these things oh maybe there's a whole cult behind how many actually do you have how many four or five okay how many how many popcorn buckets though i the kids love them only have the they are fun i was so upset when you let us borrow your popcorn bucket and it didn't work at disneyland what the heck i did not realize that it should work at all the parks come on people i guess i only have two i have two christmas ones so that when the boys come over christmas time they wear them around their neck and then we i fill it with snacks for them not popcorn because we don't let them have popcorn popcorn the puffs from trader joe's people were confused in the comments on why we weren't letting our kids have popcorn they're like you don't let your kids have popcorn but you let them have a slurpee and i'm like yeah because a slurpee is not a choking hazard right silly choking talk to some nurses that have worked in icu grapes are choking hazard certain candies are yeah oh nuts certain nuts okay and popcorn younger maybe then yeah our kids love cashews no i think it's really the shell aspect like oh yeah um our kids are bougie they love cashews and um blackberries could be worse could be it could be here i used to think those were like just you know what's actually bougie is the is the johnny pops that they like johnny pops because they go through so much of them what even is that no sugar added like popsicles yeah um anyway so now okay back to quincy quincy lived in quincy your whole life circling back okay raised and then you made the move out here to arizona i guess wait is this too far back no we don't i mean i guess maybe maybe the question is how is it living in arizona now when you lived your entire life in this small town in illinois it's weird you know like you get used to here are the restaurants i go to here are the you know things i do because it's what's available and now you know there's like an endless amount of things that's available to do and places to eat and go um you don't have the same people here though you don't have the same people here you don't have the same people here know as we did you know so some of that you know it's i would i have only positive things to say about quincy do you miss that small town community because everybody kind of knows everyone i you know honestly one thing i miss are going to our high school basketball games which are a big deal in quincy that's so sweet and um i that's one thing i love doing and you know certain restaurants tiramisu gym city those are like we still talk about like tcy isn't even local but it feels right we you know we have all these places to go here but like we're like you can never get better italian food than tiramisu or better pizza nachos than gym city and um so you know the town where there's just more mexican and pizza combos then but it works it works somehow it works but and people that i taught with and other friends of mine you know i miss those kinds of things but um it's hard to beat the sunshine every day here and honestly if you guys had moved to some dreary place that i didn't like i wouldn't have been able to do it i wouldn't have been able to do it we probably still would have gone really seriously of course yeah so if we move again will you guys follow us we're not gonna discuss that she's like okay so we polled our audience they knew that you were going to be on the podcast and we polled our audience and asked questions i'm too afraid to ask my mom and so they're gonna ask you those questions questions the audience you're representing all moms oh this is a lot of pressure yeah so don't take this lightly oh um this one's a random one what is it it says was there someone you almost married instead of your spouse no me personally yeah no why are you saying you're acting no i'm not i'm like no did you wait did you ever date anybody that i date other people but not what nobody seriously just kidding college here's the thing this is the example i had of my parents like first of all let me just we can take this out if we need to but there was a time when both the kids were really young and we needed to go to la for a week and i was like oh my god i'm gonna go to la for a week work thing but we didn't want to leave the kids we were like mom could you just come and just like while we're working you watch the kids and then we'll just be back and like do it and then the question you asked me was but what am i gonna do with your dad yeah it was like a two-day trip and i was like matt this honestly symbolizes like they are this was right when we moved here too this was when we interviewed taylor lautner and tay lautner like mom felt like she needed to she like they just couldn't leave well dad and it's sweet because this is like this is the example of marriage like I feel like you guys were always you were guys were all you were just a unit like you just like were always together like there was never so I think when I got married there was some confusion for me like when I if Matt was sick he wanted to sleep in a different bedroom because he's like I don't want to get you sick but like dad would literally never think of that like he would literally be like if you're getting sick I'm getting sick too like we're both getting sick like that and that was just like it was like we're both like they're it's just it's not one's better than the other but I think that you know you you look at your parents marriage growing up and then you yeah just think you're going to do the same exact thing and you're like oh wait this isn't the same thing and so when Matt like once he's like I'm gonna sleep better if I'm like I'm like but you don't do that you simply just don't do that like that was just whereas your parents it's crazy that you married your father you know you married someone who's like just you're nothing like my dad you're nothing like my dad but um no you're not so okay sorry how do you keep love growing in a long marriage deep question mom try to go there for me I don't know just like we were talking about thinking about the other person and not having yourself first always and going on dates and doing fun things and not keeping everything the same always and conversations and maybe maybe some PDA in there as well no mom is more PDA than she thinks your parents are 10 times more PDA than my parent I don't even my parents the most I'll see them do is be like love you like it's like a like a one little like tiny kiss and like your parents will just be like getting cozy on the couch and cuddle cuddle well I don't know you cuddle you do a little butt smacking I do not do that but yeah there's butt smacking going on everyone's slapping each other's butts I don't know no she said I don't know did you pant were you like panting Matt for a while was that a thing no me and Blake did that oh you were panting your dad yes ah yeah no problem that's just some good classic humor were you off limits to the panting I'm guessing probably not I don't know I don't remember I'm sure there was an age that that became no longer but I kept doing it to Blake I still do it to Blake that's messed up anyway um when did you know you were ready to have children hmm I think I like you were saying I think I did a lot of same things that my parents did you know actually my parents met the same college and dad and I met the same college and they got married right after they graduated we got you know we some of the same things and actually a lot the same professions kind of between what is up with our family dad and my dad and um me and my mom but anyway um I don't know I think it was something I always knew we were gonna do and after two years of being married it seemed like about the right time and um was there I don't know if I what specifically if there was a moment that I thought this was the right time but I don't know it just seemed like natural that it would be then this one's specifically for moms of girls when moms have girls do they try to live through them vicariously I think probably a lot of times they do probably I mean obviously that's not what you should be doing and I hope I didn't try to do that I think I tried to just have you do what you like to do and what made you happy um they weren't things that I had done as a child so it wasn't like oh I was I failed at dance so hopefully you're good at dance or something like that you did your own things but um I don't think I literally you know I think you just hopefully want to see your child succeed in whatever makes them happy this reminds me of something that you brought up earlier like towards the beginning you were talking about how like I had done a short stint of like trying instruments I never liked playing instruments but what's funny is that like a lot of parenting advice that I hear is like if your kids start something make them finish it but I remember mom got this piano I think someone gave it to you no that's kind of a bad story why I can't remember we first got married and I was like I'm gonna go buy we needed some piece of furniture I can remember on a Sunday and I was gonna go buy it and somehow I saw this auction and I'm like that's a nice piano and so I can distinctly remember because we always had a piano growing up calling dad and saying um it's about to rain and I actually just bought a piano at this auction could you come pick it up of course that's not an easy thing to get oh yeah instead of buying the thing I was set out to get that day but anyway you didn't tell them how much it was like you just went and purchased it yeah and that like hey go get it right now somehow pick up this big piano because it's about to rain and of course outside and we had a very very tiny house and no room for a piano but anyway um so we had a piano and then mom finally my mom like you were like hooking me up with a piano instructor and just the thought of that for whatever I was so young like I was like kindergarten or something apparently in my little kindergarten head I was like that is not happening and I was like I refused and she was like fine get rid of the piano we're not doing it she did I didn't do I don't think I did one lesson I don't remember and I and I was doing really bad at soccer I was so bad at it um I was good when I was little you're good because I like mentally knew the sport but then when it required athletic ability and other girls were getting more aggressive I just want to stop pretty sure you guys let me quit soccer in the middle of season two I don't know if those were good choices to give but I think yeah we're like if you don't like it I don't know you're like we were stricter than you and then you just letting me drop out of everything if you were quitting everything and you weren't involved in anything at all I was doing a lot of other things yeah you were doing a lot of things thank you to kindred bravely for sponsoring this portion of today's episode I am a huge fan of dropping off a meal at a friend or family member's house when they've had a new baby and you're so good at it you you do it all the time well the reason I do it is because so many people have filled in for us and that's why I'm so excited to be here with you guys today I'm so excited to be here with you guys today I'm so excited to be here with you guys is so necessary. I even just love their pajama sets that I'm using right now. I need jammies that actually accommodate the bump. And you look so cute. And they do. And they also just make me just feel beautiful and comfortable even when I'm sleeping. Kindred Bravely makes intimates and apparel for maternity, postpartum, breastfeeding, as well as baby essentials, all designed to make motherhood feel a little less overwhelming and a lot more supported. They have been trusted by millions of moms since 2015 and everything is designed by moms who've been there, which having products that support you in that critical season makes such a huge difference. So right now, Kindred Bravely is offering our listeners 20% off your first order when you go to kindredbravely.com slash unplanned. That is kindredbravely.com slash unplanned for 20% off your first order. Make sure you use our link so they know that we sent you. Exclusions apply. What were you most nervous about having kids? Hmm. I think what I was nervous about was more things that were not in my control or even your control, like safety things or something bad happening or something that nobody could control. So I didn't think, um, I was never nervous about a decision you were going to make or those kinds of things, you know, as a child or, you know, I don't think I was too worried about anything that we were doing on our part, but nervous about other things happening. What's one thing you wish you did differently raising your kids? Do you want to answer that? I don't know. Differently. I mean, I always wished that I was able to stay home full time. Um, and that I could have come up with a way at the time to do that. Didn't, I just didn't know of a better solution. You know, there are a lot more opportunities now, I think to work from home or, you know, have some kind of a flexible schedule that there weren't at the time. Yeah. Yeah. A lot of like online work. This was the best thing I could come up with. Yeah. It's like same schedule as your kids kind of a thing. Yeah. Well, I didn't ever, I felt like we were always with you, so I don't really have like any type of, um, uh, okay. No, but I think. Not true. It's Blake. It's you. I have, no, you have your kids. One of them is your favorite for. Fill in the blank here. One of them's your favorite for another, you know, for different reasons, not favorite overall. Did you say fill in the blank year? No. Oh, here. I don't know what I said, but, but basically, no, you don't have a favorite kid, but you have, you connect with each child on different levels for different reasons. And, um, no, that's not really a fair question anyway. I never really felt like there were favorites to be fair. How do grandparents take boundaries that need to be followed? I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I mean, I think you have to bite your tongue a little bit sometimes and say, this is not exactly the way I would have done it, but these are not my children. I'm not raising my children. So I have to, a lot of times, you know, well, mom, you know, mom doesn't want you to do this. So we're not gonna do this right now or maybe this is something a rule that i know dad has on something not that you guys have tons of rules but you know what i mean like these are things you know maybe with how they what they eat or something like that that maybe it's not exactly the way you would have done it but you have to go with what the parents want so um i mean if there's something big that is unhealthy for them for some reason then you'd have to talk to you guys about it but parents about it but um otherwise if it's just a parenting style you have to go with what the parents want i have to give you kudos because i feel like you do this really well like with the kids you're like well you have to ask mom or mom says we can't do that like you don't really go off the cuff with like disciplining them dad breaks the screen time rule dad breaks several rules probably i'll just pull up darth vader on his phone he gives them whatever he wants they want i think yeah it's not just the screen time it's if they ask jelly beans probably probably who knows what they're doing right now we need to have an intervention with your dad sit down you need to come to us honestly i've lost cause because i know that she's gonna reign it in so i'm like thank you i'll correct him but he doesn't know but then once he hands them darth vader i'm like what are we gonna do it's game over we've lost we've lost to ga but you do a really good job of that thank you can't do mom's really not judge this person says my mom says she won't but she seems to have strong opinions judge what i'm taking this as like parenting decisions i'm sure a lot of parents do like among your friends they're like are they like oh my gosh my daughter or my son-in-law or my son is doing this i don't think too many of the people that i'm talking to you do okay which would be we would know who they are yeah no they're not doing that i think i think the parents of people the kids your age whatever the grandparents are pretty supportive of what their kids are doing with their grandkids that's sweet that's gracious too do you think it's harder to parent today or when you were raising kids we talked about this on always here yeah um i think it's harder today just because of social media for one thing just access to so much more that you didn't have you had more control over where your kids were what they were viewing or what you know who they were talking to then then now and now there's so many avenues that you could get in trouble i guess and have have issues so i think it's harder now than in the past yeah when you think about it like me growing up my world was so small it didn't feel that way until i got probably to high school and i was like oh there's things i want to do that i can't do here but like the and that was the first time i had social media too was when i was like in high school like the world felt so small and now it feels like because of the access the world is so big which is good for so many reasons but just when you're you're developing brain like it's almost like that was a good like growing zone like a healthy safe environment to grow in to be prepared for the world at large but now it's like they're just like dunked in the deep end yeah you know what i mean there are a lot more decisions you have to make now on what you can allow or what you don't allow whereas those things weren't available then yeah like life was pretty i don't want to say it was simple but like it seemed safer or it seemed and maybe that's not true but it yeah it seems like that like you could have i mean i wow this feels really fear-mongering but you could have like a predator in your own house just on a device you know what i mean like things like that that feels scary and like the fact of like things getting posted like something could be happening and then it's also made public to so many more eyes like if you think about bullying or things like that i mean now if for your child to watch a movie they have access to everything seriously the world unless you've put some you know controls on your tv whereas in the past you put a you got a dvd disney dvd you put it in there you had to watch that a thousand that's all you that's you know what they're gonna see yeah you don't have to make a decision like disney plus has r-rated movies so you gotta make sure that your kid is watching like the disney plus kids version you know um yeah you're right it's harder yeah what uh when did you realize that abby's job was legitimate i think when i know what she's gonna say what go ahead when we we were at a hotel in st louis i don't know what we were doing there and you're like mom i think i might um i might quit college now to pursue the social media and i'm like this seems bad bad idea i don't remember this conversation yeah i remember where we were sitting in the booth in in the hotel what hotel is the hyatt wait you you're the hyatt place i was gonna quit college or was i gonna graduate early you first were gonna quit and then you found out that you could and then i said please do me a favor before you just quit can you please go talk to somebody and see if they can look at all the credits if they can also gather together to make a degree that made this possible that i have a degree i think that's true yeah you kind of and and then a couple days later you're like hey yeah they said i can get this degree i have enough credits for this degree and i'm like okay well there's something there when you're like i'm gonna drop out and they're like actually you have enough credits right now to graduate and i was like oh sick let's walk in graduation was that in the summer no it was no it was like at a christmas time wait so i don't know if it's christmas but at least it was the end it was like getting towards the end of the year it was like getting towards the end of the year the end of that fall semester wow yeah so maybe i don't know if i thought it was legit then but at least i thought you thought it was legit at the time but i don't i remember having the conversation with my dad where i was like i was so proud to tell him that we made six figures because that was like like when i was a kid that was like the number that my dad was like if you can make six figures that you've made it you know like that's like he was on inflation yeah it's gotten now i think it's higher than that but yeah no i was like i was like dad we made six figures no that was something you'd really be proud of and then and i was like sorry that i dropped out of college i'm sure he was your parents have always been really supportive too so um someone wrote in and i'm not making this up how do i get my kids to turn out like abby it's a good question you're a perfect person to be honest with you i've had some i've had other parents ask me that i can remember a parent in my class asked me that about you guys and i'm like that's so sweet yeah i i remember the parent who actually has wonderful girls like so she obviously was on doing the right thing and so i'm you know i'm not gonna take credit for that but um you were a really easy child and that's obedient and it was that's probably why i didn't want anything to change because it was easy and it was fun and um i don't think there's any big secret that i when i think about you as a parent i'm like i'm not gonna take credit for that i'm not gonna take credit for that like i think about like i don't remember there being a lot of rules or like you described yourself as strict i don't remember that but i feel like you had really high expectations for us that gave us the confidence to like achieve that because it's like you held it like i feel like a trap of parenthood that i'm afraid to fall into is like i don't ever want anything to be hard for my kids like i don't i want to make it easy but then i think that you expecting like no like having that expectation it wasn't even like oh i hope you can do this it was literally like no this is the standard yeah it gave me the confidence i was like well i must be able to meet that standard and that went for behavior but i'm also thinking about like in school like i was like you weren't like you have to do this in fact i was playing mad the other day i was like you let me skip first hour you encouraged me to skip first hour well i think at one time i was like you're working too hard slow down girl yeah and um i'm like you don't have to get an a you can just bees are fine and um if you you know because you were working really hard and were involved in everything and i was like just like i wanted to try out for everything yeah and i like i really felt like i always talk like talk about this like i have such a huge ego apparently but also growing up and even i'm gonna say i can't it carries into adulthood like i just feel like i never really struggled with confidence but i don't think that was just an ax like i don't think i was born that way like i think it was truthfully like both my parents fully believing me from the day i was born to like never once stopping like i always tell the story about dad saying like you could be president of the united states and i was like yeah i could but gosh that doesn't sound very fun like i literally believe that i was like i'm personally if you would ask him now actually i said that to him the other day because i heard you bring that up and he goes she could still now if she wanted to like this is just people that raised me like how do you ever like he could still now if she wanted to like this is just people that raised me like because she could still do that she could still do that but and yeah i don't think i was strict as as in i think that maybe that is the wrong connotation like i don't think i was because i don't think i had to be strict with you guys i just you know like i don't i was never grounded growing up i don't recall you ever really being in trouble like because you just did it i think the main thing i did was sass back and i remember that i remembered saying duh to my mom and dad to you guys and getting in trouble for that. when they were talking to me and i you only do that once you know there's a couple things you only do once you only say duh once you only call your brother a maggot once did you do that yep i heard liz i was on lizzie mcguire um and um actually a kid at recess told me that was a bad word but he actually was mixing that up with oh my gosh such a bad word and um i was like really that's crazy because it's on disney channel and i like and here's the thing in my head then it was a bad word and i could never say it again there's so many things i'm like i grew up so sheltered but i went to public schools i think there's a lot of parents are like so fearful of public schools because they're like what is my kid going to be exposed to which is so valid even our two and three-year-old learned the word shut up from freaking monsters who would have known that monsters like those two monsters that work at the factory they're like the helpers just shut up and then griffin said that and he goes the guy on monsters inc said it shut up and i was like oh gosh oh my gosh what can you show your kids these days but um and then i was like i grew up watching that and i'm okay but um like i also remember like okay this is how sheltered i was going to a full public school also in a small town but also you know who i mean everybody is exposed to everything and so i just i remember a girl said to me she's like there is a bad word that starts with f and it's three letters and she's like it's f u c and i was like that's not a word and i was pretty much right but she's like no my dad said it and it's a bad word and i don't know why like in my head whatever i said around my friends they believed so i was like don't worry that's not a word like she was like buddy stay calm she's like confused like she's like hey guys that's not a bad word when chloe told me about periods i was like that's not real don't worry like it's just p there's no blood don't worry and i just like told everyone i'm not then i was like okay everybody said it it's fine abby said there's that's not real and i'm like everybody it's fine there's nothing nothing to worry about here you might need to um cut a bunch of what i said what'd you say that was wrong here's the other thing mom made me so confident and then she struggles with confidence herself that is that is actually very true maybe that's where i was like i'm trying to live vicariously not in it just in the sense that like i probably haven't always been super confident but i thought you should be and so i appreciate that about you that you are confident and that um i always hoped that i was raising you to not care what other people thought and maybe that went to the extreme here i don't know yeah i mean i really broke the mold i did social media i did so many things it's like because you gave me the confidence to make my own decisions to the point where when i was an adult i was like i'm gonna hear you out but like ultimately i felt like i was equipped to like make an adult decision on and it's true it's hard marriage career kids where i lived it was hard for you to accept but you did you respected it well make sure to pick up your copy of let's travel to hawaii hawaii travel guide for kids by what a smart cookie publishing which is again by abby's mom laurie and um laurie's sister gina and we'll link this in the description it's on amazon so it's a really easy purchase yeah if you just like search the title amazon prime it's on amazon um i know that they would appreciate you guys supporting them and let's read a review thank you guys for supporting our show so we can keep doing this and putting out these episodes um we really appreciate when you guys leave us reviews yes this review is from chloe dixon it says most impactful matt and abby have already made a huge impact on my life work day and way of thinking i've always followed them on other social media sites and i've been a big fan of their podcast so glad she did because i look forward to listening to new episodes and i get to listen to the old ones thankfully i'm going to be real sad when i run out of old episodes and i can't listen to a new to me episode all the time oh so nice that's so sweet so sweet and who's that from chloe dixon chloe thank you so much thank you to your sister-in-law for recommending and you guys should also take that seriously there's probably someone you should share a podcast too that might enjoy this as well maybe if you share this with someone it'll make them have more positive share it with your mom that would be sweet your sister yeah and i just i think that like i said i've really taken for granted until i started my own family and have gotten closer to 30 which i know i still have a lot to learn in my life but that it's very rare to have such good relationships with your parents as adults especially in our culture in this day and age and i just think that that comes a lot from the people that raised me and they did such a good job i'm so grateful to them and i'm really grateful that my mom put herself out of her comfort zone very this was a really far stretch for her you guys clearly my dad couldn't make it let's go everybody everybody go hype lori up in the comments right now to let her know how great of a job she did on this episode yes thank you guys so much and please follow what a smart cookie publishing on instagram or facebook we'll tag it below follow it on instagram follow on facebook just bombard them buy the book it's on amazon write reviews and just interact it really just means so much to me sweet thank you thanks lori sweet thanks for listening guys and we'll see you in the next episode bye