Simple Families | Parenting + Minimalism

Is there such a thing as overly-responsive parenting? I believe so. Early in parenthood I found myself being a mindreader. It is important to be in tune with our kids’ needs, but we also need to give them the opportunity to step up and advocate for themselves. Join the Masterclass! It starts Monday and this is the last opportunity to join. Full Episode Transcription: Hello, it’s Denaye. Thank you so much for tuning in. This is episode number 170. Today, we’re talking about a less is more approach to parenting. In our family and on Simple Families, I talk a lot about responsive parenting. I don’t always call it that, but responsive parenting is more or less being in tuned with our kids’ emotional and physical and social needs. In many ways, that’s what ‘good’ parents do. They know their kids, they know what their kids need, they’re in tune with them, but today we’re talking about taking responsive parenting a little bit too far. I know that this has happened to me before. Last week on the podcast, we talked about too many toys. This is a real problem, at least here in America, and I know what I’ve heard from all of you from different parts of the world that you also experience this problem, that problem of too much stuff. But not only do so many of us have a problem with too much stuff, but we also have a problem with, more or less, too much parenting, parenting, a little bit too intensely or maybe a lot bit depending on the family. That’s what we’re talking about in today’s episode, the idea that we do truly want to be responsive parents. We want to be in tuned with the emotional and physical and social needs of our kids. However, we can take it a little bit too far sometimes. We need to start recognizing when our kids are actually better off with us stepping back a little bit and putting a little bit more of the responsibility into their hands. But first I have a little bit of an announcement to make. Last week I talked about the fact that we are in the middle of the launch for the Masterclass, which starts on September 16th which is Monday. Enrollment is currently open, and I have actually just decided that this is going to be the very last round of the Masterclass. It has been such an amazing experience to work with hundreds of families throughout this process and I am so excited to bring in a new group this month. However, it does really take a lot out of me. It’s an eight-week course and it’s really important to me to be heavily involved and present throughout the process, to be there to support you and to really get to know the families who are involved in this program with me. Many of you know that I have started to homeschool our kindergartner, so I’m going to be reallocating some of that time and energy back into our home. Now, nothing else is changing. The Mental Unload is staying, I’ll still be offering that a couple of times of the year. The podcast is still going to be weekly. The only thing that’s changing right now is the Masterclass is ending. This is the last time that we’re launching it. This is going to be our last hurrah, and I think it’s going to be a great one.

Do your kids have too many toys? When it comes to toys, there is no perfect number. But in today’s episode we are talking about why children don’t need a lot of toys. Having an abundance of toys is not only unnecessary but could be harmful. We are talking about all that and more. Too Many Toys? Today, we’re talking about too many toys. How did we get here? How did our kids end up with so many toys? Our intentions were good. The grandparents, the aunts and uncles, whoever else is buying, their intentions are good as well. But too many toys aren’t just unnecessary, but sometimes they can actually be harmful. I know harmful is a strong word to use here, but I’m going to explain more about this. I’m going to explain why scaling back on the toys is actually not only in your best interest, less cleanup time, less chaos, but it’s also in the best interest of your kids. I found minimalism back in 2014, and back in 2014, I was wrapping up my Ph.D. in child development. When I became a mom the year before in 2013, I was already heavily invested in buying high-quality toys for my kids. I wanted to fill their lives and their bedrooms with lots of educational, durable, beautiful things. I was thinking a lot about quality and never really thought much about quantity, which means every single educational, beautiful toy that I saw, I could make some excuse to buy it. So we had a lot of stuff. It was good stuff, but we had a lot of stuff. As I moved through parenthood and I wrapped up my PhD, I started to be able to bring theory to practice. What I mean by that is the theory and the philosophies that I was learning in my PhD program, I was really starting to put those into practice as a mother, and I was really starting to look at the impact of my parenting and the way that we were living our life and how that contributed to my children and their behavior and their development. It didn’t really take me long to realize that, yes, quality is important when it comes to toys, but so is giving consideration to quantity, because our kids do not need a whole lot of toys. Now, many of us are going to see that our kids don’t actually spend a lot of time playing with toys. Now, a lot of kids are playing in some way, shape, or form all day long, but the thing is they’re not actually playing with toys all that much. Now, you might have kids who don’t even spend that much time at home. Maybe they’re in full-time daycare or they’re in school full time, and then on the weekends you’re doing errands and you’re out and about doing things. So you find that they don’t spend a whole lot of time at home, but yet your house is filled with tons of toys. Or you might find that you keep buying new toys, trying to look for things that are going to be the perfect fit and they’re going to be engaging for your kid because your kid doesn’t seem to care much about toys or engage much with the toys that they have. Whatever the reason, most kids, at least here in the U.S. have too many toys. How did we get here? Why do we have this problem? Because it is absolutely 100% a first-world problem. There are two main reasons that I see kids getting a lot of toys. The first is we do a lot of front-loading. Now, when I say front-loading, that means we front-load the joy on our toys, and

Life gets busy. Sometimes it gets hard to make time for the simple things–like taking your kids for a walk in nature. But the value of the free and simple things should never be underestimated. Today, I’m sharing my favorite strategies for hiking with kids and the immense (yet not-so-obvious) benefits for the whole family. Show Notes/Links: * Episode 90, There’s No Such Thing as Bad Weather with Linda Åkeson McGurk.* Tula Toddler Carrier Full Episode Transcription: Today we’re talking about hiking, and this seems like such a simple thing, and I’m going to give you some practical tools and strategies for hiking, ways that we have found hiking is more or less successful, but also some of the benefits. I think we underestimate the benefits of simple unstructured activities like this. Last year on the podcast in episode 90, we talked about the idea that there’s no such thing as bad weather, only bad clothes. In that episode we had Linda Åkeson McGurk who is Rain or Shine Mamma, which is the name of her online platform, but also the author of There’s No Such Thing as Bad Weather. After that episode, I really felt this huge shift in the Simple Families audience towards understanding the importance of getting our kids outside. Now, even though many of us know, yeah, sure, kids need to play outside, they need nature, it can be really easy to let that unstructured outdoor time take a back seat to the structured stuff. So maybe there’s no time to get outside and play in the woods today, or even just get outside and play in the park because you have to go to soccer, and you have to go to swimming, and you have to go to all these other activities that seem to become the priority, and really there’s a few reasons that these type of activities become a priority. Number one is we’re paying money for it, and if we’re paying money for it, we want to make sure our kids are doing it. We want to make sure that they’re benefiting from it. So the fact that we’re investing our money there, it means that we’re going to invest our time in these activities. So something like hiking that’s free, we’re not going to be as invested at spending our time because we haven’t sunk the money into it. Now, another big reason that we tend to lean towards structured activities is that we feel like that’s what our kids need, and we sort of feel this pressure, keeping up with the Joneses, to do what all the other kids are doing, and we’re afraid if we don’t get our kids into a certain class or activity when they’re young, that they’re not going to thrive and then they’re not going to have the abilities as they get older. Now, I’m definitely not slamming structured activities by any means. My son does karate and both my kids do swimming lessons right now and it’s a great fit for us, mainly because it doesn’t feel like too much. That’s always my word of wisdom for people who are enrolling their kids in structured activities, is there is no perfect number, there’s no secret number. You have to pay attention to what feels right for your family. When those types of activities become a burden, or they become exhausting, or you start to dread them, or your kids start to dread them, then you might be doing too much. Another important red flag to keep in mind if you might be doing too many structured activities is if you don’t have an opportunity to make time for things like going for a hike.

In today’s episode, we are discussing the 5 Love Languages as they pertain to children. I am joined by Diane Debrover, the Deputy Editor of Parents Magazine where we talk through each of the Love Languages and explore how they show up in children. Spoiler alert: I’ve got my reservations about the Love Language of gifts. Show Notes/Links: * Article on Parents.com* The 5 Love Languages of Children: The Secret to Loving Children Effectively* Parents IRL Transcription of Full Episode Denaye:            Hi Diane. Thanks for joining me today. Diane:              Hi Denaye. So nice to be with you. Denaye:            It’s good to chat. Tell me a little bit about yourself personally, professionally. Diane:              My name is Diane Debrovner. I am the deputy editor of Parents Magazine and I’ve actually been here for many, many years. I started out as a senior editor and then I was the health and psychology editor and I’ve been a deputy editor for many years. I oversee our coverage of articles related to children’s health, and development, and behavior, and relationships, and books, and a bunch of other things. I am the mother of two daughters who are now 14 and 25 but I very clearly remember when they were very young and I was a young mother myself. So I am absolutely in the mindset of your audience and our audience and it’s been a real privilege to be at Parents all this time and see how things have changed and stayed the same at the same time. Denaye:            Right. So your kids pretty much grew up with the magazine. Your first daughter was born shortly before you started working there? Diane:              She was, she was 18 months old when I started working at Parents. And then my daughters are 11 years apart. I was divorced and I got remarried and when I had a second baby, it was really great for my career. There aren’t a lot of people who can say that. So I threw myself back into the content in a very hands on way. Denaye:            How long has Parents been around? Diane:              Parents was founded in 1926, believe it or not. Denaye:            Oh my goodness. I had no idea. Wow. Diane:           &n...

Summer is supposed to be relaxing, yet I have found that this summer we’ve had a lot of transition, a lot of change, and my brain has been very busy. Therefore, today’s episode is dedicated to just that: We’re talking about the “Tip of the Iceberg” and brain busyness. [FULL TRANSCRIPTION] This week we’re getting ready to launch The Mental Unload and it feels like a perfect time for me to go back through this program with you all again because of all the mental clutter going on in my brain. On the podcast and in the Simple Families community, we talk a lot about simplicity and minimalism being a journey. And not only is it a journey in your house with your physical stuff, but it’s also a journey in your mind with what’s cluttering up your brain. Before we dive into today’s episode I want to bring you a quick listener’s spotlight, and this is coming from Lauren, who recently participated in The Mental Unload. I run it three times a year and she participated in the March edition. So her words really stuck with me because they resonated with me personally. Her story feels somewhat similar to mine, so I’ll go ahead and read what she had to say. Lauren wrote:  “After my second child, I was feeling really burnt out, struggling to do it all and resentful of my partner. I felt guilty that I had the family I always dreamed of but I was feeling less happy. I thought maybe I needed to make a big life change like move close to family, or go back to school or work, and then I saw your Instagram post about The Mental Unload and it stopped me in my tracks. I went into this process hopeful, but it really exceeded my expectations. Being more aware of when I’m being tipped towards my tendency of anxiety has helped me so much. I recently had a tough day that would’ve usually left me feeling pretty resentful towards my partner. This time though, I was able to recognize it creeping up, communicate with my partner, and talk through it together. I started with thanking my partner with what he had done for the day, even though I was feeling a little bit unsupported. He responded by doing something nice for me to make me feel better. I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I think my relationship with my in-laws has even been improved.” I love these insightful words from Lauren because I think she touches on so many of the key issues that we cover in The Mental Unload. We’re starting this Thursday, July 25th, and if you want to join us I would love to have you.. The Mental Unload is a seven day program, but I know that some people like to take their time with it and move through it a little bit more slowly. So while you’ll receive the core content over the first seven days, I’ll hang with you for the next three weeks so you have a month altogether to work through, reflect, and process the information. If you have questions, send me an email,

Today I’m chatting with Jane Monnier about her journey towards reducing mental and physical clutter. Jane is a longtime member of the Simple Families Community. She’s also is a rocket-scientist-turned-military-wife-and-mother who has lived around the world with her family. I think you will enjoy Jane’s wisdom in this episode! (Full episode transcription below). Show Notes/Links: * The Mental Unload* Jane’s Website* Jane on Facebook* Jane on Instagram Jane Monnier Full Transcript: Denaye:            For those of you have been listening to the podcast for a while, you’ll know that occasionally I do these journey to simplicity stories where I follow members of the Simple Families audience, and they share with us more about what their journey towards a simpler life has looked like. Today I am chatting with Jane Monnier. Jane has been a part of Simple Families pretty much since I have since the very beginning. And it’s been a pleasure getting to know her through the Facebook community and through the programs that she’s done. She’s a veteran of The Mental Unload. She’s actually done it with me three times now and she joined me this last round as the community manager. Which was so great to see her be able to take the tools that she’s used and support other women. So she’s joining me today, and we’re talking more about what her journey to simplicity looked like. Jane is a rocket scientist turned military mother and wife, and her family has moved all over the world. And they’ve definitely faced obstacles and their own share of stress and overwhelm, and the accumulation of stuff. So Jane is going to share a little bit about how she’s been letting go of the physical and mental clutter. I hope you enjoy this episode. Conversation Begins: Denaye: Hi Jane, how are you? Jane:                I’m wonderful Denaye. How are you? Denaye:            I’m good. Thanks so much for taking the time to chat with me. Jane:                Of course. My pleasure. Denaye:            So Jane, I’ll first say how I’ve gotten to know you over the past couple of years. You have been a part of the Simple Families community for how long has it been, do you know? Jane:                I can’t remember exactly, but I think it was before you even had your actual blog website up.

In today’s episode, I am chatting with Rich Karlgaard, Publisher of Forbes Magazine, about his new book Late Bloomers. Rich is a self-proclaimed late bloomer. He’s sharing more of his story along with some research that will give fellow parents of late bloomers some piece of mind. Show Notes/Links * The Book: Late Bloomers* Rich’s Website* Carol Dweck’s book, Mindset

It happens. All kids will use less-than-desirable language as they are growing up. Whether its potty words or outright profanity, we all deal with this as parents. Today I’m reflecting on how we’ve been managing it in our house–including what is working and what is not working.

I recently went through and did a huge book overhaul. I got rid of all the “twaddle” in favor of prioritizing high quality, well-written children’s books. To quote today’s guest Emily Cook, “well-read children will grow into well-read adults”. In this episode, Emily and I talk about reading aloud and choosing great books for our children. Show Notes/Links: * (Our new fairytale books) Atlas of Classic Tales/Atlas of Fairy Tales* My Father’s Dragon* Good Omen* Emily’s Website: Build Your Library* Emily on YouTube: Arrrgh Schooling* Emily on Instagram: bylibrarycurriculum* Emily on Twitter* Emily’s Book: A Literary Education

It’s officially book launch week! In today’s episode I am sharing more about the publishing process behind Simple Happy Parenting, along with my goals and hopes for the book and what exactly I am afraid of. Thank you for all your support! You can still claim the pre-order bonus during launch week!

There is a fine line between selfishness and selflessness in parenthood. In today’s episode, I’m chatting with Hunter Clarke-Fields of Mindful Mama Mentor. We talking about martyrdom in motherhood and how trying to be-it-all and do-it-all is not actually the best thing for kids. This is an important message for every parent. SHOW NOTES/SHOW LINKS: * Facebook: Hunter Clarke-Fields, Mindful Mama Mentor* Instagram: Mindful Mama Mentor* Twitter: HClarkeFields* Denaye’s Book: Simple Happy Parenting* Image that Denaye referenced in the episode:

Slow living with kids…what does that look like? Frankly, the days can feel painfully slow. But sometimes they can be delightful. What gives? Today we are talking about shifting toward a slower lifestyle and what that looks like with family life. Finding a balance between structured and unstructured family time can help us find more happiness in parenthood. Show Notes/Links: * Preorder Simple Happy Parenting* Claim the Preorder Bonus

I get to be on the other side of the table today! In today’s episode, I am being interviewed by the host of Minimalish, Desirae Endrees. I had the pleasure of being a guest on Minimalish last week and I loved our chat so much that I wanted to re-air this episode for you on Simple Families. In this episode, I’m talking about how Simple Families got started (and about the other blog I had before Simple Families was born). Thanks to Desirae for having me on and letting me share this with you all. Show Notes/Links: * The Original Episode on Minimalish* Minimalish on Instagram* Minimalish Facebook Group* PREORDER SIMPLE HAPPY PARENTING + CLAIM BONUS COACHING* Why I Got Rid of My Wardrobe* Why I Got Rid of the Toys* Un-Fancy (Caroline Rector)* Courtney Carver – Be More with Less – Project 333* Care/of – plus use coupon code coupon SIMPLE25 for 25% off

In today’s episode I am sharing more about our decision to homeschool. Homeschool was never in the plans for our family, so I will tell you more about our decision to go down this path. I’m also sharing some of the vital pieces in making this process successful for our family. Hint: It doesn’t involve me doing-it-all and being-it-all. Show Notes/Links: * Oak Meadow* All About Reading* Wild + Free

Changing your mindset and finding joy usually doesn’t happen overnight. Baby steps, right? In today’s episode, I am chatting with authors and happiness experts Marc and Angel Chernoff. We’ll explore the small ways we can increase happiness and life a more intentional life. Show Notes/Links: * Marc and Angel’s Website: Marc & Angel Hack Life* Find them on Instagram + Facebook* New Book: 1000+ Little Things Happy Successful People Do Differently* First Book: Getting Back to Happy: Change Your Thoughts, Change Your Reality, and Turn Your Trials into Triumphs