It’s Christmastime! Or, for the most traditional among us, it will be in just a few days! And that means it’s time for shopping, making Christmas lists, and making sure we can find the right scissors and have enough tape!

As we begin thinking about Christmas shopping for our kids, how can we get them gifts that won’t just end up in a thrift store pile in a few weeks? How can we give our kids gifts that are meaningful, gifts they’ll remember for years to come, and not just simply check items off a lists they handed us?

If you’ve ever wanted to give your kids meaningful and special gifts that will communicate to them, “I see you and know you and know what you love” then you are in the right place! In this week’s episode, I share with you how you can think outside the box store and brainstorm ideas for giving your specific kids Christmas gifts that will be so special to them that they will be talking about them well into adulthood. With lots of examples from our own Christmas mornings over the last 20 years, I share with you why we give gifts the way we do, why we reject gift-giving formulas, and how we’ve built two decades of Christmas morning memories with our kids that we wouldn’t trade for anything!

A friend was told me, “You and Jason excel at gift-giving.” While there are so many things that we are not very good at, this is our wheelhouse. And in this episode, I share with you our tips, strategies and ideas for making Christmas morning about so much more than just toys that will soon be forgotten. And trading that for gifts that communicate to your kids how known andloved they are while creating bonding family memories that will build on each other and that all of you will love looking back on.

From your toddlers to adult kids, this one is practical, full of our best ideas, and will help you make this Christmas your best ever with your kids!

Available TODAY everywhere you get podcasts!

I think a lot about what I’d want the young mom me to know! What would I tell her? What advice would I give her? What things did I learn that changed me and made me a better mom? What comforted me and gave me courage in that overwhelming season of motherhood that so many of you are in today?

In this episode, I walk you through five things I wish I knew when I was a young mom. With stories from my own early days as a mom, I share with you the things that moms a few stages ahead of me told me that immediately impacted the mom I was and the mom I was becoming. From comparison in friendship to practical advice on dishes and laundry, these are things I STILL cling to and wholeheartedly embrace, even now as a mom of older kids and young adults!

You’ll walk away after listening to this episode deeply encouraged and maybe like me, these things will become transformative for you in the way you parent, how you combat lies of comparison, how you see your kids, and how you view the God that loves you and sees you in every season!

Grab your headphones, and maybe a tissue or two and come with me as I take you back to my days as a young mom and share with you what I wish I knew!

Can’t wait for you to hear this one!

We ALL want grateful kids, right? I know I do. So how can you begin to foster and develop gratitude in their young hearts during this season when we tend to focus more on being thankful? How do you know what might actually be worth the time and effort and create lasting impact on your kids?

In today’s episode, I share with you seven practical activities you can do with your young children during the month of November that will help them practice gratitude and develop a love for expressing that to God and others. I give you age appropriate and SIMPLE ideas for you to do as a family, as well as things your kids can do individually. From creating meaningful cards for friends and family to filling a collective jar with thanks to God, you’ll find something in this episode that’s perfectly suited for your family and just might become one of your favorite November traditions!

Want grateful kids? You have so much opportunity to impact their tender and malleable hearts towards gratitude this month that will serve them well into adulthood!

Available NOW on all podcast platforms!

The relationships in my life are incredibly important to me, and I imagine yours are to you, too! But how do we balance life as moms, raising kids, volunteering at school, investing in our marriages, buy all the groceries and get everyone where they need to be, and still make time to foster meaningful friendships without sacrificing one or the other?

Do you ever wonder if you’re making the right decisions for your kids and family? If you’re a parent, your answer is likely an emphatic ‘YES!’

In today’s episode, I share with you two financial decisions we made early on in our life as parents that dramatically impacted our family life. We didn’t know it at the time, but those decisions sent us on paths that would bond us closer with our kids (and future kids!), make way for some of our BEST memories together, and help form our kids’ character in profound ways.

Through stories from our early days as a family, I share with you why we originally made these two decisions, how overcoming various obstacles served as good gifts to all of us, and what we saw happen in our kids, our family, and the people who’ve come into our lives throughout the years as a result.

You’ll leave this one with so much to think about! I can promise you that!

Available TODAY!

They say kids grow up so fast and that it all passes so quickly. One minute they’re the newborn baby in your arms and the next minute you’re throwing them the keys to the car and they’re driving away. Did I really just blink and it all happened that fast?

We can’t slow down time, but there are intentional things we can do to make it less likely we’ll look back and feel like we missed their childhood.

In today’s episode, I share with you five practical things that will help you savor the time you have with them, make it count, and give you and your kids memories that will serve as building blocks for your future relationship. With intention coupled with practical wisdom, you can begin to think about and implement these things now with your toddlers and preschoolers! But even if your kids are teens or young adults, it is NEVER too late to purposefully build a foundation for a lasting relationship with your kids and capture memories together that you’ll look back on together for years to come.

It’s not that you have to be intentional about not missing them growing up. Because you don’t have to be. But you GET to be intentional about it! And you’ll never, ever regret it.

Tune in NOW everywhere you get podcasts!

What do we do when our real life experiences as parents aren’t matching up with what we’ve always been taught or believed? Me? I go right in and start asking hard questions and researching and doing the work to get to the bottom of why things aren’t adding up.

In this episode, I share with you the journey I went on to reconcile what was happening in my relationships with my young children with what I’d always heard: “You can’t be friends with your kids.”

By clarifying the distinction between friend and peer, I share with you how my discovery led to a powerful framework for building meaningful relationships with my kids. After years of thinking about my kids this way, I have learned how to be their mom, enforce the rules, help them honor me and God, and simultaneously build a lasting friendship that is a gift to both of us.

Whether you have babies and toddlers or teens and adult kids, you can begin to build a foundation with your kids that fosters closeness, mutual respect, honor, and love. And these things? They’ll serve you so well as your kids become adults and can choose how they spend their time and who they spend it with.

I wanted to be friends with my kids. And I want that for you, too!

This week’s episode will empower you to build lasting and sweet friendships with your kids. Listen in NOW everywhere you get podcasts!

In this first episode of SEASON THREE, we tackle group parenting. What is it? Why does it matter to me as a young mom? (Let’s start this season off with a bang, shall we?)

With examples from her own life and parenting, host Sarah Short discusses the current push to make collective parenting decisions with a group of families. If you’re a new mom who hasn’t encountered this yet, you’ll hear Sarah’s insightful framework for thinking through how to parent alongside your friends (and family!)

By breaking down parenting into two categories: philosophy and practice, this episode walks you through how parenting in community with similar philosophy can be incredibly beneficial and encouraging, while illuminating the pitfalls of collectively agreeing to parenting practices.

From smartphones to Playstation and Xbox time to ice cream at the pool - you don’t want to miss this episode as we dive into how to courageously parent our individual kids, how to retain the ability to change our minds, and how to maintain healthy friendships with other parents!

Click play NOW for the FIRST episode of SEASON TWO!