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The daily routine is pretty much ‘survival mode’ for most moms. From cooking, cleaning, working, and driving around town to wiping tears, snot, or other unfortunate body parts, moms are only thinking about how to get through the day. Who cares what’s going on in the world, because honestly, we should be proud that everyone in our family is alive, fed, and clean, right?!

While caring for our families is one of our top priorities, it’s still crucial that we are at least vaguely aware of what is going on in our world and in our country. It does affect us and our families!

On this episode of Mom·ing we talk to homeschooling mom of five, and the founder of A Mom on Politics, Jamie Reitenour. Jamie encourages us to know the source of what you're reading, to ask yourself questions like, "Who wrote this? Can I find another source to confirm it? Was it taken out of context?" So much of the 'news' these days is not information or facts; it's opinion and...

Resources are listed at the bottom of this post.

The heart attitude of our children is probably at the top of our prayer list as a mother. As moms who love Jesus, it's safe to say we can narrow all of our parenting goals into one: we want to raise kids who hear God's voice and obey it!

On this episode of Mom·ing our guest Debbi Bryson gave us some wonderful encouragement about feeding our spiritual health as mothers. It takes intention, purpose, and loads of grace. 

When it comes to alone time in God's Word, some moms are floating adrift in a sea of anxiety, despair, and too high of expectations. Others feel shame and defeat for not being in God's Word for a week (or months! or years!) 

You cannot stay in that place, Mamas. It's time to be intentional about reading God's Word and letting it soak into your soul. Take time everyday. Set realistic expectations for yourself depending on how old your children are. Don't let busyness crowd out your time with...

Hope is a word most of use throughout our lives. "I hope this new recipe turns out. I hope my teenager is being honest. I hope my marriage will survive." In the Bible, the word hope has so much more weight. 

We can define Biblical hope as: the absolute expectation of coming good. I don't know about you, but I need me some good news these days!

How can we have hope in a topsy turvy world? When up is down, wrong is right, dark is light, and bad is good, it can be hard to find the truth, peace, and grace we need to walk through each day. 

On today's episode we invited familiar Mom·ing guest Nicole to talk about keeping an eternal and heavenly perspective as we raise our kids and make plans for the future. Nicole shared with us the loss of her daughter Sadie, and how that experience changed the way she viewed her life. Eternity was all of a sudden much clearer. Whether you're in survival mode or cruise control, knowing the end game and what waits for us...

Stress and anxiety oftentimes go hand in hand with motherhood. Because we have so many plates in the air, it's definitely a balancing act to make sure nothing drops. 

How do we manage stressful moments? How do we cope with anxious thoughts? How to we cope when we are exhausted and it's only 7AM? Our Mom·ing guest Shanti gives us some great practical steps to stop stress in its tracks. She also shares with us some of her personal story in dealing with anxiety and depression.

If you are struggling with depression, anxiety, or stress, it's important to know you're not alone. It's also important to develop healthy coping mechanisms so we don't implode into ourselves or explode onto our families. 

Using unhealthy coping mechanisms like escapism, distraction, busyness, denial, control, or retreating inward doesn't deal with the root problems, and they often have very negative consequences for ourselves and those around us. 

Learn how to prioritize...

Moms are expert multitaskers, or at least we try to be. I think a lot of mom guilt comes from the fact that there is so much required of us that we will inevitably fail at some point. Time to take a break, Mama!

Today's guest, Nicole, is a homeschooling mother of seven and definitely knows a thing or two about priorities, balance, and finding sanity in the chaos. 

On this episode, Nicole shared her list making tool with us, which helps give her a quick visual of where she is in her day and where she needs to end up. She also makes one for each of her children so they can stay on task, and she can give a quick verbal shout out to see where everyone is.

As wonderful and organized as this all sounds, more often than not, reality comes crashing down in the form of unexpected grandparents visiting, impromptu trips to the library, last-minute WalMart runs, and waiting in three-hour DMV lines. Instead of seeing these as interruptions, Nicole encouraged us to see them as opportunities...

2020 was really weird crazy insane interesting. Like any year, there were highs and lows, but it seemed as though everything was more extreme this year. The lows were intense valleys and the highs were exuberant mountain tops.

One thing is for sure, we feel like changed mamas! And that's a good thing :) It was one of the hardest years of our lives: aside from the Covid hoopla, Stacy had massive health problems and Rachel's husband was without a job for nine months. However, we serve such a great God, and He takes all things and turns them for good. 

This podcast was one of the really good things that came out of 2020! We also felt shaken and awakened by the Lord this year. To use a popular phrase from this year, we are 'woke' to the fact that living in America, we have become soft Christians. We have taken precious things for granted: worship, gathering for church, family, and freedom. Our Constitutional and God-given rights have been infringed upon. And we...

Merry Christmas, Moms. It is officially the busiest season of the year, but what a GREAT reason to be busy: celebrating Jesus. I love that no matter what-pandemic, political climate, where you live, or what havoc 2020 may have wreaked on your life-we celebrate the fact that Jesus humbled Himself and endured this broken world for our sakes and for our salvation.

Christmas will never change because Jesus will never change.

In this episode our guest Julie, mom to four biological children and foster mom to countless more, shared with us her joyful traditions to help keep the focus on the meaning of the season. It's super easy to get caught up in the hoopla, and before you know it, it's December 26th and you're wondering why you're so exhausted and missed Jesus completely. 

Here are some of the fun, meaningful, and kid-friendly activities that we discussed on the episode:

1.) Advent calendar: we love handmade items, but there are plenty of store bought advent...

I can smell Christmas. It's so close. Actually, I could see Christmas in September when I was making a Costco run. No joke, there were decorations, ribbons, and gifts lining the aisles well before Fall. 

Whether or not you'd like to admit it, you probably like gifts. Maybe it's not your love language per se, but as a mom any little gift or surprise is a welcome addition to the life of honored servitude that we live. 

In this episode we talk about the intangible gifts that we see in our children. Our guest was Denise, a pastor's wife, mom to three, and grandma to two, spoke into this issue in a real and genuine way. 

Denise reminded us how important it is to recognize the differences in each of our children and to adjust our approach as we interact with them. Each of our children is uniquely created and gifted by God, and encouraging those gifts is definitely not a one-size-fits-all method. We need the Holy Spirit to help us see what each of our children...

Thanksgiving is close and we couldn't be more excited! There may not feel like much to be thankful for in 2020, but there is always something to be thankful for when you're a child of God.

In this episode we tackled the very important issue of raising selfless kids in a selfish culture. This starts with having a thankful heart and it starts with us as moms. If we don’t have thankful hearts, it’s almost certain that our kids won’t either.

Our guest Cathy, who is the director of children's ministry at church and our dear friend, gave us some wonderful, Biblically-based application for fostering a heart of thankfulness in ourselves, as well as in our children.

It seems as though teaching or fostering an attitude of gratitude in our American culture is like swimming up stream in a storm. The culture praises self: self is king and self is god. It's easy to get caught up in that mindset! It's a daily choice to be thankful.

In this episode, we talked about how...

Motherhood is many things: amazing, tiring, wonderful, hard, exhausting, and satisfying. It's also a major grind. 

Motherhood has been described in this way: the days are long but the years are short. We do the same thing day-in and day-out: cook, clean, teach, work, drive, repeat. Somewhere in there we are supposed to sleep. We are constantly not only trying to meet the needs of the family that God has given to us, but teach and train our children to become God-loving and fearing adults.

Very quickly, we can become tired and depleted, which often leads to us losing our joy and purpose as we parent. Constantly taking care of and training up little humans day after day can take its toll, so it’s important that we find time to fill up so that we can be poured out again.

Sometimes our mom·ing work can feel meaningless. Washing dishes and scrubbing toilets, or reminding your child to put deodorant on every day...