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Simple Farmhouse Life
319. What I Don’t Stress About Anymore as a Mom of Nine + More Q&A
00:51:44
What I’ve learned about newborn sleep, sleep training, toxins, and homemaking after nearly two decades of motherhood
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Sometimes the smallest things, like a sweet family photo or memory can make someone feel close even when they're far away. Now imagine that small thing instantly showing up in loved ones living rooms like magic. With the gift of a Skylight frame, you can send photos right to family members. Frames from your phone in seconds, no apps or subscriptions required. It's a simple way to pop in and stay connected with the people you love. We actually purchased a Skylight frame for Luke's grandmother a couple years ago because she doesn't have a smartphone, she doesn't check phone Facebook and this year I'm excited to gift one to another loved one. The Skylight frames quick one minute setup is easy for all ages or tech skill levels to use. You don't need an app or subscription. If you aren't happy with your frame, you can return it within four months for a full refund, no questions asked. Plus, if your device experiences a covered issue within the first three years, Skylight will replace it free of charge. Find out why the Today Show, Wall Street Journal, HuffPost and Tom's Guide all recommend the Skylight frame Right now Skylight is offering our listeners 20 doll their 10 inch frame by going to myskylight.com farmhouse go to myskylight.com farmHouse for $20 off your 10 inch frame. That's M Y-S-K-Y-L-I G H T.com farmhouse.
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But if something came up, we're out and about. I am not going to ruin the day by, you know, not eating or saying we can't go and enjoy something fun because we would have to eat something that would be not good for us. I think that the 8020 rule very much appl and just looking at the amount of worry and anxiety and how much worse all of that is for health. I think so many of these things you just can't control.
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My name is Lisa, mother of nine and creator of the blog and YouTube channel Farmhouse on Boone. On this podcast I like to talk about simplifying your life so you can live out your priorities.
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I help you learn how to cook.
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From scratch and decorate on a budget through this podcast and my courses Simple Sourdough in the Simple Sewing series. I also help people reach their goals from home through my business course YouTube Success Academy.
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I will leave links to these resources.
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In the show notes and description box below. Now let's get into the show.
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Welcome back to the Simple Farmhouse Life Podcast. Today I'm going to be taking more of your questions over on the Google sheet. I have Ms. Miriam in my lap again, because that's how podcasts are done these days. So first we'll start with a little bit of a house update. The house was on pause for about two or three weeks. I knew we could probably run into a situation like that with our windows, but because of when the electrician came and all of the things that go on behind the walls took a little bit longer as well. There was really only about a two or three week pause with the house build, which was great because I kind of thought it would be a lot longer. The second set of windows. We basically ordered our windows in two different parts for various reasons, but the second set took quite a while because we decided to go with linseed oil paint. And so there was some extra prep work when it came to that. But they are finally in and now there's really nothing else that we have to be waiting on to move full steam ahead on everything. So by the time this episode comes out, we'll be in the middle of insulation, maybe even beginning on the drywall, pan paneling, all that kind of stuff. So I think that we'll be moving really quickly. I'm excited to move inside. We have not done anything inside yet except for the, you know, the electrical and all that kind of stuff. But it still looks like a house with studs. And soon that won't be the case anymore. Things will actually start feeling real. Luke and I decided that we both kind of feel like moving in is like a hypothetical thing. Like it doesn't feel real that we're ever actually going to live there. Just doing this process for so long. I know it's really not in the grand scheme of things very long at all, but it feels like we've been in the middle of it for a really long time. It seems crazy that we actually could be moving in in the next, I don't know, three months. Is that naive to think if we are doing insulation here in the next week or so? I don't know. We'll see. But we are moving ahead on all of that. And I'm excited to pick out the interior things. Those are things that I really thought about a lot at the beginning of this process. Started making Pinterest boards, all of that, and then realized, oh, this is way too soon. It's not time for this. And so I've totally put it on the back burner, completely out of my brain. But I'm going to have to get my brain back excited about all of that because I wasted a lot of energy on that up front thinking, oh, we're building a house, I need to know the paint colors. And really that's like so far down the line. If you are planning to build a house, there's a lot of things to consider long before you think about what kitchen faucet and paint colors you're going to put on the cabinets. In a few weeks, my friend Ann from Storied Underscore Interiors over on Instagram is going to be in town and she's going to come over and help me pick out colors. Because I've told my sisters this many times, but I have a certain style that when I see it in books, when I see it online on Pinterest, I really gravitate toward it and love it. But then I end up choosing colors and different furniture pieces and art and all of the elements that make up a beautiful room. I end up kind of choosing familiar things, safe things, easy things that don't really actually contribute to that style. And I feel like Ann really does a good job of putting together a room in this kind of relaxed country look that I'm going for. Very collected. And I want to have someone talk me out of choosing, like, just blues and greens. Even though those colors are beautiful, I know that that's. I'll just end up making the same room that I've always made. And I. I want to. There's like a different style that I'm trying to capture, and I know it'll take a lot of time, but I also would like a little bit of help achieving that. And Ann's really good at it, and she lives somewhat close and her brother, I believe, lives near where I live. And so she's going to be in town and it's going to be perfect timing because as of right now, it all feels very abstract to me. And I know I can picture it. I'm pretty sure Ann can also picture it as well, but it'll be better when we actually see the wall material up and considering the colors through that lens. So that's going to be really fun. I'm going to try to share more about that on my YouTube channel and on here the whole process of creating our new old house. If you're new to this, this podcast and you want to catch up on the whole new old house thing, you can go over on Farmhouse on Boone, the YouTube channel. I recently shared that I went and got a bunch of architectural salvage for our home. I also did a walk through of the entire property on a different video, recently shared a lot of building updates and then if you scroll all the way back to when we first started building and I shared the design plans, it's really fun just to see kind of where it started and then the whole process of, of how it is where it is now. Nowhere near done, but we are working toward it. Okay, let's jump into some of the questions. I glanced over these briefly before starting this episode, and this one stood out to me. It's something I think about all the time. As a mom who is 40 years old, I have a range of children from 17 down to just three months. I have been a mother of small children in a lot of different environments as far as the culture, the world, the Internet, and there are so many differences and it's hard for me to fully understand what it would be like to first be a mom in this day and age. Because although I am a new mom to a new baby, not.
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Not a new mom.
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But though I do have small children as well, I have a four year old, a two year old, a baby. So I'm kind of in the trenches with all of that. I also have the perspective of becoming confident in my motherhood through a time when we didn't even have Internet service at our house, didn't have smartphones. I relied on the wisdom of people I could ask around me books. And that's about it now. Of course, blogs came around a few years into that, but trying to figure it all out with this sea of information has to be just so wild. So let me read the question. Hi Lisa, I've so enjoyed your podcast since becoming a mom. Thank you for all you share and your encouragement. Since my baby was born, I've struggled with some anxiety and potential OCD realm worries about all the toxins in our lives, from food ingredients to EMF to tick bites to hazards of lead or PFAs. How do you keep it all in perspective? On a related note, my husband and I just moved to a lovely home that had some architectural salvage items which we learned were unfortunately very high lead. It really triggered a lot of my fears for my baby. We are working to get rid of it all and I wonder if you had this concern with any of your beautiful salvage items in your new old house. Thanks and God bless you and your family. So I think the way that I'm able to put it into perspective is actually just practically looking at what life has looked like for the last 17 years since becoming a mom. Now, some people call this survivor bias, so take it for how you will. It could just come off as dismissive but when you've had a child that you didn't know about any of these things. Now, of course, we've known about lead for a really long time. I believe our first house, we might have had it tested for lead, but it was an old house as well.
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But so many of the other things you mentioned we didn't know about. Like I did not know about PFAS or didn't really understand that there was any concern with EMF and tick bites. That's just something that, you know, as a Missouri person my whole entire life, ticks are just a common thing that you. That happen all the time. So I just kind of approached it practically. You know, we check the children for ticks before bed when it's summertime. There's occasionally one that you look through their whole body and you miss one and you realize, oh no, that's been on there longer than I'd hoped it would have. And you just pray that there's nothing that happens. But then the survivor bias part that comes in is so far we haven't had really any issues from that and we have healthy kids. So on another example, something I used to be really worried about was use of antibiotics. Now I'm not saying I'm okay with using antibiotics, but there was a situation recently where it's actually already been probably a year and a half, maybe even close to two years ago now, maybe more than two years. I can't remember where my oldest daughter, after having her wisdom teeth removed and we didn't do the antibiotics for that, but about a month or two later, she developed an infection in one of the spots where she had the wisdom teeth removed. And it was, you know, her face was swollen, she had a fever. It was obvious that it was an infection that we needed to use antibiotics. Like those are things back in the day. Which back in the day you wouldn't have your wisdom teeth removed, but if you got an infection way back in the day, you just died. So of course, you know, we use the antibiotics. And as a mom who is very busy, has a lot of things going on, I didn't really give it very much thought. Whereas when I was a new mom, that would have been kind of an all consuming thing. Like, oh no, I've just ruined her gut for basically forever. Now she's going to be so sick, it's going to mess her up forever. And it's something that, you know, you knew you had to do. And she took probiotics for a little bit afterwards, but we haven't seen Any effects from that? She's not sicker, she doesn't have any digestive issues. We still have her on a healthy diet that all of our family is on. Food from scratch, lots of whole grains, raw milk, sourdough, all that kind of stuff. And she's, she hasn't had any issues at all. So I think ultimately you do the best that you can. And worrying doesn't add, what does it say in the Bible, like a cubit to your stature or a minute to your life or something like that. So practically, it doesn't make sense to worry about things you can't control. Tick bites you can't control outside of just not going outside, which has to be way worse in every way possible for your mental health, for physical health. But that would be the only way. Yes, you can wear long pants, yes, you could use some kind of natural bug spray. But even still, if you live in areas that have a lot of ticks and you're outside, you're going to get a tick bite. And so it just doesn't make sense practically to worry about that, to worry about pfas. Regarding the pfas, and I think PFAS are like, are we talking about oils or that's PUFAs, polyunsaturated fatty acids. I don't know. So I think that's what you're talking about there. But so our take on anything like that is we cook healthy at home, and if we are anywhere else, we don't worry about it. So if we're out and about and I didn't pack lunch, which usually when we're out and about, I do pack a lunch, but if something came up, we're out and about. I am not going to ruin the day by not eating or saying we can't go and enjoy something fun because we would have to eat something that would be not good for us. I think that the 8020 rule very much applies. And just looking at practically the amount of worry and anxiety and how much worse all of that is for health, I think so many of these things you just can't control. And it takes so much of the joy of motherhood out when you're worried. When I was a young mom, we didn't have, I didn't know about pfas, tick bites. I don't even feel like I worried about that until many years later, probably because we heard so much about it online. But before that, I don't even know if I checked the kids every night, but the last several years, check the kids every night. I definitely have way more anxiety about it now than I used to, but back when my first was born, I don't think I even worried about that for so many years. I definitely didn't worry or have a clue what PFAs were EMF. We had our own things to worry about. I remember being worried that if I didn't get her on a certain sleep schedule, she would never sleep on her own. And there's a lot of perspective that comes from having older children and seeing, okay, I did this this time, I did this this time, and turns out they both sleep fine by age 2, pretty much no matter what I do. And so when you have that perspective, it is really so life changing. So if you have any older mothers around you that you could, you know, ask if they had any advice or could pour into your life, I think that's another valuable thing. Now, something that I did when I was a young mom and a lot of young moms tend to do, is not humbly seek that kind of advice. Like when moms would tell me when my oldest was a baby, oh, you can't spoil a newborn. I really literally just thought that they were wrong. I was like, well, yes, you can. Because if I pick her up every time she cries, then I'm going to teach her that, you know, you have these like silly things that if you're an older mom and you hear a young mom say that, you're just like, seriously. So if you could humbly approach a older mom locally that you could actually connect with in real life, who has been there, who could give you that perspective when you don't have perspective yet, I think that could help a lot because you'll find that there's just so much to worry about these days and a lot of it just probably will make almost no difference. Now with that being said, of course I'm a mom who believes that what we cook in our homes, what kind of toxins like that we can actually control. I think that's all great. I don't want to fill the air with harsh cleaning products. We don't use anything scented. I have unscented candles, unscented shampoo and conditioner. I do what I can. We cook from scratch. I mill grains, we like sourdough, all that kind of stuff. But for the things you can't, it just, it's going to take the joy out of it and it probably won't even make that big of a difference if the core things that you're doing, the whole 80, 20 rule thing, are things that you are actually prioritizing when.
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Love them.
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Also, the cashmere feels incredible. Soft, structured and it doesn't pill. It's the kind of quality I'd normally expect from a $200 sweater, not 50. Quint has gifting cover beyond clothing too. I have some beautiful linen pillow covers on my Euro Shams I picked up from Quint. They have something for every room. Buying gifts so good you'll want to keep them with quint. Go to quint.comfarmhouse for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns. Now available in Canada too. That's Q-U-I-N c e.com farmhouse to get free shipping and 365 day returns. Quint.com farmhouse if you run a small business, you know there's nothing small about it.
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As a business owner, I get it.
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Best resources for Learning to Use a Woven Wrap I've used a stretchy wrap for my babies but want to expand to wovens also. Have you ever dealt with oral restrictions sl tongue ties with your babies and had to address nursing nursing issues related to them? Okay, so the woven wrap. To be honest, I only really do one type of tie and it works fabulously all the way until a baby won't go in the wrap anymore. So I use it pretty much around the clock. When my babies are between, you know, zero to around seven or eight months, I start getting them down for some naps and then when we're out and about beyond that all the way until they're about 18 months depending on the baby and the temperament. I can get them asleep in a woven wrap if we need to. Like in a pinch if we're out and about and they have to have a nap. Whereas like my 2 year old right now he is okay if we're out and about all day to just not do a nap at all. He might, you know, fall asleep for a few minutes in the car or something like that, but he can make it. Whereas when you have like a 1 year old up to 18 months they have to have that nap. The woven wrap works great for that. So it's actually a very simple tie. It is reverse of a stretchy wrap. So if you've used a Sally or a Moby or a Boba, you will put that middle panel around the center and then tuck in the ends of it, the long ends behind it and then tie it all around you like wrap it around your back, tie it and then put the baby in. Whereas with a woven you put that middle panel over and then you put the two long tails instead of tucking it in they go over. Then you put the baby on before you Tie it the rest of the way. And the reason I love this about a woven wrap is you adjust it to the size of the baby. So you get the baby in that center panel, and then you start pulling the two long tails up over your shoulder until it's very tight on the baby. So it adjusts to what size the baby is. Whereas with a stretchy wrap, the goal is get it as tight as you possibly can before putting the baby in, because they stretch it out and then they sag down. And if you ever find that you're unable to get things done with a stretchy wrap, you just have it way, way, way too loose. You have to tie it way tighter than you think you need to. The cool thing about a woven wrap is you figure that out because the baby is in while you're adjusting it, and then you tie it on the rest of the way while the baby's in there. So another thing about the woven wrap is, unlike a stretchy wrap, where I wear it as my shirt almost the entire day, I never take it all the way off because you tie it completely before putting the baby in. I take it on and off. So I might wear it for a few hours for their morning nap. And then I will hold the baby or, you know, one of the siblings will hold the baby and talk to her while she's awake between that time. So I like it for that. I like it because it's more supportive. It works very well. Even if you have a very large baby, it doesn't stretch out. It's very comfy and soft, and it feels, you know, it conforms to the baby, but it's not stretchy. So I like that they are very adjustable for, like, you can use it on your back. And that's a really great advantage of a woven wrap. But that's not something I've done a whole lot of. I have done it, but if you asked me to do it right now at this exact moment, I wouldn't even remember how to do it. I'd have to look it up. Whereas that front carry, I think they call it a front wrap, cross carry, something like that, I don't even know. But it's just like the basic tie. I use it over and over again. They're so cozy in there. So you can tuck their little head in on one side panel so they can take their nap. I usually try to switch their head around so that they're not always facing the same way. And you want to avoid that. But other than that, I love it. That's the only wrap I'm using this time around. I get a lot of questions on YouTube of like, a lot of it must be older people, because I feel like if you had a baby, you would know the answer to this question. But I always get people who say, well, why don't you put the baby down? Like, while you're cooking and while you're doing things around the house, why don't you put the baby down? So many reasons. One is babies don't like to be put down. I mean, I know some babies do. People are like, well, my baby did. Yes. Some babies. I've never had one. All of my babies like to be held. I think most babies do. If you have one that likes to be put down, I think that's probably more the exception to the rule. I think most people, it's a struggle to get, you know, cooking done, laundry done, playing with the other kids, getting other kids dressed, taking other kids to the bathroom. There's all kinds of little things you have to do with a toddler, toddler that you need to, you know, be able to do while also having the baby. And a lot of babies won't let you put them down. And so you feel a little bit trapped, like, I can't do anything. Well, the wrap takes care of all of that. You tie the baby on and they get to go about your day. And it's a very great learning experience because they get to interact with all the things that you're doing, hear you talking, you know, I think it's a good thing. I think that's why babies kind of demand to be held. It's because they need it. Another reason is practical. The way our house is currently set up. Our kitchen is very set apart from the rest of the house. It's. There's like a hallway away from the kitchen to the dining room and to the library. And then you have to go all the way upstairs to go to our bedroom. So there would be nowhere in the kitchen, which is where I find myself most often, to set the baby. And then if there were, I would have to constantly move the little thing, whatever it would be. If it was like a swing or a pack and play, one, it would be majorly in my way because we have a tiny kitchen. So I need the baby kind of like out of the way of the children running about everywhere. They'd step on her. And then two, I don't have to constantly move, like baby holding apparatuses throughout the house. And so just for so many practical reasons in this current stage, of life with the age that the baby is, just to put her in the wrap. Now I do also have several siblings who love to hold her, primarily my 12 year old son. He is like the current baby holder right now. With the last child it was somebody else, but this time that's who it is. And so a lot of times when she's not in my wrap, either my 12 year old son or my 10 year old son or my 17 year old daughter love to hold her. They all do. So it's really just practical to carry the baby around now when they are around five months and I can start putting them on my back. Fabulous. Because then they're getting bigger. So they're kind of in the way of you standing at the stove, standing at the countertop, at the sink. Instead they're on your back and they can see around and almost even see more on the back. So I'm looking forward to that time. But right now this is what works easiest for us to get done all the things that we need to. Because there's that saying that goes around of babies don't keep, which I agree, babies don't keep. And you know what happens? Even if you take every moment, savor every moment, they still don't keep. And it's sad, it's terrible. And I love at night when I start laying in bed after getting the little kids in bed and the teenagers are all just doing whatever they're doing around the house, but just sitting there with the baby, not in the wrap, doing nothing else. I love that. But people will say, you know, leave the laundry, leave the dishes, leave the cooking for another time. That would work if you had a very short phase of babies being babies. But in our family we've, you know, this is just how it's worked out for us. We have a 17 year age gap between the oldest and the youngest. So I can't imagine what kind of disarray there'd be by now if we just neglected everything for 17 straight years. And so because of that, you know, there are things that we have to take care of the other kids and they're just happier in the wrap. Most babies, some, some aren't that way, but most are. Okay. So that was a long explanation on why I love the woven wrap so much. And I'm sure there are some really great little tutorials on the. Let me just double check. That's what it's called. Yep. F wcc. I'm right. Front wrap, cross carry, look that up. That's what I do. I think the more you do it, the more you figure out like how to get them really comfortable, how to get them tight and secure. So if the first time you do it, you don't have them tight and secure, just carry on. Also, if you find that your wrap is not as comfortable, it's scratchy. Just know that woven wraps get more soft and just comfy the more times you wash and dry them. So just continue on. I'm convinced you'll love it. Anybody I've introduced to it in real life personally loves it. As far as the tongue ties I have, interestingly, I dealt with it for four kids in a row. So first four, nothing. Then four more all tongue and lip ties and then Miriam nothing. I have no idea why. I'm sure it's probably one of those like, health things that I'm ignoring. There's probably some reason I'm to blame. Like we were talking about earlier, there's always a reason for everything. And I think that's what makes everything so stressful is there's always a reason for everything with moms these days. My sister was telling me the other day that the reason you would have a more strong willed, like defiant toddler is because if you had a more traumatic birth, that's something that's going around these days. I just, I know it's anecdotal, I know, but the one that I find to be like the most difficult toddler of all the toddlers and my entire nine kids, even though I can't say with Miriam yet because she's like toddler yet. So the most difficult toddler of the eight, super easy, relaxed birth, like pain free birth. So anecdotally not true for me. You don't have to blame yourself for literally everything. Like if you have a, a toddler that's, you know, toddlerish, so they throw fits. We just don't blame yourself. If they're a toddler, that's just normal. Like toddlers, they're smart because they're no longer babies and they know what they want. But it's always about like, what they want is usually a bad idea because they're also not smart enough to make their own decisions. If I don't live by themselves. And there's just that tension there of like, I want what I want and I know best. And then the parents like, no, I know best. And that's just part of toddler life. And if you have a defiant one, it's just normal. Okay, that was a, that was a distraction there from the tongue tie thing. So again, I'm sure there's some deficiency that I had for those years that I had those four kids, because it is kind of weird that there's four that didn't, four that did, and then one that didn't. I don't know, I'm sure it was some vitamin deficiency or whatever, but all those kids are fine. And we did do the reversals on all four of them. Now, I know that's also controversial, but at the time it's just what my midwife recommended. The first time around, when we first had a tongue tie on that fifth born child, we took him to a local place that like, it was just so much worse than the other time. So they had this thing where they like laser it and then you have to stretch was absolutely awful. The three after that, I switched midwives and this midwife just snipped it really quickly. I put them on the breast, they nursed wonderfully and I never had to stretch it or do anything else. And nursing was fine. So it was like one was like such a big deal and then the other three were literally no big deal. It was just done in my home. I didn't have to do any extra stretching or anything. And so if we ever dealt with a tongue tie again, that's just what we, that's what I thought we would do with Miriam because I just assumed because of the four before her that she would have a big issue too. I think my one prior to her had a tongue and a lip tie and we reversed both of them. But with Miriam, I just assumed we would, and I assumed we would just do that thing where she just quickly cuts it, I nurse her, it's no big deal, but she didn't have any issues at all. I am definitely an advocate of nursing. I think that, you know, it's easier on the mother because it's convenient, it's always right there.
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It'S obviously healthy, it adapts to the different ages of the babies and what they need. And so when necessary, I, you know, I'm sure there's a lot of opinions on this. Very strong ones. Sometimes it simplifies things. Just take the advice of a provider you trust. So I had a midwife I trusted and that's the route we took for those four. I would definitely not go back to doing the whole thing we did with our fifth born. That was just like way too much. Now I have had a lot of nursing pain with all but two of my children and it didn't always go with tongue ties because sometimes it wasn't a tongue tie. One that I had nursing pain and then with Miriam, she had no tongue tie at all. She is so like her tongue goes all the way up. I'm like, wow, you have literally nothing under there. But she the first two weeks were extremely painful for nursing and you know it. After that, those two weeks, everything's great. But that's been my experience of almost all my kids. Tongue tie or not, the first two weeks is very painful and then after that it's it's no big deal. So that's been my experience.
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Not only are we back to our homeschool routine, which means that there's a lot more to fit in every single day alongside of a lot of other things, but we also have been really enjoying fall activities. Going to the pumpkin patch, apple orchard, the kids come home with corn, filling their pockets and shoes from the corn bins we're playing in.
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I am glad that we have Homag.
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Glow to help keep our home clean during this busy season.
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And that's why I want to say.
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Thanks to Homag Glow for many so sponsoring this episode. Homog Glow is a five star home service platform dedicated to making your space clean and tidy. With their easy online booking capabilities, you can instantly schedule top rated cleaners in your area for a special occasion or regularly with their Forever Clean membership. So think of Thanksgiving hosting if you feel overwhelmed because you're going to host a lot of people. Getting that one deep clean can really make your life and your to do list so much easier.
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B
I've been managing all of the cleaning.
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In our home between myself and my.
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Family for quite a while now and.
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It'S been so nice having someone come through and get all the places that we miss. It gives me peace of mind. Cleaners with Homag Glow pass a rigorous certification process and maintain a 4.8 star average platform rating. And it's a great way to support local cleaners because 100% of the cleaning fees and tips go directly to the cleaner.
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To schedule a cleaning, you simply go.
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To Homog Glow's website to choose the day and time you're looking for and the duration of your cleaning. To match with a cleaner, you can schedule as quickly as this week or get something on the calendar for next month. If there's something you know that you're going to need a cleaning for to.
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Check it off your to do list early. You can see photos and reviews of.
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Background check cleaners before booking the right cleaner for you.
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And the best part is one with.
- [35:32]
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Their Forever Clean membership you can save $30 an hour on all future cleanings. You can book unlimited cleaning starting at $19 an hour backed by Homag Glow's happiness guarantee. Homag Glow services are only available in the US Take home cleaning off your plate this fall by using Homog Glow. Head to homag glow.comfarmhouse to get your first three hours of cleaning for only $19.
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That's h o n m e a.
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G l o w.com farmhouse okay hi.
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Lisa, I would love to hear you talk about newborn life. I recently had my second and keep thinking I bet Lisa has this all.
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Down to a science.
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After nine kids I know you baby wear nearly all the time. Do you pay attention to wake windows during the day? Do you wake your newborn up to nurse during the day or wait for them to wake on their own? I'm assuming you co sleep since you said you didn't bring a crib to New York. We're trying coping for the first time and it makes me nervous, but it feels like the only way to get any sleep right now. When do you typically transition them to a crib or bassinet? If ever I remember you saying you sleep train around one year old. I'd love to hear any newer rhythms you found to work well for you. The newborn season just feels so chaotic and overwhelming to me. Okay, well I wouldn't say I have it down to a science at all because it actually is just very intuitive. You asked do I do wake windows? I don't pay any attention whatsoever. Now with my first I did. Like I mentioned earlier, I kind of ruined the first year of life. Not I didn't ruin it, but I don't have the fondest of memories with my first because I worried about all of those things. And I know now after nine kids that you don't have to worry about them at all. They will sleep. You will not mess them up. Now it all depends on how serious you want to get about it at some point. Because at some point you will have to sleep train. But it takes a couple days so you have to worry about their whole like first year of life about doing all of these things. Because I've seen people who get their kid on a really great schedule and then something changes and then they have to do it all over again and it's this big stressful thing and I've done it too. Or you can just not do it at all. And then when they're old enough for it to not go back and forth, you can kind of just do it. And that's what I've always done. And it's worked fabulously. So I don't pay any attention to wake windows. I never wake a baby to nurse. Now, if you have a really tiny baby or they have jaundice or some other condition, I would just go with your pediatrician's recommendations on that. But once they're past, like, two or three weeks, usually all those things are ironed out. No, never, ever even consider it. I just put her on the breast. Anytime she's fussy is what I do. So they're in my wrap sleeping, and then when they get really fussy and they start wiggling a lot, I assume they're hungry. And then if an hour later they're fussy again, I'll just nurse again. There's no need to think like, oh, it's been one hour, it's been two hours. I remember with my first daughter, like, having. Keeping track of which side I nursed her from and how long has it been, and did she have a wet and poopy diaper? Never worried about that. Beyond her, I think there was, like, a product when she was little that people were like, you should get this. Watch where it tells you what side that's overthinking it. For most kids now, I know somebody's gonna say, oh, we had this certain issue where if we didn't do xyz. But for most kids, at least for all of my other eight kids, this is worked. This worked just fine. So just put them in the wrap when they're tired. If they're fussy, just nurse like this whole podcast episode. I'm just gonna nurse her because I can't be up and around in the wrap, which would be keeping her asleep because I'm sitting down recording a podcast episode. So because of that, I'm just going to need to latch her on the entire time. But that's totally fine. And then when I get up from this, I'll probably put her in the wrap, or if I have a little bit more computer work to do, I'll just keep her latched on. And then if she wakes up about an hour after being in the wrap, because she's half sleeping right now, half nursing, then I will just nurse her again. It's. You can't over nurse now. She does spit up some, but that's okay. That's like the biggest consequence of her over nursing. Let's see here. Yes. On co sleeping. So that's something again. Like, co sleeping is one of those things where I am Very confident, very comfortable with it. I've done it for nine children, actually. No, that's, that's not true. I've did it for eight children. My first, I thought, you know, I just followed all the recommendations and I know there are those out there every time I talk about co sleeping who are adamant that it's always, always a bad idea. And so I just want to give the disclaimer that it's not recommended and so you have to be comfortable with it. I know one of my sisters was very uncomfortable with it, but she discovered what you discovered, that she could never sleep if she didn't do it. And she read a book. I need to ask her what book that was on co sleeping and how to make it safe because she was very, very nervous about it. She had always been a very heavy sleeper. And so she read a book and this book convinced her that it was very safe under certain circumstances. So, you know, certain types of blankets, certain conditions like do not be drunk and co sleep, do not be super. Like there's a certain weight limit you should. If you're over a certain obesity metric, then it's not really recommended to co sleep. There are certain blankets you shouldn't use. You know, find some resources like that that will make you feel more confident. But if you're wondering what I do, yes, I just put the baby in bed with me. That's what I've always done. And it, it just really like doing all of these things makes the newborn phase feel easy, truly, like the toddlers don't feel easy, but the newborns do. And I had someone in my comments when I shared that Luke and I went to New York City because he surprised me with the 40th birthday trip. That said, like, if, if your newborn's hard, you know, and your experience isn't like this, just you're not alone. And that I understand that, like there's not everybody has the same experience. But this has been my experience the eight times after how I did my first. It was night and day difference. And so I just have the, the perspective of worrying about all of these things and then just kind of spoiling the baby, for lack of a better word. Doing exactly what they want, nursing them whenever they want, wearing them whenever they want, and holding them all the time. Seems like that's just what babies kind of want. And I know with my first I worried that it would be impossible to ever get her to sleep if I did those things wrong. And I know now that I was wrong about that. And so when do I start putting them in a bassinet or crib. Usually it depends on the temperament of the baby. So I've had anywhere from six months up to, I'd say about nine months is when we start with naps and there is some crying. When I lay them down, there's some crying, but they're old enough to need that sleep. So usually what happens is at some point they stop sleeping very well in the wrap. For me, and for one of my sisters, that's a very later date. Her babies sleep very well in the wrap all the way till they're one, whereas mine start to get squirmy and curious and they no longer want to sleep in the wrap. And so they're not getting enough sleep. And it's just there becomes that time where it's like, okay, you need to lay down and sleep, usually about two or three times. And putting them down for a nap, they understand that when I get laid down here, I need to go to sleep. And so once we learn that, it's pretty smooth sailing. And then a few months later, we do the same thing with overnight. And the reason I wait until one is because if I go any kind of back and forth with nursing them overnight, they start pushing it earlier and earlier. So what I always. What I thought would work earlier on with some of my. My babies is, oh, I'll. I'll just only get them after say, 4am or something like that. Well, they would then go to 3am, 2am, then they'd be back in my bed like after, you know, they'd keep pushing it back until they were just in my bed all night. So I wait until one because I want to make sure that they are able to sleep the night through without nursing because I either need to go all or nothing. And I also have to be mentally ready for it. If I go back and forth, it makes it even harder. It makes it to where.
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We do it one night, then we don't do it. And that's just terrible because if you do it one or two nights, it's done. And they sleep through the night after that. Whereas if you go back and forth, it's confusing, it causes more crying, it causes more stress. And so for me, if I can just wait until I know that, that they're old enough and they're okay not to nurse throughout the night, we can kind of move in that direction. That's what I did with all of my kids. And I know another thing that young moms really worry about. And again, I hate giving advice on stuff like this. But I know it's so needed because I get asked about it constantly, like the amount of DMs and emails I have about sleep. Because when you're in the thick of it, it's like the only thing that you can think about because it's so hard. But I hate doing it because I know that there are such controversial opinions when it comes to this. But I did it. But people will ask me like, you know, do you have your children like hate you now? Are they traumatized because at some point you sleep trained them? And my 17 year old and 15 year old aren't traumatized like they. And of course there's probably like these little hidden things I don't know about and all this kind of stuff, but they seem very emotionally regulated I think is the word we use these days. They seem confident, happy and connected. And so for me this is definitely something I don't regret doing and it's something that is practical because at some point kids and parents have to sleep. And so if you still have to nurse like I'm. People have different levels of their tolerance for this. But I'm unwilling to still nurse a like 3 year old to sleep or to lay down until a 3 year old's to sleep. At that age, you know, I always have another baby and so I just. At that age they need to be able to lay down in their crib and of course we do books and we kiss them good night and all this stuff and they're, they're happy and they know that we love them. But I'm not going to like lay next to them till they are sound asleep quietly roll away. When they are that age, I'll do it for while. They're little babies and they don't know any better and they don't have object permanence and all that kind of stuff. But then at a certain point I'm just, I'm just. Personally I think it's good for us if the baby or the child learns to fall asleep on their own. So that's my little take on all of that. I gave way more than you asked. I keep seeing your blog course mentioned but cannot find it even in the newer videos. Is it still available? I am so sorry we forgot to change the intro for this podcast for a really long time and I actually do not offer the blogging course any longer. The reason for that is it was way too difficult to update it. So much has changed in the blogging world and I simply do not have the time to basically remake the entire course and so I stopped offering it. We are actually working on soon we're going to be phasing out the YouTube course as well and I'm just going to be doing my homestead type courses. So we have a sewing course, a freshly milled grains course, sourdough and fermented foods. Those don't really change. I can add to them as I learn more things, but I don't have to go back and redo them. And that is just what I need in this phase of life. So we're going to be phasing out all business courses because of that. Okay, Hylis, I know organic foods are important to you, but do you ever buy non organic foods? For example, if you're in a pinch and there's not an organic item in stock, or if there are some foods that you like but they're not organic? You mentioned having cravings for Haagenaz ice cream in one of your recent podcasts. So you will find that I definitely will buy non organic in a pinch, like anytime. Well, a lot of produce if it's not in the summer and somebody has it locally at the farmer's market or something, that's really the only way for me to get organic where I live. As far as produce now, Azure Standard, I can get it from there as well. But do I sometimes forget to order enough for the monthly order and have to get it from Walmart? Yes, of course. And so I, I do not worry about that now. I do try to get it from Azure Standard, but if I forget to place my monthly order or if I run out of something, it is. Yeah, I'm not above non organic food. I do try to choose it when possible and then like you said, Haagen Dazs. Yeah, I don't worry about that stuff. It has good clean ingredients other than the non organic aspect of it. I will take one more and I'll save the rest of these for another solo episode. How do you do bedtime with multiple littles without taking hours? I have three, three and under and a seven year old who all need assistance going to sleep and or waking up multiple times in the night. Okay, so the bedtime routine part we do as groups. So the oldest four, I'm referencing them as, or I'm referring to them as the teenagers, but really the youngest is 10 in that group and then my son is almost 13 and then we have 17 and 15. They don't really have a bedtime routine anymore. They kind of like it's way different for them. So then we have 8, 6, 4 and 2. They're in a group. And it was me handling that before I had Miriam. This is what typically happens for us. It's not like the spoken thing like, okay, now you get bedtime routine, but it just kind of happens because usually it'll be the time of night where she will need me to just lay down and nurse her. I find that a lot of my kids, there's a certain time of night where they no longer want to be in the wrap, they just want to be in bed, but they need assistance with that. And so when that happens, typically Luke will take over the bedtime routine with those other four and I will handle the baby. But before that, before I had Miriam over the summer, I was handling that just because I enjoy it. I will sit down with those four and read a book to them or several books, depending on how early we get to the bedtime routine. Now if it's too late, I will tell them this is not a book night. We did XYZ instead. So they know, you know, if it's an hour past their bedtime because we did xyz, we were at so and so's house and we had a fun time. I'll say this just isn't a book night because, you know, we already had the fun and now it's time for you to go to sleep. But if we get up in a certain amount of time and we can spend 30 minutes reading through some books or a chapter of a book that they like, we'll do that. A lot of times the two year old will start to become, you know, jumping all over us and he's tired and needs to go to bed. So in between, you know, one book and the next, we might put him in his spot and then continue reading to the other three and then that's about it. That might take 30 minutes to put on the jammies, brush the teeth, if we need baths, that usually we'll start that earlier, read the book and then walk out of their room. But like I mentioned earlier, I'm unwilling to lay with each child until they fall asleep. And we're pretty strict. I'll say we're strict, but this has been back and forth. Ideally we're really strict about them staying in their beds, especially the four year old. So the four year old and the two year old were strict about them staying in their beds. The older two, the eight and the six, if they get up, you know, to do something, they're still able to put themselves back in their bed and go to sleep. Whereas the four year old, if he comes out for something like he needs water or something like that, then you know, I need to put him back in his spot and cover him back up and fluff the blanket and all those little things that toddlers come up with. So usually what I will do is I will say, okay, we did the water, we did the teeth, we did the jammies, we did the book. Now it's time for you to stay in here. We've done all the things and now you need to stay in your bed. I don't wait until they're asleep because you know you got other things to do. If you have all little kids, you're in the season of life where you get to put kids down nice and early. Whereas when you have older kids and teenagers, there's always people up, which is fine because they can take care of themselves. But those quiet moments that you have alone right now at bedtime, that's a fleeting season of life. And yeah, I would just, I would just have them go to bed on their own.
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I'm not willing for bedtime routine to take hours. I don't think it's necessary. I don't think it's a bad thing to be able to tell children that, you know, they just need to go to sleep and they learn, need to learn to self soothe. I think part of the reason that kids, well, I don't know about kids. I know the reason why babies wake multiple times a night because they fell asleep with me getting them to sleep and they just sort of stir and realize, oh, she's not there anymore and they cry and I imagine kids would do that too. If we are getting them to sleep as opposed to having them fall asleep on their own. That could be the reason for that. It's definitely the reason for babies and it's something that I deal with all the way until they're one because like I said, I wait until one. But we have some really rocky months between about eight months and one because of that whole thing like they're no longer co sleeping that great, but they need me to fall asleep. And at some point you have to teach them to fall asleep on their own. And if you don't, they're going to need you all throughout the night every time they notice they're a little tiny bit awake. Like where's mom? Where's mom? She was here whenever I fell asleep. Where is she now? And so I think it will really help if they learn how to fall asleep on their own. And I think moms these days feel really guilty about that. And I don't think that was a thing back in the day. Like, I think moms moms were allowed to just go put the kids to bed and then move about their day or their evening or whatever. Not their day, but their evening, 7, 8 o'. Clock. You know, when you put the kids to bed, I don't think people felt like they had to like actually get them to sleep. And I think these days we're so worried that we're going to ruin them if they're ever upset, like at all, that.
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We think that we we have to have this really long drawn out bedtime routine and we just don't do it in our home. So. All right. Well, as always, thank you so much for listening and I will see you in the next episode of the Simple Farmhouse Life Podcast.
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Thanks as always for listening to the.
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Simple Farmhouse Life Podcast.
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My husband Luke and I and our kids work together side by side on.
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Our little homestead and use our blog.
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Podcast and YouTube channel to reach other homemakers, home cooks and home setters with practical recipes and daily family life.
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For everyday sourdough recipes, make sure to.
- [54:45]
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Check out our blog, farmassonboone.com and to dig deeper, we do also offer a course called simple sourdough over@bitvit.ly farmhousesourdo course. That's all one word. Bit ly farmhousesourdo course. If you're looking to learn how we earn an income online, check out my YouTube course at bit ly farmhouseyoutubecourse.
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All one word.