329. Rest for the Overwhelmed Mom: Creating Peace in a Full Life | Carolyn of Homesteading Family

Summary

Podcast Summary: Simple Farmhouse Life — Episode 329

“Rest for the Overwhelmed Mom: Creating Peace in a Full Life | Carolyn of Homesteading Family”
Host: Lisa Bass
Guest: Carolyn of Homesteading Family
Date: February 17, 2026

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Episode Theme Overview

This episode centers on how mothers—especially those with large families, homesteads, and/or businesses—can cultivate rest and peace amid nonstop responsibilities. Lisa Bass welcomes Carolyn from Homesteading Family, who recently completed a planned “year of rest” after six years of intense homesteading work. Together, they explore what intentional rest looks like, how to manage commitments, and practical ways to live with a sense of rhythm rather than constant overwhelm.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Carolyn’s “Year of Rest” (03:18–13:22)

• Long-term Planning:
  Carolyn and her husband Josh, recognizing their “project people” tendencies, planned ahead to take the seventh year after moving to their homestead as a year of rest.
  • “We should take a year, the seventh year and we should slow down and not do major projects.” (05:03 – Carolyn)
• Defining Rest:
  Rest didn’t mean cessation of all activity but rather a halt on any major new projects or infrastructure changes—while maintaining existing systems (animal care, gardening, etc.).
• Unexpected Twists:
  Life still brought “projects”: their daughter got engaged, a wedding was hosted at the homestead, and a cabin was built for her and her fiancé on short notice.
  • “You’re not going to say no to ‘Can I have my wedding at the homestead?’” (12:31 – Carolyn)

2. Living by Rhythm, Not Schedule (09:39–10:57, 21:16–23:32)

• Household Management:
  With many hands in the home, Carolyn emphasizes the importance of living by a daily rhythm rather than a rigid schedule, allowing chores and responsibilities to be handled peacefully—even with 11 children.
  • “Everyday work... can be rhythmic and can actually be very peaceful and very enjoyable.” (10:08 – Carolyn)
• Rest as Relative:
  For the Bass and Carolyn families, a day without extra projects still involves lots of work—but feels restful compared to their normal, more overloaded pace.
  • “Your version of rest sounds like a lot of people’s version of really hard work.” (09:07 – Lisa)

3. Rest as a Mindset, Not a Circumstance (01:09, 22:33–31:37)

• Choosing Rest Over Stress:
  Removing external commitments isn’t enough—achieving rest is primarily about micro-moment decisions, boundaries, and mental focus.
  • “You can use all of everyday life circumstances as an excuse to be stressed and not even realize that it’s been a choice... just because you remove the things that you feel like are stressing you out doesn’t mean that you’re automatically resting.” (01:09; 22:33; repeated as a key insight)
• Input Management:
  Carolyn found greater peace by removing news and social media apps from her phone and replacing them with Bible verse apps.
  • “That right there—I think that was worth several months of not doing work around the homestead.” (26:20 – Carolyn)

4. Practical Structures for Large Families (34:33–36:05, 49:21–53:46)

• Making “Me Time” Work:
  Even with a busy household, some structure can help: coordinated nap/quiet time, morning quiet moments, and delegating chores.
  • “Nap time for me is like a law in my house… Even if they’re too old for nap, they get to sit quietly with a book.” (35:08 – Carolyn)
• Family Systems:
  Carolyn’s family rotates baked breakfasts that are prepped ahead, allowing her to honor her own morning preferences.
  • “Now we just have in our regular chore rotation people… every morning, just slide a breakfast casserole right in, have it out, and everybody can be at the table.” (49:21 – Carolyn)
• Individual Styles:
  Both hosts stress the need for each mother (and family) to find their own rhythms without comparison or guilt.
  • “It is important to be honest with yourself... you might just have to do all the things that you do just later.” (52:41 – Lisa)

5. Commitment Management in Business and Life (36:22–48:58)

• Saying No:
  Carolyn shared that saying no to business projects and especially speaking engagements was a huge stress-reduction win—something she plans to continue.
  • “I realized [speaking engagements create] a disproportionate amount of stress for the amount of time…” (37:41 – Carolyn)
• Future Commitments Trap:
  The hosts discuss how it’s easy to overcommit when the future seems less full, then regret it when the time comes.
  • “Future me doesn’t have any time constraints.” (43:37 – Lisa)
• Checking for Joy:
  Carolyn’s litmus test: If she can’t feel joy in simple moments with her family, she knows she has too many commitments.
  • “It’s hard to find joy in anything when you have too many commitments.” (45:07 – Carolyn quoting a mentor)

6. Rest is Not Doing Nothing—Purposeful Work is Life-Giving (29:21–31:44)

• Rest≠Idleness:
  Doing nothing for long stretches (“a month in Fiji”), while tempting in theory, doesn’t bring happiness or fulfillment for purposeful people.
  • “I would get about two weeks in, and I would be crawling... probably three days.” (29:58 – Carolyn)
  • “We need purpose. We need a reason to exist, and we find that purpose in responsibility.” (29:27 – Carolyn)
• Shifting Perspectives:
  The “Instagram version” of rest is unrealistic; instead, aim for a slower, more thoughtful pace where joy is actively chosen.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Mindset and Rest:
  “You can use all of everyday life circumstances as an excuse to be stressed and not even realize that it’s been a choice that we’ve made to be stressed rather than a result of a schedule. Because you can be at rest wherever you are or you can be at stress wherever you are in whatever circumstances.”
  — Carolyn (01:09, repeated at 22:33)

• On Teenagers and Control:
  “I don't think you realize when you have little kids, like, you just can control your whole entire life, can't you? … And then it all changes.”
  — Lisa (12:54)

• On Micro-Decisions:
  “Maybe it’s the micro decisions that actually are affecting us a lot more than even the macro what’s on our to do list... Every moment I get to choose am I going to be stressed by something or am I going to choose gratitude?”
  — Carolyn (26:40)

• On Overcommitment:
  “It’s hard to find joy in anything when you have too many commitments. … It’s hard to even have joy at the breakfast table when I feel over committed somewhere else.”
  — Carolyn (45:07)

• On Individual Rhythms:
  “Making your daily rhythm what serves you. Not what somebody else says you should do, but something that actually works for you. And recognizing if something’s not working, it’s okay to cut it out and say, this doesn’t work for me.”
  — Carolyn (52:41)

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• [03:18] — Carolyn introduces her family, their homestead, and the origin of the “year of rest.”
• [06:08] — How rest was defined and implemented (no big projects, maintenance-mode only).
• [12:06] — The “rest year” derailed by daughter’s wedding and cabin-building.
• [09:39], [21:16] — Discussion of rhythms vs. rigid schedules in large families.
• [22:33] — On the mindset of stress/rest, and Carolyn’s news/social media input experiment.
• [29:21] — Why total idleness isn’t real rest; humans need purpose.
• [34:33] — Structuring household for “me time” and practical rest.
• [36:22] — How they handled business commitments; the decision to curtail speaking gigs.
• [45:07] — The “joy barometer” for over-commitment.
• [49:21] — Being honest with yourself and household routines (specifically with breakfast).
• [52:41] — Encouragement to find what genuinely works for your own personality, family, and season of life.

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Closing / Resources

• Homesteading Family
  Website: homesteadingfamily.com
  Platforms: YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, Everyday Homesteading Podcast
  "Find Your Peaceful Homestead Rhythm" eight-week challenge offered inside the Homestead Kitchen membership.

• Lisa Bass
  Blog: farmhouseonboone.com
  Courses: Simple Sourdough, Fresh Ferments, Freshly Milled Grains

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Final Takeaway

Rest for the overwhelmed mom isn’t about stopping all activity but about setting wise limits, working from a place of peace, aligning your daily rhythm with your real life, and being intentional with micro-choices and commitments. Letting go of comparison—and being honest about your own needs and preferences—can help foster lasting joy and contentment, even in the busiest seasons.

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Transcript

[A]

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[B]

Use all of everyday life circumstances as an excuse to be stressed and not even realize that it's been a choice that we've made to be stressed rather than a result of a schedule. Because you can be at rest wherever you are or you can be at stress wherever you are in whatever circumstances circumstance you are. So I think that's for me a big takeaway is that just because you remove the things that you feel like are stressing you out doesn't mean that you're automatically resting or working from a place of peace or rest.

[C]

My name is Lisa, mother of nine and creator of the blog and YouTube.

[A]

Channel Farmhouse on Boone. On this podcast I like to talk about simplifying your life so you can live out your priorities.

[C]

I help you learn how to cook.

[A]

From scratch and decorate on a budget through this podcast and my courses Simple Sourdough and the Simple Sewing Series. I will leave links links to these resources in the show notes in description box below. Now let's get into the show.

[C]

Welcome back to the Simple Farmhouse Life Podcast. Today Carolyn from Homesteading Family and I are going to talk about rest. Rest as a mom, as a homesteader, a homemaker, potentially a business owner. Carolyn and her husband Josh planned for for a year of rest six plus years ago I guess seven years ago and they followed through with it. So this last year they did a year of rest. She's going to help us talk about what that looked like, how to not over commit on your schedule so that you're not feeling stress all the time. I think she has some really great insights. So let's dive in. All right, Carolyn, welcome to the show. I'm looking forward to chatting with you, catching up with, going to talk about your year of rest, which I find very intriguing and weirdly exciting to talk about because I'm in a very busy season of life. So let's start with introductions for those who don't know what we're talking about this year of rest, tell us about you homesteading family and just, yeah, some quick introductions.

[B]

Yeah, well, hey, let's see. Jo. My husband Josh and I live in the far north of Idaho and we also have a large family. We have 11 children. We now have one grandbaby, we have two that are married and one that's engaged. So we're, we're kind of growing and it's yeah, really busy season. I actually thought that things would slow down. Oh, silly.

[C]

That's what every young mom thinks. Well, yeah, like years ago, ever since.

[B]

Newborn stage, I was like, you know, when they get to the next stage it'll be easier. It'll slow down a little. And when they get to the next stage and then I thought when they become adults, it'll down a little bit. Oh no, that doesn't happen. So anyways, yeah, but up here we have a really active, really full homestead and you know, we're always busy doing things. Josh and I are project people. We love being busy. We love doing stuff. Between the two of us, we run homesteading family and the school of traditional skills. So you know, that just means on a business side we're always doing business sort of projects. We love to teach and share about homesteading. And so when we moved on to this piece of property eight years ago now, Josh made an announcement at the beginning. He said, I think we should work for six years knowing that we're project people and that we are going to work ourselves into the ground probably on a new property that we hope is our long term property. So it's like finally we get to make this what we want it to be. And then he said, I think we should take a year, the seventh year and we should slow down and not do major projects on the 7th.

[C]

That's some serious long term planning right there.

[B]

I laughed at him actually.

[C]

Yeah, yeah.

[B]

I was like, yeah, right. That's funny. That's a really sweet idea. I love it, you know, and just kind of thought, oh, when it gets to it, there's no way that we will actually do that, because again, we're just. Just, we're doers, we're goers, and we like doing things. And so. So we got to the seventh year and he was still serious about it. And so we were like, okay, how do we make this happen? And that just kind of really kicked off a different year for us. That didn't go entirely the way we had planned, but definitely gave us some elements of rest. Yeah.

[C]

Okay, so this was last year.

[A]

Correct.

[C]

Like, you guys are coming out of. Because you said you've been there eight years.

[B]

Yeah.

[C]

So your season of rest. So we can not just talk about it like this future thing. But you have things you learned from it. And he actually followed through. So what did that look like as far as animals, gardens?

[B]

What did.

[C]

What was the year of rest?

[B]

Well, even with kids, you know, even if we sold off the animals and decided not to garden for a year, it's like, are we going to take a year off chores? No, you can't really do that. You still have to do life. You still have to feed everybody. We still have to take care care of things. So right off, we qualified what we meant by a year of rest as saying, we'll still do all the normal maintenance items, but we're not doing major projects. We're not adding new skills or new systems to the homestead, and we're not doing any big infrastructure projects on the homestead. Because up till this point, you know, every year we're like, let's terrace the hill in the front and turn it into a garden. Let's, you know, revamp the pasture that's not holding enough grazing animals and get it to where it's holding more animals for grazing season, which up here in North Idaho is pretty short. So it's really important to really make sure your pasture is in great shape so you can hold animals as long as you can. You know, we were doing remodels on the house. We're doing additions on the house. We built a house for mom and dad on the property. You know, all these different things that have been happening. So right off, we kind of said none of those. That all stops. So that was pretty easy. Like, we thought that was going to be pretty easy, I should say.

[C]

That sounds straightforward.

[B]

We're in control of the infrastructure, usually is what we think. We had a few surprises that crept up on us, but we'll get into that in a minute. So that was kind of the infrastructure side for us. No major infrastructure projects. No major project. And what that, what we realized pretty quickly is that it's really easy to redefine project in your mind as soon as you want to get something done. Like, that's not a project, that's a hobby I enjoy. So that right on a rescue. So we had to keep encouraging each other, like, no, no, scale back, do the hobbies you already love and don't bring on a new one and, you know, give some room for some other things. But what we didn't scale back on was the gardening systems we were already doing, the animal systems we already had in place, the milk cow, you know, kind of all the normal everyday things that we usually do. But because we didn't have these major projects that started opening up a lot of time for us, that we were able to, like, get our chores done more quickly and in a more relaxed way throughout the week, and that would open up all day. Saturdays for us are usually project days around the home. Because we didn't have all these projects, we were able to spend a lot more time doing fun things during the Saturdays.

[C]

Well, I think your version of rest sounds like a lot of people's version of really hard work. I don't know if that's maybe not what people are expecting with rest, but for someone who pushes as hard as you, managing what you've already learned, what you already have in place, the children you already have probably did feel like rest for you because it was stepping back from the projects that you were currently used to, like, planning for. What were some of the. You mentioned some setbacks along the way.

[B]

Yeah, well, let me just, let me just tackle, you know, touch on that idea of, like, in our household, we have so many hands to help. And one of the things that I talk a lot about over at Homesteading Family, also in our everyday homesteading podcast, is this idea of living by rhythm instead of by a schedule. And it's something we're talking about a lot right now, is that, you know, your everyday work, even on the homestead, even when it's full, doesn't have to be stressful or heavy.

[A]

Right.

[B]

It can be rhythmic and it can actually be very peaceful and very enjoyable. And so we try to kind of live by that all the time. So for Josh and I, what feels like the heavy pieces are the extras, you know, that the big projects and the big thing, the rest of it's just kind of fits into life and everybody knows what they do, everybody plays a part on the homestead and it just kind of gets done in a pretty peaceful way for the most part. Obviously you mix children and animals and all of that and you always have a surprise coming at you, but for the most part, it's pretty relaxed and mellow. So, yeah, what we didn't expect in all of this is that our daughter got engaged and decided to get married in October of the year.

[A]

Well, it was the year.

[B]

And asked, can we have our wedding on the homestead? For one, which I've never planned a wedding. I now have. I have one under my belt. I have probably a lot more to do.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And so right there we had a wedding on the homestead, which is a pretty big project. But then on top of that kind of the blessing of all blessings, she and her fiance asked if they could move on to the homestead and continue homesteading alongside of us, which has kind of been our dream since we landed here, is to have a place where children can, you know, have a little home of their own, have their own space. Not in our home or anything, but they can still be part of the family in a way that, you know, helps us all to be able to support each other. So what that meant, though hidden in those words and that excitement of that dream was, oh, we need a place to live.

[C]

Yes.

[B]

And in north Idaho, it's not an ideal circumstance to just try and live in a camper trailer over the winter, you know, can be very cold.

[C]

Right.

[B]

And so that meant that in a matter of about six to eight weeks, Josh and all the boys and our new son in law built a, a small cabin on the property before the wedding. So kind of starting in about August, we were go, go, go to get through the wedding. So that was not expected. But it's one of those things you're not going to say no to.

[C]

Right.

[B]

You know, oh, no, you can't get married right now. It's our year of rest. So. So, yeah, we just jumped into that and we actually had a blast with the whole thing. We made a lot of memories, built a house, put on a gorgeous wedding and they're here on the property and we just love it. Absolutely. But it did kind of change our year.

[C]

Yep, yep. It's kind of funny how that worked out. Right? Like the one year that you don't have as much control because your kids are older. And that's the one thing, like I would say to sum it all up in a word, what I've learned about having older kids is just the lack of and that's three words. But the lack of control. I don't think you realize when you have little kids, like you just can control your whole entire life, can't you? Yep. And then it all changes.

[B]

Yeah. And it's exciting and it's good, but it's exactly that. No, you're no longer the one that's making the schedule. You're just kind of living by other people's schedules in ways as they get older. You know, you want to be there when the new grandbabies are born. You want to be part of all these things. And so you kind of have to get a little more fluid with your schedule than you do when you have littles. And you can. Yes, exactly what you said. It's like, well, we're gonna adjust nap time by 15 minutes today. Like you've got this micro control even when you don't feel like you do everything.

[A]

Everything.

[B]

Yeah.

[C]

It's like we're gonna. Like you don't tell anybody what you're gonna do after, like you just literally put them in the car and go like you do whatever you want. Yeah.

[A]

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[C]

Or not adult but with adult children you could just opt out. You could just choose like to just be like forget it. But obviously that's not what you want to do and that's not what I want to do. So with that they have their own. Yeah, like you're not going to plan when they have a baby or when they get married. That's all just up to them.

[B]

So I always think of having kids as God's maturation plan for us adults.

[C]

Yes.

[B]

Start in this phase and then you graduate to the next phase. And now we're in a phase of like okay, yeah, I really don't have control. So yeah, this is for the, like I did for a while.

[C]

But yeah, it's so, so true that, that that's exactly how it is. So it's so hard to. I know this is a bit off topic but to compare what your life is like to someone who's a lot further on because they've learned things that only going through that can really teach you. So.

[B]

Yeah, I think that's a good thought. It's hard to mentally exist anywhere where you aren't right now, at least for me. I have a hard time seeing myself outside of my current situation. So.

[C]

Well, there's just variables you don't expect. Like one of my sisters was saying that young moms always talk about, like, what it would be like to have teenagers to help.

[B]

Right.

[C]

But they always forget to add, like, anything about a teenager or an adult. That would be also difficult. Like they only see it.

[B]

Oh, my goodness. I'm about to hand you to somebody. Speaking of teenagers, I had no idea how much talking I was going to have to do and listening as we got older.

[C]

Yes.

[B]

Like, yeah, picture of. I'll have another driver and they can go do errands. I didn't formulate in the idea that. No, you're going to spend lots of hours listening.

[C]

Yeah, yeah. So, yeah, I think what her point, and I had never kind of thought about it the way she said it because she's a young mom and she said that, you know, young moms think of what it would be like to have like, older kids helping out with certain things. And she said, but they just only can think of it helping their current situation. Like I would have somebody to entertain or somebody to drive them somewhere, she said, but with none of the additional, you know, parts that they would add. You know, maybe like all like you said, like, now we have a wedding to plan, which is amazing and beautiful and something you all look forward to. But to think life will just slow down because, you know, now you, you have help is something maybe not to think.

[B]

I. Lisa, I'm really sorry. I'm getting a call from my teenage daughter, adult daughter, who has all my kids out skiing, and she said, no worries, an emergency. I need to call her right now. It might just be a 30 second call.

[C]

No worries.

[B]

Just like do that here and.

[C]

Yeah, go right ahead.

[B]

Yep. Okay. Somebody just either sprained or broke something up on the ski mountain. But you know, young, she's my daughter's 19 and super sweet and she just was like, do I bring him home right now? Do I have to take him to the emergency room? What do I do?

[C]

Oh, no.

[B]

Ask him how he's doing and if he's okay to sit while other people ski, let them ski and if not, bring them all right home. That's okay. So, yeah, you're an hour and a half. So we're good to keep going. So thank.

[A]

Okay.

[C]

Even if they come straight Home. They're not getting here anytime soon.

[B]

No. Plus, you learn this many kids in, too. This is the other parenting thing. When to panic and when not to. Because, you know, a sprained, maybe broken wrist is definitely. Does not fall in the emergency category. It deals. It can be urgent, Deal with it quickly, but we don't have to get upset about it category at this point.

[C]

Absolutely. Yeah. There's so many times that certain things come up and I'm like, I would have worried about this as a young mom, and now I know.

[A]

Okay.

[C]

And you know, certain kids, too. Like, if some certain kids are hurt, it's bad. And if certain other kids are hurt, you're like, it might be okay.

[B]

You know what I mean?

[C]

You got a little bit of that going on.

[B]

Yeah. Well, the one that just got hurt is the one who always just got hurt. And he's very tough, but, like, he's the only one who's had stitches and broken things and.

[C]

Okay.

[B]

Split things and cracked teeth and he's just. Yeah. Lives a little harder than the rest of us or something. Yeah, right.

[C]

Exactly. I have one like that, too. I hope he makes it.

[B]

Yeah. Please just stay alive. Like with all your body parts would be nice.

[C]

All you can do. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So you were talking earlier about just your rhythm of the day and how when you don't add any additional projects, how simple that feels. And I can relate so much to that because right now we're in the middle of building a house, so it's like, very mentally consuming. And there are certain days where for whatever reason, nothing's happening at the house. Like, the stuff just didn't quite overlap and we're just doing like a regular day at home. And I'm like, this isn't even tough. Like, just us doing our normal school, our normal chores, our normal afternoons, just exactly how it goes without any additional projects is actually quite a break. So I think that again, we were talking about it being difficult to imagine certain. Certain people with their lives because you have 11 kids. And I know not all of them are home because a lot of them are grown up, but when you're not, when you don't have 11 kids, you think, how on earth could that ever feel? Like a, you know, just like a regular everyday. Not chaotic and crazy, but it actually can when you don't have the other variables. So I think I understand how that actually could be, like, rest, even though I don't have 11 kids. But that makes sense to me.

[B]

Yeah. Well. And, you know, I think when you think about Life as living by rhythm. And this is just. This is one of the takeaways that I have from. We'll call it the first half of my rest year. Because the second half maybe didn't work out. The first half of the rest year is that. But you can take away all of the projects, you can take away all of the things. I mean, let's be serious. You can be on vacation and still be worked up and stressed, right? Yeah. You can be on the beach and be totally overwhelmed by stress about something, or you can be working, you can be doing all the things, and you can be very rested and working from a place of peace. And I think this is one of my big takeaways, is that we do need to manage what we're doing. I think most of us, especially as homesteaders, we're. We're go getters. We want to make things happen. We're doers, we're hard workers. I think we overwhelm ourselves and overload our schedule. I think that's a very normal thing to do. Take on too many projects for our own good. But on the other hand, I think we can use all of everyday life circumstances as an excuse to be stressed and not even realize that it's been a choice that we've made to be stressed rather than a result of a schedule. Because, Right. You can be at rest wherever you are, or you can be at stress wherever you are, in whatever circumstance you are. So I think that's, for me, a big takeaway is that just because you remove the things that you feel like are stressing you out doesn't mean that you're automatically resting or working from a place of peace or rest. And you know, again, where I'm talking about this a lot right now, because I'm hearing from a lot of people. I don't know about you, but a lot of people are using the word overwhelmed right now. Yeah, I'm overwhelmed with this. I'm overwhelmed with that. And what I keep saying is like, well, if you take an overwhelmed life and you start adding homesteading skill, you start adding a milk cow to that, or chickens, or preserving food or baking your own bread to that, you just get a more overwhelmed life. Like, you're not making yourself more rested by doing more things. So we have to kind of step back and say, why am I in this situation in the first place? Why am I feeling so stressed? Why do I feel overwhelmed? And it might not because. Be because of the things you think it is. For me, one of the things that I did Late this last year, when I realized maybe I wasn't as, as rested as I wanted to be, I went and I took all the news apps off my phone and I literally, in place of the news apps and the social media apps, I dropped little Bible verse apps like, so that, because, you know, sometimes you pick up your phone and you're like going to things before you even notice it. Yeah. You're like, what was I doing tapping on it? And all of a sudden I've got a Bible verse sitting there looking at me instead of news headlines or some social media. And it was like that right there. I think that was worth several months of not doing work around the homestead. The amount of peace that I felt almost instantly, as soon as I slowed down that input that was coming into my brain, the stuff that says this is bad, you should be worried like stress out about this. And I'm not even a stressor. Like, that is not my go to thing to be a high stress person, anxious person. Yeah, I'm pretty optimistic. I roll with the punches pretty. But that constant, like, I have to filter this, I have to filter this. It creates a level of stress because you're just constantly having to filter out these negative messages to your own brain. So I think for me, some of my big takeaways is that maybe it's the micro decisions that actually are affecting us a lot more than even the macro what's on our to do list. Because, you know, there's so much of that every moment I get to choose am I going to be stressed by something or am I going to choose gratitude? You know, am I going to walk in worry and fear or negative thoughts? Or am I going to choose to actually look to the Lord and say, hey, I, I believe what you said. And so I'm going to walk in hope and joy over this. And it's like those moment by moment decisions, what am I taking in, you know, what am I dwelling on mentally? And then what's coming back out of my mouth? Because that just fuels anything positive or negative. Whatever you're saying, oh man, that fuels you and your whole environment around you. I mean, as A Mom, you 100% know this. If you get negative and start pushing on the kids in a negative way, the whole house gets super down. Like it's fast in my home. But if I start, like, how do I encourage people around me? The entire attitude lifts and it's better. So it's like those three things I think actually have way more power over us than the, than these big things. Like the big infrastructure projects or the big to do lists in a day. Because when I get those things right, like, what's going on in here and what's coming back out of my mouth, all of a sudden, all those other things are just. They're just the next thing to do, right? Yeah. They're not a stress, they're not a problem. They're not heavy. They're just like, yeah, that's what I get to do next. Yes.

[C]

And I think, like you said, you could be stressed on a beach. Like, we've. I've had times where there really wasn't a great reason why I should be so stressed because there wasn't a whole lot going on. And I think when people think, okay, milking a cow, baking bread, having all these children, you're homeschooling sometimes, like you mentioned, the decision fatigue, having a rhythm like that and just kind of knowing, like, okay, one foot in front of the other, like, there's no part of the day that feels like there's 25,000 things demanding your attention because you've cleared your environment, whether that be on your phone or whatever, it's not really so much what you're doing, and especially when you have that kind of structure to your day, that kind of rhythm, you don't even have to necessarily question what the next thing is to the point where it can actually make your day more peaceful than when there are a lot of decisions that need to be made of how to spend time, and then you can end up spending some time maybe doing things that affect your brain in a negative way. I'm saying this because it's. I think sometimes we think if we just do nothing, like, if we could just sit on a couch for a year, then we would have a year of rest. But I think that's not really true.

[B]

But I don't think we'd be happy with it.

[C]

No.

[B]

Honestly, no.

[C]

We would feel something to worry about, probably.

[B]

We would find something to worry about. And, you know, I think humans need purpose. We need. We need a reason to exist, and we find that purpose in responsibility. And so, you know, in places where we're responsible for, in places we see move forward under our care, that gives us a lot of purpose, and that purpose brings us a lot of joy. And so, you know, if you were to just go, oh, Josh and I are always joking about a month in Fiji, you know, and I think I would get about two weeks in, and I would be crawling probably three days.

[A]

Seriously?

[B]

Yeah. Oh, you may be a worse doer. Than I am.

[C]

Oh, I could never. I have gone on, like, beach vacations and find them so difficult. Like, yeah, I am. I. I would have a really hard time.

[B]

You would too.

[C]

I think you're just thinking that because you haven't tried it.

[B]

Yeah, well, I mean, and that's. That's our joke is that we'd be crawling out of our skin in a couple of days. As much as it sounds lovely, it's like you. I. We would still have to do something. We would be fishing, we would be out climbing, I don't know, coconut trees to find, you know, to produce something, to bring some value because we need to be doing something. And so I think this is this really kind of idealized form of rest in our mind that we have to do nothing.

[C]

Yes, there is.

[A]

Absolutely.

[B]

Yeah. And that. That's kind of like, you know, that's the Instagram version of rest for us. Like that highly idealized thing that's not even realistic. Instead of this, like. No, we can slow down to a pace where we can be thoughtful, mindful of our own thoughts, mindful of our own actions, and take care of ourselves maybe in a more thorough way than our everyday. Like, you know, go, go, go. Is that we usually have. So we can slow down a little, but we can still maintain a maintenance pace for ourselves, and we can be really, you know, comfortable and at rest with that. If we get the mindset part right, that just says, I can choose joy.

[C]

Yeah.

[B]

That is really ultimately what it comes down to. Am I joyful right now in this moment? Yeah.

[C]

Today I was cleaning up the house because it's. Well, as we're recording, it's Tuesday, and yesterday there was a lot of other stuff, so I needed to get, like, a lot of cleaning done from the weekend. And I was thinking, man, if you are a new homemaker and you are frustrated that it's a repetitive thing like that it just never ends. Like, the house isn't going to ever be clean. Like, you can try to stay up with making it decent and all that, but for it to be perfectly clean, people would have to just leave and not live there. And if you have that in your mind, this is going to be a very disappointing job. Job for you. Like being a homemaker, caring for a homestead. Like, you can't expect that there won't be anything demanded of you. But I think the. The idea, the takeaway is that it can all be joyful, too.

[B]

Yeah. And, you know, I like to see the things that are. Could be considered monotonous, you Know, especially as a mom, the moment you clean the house, it gets dirty again. The moment you make the meal, it gets consumed. You know, the moment you need the garden, they're growing back at the beginning of the row by the time you get to the end of the row. And so it feels like this can be, you know, all the time in your face, that you're just not making progress. And one, I started knitting for this exact reason, because somebody said, you need something that stays done.

[C]

Okay, finish.

[B]

And it's like, yes, I know some people quilt or other things, but it's like, I have a product that is done, and I love that, you know, so it's really fulfilling. But also, it's. Again, it's just this mindset shift that says, I can choose to see this as an opportunity to practice. Yeah. You know, because those are the hard moments. The moments that you're scrubbing the toilet again, the moments that the baby is, you know, poopy again. And I. You know, I've had a lot of my life where I've had two and three in diapers at the same time. And it's like, oh, my goodness, is my whole life about changing diapers? And. And it's like, well, God just gave us an amazing crash course here with a lot of practice. You know, those practice problems in the math section for the kids. Right. Like, we're getting that practice problem over and over again where we're just gonna drive home this opportunity to be thankful and grateful. And it's like, we get to practice and test it and test it and try. That way, when we do have those harder moments where things really do go wrong, you know, we have all of this practice under our belt with these little things that aren't really that hard. You know, they feel hard in the moment. Doing the dishes again feel hard in the moment. But when you stand back and go, you know, I'm not watching a child starve.

[A]

Right.

[B]

Those are the hard things that happen in the world. And so it's like, let's practice here with the things that are easy.

[C]

Yeah. I think the thing that made me the most frustrated when I was like, now I'm just. It's just kind of what it is. But the expectation that you would have, like, all of this free time, like, you. A lot of moms will ask. I'm sure you could ask that all the time, too. What about your, you know, your own personal time? And I think at just some point, you realize it's just maybe not something you have to necessarily have A large quantity of to, to thrive. If you're taking those moments throughout the day that you have joy with just what you're, with what you're doing.

[B]

Yeah, yeah, definitely. I, I now maybe it's because I have so many older kids to help in the house, so I do feel like I get quite a bit of time. But even when the kids were little, you know, Josh and I would be up early enough that we could have a little bit of quiet time. We could have a cup of coffee together, first thing, a little bit of prayer time. And, and so we did shape that into our days. We always have. Nap time for me is like a law in my house, especially when little, everybody takes nap at the same time. Even if they're too old for nap, they get to sit quietly with a book for which in my house is like the best reward you could ever give a child is like book time, reading time. And so, you know, but I would get a specific time to take care of myself a little bit. But you know, especially when you have all those littles, it's never what you feel like you could use, you know, to keep take care of yourself.

[C]

Yeah, yeah, it could definitely be, it can definitely be a challenge. Now I am personally just curious, did you guys do any kind of rest with the business? Now I know the business carried on, but was there less projects or how did you approach that during your year of rest or your six months of rest?

[B]

We did, we actually, especially for homesteading family, said no new projects, no new major things and we did pretty well with that. I did not release a brand new class, which is, you know, that's kind of a break for me right there. Not having some major class that I'm going to film. But you know, again, in maintenance mode is kind of what we said. Is it something that we normally do to just kind of keep, keep the engines running in the background? And if the answer was yes, then we went ahead and did those things. And sometimes that was, you know, filming lessons or things for inside the membership to keep that going and moving ahead. But, but in a broad sense there wasn't any big pressing projects for us business wise. We also said no to all of the speaking engagements and everything like that, which was wonderful. And honestly I've come away from it realizing those create a lot of stress for me and I don't know how many of them I'm gonna do moving forward. We've already said yes to a few this year, but after that I, I having a break from it. I realized that's like a disproportionate amount of stress for the amount of, you know, time that you actually are doing. The speaking.

[C]

I do, yeah.

[B]

That's a lot of energy. And getting ready for. For, you know, major speaking engagements is a lot of energy for me and a lot of mental work.

[C]

Yes. I had the exact same thought and said no to everything. And I'm. I'm never. Probably I say never, but who knows? I can't say never say never, but pretty much sure I'll never say yes to another one. To be honest, I'm like, yeah, I don't know why, but mentally, it is something that you feel like you need to prepare for so much. So it's not just the actual travel and the time on the stage. It's just like, thinking through, like, do I have something valid to say? Which is so funny, because you and I both. We have YouTube channels, we have podcasts, so we talk to thousands of people, but somehow standing in front of them physically feels like a really big deal, right?

[B]

Yeah. Well, especially if you have to have a slide deck. That's the one that gets me. I'm like, oh, my goodness, how did this come into being like that? I have to actually speak in that way. But, yeah, and then I know I've seen you at getting. I've gotten to be at conferences with you, and I'm not coming up with the right word. Conferences, Festivals.

[C]

Yeah.

[A]

Convention. Yeah.

[B]

And it's. It's a very socially engaging moment for people like you and I where we get to talk to people all over the place, which is so much fun. Like, that is my favorite part of being at an event like that is getting to talk to all the people. But when you combine that with having to be on stage and having to teach and then if you have your kids involved, you know, making sure that the family's still taken care of, it does. It gets really exhausting and. And it can be hard to do. So anyways, I mean, for me, that was a big takeaway of when I got to say no to those, because I was like, no, I'm having a year off. I. Every single time I wanted to do a happy dance in the background, I was like, I. That should. Should cue a part of my brain that says, maybe this is a sign that this isn't something I should be doing in this season of life.

[C]

Yeah.

[A]

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[C]

How do you decide? You know, so that was a year of rest. So it was pretty easy to say, okay, this is why we aren't doing xyz. And I've heard a lot of like business expert people say unless it's like a oh yeah for sure kind of thing, then you should say no. And so I try to kind of adopt that attitude. But then also there's some things that are like, well, you know, it, it would be a good thing to do, but it's not like a. I don't know if I have enough things that are like for sure, yes, let's do it. So how do you. And I'm sure you've heard this advice too, too. How do you decide? As you know with homesteading family, I'm sure you get tons of opportunities what to say no to and what to allow.

[B]

And that's. That is really hard for Josh and I because we created homesteading family because we wanted to help people, not because we wanted to make money or have a business or any of those things because we literally Wanted to help people. So it can be, you know, if you. If you go into something like this purely from the. It's a business side, I think it's a lot easier to make that decision because you're like, well, what is. You know, is this making me money? Yeah. What's the ROI of this for us? We're like, we would teach even if we were doing it for free, because we're here for helping get. Like, the struggle I went through to learn these things as a young mom and not know anybody around me who was doing what I was doing was so frustrating and so real that as soon as I started being like, okay, I've lived this enough to know that I've got it figured out, I was like, I have to go help other people. I have to help other moms who are doing the same thing, and they want better answers for their families, but they can't struggle the way that I have been, like, so stubborn and, like, I'm gonna figure it out. And. And so that makes it really hard to say no. And Josh and I are always having to talk to each other, like. Like, what do you think? We could go. We could go do this. It would really help them out. It would really help these people out. Like, yes. But we have to save energy for our own family and our own, too. And so I don't think I have a good answer for you on how we make.

[C]

Yeah, it's okay.

[B]

Yeah.

[C]

It's tricky, though, because there are so many factors involved. And I think also, I don't know if you're like this, but future me doesn't have any time constraints. Future me has no projects. And so a lot of times I'll commit to things in the future. And when they come around, I'm like, oh, if they had said last week, do you want to do this? I probably would have said no.

[B]

Right.

[C]

But since they said it, you know, a year ago, like, speaking engagements would be an example of that to where it's like, oh, I'll worry about that, you know, six months from now or whatever. And so I think it can be tricky to know. And then, you know, if you're not with a YouTube channel or a podcast, there's for sure opportunities like that.

[B]

That.

[C]

That it's hard to decide in your own life. Like, is this conducive to my current family? Just finding that balance of when to say no and when to take things on, I think is tricky to make sure you're not burnt out, to make sure that you have enough good things to do. Because I do think sometimes it's possible to have too. Too few things to work toward that could make it to where it can almost be like hard to always be thinking about what the next step is. But yeah, it's. It's a tricky one.

[B]

You know, somebody said to me once when I had a season where I had taken on way too many commitments to try to help other people and show up at places and you know, it's. It's very hard when your mission is wrapped up with your business because it's like, wow, yeah, I want to help the people. And it's a good business idea, isn't it? Like.

[C]

Right.

[B]

You know, it's easy to convince yourself. But I had taken on too many of these things and I was feeling very. A lot of stress about it of just like that feeling that you're constantly pushed, like you have to go faster and faster and do more all the time. And an older lady that I really respect said it's hard to find joy in anything when you have too many commitments. And I felt like that was just such a guiding factor for me after that, it was like, yes, that's what I'm feeling like. It's hard to even have joy at the breakfast table when I feel over committed somewhere else.

[C]

Even during easy things like the beach, you know.

[B]

Yeah, exactly. We're back at the beach and we're stressed out because three months from now I might have a speaking engagement, you know.

[C]

Right. And you're like, I really should be working on those slides.

[B]

Yeah, exactly. And so it's like, for me, that has started to become my barometer is if it's starting to affect my stress level to where I can't feel joy when I'm just having a tea party with my daughters, you know, if I'm.

[C]

Always like something that's not tied to any mission, money, whatever, I mean, it is obviously like time with your daughters, but you can't tie it to anything tangible.

[B]

Right. And if I can't sit and enjoy that because I'm so worried about all these other things or they won't just stop spinning in my head, then I'm doing too much and I need to be able to.

[C]

So that's a really good point and a good way to look at it. It. Because I think that that's probably different for each person, but it's something that you can feel.

[B]

Yeah.

[C]

For yourself. Like, like you said, if you're sitting there having breakfast, which should just be a moment where you're resting there's really, you're eating good food. If you're feeling stressed during that, then that, that is, that's a good, a good barometer. And how do you go about. I know you just did your year of rest or your six months of rest. So it's kind of straightforward when you're doing that. But how on a everyday like now, in 2026, you're no longer on your year of rest. How do you decide as it's going? Like, I don't know, I feel like sometimes you commit to a bunch of things then future you is not enjoying breakfast. So it's like, okay, well how do we pull back from all this?

[B]

Yeah, you know, sometimes I feel like you kind of get into this zone where you're like too much, too much. But that doesn't stop the commitments that you've already made right now. Correct?

[C]

Yes. That's what I'm getting at.

[B]

So you kind of have this maybe a little bit of a fallback position is what I would, would call it of like this is where I sit the kids down and go, I've gotten a little over committed. I have a lot on my plate. I need a little extra help to get through this. To get through it. And then here's what I'm doing so that we don't live in this space. You know, I'm canceling the things out in the future. I'm saying no to things out in the future so we don't have to live in this. Because you'll burn people out around you really fast too.

[A]

Oh yeah.

[B]

Always in a stress state. But if you're like, oh man, here I, I got myself here and I need to get out, people are really willing to step in and help. You know, on the business side sometimes it means hiring somebody to do some jobs. And you know, on the business side that's not always easy because you have to train people to do them properly. But you know, taking that fallback position of saying what projects do I have that I can cancel and say this was over, optimistic, I need to put it down. And then calling in the support where you can't and making sure you make a change for the future because it's so easy to do that. And then the pressure lightens up a little bit and you're like, ah, actually I'm fine. And then you just do it and you're right there again. And so it's like, no, you have to actually say, I can only do this much and that's okay.

[C]

Yeah. And maybe it's you know, it's a moving target, depending on what you have going on in your life, like if you're about to have a new baby or there's a wedding coming up, whatever it may be. So it's not as straightforward as just saying, this is what I can handle because it's not always going to be exactly like that. So, yeah, I like the idea of them helping you get through it and then not making that mistake again.

[B]

Yeah. And I, I think like, telling ourselves the truth is a major thing and it's, it can be really hard to do. And I'm, I'll go back to a time of my life where I had all these hungry people, all these kids. Josh loves a big, hearty breakfast. I'm not a breakfast person. I don't like breakfast. I don't want to look at breakfast. It makes me feel a little like if I have to look at food too early in the morning and. But you know, part of my brain said, well, to be a good mom, you're going to get up and you're going to feed. My mom did this every morning. She was always at the stove feeding us. It didn't matter if we had to walk out the door at 6am them, you know, she made sure we had a hot breakfast. She just was determined. This was her little rebellion in the world. Like, you will not eat cereal. You will eat a good hot. Yeah. And so, you know, seeing that as a mom, I was like, what's, what's the matter with me that I don't want to do this, that every morning I'm dragging my feet. And it wasn't until I like got over the, you should be, you know, here's what you should. And, and just kind of got realistic and said, the reality is, is I'm not a morning food person. As soon as I recognize that, all of a sudden there were like a ton of, of solutions. Okay. You know, I can make, make ahead breakfasts. I can make casseroles the day before breakfast casseroles that I just slide into the oven and I never even have to look at an ingredient. You know, I could do all these things to still achieve my goal of making sure my family has a good, hearty, protein rich breakfast in the morning without going against my own nature and like fighting it the whole time of. I just am not a morning person. So now we just have in our regular chore rotation people, Monday morning people make three baked oatmeals that are egg heavy. Tuesday morning, they make a couple of really egg heavy French Toast casseroles. And then, you know, other days of the week, we slide in some other variable ones, depending on what's going on. And so every morning, just slide a breakfast casserole right in, have it out, and everybody can be sitting at the table by, you know, 7 o', clock, 8 o', clock, depending on the season. And I've never had to touch food. And so it's like, yeah, being. Being honest with ourselves. Yeah. The solution starts.

[C]

I think that's so important too, because you talk to other moms. Like, I'm really, really close with my sister, and so we talk about everything all the time. And the way that we, like, hit the ground in the morning is completely different. And I'm like, I'm not gonna feel bad about the way I hit the ground because I like to sit and drink coffee. I don't. Like, she gets up and she's going like, she's, you know, she's got, like, her day. I want to sip coffee for a solid 30 minutes, maybe longer. And it's okay. Like, we might just have to do all the things that you do just later. But I'm gonna make sure, because that's something that Luke and I both love to do. We've always done it that way. We went on vacation one time with them, and we were like, chill, like, calm down. You know, because that's just.

[B]

It's just different.

[C]

And so it's okay. And it's okay to be different, too, because we both get the things done that we need to get done, but we approach it very differently. And so I think we. It is important to be honest with yourself.

[B]

Yeah. And, you know, sometimes your energy is higher, sometimes it's lower. You know, if you've got autoimmune stuff, you might have moments where you're just. Just. It's. It's not your moment to be hiding and, you know, or it's a baby season, or you have an aging parent that you're taking care of and there's some illness there. Like, there's all these different things that just change life. And so, you know, one thing we really talk about at homesteading family is like, making this what serves you. Making your daily rhythm what serves you. Not what somebody else says you should do, but something that actually works for you. And recognizing if something's not working, it's okay to cut it out and say, this doesn't work for me. Yeah, that doesn't make you a failure. It doesn't make you less. It just makes you different, which you're supposed to be. You're supposed to be you, and you're supposed to be different.

[A]

Yeah.

[C]

And we all have our things that we, like, swear by, you know, like, this is. This works so well. Like, I'm trying to convince you, like.

[B]

You should do this. It works so well.

[C]

And then for another person, it just very well might not.

[A]

So.

[C]

Yeah, I think that's important.

[B]

I remember as a rat, as a young mom, the moment that I, I. That I discovered having a drawer filled with just rags in my kitchen, because we don't really do paper towels in our house. My kids just. I don't. They could use a whole roll of paper towels in about 30 seconds.

[C]

Exactly.

[B]

Yes. Tired of buying them, huh? But I was like, this is brilliant. It works so well. And I thought everybody needed a rag drawer at that point. And, you know, it's like, that doesn't work for everybody. Yeah.

[C]

Not everybody has that many kids that are going to tear it all apart in no time. And, yeah, I'm with you. It's never on my list either. But then we'll have people over and I'll forget about that, and they'll be like, do you have napkins? I'm like, no, I'm so sorry. Did. I'll give them a tea towel or something.

[B]

Oh, my goodness. Yes. Yep.

[C]

Yep. Well, I think you brought up so many things to consider. I really liked your tidbit about, like, if you're sitting there doing something relaxing, you're not relaxed. Like, that to me, is something I'm going to be thinking about all next week. So tell the listeners where they can follow along with you and your family and whatever is coming up for 2026.

[B]

Yeah. The best place that you can find all the things is homesteadingfamily.com but of course, we have a YouTube channel, Facebook, Instagram, and the everyday homesteading podcast. So those are kind of all the things that. All the different places you can find us out there. And yeah, you know what? I'm excited. We're just. Right now, we're filming this the end of January, so I don't know when everybody's gonna hear it, but inside the homestead kitchen membership, we're actually doing a whole program where we're walking people through. It's actually a challenge of find your peaceful homestead rhythm challenge. So we're going to be starting that inside the membership. And it's like, at eight weeks, we're actually walking together how to revamp from this, like, schedule driven, Always watching the clock, always feeling too much to do to to really learning how to work in a rhythm peacefully and learn how to appropriately fill our time without overfilling it like we want to do as homesteaders without getting ourselves to where we're always stressed. So yeah, that's kind of the big things that are coming up for us right now. And, and that's something that our members always have access to once they sign up for the membership. So. So yeah, if that's your sort of thing, then you'll want to go check that out again. Homesteadingfamily.com you'll get access to all the different places.

[C]

Awesome. And I will also leave that link down below. But I think that that's going to be great because it's really hard to find that balance and I think if you've struggled to find that balance, I think that would be something great to hold yourself a little bit accountable to. So we will leave that resource link down below Homesteading Family and all the places I know. I'm looking forward to following along with you guys in 2026. Thank you so much, Carolyn.

[B]

Yeah, thank you Lisa. It's great to get to hang out.

[A]

Thanks as always for listening to the Simple Farmhouse Life podcast.

[C]

My husband Luke and I and our.

[A]

Kids work together side by side on our farm in Missouri and use our blog, podcast and YouTube channel to reach other homemakers, home cooks and homesteaders with practical recipes in daily family life. For everyday sourdough recipes, make sure to check out our blog farmhouse on Boone.com and to dig deeper, we do also offer a course called Simple Sourdough over at Bit Ly Farmhouse Sourdough Course all one word. We also teach people how to ferment vegetables and mill their own grains through our courses, Fresh Ferments and Freshly Milled Grains. We will leave links for all of that down in the show notes below.

[B]

Sam.