Model Minority Moms
Welcome to Model Minority Moms where we reckon with the myth of success in career, family and life. We’re Jeanette, Kate, and Susan - Harvard classmates and Asian American working moms who get real about the pressures of fitting in while standing out. https://modelminoritymoms.com Model Minority Moms is a project of Real Life Media LLC.
Episodes
Ep142: Power, Money and Marriage Part 3 - Claiming your power is dissecting your resentments?
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Ep141: Power, Money and Marriage Part 2- Why do many women downshift their careers after kids
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Ep140: Power, Money and Marriage Part 1- We started even and now we're here
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Ep139: Mean Mommy vs Nice Mommy - which one are you?
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Ep138: Faith & Spirituality series - Marriage across faith backgrounds, what to tell your kids about God, the afterlife and moral living
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Ep137: Faith & Spirituality series - Religion was weird, powerful, confusing, and beautiful for us as kids
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Ep136: Faith & Spirituality series - The joys and hurts of being an Asian American Christian with Kristin Lee, author of We Mend with Gold
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Ep135: Peeing yourself, prolapse, pain - get the pelvic 411 with Dr. Jennifer Guan
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Ep134: Feeling hot and crazed? Could it be perimenopause - with Dr. Rebecca Dunsmoor-Su
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Ep133: Teaching kids their heritage language - a conversation with Jojo Learning Founder Christine Yang Barry
**Giveaway Alert! Keep reading for details** In this episode, we interviewed Christine Yang Berry, creator of the multiple award-winning Jojo Chinese songs for Baby and Me musical book series. Christine created these musical books to help families introduce Mandarin to babies, toddlers, and preschoolers through singing, bonding, and everyday communication. We talk to Christine about the challenges
Ep132: The Joys and Perils of being Mixed Asian
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Ep131: Dad postpartum depression and being a biracial dad - interview with Daniel Tam-Claiborne
**Special note to our listeners** Love the show? Help us keep the conversation going!Become a paid subscriber through our Substack.Your contributions help us continue to make contenton issues related to the Asian-American, immigrant, modern parent experience.THANK YOU to our super awesome listeners who have already signed up!---------------------------------------
Ep130: Navigating belonging as a biracial person - interview with Daniel Tam-Claiborne
Do you sometimes ask your kids questions like "are you doing ok?" or "am I causing you trauma" and then they stare at you blankly and ask if they can have candy now? All three of us have kids who are of multiple racial and ethnic ancestry. We all worry about how they will relate to various parts of their identities and if they will feel a healthy sense of belonging... but that&
Ep129: K-everything series- KDramas
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Ep128: K-everything series - Korean food (Warning: don't listen hungry!)
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Ep127: K-everything series - Kpop Demon Hunters
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Ep126: K-everything series - K beauty
Snail mucin, "glass" or "mochi" skin, BB creams, face masks galore... if you are even remotely interested in makeup and skincare, you've probably noticed the rising influence (bordering on takeover) of Korean beauty in America. Emphasizing skin care and a more "demure" look, Korean beauty products have gone mainstream in the US and are everywhere now from Sephora
Ep125: To save your child, what would you do?
We speak with Peggy, who received devastating news six months ago that her baby had a rare genetic mutation that meant she may not survive childhood. She and her partner are on a journey to try to beat the odds by developing a gene-editing treatment for her daughter's condition that would require them to raise millions of dollars in charitable giving and convince leading scientists to work on
Ep124: K-everything series - Kpop
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Ep123: Tired of being tired? We can relate...
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Ep122: Takebacksies... we repent!
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Ep121: Survival vs resistance, centering a marginalized experience and more with guest Yiming Ma, Author of These Memories Do Not Belong To Us
**Special note to our listeners** Love the show? Help us keep the conversation going! Become a paid subscriber through our Substack. Your contributions help us continue to make content on issues related to the Asian-American, immigrant, modern parent experience.THANK YOU to our super awesome listeners who have already signed up!**********************In this episode, we welcome
Ep120: To will or not to will. Or trust or not to trust? Definitely gonna die tho...
**Special note to our listeners** Love the show? Help us keep the conversation going! Become a paid subscriber through our Substack. Your contributions help us continue to make content on issues related to the Asian-American, immigrant, modern parent experience.THANK YOU to our super awesome listeners who have already signed up!---------------------------------------On this episo
Ep119: Going on 40 (wrap up) - lessons learned and looking forward Part 2 of 2
**Special note to our listeners** Love the show? Help us keep the conversation going! Become a paid subscriber through our Substack. Your contributions help us continue to make content on issues related to the Asian-American, immigrant, modern parent experience.THANK YOU to our super awesome listeners who have already signed up!------------------------------------------------The fi
Ep118: Going on 40 (wrap up) - lessons learned and looking forward
**Special note to our listeners** Love the show? Help us keep the conversation going! Become a paid subscriber through our Substack. Your contributions help us continue to make content on issues related to the Asian-American, immigrant, modern parent experience.THANK YOU to our super awesome listeners who have already signed up!------------------------------------------------Now that
Ep117: Going on 40... has the role of career changed for you? (Part 2)
**Special note to our listeners** Love the show? Help us keep the conversation going! Become a paid subscriber through our Substack. Your contributions help us continue to make content on issues related to the Asian-American, immigrant, modern parent experience.THANK YOU to our super awesome listeners who have already signed up!**********************************When you're a high-a
Ep116: Going on 40... has the role of career changed for you? (Part 1)
**Special note to our listeners** Love the show? Help us keep the conversation going! Become a paid subscriber through our Substack. Your contributions help us continue to make content on issues related to the Asian-American, immigrant, modern parent experience.THANK YOU to our super awesome listeners who have already signed up!**********************************When you're a high-achievi
Ep115: Going on 40... body surprises
**Special note to our listeners** Love the show? Help us keep the conversation going! Become a paid subscriber through our Substack. Your contributions help us continue to make content on issues related to the Asian-American, immigrant, modern parent experience.THANK YOU to our super awesome listeners who have already signed up!******************************Peeing yourself. Hair loss. Boob
Ep114: Going on 40… or 14 when we're with our parents and siblings
**Special note to our listeners** Love the show? Help us keep the conversation going! Become a paid subscriber through our Substack. Your contributions help us continue to make content on issues related to the Asian-American, immigrant, modern parent experience.THANK YOU to our super awesome listeners who have already signed up!****************One learning from getting older is that you real
Ep113: Going on 40... Midlife Crises... are more understandable now?
**Special note to our listeners** Love the show? Help us keep the conversation going! Become a paid subscriber through our Substack. Your contributions help us continue to make content on issues related to the Asian-American, immigrant, modern parent experience.****************Let us explain. No, we haven't bought a red convertible, had an affair or gotten a divorce. But reaching this stag
Ep112: Going on 40... is success an existential mirage?
**Special note to our listeners** Love the show? Help us keep the conversation going! Become a paid subscriber through our Substack. Your contributions help us continue to make content on issues related to the Asian-American, immigrant, modern parent experience.****************As we turn the corner into mid-life, we're talking about the questions we're wrestling with at 40 - Am I living
Ep111: Picking a kindergarten... who's this actually about?
**Special note to our listeners** Love the show? Help us keep the conversation going! Become a paid subscriber through our Substack. Your contributions help us continue to make content on issues related to the Asian-American, immigrant, modern parent experience.****************Kindergarten…you think it's far away until it's not. All of a sudden you're faced with a myriad of decisions t
Ep110: To have a baby or not to have a baby, that is the question
For some of us, we always knew we wanted kids, no matter what. For others, that was never in our vision for life but nearing the end of the biological clock, we're revisiting that question. For still others, we may have started one way but ended up another because of relationships, biology, logistics, costs, better understanding of what parenthood entails, the-world-is-ending-feeling, etc. In this
Ep109: Talking to your kids about S-E-X - Interview with Justine Ang Fonte, M.Ed. MPH, a K-12 sexuality educator and author
For many millennials, sex education was about awkwardly passing around a banana with a condom on it in PE class or carrying around a sack of flour pretending it was a baby. We want to do it better for our kids, OBVIOUSLY, but... do we really know how to do it better?We are excited to welcome Justine Ang Fonte on the show. She was featured in the New York Times about her work bringing sex ed to N
Ep108: Our 100th(-ish) episode retrospective
In true MMM fashion, we are releasing our look-back conversation on releasing our 100th episode... on episode 108 X_X. We talk about what keeps us going with the show (psst - its not the big bucks), what our partners think of it, what topics we've considered but decided NOT to do, what our listeners have shared with us, our favorite episodes (it's so hard to choose!), our controversial nam
Ep107: Stuck in a career rut? Burnt out? Don't know what to do next? Interview with executive coach Minal Mehta of The Ineffable Leader
Trying to keep career momentum as a mom of young kids can be really tough. On top of all the demands of being a parent, wife, and daughter, going hard at the office can start to feel like a slog. Moreover, being a parent and approaching middle life can surface a lot of questions about your priorities and your choices, including about work. And of course, all your baggage from being a women, Asian-
Ep106: Introducing: Add to Cart with with Susan Lieu
We're so excited to share with you our first collab with another podcast - Add to Cart! Susan was a guest on the show to discuss her book, her love of Costco and her grumblings about the rising price of matcha lattes :)Listen to the trifecta of the Asian Aunties as Susan Lieu joins SuChin Pak and Kulap Vilaysack on this episode of Add to Cart. Susan talks about writing her first memoir, “The Manic
Ep105: Considering marriage counseling? Talking to Jessica Sather, a licensed marriage and family therapist in Emotionally Focused Therapy
If you've been with your partner for awhile now, you may realize that there are certain conflict patterns that happen over and over. He does something that pisses you off, you bring it up, he does X, you do Y, so on and so on, over and over again. Or vice versa :p Or you guys are just so tired from parenthood, work, continued disappointment or dealing with things from the past that you have ju
Ep104: Suchin Pak - MTV host, mom, what it means to be married in sickness and in health
Do you remember watching MTV as a teenager and noticing that one of the hosts was kick-ass Asian-American young woman named Suchin Pak? Well, guess what - WE HAVE HER ON OUR SHOW TODAY and we go deep on her unexpected path to MTV, what it was like to work that job for over a decade, what life is like for her now as a mother of two, and the winding journey she's been on with her husband who has
Ep103: How your mental health affects your wealth
Do you ever wonder why it's so hard for you or your partner to stick to a budget? Or organize your finances? Or even talk about money? Do you read tons of financial advice but struggle to actually do it? Or do you tend to stick your head in the sand and hope it will all work out?
In this episode (our first *video* episode!), we talk to Shang Saavedra, the author of the recently released book call
Ep102: What it's like to be an Asian-American psychiatrist
We talk a lot about mental health and we thought it was about time to bring on a real mental health expert on the show, preferably someone who also has personal familiarity with the Asian American experience. What do you think of psychiatric medication? Do you ever see any Asian-Americans who are our parents generation (and what is THAT like???) What do your parents think about what you do? How do
Ep101: Your Uterus is Not Hysterical - how men having dumb ideas about women's health has led to the situation we are in today
Have you ever wondered why the term "hysterectomy" sounds so similar to the word "hysteria"? Well it turns out it's because the ancient Greeks thought that the root of all of emotional troubles for women were due to a uterus that just wandered around the woman's body if it wasn't kept busy with enough sex and pregnancies. Tune into this hysterical (pun intended) interview with author and OBGYN exp
Ep100: Finding out the truth about her parents - guest interview with actress, comedian and producer Kulap Vilaysack
Kulap Vilaysack is a bit of a unicorn. She's a Laotian-American actress, comedian and show creator who has directed and produced hit shows like Bajillion Dollar Propertie$. She even has a real DC Comics superhero inspired by her, Katharsis! She also created a documentary about her family called Origin Story, where she tells the story of her father who she learned wasn't her biological dad when she
Ep99: Climate anxiety for parents!
If you weren't worried about climate change already, don't worry! Becoming parents will surely increase your climate change anxiety. From the very real concern of leaving behind a burning and unlivable planet to your children, to the very real concerns now of protecting your young ones from excessive heat, wildfire smoke, floods and storms, parenthood is **guaranteed** to give you greater climate
Ep98: Radically re-thinking education with teacher and school leader Susan Yao
Most of our listeners (and us) grew up in a pretty traditional education system. There were lessons, there was a lot of practice, there were tests and if you got a A, someone asked why it wasn't an A+. For many of us, it also was layered with a ton of stress and constant anxiety. It was all supposed to lead one day to admission to a top tier college and then a rather hazy happily-ever-after. Now r
Ep97: The Golden Hour - our pop culture favs right now
WARNING: This episode contains spoilers for Bridgerton (seasons 1, 2 and 3), Queen Charlotte, the Kdrama Crash Landing on you and C-Drama The Double.
In this episode, we're talking about the Golden Hour - the time between roughly 9pm-10pm, when the kids finally have fallen asleep, the house is decently cleaned up, and you finally have a little time to do something that *you* want to do. Sometime
Ep96: Help - running out of RAM
Tells children "doe" means "small deer" (that's wrong). Bops sideview mirror from minivan for the nth time. Cannot remember garage code that you've had for the last two years. Having more trouble finding phone than usual. Maybe thinking about putting kids' cereal in a timed pet food dispenser. Maybe.
If you can relate at all, this episode is for you mom/ parent of young children. If you're just c
Ep95: So you want to be a dad
We humbly present to you, our mini-dad-bootcamp in podcast episode form. If you're thinking about being a dad, listen to it now. If you're already a dad, listen to it before it's too late. If you're a woman in a heterosexual relationship, send this to your partner. What we say isn't easy but it's real, and we hope our 15+ years of experience parenting in the context of a ma
Ep94: Party like it's your birthday
It's your birthday, it's your birthday, we're going to partay like it's your birthday... ok maybe it looks a little different when you're nearing 40 with young kids. In this episode, we hash out our feelings around our birthdays - the expectations, the disappointments, the meltdowns we're not proud of and Susan's dream birthday... a FUN-eral.
Ep93: When Anxiety met Motherhood, Part 2 - Interview with Peipei Fiore
In the part two of this interview, we dive deeper with Peipei into the impact that her mental health journey has had on her relationship with her partner and her children, and ways she has tried to rebuild from the toll that her struggles have taken on her relationships.
Ep92: When Anxiety met Motherhood, Part 1 - Interview with Peipei Fiore
In this episode, we sit down with Peipei Fiore, a former television executive and mom to three girls, who was forced to confront her long-running anxiety and depression when she unexpectedly became a mother and wife. She's also an OG MMM listener who was gracious enough to share her story with us. In this two-part series (second part to be released in two weeks), we dive deep into Peipei's
Ep91: The Pivot - Making your passion a career with Kat Lieu from Subtle Asian Baking
Kat Lieu is the mastermind behind the popular Subtle Asian Baking IG/FB account as well as the cookbooks Modern Asian Baking and Modern Asian Kitchen. While her food content has found a rapidly growing audience going from zero to over 150k+ followers in just a few years, she actually spent the first decade of her adult life in a totally different career path that was chosen for her by her parents.
Ep 90: Mom burnout
Need we say more? Most moms - we daresay every mom - is familiar with burnout. How can you not be when you are meeting the demands of helpless, emotionally unregulated littles 24/7 for years? Especially when people around you often seem to minimize, not notice and/or actively criticize what can feel like an endless trudging sacrificing juggle. Here in true MMM fashion, we feel our feels and put ou
Ep89: Taking your kids to the homeland
When us first-gen Asian-Americans become moms, one journey in particular starts looming in the horizon: introducing our kids to our mother country, with all its foods, sounds, customs. When is the right age? What should we expect? Should we bring a car seat? Is it even possible to take your young child to another country when normal daily life can feel like a struggle? Well, Kate has just taken he
Ep88: Love after kids
Another totally under-discussed issue in popular culture: what happens to love between spouses after the kids come. In rom coms, it's always happily ever after right? The end. Talk about over-simplification. The truth is that your relationship with your partner WILL change after kids - for better or for worse. In this episode, we talk about our expectations vs the reality of relationship with
Ep87: Got a case of considerate-ness?
Being female, Asian-American, and a parent - that's a triple whammy right there for a bad case of the considerate-ness. Do you struggle with feeling like you are considerate but it's not reciprocated, resulting in rage, burnout, and disappointment? Do you feel like you are playing by rules of considerateness that you alone are playing? Are you right or is everyone else? If these questions
Ep86: Are you Seattle-curious?
Our listeners are in Seattle, of course, but also heavily in SF, LA, New York, DC area... the usual suspects. When we talk to people in these cities and beyond, the topic of moving to Seattle often crops up. People are Seattle-curious, we often find. So... is the Emerald City all that it's reputed to be? We take you beyond the Space Needle and give you an insider's look at what's it re
Ep85: Divorce FYI
In this final episode of our mini-series on divorce, we interview Diem Chi Nguyen, a Seattle-area attorney who focuses on family and divorce law. She walks us through the basics of the divorce process - how long it takes, how much it costs, different paths to take, how custody of children are handled, how assets and debts are split - peppered with anonymized stories of how things can turn really w
Ep84: A divorce in real-life
In this very special episode, we interview an anonymous guest about her experience going through a divorce - what led to the separation, how she and her ex handled things with their kids, all the extremely messy and hard ups and downs of the process and how she survived it all. Whether you are considering a divorce, want to support a friend going through divorce, or just want to hear a real-life,
Ep83: The D-word
No, the other D-word (guess who wrote that one! :)
In the first episode of this mini-series, we are talking about divorce. Hurtling into middle age, divorce seems to be popping up, silently but more frequently around us. We talk about the how we saw divorce in our own families growing up and how we think about divorce now. When do we work through it? When is enough enough? Where are our bright li
Ep82: Maybe we're ok, maybe it's Maybelline
Since we were little girls, we got all kinds of messages - both direct and otherwise - about how we looked and how we should look. Even as full-grown women, those messages still echo loudly in our minds. We've had to evolve - sometimes painfully - to grow our confidence and embrace our appearance. As with so many issues, becoming moms has forced us to re-examine what we say to ourselves and ou
Ep81: Mom Rage
Does any other mom experience blinding anger on the regular? Anyone? Anyone? Ok, so no one right? Then this episode is for us (and for you if you know what we're talking about). We break down why the heck do we get SO mad sometimes, is it normal, is it bad and how to handle it when the anger pressure is building and we're about to blow.
Ep80: An Exclusive with the author of A Manicurist's Daughter
In this very special episode, we bring you an exclusive interview with Susan Lieu, the author of the forthcoming book, the Manicurist's Daughter, available in bookstores on March 12th and available for pre-ordering now! It is already getting rave reviews from top outlets, including Publisher Weekly, Kirkus, Elle and Goodreads!
Of course, if you listen to our podcast, you will know that Susan
Ep79: Getting help as a mom
As a mom, it can feel like you're running 24/7 and sometimes even that's not enough. If you can afford it or have people in your life who are available, many moms need help - help with childcare, help with cleaning, help with meals, help with laundry... heck, sometimes just an extra pair of hands to go get towels while your child is throwing up is invaluable. But getting help - whether pai
Ep78: Discipline - you got it under control, right?
Taking forever to put on shoes. Leaving toys on the floor. Refusing to come to dinner. Fighting with siblings. Sneaking a piece of forbidden candy. When the inevitable need for discipline crops up with our children, how do we react? As is frequently the case, so much of it is informed by how we ourselves were parented. Join us for a discussion of how we were (or weren't) disciplined growing up
Ep77: What's in a baby daddy?
What makes a good husband, a good boyfriend, can be a little different from what makes a good baby daddy, in our opinion. Combining our 15 years of child-rearing experience (don't ask us how we calculated that!), we share our highly non-expert opinion on what's important in a baby daddy.
Ep76: Periods
Bloody, leaky, crampy, moody, inconvenient, embarrassing, painful... yet it's what allows us to create new human life. Yes, we are talking about our periods - what has been our relationship to Aunt Flo throughout our childhood, our teenage years, our young adulthood, trying to get pregnant, being pregnant, post-partum, up until now. How have we interacted with our parents, friends, partners, s
Ep75: Birthdays birthdays
Invites, venue, food, cake, activities, goody bags. Presents or no presents? Invite whole class or just a select few? What's the budget for a three-year-old's birthday? Yup, we're talking about the thing that at a certain point in your parenthood journey, starts taking over your social calendar - kids' birthdays.
Ep74: Too Enriched for my blood?
Providing better for our children than we had is a no-brainer. But how much is too much when it comes to the endless types of activities we can sign up for? How much of our intention to provide exposure and opportunities is more of a projection of our own insecurities? Are we talking about T-Ball or are we talking about trauma? And what’s even the point of all of these activities? All that juice a
Ep73: [LIVE RECORDING] Almost over the hill - Confessions of a recovering, middle-aged overachiever
If you were an overachieving child/ young adult, does it ever leave you entirely? What are the costs (and benefits) of being a perpetual overachiever? Do we secretly want our kids to overachieve though we're trying our best to present a chill demeanor? We bring the honest talk at a live recording at our beloved alma mater and poster child of overachievement, Harvard.
Ep72: Downshifting careers as a Mom
Ok, we are going there. You’re a working mom who is highly competent, driven, ambitious, well-credentialed and… you’re going to switch to a more flexible, lower-intensity career? Whaaat? It's a common and significant shift among many moms we know, but glossed over with shrugs, shame and a little chip on the shoulder. In MMM style, we unpack all the feelings around choosing to downshift your c
Ep71: Clinging to the Mother Tongue
Language is loaded. Preserving our mother tongue with ourselves and the decision (and labor!) of passing it down to our children is super complicated. We talk about what it means to feel like a “cultural orphan,” our aspirations for our kids when we were first pregnant, and the honest reality of how it’s going.
The Back to School Episode
How do we actually know if a school is a “good” school for our kids? How do we actually get a spot? (spoiler: banana bread yields mixed results). How to manage transitions from a situation you and your kids know to something that is new? What if we feel like we made a mistake moving our kids to the new school at the first dropoff :( Here are the real stories and the real feels behind the happy fi
Backstreet's Back -- All Right?
So yeeeah… we were talking and we are back together. Nope, not with our exes, with our show. Why we disbanded, why we came back, and unpacking how restarting a thing is twisted in the fear of failure. Plus, a live recording opportunity in October!
Ep68 - Our Final Episode
Yep, you read that right. After publishing nearly 70 episodes over the last 2 years, we are wrapping up our show with one final episode. Tune in to hear how we came to this decision and our parting words to our dear listeners.
The show is ending but you can still keep track of us. Feel free to follow us at:
Jeanette: Instagram @acanary0 and website https://acanary.com
Susan: Instagram @susanlieu
Ep67: The dreaded teenage years - a book with Dr. Emily Kline
Monosyllabic answers. Slammed doors. Huge messes. No, we're not talking about toddlers. We are talking about the other "t" word... teenagers. Believe it or not, like it or not, our chubby little angels will turn into angsty, horny, grumpy teenagers one day. We talk to Dr. Emily Kline, author of "The School of Hard Talks: How to Have Real Conversations with your (Almost Grown) Kids," about an impor
Ep66: Vacationing with kids - the big picture episode
Are there any vacations any more post-kids? Or are there only trips now - a thing you do where you're not in your own home, where you don't have all the things that you've bought to make life a little easier, where your kids will sleep and eat less well? Do you need a vacation from your vacation? In this episode, Kate, Susan and Jeanette talk about the mindset shifts that have helped us enjoy 'vac
Ep65: Traveling with kids - the nuts and bolts
Do you miss those days when you could breeze into the airport 45 minutes prior to departure in your Uber and carry-on-only luggage? With diapers, pack n plays, strollers, wagons and more traveling with kids is different now, to say the least. In this episode, we share our learnings and tips of making traveling with kids a little less stressful (with the usual healthy dose of humor and occasional f
Ep64: To au pair or not to au pair?
Some of us may have heard about the au pair program, considered it or even participated as a host family. Is it a Mary-Poppins-dream-come-true or is the reality having a foreign teenager live in your house, driving your car and not being of much help? Susan, Jeanette and Kate bring our honest perspectives of participating in the au pair program as well as channeling some of the anonymous au pair s
Ep63: Potty training
Elimination communication. Child-led toileting. Pullups. Incentives. Potty training books. Pee everywhere. Poop smeared on walls. Kid and parent meltdown. What are the visions floating around in your head when you think of potty training? As Susan approaches potty training time, Jeanette and Kate talk through their experiences (the good and the fails) and give a real-life perspective on potty trai
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紐約鳥｜New York Aperture
Stand In The Circle
Doctor Zhivago Slow Read
The Swerve Podcast: Obscure Topics | Conspiracy Theories
The Young and Called Podcast .
Conspiracy Files with Paige Carter
