curiouser & curiouser Podcast

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I loved this conversation with my friend Cassie, and if I had to give it a singular theme it would be “intentional living.” We talked about how their family is trying to drown out some of the “shoulds” of the world in an effort to make their lives look the way it needs to look for THEM specifically. For their family, one example of that meant selling their home rather abruptly last year to travel for a few months without quite knowing what the next step would be. We also chatted about how to view things and stuff, and about being more mindful about what we bring into our lives and our homes.

If you’re someone who’s also striving to live life with intention, which might mean deviating from the expected from time to time, I think you’ll enjoy this episode.

Okay, ready to hear from Cassie? Let’s go!:

The post curiouser & curiouser Podcast: Episode 46 (Intentional Living With Cassie Schmisek) appeared first on curiouser & curiouser.

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Or you can listen to the episode here!:

Fellow moms of littles – or moms to be – who live in Winston-Salem: listen up. This episode is for YOU! I’m thrilled to be able to share Mom League with you here today. This is a resource our community has needed in a BIG way, and I’m so glad it’s finally available.

Mom League is a way for new moms to come together to build community and learn helpful things along the way – information that will help them navigate their parenthood journey. In a Mom League course, for example, moms will hear from experts like a lactation consultant, a pelvic floor specialist, and a counselor about postpartum depression and anxiety (among many others!). All of these folks are part of our community, too, and they’ll open the door for conversations and knowledge that can really change the game in early parenthood.

Right now, Mom League is for moms of newborns, but the plan is for it to grow to include moms of infants and toddlers as well – so definitely stay tuned for more courses to be added to the mix! In fact, go ahead and give them a follow over on Instagram to keep up with them that way. (It’s also definitely NOT just for first-time moms. As a relatively new second-time mom, I can attest to the fact that experiences can be so different from baby to baby, and the desire for and benefit of connection with moms at the same stage of parenthood doesn’t go away with subsequent kiddos.

Okay, ready to meet Annie and Kelly, the amazing mamas behind Mom League, and hear them talk even more about this great new Winston-Salem resource? Let’s do it!:

The post curiouser & curiouser Podcast: Episode 45 (Introducing Mom League — A New Resource For Moms In Winston-Salem) appeared first on curiouser & curiouser.

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Or you can listen to the episode here!:

This was a particularly memorable episode to record, because my guest, Kacie, had her baby with her and at the time we recorded baby birdie was just four days old!

Talk about the perfect guest to have her newborn with her, though, since this episode was all about Kacie and her lactation support business, Lollies Lactation. I think this is an important one to listen to if you’re pregnant or if you have a baby and are navigating breastfeeding – whether or not you’re currently having challenges with it. It’s so helpful to know where to get support and ask questions if you need to. (Be sure to follow Lollies Lactation on Instagram, too. Kacie always shares lots of helpful pieces of info there, as well as more details about the support she offers AND her new program Birdie at the Breast, where she’ll share real workshops with her baby girl to create amazingly helpful content!)

During this episode, we talked some about my first breastfeeding experience with my daughter, Maggie. I’d planned to breastfeed for a year, but went into that journey with very few tools, all things considered. Then when we ran into supply issues and other challenges, rather than asking for help I tried to deal with it on my own – I think due to a combination of pride and not feeling like we needed to spend money on lactation support, which can be expensive. That troubleshooting didn’t work, which resulted in me ending my breastfeeding journey with Maggie far earlier than I’d planned. The whole experience was incredibly defeating, and I wish I’d reached out to someone like Kacie during it.

Also, great news – Kacie shared during this episode that she’s now able to accept health insurance, so that cost hurtle is no longer there for most clients. I loved hearing that!

Okay, ready to hear Kacie talk about the kinds of support she offers, her personal challenges with breastfeeding and how that led to her passion for helping others, a little more about my two – very different — breastfeeding experiences, and more? Let’s dive in!:

The post curiouser & curiouser Podcast: Episode 44 (Chatting With Kacie Mintz Of Lollies Lactation) appeared first on curiouser & curiouser.

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I’m so excited to share this conversation with you via this podcast episode. It’s with someone I know thanks to Instagram, Erin Bahadur. I started following Erin after I read a beautifully poignant post about parenting on The Everymom that she’d written about a year ago now. She had her second baby just a couple of months before my son, Vance, was born, and so we were navigating the postpartum period at the same time and we were both adjusting to adding a second kiddo to the mix, and I felt so grateful to be able to get a peek into someone else’s journey that looked similar to mine in many ways.

I began reading Erin’s blog, Erin’s Inside Job, and was struck by her willingness to share her life. I shouldn’t have been surprised, because she’s incredibly open on Instagram as well. On both platforms, a theme she talks about is addiction, and I read about her story dealing with serious drug addiction – addiction that ultimately led to time in prison. I found her story to be incredibly powerful as well as really important. After all, so many of us deal with addiction in one of its many forms (either firsthand or watching someone we love struggle with it), and so talking about it is HUGE. Reminding others that they aren’t alone and that there’s hope beyond addiction can be the light they need to get through it. Also, doing the work to uncover the root cause of addiction is key to breaking those addictive behaviors, and we dug into that — as well as things we hope to do to help our children bypass addiction — in our conversation.

I’ll let Erin tell more of her story, and I’m so honored she was willing to share it with us here:

The post curiouser & curiouser Podcast: Episode 43 (Talking Addiction With Erin Bahadur Of Erin’s Inside Job) appeared first on curiouser & curiouser.

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Over the summer, five friends and I started a new Instagram account called The Conscious Crew. (I talked about the account a bit in this blog post from back in July!) We’ve had the best time with the account so far, and all six of us got together on Zoom recently to chat all things Crew. That conversation is what you’ll hear in this latest podcast episode!

Take a listen to hear us discuss topics including:

-Why we started The Conscious Crew Instagram account
-What kind of content you’ll find there
-What makes our account special
-What you can look forward to seeing from us over the holidays

This group is such a special one, and I’m really proud to be part of it. I love that we can bring our six unique personalities and perspectives together to share our journeys when it comes to ways we’re trying to be intentional about ALL facets of our lives. Our hope is to grow a community of others who are also on this journey — at varying stages — so we can help support and encourage one another along the way. (After all, starting to make some of these changes can feel a little isolating at times! We get it, and we’re here for you.)

I hope you’ll join The Conscious Crew over on Instagram! We can’t wait to connect with you there.

In the meantime, take a listen to get to know more about us!:

The post curiouser & curiouser Podcast: Episode 42 (Get To Know The Conscious Crew) appeared first on curiouser & curiouser.

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I finished this conversation with Haley Lieberman (founder and CEO of Shop Tomorrows) feeling SO fired up about all things clothing. I knew Haley was going to be the perfect person to talk to about this topic, and I was 100% correct.

Recently, I’ve felt a big pull to change my habits, mindset, and overall approach when it comes to the way I view clothing. The more I’ve learned about the clothing industry (fast fashion in particular) and the negative ways it impacts the people who make our clothes, the environment, and sometimes even the health of the people wearing the clothing, the more compelled I’ve been to really examine my behavior and see how I can make changes — both on a small scale and, hopefully, in a larger way as well. (I highly recommend checking out the documentary The True Cost on YouTube about the clothing industry.)

Here are some quick stats about clothing that I found staggering:

-80 billion pieces of clothing are purchased worldwide each year, which is 400% more than a decade ago.
-The fashion industry is the world’s second-largest polluter, second only to the oil industry.
-One in six people work in the global fashion industry.
-Only 10% of the clothes people donate to charity or thrift stores get sold.

There’s SO much inexpensive clothing available to us, and there has been for years now, so we as a culture forget that it wasn’t always that way. It’s so easy to buy a couple of shirts or a jacket at Target while running in to grab something from the grocery section and not think twice about it. Whether you’ll actually get much wear out of those things is another story. And then, what will you do with it when you don’t want it anymore? Will it hang, forgotten, in the back of your closet? Will it sit in a bin in your attic? Will it be added to a landfill somewhere? Will it be donated (and if so, will it actually get into the hands of someone who can wear it)? None of those options sound all that great, do they? (P.S. This has been my relationship to clothing for YEARS, so this is most certainly not me being judgy!)

But it wasn’t always this way. Check out this comparison (found here in a 2013 article):

“In 1960, an average American household spent over 10 percent of its income on clothing and shoes – equivalent to roughly $4,000 today. The average person bought fewer than 25 garments each year. And about 95 percent of those clothes were made in the United States.

Today, the average American household spends less than 3.5 percent of its budget on clothing and shoes – under $1,800. Yet, we buy more clothing than ever before: nearly 20 billion garments a year, close to 70 pieces of clothing per person, or more than one clothing purchase per week.”

Haley is someone who’s been walking the walk when it comes to a much more sustainable and intentional relationship to clothing for years. In fact, her company is a secondhand marketplace for children’s clothing. And while I think it can be easy to get on board with secondhand clothes for kids (after all, they grow out of things quickly), I don’t think it’s the default for most adults.

Haley said several things during our chat that have stuck with me in a big way. One of them was, “We don’t need to make more stuff. Everything we need is right here between us all, within our communities, our families, and our wider networks.” That rings SO true for me. She also described shopping fast fashion as “a sugar high,” which is an analogy that feels so perfect. It feels great in the moment, but afterward you will likely feel bad about it — maybe even guilty because you know you probably should have made a better choice or avoided the purchase altogether.

Does this mean I’m never going to buy new clothes? NO WAY — of course I will! I just hope to make those future purchases much more mindful and less frequent.

Take a listen to this episode to hear us talk about modeling an intentional clothing relationship to our kids, how to make this shift happen amidst busy lives, making secondhand cool, and so, so much more.

Oh, and here are the resources she mentions toward the end of our conversation. I can’t wait to dig into these!:

–The Wardrobe Crisis (podcast)
–Articles of Interest (podcast)
–Overdressed: The Shockingly High Cost of Cheap Fashion (book)
–The Conscious Closet (book)
–Politically in Fashion (organization)

I hope you love listening to this conversation with Haley as much as I did recording it!:

The post curiouser & curiouser Podcast: Episode 41 (Talking About Changing Our Mindset And Habits When It Comes To Clothing With Haley Lieberman Of Shop Tomorrows) appeared first on curiouser & curiouser.

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I was introduced to Nancy Kopman via the virtual preschool Maggie and I discovered in 2020 when she was home from school. (You can listen to Jamie White of that virtual preschool and me chat more about what that looks like in this podcast episode, in fact!) Nancy is the music teacher of virtual preschool, and Maggie and I always get so excited when it’s music time. Nancy’s songs are fun to sing in the moment, and they’re also ones that I find myself singing to Maggie often in other parts of our day, whether to help get through a difficult moment or just to have a moment of shared joy and connection.

I was thrilled Nancy agreed to chat with me for this podcast episode, and I loved learning more about her background and what makes the work she does — helping children learn, feel, and grow through music — such a wonderful fit for her. Anyone with young children will benefit from listening to this episode, and be sure to spend some time listening to her music afterward, too — with your kiddos, of course! Here’s a link to her website, and you can also find videos of her singing her songs on her YouTube channel. On the go? Search for “Nancy Kopman” on Spotify!

Okay, ready to hear Nancy talk music for kids? Here we go!:

The post curiouser & curiouser Podcast: Episode 40 (The Importance Of Music In Child Development With Nancy Kopman) appeared first on curiouser & curiouser.

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Or you can listen to the episode here!:

As someone who feels gleeful when things are in order, I was SO excited to learn that Winston-Salem now has an organizing resource! Tartan Professional Organizing is a new company, helmed by Natalie Broyhill and Danielle Ceberio, that offers organization help of all kinds — including the organization of both physical and digital spaces. (Yes, Winston friends: That means if you watched The Home Edit on Netflix and drooled over those perfectly arranged pantries and closets, you can get the same end result at your house with these lovely ladies. AMAZING, RIGHT? I think we all have our birthday and Christmas gift ideas locked in for the foreseeable future, right?)

Even if you aren’t local to Winston, though, I think you’ll enjoy this episode. Natalie and Danielle share some great tips on organization, give us a peek into what organization (and its maintenance) looks like at their houses, and talk through how to deal with all that extra “stuff” that’s so easy to accumulate. I was so inspired after chatting with Natalie and Danielle to record this episode that I went on an organization spree in our house, and it felt INCREDIBLE.

Oh, and be sure to follow Tartan Organizing on Instagram. The things they share in stories are so fun, and their before and after photos are always so cathartic to see. For example…

I’m also excited to share my podcast’s first sponsor, Shop Tomorrows, as part of this episode! It’s the perfect match, too, since Shop Tomorrows — a new way to shop for secondhand clothes for kiddos — is all about intentional purchases (and therefore intentional accumulation of things), which is something Tartan Organizing can totally get behind, too. Use the code ANNA20 through August 31 to get 20 free tokens to Shop Tomorrows! (P.S. You can check out my Shop Tomorrows closet here in case you want to shop a few of Maggie’s outgrown pieces.)

Okay, ready to talk all things organization? Here we go!:

The post curiouser & curiouser Podcast: Episode 39 (Organization Tips & Tricks From Danielle and Natalie of Tartan Professional Organizing) appeared first on curiouser & curiouser.

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Or you can listen to the episode here!:

I’m SO excited to share this podcast episode with y’all! My husband, Kevin, and used a portion of a recent date night to spend some kid-free time together talking about pregnancy and childbirth from Kevin’s perspective, and I love that we were able to have this conversation.

I learned things I hadn’t known before about his experience, and I really appreciate the advice he shared with other dads-to-be throughout this episode as well. We also chatted about how our approach to life tends to be a bit unconventional, not for the sake of being different but because we want to be as intentional as possible about the way we live.

I hope that if you’re in a similar life stage you’ll find this episode interesting and informative, and hopefully will leave with a helpful takeaway or two.

The post curiouser & curiouser Podcast: Episode 38 (Talking Pregnancy & Childbirth From A Guy’s Perspective With My Husband, Kevin) appeared first on curiouser & curiouser.

Subscribe — and listen — to my podcast on Apple Podcasts here!

Or you can listen to the episode here!:

I learned about Jaren Soloff’s book, The Postnatal Cookbook: Simple and Nutritious Recipes to Nourish Your Body and Spirit During the Fourth Trimester, at just the right time. I have one postpartum experience under my belt, so have some firsthand knowledge about what that was like, and I’m about to enter another fourth trimester.

Her book — which is WAY more than just a book of recipes, by the way — left me feeling much more prepared to enter the postpartum phase this time around. It would be a great resource not just for anyone who’s pregnant, but also for anyone close to someone who’s pregnant. It will help you understand more about what to expect in the fourth trimester, helping you anticipate how to manage that phase if you’re about to experience it yourself OR how to support a loved one during her fourth trimester.

It was an absolute pleasure chatting with her for my podcast, and I hope you’ll take a listen to hear all the helpful information she has to share. She also shares some personal things, such as her struggles with an eating disorder, and how disordered eating can often appear during the fourth trimester. (Of course, I could relate!)

Jaren is both a registered dietician and a lactation consultant, so she’s armed with lots of relevant experience to help women navigate this important (and often overwhelming) stage of motherhood. The first section of the book serves up information about how other cultures approach the postpartum stage, how nutrition can help combat postpartum anxiety, some helpful food- and body-related tips on how to approach this stage, and more.

The rest of the book is full of delicious, nutritious, and EASY recipes. The recipes build on the nutritional recommendations she makes in the front of the book, so you can feel great about getting nutrient-dense food that’s perfect the fourth trimester. (She does the work for you, which I so appreciate.)

So far, I’ve tried her Blueberry Walnut Muffin recipe as well as her Slow Cooker Three Bean Chili. Our family loved both, and I can’t wait to try some others.

If you’d like to give one of Jaren’s recipes a try to get a feel for just how tasty and easy they are, she was generous enough to let me post one here:

SLOW COOKER THREE BEAN CHILI

Ingredients:

1 Tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
1 medium onion, diced
3 cloves garlic, diced
2 Tablespoons chili powder
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1/2 teaspoon paprika
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 (14-ounce) can fire-roasted tomatoes
3 (14-ounce) cans beans of any variety (garbanzos, chili beans, black beans, pinto beans, kidney beans, or cannellini beans), rinsed and drained
1 cup corn kernels (fresh or frozen)
2 cups vegetable broth
cilantro, shredded cheese, sour cream, lime juice, and red onion as optional garnish

Instructions:

1. Heat the olive oil in a small pan and add the diced onion and garlic, sautéing for 2-3 minutes (until fragrant). Transfer cooked ingredients to a 6-quart slow cooker.
2. Add the remaining ingredients to the slow cooker, stirring the ingredients to combine, and cook on low for 6 hours.
3. Taste when done, adding more salt to taste. Ladle the chili into bowls and add toppings as desired.

(See? SO EASY!!!)

See where to get a copy of The Postnatal Cookbook here!

During our conversation, Jaren also shared a few fourth trimester resources that I wanted to be sure to link to here. Those include:

–4th Trimester Bodies Project
–Intuitive Eating
–Jaren’s website

Ready to talk all things postpartum with Jaren Soloff? Here we go!:

The post curiouser & curiouser Podcast: Episode 37 (Talking Postpartum Nutrition With Registered Dietician and Lactation Consultant Jaren Soloff) appeared first on curiouser & curiouser.