“A mom is only as happy as her unhappiest child.” Have you seen this quote floating around social media? It’s caught our eyes more than a few times.

I think for a lot of us as parents, this phrase can feel accurate because when our child is hurting or struggling, it becomes the main focus of our lives. Our emotions can get all tangled up in their anxiety, pain, or their failures, and those feelings can make us feel like we let them down.

You may be in a hard parenting season right now. You may be having a difficult time feeling okay because your child is not okay at all. If that’s you, we are so glad to introduce our guest, Erica Wiggenhorn.

She is a national speaker, best-selling author, and she’s on the writing team for Proverbs 31 Ministries. Erica’s passion is to equip people to read God’s Word with confidence. She’s also a wife and a mom of two who knows all about the joys and challenges of parenting.

In this episode, Erica shares with us:

• The danger of focusing too much on a single circumstance
• How we can unwittingly direct what our children are placing their faith in
• Practical ways you can remain connected with your spouse in this season
• And much more!

We hope you find encouragement and hope in this episode!

Show Notes: growinghometogether.com/erica-wiggenhorn-95

Does your calendar have nearly every square filled to the brim? For most families, May is a particularly busy time of year with graduation parties, school concerts, sports, final exams, and all the things that go along with wrapping up the school year.

Even with such a busy schedule, we can get to the end of a packed-out day and still feel like we don’t have much to show for it. We can be in the same room with the people we love and feel like we haven’t connected at all. When we take a minute to slow down and look inside, we may even realize how we have lost our sense of purpose and joy in it all.

Brenda Yoder is here to talk about this very thing! Brenda is the author of Uncomplicated: Simple Secrets for a Compelling Life. She’s also a speaker, a counselor, an educator, and a mom who knows what it’s like to juggle a full and complicated life. Brenda is here to share how the wisdom and simple habits of the past can speak into the busy and hectic lives that we lead today.

Brenda shares with us:

• Some of the underlying reasons for stress
• The role of interdependence in regaining community
• The simple power of ordinary practices
• And more!

We hope you find encouragement and hope in this episode!

Show Notes: growinghometogether.com/brenda-yoder-94

When we got married over 30 years ago, we learned right away that growing a strong relationship would be a never-ending process. In our years together, we keep blending our personalities, habits, and the good and bad in our backgrounds so that we can love each other well and accomplish the oneness that God designed for marriage.

For couples who marry after divorce or the loss of a spouse, they face even more layers of grief and complexity to grow a strong relationship. That’s why we are so glad to welcome Sabrina McDonald on the podcast today to help us understand the challenges of building a blended family.

She is a writer and speaker with expertise in marriage and family counseling. Sabrina has been a contributor to national ministries like Focus on the Family and FamilyLife. She is the author of her latest book, A Home Built from Love and Loss: Coming Together as a Blended Family. For anyone facing the challenges of blended families, this book offers practical advice and spiritual guidance to find hope amid grief.

Sabrina shares with us:

• The challenges of a blended family
• Tips for maintaining a relationship with all your children
• Different ways grief can manifest
• And more!

We hope you find value in this conversation!

Show Notes: https://growinghometogether.com/sabrina-mcdonald-93

This week on the podcast, we're revisiting an excellent conversation originally shared in 2021. Anxiety remains a challenge for many children and families (including ours). While you’ll hear references to COVID-19 in this episode (as this was recorded in the height of shutdowns), the practical tips for anxiety are well worth revisiting so we can better support our kids in their challenges.

Show Notes: https://growinghometogether.com/kelly-boprie-92/

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We don’t need the experts to tell us that anxiety is a very real and growing struggle for children today. It touches nearly every family we know, and moms and dads are feeling discouraged and helpless in the face of their kids’ emotions.

That’s why we’re thrilled to welcome an expert therapist and mom of two to the podcast today. Kelly Boprie provides therapy for kids who face struggles with anxiety and depression, trauma and eating disorders. In her practice, she guides children through the transformative work of overcoming difficult emotions and behavior. This episode provides a wealth of practical help for parents by teaching us:

• How to recognize anxiety issues in your kids at all ages and stages
• How to discern the difference between a temporary struggle and a mood disorder
• The ways anxiety affects your kids’ ability to function and thrive
• Simple stress-management skills you can teach your kids to move them from panic to peace
• The importance of managing your own anxiety as parents
• How to teach your kids to name and express their emotions
• Knowing when and how to seek professional help for your child
• The impact of faith on our fears

Adopting our youngest son through the foster care system ten years ago was truly one of life’s greatest gifts. But one thing we didn’t fully understand as we looked forward to a bright future with our beloved little boy was just how much trauma a child suffers when they’re separated from their birth parents. 

Like many foster and adoptive parents, we are on a constant learning journey and are always looking for better ways to support our son through the unique struggles he experiences. That’s why we’re so grateful that Jenni Lord was able to join us for this candid conversation.

Jenni founded Chosen—an organization committed to empowering parents and fostering children’s trauma recovery. Chosen connects families impacted by the child welfare system with the resources and support they need to move from hurting to healing. 

Jenni shares:

• How trauma impacts the brain, body, and behaviors of youth in foster care
• How prioritizing connection over correction can strengthen your parenting
• The importance of creating safe spaces for your child to open up
• And more!

We hope you enjoy this conversation as much as we did!

Show Notes: https://growinghometogether.com/jenni-lord-91

There’s a common misconception that it's always the big things—like dishonesty or infidelity—that cause marriages to fall apart. But the truth is, many marriages experience death by a thousand cuts as small areas of misalignment add up over time.

Every marriage has its squabbles, clashes, and little flare-ups of friction. Over our more than 30 years together, we’ve certainly had our fair share of moments where our mindsets didn’t quite match up.

We’ve all been there at some point, and that’s why we were elated to chat with today’s guest, Kari Trent Stageberg. Kari is a wife and a mom of two little boys. With her dad, she runs a nonprofit called Strong Families, and she’s also the author of The Merge for Marriage, a book designed to help couples stay on the same page in spite of all the ways they may be different.

In this conversation, Kari shares:

• How to work together with your spouse towards the same goal even if you use different approaches
• Tools for resolving conflict, nurturing connection, and bringing joy back into your relationship
• Why today’s world creates unique challenges for modern marriages and how to overcome them
• And more!

We hope you enjoy this episode!

Show Notes: https://growinghometogether.com/kari-trent-stageberg-90

We all have wish lists in life—wishes for bigger houses, more quality time with our spouses, or even just a simple wish for better weather.

While there’s nothing wrong with dreaming, we find our spirits dragging when we grow too preoccupied with the parts of life we wish would change. When this mindset takes over, it can prevent us from finding joy in the present.

So what’s the solution?

Our inspiring guest, Tama Fortner, is here to help us find out. Tama is a best-selling writer who has published and contributed to many books that are inspirational for all ages. Her newest book, Everyday Joys Devotional, invites us to experience God in our real day-to-day lives. Tama was moved to write this book during a time of great personal struggle. When her hope was scarce, she asked God for help, and He gave her a strength that empowered her to restore a joyful spirit to her heart and her home. 

Tama shares with us:

• How to start seeing His divine presence even in the ordinary moments of life
• Advice for setting a positive tone of joy and trust in your household
• The secret to holding happiness even during the “in-betweens” of life
• And more!

We hope you enjoy this conversation!

Show Notes: https://growinghometogether.com/tama-fortner-89

Raising our two sons has been one of the most rewarding journeys of our lives. If you have boys of your own, you know that parenting sons comes with its own unique set of blessings and challenges.

One skill we strive to help our sons build is the ability to overcome the lies they encounter in life. We want to help them better understand what’s true and false about who they are, what’s really important in life, and where God is when things get hard.

That’s why we were so grateful for the opportunity to chat with today’s guests, Erin and Jason Davis. They’re the authors of Lies Boys Believe, a book that helps kids understand the truth of the Bible using strategies taken straight from Erin and Jason’s experiences raising four sons.

In this episode, you’ll hear:

• How to use narratives from the Bible to counteract the lies society has told your son
• Tips for working the Word into daily life in a way that helps your sons appreciate the stories of Scripture
• Why grounding your sons in the truth of the gospel will help them identify lies for themselves
• And more!

We hope you enjoy this conversation!

Show Notes: https://growinghometogether.com/erin-jason-davis-88

Our son entered middle school this year and he is growing in all sorts of new and fun ways! He outgrew his shoe size, his appetite is bigger, he’s grown a wider circle of friends, and he’s definitely sleeping longer and longer hours. Along with that growth, his desire and appetite for screen time is growing bigger too!

Honestly, navigating our son’s screen time isn’t a new challenge to us. We’ve wondered for years how to set good boundaries so that screen time could be a blessing and not a burden as he grows.

That’s why we are glad to have our guest on the show today, Arlene Pellicane. She is the author of Screen Kids and is here to help us all navigate screen time with our kids.

In this episode, you'll hear:

• How technology has been designed to be addictive
• The importance of managing your own screen time
• Practical tips for putting limits on screen time as a parent
• And more!

We hope you enjoy this conversation!

Show Notes: https://growinghometogether.com/arlene-pellicane-87

The goal of our ministry has always been to help you care for the soul of your family and help you nourish relationships that keep God at the center of your home.

We know that many couples desire the closeness and encouragement of sharing their faith with their husband or wife. Instead, they feel a painful sense of disappointment when their spouse isn’t stepping into the role of spiritual leader as they expected. It can feel lonely and like you are single-handedly trying to teach your children about Jesus and deepen your family’s spiritual walk.

That’s why we are so glad to welcome today’s guest, Dana Che Williams, to talk about what it really means to lead your family spiritually and how couples can find peace in this area of their marriage. Dana is a wife, mom, speaker, marriage coach, and the host of the Real Relationship Talk podcast.

In this episode, you'll hear:

• A definition of spiritual leadership
• What it looks like to be unequally yoked in your marriage
• The impact of cultivating a deep relationship with the Lord
• And more!

We hope you enjoy this conversation!

Show Notes: https://growinghometogether.com/dana-che-williams-86