I’ve been decluttering my house for years, working through all the layers of things we have. A few weeks ago, I opened a bin of extra bags, backpacks, and soft luggage and figured I could let these things go since it’s been a while since I’ve used them. But then I remembered all the times we DID use them, how useful they were, and all the times in the future that they could come in handy. I put the lid back on the box and decided to deal with it later.  As I was mulling over the content of the box a few days later, I had an epiphany about the real reason I wasn’t ready to let these things go. We hold onto extra stuff when we don’t have a system for how we will do things. Because I don’t have a clear system for all the aspects of how we travel as a family, I hold onto more bags and travel items, “just in case” or “grab and go,” without giving it lots of thought. Is this okay? Yep! But it’s also a challenge for me that I’m excited to keep plugging away at. Developing more systems not only for traveling but for lots of areas of our home and life.  Once we know how we’ll do something - like the toiletries bags we will use when we make stops in hotels on our road trips - and what and where everything goes in it - then I can confidently get rid of the excess.  There are lots of possible systems you can develop in your family and home to make things run more smoothly, but I want to encourage you that you don’t need too many in place for you to be able to move forward and spend time on the things you love. Here are five systems that I recommend starting with:   Laundry   Dishes   Meals   Wake-up   Bedtime   If you decide the who, what, where, and when in each of these areas, you are already on your way to having your days go a lot smoother. Once these are good enough - not perfect - it’s time to move on to exploring!  You can learn more about that on the 5-Step Path From Surviving to Thriving and where you are on it with my free checklist. And if you need help building family systems that are unique to you and your needs, check out my program, Made to Soar: Next 90 Days.

Why You Might Be Holding Onto Stuff [Episode 271]

The GO TO Podcast For Moms With Kids At Home!

Do you want to love motherhood but find yourself in survival mode or burned out more than you'd like to admit? 
Do you feel tugged between enjoying every moment with your kids because it "goes so fast" and feeling mom guilt because you don't? 
Are you tired of wandering around the house or scrolling social media but don't know where to find the time or energy to do something that you would enjoy?

There's a way to create a life that you are excited to wake up to each day so you enjoy your time with your family, have a smooth running home, and still move forward on your greatest goals.

Hi! I'm Jessica Jackson, homeschooling mom of four, productivity and time management expert for moms, and project enthusiast.

In this podcast, I will teach you how to:
- Navigate survival seasons with a thriving mindset through practical tips
- Create a vision for your life and get clear about what really matters to YOU
- Effective planning, productivity, and time management strategies when you have kids at home - they're different!
- Build family systems that support the entire family - including mom
- Establish habits and rhythms that nurture you
- Become a Soaring Mother so you can live connected with God, use your gifts and talents to bless those in your circle of influence, adventure with your family, and enjoy meaningful relationships

I began motherhood with hopes and dreams that I could navigate my days confidently with purpose, live intentionally, find joy and contentment in everyday life, and have God’s help and strength in this lifelong journey. 

Reality:

I was in complete survival mode
I felt guilty a lot of the time
I had no clue what my days should look like
I was snappy and irritable with my family
Can you relate?

The good news - I closed the gap between what I hoped was possible and my reality.

And you can too.

I can't wait to help you live life with purpose and joy and see your growth in the everyday moments of motherhood.

Next Steps:
Watch the Free Workshop: 3 Secrets to Do More of What You Love Without Hiring a Babysitter
http://thrivinginmotherhoodpodcast.com/workshop

Get your Thriving in Motherhood Planner
http://thrivinginmotherhoodpodcast.com/planner

Get your Thriving in Motherhood Journal
http://thrivinginmotherhoodpodcast.com/journal

Join Made To Soar: Next 90 Days
http://thrivinginmotherhoodpodcast.com/made-to-soar

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With summer quickly approaching, I needed to refocus on what we are going to make our learning priorities for the next few months. We go year-round in our homeschooling so that we can have the ultimate flexibility to take breaks or just enjoy the nice days outside. And, hot weather here in the South has us indoors more than in the winter months. In this week’s episode, I’m sharing the question I asked to give me the clarity I needed to decide what we are going to focus on in our schooling and home so that we can have confidence in how we are using our time and energy. The question I asked myself is: “What do each of my kids need to be prepared for next fall?” With this question, I was able to narrow down the few things that matter a lot and let go of the rest. For us, we are making a family project of working through Story of the World 4 this summer so we can enjoy modern history when we start Alveary in the fall. We are also focusing on some specific skills tailored to what each child needs, instead of keeping up with all of the subjects and curriculum. Everyone is continuing with math and a few of my kids are starting All About Spelling. We started a writing club by buying our own notebooks and writing on our own time, sharing what we write when we are ready. We are also working on organizing bedrooms and our school space in May to have our environments set up to make it easy to do what we want to do. I’m prepping the Alveary curriculum in June while getting ready for our annual cross-country road trip.  Resources We Are Using This Summer: Story of the World 4 Alveary (use code JJACKSON for a $25 discount) All About Spelling

How I Decided Our Learning Priorities For the Summer [Episode 317]

For the last 30 days, I've been using the  Thriving in Motherhood Journal. Before this personal challenge, I would use it about once a week when things were hard and noticed a nice lift to my week. But as this year has continued to surprise us I started to flounder and wanted to see what impact the journal would have in my life.  In this week's episode, I'll share some of the logistics and tips for using the journal, the impact it had on my life, and my invitation for you to give it a try for yourself.  You may be wondering what it actually took for me to stick to my 30-day challenge. Here are some things that I found helpful:   Have a pen ready   Have multiple windows of when you will use the journal and put it in the next likely spot (next to your bed, office, kitchen, etc.)   Be flexible with morning or night (or both).   Pick it back up when you miss a day.   Don’t pressure yourself to answer every question. Pick the relevant ones for that day and leave the rest.   Don’t worry about keeping the daily and weekly pages perfectly ordered.   When I started this challenge, I was floundering. We’ve had a hard year on lots of levels - health, jobs, lots of things going on, kids struggling with different things (including surgery), and the unexpected keeps popping up. I have felt exhausted. Here are some of the positive impacts I noticed during my 30-day challenge:   Using the journal has empowered me through this season. I’ve been surprised at how much joy I have felt in the last 30 days.   I’ve been able to parent better, more consistently, and more confidently instead of pulling into myself and surviving through the hard days.    I’ve processed some hard emotions/situations so I could truly find peace and let go.   I did a lot more service outside of my home in 30 days than I did all year. Small ways, like helping return a grocery cart and carry food out to the car, and bigger things too.    I captured many magic moments during the last 30 days and now my days are full of them.   My health wasn’t great during this window but when I did my monthly review I discovered a miraculous amount of things got accomplished. I attribute this to the power of having the vision in my Thriving in Motherhood Planner and asking the daily questions in the journal about the next three steps for my priorities that week.   I got rid of mom guilt which normally rears its ugly head during hard survival times with the question, “What would help me feel successful today?” This question allowed me to pivot to what mattered most each day.   I have struggled with anxiety about facing the next day in the past and fret at night about what is to come, especially when I’m sleep-deprived. But this journaling process helped me live more in the moment each day and ending the day with magic moments, gratitude, big wins, and God’s involvement in my life made a big difference.   This process led me to naturally have a better routine before bed and get rid of tech when I was journaling.   I’d like to extend an invitation to you to pull out your  Thriving in Motherhood Journal (or get yours today) and commit to 30 days of journaling. Watch and see the difference it makes in your life. If you've already been using the journal, I would really appreciate it if you left a review on  Amazon to help other moms find it and see if it would be a good fit for them. And as a special bonus, if you leave a review on Amazon, you’ll be entered to win a 2024 coil-bound Thriving in Motherhood Planner!  There are some amazing bonuses you can claim when you purchase the journal to help you get the most out of it so don’t wait to  get yours!

I used the Thriving in Motherhood Journal for 30 Days - What I Discovered [Episode 316]

I got a fantastic question from a mother who is using the 2024 Thriving in Motherhood Planner this year: "I get confused sometimes about the distinction between things like goals  (quarterly vs. yearly) vs. projects vs. habits vs. Big 3 vs. focus vs. tracking.  Should these things all be related or not necessarily?  For example, on page 31, I'm not sure what goals vs projects are.  Do I choose a big goal and then break that down into projects, or are goals and projects different? Should my daily, weekly, and quarterly goals all go back to my 10-12 goals for the year?  I guess I'm just not clear on how these things are different or if they should all be connected!"  In this week's episode are going to do a deep dive on the difference between Projects, Goals, and Habits and how you can practically organize your ideas to make things happen with the Thriving in Motherhood Planner. First, use this how it works best for you!  There are no grades or right or wrong answers. But, if you’re curious, here’s how I use my Thriving in Motherhood Planner in these different areas.   Projects: Projects are things with multiple steps that need or want to happen. For example, on my list are creating a family meal binder, updating our family yearbooks, planting raspberries, planting a medicinal and culinary herb garden, and cleaning out garden pathways.     Goals: Goals are a little more personal and stretching—definitely outside of my comfort zone. This year, I put three goals down: write a book, do community service as a family, and do a cooking camp with the kids. These are also multistep goals, but they are also about shaping who we are as people and doing things that are intentionally hard.    Habits: Habits are also about becoming—but on a daily level. For me, I wrote about prepping for the next day and knowing what's going to happen so we get a head start, tracking finances, daily exercise, and reading with a commonplace notebook.   Could some of these be mixed in different places - absolutely.   Another way to think about it is that Goals are things I want to HAVE, projects are things I want to DO, and Habits are things I want to BECOME. Also, I don't fill out page 33 (Goals, Habits, Projects page) for the whole year all at once.  I do it quarter by quarter. Sometimes, it is in planning, and sometimes it is in review to just see an overview of what happened. Will goals or habits have projects involved? Very possibly! Do I use the goal planning pages for a project? Sometimes! Do I not use a goal planning page for a goal? Yes! I like to have my daily, weekly, and quarterly goals funnel down from my vision. Some years, my vision is clearly defined on page 33, and sometimes, it is NOT. But I am picking what I focus on each quarter based on my vision and my month based on the quarter. My big three for the week have at least one thing from my vision on it most weeks (and sometimes it's taken up with homeschooling, celebrating a birthday, or getting the car fixed). Focus is usually more about who I want to be, a scripture that I want to remember, a thriving thought that is helping me navigate day-to-day life or something that is challenging me and I want to navigate it better. It is nice to have it as a reminder on my weekly page spread. Tracking is for the daily habits I want to keep a record of accomplishing. In some seasons, it is really motivating to check them off, and other times, I think just doing the things is enough and could care less if there is a check in the checkbox. If you have any more questions about how I use the Thriving in Motherhood Planner or whether it’s right for you, email me at jessica@thrivinginmotherhoodpodcast.com, and I’ll get back to you!

Goals vs Projects vs Habits in the Thriving in Motherhood Planner [Episode 315]

Cleaning my home with my children has always been my number one priority. When they were babies this looked like using cleaning supplies that would be safe while they were in a baby carrier on me. As they were toddlers, it meant they could clean with me, and I wasn't worried about what they were touching. As they get older it means having materials I'm confident they can use safely by themselves.  But knowing that this is what I wanted and executing it were two different things. In this week's episode, I'm sharing all the things I've tried and what worked, what didn't work, and what we are doing now that has been the right fit for us. I tried many things over the years. The first was to walk through the cleaning aisle at the store to find the products we needed. But due to overwhelm (the number of options, not knowing which products were actually safe, and calculating the expense of it all), I always walked out of there with nothing. This also meant that for years, the actual cleaning in our home was minimal because I was so worried about picking the wrong thing. My friend Hannah (we were neighbors in grad student housing - true friendship is formed in not ideal living conditions) created a course called Simple Green Cleaning (not available right now) that taught me how to clean the majority of my house with a few basic ingredients like baking soda, vinegar, and dish soap. I thoroughly enjoyed feeling confident cleaning my house and mixing up what I needed when I needed it. But when I started teaching my kids how to do it, they were so inspired by the process that they created their own cleaning supplies by mixing soaps, shampoo, conditioner, and lotions, and it made a pretty big mess. This didn't quite work with my purpose of cleaning with my kids. A few years ago, we decided to try Force of Nature, which is completely safe for skin, disinfects, and can be used on all surfaces. It has been a game-changer. We have ONE cleaning product we use on EVERYTHING. It makes it simple to teach our children how to use it (plus they LOVE the process of making it and never complain when I ask them to clean) and I never have to worry about what they are breathing in or is touching their skin.  While I haven't done a petri dish test to confirm how well it disinfects surfaces, but it cleans well enough to remove all smells and clean surfaces, so that is good for me! When it comes to my main priority of cleaning with my kids, this one checks all of the boxes. If you want to try Force of Nature yourself, you can get a discount with this link: Force of Nature Get 40% off bundles in April with code: PLANET40 Get 60% off Cleaning and Laundry Duo Bundles with PLANET60

My Number 1 Priority For Cleaning My Home [Episode 314]

When I had three kids, four and under, I learned about Charlotte Mason and her principle of spreading a wide feast of ideas. Practically, this looks like 20 different subjects in a Charlotte Mason classroom that get covered during the week.  Before we were in the formal school years, I got into the habit of discovering where all the different sections of books were at the library so I could just walk the shelves and grab some that covered a wide range of ideas without any preplanning. For years, we have had this system in place that has provided an educational cushion through all the ups and downs in our lives and given our kids a lot of learning in a very natural way. For years, we have had this system in place that has provided an educational cushion through all the ups and downs in our lives and given our kids a lot of learning in a very natural way. I also supplement by putting books on hold at the library that deep-dive into what my kids want to learn more about so that I’m not hunting for specific books once we get there. In this week’s episode, I’m sharing practical tips for not losing the library books and keeping free books free, bringing some great books into your home, and some of our recent favorites. How we avoid fines and the library to keep our books free:   We moved all our personal books upstairs to a home library and have a separate bookshelf downstairs for the library books to create separation.   We have ONE library card, so we don’t lose track of the books we have checked out, what’s on hold, and what we have to return.   We try to get to the library on the same day every week so that we don’t have many different due dates to keep track of.   I try and go to our library account after we get home from the library to renew any books that we might have missed returning.   We have a library book bag that holds between 20-30 books, which creates some margin.   Recent Library Book Favorites That Were So Good We Would By Them   Professor Wooford McPaw’s History of Astronomy   Papa is A Poet A Story about Robert Frost   The Planet Hunter: The Story Behind What Happened to Pluto   Nothing Stopped Sophie: The Story of Unshakable Mathematician Sophie Germain    Hawk Rising    Send a Girl!: The True Story of How Women Joined the FDNY    Find Me! Adventures in the Forest    The Apartment: A Century of Russian History    Under Your Feet... Soil, Sand and Everything Underground    Charles Dickens (Little People, Big Dreams)   A Walk in London   Cooking Class Global Feast!: 44 Recipes That Celebrate the World’s Cultures    

Why You Might Be Holding Onto Stuff [Episode 271]

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