Speaker 1: You're listening to a MoMA Mia podcast.
Speaker 2: Welcome to Parenting out Loud, the podcast for parents who
Speaker 2: don't always listen to parenting podcasts.
Speaker 1: We're here to get you up to.
Speaker 2: Speed on what's happening in the culture and what parents
Speaker 2: are actually thinking about.
Speaker 1: I am Stacey Hicks, I'm Amelia Laster.
Speaker 3: And I'm Claire Stevens filling in for Mons, who is
Speaker 3: off doing allegedly more important things Mum Maya's new show Unleashed.
Speaker 2: She is, but we're happy to have you and the
Speaker 2: human you're currently growing.
Speaker 3: Yeah, longtime fan, first time yeah host like I forgot
Speaker 3: the word for host.
Speaker 1: Of coming up on today's show.
Speaker 4: Are easy kids all they're cracked up to be.
Speaker 2: And there are two types of households and they both
Speaker 2: hinge on a word that I can't say without laughing.
Speaker 3: So we'll see how this goes and the case for
Speaker 3: watching TV with your kids. But first, in case you
Speaker 3: missed it, parents, picky eating is not your fault. So
Speaker 3: as a picky eater, and as someone who has a
Speaker 3: niece who is a very very picky eater, that would
Speaker 3: be Luca and Jesse's daughter, friend of the pod, picky
Speaker 3: eating is something I think about and talk about a lot.
Speaker 3: So I clicked really fast when I saw an article
Speaker 3: in the New York Times called There's a reason American
Speaker 3: kids are such picky eaters. And basically an historian studied
Speaker 3: the rise of picky eating and has argued that it's
Speaker 3: not a phase, it's not evolutionary, and it's not your fault.
Speaker 3: It's manufactured. And it's manufactured by the fact that we
Speaker 3: now have more processed food and we're obsessed with like
Speaker 3: snack culture. So her research shows that children in the
Speaker 3: eighteen hundreds, and I'll try not to laugh, so I
Speaker 3: say this, we're eating oysters, organ meats, bitter greens and
Speaker 3: loving them. There was no such thing as kids food,
Speaker 3: So this is an extract, she said. A group of
Speaker 3: children in eighteen thirties Boston spent their pocket money on
Speaker 3: raw oysters, dowsed them with vinegar and pepper, and ate
Speaker 3: them with rapture.
Speaker 4: That's amazing rapture.
Speaker 1: That's because they didn't have goozman and go no.
Speaker 3: We'll get to that. We will get to that. A
Speaker 3: girl in eighteen seventies New York adored a salad made
Speaker 3: of tiny crabs that she ate by the spoonful shellin.
Speaker 4: Or oh I don't like that.
Speaker 3: No, it was normal for a child to cheer when
Speaker 3: she saw turnips growing in the garden, or for another
Speaker 3: to call cabbage his delight. Also, families ate the same meal. Yes, yes,
Speaker 3: we've heard that's really important, and telling me no one
Speaker 3: snacked on anything, so when it came to meal time,
Speaker 3: people were ravenous. But then processed food exploded, so sugary
Speaker 3: cerealsckage snacks. Companies started marketing directly to children and sort
Speaker 3: of suggesting that children needed more bland foods, things that
Speaker 3: were beige and easily likable, So we were kind of
Speaker 3: trained to think that children were fussier. Stacy, does this
Speaker 3: ring true, this kind of sociological idea of why we
Speaker 3: have picky eaters?
Speaker 2: It makes sense when you put it like that, But
Speaker 2: I also think part of it is just that kids
Speaker 2: are hardwired. Like you and I were talking about that earlier,
Speaker 2: you could do the exact same thing as someone else
Speaker 2: in terms of, you know, you hand them a piece
Speaker 2: of steak to munch on so that they're used to that,
Speaker 2: and you give them lots of greenspurst whatever. It can
Speaker 2: kind of end up the same. I feel like it's
Speaker 2: kind of like personality, like you could move the dial
Speaker 2: a little bit. But I feel like a fussy eater
Speaker 2: might be a fussy eater no matter what you do.
Speaker 3: Anyone who has witnessed or who has a fussy eater, yeah,
Speaker 3: knows that it is. I look at Luna, So my niece.
Speaker 3: We gave her cottage cheese the other day. She almost
Speaker 3: vomited like it was the texture. I think she thought
Speaker 3: it was yoga. She felt tricked and she whereas Matilda,
Speaker 3: my daughter, will eat sardines, she wills and she is happy.
Speaker 3: I'm like, I'm gagging, what is wrong with you? And
Speaker 3: Jesse and I, identical twins, have done the same thing
Speaker 3: with food, and they are two different kids.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I wonder whether it's also just yes, they're saying
Speaker 2: that they need more bland foods, and maybe that's to blame,
Speaker 2: like we've just made them too used to those things.
Speaker 2: But I think it's almost that we give them a
Speaker 2: lot of choice now as well.
Speaker 1: You know how somewhere along the.
Speaker 2: Line we were taught you have to give them autonomy
Speaker 2: and say like would you like this banana yogurt or
Speaker 2: this musli bar?
Speaker 1: So that they've got lots of choices, you asking.
Speaker 2: Yeah, if it's just a musli bar, they're gonna be
Speaker 2: excited about that, in the same way that those kids
Speaker 2: were frothing over oysters.
Speaker 4: That's the best you've got, that's what you'll do.
Speaker 5: I do feel like in the nineties growing up, a
Speaker 5: musli bar was an exciting thing. That was yeah.
Speaker 4: And if it was a chocolate chip chiwi musley bara.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, yep.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: The other thing that I always feel like saying when
Speaker 3: we see these historical stories is kids in the nineteenth
Speaker 3: century also died a lot.
Speaker 4: That's such a good things like.
Speaker 3: Scurvy, and I just wonder were their children running around
Speaker 3: sculling oysters? Sure, but the children who were picky like me,
Speaker 3: maybe we didn't.
Speaker 4: Survive such a good point exactly.
Speaker 3: So I'd like to challenge the historian.
Speaker 5: I want to talk about a phrase that you hear
Speaker 5: a lot from new parents. I'm sure you've both heard
Speaker 5: it before. You ask new parents or how are you sleeping,
Speaker 5: and you're kind of expecting that they're going to tell
Speaker 5: you how difficult it is. But I've noticed that a
Speaker 5: lot of new parents these days instead kind of light
Speaker 5: up and they beam and they tell you, oh, we're sleeping, great,
Speaker 5: we have an easy baby.
Speaker 4: Have you ever heard people say that?
Speaker 3: And it's so annoying. But in my head I'm like,
Speaker 3: you just wait your baby. They haven't.
Speaker 4: In my head, I'm thinking just wait.
Speaker 5: But then I read this piece on Mama Mia this
Speaker 5: week that got me thinking a little bit more deeply
Speaker 5: about how we call some children easy and I guess
Speaker 5: by implications some children difficult. And it was a very
Speaker 5: moving piece by an author called Ayushi the Core and
Speaker 5: the piece is called The Emotional Cost of being the
Speaker 5: Easy Child, and it has this unforgettable first sentence. She says,
Speaker 5: the first time someone calls you easy, you don't hear.
Speaker 4: The warning in it. And what she goes on to
Speaker 4: argue is that easy children do get a lot of rewards.
Speaker 5: The rewards are attention, validation, people telling them how delightful
Speaker 5: they are, how agreeable they are, and they grow up
Speaker 5: learning that the more they stifle their own emotional needs,
Speaker 5: the more validation and approval they get from the people
Speaker 5: around them, and that can turn out to have these
Speaker 5: really pernicious effects in adulthood, As the author says, you
Speaker 5: can become extremely competent at life while feeling oddly distant
Speaker 5: from desire. I just love that concept of feeling oddly
Speaker 5: distant from desire. So I want to ask you, Stacy,
Speaker 5: because I know this really hit a chord for you.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it did.
Speaker 2: This was one of those stories that when you're reading it,
Speaker 2: you feel like glass is shattering in your head about
Speaker 2: your understanding of yourself. You need to explain this to me, yes,
Speaker 2: because this did not resonate for you in the way
Speaker 2: it did for me. And I think that's because I'm
Speaker 2: a people pleaser and you're famously type B, which we've
Speaker 2: spoken about.
Speaker 4: Mostly do not please the people.
Speaker 1: Yeah, tell us, no, you do, but just not in
Speaker 1: the same way.
Speaker 2: The main takeaway from me and what they were talking
Speaker 2: about is yes, like you get rewarded. There was this
Speaker 2: great quote about you're rewarded in a hundred small ways,
Speaker 2: like you spoke about you get a gentler tone, fewer lectures,
Speaker 2: that subtle social prestige of being called the one that
Speaker 2: gets it. But what you don't get is as much attention,
Speaker 2: as much reassurance. And the main thing is that you
Speaker 2: don't experience conflict as much. You don't ever really get
Speaker 2: to practice disappointing someone and having to in that and
Speaker 2: that just being something you have to deal with. And
Speaker 2: that was my main takeaway is that for people who
Speaker 2: wet the easy child, which I think I probably was
Speaker 2: after reading this, is that you really struggle with any
Speaker 2: kind of conflict or disapproval later on in life, like
Speaker 2: you hate it.
Speaker 5: Do you draw a straight line from that to were
Speaker 5: you told as a child, Oh, you're so easy, you're
Speaker 5: so you're no trouble.
Speaker 1: I think so.
Speaker 2: I think I was always seen as you're such a
Speaker 2: good girl, you're such a high achiever, you do all
Speaker 2: of the right things. And not that my brother wasn't
Speaker 2: a difficult child by any means, but I think it's
Speaker 2: probably something that got put on me that has kind
Speaker 2: of followed me to the point where I think that
Speaker 2: that just does play out.
Speaker 1: And it reminded me a lot.
Speaker 2: There's this other article I saw the other week in
Speaker 2: the New Yorker about fawning. Have you you know the
Speaker 2: the concept of fite flight freezer fawn and that if
Speaker 2: you're a fauner, you're basically trying to ingratiate yourself to
Speaker 2: someone who you want to earn their approval. And I
Speaker 2: could definitely see how people were easy children then grow
Speaker 2: up to be fourness to kind of fit in and
Speaker 2: make sure that they're still holding that label.
Speaker 1: Did you feel that you're not long?
Speaker 4: Yeah, you were aggressively clear.
Speaker 3: My mum would always laugh because in primary school, if
Speaker 3: somebody was mean to me, I would be overly nice
Speaker 3: to them. That was my only response. So there was
Speaker 3: a girl who was bullying me, and apparently I don't
Speaker 3: remember it, I must have been like five, and I
Speaker 3: told her she had beautiful hair, and then she was
Speaker 3: like clean, so nice, and that has always been my like, am.
Speaker 5: I but that's brilliant, Like just tell someone who's being
Speaker 5: awful to you that they.
Speaker 4: Have beautiful hair.
Speaker 3: Yeah, no, I like it is a good strategy. However,
Speaker 3: it does mean that I absolutely hate conflict and I'm
Speaker 3: not good at it. I feel like I had no
Speaker 3: choice for it to be an easy child because mum
Speaker 3: had four kids under two and a half, so two
Speaker 3: sets of twins, and you couldn't there was no room
Speaker 3: for the most difficult out of the four of us
Speaker 3: was Jesse, also a friend of Pod, and she was
Speaker 3: not difficult by any means, but she'd state what she
Speaker 3: wanted and then we'd all just kind of follow Jesse.
Speaker 3: But because of that, when it comes to any kind
Speaker 3: of I see things as conflict that my husband does
Speaker 3: not see as conflict.
Speaker 4: And he because you're always scanning.
Speaker 3: Yes, yes, I'm scared, and I am constantly scared of
Speaker 3: getting in trouble. It's my worst fear getting in trouble
Speaker 3: from strangers, even just stating needs. Like if somebody kind
Speaker 3: of asks me if I can do something, it's sort
Speaker 3: of only occurred to me in the last couple of
Speaker 3: years that I can say no.
Speaker 4: So how is this informing how you parent? Then?
Speaker 5: Because obviously you had a very happy childhood and you're
Speaker 5: still very close with your parents. It's not as though
Speaker 5: you're saying they did something wrong, But is there a
Speaker 5: way that you want to parent differently?
Speaker 3: The lovely thing about parenting that I didn't expect is
Speaker 3: child comes out as them and they are not a
Speaker 3: mirror image of you. And I look at Matilda and
Speaker 3: I'm like, oh, you are just you know what you want.
Speaker 3: In terms of personality, she's like my husband. She is
Speaker 3: an extrovert, which is so unfamiliar to me. At the park,
Speaker 3: she's like going up to kids I look at her
Speaker 3: and think it is my job to encourage that and
Speaker 3: to not get her to minimize herself because she's freaking hilarious.
Speaker 3: But it is interesting to then see Jesse's daughter, who
Speaker 3: is more of that people pleaser, doesn't want to upset anyone,
Speaker 3: and to see that contrast. But this is the tricky thing.
Speaker 3: I do think part of it's innate, part of it's
Speaker 3: an eight. It becomes self fulfilling, Like you are kind
Speaker 3: of pegged as, oh, thank god, you're conscientious, you're quiet,
Speaker 3: you listen, you follow instructions. I think for me, like
Speaker 3: probably there were some personality things that came out later
Speaker 3: that weren't that that then had to be kind of
Speaker 3: suppressed because I was chaotic and disorganized, but I was
Speaker 3: always trying to mask it because I was like no, no, no,
Speaker 3: no no, I meant to be the good one.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but then there's things in there, like she mentions
Speaker 2: that you will be praised for being less needy, and
Speaker 2: that scene is a really positive thing. But what that
Speaker 2: does is say to you, don't ever say your needs,
Speaker 2: and you're kind of are pushing down things that probably
Speaker 2: are naturally something that you would do to see that.
Speaker 4: Do not lie to me. Are you walking around all
Speaker 4: day at work with a little voice in your head
Speaker 4: that's whispering, do not.
Speaker 3: Say your needs? And then I close surprised when other
Speaker 3: people do it, and I'm like, I'm not mad at you.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's what she was saying when she was going
Speaker 2: through like what the costs become when you're older, And
Speaker 2: it's like they're subtle, Like these things are not things
Speaker 2: that are ruining our lives.
Speaker 1: Like that's very clear.
Speaker 5: And also like on the flip side, we should say
Speaker 5: people who are constantly telling you their needs are tedious.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah, I don't direct, so it's fine to
Speaker 2: be the way you are. But one of the ones
Speaker 2: I though it was really interesting she spoke about the
Speaker 2: over apologizing, So even when things that are not something
Speaker 2: that you've done, you will apologize just to ingratiate yourself
Speaker 2: to someone. But the other one was that you struggle
Speaker 2: to be even slightly inconvenient without thinking it's a catastrophe.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and that's what we're talking about.
Speaker 2: So I guess the reassurance for people who have children
Speaker 2: that are not considered easy is that they will ask
Speaker 2: for what they want when they're older, and that's great,
Speaker 2: So we just need to roll with whatever they are.
Speaker 3: That should be encouraged.
Speaker 2: Okay, little bit of a gearshift now, But I want
Speaker 2: to talk about this headline I saw. Sometimes you just
Speaker 2: see one that puts into words things that you've been
Speaker 2: grappling with your entire life. And this article fro him
Speaker 2: self was called did you grow up in a fart
Speaker 2: pride or a fart shame household? And if you can
Speaker 2: already hear me giggling, you know which one I'm from.
Speaker 2: It's probably quite obvious to you what is what, but
Speaker 2: I'll just spell it out for you. So, if you're
Speaker 2: from a fart pride household, a fart is just a fart.
Speaker 2: There's no reaction from anyone, and they might even be
Speaker 2: seen as funny. If you're from a fart shame household,
Speaker 2: it's not that you were like forbidden or like shunned
Speaker 2: from the house if you let one slip out, But
Speaker 2: it's more that you were told that it was something
Speaker 2: that needed to be minimized or controlled, or you had
Speaker 2: to be considerate.
Speaker 1: It was seen as.
Speaker 2: Bad manners if you were doing this in front of
Speaker 2: someone else, I am.
Speaker 4: Dying to know. Are you which one were you guys.
Speaker 3: Yeah, see, I think it's gendered potentially, if you grew
Speaker 3: up with like all girls, it might be a different thing.
Speaker 3: But because I had brothers, yeah, I would say, because
Speaker 3: it was we were evenly scaled genderwise. We were fart neutral.
Speaker 4: Yeah, we were.
Speaker 5: Very much a fart shame household. I don't even like
Speaker 5: talking about it, I.
Speaker 1: Know, and I can't believe.
Speaker 4: I don't think you should talk about it.
Speaker 5: I don't. I don't like anything about it. Stacey is
Speaker 5: clutching an emotional support pillar. I don't even have one.
Speaker 5: Maggie Dent, who is an Australian parenting guru. I love
Speaker 5: her work, but one part of what she writes about
Speaker 5: that I just feel very reluctant to go along with
Speaker 5: is she says that farts are a great bonding mechanism.
Speaker 4: Particularly with boys.
Speaker 5: She says a well timed fart can lighten the mood,
Speaker 5: diffuse a conflict, and be a wonderful bonding connection with
Speaker 5: a son. And she says that one specific scenario where
Speaker 5: you might try this is you're a mum, your son's
Speaker 5: just gotten up, he's grumpy, he doesn't say good morning
Speaker 5: you are meant to.
Speaker 4: And I quote this is a quote.
Speaker 5: I would never use this phrase drop a fart to
Speaker 5: lighten the mood.
Speaker 4: I'm not doing that, Maggie. I think you're brilliant. But nope, he.
Speaker 3: Gets so mad to see I need boy parenting advice
Speaker 3: because I'm eighteen weeks pregnant with a boy and I
Speaker 3: am looking That's exactly the kind of advice I'm looking
Speaker 3: for you.
Speaker 5: But I'm not gonna follow that advice. Are you going
Speaker 5: to follow that advice from Switzerland?
Speaker 3: Well, this is the thing among children. I'm very like
Speaker 3: fart liberated around children. Yes, this is a shared sense
Speaker 3: of city. Yes, this is how we can.
Speaker 1: We're on the same level.
Speaker 3: But I'm always like, don't tell you do.
Speaker 2: You know what's the worst part is that, as you
Speaker 2: were saying about this being a bit gendered sometimes, is
Speaker 2: if you marry into a fart incompatible household, that your marriage.
Speaker 1: Yes, so I've.
Speaker 2: Come from fart shame into fart proud and that is
Speaker 2: a very confusing dynamic, especially for our daughter, who sees
Speaker 2: one be very okay with this and one who just
Speaker 2: never does it.
Speaker 5: I think it's a very important question to ask on
Speaker 5: a first day.
Speaker 1: They do say, it goes quite deep like.
Speaker 2: There were mental health experts in this piece talking about
Speaker 2: how your family is unspoken.
Speaker 5: Called mental health experts that part they're busy.
Speaker 2: Said, the unspoken farterals in parts of your childhood can
Speaker 2: be a bigger representation of how you handle embarrassment, how
Speaker 2: you express being vulnerable, and how you'll get along with
Speaker 2: potential partners if you are.
Speaker 3: I reckon the easy child never farts and then you
Speaker 3: become you don't issues as an adult because you need to.
Speaker 3: And I reckon men. You know, women just always have
Speaker 3: got issues. It's because we're holding in our parts.
Speaker 1: It really is, okay, so we all need to adopt.
Speaker 5: Okids eating oysters and we're farting all the time. Yes,
Speaker 5: what great advice do you give on the show We're
Speaker 5: not your regular parenting podcast?
Speaker 3: Finally, a piece of parenting advice that doesn't make me
Speaker 3: feel like I'm failing. An opinion in The New York
Speaker 3: Times was titled just let your kids watch TV already
Speaker 3: and hell yes. The argument is we've been thinking about
Speaker 3: TV time all wrong. We've conflated screen time, which is
Speaker 3: a very isolated, singular activity, with TV time, which was
Speaker 3: always a group activity, and gave us a shared language,
Speaker 3: a way to relate to people. It was a shared experience.
Speaker 3: This essay suggests that we should be using it as
Speaker 3: a way to bond with our kids, rather than sort
Speaker 3: of outsourcing parenting to the TV.
Speaker 5: No, but see that makes me feel bad, Like that's
Speaker 5: how I use the I know I have to watch
Speaker 5: the shows with them.
Speaker 3: Well, I actually felt very smug because Matilda was a
Speaker 3: little bit sick this morning and we watched a lovely
Speaker 3: episode of Bluey together. Was on my phone. Yes, but
Speaker 3: the person who wrote this essay doesn't need to know that.
Speaker 3: So she was so cuddly. She was sucking her up.
Speaker 3: That's what I love about watching TV with a kid,
Speaker 3: if they get cuddly.
Speaker 4: Particularly the Bluey episode sleepy Time.
Speaker 3: Yes, sopid, they are really cuddly. She did ask questions.
Speaker 3: She's engaging with it, and she's like, mum, where's the
Speaker 3: mummy gone? What's that? Who's that?
Speaker 2: Like?
Speaker 3: She's asking things. I'm like, this is an enriching experience
Speaker 3: for both of us, and I don't have to move,
Speaker 3: and that is something I'm gonna need pret drop of.
Speaker 3: Actually did not.
Speaker 4: I didn't it perfect.
Speaker 3: She would have really liked that. She would have loved that. Amelia.
Speaker 3: What's your attitude towards TV as a parent?
Speaker 2: Oh?
Speaker 5: I love TV, always have watched a lot of it
Speaker 5: growing up. And I think that what I struggle with
Speaker 5: a bit with this advice is that notion of this
Speaker 5: is another thing on my to do list, Whereas TV
Speaker 5: was a way for me to fold laundry or to
Speaker 5: scroll my phone, both equally valid activities, and now I
Speaker 5: have to be able to also sit down with the
Speaker 5: kids and watch the TV with them.
Speaker 4: That's it.
Speaker 5: I think there's some really amazing ways in which TV
Speaker 5: can teach children about the world. I was thinking about
Speaker 5: this after the very sad passing of James Vanderbeek from
Speaker 5: Dawson's Creek recently, and it got me thinking about how
Speaker 5: important shows like Dawson's Creek were in establishing my place
Speaker 5: in the world when I was a kid, and I
Speaker 5: do worry that in a very diffuse, algorithm driven world,
Speaker 5: kids are not getting those kinds of like universal monoculture
Speaker 5: TV viewing experience as anymore.
Speaker 4: Yeah, they're just getting sat in front of Netflix.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and that's like shows like Friends. We're a friend's household.
Speaker 2: So Friends was the show that we always watched, and
Speaker 2: it almost becomes like another family member, Like it gives
Speaker 2: you a language that you will share, you say in
Speaker 2: jokes off that show. And I feel like now screen
Speaker 2: time and TV time, as you said, have been confused,
Speaker 2: and so we think that we have to set limits
Speaker 2: on all of it. But as you were saying, we
Speaker 2: didn't have limits on We just always had the TV on,
Speaker 2: Like I remember every day after school I'd watch Round
Speaker 2: the Twist, Johnson and Friends Heartbreaker. Joe's catchphrase like whatever
Speaker 2: was on, you watched it. We kind of have demonized TV,
Speaker 2: but really, as you say, there's so many ways that
Speaker 2: it like connects you to the world, particularly if.
Speaker 5: You're watching it on like a big screen in other words,
Speaker 5: not an iPad, like on a big screen in the
Speaker 5: living room with people coming and going and parents setting
Speaker 5: the next you answering questions. I think that experience of
Speaker 5: watching television can be really special.
Speaker 3: Well, even as you say, like if you're folding the
Speaker 3: washing whatever at my place, because we live in a
Speaker 3: tiny apartment and everything is essentially in the same room.
Speaker 3: If I'm folding the washing, the TV's on just there.
Speaker 3: The amount I know about the Wiggles, the amount I know,
Speaker 3: and Matilda and I converse mostly about the Wiggles, But
Speaker 3: then I do genuinely think that it is a bit
Speaker 3: of a social glue that connects her to other kids,
Speaker 3: because then you go to the Wiggles concert and she's
Speaker 3: like Simon Lucky like she knows Wiggles says he yeah,
Speaker 3: we go through them every night.
Speaker 4: It's a little bit of overflow of Wiggles. No, but
Speaker 4: they're great.
Speaker 3: They all very different account and so you know, you
Speaker 3: go to a Wiggles concert, you go to daycare, and
Speaker 3: there's a way I think it actually makes her feel safe,
Speaker 3: Like when she sees like a bluey T shirt, she's like,
Speaker 3: you're like me, and it's kind of a shared experience
Speaker 3: because you're right, it can feel like we don't have
Speaker 3: those kind of shared monoculture. It's very it's rackshed, whereas
Speaker 3: TV is kind of the one way that we can
Speaker 3: share that. What you were saying Ameilily about feeling like
Speaker 3: it is just another thing for you to do. I
Speaker 3: completely agree with that, and this demonization of TV feels
Speaker 3: really bizarre that you like, basically the only way you're
Speaker 3: allowed to have your kid watch TV is if it's
Speaker 3: educational in some way, or you're optimizing your bond with it,
Speaker 3: whatever it is. And I'm just so sick of this
Speaker 3: idea that every moment of your kid's life needs to
Speaker 3: be optimized. Yeah, there was a comment on this article
Speaker 3: because I always go through the comments on parenting articles.
Speaker 3: It's so fun. And the woman who wrote it, the mum,
Speaker 3: had clearly written out everything that she had done that
Speaker 3: day prior to her kid watching Poor Patrol as a
Speaker 3: bloody like defense thing of I'm not a neglectful parent.
Speaker 3: We drew and we went outside and play. We did
Speaker 3: all of these things. And one of the comments said
Speaker 3: that is not an exhaustive list of every thing you
Speaker 3: can do in Chicago with a child, and it's like,
Speaker 3: why does it have to be? Why can't kids unwind?
Speaker 5: Like I think that's You've just hit on another really
Speaker 5: important point here, which is that just like adults, kids
Speaker 5: reach a sensory limit or they're exhausted by a long day,
Speaker 5: and just like we like to flop down in front
Speaker 5: of the TV or we like to scroll Instagram, which
Speaker 5: they can't do, thanks Anthony Alban easy, then.
Speaker 4: That's what the TV is for. Yeah, gives them a
Speaker 4: little bit of downtime.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and she was saying that as well, like that,
Speaker 2: sitting down with him and just watching him watch the show.
Speaker 2: It was just the act of them doing nothing like
Speaker 2: that's enough. It doesn't have to be that the show
Speaker 2: is particularly educational. It was bonding for them. But they
Speaker 2: were watching Poor Patrol and she said it was just
Speaker 2: funny to see the moments.
Speaker 1: He laughed. What he thought was funny about that show?
Speaker 5: Is there anything better than a kid genuinely cackling?
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's something that you're like, I don't really get it. Yeah,
Speaker 3: I love that for you.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you miss that if you're off in the next
Speaker 2: room doing laundry, which is very much how I use
Speaker 2: the TV as. Okay, there that's on, so I can
Speaker 2: go and do this, but really, like we can just
Speaker 2: chill and watch Poor patrols.
Speaker 5: Okay, And maybe the whole thing is like, as you suggested, Stacy,
Speaker 5: screen time has become such an umbrella for actually very
Speaker 5: different activities.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 5: Yeah, and we need to just start being a little
Speaker 5: bit more unabashed about children loving TV. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Now it's time for our recommendations the things we are
Speaker 2: loving Sick this week. Claire as our host of honor
Speaker 2: do you want to go first?
Speaker 3: Yes. So at daycare they are doing a very cute
Speaker 3: activity where the kids have to bring in their favorite
Speaker 3: book from home and then they all read it together,
Speaker 3: very very cute. I'm like, is it ever coming back?
Speaker 3: Like all of that, but it reminded me of Matilda's
Speaker 3: favorite book that we are obsessed with. But I'm also
Speaker 3: recommending it as I'm always asked, like whenever I come
Speaker 3: into the office, people say, oh, I've got to get
Speaker 3: a present for a one year old or two year
Speaker 3: old like kind of like baby toddler, and I've got
Speaker 3: to get a present. I want to get a book.
Speaker 3: What books are we doing? And this is the one
Speaker 3: I always recommend. So it's called paper Dolls. It's written
Speaker 3: by Julia Donaldson.
Speaker 4: I love her.
Speaker 3: So it's actually a few years old. I thought it
Speaker 3: was very recent, but I missed it. So Julia Donaldson
Speaker 3: is the author of the Gruffalo, Room on the Broom,
Speaker 3: Snail on the Way, all the all the classics. She
Speaker 3: is also the auntie or great auntie of Lola Young
Speaker 3: the single And that's just like a fun fact. Thank
Speaker 3: you for that. I heard a funny conversation about where
Speaker 3: the Lola Young Success is nepotism because I've got Julia
Speaker 3: Donaldson and I don't I don't really think so. But
Speaker 3: this book is so cute because Julia Donaldson apparently whenever
Speaker 3: she writes like the Gruffalo and once you know this,
Speaker 3: you see it, she writes it as a song, and
Speaker 3: that's why it might be nepotism. The Lovely Young Thing.
Speaker 3: But anyway, she writes it as a song, and you
Speaker 3: can see all the rhythms.
Speaker 4: That's why it might be. This is not an Apple
Speaker 4: Martin situation.
Speaker 3: It's a few generations. But when I read this with Matilda,
Speaker 3: we've turned the whole thing into a song. She knows
Speaker 3: the entire thing, and it's a really cute story about
Speaker 3: all the things going into the little girl's memory and
Speaker 3: all the things she remembers about her childhood, and they're
Speaker 3: very familiar kind of fixtures of childhood. So any little
Speaker 3: kid who reads it will be able to kind of
Speaker 3: personalize it. But then the other fun thing, we've actually
Speaker 3: made our own paper dolls, which is really good parenting
Speaker 3: for me. Like it's grafts.
Speaker 1: It is sitting in front of the team.
Speaker 3: No no, no, no, not at that time, No, and it's
Speaker 3: just become this whole thing. So that is the book
Speaker 3: Matilda will bring you. That's the book I want to recommend.
Speaker 3: There's also another one called Animal Laophabet and it's the
Speaker 3: cooler like pop up like things coming out of their
Speaker 3: amazingly designed and that's really Donaldson as well. So I
Speaker 3: just all her books.
Speaker 4: She's so clever.
Speaker 5: I actually just read with my kids last night, The
Speaker 5: Highway Rat. Oh yes, yes, yes, just an excellent read.
Speaker 5: And I've recommended on this show before that if your
Speaker 5: kids are school age, this is an elite recommendation. If
Speaker 5: I do say so myself. They get sent home like
Speaker 5: really boring books for phonics, like just teach them how
Speaker 5: to read. But Julia Donaldson has written phonics based learn
Speaker 5: to read books that you can buy in a set.
Speaker 5: They're British, but you can have them shipped over. I
Speaker 5: think we have the technology now and they're just so
Speaker 5: much better. Oh, because she's so that's so interesting that
Speaker 5: she writes some as a song that explains why they
Speaker 5: have such an amazing lilting quality.
Speaker 3: Yeah yeah, well, speaking.
Speaker 5: Of singing, my recommendation this week is it's a bit
Speaker 5: of an art house movie. I don't know if you've
Speaker 5: come across it. It's quite neat. I'm a bit of
Speaker 5: a cinema bar.
Speaker 4: Yes, it's called The Sound of Music.
Speaker 1: Oh is that new?
Speaker 4: It came out in nineteen sixty five.
Speaker 1: I think I'm part of it.
Speaker 5: I don't think I'm going to issue spoiler alerts because
Speaker 5: I think if you don't know the plot, yes, it's
Speaker 5: on you, It's on Disney. Why did I decide to
Speaker 5: watch it with my children because I was reminded of
Speaker 5: the power of a movie night when we talked from
Speaker 5: the show about Miranda Carr and how she doesn't let
Speaker 5: her children have any screen time except for occasionally they
Speaker 5: might snuggle up and watch a movie. And for some reason,
Speaker 5: I was thinking of that quote, as I think of
Speaker 5: inane celebrity quotes all the time. For some reason, I
Speaker 5: thought we should snuggle up and watch a movie tonight.
Speaker 5: And obviously the platonic ideal of the snuggle up movie
Speaker 5: is the Sound of Music.
Speaker 1: I thought you were going to say you chose it
Speaker 1: because the dad's hot.
Speaker 4: Yes, he's no Dick fandom.
Speaker 5: As regular listeners to the show, No, Mary Poppins is
Speaker 5: my fifty shades of gray.
Speaker 4: But I found it. I haven't seen it since childhood.
Speaker 5: First of all, a lot of bangers in this one,
Speaker 5: lot so many bangers.
Speaker 3: That soundtrack was my top Spotify songs because Matilda's Matilda
Speaker 3: knows all the words.
Speaker 5: Brings me to cheers. You cannot watch the movie without singing,
Speaker 5: which will annoy your children. And I remember Mom's talked
Speaker 5: when we talked about Mary Poppins, how setting her kids
Speaker 5: down to watch it is really hard because it starts
Speaker 5: with the credits, because you know how whole movies are,
Speaker 5: and they're exceptionally boring, like you're learning about who the
Speaker 5: second production designer is, and your kids like.
Speaker 4: What is this?
Speaker 3: Is it not action?
Speaker 5: But I'm recommending it because A the songs are bangers,
Speaker 5: but b in these complex and difficult times, I found
Speaker 5: it extremely moving, Like I can't stop thinking about it.
Speaker 4: It's such a good movie.
Speaker 5: Like and that the power of music in a time
Speaker 5: of political tumult. I'm just saying, oh beautiful, it's relevant
Speaker 5: to the times. And Julie Andrews, what an absolute icon
Speaker 5: that woman is.
Speaker 1: She really is, Okay, I'm going to rewatch.
Speaker 6: And the villain of the woman the dad was dating,
Speaker 6: Oh she's not really a villain as a kid, and
Speaker 6: then when I watch it, she's just like, I think
Speaker 6: she's living her best life.
Speaker 5: That woman is like sipping champagne in every scene of
Speaker 5: the movie, and it's made it very clear she's not
Speaker 5: interested in children, which.
Speaker 4: I cannot blame her. There are a lot of them
Speaker 4: in that movie.
Speaker 2: Well, my recho this week is something that I kind
Speaker 2: of stumbled upon by accident, but it's really working, which
Speaker 2: is to let your kid record a secret video, which
Speaker 2: sounds bad, So I will explain what I've made by this,
Speaker 2: So you know how like if you've got relatives into
Speaker 2: State or whatever, and you try and get your kid
Speaker 2: to come to the phone and speak on FaceTime and
Speaker 2: they're just like, what are you doing? They're not here,
Speaker 2: I don't care, and they run away, and that is
Speaker 2: embarrassing for you when you want them to be an
Speaker 2: easy child. So my daughter asked me one day, my
Speaker 2: brother and his wife live into State. She loves them,
Speaker 2: but when they're not there, when you're trying to do that,
Speaker 2: that doesn't always go well. And she said about her
Speaker 2: little friend that lives far away now as well, can
Speaker 2: I go to my room and make a video of
Speaker 2: my room for Goldie, her friend, and I said, of
Speaker 2: course she can. That's fine because you know how you
Speaker 2: can just open an iPhone without opening anything else, Like
Speaker 2: you can just go to the camera, they can't get anything.
Speaker 2: She went and recorded a ten minute long video, My
Speaker 2: very quiet child chatted for ten minutes in this video
Speaker 2: and showed her little friend her whole room, and it
Speaker 2: just sparked this idea. I was like, Oh, she can
Speaker 2: do that for her uncle and Annie as well. So
Speaker 2: now she goes and makes little videos.
Speaker 4: This is like MTV cribs. I love it.
Speaker 2: Just tell them about her day without the embarrassment of
Speaker 2: you there like hovering, like being like tell them about
Speaker 2: when you did this, Like they can just do it themselves.
Speaker 1: They feel really cool because they're like hold a phone.
Speaker 1: They never get to do that. And she just loves it.
Speaker 1: And they're the cutest things ever. Like they obviously not secret.
Speaker 1: I watch them. I've watched them multiple times. You can
Speaker 1: choose whether you want.
Speaker 2: To strictly keep them private, but then your family members
Speaker 2: love them or they're you know, your long distance.
Speaker 4: Pro'll call them secret videos to her. Yes, I love that, Yes, So.
Speaker 2: It feels like she's getting to do something really special.
Speaker 2: So I would just recommend, like get them to film
Speaker 2: on what they say.
Speaker 3: And it's also like the kids version of voice noting yes,
Speaker 3: because it's just one way. Yes, it's like, by the way,
Speaker 3: I don't give a crap what you're doing. Yeah, look
Speaker 3: at my bedroom and they don't they don't care.
Speaker 1: I love that, Yeah so much.
Speaker 4: Yeah, great idea.
Speaker 1: Try that. That's my re coach.
Speaker 2: Well that's all we have time for on Parenting Out
Speaker 2: Loud this week. Big thanks to our team, Junior content
Speaker 2: producer Tessa Kotovich, audio producer Leah Porges, our executive producer
Speaker 2: is Sashtanic and the group EP is Ruth to Bine.
Speaker 1: And also thank you to Claire.
Speaker 3: Thanks feeling in this week, Thanks for having me.
Speaker 2: Have a great week and we will be in your
Speaker 2: feed next Saturday morning.
Speaker 1: Bye.
Speaker 4: Mamma.
Speaker 5: Mia acknowledges the traditional owners of the land on which
Speaker 5: we have recorded this podcast.