WEBVTT - The Hit Show Making A Case For 'Best Friend' Parenting 0:00:04.640 --> 0:00:10.200 Welcome to Parenting out Loud, the podcast for news, trends, culture, 0:00:10.480 --> 0:00:13.280 all kinds of parenting chitchat. What we like to do 0:00:14.160 --> 0:00:16.960 is talk about the things that parents are thinking about. 0:00:17.280 --> 0:00:19.560 I'm Monice Boy, I'm Amelia Lester. 0:00:19.640 --> 0:00:22.800 And I'm Stacy Kicks. And coming up on today's show, 0:00:22.920 --> 0:00:26.160 we have some Muma mea Baby news. But everyone is 0:00:26.200 --> 0:00:28.000 talking about the name. That's not the part we want 0:00:28.040 --> 0:00:28.600 to talk about. 0:00:28.920 --> 0:00:32.479 There's an article about how no one is reading anymore. 0:00:32.760 --> 0:00:35.280 It sent everyone into a tisio over the last week. 0:00:35.360 --> 0:00:37.239 But we have some counterpoints. 0:00:37.720 --> 0:00:40.720 When you hear the words my daughter is my best friend, 0:00:41.080 --> 0:00:44.000 what do you think really? Truly? I want to talk 0:00:44.000 --> 0:00:46.760 about how the biggest show on TV right now is 0:00:46.800 --> 0:00:48.919 making the case for best friend parenting. 0:00:49.440 --> 0:00:52.320 But first, the Men's World Cup is reaching its final 0:00:52.560 --> 0:00:55.720 exciting stages. Yes I said it, the Men's World Cup. 0:00:56.720 --> 0:01:00.279 But one parent may have taken their pride in their 0:01:00.360 --> 0:01:03.960 child's achievements a tad too far. Have you heard of 0:01:04.080 --> 0:01:05.040 Erling Harland. 0:01:06.000 --> 0:01:09.200 This is the man with the big blonde pony. 0:01:08.959 --> 0:01:12.360 Right, Yes, the Norwegian striker who looks like a Viking 0:01:12.520 --> 0:01:13.840 and has a man burn. 0:01:13.959 --> 0:01:17.679 I want his haircare routine immediately. That is extent of 0:01:17.720 --> 0:01:18.880 my knowledge of this man. 0:01:19.000 --> 0:01:21.720 Everyone loves him. He's kind of like the unofficial star 0:01:21.800 --> 0:01:26.039 of the tournament. That said his team Norway was knocked 0:01:26.040 --> 0:01:29.919 out by England over the weekend, but Erling's dad couldn't 0:01:30.000 --> 0:01:33.080 let it go. He happens to also be a former 0:01:33.120 --> 0:01:37.960 professional soccer player. His name is alf Inger Harland. And 0:01:38.280 --> 0:01:41.280 instead of saying well done, son, you tried hard, I'm 0:01:41.319 --> 0:01:43.479 proud of you, I mean he may have said that 0:01:43.640 --> 0:01:47.039 alf Inger Harland instead took to X and that's never 0:01:47.080 --> 0:01:50.080 a good sign when you take to X. But someone 0:01:50.120 --> 0:01:54.720 had posted on X well done to Jude Bellingham, who 0:01:54.840 --> 0:01:57.280 was one of the English players who kicked a goal 0:01:57.400 --> 0:02:02.160 during the game, and Alfinger re spawns well done Bellingham 0:02:02.280 --> 0:02:06.560 and referee, basically implying that the referee kind of rigged 0:02:06.600 --> 0:02:08.120 the game for England. 0:02:08.200 --> 0:02:08.560 Yeah. 0:02:08.800 --> 0:02:11.480 This really tickled me because it reminds me of the 0:02:11.560 --> 0:02:13.919 signs that I see at my kids football games. There 0:02:13.919 --> 0:02:16.359 are these signs up basically telling parents to calm down, 0:02:16.440 --> 0:02:19.080 take a chill, pill, not take everything so seriously, don't 0:02:19.160 --> 0:02:22.120 argue with the referee. And the sign ends with this 0:02:22.320 --> 0:02:25.560 is not the World Cup. But the question is what 0:02:25.639 --> 0:02:29.240 if it is the world this is the actual World Cup, minds, 0:02:29.240 --> 0:02:31.040 would you be able to resist weighing in? 0:02:31.639 --> 0:02:35.000 Do you know what? I'm over this? Like this is 0:02:35.080 --> 0:02:38.240 the exact kind of unsports some like behavior that we 0:02:38.280 --> 0:02:41.160 are trying to stamp out in junior sport. And so 0:02:41.280 --> 0:02:44.440 to see a parent on the sideline blaming a ref 0:02:44.800 --> 0:02:49.360 on the world stage is actually disgusting, and I'm not 0:02:49.440 --> 0:02:52.799 about it, and I think, I just I don't even 0:02:52.880 --> 0:02:54.480 know what to say. When I saw this, I just 0:02:54.520 --> 0:02:57.640 thought it's everything we're doing, the kid's sport is trying. 0:02:57.800 --> 0:03:02.720 It's a horrible example of unsportsmanlike behavior. And I'm a 0:03:02.760 --> 0:03:05.760 bit over men just thinking that they can come out 0:03:05.840 --> 0:03:07.919 and just say awful things about people all the time 0:03:07.960 --> 0:03:10.320 and just get away Scott Free. Not on my watch, girls, 0:03:10.440 --> 0:03:12.040 not on my watch, but Red Card. 0:03:12.520 --> 0:03:16.040 I mean, I'm famously not a sporty gal. You know, 0:03:16.160 --> 0:03:20.960 I played golf for about four months before before retiring, 0:03:21.000 --> 0:03:24.280 and that's about as sporty as I get. But you 0:03:24.360 --> 0:03:27.239 said he was an athlete himself, like he played this 0:03:27.400 --> 0:03:29.839 game as well, And I imagine it's then very hard 0:03:29.880 --> 0:03:32.440 once you're retired and you're watching your child do that 0:03:32.600 --> 0:03:35.160 exact thing that you did to kind of turn off 0:03:35.240 --> 0:03:38.000 that passion for the game. I'm not excusing him, you know, 0:03:38.600 --> 0:03:43.280 I agree you probably shouldn't say that, but like, isn't 0:03:43.320 --> 0:03:45.120 that just passion for the game. Don't you kind of 0:03:45.200 --> 0:03:46.840 need that passion to get to that level. 0:03:47.000 --> 0:03:51.280 Well it's sort of extra sad though, because earling is 0:03:51.400 --> 0:03:54.280 kind of a famously good sport, and in fact, when 0:03:54.440 --> 0:03:59.280 that player, Jude Bellingham kicked that goal, those two players 0:03:59.360 --> 0:04:03.000 are very close, and so I bet he was really 0:04:03.120 --> 0:04:05.760 mad at his dad for this, because he's out there 0:04:05.880 --> 0:04:10.000 giving Drew Bellingham a hug and being so respectful and 0:04:10.160 --> 0:04:13.280 supportive of the opposing team's achievements, and then his dad 0:04:13.520 --> 0:04:16.920 just kind of ruins it all. The end of reading 0:04:17.120 --> 0:04:20.120 is here. That's according to an article from the Atlantic, 0:04:20.240 --> 0:04:24.800 which is everywhere this week. Now, that conclusion, it feels shocking, 0:04:25.120 --> 0:04:28.200 but not necessarily surprising. Let's face it, I think we 0:04:28.360 --> 0:04:31.320 all know how our attentions fans have been shot over 0:04:31.400 --> 0:04:34.160 the last decade or so by short form video and 0:04:34.279 --> 0:04:39.040 social media, and we're just generally less likely to pick 0:04:39.120 --> 0:04:41.200 up a book. I think that's sort of a given 0:04:41.279 --> 0:04:44.520 at this point. But what I found most chilling about 0:04:44.600 --> 0:04:47.400 the article was the idea that the kids who are 0:04:47.440 --> 0:04:49.960 growing up today, so these are kids who are theoretically 0:04:50.040 --> 0:04:54.599 not yet on social media, not yet on smartphones, certainly 0:04:54.720 --> 0:04:57.920 not even using the Internet with any regularity or without 0:04:57.920 --> 0:05:01.680 close supervision, those children are actually facing the same problems 0:05:01.720 --> 0:05:03.960 and are also not reading. So it might be something 0:05:04.160 --> 0:05:07.120 like in the air which is causing people not to read. 0:05:07.680 --> 0:05:10.039 I pulled out some facts from the article to share 0:05:10.120 --> 0:05:13.200 on this point. First is that this next generation coming 0:05:13.279 --> 0:05:17.320 up now reads much less than today's adults did when 0:05:17.400 --> 0:05:20.440 they were kids. Second fact, I've got three of them. 0:05:20.720 --> 0:05:23.640 Every year older a child gets, the less they are 0:05:23.880 --> 0:05:28.080 likely to like to read. And then final scary fact, 0:05:28.279 --> 0:05:31.160 high school students have started to think of reading for 0:05:31.279 --> 0:05:35.120 pleasure as an alien practice. This is what people told 0:05:35.160 --> 0:05:39.400 The Atlantic Reporter again and again. In high schools, students 0:05:39.520 --> 0:05:42.640 just don't understand the concept of picking up a book 0:05:42.800 --> 0:05:46.920 for pleasure. So that's kind of horrifying. But at the 0:05:47.000 --> 0:05:50.640 same time, I'm a little skeptical about articles like this. 0:05:50.920 --> 0:05:53.360 They induce a lot of panicinness there's a lot of 0:05:53.560 --> 0:05:58.120 kind of getting clicks because you're scaring people, and they 0:05:58.240 --> 0:06:01.400 don't offer a lot of solutions. And this Atlantic article 0:06:01.520 --> 0:06:04.400 even concedes this really interesting point that I don't think 0:06:04.440 --> 0:06:07.080 it makes enough of, which is that people are actually 0:06:07.160 --> 0:06:10.040 reading more text now than ever before on their phones. 0:06:10.520 --> 0:06:13.479 It's just that that text isn't necessarily in the form 0:06:13.880 --> 0:06:17.440 of a bound book that you sit down and read 0:06:17.480 --> 0:06:20.600 in the way you used to. So the big question 0:06:20.800 --> 0:06:23.440 that I want to put to you both, and I'm 0:06:23.480 --> 0:06:26.960 going to start with you Stacy, is this really the 0:06:27.200 --> 0:06:31.040 end of reading or are people just reading in different ways? 0:06:31.520 --> 0:06:33.360 Do we all need to come down? Yeah? 0:06:33.520 --> 0:06:35.200 I do feel like this is a little bit of 0:06:35.560 --> 0:06:38.640 a moral panic and that we're reading in different ways, 0:06:38.680 --> 0:06:41.160 and that we're consuming knowledge in different ways too, Like 0:06:41.240 --> 0:06:44.200 if you think about podcasts that people are listening to 0:06:44.400 --> 0:06:47.320 and audiobooks, and the fact that there's so much more 0:06:47.600 --> 0:06:50.120 television at a disposal now, it's not the same three 0:06:50.240 --> 0:06:52.240 channels and you've kind of just got to watch what's on, 0:06:52.440 --> 0:06:55.400 Like there is so many there's so much slot, But 0:06:55.440 --> 0:06:58.000 there's also so much educational content on there as well, 0:06:58.360 --> 0:07:00.720 And isn't that essentially like the purpose of reading is 0:07:00.800 --> 0:07:04.280 to kind of spark creativity to learn. It's just that 0:07:04.360 --> 0:07:08.560 we're doing that in different formats. Now, and as you said, 0:07:09.000 --> 0:07:12.440 we're reading so much like between the school WhatsApp group 0:07:12.520 --> 0:07:14.720 and the emails you might do during the day, like 0:07:14.840 --> 0:07:17.480 we are consuming a lot of words. It's more just 0:07:17.600 --> 0:07:20.960 that it's not the high fluting books that some literary 0:07:21.000 --> 0:07:21.400 types might. 0:07:21.520 --> 0:07:24.240 And in fact, arguably we're even writing more than a 0:07:24.320 --> 0:07:27.080 yeah before too, because so much of how we communicate 0:07:27.120 --> 0:07:29.880 with people now is through texts, which was not the 0:07:29.920 --> 0:07:31.800 case to say when we were growing up. Mon's what 0:07:31.960 --> 0:07:34.160 was your reaction to this article, Amelia? 0:07:34.320 --> 0:07:37.120 This was the longest article you've ever sent me to read, 0:07:37.200 --> 0:07:39.480 and I didn't. I couldn't even read the whole thing. 0:07:39.920 --> 0:07:44.680 Case in point, I boring. Oh my god, Amelia, it 0:07:44.800 --> 0:07:49.440 was four thousand words. So I skimmed it and look, 0:07:49.800 --> 0:07:52.840 then I got the gist and I went straight to 0:07:53.040 --> 0:07:55.960 Australian research because I was like, okay, America, shut up, 0:07:56.520 --> 0:07:59.320 you're just falling to pieces. We don't want your panic 0:07:59.400 --> 0:08:01.640 to say a state like what are we doing in Australia. 0:08:01.640 --> 0:08:04.560 It's different, and you're right, it's not so bad here, 0:08:05.400 --> 0:08:07.880 like everything's going to be okay. But the point you 0:08:08.000 --> 0:08:12.920 made before about us reading more texts and we read 0:08:13.040 --> 0:08:16.560 more words, and we read words differently. That may be true, 0:08:17.280 --> 0:08:22.480 but educators are sort of concerned because what books do 0:08:23.240 --> 0:08:26.400 is when you read a book across a period of time, 0:08:27.320 --> 0:08:29.920 you have to There's lots of skills that come with 0:08:30.120 --> 0:08:32.559 kind of deep reading and long form reading, like you 0:08:33.200 --> 0:08:39.679 understand metaphor, you understand figurative language. Yeah, so educator is 0:08:39.679 --> 0:08:42.640 a concern because while kids can read words, and words 0:08:42.679 --> 0:08:45.240 are great, and it's great that they have good knowledge 0:08:45.280 --> 0:08:48.360 of what a word is, they're lacking comprehension. They don't 0:08:48.440 --> 0:08:51.000 understand metaphor, and they can't sort of think more deeply 0:08:51.520 --> 0:08:55.400 or about books and stories. And so that's I think 0:08:56.520 --> 0:08:59.800 some of the panic is around that while they can, 0:09:00.480 --> 0:09:04.040 literacy rates are great, it's those soft skills that come 0:09:04.559 --> 0:09:06.120 with sitting with a book for a long time. And 0:09:06.200 --> 0:09:09.920 the other point someone made is that it requires kind 0:09:09.960 --> 0:09:13.000 of attention and focus because a novel means you have 0:09:13.160 --> 0:09:15.160 to sit with it and you have to hold a 0:09:15.240 --> 0:09:17.640 story in your head. You have to think about different characters, 0:09:17.679 --> 0:09:22.360 different story arcs, you have to think about the entire 0:09:22.520 --> 0:09:24.520 like sort of life cycle of a book. When you're 0:09:24.559 --> 0:09:30.640 watching TV or you're consuming other media, it barely asks 0:09:30.679 --> 0:09:33.760 you to hold anything for very long, and so that 0:09:33.960 --> 0:09:36.480 was the concern too about sort of like deep focus 0:09:36.640 --> 0:09:37.079 on something. 0:09:37.160 --> 0:09:39.880 But the funny thing is that when novels first came 0:09:40.000 --> 0:09:44.760 about in roughly the seventeenth eighteenth century, they were not 0:09:45.000 --> 0:09:49.200 seen as a worthy endeavor. In fact, people reading novels 0:09:49.280 --> 0:09:52.200 were seen as wasting time. So it's sort of funny 0:09:52.240 --> 0:09:56.120 that we've now decided as a society that reading novels 0:09:56.280 --> 0:10:00.959 is just the most educated era thing you can do. 0:10:01.880 --> 0:10:03.760 That said, I'm going to argue against myself a little 0:10:03.760 --> 0:10:05.560 bit and say that there does seem to be something 0:10:05.640 --> 0:10:08.800 kind of magical about reading books. And just to pick 0:10:08.920 --> 0:10:15.839 one interesting example, this is Australian research modes. Outside of schoolwork, 0:10:16.480 --> 0:10:19.959 a child can read as few as one hundred thousand 0:10:20.000 --> 0:10:23.960 words per year and as many as ten million words 0:10:24.000 --> 0:10:26.800 a year, and that is just determined by how much 0:10:27.080 --> 0:10:30.480 they are reading outside of school. That is a huge range. 0:10:30.520 --> 0:10:34.040 There's a huge opportunity there to kind of stuff a 0:10:34.240 --> 0:10:37.600 child's head full of interesting words that they can then 0:10:37.720 --> 0:10:40.040 draw on in their everyday life. So there does seem 0:10:40.080 --> 0:10:46.080 to be something kind of inherently magical that happens when 0:10:46.360 --> 0:10:48.199 children in particular. 0:10:47.880 --> 0:10:51.959 Pick up books. The other moral panic we see is 0:10:52.040 --> 0:10:54.440 around book Week, which is coming up in August. FYI, 0:10:54.559 --> 0:10:56.920 if you haven't sort of your costume thinks, start to 0:10:56.960 --> 0:10:58.760 think about it now, because August will be here in 0:10:58.800 --> 0:11:02.280 a blink. Every year the book Week rolls around, we 0:11:02.440 --> 0:11:07.559 see these kinds of opinion columns come out and say, oh, oh, 0:11:07.760 --> 0:11:11.359 my school's full of Pokemon characters and we had Disney princesses, 0:11:11.400 --> 0:11:13.839 and we had Spider Man, and it's just terrible and 0:11:15.120 --> 0:11:17.360 that all these purists that come out and want children 0:11:17.400 --> 0:11:24.160 to dress up as proper book characters. And that is 0:11:24.320 --> 0:11:28.880 also fraught and not entirely helpful. Because I read this 0:11:29.120 --> 0:11:33.360 great piece in the Conversation by an education researcher Joanne O'Mara, 0:11:34.080 --> 0:11:37.040 and she says, don't worry about what they come to 0:11:37.120 --> 0:11:39.079 as book week. The important thing is like, if you 0:11:39.120 --> 0:11:41.200 want kids that read, you've got to let them choose 0:11:41.320 --> 0:11:43.560 what to read. So if they read a blue book, 0:11:43.600 --> 0:11:45.880 who cares, They're into it, they love it. If they 0:11:46.000 --> 0:11:49.040 read a Spider Man comic, who cares, it's all reading. 0:11:49.480 --> 0:11:52.040 And she says that's what builds a reading habit, Like, 0:11:52.200 --> 0:11:54.800 do not judge your kids on what they read. Don't 0:11:55.000 --> 0:11:58.079 force your kids to read what you deem a worthy book. 0:11:58.600 --> 0:12:02.679 In fact, too many kids experience what she calls and 0:12:02.800 --> 0:12:06.079 I love this term. It's actually coined by author and 0:12:06.120 --> 0:12:09.559 teacher Kelly Gallagher. She called it read aside, which is 0:12:09.640 --> 0:12:14.000 the systematic killing of the love of reading, often exacerbated 0:12:14.080 --> 0:12:17.839 by the inane, mind numbing practices of school. So the 0:12:18.320 --> 0:12:21.480 argument is is like, if you make reading not fun 0:12:21.559 --> 0:12:23.920 in your house, if you're like it becomes a forced 0:12:24.120 --> 0:12:26.480 chore and your child doesn't have any choice of what 0:12:26.520 --> 0:12:28.319 they're reading. It becomes this kind of rote thing that 0:12:28.360 --> 0:12:30.600 they feel that they have to do, they're not going 0:12:30.640 --> 0:12:33.920 to love reading. So what they're saying is just let 0:12:34.000 --> 0:12:36.920 them go for it. Whatever an audiobooks count to. And 0:12:37.600 --> 0:12:40.760 but I see from what you deem I think that 0:12:40.880 --> 0:12:43.120 point about listening the range is so important. But at 0:12:43.160 --> 0:12:45.480 the same time, I'm also told to create habit, and 0:12:45.640 --> 0:12:48.800 habit is so much about doing something every day, whether 0:12:48.920 --> 0:12:52.559 or not you especially feel like doing it. So sometimes 0:12:52.600 --> 0:12:55.960 when I hear that advice, I feel like I'm getting 0:12:56.000 --> 0:12:59.200 slightly mixed messages from experts, because yeah, I do try 0:12:59.320 --> 0:13:01.839 and read with my children or have them read to 0:13:01.960 --> 0:13:05.880 themselves every single night, but that's like brushing her teeth. 0:13:06.200 --> 0:13:08.439 Sometimes they really don't want to do it. Am I 0:13:08.640 --> 0:13:11.280 committing read? Aside by forcing them to do it every night? 0:13:12.160 --> 0:13:14.280 Are you forcing them to read like told story? Or 0:13:14.360 --> 0:13:15.600 do they get to choose when they read? 0:13:16.760 --> 0:13:20.520 Mostly they get to choose. But I wonder whether this 0:13:20.800 --> 0:13:23.040 now for parents is a bit trickier because it's like 0:13:23.080 --> 0:13:25.080 a do as I say, not as I do situation 0:13:25.400 --> 0:13:28.120 in that when you become a parent, a lot of 0:13:28.200 --> 0:13:30.800 what you when you read is by yourself once your 0:13:30.920 --> 0:13:33.720 children are asleep. Is kind of that moment of solitude 0:13:33.760 --> 0:13:35.719 where you do it. So they're not seeing you do that, 0:13:35.840 --> 0:13:38.320 but they do see you pick up your phone quite often. 0:13:38.640 --> 0:13:41.839 So it's very hard to like them be engaging them 0:13:41.880 --> 0:13:44.520 and making that something that they see as something that 0:13:44.559 --> 0:13:45.520 they really want to do. 0:13:46.000 --> 0:13:47.920 So I asked Sally Hepworth about this. 0:13:48.120 --> 0:13:48.800 You might know her. 0:13:48.840 --> 0:13:52.000 She's a friend of the show. She's an amazing host 0:13:52.080 --> 0:13:55.760 of Unleashed, another mum of meer podcast, which is hilarious, 0:13:56.600 --> 0:13:59.199 and she's also a New York Times best selling author. 0:13:59.280 --> 0:14:03.199 And she has three children, all of whom are voracious readers. 0:14:03.320 --> 0:14:05.240 And I said, tell me your secrets. What are you 0:14:05.280 --> 0:14:07.280 doing in your house to create these conditions where your 0:14:07.320 --> 0:14:10.400 kids will just dive into books four hours. And she 0:14:10.559 --> 0:14:14.480 gave me some great tips. The first one was, just 0:14:14.559 --> 0:14:17.960 as you said before, Stacey, kids need to see you read, 0:14:18.240 --> 0:14:21.560 so if they're seeing you enjoy books, that kind of 0:14:21.600 --> 0:14:24.480 modeling is really powerful. And she said reading needs to 0:14:24.520 --> 0:14:27.040 be valued in your house and prioritized. So she'll say 0:14:27.080 --> 0:14:29.120 to her kids when they're at the shops and they 0:14:29.200 --> 0:14:31.680 want a toy, she'll say, no, I'm not getting you 0:14:31.720 --> 0:14:33.440 a toy, but if you want a book, you can 0:14:33.520 --> 0:14:36.280 have any book you like. I will never not buy 0:14:36.360 --> 0:14:38.800 you a book if that's what you want, Like, there 0:14:38.880 --> 0:14:40.840 is no limit on how many books I will buy you, 0:14:41.240 --> 0:14:44.760 So she prioritizes books over toys. She says reading to 0:14:44.840 --> 0:14:47.120 your children long after they can read to themselves, is 0:14:47.160 --> 0:14:50.440 really important. She says, let them read whatever they want 0:14:50.480 --> 0:14:54.000 to read. A comic book counts and audiobook counts. And 0:14:54.240 --> 0:14:56.840 the last tip is kind of like controversial I thought, 0:14:57.520 --> 0:15:01.880 is that age inappropriate books are fine. In her opinion. 0:15:02.080 --> 0:15:04.880 She says, kids want to be like titillated, and they 0:15:04.960 --> 0:15:07.120 want to read things that are scary, and they want 0:15:07.120 --> 0:15:09.120 to read things that are a bit rude. So if 0:15:09.160 --> 0:15:11.800 you think like she said, give them books that will 0:15:12.040 --> 0:15:14.680 make their heart wild and make their brain fire up, 0:15:14.760 --> 0:15:17.400 you know, like kids want that make it exciting and 0:15:17.480 --> 0:15:20.240 fun for them. So yeah, I love that. 0:15:20.400 --> 0:15:22.480 I mean, of course, she's a New York Times bestselling author. 0:15:22.560 --> 0:15:24.880 She just coined the phrase gives them books that make 0:15:24.960 --> 0:15:28.400 their hearts wild. That is so beautiful, Sally, thank you. 0:15:28.880 --> 0:15:29.800 No one else is cute? 0:15:30.600 --> 0:15:30.760 Is that? 0:15:32.320 --> 0:15:33.840 You know? When it comes to researching for this show, 0:15:33.880 --> 0:15:36.080 I found out all these great things about the way 0:15:36.120 --> 0:15:38.800 Australia does stuff. Do you know every single state and 0:15:38.920 --> 0:15:42.840 territory runs a Premier's Reading Challenge where kids are encouraged 0:15:42.880 --> 0:15:45.640 to read like twenty or thirty books a year. They 0:15:45.720 --> 0:15:48.240 write them all down, send them into the Premiere or 0:15:48.280 --> 0:15:50.960 the head of state of territory and they get an award. 0:15:52.040 --> 0:15:53.080 That's so cute. 0:15:53.560 --> 0:15:55.920 I want an adults Premiers Reading Challenge. 0:15:56.240 --> 0:15:58.480 You know. While we're on reading, I have recorded on 0:15:58.560 --> 0:16:00.840 this show, but it was a long time ago. Now 0:16:01.400 --> 0:16:05.480 is that Dolly Imagination Dolly's Imagination Library. So Dolly Parton 0:16:05.600 --> 0:16:08.120 sponsors books to get sent to kids all around the world. 0:16:08.160 --> 0:16:10.960 So if you're you're in an eligible area, you get 0:16:10.960 --> 0:16:13.040 a free book a month until they're five years old. 0:16:13.200 --> 0:16:15.680 Taylor and Travis just don't two million dollars. 0:16:15.880 --> 0:16:18.400 Yes, so they're probably expanding it out now. So my 0:16:18.600 --> 0:16:21.480 daughter got a book a month from Dolly Parton. 0:16:21.560 --> 0:16:25.120 Yeah, it's the best and the cues are so carefully chosen, 0:16:25.520 --> 0:16:26.040 so great. 0:16:26.320 --> 0:16:29.240 Yeah, and they're often really tiny books too, so they're 0:16:29.280 --> 0:16:31.160 not like these big you know, because they're posting them 0:16:31.160 --> 0:16:33.640 out to you, so they're very easy to lug around 0:16:33.760 --> 0:16:36.480 and have them read wherever you are. It's the best thing. 0:16:36.840 --> 0:16:40.240 So our beloved Claire Stevens, the host of Mum and 0:16:40.320 --> 0:16:42.640 Me Are Out Loud and the sometimes host of Parenting 0:16:42.840 --> 0:16:46.080 Out Loud as well, she had her second baby, little 0:16:46.120 --> 0:16:48.880 boy called Darcy, who is honestly one of the cutest 0:16:48.920 --> 0:16:49.560 newborn babies. 0:16:49.600 --> 0:16:52.680 I've honestly said, this is what everyone is saying about 0:16:52.720 --> 0:16:53.240 this baby. 0:16:53.320 --> 0:16:56.640 He is so so cute. He's like a fully conscious baby, 0:16:56.720 --> 0:16:58.400 like he looks like he's been here before. 0:16:58.560 --> 0:16:58.920 I love it. 0:16:59.720 --> 0:17:01.880 But there is a detail that really spoke to all 0:17:01.920 --> 0:17:04.960 of us in the photos that Claire posted, and that 0:17:05.200 --> 0:17:09.320 was Claire's Claire just looking so so happy with her 0:17:09.560 --> 0:17:12.800 post birth meal, which was a large macas meal, which 0:17:12.880 --> 0:17:16.359 I think is brilliant. She had gestational diabetes. She has 0:17:16.400 --> 0:17:18.479 been waiting to have some junk food and I can 0:17:18.560 --> 0:17:20.719 just imagine how good that would have tasted to her. 0:17:21.440 --> 0:17:24.479 So it got me thinking about, like, what was your 0:17:24.600 --> 0:17:26.960 post birth meal, because so many people are like, I'm 0:17:27.040 --> 0:17:29.359 banging it for sushi, Like I want sushi or I 0:17:29.440 --> 0:17:32.960 want a champagne? What did you two have? I when 0:17:33.000 --> 0:17:33.359 I had my. 0:17:33.359 --> 0:17:35.720 First child, I had no idea about how it would 0:17:35.720 --> 0:17:37.879 all feel afterwards, but I had this vision that I 0:17:37.920 --> 0:17:41.200 would be sweaking champagne. Yes, so we bought champagne to 0:17:41.320 --> 0:17:44.359 the hospital, And as you may know, it's not really 0:17:44.800 --> 0:17:47.960 the thing you do after giving birth. So I think 0:17:48.040 --> 0:17:53.320 my first post birth meal slash treat was not realized. 0:17:53.680 --> 0:17:56.159 Oh maybe you need to just treat yourself to a 0:17:56.240 --> 0:17:58.720 really nice meal. Now I've been treating myself ever since. 0:17:58.800 --> 0:18:00.000 Yeah, yeah, mon's. 0:18:01.320 --> 0:18:04.960 I remember the cup of tea that I had in 0:18:05.080 --> 0:18:08.280 the birthing sweet was the best cup of tea of 0:18:08.400 --> 0:18:11.480 my life. And they gave me an egg sandwich as well, 0:18:11.720 --> 0:18:15.880 and I've never been happier, Honestly. I remember saying to them, 0:18:16.040 --> 0:18:17.439 this is the best cup of tea I've ever had. 0:18:17.480 --> 0:18:20.400 It was because I just lipped in in a polystyrene cut, 0:18:21.320 --> 0:18:25.720 just yeah, you're so, you're just a different person after 0:18:25.800 --> 0:18:28.680 you give birth, and it just yeah, it just felt 0:18:28.760 --> 0:18:29.440 really intense. 0:18:30.200 --> 0:18:34.800 I remember the similar mons having a sandwich, like the 0:18:34.920 --> 0:18:36.760 sad little sandwich they give you on the tray, and 0:18:36.840 --> 0:18:40.879 being like, oh, this sandwich is the best sandwich. I 0:18:40.960 --> 0:18:42.480 think it was about two days old, like it was 0:18:42.600 --> 0:18:46.600 not fresh. But I remember thinking how amazing that sandwich was. 0:18:46.800 --> 0:18:49.000 But I ordered a family pizza for myself to the 0:18:49.080 --> 0:18:52.000 hospital that night. I ate a whole good pizza and 0:18:52.119 --> 0:18:54.760 it was iconic. Yeah, it was great. All of this 0:18:54.920 --> 0:18:58.720 to say, congratulations, Declare, and I hope you have many 0:18:58.800 --> 0:18:59.760 more macas meals in. 0:19:00.440 --> 0:19:01.159 Big Macs to come. 0:19:01.359 --> 0:19:02.359 Yeah, I want to. 0:19:02.359 --> 0:19:05.080 Talk about a different parent child relationship, and that is 0:19:06.040 --> 0:19:09.200 the mother daughter relationship in l Now, this is the 0:19:09.280 --> 0:19:12.159 number one show on Prime at the moment. It's the 0:19:12.280 --> 0:19:15.840 Legally Blonde prequel, right is it good about blonds? 0:19:16.760 --> 0:19:16.960 Oh? 0:19:17.560 --> 0:19:21.520 It's unbelievable. I I am so happy to bring this 0:19:21.600 --> 0:19:23.399 recommendation to you because I feel like all I do 0:19:23.560 --> 0:19:25.560 is watch what Stacy tells me, and now I shall 0:19:25.600 --> 0:19:27.560 bring this to you. Please, watch l and the Reason. 0:19:27.680 --> 0:19:30.000 Yeah, and I haven't seen any I'm really glad to 0:19:30.040 --> 0:19:30.320 hear this. 0:19:31.600 --> 0:19:33.480 If you're not across it. It's kind of the Legally 0:19:33.520 --> 0:19:36.240 Blond prequel. As I said, it's Elle Woods when she's 0:19:36.280 --> 0:19:38.639 a teenager, so before she goes to Harvard, before she 0:19:38.720 --> 0:19:41.359 goes to law school, before she does the bend and snap. 0:19:41.440 --> 0:19:41.560 You know. 0:19:41.680 --> 0:19:44.239 It's kind of like when her family moves from LA 0:19:44.359 --> 0:19:46.880 to Seattle. And the story is that she's this LA 0:19:47.000 --> 0:19:49.080 girl living in an LA world, and then she goes 0:19:49.080 --> 0:19:51.840 to the very grungy city of Seattle. It has to 0:19:51.920 --> 0:19:55.600 kind of find her bearings there. But everyone's talking about 0:19:55.720 --> 0:19:57.680 sort of the love triangle part of it, the best 0:19:57.680 --> 0:19:59.960 friend part of it. But the thing I can't stop 0:20:00.200 --> 0:20:02.280 thinking about and why I want you to watch this 0:20:02.520 --> 0:20:05.480 is because of the relationship with the mum, Eva Woods. 0:20:05.520 --> 0:20:10.760 And she's played by June Diane Raphael, who is mesmerizing 0:20:10.840 --> 0:20:14.040 in this. She is magnetic. You cannot stop watching her. 0:20:14.119 --> 0:20:17.440 She's so much fun to watch. And what's interesting is 0:20:17.520 --> 0:20:20.399 that she is positioned as Elle's best friend. 0:20:20.600 --> 0:20:20.679 Right. 0:20:20.760 --> 0:20:23.520 So Elle's an only child. She's got this mother who 0:20:23.880 --> 0:20:26.879 they watch the same TV show they watch, Bold and 0:20:26.920 --> 0:20:28.960 the beautiful or days of our lives, whatever it is. Together, 0:20:29.680 --> 0:20:33.399