Family Looking Up

True story...one day, on a mom fail DAY, I allowed my sons to play video games for HOURS. Finally after I finished whatever project it was that had distracted me from paying attention to my boys, I told my boys to get off their devices. As soon as my boys got off, it was like a fog had been lifted from them. They told me they were starving and had to go to the bathroom. They had been so sucked into their devices that they had completely stopped paying attention to their basic needs. My boys could literally could spend their ENTIRE day playing video games on their devices if I didn’t regulate what they were doing. I HATE regulating screen time! I am constantly looking for ideas to regulate their screen time. I was so excited to find Andrea Davis and her website, “Better Screen Time.” Andrea is the mother of five children. Through both research and her own family’s experiences she has created a great resource for parents to learn about managing screen time and cell phone use. In this week’s episode we get the opportunity to learn from Andrea. She talks to us about strategies for regulating screen time and helping our family buy into regulating their own screen time. Here is what we talked about:

1. What family life event lead Andrea to create her website, “Better Screen Time.”
2. Andrea’s tree frog experience and how it relates to screens in our home.
3. How to get your family to buy into controlling their screen time use.
4. Taking back cell phones when you feel like your child isn’t ready.
5. The value of teaching our kids the WHY.
6. What a Family Tech Think Tank is.
7. How to start a family tech think tank
8. How to get the whole family to buy into a new screen time plan.
9. Topics to discuss with your family about monitoring screen time.
10. Teaching kids to come up with their own consequences.
11. Managing the amount of time your kids are on screens.
12. When is a child ready for a cell phone.
13. When and how to transition a child from a flip phone to a smartphone.
14. Teaching kids the dangers of social media.
15. What “technoference” is and how to avoid it.

Mom Squad Challenge: Schedule a time on the calendar when you can have your first Family Tech Think Tank.

Hey Mom squad! This week is Mother’s Day. YAY!!!! We wanted to celebrate YOU this week, so we brought on three very special guests. This week we talk to Calee Reed, Hilary Weeks and Shawna Edwards. All three women are talented musicians. And all three women have written beautiful songs about motherhood. This week we get to talk to these fun ladies about their families, their mom fails, their musical talent and the inspiration behind their beautiful songs. Get ready to learn, laugh, and cry.

Our first interview was with Calee Reed. Calee is a mother of five kids. She is a Christian singer and songwriter. She travels the country spreading her message of faith and hope through music. Here is what we talked with Calee about:

1. Calee’s blended family.
2. Advice Calee would give to new moms.
3. The hardest part of being a mom.
4. Lessons Calee has learned from her experience as a mother.
5. Calee’s hilarious mom fail.
6. Where Calee learned to sing and her family’s musical talent.
7. Where Calee gets inspiration for her songs.
8. When Calee first started writing songs.
9. When Calee finds the time to write with her busy, young family.
10. The inspiration behind “She Put the Music in Me.”

Hilary Weeks is a mother of four daughters. She is a Christian Billboard chart-topping singer and songwriter. She is a frequent performer at Deseret Book’s “Time Out For Women.” In our fun conversation with Hilary we talked about the following:

1. Hilary’s family.
2. Lessons Hilary has learned from motherhood.
3. Lessons Hilary learned from her mother.
4. What did your mom do really well?
5. Hilary’s funny mom fail.
6. When Hilary first started writing songs.
7. The inspiration behind the song “Stand Still.”

Shawna Edwards is an accomplished pianist, and an award-winning writer and songwriter. Her most well-known songs, “Do You Have Room?” and “The Miracle” have been performed all over the world. She is a mother of 5 and grandmother to ten grandkids.

1. Shawna’s family.
2. The joys of being a grandmother.
3. Shawna’s creative birthday gift to her grandkids.
4. The hardest part of being a grandma for Shawna.
5. Things Shawna learned from her mother.
6. Shawna’s mom fails.
7. What made Shawna start writing music just ten years ago.
8. How has music impacted Shawna’s family
9. The inspiration behind Shawna’s song “More than Enough”

This week on Family Looking Up we were joined by Saren Eyre Loosli, founder of Power of Families, co-founder of Power of Moms, daughter of Richard and Linda Eyre, and mother of 5. Saren holds a B.A. from Wellesley College and a Masters in Education from Harvard. She’s consulted and conducted training for numerous non-profits including the National Institute on Out-of-School Time, YMCA and One-Heart Bulgaria and has traveled to Africa and South America with Choice Humanitarian.

~ We discussed what entitlement is and why it is detrimental to the overall happiness and success of our children’s lives.

~Saren shared great insights on what we can do, as parents, when we hear “My friends have this” or “ My friends don’t have to do that”.

~We discussed a question that one of our listeners asked: "How do you raise entitlement free kids without being a “no mom” (always quick to say no to your kids)?”.

~Gratitude is a great antidote to entitlement. Saren discussed ways to teach gratitude to children. We also explored the topic of teaching them the right principles that help them to FEEL the right things instead of just DOING the right things.

~Many take their children into 3rd world countries to open their eyes to their blessings. Not all parents can or want to do that. We talked about other options parents can explore without going to Ghana.

~Saren had some terrific advice and insight on chore systems for children. We discussed the pros and cons of them, why they are worth the trouble, and how to implement them. We also discussed how defeated we all feel at our inability to be 100% dedicated to those systems, and why it’s okay to not be perfect.

Mom Squad Challenge

Take 30 minutes this week to sit down with your kids and talk about the things they need to be responsible for in your home. Include in the discussion, what you do in the home so they can understand how much you help them. If you don’t already have a simple

chore system in place, this would be an ideal time to start one.

To find out more about Saren Loosli, visit www.poweroffamilies.com .

When you visit the website, you’ll find many books and resources available to you at no cost. It is a fabulous resource!

Power of Families is also on Facebook and on Instagram as @poweroffamilies.

We want to thank Saren for her willingness to share her insights, experiences, and resources with us at Family Looking Up!

This weeks interview was SO energizing and inspiring! Chanelle is an author, a health and life coach, and a mom and wife who is with us this week to talk about the power that our mornings CAN have. We were full of questions and excited by the answers that she shared with us! We hope that you love this episode and find as much inspiration in it as we did!

Parents never set out on their parenting journey with the goal of making man babies that take from, rather than give to, the world as a whole. We all want to raise little boys into good men who know how to treat others and leave the world a better place than they found it. Bethany Jett is a mom of boys who knows a thing or two about how to raise boys to be good men. We loved her and hope you enjoy this episode!