Organization is a Team Sport Part 1 & 2

Rhonda and Casey, welcome to the Organized 365 Podcast.

Awesome. Thank you. I am so excited. How are you feeling?

Absolutely glad to be here. A little nervous, but so enjoy— so looking forward to it.

Well, thanks for representing the male figures that listen to or are in the audience of women who are listening to the Organized 365 Podcast on repeat.

Yes, happy to do it.

So you heard Rhonda's story just a couple of weeks ago on the Organized 365 podcast. If you scroll back, and now she has brought Casey with her, and Casey came to Cincinnati to the paper, um, to the homeschool convention, and I got to spend some time with him and we had a couple of meals together. We talked about so many different things. So this is gonna be a little bit different of a podcast than the regular Wednesday podcast. We're actually doing this on Friday. Because I want to really talk about, you know, how organization changes throughout our lifetime and to talk about a couple who have gone through an organizing journey and what they've seen throughout their married lives together. Does that sound good?

Sounds great.

Yes.

Okay, let's go. Sounds good.

Okay, Casey, you don't seem like a willing participant, and this was partly your idea, so I just want to clear the air from the beginning. That I am not forcing you to be on this podcast.

Those are true statements. I'm glad to be here, and I am a willing participant.

Oh, and you're gonna know how willing he is when we dig into the questions because he, he took some notes of some things he wants to say.

Awesome, awesome. I'm gonna work on not talking very much. Um, but I really wanted to frame this in the beginning because you have been married a long time. Before you had kids, you've had kids, some of your kids have launched, some of your kids are launching. And so you've seen a long, you know, multiple decades together. And so I wanted to kind of start and open the floor to like, what has the division of household labor been like for in your family before you had kids, when you had little kids, when you were homeschooling, as the kids have gone? I'm just going to open the floor for you guys to have that. Conversation.

Okay, yeah, that sounds great. Um, well, so just a little shout out for ourselves. We celebrated our 28th wedding anniversary over Memorial Day weekend. Um, so that's fun. Um, yeah, Casey and I actually sat down yesterday with, um, some of your pre-questions that you wanted us to talk about. And as we were talking about these things, the division of labor in the house, We're putting percentages to it. Okay, there's something you gotta know. He's a civil engineer. My master's degree is mathematics, so we like numbers.

Oh, man.

So I know our kids, poor things. I mean, they just, they were doomed from the beginning. Um, so as we're doing this, I said to him, I said, wait, we need to step back and put Lisa's terminology to this. Makes sense. So you, you kind of take it away. So our conversation—

Again, you know, we've been married 28 years. And so when we started and we're looking at your, you know, your questions that you'd sent and we're talking through that, and it was really great just to see how we have changed, how we have grown through the years. Because when we got married, uh, you know, she's a great cook and so she doesn't like to do dishes. So we early on, uh, we said, you know, we're about 60/40 when it was just the two of us. As far as housework, and when I say housework, the tasks of daily living, the cleaning, again, to use—

Don't you love it?

Nice work.

The household maintenance, that's all me. Home organization, definitely early on and still today, mostly Rhonda. But again, so I'm going to break it up. Before kids, we said 60/40. Rhonda did 60%, I did 40%. And before kids, We both worked.

We were both working. I was either teaching or in my master's program, which I was still teaching as an assistant.

And so then she had this idea that we would homeschool. Well, I guess we— first off, we had kids. We had kids.

We just stopped doing all of it. Like, that's what I said to him. He's like, after kids, 0% and 0%, because we were just Keeping our head above water.

So we had our first 2 boys, um, very close together, and we did that on purpose. And, uh, and at that time my job allowed me to work 4 10s. So she's still working, um, she's working part-time at this point. I'm working 4 10s. So I took care of the kids on Monday because I'm off work. She, uh—

I would do like a 12-hour day on a Monday. I would go in at 7, Stay till 7. My job was very flexible. It wasn't like time sensitive. It was at that point I was working in an office doing educational research. So this was after master's degree. I'd graduated. Um, I think I told you in the last podcast that I finished my master's coursework while pregnant with my first child. And I thought, oh, I'll write my master's thesis while I'm on 8-week maternity leave. That, that'll be so easy. They just sleep, right? Didn't happen. It was a full year and a half later before I finished my, my master's thesis. So I graduated. I was doing work in educational research in our teacher professional development office that our university ran regionally. There were 5 of them across Missouri at the time. It was like 1999, 2000-ish.

Yeah.

So then, so then we make this decision to homeschool our kids. We have— there's a 7-year gap in between our sets. We have 2 boys, 7-year gap, and then we have a boy and a girl. So during that time, Rhonda quits her job. She's stay-at-home full-time at that point. I'm working. And so then, you know, to look at our— the percentages, our tasks of daily living, we said we would really be at about 75/25. Rhonda doing 75, I did about 25. Cleaning, all Rhonda. Uh, I did very little cleaning. Sure.

Uh, to this day, he would do dishes and laundry.

I do dishes and I can do some laundry. She doesn't let me do her laundry, but she's afraid I'll mess up.

He's good at folding, putting away sheets, towels, socks, and underwear.

Tasks, that's it. Uh, household, household maintenance, still 100% me at that point. but 100% Rhonda on home organization. And that's kind of where we go up until our kids get old enough to really pitch in and help. And, you know, and during that time, again, there's just a lot of survival, you know, a lot of piles of stuff. And so—

A lot of moving the piles.

Yeah, a lot of moving the piles. So anyway, so I would say where we're at today, we have 2 kids that are grad— You know, are graduated. Our older boys are gone out of the house.

They're 25 and 23.

And then we still have a— we're gonna have a senior and a junior. So we're about to work ourselves out of the home education job. We're gonna be unemployed in that area, which was the goal. And they're thriving. They're doing good. But now, just to get back to what we were talking about, we would do— I'm looking at my notes. So task of daily living, that's 50% Rhonda, 20% me. 30% kids.

Because he does work out of the home, you know, he is gone at a job, at an office.

Yeah, I'm, I'm really gone 11 hours a day because we— because I have to drive, because I have to commute. So I leave at 7 and I get home at 6. So that's just the way it is. Uh, cleaning, uh, 50% Rhonda, 10% me, 40% kids. Let's see, I still haven't figured out how to clean anything yet.

I have seen you clean a toilet.

There you go.

It's fine. It's good.

Uh, household maintenance, that's still, uh, me, um, a bunch. Rhonda does 10%, I do 70%, uh, but I definitely bring, uh, Kidron and Chloe in. They do about 20% of that. And then the home organization, uh, I've got 80%, Rhonda, 20% kids. I'm really about a zero.

He loves it when it's done and when it's maintained. He will, he will. Okay, so you kind of throw yourself under the bus just a little bit on some of this, but, um, he does know how to clean. He is a team player. I'm not locked in the house barefoot and pregnant, you know, whatever. Um, but you know, when we look at, um, some of the maintenance things, he, he is a rock star. He fixes everything, and I mean almost everything. Up until recently, We didn't hire anything. All car maintenance was on him except, you know, fixing the car. Yeah. If we had a refrigerator, I mean, it wasn't go buy a new fridge or call the guy. It was figure it out and let's fix it.

I'm an engineer.

You take it apart. So you're saying you actually know what those manuals are for?

Yes.

Oh, mine are gone. I got rid of mine.

Yes. Yes. So he fixes everything. We love to project together. Every home has either been remodeled or added onto, that sort of a thing. We love to team. We're not quite as enthusiastic about it now as we were in our 30s and 40s, but we still do love a good project. You know, clean it out, paint a room, put up trim, you know, whatever it is. So when he says 100%, it's really true. In fact, at one point my older boys were complaining because they were helping Dad with the household maintenance projects. And I said, let's sit down. I made a lesson out of it. So I said, here's how much it would cost to call this repair guy. Here's how much it would cost for the hours, da da da da da da da. Your dad saves us about $700 to $1,000 per month when you average it all out. So if you would like to fund this, we could hire somebody to do it. He's like, can't we just hire somebody? So, um, you know, just to bring that up. And, and we've realized that's his skill set. He's really strong in that area, you know, and I'm strong in other areas. And obviously we are bringing our kids into all that we're doing as much as possible, even if they complain.

And that's— we hopefully will get to that later, but just so I don't forget, that's one of Rhonda's giftings, is that seizing the moment, an educational moment. And hey, this is what's going on. Because if it was, you know, I wouldn't have brought in the whole, hey, if this would have cost, you know, this— the plumber would have cost us $250. I wouldn't have brought that aspect into it. It's just simply, hey, here's a task to get done. And I'm teaching, I'm teaching my kids how to do the task alongside of me. But she's like, no, let's stop and look at this from an educational standpoint. This is what this really brings to the table. And she's just great at that part.

Thank you.

I love the mathematical aspect to it. Like, I know I always hire it out, so I know, I know how much this is costing. There definitely is a mathematical component to especially the maintenance. As I'm starting to do my research of the literature For my PhD, and the first literature review I'm doing is on the definition of housework. And and how has housework been defined in all of the data that you see that's come out of academia? You're going to be shocked at how it has not been defined. Anyways, there is a theory. There are a lot of theories out there, and one is called doing gender, and it actually says some tasks are female tasks and some tasks are male tasks. And I can't really speak much more beyond that because I haven't done enough. research, but maintenance is always in the male category. So, it is interesting that that one is one that you've said that you do 100%, or you and the kids do it. Another thing I love about— boy, you guys did your homework for this podcast. I love how you added in the percentage of the kids. Now, I've been very vocal about the fact that I hire out the help because Greg and I aren't going to fix it. I come from a long line of people who don't know how to fix things. We're salespeople. We are not engineers. That is for sure. And, uh, I also have said, you know, my kids didn't have chores because school was too hard. I mean, it was too hard for also to add chores on top of that. And so there wasn't any like, and the kids do this percent. So I love hearing the reflection of the percent the kids do and in each category. That is just so awesome. Thank you for taking the time and sharing all of that.

Yeah, it's great. Um, you know, something I always joked with Rhonda is the best way to take an hour project and turn it into 3 is to get— especially early on, you know, I mean, it was— she was always encouraging, hey, you know, get the kids involved. Yeah, so that swing set that we're going to put together now, instead of being 1 hour, it's 3 hours because I've got—

Or a week.

Well, I've got the 5 and 7-year-old involved, and there goes your tools and your parts. And but, uh, I mean, all of my kids, but, you know, they've changed tires, they've changed oil, we've replaced alternators. I mean, Ceiling. We've done it all.

We added on.

When we built our house, yeah, that was super cool because each one of my kids laid the floor, the hardwood flooring, in their own room.

Wow, how cool.

I mean, we didn't just let them loose. They had supervision.

Yeah, I think.

Yes. But yeah, but yeah, that, that's always— that's been a really great aspect. And I will say that I— it would have looked different if my kids had been in a traditional classroom setting away from the house. Especially once you start adding on extracurriculars, whether it's sports or clubs or instruments or singing or theater, whatever. It would have probably looked a little different.

Yeah. Now what's interesting is, you know, home organization is a category of housework by my definition. And Casey, you said that's always been Rhonda's domain. So we're going to talk about that. In the literature reviews that I have done, no one identifies home organization in housework and anything that is not visible work, you know, like auto. Sometimes, sometimes auto maintenance is considered part of housework in definitions, but never home organization. And I find that often in the literature reviews that I'm doing, much of the housework is what can you see, like cutting the grass, doing the dishes, Vacuuming, though, interesting, isn't mentioned. I'm like, I find it so interesting that cutting the grass is mentioned, but vacuuming isn't mentioned. And it's because you can't really see it after you don't— you see the pile of dishes go away. You quickly don't see the vacuuming. And home organization is something that you don't necessarily see it, but you know it when it's not done. And Rhonda was very transparent in her podcast episode about how it was a hot mess. Which, I mean, first of all, children equals hot mess. I mean, it just is. Um, so I'm wondering, Casey, what you have seen in Rhonda in over the last 28, 30 years of her getting organized, trying to get organized, being organized. What has that looked like? And then what was it like when she found Organized 365?

And yeah, absolutely, because one of the things that I really like about what Organized 365 FIVA has done is you just use the term visible, you know, where you, you've identified the task, those invisible tasks, and you turn them and you make them visible. Because that's something that we've now brought into our conversation about these invisible tasks, because they all take time. Well, where's all this time go? We have all this time. You're home all day, Rhonda. How can this happen?

Why can't— why is it the same pile of laundry on the couch? There's still a pile of laundry on the couch when I get home and Dishes are everywhere.

And so I think that's a foundational thing that, that you have done and obviously helped Rhonda with, is that identifying the invisible task. So, you know, throughout, throughout our marriage and the home education experience, Rhonda has tried some other, you know, some other home organization ideas. And, you know, I guess what that looked like, it was You know, buying a book and reading this book. And, you know, I wrote down buying a book and containers is what it seemed like would happen, is there would be this book that one of her friends would tell her about. And, you know, she would read this book and we would always end up with a bunch of containers and stuff would get piled up somewhere. And then we would just take that pile and move it to this other room, and then we'd go— then it would appear in this other room. I'm like, what? Nothing ever left the house, you know? I mean, it was like, what are we doing? And so, you know, and we tease and we joke about it, but it was— there was a real frustration though with Wanda.

Yeah.

I was thinking about this this morning that maybe an analogy for that would be like you have a goal of losing 20 pounds. And so you start exercising and you start eating differently. And you get to— you lose 5 pounds, and 6 months later you're still at 5 pounds, and you get frustrated and you just quit because you haven't seen any results. And so I think that's where Rhonda was with these other organizing ideas, I'm going to call it, because yours is not an idea. It's a lifestyle. It's a— it's completely a different change of thinking. But that's, that's what I saw through it throughout. And it just throughout our life, and it's really caused an ongoing sense of brokenness, or what's wrong with me? I'm a failure. How come I can't do this? And that's a big deal. You know, when you're constantly battling That self-talk of, I'm broken, you know, I'm a failure, you know. And that's why I love what you do, and that's why I love Organized 365, because I have seen a dramatic change in my wife and who she is because of her ability to process, make decisions, and keep things in order now. Excuse me, that she's never been able to do in the 28 years we've been married. So.

Yeah, I would say that what you described is like spinning our wheels, spinning our wheels, just moving things from one place to the next. Yes, they might be in order, but it's just a shifting of the stuff and you keep running across the same stuff, you know. Um, that was a great description.

Yeah, so that's a big deal.

So what is it like now in your house? Compared to like, whatever, 5 years ago?

Complete bliss and happiness.

Perfection.

There's no papers out of order.

We never fight. We never fight. I never misplace anything ever.

But, but no, seriously, it is, uh, it's definitely so much better. I mean, it's not perfect. It's still a work in progress, you know. Um, but for, for example, one of the things that, uh, You know, we're very social. We entertain a lot. We have people in our homes a lot.

We don't entertain, we're hospitable.

Okay, whatever. Same thing.

We don't do a dance or anything. Oh, well, I don't dance.

But anyway, so we, you know, have kids, you know, kids groups over, you know, stuff from church. But so what would always happen with that is, okay, small group is coming over Sunday afternoon. Small group is, you know, 30 people. And so you have all this paperwork on the table and you have these piles here and piles there. So what do you do with that?

Yes, exactly. Shove it all into a box.

That's what laundry rooms are for.

You put it in the bedroom and shut the door.

Now it's fixed.

It's gone. Well, something that, that we realized that happens through that is You lose stuff. You know, there's a bill that doesn't get paid. There's paperwork that got lost because you just stuck it all in a box and shoved it in the room, and then you dealt with it later.

Or somebody's keys or wallet or—

Oh yeah, you know, all the, all the things.

Yeah. And so we don't do that anymore.

No, we don't do that. And we have a routine now, and Rhonda has helped, you know, help teach me. And, you know, I'm learning The Sunday basket. I have my own Sunday basket. You know, Ron hands me my pile and we do our paperwork together, but it's really getting to where it's a team effort. And again, she's educating me on how it works. But—

I would say one thing. I want to make sure it doesn't come across like everything is perfect, it's all fixed, blah, blah, blah. No, we still have stuff happen. I still, like, I just dealt with my home office. And I wrote a note down saying that my home office is becoming a room-sized Sunday basket, you know, so I needed to deal with it. And so I did. There was papers, there were duffel bags, there were, you know, all the stuff that got dropped and left there. Um, but we have a way to deal with it now.

Yeah.

Um, my definition of organization isn't everything in a perfect manicured bin with, you know, lined up on the shelf like a, like a store. It is, we have places for things, and if we wanna put things away, they have a place to go. And if we wanna find things, we know where to find them. Um, otherwise our house can still get cluttered, laundry, kids' stuff, books, papers, but it's not swipe it into a box and shove it in the bedroom for 6 weeks later to find. It is, oh, let's pick these things up and put them where they go. Um, or, you know.

We have a place like, right. I have readers. Uh, I normally don't have glasses, But in order to be able to see up close. So I have 15 pair of reader glasses that I lose constantly. I feel for people that have readers. I've had great eyesight my whole life. All of a sudden at 50, I can't see up close now.

Right.

So, but you know, that's a great example. All these glasses are laying all over the house. Not any, you know, no, Rhonda, they go in this one spot in this drawer. So anytime I'm looking for glasses, I go, it doesn't take me 10 minutes.

But because he's laid the rest of them all over the house. We have enough that even if he goes to the— there's going to be some in the basket at some point.

But things are, things are in a routine, they're in a rhythm. And but I kind of wanted to back up just a second. I had wrote down the, the, the why behind it. Why does— why did this work for Rhonda? And I think it's so important. What worked for Rhonda is because what you've taught her, what Organized 365 has taught her On the why, why it works for her, the decision-making process. Um, it really— you helped Rhonda understand her own mind and her own shortcomings of why, why did I just keep these 17 boxes of elementary and junior high schoolwork? And she's like, how come I can't throw that away? And so it's that, well, that's that's your validation that you did something. It's your, you know, you were successful. This is your kid's work. Okay, and, and you have taught her to say, okay, throw 16 of them away. You know, if you need one as a reminder, okay, fine, keep the one, but throw the other ones away. You don't need them. And so that, that part is so good. And Rhonda is very visual. And so the Sunday basket the slash pockets, the colors. I mean, those all speak to her. I mean, they have meaning. Obviously they have meaning because of your program, but they, they have so helped her with her decision-making. And it's just, it's changed, you know, uh, so much about her, you know. And I say so much about her, just the empowerment, you know. I talk to her all the time about she is more confident as a woman today than she was 2 and a half years ago.

Wow.

And that's, that's priceless. So, wow.

I was pretty confident. I don't know, but I have more, I have more, I have more, like, validity to the confidence. It's not false confidence.

Maybe it was unfounded.

Well, and I think, yes, I was so glad that you followed through on that and said that was the validation of the fact that she had done a good job. being the teacher of her kids.

Yeah.

And I think that once your spouse acknowledges that's why you have the thing, it's so much easier to get rid of it. But if you have a spouse who's not saying, oh, okay, I, I understand why you kept this because it's validating that you homeschooled our children and that you are a good mother. And I concur with what Lisa is saying. Now Rhonda could get rid of those because now you will say you are such a great wife and mother and thank you for raising our children and what you have done. So your affirmation and acknowledgement replaces these boxes of things. And as I'm listening to this, I'm like, man, this would be amazing if Greg would come on the podcast. It's never happening. Just so you know, it will never happen. First of all, he will never let my head get that big. He thinks it's his job to make sure that I do not. Like, no, we do not need to acknowledge any, anything that's happening over here. We don't want it to get any bigger than it already is. But also, you need— we keep stuff to remind us of what we want to remember. But if there's another person that then will take the place of that stuff, you can remove the stuff. And there aren't— well, I hope there are many, many more couples that want to come on the Organized 365 podcast because that's how we change the narrative. Like, women can't change the narrative on our own. Like, we need men and couples to come on to help change the narrative.

Yeah.

But it also, it is the, you know, sometimes Greg will say, I come from a long line of sarcastic people, and Greg is also sarcastic. So he'll say something sarcastic. I'll be like, what I heard you say was, and then I'll frame it like positively. He goes, yeah, that. So sometimes you just have to be like, what I heard you say is, I would like you to get rid of these bins because I know that you are a fabulous wife and mother and that you have poured into our children. And your spouse may just say, yeah, what you said, but what they mean is, I am very grateful for what you have done. I don't know how to verbalize that. That is not how I was raised. That's not what was modeled to me. But yes, of course, I think you're an amazing wife and mother, and thank you for everything that you've done for our children. It's just not— we haven't really seen that modeled before.

Yeah, I think that, you know, to some things, I'll, you know, I'll say some things that have changed in Casey. Casey's version of declutter is anything that— I'm Casey— anything I don't see value in, trash it. Like, I don't even care, burn it. It doesn't have to go anywhere. I was so much the frugal, we got to donate it, this family could really use it. Daddy's like, get it out of here. Just, I don't even care. I see no use for it. So in the beginning, not so encouraging. He meant well, you know, because he wanted me— he saw me struggling with the stuff. And he wanted— his heart was to help me eliminate stuff, and that in his mind was helpful. So through what I have learned, I have been able to verbalize then to him. And when I had this aha moment about— look, we'll just use the school papers example— As like, oh my goodness, that's why I'm holding on to them. It was a podcast you did. I don't remember who it was. I think it was a Wednesday podcast. I cannot find who it is, but I need to listen to it again. And it was a light bulb, and I shared that with him. And the more and more that I am sharing in what I'm learning, um, the more he has aha moments too. Like, yes, oh, that does make sense. That is why, you know, I think I shared in the other podcast, we've always been super intentional with each other and with our kids, um, about learning, you know, about having knowledge about who you are, how you're made, strengths, weaknesses. Who I am, how I'm made, and then in our kids. Because when we have information, we learn. When we learn, it gives us understanding, and with understanding can then come grace. So I know his strength is not scrubbing the shower or the toilet because detail can— in that realm, he feels like he's wasting his time. It's too much detail. However, I know his detail gifting in our cars and how he keeps them running and keeps them so we can have them until they hit 200,000 miles. You know, and we're not paying all the mechanics all the time. So.

Yeah, absolutely. And it's something interesting though, Lisa, is that I think I've always been very supportive of Rhonda. And, you know, even with the homeschooling stuff example is, but when she heard it from you, um, well, it was, it was like it was, oh, I can throw that away, or I can get rid of that. Because I was, you know, again, she, she was wanting to donate something to the thrift store, or we're going to sell this. And, and that was a great intention, but putting into action was such a, you know, a struggle. And so I think—

So it'd be in my car for 6 weeks, and then we'd have to go on a road trip. And guess what? All the crap comes back in the house. On our road trip, all the crap goes back in the car, lives there for another month. Oh, we have to go somewhere, bring it all back. Seriously, I am not joking. So many times that happened. Did drive you crazy.

But we'd get in an argument and I'm like, just throw it away. Just ditch it. It's $25, but somebody could use these jeans. And I'm like, you know, I love the heart, but you know, it's causing stress and friction in our marriage because it's still in the van. But yeah, but you've been able to frame that in the podcast when she's— when she hears that about the homeschooling papers.

And for the permission of stuff in the closet.

The closet. You know, I love that conversation whenever she was going through the closet and I'm getting rid of these. Can I see the size?

I don't care. Sure.

You know, I'm getting, you know, I'm not a size 8 anymore. It's fine. Yeah. You know, I'm pitching the size 8 jeans because they're just, you know, because you, you educated her on that is those jeans are talking to you and they're not saying nice things. You know, and so she got rid of the size 8 jeans. And so that's just been trans— you know, just one area after another, or again, where you get rid of that negative talk and it's more positive on a daily basis, and you end up with a more positive, confident wife out of the deal. That's what 365 has done with— I mean, that's a long, drawn-out answer to how our home looks today and how things are going. All right.

Well, we are like not even halfway done with our conversation, so I'm gonna go ahead and close this one out here as part 1, and we're gonna come back for part 2, which we're gonna dive into Friday work boxes, homeschool work boxes, and marriage. Anything else you guys wanna say about, um, the household and organizing the household before we go to part 2?

Um, I would just say To anybody that is listening to podcasts or has any of the programs or courses from Organized 365, share with your spouse and your kids. They don't have to sit and listen to the whole thing. You know, I like all the the stories that you tell, and you're talking to me. We're having a conversation as I'm going about the house. Him not so much. Give me the bullet points. You know, so share those things that you're learning about yourself. Be vulnerable. Be transparent. Parent. Um, and you'll be surprised at how they will eventually— it might not be immediate, but they're gonna— you've said this before, Lisa— they're gonna see results and then they'll start asking questions. And when the results really started happening, and that felt like it was probably a solid year, um, it's like, whoa, hold on, this thing you're doing— because he has no idea what I paid for All Access when it was called All Access. I just Oh no, I already told the story. I bought it for my mom, took it back. So I would just say be transparent and share. And then what would you say to the—

Yeah, absolutely. Because, you know, and get involved and ask questions because as you're seeing stuff going on, it's like, hey, what is going on? You're seeing a positive difference and be that encourager because it's not easy and you don't want them to fail. You want them to thrive in that home. organization world. And really, it's not just home organization, it's your whole life. It's everything. This is just your office. But yeah, get involved, ask questions, and be a part of it. And you'll learn stuff too as the husband. It's helped me as well.

All right. We'll be back in a couple of days for the rest of the interview with Rhonda and Casey. All right. So, you're joining us back here with part 2 with Casey and Rhonda who are sharing with us how Rhonda got organized in the last 28 years of marriage with Organized 365. We're getting ready to segue from organizing the house and just running the household and understanding the different kinds of housework and division of labor into what this looks like in homeschooling and Friday work boxes, their marriage, and what they're seeing amongst those of us that have been married for 28 years. But before we do that, Casey, you said you had more that you wanted to share in the last podcast episode.

Yeah, I just wanted to, to speak a little bit on what Organized 365 has done with Rhonda in decision-making. Before this, Rhonda really struggled with decision-making. And I use the word she was paralyzed. She would just struggle so much, even on the little things of, you know, getting rid of the size 8 jeans or the donation stuff. It's okay. Do I donate it? Do I just throw it away? And, and so 365 has really helped her go through that process of prioritizing those decisions. And okay, I know what I'm going to do with it. And I make the decision to move on. It doesn't take so much of her mental capacity of constantly having this, this juggle in her head of, well, do I get rid of it?

Do I save it?

I might use it. You know, all of that stuff that she would bounce around. So that's been a huge thing. You know, she sets up her rules that she was talking about the other day. I have, I have my rules. Yeah, you know, and so here's the rules.

I'm an A student. You are, you are an A student.

So yeah, so, so, you know, she sets up her rules before she goes through, you know, organizing the closet or going through the kitchen, or I mean, we just did our game closet the other day with homeschooling. We have an entire— I don't know what that thing is— 8-foot closet For games, you know, it just— we had all kinds of games and art supplies. And art supplies.

Yeah.

So anyway, but she sat down, her and the kids, here's our rules, and boom, got it done. So before, that would have been like a 3-week process or maybe 6 months, and the games would have been out. And what are we doing? We're saving them? We're throwing them away?

Oh wait, people are coming over, shove them back in.

So this is a great segue. The first story I remember about you, Rhonda, is you were sharing with me Um, you're watching the replay of the Friday Workbox planning day, so I'm gonna let you share the story because I want to hear it again.

Okay, okay. So it was last fall around the end of September, so it would have been the planning day that was, you know, in the beginning of September for quarter 4. And we're on a road trip, we're headed home. We love to road trip. Fortunately, I do not get carsick, and so in my— he drives. Like he is the driver and I've got my portable Sunday basket, I've got my binder, I've got my laptop, I've got my pens, you know, I'm surrounded by office supplies. And so I propped the phone up and we're listening to you on the Friday Workbox planning day and he's just sitting there listening, you know, and I've got my goal planner. But then I also had a blank notebook and I said, okay, because he is in a stage of he's going to be retiring. At his current job, and he and one of our sons have started another business, and he'll be able to jump into that. So I said, okay, I want you listening to this regarding the business and where, where you guys are with things. And so we're listening a little bit, and for this particular one, you kind of summarize— we went, we were going through each of the pocket colors. So, okay, pink, and you were talking about pink and the ideas and the dreams and the leads, and he went, wait, hold on. What's pink? Pause. So I'd pause and he's like, what's pink? I said, okay, pink is your dreams, your ideas, your aspirations, your how you're gonna advertise, how you bringing in people, how are you know.

And so that's where I'm like looking at her and like, oh, we're spending way too much time in pink.

He said, we're way, we're way too much time in pink. Okay.

We're me, me and my son, we're, you know, because again, we're just starting this business. But whenever you buy, you know, equipment and you start a business It's good to, it's good to plan, it's good to dream, but there's a practicality piece, right? You need to bid jobs. Yeah. And go to work.

So he has said, oh, we're, we're too much pink. He said, okay, hit play. So hit play. So we get into purple, you know, and purple is like the current projects and, you know, what you're doing, what's bringing in the money, da da da da da. And he's like, wait, wait, wait, wait, hit pause. What's purple? So I talked a little more about it. He's like, yes. So we need to be sure we're tracking our customers from start to finish. Our billable hours is what he said. And on—

In the engineering world, you know, you're all about billable hours. You need to make sure your engineers are productive.

I have—

I'm the director of an engineering group at our local utility. So, you know, you want your people, you know, being busy, being productive. Yeah, I'm looking at that from the job standpoint. And like I Okay, we've got to have, you know, our purple. We've got to do some more billable hours. We got to get that cranked up.

Yeah. So I forgot to mention, we did the snapshot page before we started. And so we decided he was sunsetting but promotion ready at the same time, you know, because he's leaving a job and then entering into— and that's kind of where I am too. I've discovered with homeschooling, I'm sunsetting. And then with my business, I'm You know, and I'm— I know I'll be involved in the other business as well. But, um, so then this is where it really got good. Hit play. Now we're on blue, and blue is your people, your meetings, your professional development, your training. You know, um, how you got into— you were talking quite a bit about the cost of meetings.

Cost of meetings.

And he went, hold on, hold on. And so I hit stop. He goes, do you realize what you are getting here? I'm like, what do you mean? He's like, this is not just working through logistics of a job. This is business training. She is teaching you how to run a business, how to manage people. And he said, I've been a supervisor for XYZ, you know, years. I've never gotten this kind of training. So I'm going to let you kind of take that. Let's share your perspective.

And I assume other people that are, that are listening to the Friday Workbox stuff, that they understand that, that they're getting that, is your transparency with talking to people about the home organization and business organization. You know, your, your, your blue slash pocket, that's where we got, you know, like, hold on a second. You started talking about that, the cost of these meetings, and at my job We, we have meetings all the time. They drive me crazy. We have very non-productive meetings. And, uh, so that's something that I took away just from that one drive home was I started having that conversation with my people at work. Okay, what is the cost of this meeting? What are we getting? Why are we doing this? Because it's just not productive. It's a waste of our resources if we're not accomplishing something. So that was a huge thing. And again, that just the business training, because your transparency into how you're running your business and the challenges that you have and how you found solutions to those challenges. Yeah, it's amazing. I was like, holy cow. So she's not only teaching you, you know, on the organization piece, but she's also giving you business 101 how-to practical advice here. So that was a big aha moment for us driving back from Tennessee.

Yeah, yeah, it was great.

It was great.

And then we got into Green, of course, and, and he's talking about the, you know, you were talking about your checklist, your to-dos, your financial, and he's like, oh, we need a better system. And you actually took action.

Yeah, in the business. So 2 actionable items out of that road trip for For our, you know, our startup business, me and my son, is, you know, so, okay, so I went home and we created a standardized bid form for our jobs. So, you know, all this stuff that we were going to track, all of our materials, labor, some miscellaneous expenses, and—

And you made a spreadsheet?

Yeah.

So I get it. So yeah, so we ended up with 2 spreadsheets out of it. One, so we're bidding jobs, and then one On just customer, our interaction with our customer, the scheduling piece, all the, all of the stuff we ordered, how much time we actually spent. So we bid it for X and we thought it would take us 3 days to do it. Okay, so after the job, we bill it all. Okay, how many days did it take? How did we do? So yeah, those are 2 things that came out of that 7-hour road trip from just listening to that one podcast. Went home and put it to, put it to use.

And so at that point, I was already going through the certification program. Yes, I wasn't done yet. I was supposed to go to Florida. Hurricane happened, quick pivot, ended up in Arizona, which I'm just telling you would not have happened. Previous me would have locked up and nothing would have happened. For me to be able to pivot and leave in less than 24 hours, I mean, I mean, that just is a testament, honestly. I mean, I say it jokingly, but it's true because I was ready to go. I had pre-done everything. So that's a side story. But what this did—

You had a plan.

I had.

Um, what it did is it then validated my journey to becoming certified. And then he was like, can you get Workbox certified? Like, is that a thing? He's like, you need to do that next. Like, this is amazing. You need— that's what you need to do next.

So I did.

So having that support.

Yeah, absolutely. Because again, as we talked about previously, as she's learning stuff, you know, she's teaching me and we're applying it, you know, not only in our home and our marriage, but we're applying it in the launch of our new business.

Well, thank you for sharing that story again. Now I'm gonna be able to listen to it on replay. Because I know that I have a ridiculous amount of business knowledge. There's— I was listening to a podcast, and I realized that I've done something in my business that will make it extremely sellable in the future. And I just did it on intuition. No one ever told me to do it. And I said to Greg, it is crazy the things that I have been able to figure out in business with no MBA and no one helping me. Like, I just, I don't know why. But also, the more I learn about business in general is, yes, Procter& Gamble is headquartered down the street here in Cincinnati, and many people work at Kroger and Procter& Gamble and GE in Cincinnati. But most people actually work at a small business. Most people work at a very, very small business in the United States. It's like 83% of companies are small businesses. It's a crazy percentage. And, um, I have helped a lot of people start businesses, and I have been successful in a lot of different businesses. I always tend to make money in whatever I'm doing because I'm organized. And so through direct sales and through helping other people in businesses and through growing my own businesses, I figured out the invisible work that everybody's doing. And I made a common language through these colors so that CEOs and startups can talk to their employees and their operations people through these colors. And they just use the colors in the reverse order. And, you know, I could easily And it would be so much easier if I just went out, sold the business, and I was a coach. I'd make a fortune and I'd be done because I understand business at that level. But I said early on in Organized 365, I would not stop doing home organization because most people who get good at home organization stop doing home organization and they move to business organization because that's where the money is. So I have now stayed in home organization for almost 12 years. And now I'm getting a PhD in psychology so I can explain home organization at a level that everyone's going to be able to understand it, because I feel like this is what I'm uniquely called to do, even though the other would be way more profitable. And like you've said, other people actually look at the meeting mastermind that we do for $997 or planning day, which is $250, and they're like, this is like a $10,000 course. I'm like, I know. And because I don't charge it that way, I think people think like, oh well, it's no big deal, or she must really not know what she's talking about. That's not the case. You're getting $10,000 worth of value on those planning days, and I know I for sure could charge that and people would pay it, but it's just not the business model that I'm growing. But you really are getting the highest level training you possibly could get.

Yeah, it's very, very good stuff because again I've been doing my job for 27 years, and I've been in management now for 12 or 15 of those years. And yeah, there's just conversations that haven't— training, I say conversations, but there's training that I haven't had through my own job and wisdom that you're able to speak to.

Yeah.

And really what helps with the colors and the language that you use is the why behind it, is explaining, hey, this is what you're doing, you know, breaking it down. So again, you know, you continually make the invisible visible because that admin stuff, you know, my son, for example, that's not his gift. He doesn't like that. You know, he's definitely in the purple. You know, he's He's the billable hours and he doesn't want to do the follow-up admin side of it. Well, if you don't do that, you're not going to get paid.

Yep.

You know, and you're not going to know whether you're profitable or not. All you're doing is getting the job done. You're finishing the task, but you have to be able to bid it. You have to be able to bill and you've got to be able to analyze that data to say, okay, are we covering all our overheads, all of our expenses?

Yeah, I would say that what you're doing is you make it accessible. You know, you're making it accessible. And if you stopped being in the home space, I mean, everyone who works at all the jobs in the businesses that you could go and do all this business training, they all go home somewhere, right? And that's where it all starts or ends, you know. And so when, you know, Casey describing that things are not as chaotic, house is not perfect, It can get out of hand and get cluttered and, you know, whatever at times, but it's manageable. We have a place, a way to reset, a way to go back to a foundational place. Therefore, when we leave our home, we are better equipped because we're not, um, like buried in our home.

Well, you've— so you've taught her to create—

Don't leave the home space. That's what I'm saying.

I'm not gonna—

don't leave it.

Taught Rhonda how to create a cadence to our home. Sunday work basket, you know, the Sunday basket. Okay. Like Sunday, we're doing this stuff. There's a cadence to it. And so, I know after that, I'm going to have a to-do list of paperwork to do, bills to, you know, to pay that I take care of. Again, we share these things, but definitely don't leave that home organization space because it truly is a A need. It's a, you know, I'm going to call it a ministry. You know, it's a business, obviously, but you're impacting people's homes and you're impacting people's lives and relationships, relationships, marriages, all of that. So it's so much about—

I think it's the operationalization of the work that is happening in the home. First, it's the understanding there is so much work and then the operationalizing of it, because even in Organized 360, I had already created the Friday Work Box back in 2006. I already understood the 4 kinds of work. I taught this in direct sales when I was growing Organized 365. After I got to years like 6 and 7, I got very frustrated because I wanted to do a lot more pink and purple and pink and purple, and I had to spend so much time and money investing in the blue team and creating the green systems. And as you grow and are successful in business, you will have to continually go through and completely refine the green systems that you are running your business on every time you hit a 3 or a 1, as the guy who started Infusionsoft will say, that it's $100,000, $300,000, $1 million, $3 million, $10 million, $30 million, $100 million, $300 million, $1 billion, $3 billion, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. At all of those points, you need to completely do your system. So I said to my lawyer the other day, I said, hey, have you seen this to play out, this ones and threes? And she went back and she thought through all of her clients. She was like, oh my gosh, that's exactly when it happens. So this idea that you need to continually uplevel the operation part of your home as you go through different phases of life matches what businesses are doing as they're growing. And no business wants to slow down and stop taking orders. And redo the systems and redo the contracts and get the new website. But if you don't, you have so much operational debt that you end up just spinning around like you had talked about at home. You just end up spinning and you don't make any progress until you stop and you invest in the operations side of the business and you invest in all the systems. And then you could scale to the next level. And then you do it again and you do it again, you do it again. And that's what we do at home. In each of these phases of life, as you go from one phase to the other, You have to declutter, you have to organize, you have to uplevel your skill set. And if you aren't continually upleveling your skill set and your knowledge and your ability to organize and be productive in the next phase of life and understand what the next phase of life is going to teach you, then you're spinning with past learning and trying to do it in a new phase of life. And that's why it's not working.

Yeah. And even I would break that down even more, Lisa, with your many years For the home, you know. Yeah, your summer and your fall, you have to stop because we think we've— you've said this so many times and it's so— it's proven true in our house anyway, that if you, you— I don't have time to plan, I don't have time to plan. Well, if you don't have time to plan, you end up wasting so much time and resources and energy and sanity and sleep. Yeah, because it's the very thing that if you take the time to do this thing that you feel like you don't have time to do, It saves you time in the future. Like, it's that whole your future self will thank you for taking the time to sit down and do this. Now, this hit Casey. I'll tell a quick story. So he wants to be productive, he wants to see it. So he's the one that you show me you've mowed the yard and I will know you're productive.

Right.

When we're first schooling, he's like, show me the paper that they produced in their day and you've shown me that they've learned something, right? So it's that kind of thinking. So, um, when we sat down last fall after home planning day, I said, okay, we got to— it was last summer— we got to do our calendar. And we literally did every single solitary game and practice with locations and addresses and times and people.

Wasn't it amazing though?

Oh no.

When you were done, when we were done.

He was like, he was like a caged animal up and pacing and like, oh, are we done yet? No, we got to get to December. We got to get to December. We're seeing this through. But I will tell you, when we started our fall, it was a dream.

It was.

That doesn't mean everything's perfect. You don't get wrenches and whatever. Don't hear perfection. But it was the, the shared family calendar. All he had to do was look. He didn't have to ask me. We didn't have to wonder where we're going, what time is it, what's the address. It was all right there.

Yes.

And we were able to pivot if we needed to pivot to give somebody a ride or have someone pick up one of our kids. It was super easy to communicate those things, and it was really easy because I love him, but time management sometimes is a struggle because he says, oh, it's 15 minutes, or oh, it's once a month, or oh, it's once a week. Let's have these people over. And it's like, wait, wait, wait, can we look at the last 2 weeks and how crazy it's been? And let's look at the next 2 weeks, how crazy that's going to be. This is our only night to be at home and look at our kids for more than 5 minutes. It's like, oh, okay. So that planning is so— that pivoting like you're talking about, and it looks different each phase of the year and each phase of life.

That's been huge though, the planning piece where we sit down, we do the calendar now. regularly together. And it's like, oh wow. Again, you're making the invisible visible.

Yes. Oh, I mean, I always—

we have a lot of stuff going on. You put it on the calendar, you're like, oh, we have a lot of stuff we're doing. But we're active people. We do a lot of stuff. So we do. But it's a good thing.

How has this impacted homeschooling? Because I know you have like gone like a duck to water with the homeschool box.

Uh, yeah, for sure, for sure. Um, so it's— I talked a little bit about this in the other podcast, so I won't go too deep into it, but what it has taught me is how to separate the two. Because with homeschooling, homeschooling is a way of life. It's a lifestyle, you know.

It is—

you're immersed constantly in what you're learning. It's not just at the table from 8 to 3 with this book answering these questions. That's not what it is.

It's—

I mean, I used everything. Like, if we went to the local Bass Pro, has an aquarium, and we had passes, we might just be doing it because it's hot outside and it's something to do. By golly, that is science, and we are going to learn something new about some of these fish. Or, you know, we're going to touch a stingray. We're going to— so, so much of that is— You can get it woven together. And that was really hard for me to separate, but I did it. I did it. I can now take— these are my homeschool tasks, especially the administrative ones. These are my household home tasks. Even though we live here and we do school here all the time, it really has given me— and it gives me better leverage. So when I'm looking at homeschool things, it's just my homeschool things, whether I'm grading papers or tests or we're looking for at the next assignment, you know, that's coming versus I'm looking at bills, I'm looking at our home calendar, I'm looking at, you know, um, I will say the other thing that helped, I mentioned it as well, is the Kids Program and the Launch Program.

Mm-hmm.

You know, having access to those. I learned so much from the Kids Program. We called it Lisa School and we did it, you know, we went through it. The, the, the things that I have learned through through planning day. And again, I will say this, it's all-encompassing. Like, one little snippet— people have to understand, I have everything. I've done everything. I've listened to everything. So I've got this whole big global picture. I feel like I have your full schematic of what you intend to give to people. It's not just a single podcast. It's not just one planning day. It's not, you know, it's the whole picture. Um, but through that, I developed a planning day Oh yeah, this is so cool.

I forgot about this.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So we did a day about a year ago. I just did a day. We looked at time, how many hours you spending, what are your routines, let's add it up, blah, blah, blah. And it really was eye-opening. It didn't mean that everything went perfectly. They always followed the schedule. They were always productive. Not true. But it was a language. It was a foundation and a place to return. Well, I took that to the next level. level this past January. And I did what I called Student Success Week. And each day we spent a couple hours on a separate category.

Mm-hmm.

I posted all the days in the app. You know, if somebody wants to go and read it, fine. But, um, we looked at time one day, we looked at their resources one day, we looked at the academics one day, we looked at your personal, which is spiritual, physical, and passion projects. And just bringing those things in. What do you have? What do you need? What sport do you play? Do you need new shoes? Do you need— it's that, it's the blitzes, you know, when you start looking at all the blitzes, which we talked about in the other podcast as well. It has profoundly impacted homeschooling. So I do homeschool my last 2 differently than when my other 2 were at home and it was all 4. With all 4 of them, I was a little more eclectic. I picked and chose curriculum. I did a lot of things from scratch. We participated in various co-ops throughout the years. We ran a couple of our own co-op groups, not anyway, for a season with certain themes behind them. But with these other 2, we joined Classical Conversations, which is a community that meets once a week. There's a curriculum involved. The assignments are laid out. The books are assigned. You know, all of that is kind of already Done. So what I'm allowed to do then, it's much like a college class. It's like they get their syllabus at the beginning of the year. Now we have to step back and let's break this down. So to write this 5-page paper in 8 weeks, what do we need to do first? In order to be ready with your memorized speech, what do you need to do? So it's teaching them the skills of back up, break it down. I couldn't have done it as effectively if I hadn't gone through The planning days that I had gone through, because it helped me look at time differently and helped me show them their time differently. Again, invisible stuff, making it visible. My son, in this Student Success Week, I said, how long do you think it takes you to do your morning jobs? Oh, 15 minutes. So I'm like, okay, write it all down, every single thing, write it all down. How much does this take? How much time? How much time? And he Wrote it all down, added it up, 45 minutes. And I'm talking brush your teeth, you know, go feed the water, the cows, you know, do— there are a bunch of just little jobs. But his time awareness was expanded at that point. So I would say that's, that's where it has helped me be more effective, more routinized, passing on to them those routines. They have their own Sunday basket, they have a launch binder. Um, they do not come to me and say, Mother, it is time to do our Sunday basket. I have not done that in a week. That doesn't happen. It is, guys, we're going through them. Which, let's be honest, there's not that much stuff in there, but it's getting that— like, this is where you can contain— Mom, where's my— oh, I put it in your Sunday basket. Where's my— where's my physical form? I've got to turn it in for the next quarter. Oh, that's in— that's yours. That's in your binder. Like, you go get it. You know, so would you add anything to that?

Yeah, I was gonna say, from, from my perspective, what I see different is then when I come home from work at 6 o'clock, that there's more— again, there's more of a cadence and a routine. It's, uh, we're not looking for stuff. Um, school stuff has typically been done before I get home instead of it kind of just being a 24-hour process. Because you've done life, you've done school. I'm serious, because you, you know, because it is a lifestyle. Well, you did this other, you know, home maintenance project, or you did this, you know, this other thing that wasn't school. And so here you are at 7 o'clock doing math, you know, and so that takes away from our family time, you know, if Junior's doing math at 7 o'clock, you know, which You know, I get, you know, public school, you got homework, you got to do that at night. But that's one of the pluses of homeschooling is you've got, you know, the daytime all day long to get your schoolwork done with your teacher. Yeah, they should.

They don't.

Sometimes they don't.

I had one son that we only did math at night because that was his best time to do math. That was my oldest son. So that's also good flexibility. And we're not home every night at 6. We're in this season, depending on the sports season, sports, we don't meet up at home. We're going to meet up at a field or Or at a stadium or at a theater. So we are still very much in that active because our kids are active with theater and sports and things like that. So.

But definitely that planning piece so that the kids, you know, you've defined school and then you've defined, you know, life outside of school and you find balance between the two so that they're done during the timeframe that the expectation is okay. We're not doing that after 6 o'clock. We're doing theater, we're doing football, we're doing baseball, we're doing these other things instead of school at that time. So—

And has this changed or impacted the amount of impact that your family is able to make in your community?

So, uh, yes. So that's, that's the short answer. That's the short answer.

So that's, again, we talked about it But that confidence piece, um, uh, that, that, that has changed in Rhonda. So it's allowed us to do— and we've been married for 28 years and it hasn't been perfect, uh, but we are married. We're not divorced after 28 years.

Yeah.

And, uh, we still like each other. And, uh, most of the time.

Yeah.

And we get along well. And so—

That's just truth.

It's just—

yeah.

So, but it's helped us You know, the, the tools that we've learned with organizing and communication skills and knowing each other, being organized and planning, now we have some margin.

Mm-hmm.

And we can go talk to our peers. We can go talk to them about their marriages, you know, their relationship with their kids, and being able to take what we've learned from you and share it with other people to make positive impacts, hopefully, in their families. As well. So it's—

I think you hit the nail on the head though, because if your home is chaotic, you don't— you don't— all you're doing is spinning your wheels the whole time. You don't have the energy, the mental capacity to pour into somebody else. You know, it's, it's the oxygen mask scenario that we moms have heard forever. Put your own oxygen mask on first before helping someone else, right? That's what they say in the airplane. And the reason that is, I am not wearing my oxygen mask. I can't possibly help somebody else. We have had some major life, unexpected family events occur in our family the last couple of years. And if it had not been for a lot of the things that we had set in motion or that I had set in motion and you were coming along, we could not have had the capacity to be, you know, on call. Walking with them, being there at a moment's notice, you know, the unexpected moment, the phone call late at night, or the getting in your car and going to somebody because of a situation. We could not have done that and still maintained home relationship with our younger 2 that are still living at home. And then, you know, each other especially.

Because it's the capacity. Yeah, that capacity piece. Because what we've seen, what we're seeing in our peer group, you know, those people that are homeschooling, they've been married for 25 years. We have close friends that it's breaking our hearts, but they're getting divorced. You know, they're coming to the end of their homeschool journey. One, one friend of ours, it's a public school, but we literally have 4 couples that we know, have known for years and years. Their kids have graduated, they left the house, and mom and dad get divorced.

Or they're close to that. Or close to that.

And so we've tried to walk alongside them and talk to them. And so we've really made that kind of a ministry, a calling that Man, we need to make people aware of what's going on. We have started having that conversation ourselves about what are we going to do when the kids are gone? When it's just, you know, when it's just you and Greg, you know, all your kids are gone. You know, what does that look like?

Yeah.

You know, you got grandkids, and so that's going to help have them back in your house. But it's happening, and it's heartbreaking to see And the way that ties back into Organized 365 is your house is more organized, your life is more organized, you have more margin, and it allows you— I think you say this all the time— it allows you to do, you know, what God uniquely gifted you to do.

Look at that.

So I know you're getting an A+. That's all I have to say.

That's all on his own. That's all on his own.

But it's so— but it's true.

It's so true.

You know, we all are gifted. To do something. And you, you are gifted very much in this organization space, you know. And you talk about the home organization, but your home is a business, you know. When you talk about— yes, people leave the home, the home space, and go to the business space.

Yes.

Well, your home is a business, right? You know. And so you have to manage it. I mean, my land— we all have—

They used to call it home economics, right?

Yeah. All we did was make biscuits and Yeah, we all, we all have income, we all have expenses, you know, your balance sheet, you know, your income. Yeah, it's just—

I think, I think speaking, he kind of bridged into talking about marriages and that impact is that as we go through life in the survival phase, um, especially I'm gonna speak to women who are moms, um, we can lose ourselves. We can lose our identity in our kids. Kids and our husband and our home. And that's great. Like, I, I am replaceable everywhere else in this world except in my kids' lives, Casey's life, and in my home. They can replace me teaching, doing whatever. That's fine. I learned that the hard way. That's a whole other story. My pride was whatever. But I am not replaceable in those places. And it's great to be in that place when you're in that survival mode, but we Casey and I even talked yesterday and he was like, we don't get in the pink. We stop dreaming.

Yep.

We stop, we stop looking at like, we literally are just surviving. And sometimes it doesn't feel like we're doing it very well. There's a lot of drowning, being swept up by all of the things that come at us with kids and culture and life and all the responsibilities. But I think that we don't dream anymore. We don't talk about it. Like, imagine yourself when— and we've started having these conversations probably 3 or 4 years ago because we saw some things slipping away between us, and we're like, no, that is not an option. We are not going to let a foothold, you know, happen that is going to pull us apart. You know, we got married before the kids got here. So there's obviously something there. That they're going to be married when they're gone, right? And we're going to be there when they're gone. So I think we can sometimes depend too much on our kids, too much identity in them. And I love my kids, we are heavily involved, clearly. But, um, we, we forget that we are a person outside of that.

So, um, yeah, so, so to, you know, you asked about the community and how we're impacting, you know, how does Organized 365 help us to impact that? And that is That is a big deal. And just a little thing I'd like to add about that is, as, as these, you know, basically the moms are doing most of the home organizing, home organizing, I'm assuming. Dads are watching that happen. So all the, all the ladies that are, that are watching this, and maybe you're wondering, how do I get my husband more plugged in, or how do I get buy-in from him? Um, without too much detail, I'm just going to say that one of the The perks that comes out of this whole home organization thing. Rhonda's like, what the heck is he gonna say? What is he getting ready for? She's nervous. But because you have margin, because you have, you know, you're not having all this stuff in your head, because what do you do? You teach them to what? Write it on a 3x5 card, put it in the Sunday basket, right? You got those cards. I love that because that's what was happening to Rhonda all the time. We've got our card. Write it down, drop it. Because before that, it was just in her head all the time. She, you know, there was no, um, space to think about anything else. She was trying to keep all these balls in the air. So I say all that to say that one of the things that's happened is she has time to think about us. She has time to think about me, you know. So that, you know, so again, ladies, if you're looking for some buy-in from your husbands, There's a physical intimacy perk to this whole thing, is that, you know, her mind isn't wrapped up to—

And now we gotta go to a commercial break. We don't even have commercials.

Everybody, everybody's embarrassed now.

But no, but you know, you ladies have all that stuff.

We're trying to get this to-do list done that is never-ending, and we're just running and running and running to Where are we running to?

No, it's true.

It's true.

And I would, I would just encompass all of that with just being able to relax and turn off. You know, I told the story about the pixies and Harry Potter in the other podcast. You can go listen to that story. That's exactly what it is. It's swirl, and it never stops because we know there's all this stuff. It's why I've never been good at taking naps, because as soon as I lay down, my head hits the pillow, it's Oh, I should be, you know. No, rest, dump it out, dump it out so you can rest, so that you can invest, you know, in the relationships that matter. Yes.

Yeah. So anyway, there's just a perk for you ladies if you want to, you know, hey, how to get buy-in from your husband. There you go.

There's a tip.

I will say men like to be listened to and paid attention to, right? Yeah, sure.

I mean, we like it. Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

And we have to take care of the kids. And so Greg is very excited that he is now back on the totem pole. He still says he's below Hunter, but anyways, he's like, it's Grayson, the kids, the dog, me. That's what he always says.

I'm like, really?

Yeah, yeah. And I, I think it's just communication. And we're so busy trying to make sure that we don't drown that we don't have time to just talk. Yeah.

And so that's, that's the huge takeaway is when you get your house in order, you have some margin and you can thrive in life instead of—

It's true. That's a great way to put it.

That's it in a nutshell.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Anything else you guys wanted to add before we close out?

Sure you want to ask that question, Lisa?

I have no more details.

Have we gone through all the notes yet?

Did we get through your notes?

We did. We got through all— we got through all my notes.

Yeah.

Okay. Absolutely. Well, I just— yeah, go ahead. No, you go.

No, I was just going to, you know, again, to back to that, that pink slash pocket, you know, that idea of your marriage and the dreaming part The planning. Be proactive, ladies. You know, get your husband. You know, Rhonda, we spent a day just planning, you know, and overnight we have the luxury of my mother-in-law has a cabin and we go plan, you know, and talk about it. And, you know, it's great because we're not just surviving.

Well, I think—

We're thinking about what does this look like? What What is our home? What does our marriage, what does our businesses look like a year from now, 3 years from now, 5 years from now? And so, yeah.

And I would say that just remembering that it is a journey and it is a process. It is not an arrival. Now, don't get me wrong. We have seen some definite benefits and bonuses. That is a good positive trajectory that we are just going to keep going with. But I would say, just remember to be a safe place. I say this to the wives and the husbands. So if either one of them are struggling with getting rid of things, be a safe place and have grace with them, even if it's put it in a box, label it to look at in 3 months, and it goes on a shelf or whatever. Just learn about one another. Why is this important to you? Ask the questions. You know, um, what, what, what is it about this that's, that's difficult and a struggle? And then have that grace with each other moving forward. Starts with ourselves. Have grace with yourself first, which you say all the time, and it's one of the things we've talked about. Um, and then what was I— I had to wrap up.

I don't know. I was gonna say, uh, ladies, if you're on the fence, buy the Sunday basket. It'll just do it.

So I could say, there you go.

Oh, I don't know if I afford it. Yeah, you can't, you can't not afford not to do it.

It's true.

It is the catalyst that starts the thinking in the process. And I would say those of you with small kids, you know, maybe you can't relate to where we are because of our phase of life. Get someone to watch your kids and do a planning getaway with your spouse. It's worth it, even if it's hard and it feels like it's more work to be gone than it is to be home, because it always is when you have small kids. It takes more work to prepare for you to be gone than it is for you just to stay home yourself. Doesn't matter. It's the one thing that you can put time into your future self will thank you for. And don't just do it once and wait 5 years and do it again. Do it a couple of 3 times a year for sure to be on the same page.

And all you old people out there like me and Rhonda, Volunteer to keep those kids.

That's right.

We have these little ones that come over so that the mom and dad can go plan and have overnights. Their marriages can thrive. Be invested. That's it.

That's so great. So great. Rhonda, how can everyone find out about you and the services that you offer?

Okay, so my website, my business name is Show Me Organizing Solutions because we live in Missouri. Um, so it's showmeorganizingsolutions.com. Um, I'm also in the app just by my name. I love being a fellow learner and, um, productivity. Um, I don't know that I'm— I'm not an expert. I'm not a guru either. Anyway, I'm working on it. I'm working on it. Yeah. Yeah.

You're a subject matter expert.

Well, yes, subject matter expert. I love it. Do you know what the definition of an expert is in the court of law? You just have to know more than everyone else in the room. So I'd say everyone who listens to the Organized 365 podcast is probably an organization subject matter expert in your community.

Oh, that's— I think I have my master's degree in it now.

There you go. See, I'm just saying, you guys, thank you so much for this gift of your time, the investment in being prepared for the interview, and the candidness with which you spoke and shared stories. I know that this will really impact so many. And if you have a spouse like I do that is never coming on the camera and also never gonna do a planning day, it is still beneficial for you to do the planning day for yourself, because once you know what you want and you need, then I sneak the questions in. So I'm like, Greg, and I'll like throw a planning day question out there, and then I just listen to the answer. And so it just takes me longer to get the information back to plug into the plan. You know how to do this. Like, you guys know how to do this inside of your marriages. Don't not plan or not dream because you can't find 4 hours or your spouse won't sit down and do it with you. You make the change in you and you will be amazed how your family comes around and changes as well.

So true. Thank you so much. This was so fun.

Thank you guys.