WhinyPaluza Family Friday Episode 001 The Book Club Discussion

Thank you, my wonderful friends, for doing my first Winey Palooza podcast. I'm super excited. You should have seen me running around this morning like an excited little girl. Thank you for reading my book this month. This is my book club, and they read my book this month, so I'm so excited. And you had a question, so should we start with your question?

Sure.

So tell—

go ahead.

Want me to ask the question?

Ask the question.

How did Lily end up getting a hair around her toe anyway?

Okay, so what I learned through this process is that in the laundry, like, my hair and her hair will get caught in the laundry inside the socks, inside the pajamas. And so either her footie pajamas or her socks had one of my hairs, and, um, I don't know, Seth discovered it. I wasn't home. And Seth discovered it wrapped around her toe and he was like, "You have to come home." And I'm like, "You're crazy. Like, just cut it off her foot. Just get it." And he's like, "I can't get it off." And then I got home and I was like, "I can't get it off either." You have to pause. So Seth knew the owner of urgent care. So I shoved him and Lily out the door and I said, "Go, just take her there. I can't get it off. She'll cut it off in 2 seconds." Well, 45 minutes later they were still waiting and it was like this whole big deal.

Wow.

And I was like, "Okay, you're not sending my baby to the hospital." to the hospital for a hair. Like, get this hair off. And I was in like my mama bear, like, mean, like, do it, like, get the IV in, like, stop pricking her, like, it was horrible. But the lady, like, just cut her skin a little bit and cut it off. But it was like so wrapped. You can lose a toe. I've heard about it, but I'm like, how does that happen?

And I've never known anybody it's happened to.

Well, and then I posted something and everybody was like, "You have to check, you have to wash your stuff separately," which I don't do. "You have to turn socks inside out. You have to turn footie pajamas inside out." I'm like, I still don't, I need to, like, I need to follow that advice.

Yeah.

I find my daughter's hair in the wash all the time. So yeah.

So it can happen. And it was scary. It was scary. I just am glad that she didn't have to go to the hospital and be put under. And it could be like this whole ordeal. Like, who knew?

Well, being a hair stylist, you know, we get hair everywhere all the time, and you can get hair slivers.

Yes, I've heard of that.

They are painful. But when it was wrapped, that was my initial thing, like it had to be in the laundry, or my initial thought. And then, um, I just couldn't figure out, like you're saying, why they couldn't get it off.

I thought that you and Jamie I thought they would know everything. And Jamie's like, yeah, no.

She's like, I did not know everything.

The only thing I might have attempted was to, like you said, like cut it yourself. Like, you know, the seam ripper.

Yes.

I would have taken the seam ripper.

No, I'm saying I thought that you would know all my stories.

Oh, oh, oh.

I thought you would know all the stories. And you texted me and you're like, I do not know all these stories.

No, I do not, because I cannot keep up with you. Yes, you can.

You all do. You all do.

Can I ask, do you mind if I start with my first question?

Go for it.

What was your favorite chapter or moment in the book?

I think I gotta go with Pumpkin Farm.

Just because it's like the quintessential outing with your family.

Oh my God. And you think it's going to be so fun.

You're like so determined to have fun.

And then they were like, They hate it.

They want to just do something that you could have done at home.

Yes, all that money, all the money. Yeah, and it was October and we were in jeans and we were sweating and I'm like, and the Bills game is on, why the heck is people here?

It was very, very symbolic of just trying to make a nice memory with your kids. Yeah, it's an example of like you can't force these things. Yes, the true things that are in the moment. Just happen on their own.

Yes, that's true.

Build this whole thing and it's never going to work out.

That's an excellent point.

So that's about making a plan and turning it all back to you.

Right? Our plans don't always work out, that is for sure.

I think a common theme for you is birthday party and birthday party planning.

Yeah.

And also how holidays shape your everyday life and your— because I remember so much of actually you going through these things. I remember the baby naming and Yes.

Yes. Um, Sukhoth.

Sukhoth at your house.

Yes.

The very last one. You were moving in the middle of—

Yeah, I remember. And then they were just like, let's put a sukkah in your backyard. Okay, I'm moving. Okay.

I feel like so many of those moments are definitely defined by your birthday party planning or your yearning to create this magical moment for your kids. And I feel like there were— and I actually read 20 pages apart between Max turning 7 and Max turning 8. I'm like, where did that year go?

I didn't write. And what I said in the ending was the plan was to write every week. And I didn't. And what I learned by the time that I finished the book, I was like, OK, your biggest lesson is to be easier on yourself. So I was pissed that I had let that whole year go by. And then I was like, no, look at all these pages that you have. Just be thankful for what you wrote.

But life happens.

Yes.

And that's not always the case.

My favorite maybe chapter in your book was the delivery of Max, and I was just crying because as your kids get older, you don't remember how little they were and the chaos that involved and how your house was so messy and now it's so clean. Like, my kids are older and in and out, in and out. I just— my house will be clean one day.

One day my house will be clean.

It brought back the baby memories.

Yeah.

That was very cute.

I also like how you prefaced for us that the goal and the intention is sometimes different from the outcome, and you have to always gauge yourself to not only be easier on yourself but to give yourself credit.

Yeah.

But also to, for you, like a Type A personality, you have to also, like you in the car with the DVD and the whole—

Let's talk about the DVD player.

That was bad.

You have to be able to go with the flow. Which I've learned.

I'm learning that.

And parenting, parenting and motherhood and being a Type A personality are, they will ruin you if you try to stick to your original.

Yes. So when I had Max, I never went to bed without the house clean. And by the time I had Lily, it was all out the window. But you picked my favorite one. That's why I'm crying. That's my favorite one. And I cry every time I read it.

I was in labor with my daughter too and ended up with a C-section. So yours was a little different than mine, but I can relate.

Yes, and after 25 hours and 3 hours of pushing and being so sore from that process and then being cut open, that was like— to wake up to that pain was just— I still remember the pain.

And I didn't even care about my baby, I was in so much pain. I was like, I—

we had a boy?

What? And I was like, I don't care.

I just—

okay, you're surprised.

Yeah, I'm like, just give me pain meds. I don't care about anything.

Yeah, and then the 4 o'clock panic, the 4 o'clock AM wake-up panic of Seth. Where is he?

Go get him right now. He's not inside of me. Go get him. I'm like, right now.

Okay.

Okay. What did you relate most to?

The whole book or that particular—

Just, just, just your— something in the book that maybe spoke to you and your parenting, something that you related to most?

I will say your ability to carry on traditions and be with your family, because that is us as well.

I love that.

Yeah.

Yes, I think I'm starting to actually embrace it more and stop being so stressed out about it. Like, the house doesn't have to be perfect, right? The food doesn't have to be perfect. I guess by the third kid.

I think also for me, it was the amount of chaos that ensues when you introduce gymnastics and dance and sports and all the things that they want to do versus they say they want to do it or don't want to do it, but you just need to pick something and let them do what they are prone to doing, what they're good at. I think part of it for you is wanting them to be happy but also not wanting to drag them there if they don't want to do it. I think for you, you know, who's driving the bus was also a common theme. And, you know, you got to stay in your driver's seat, man. Stay firm, keep your seatbelt on. Don't let those kids in. Oh, but you got to— they can't cross the yellow line.

You make it look like that chaos won't happen though. Like, this is going to be fun. This is going to be fun.

It's going to be fun.

I just die laughing because then it goes, woo!

Woo!

You know, I think that I love relaxing. Like, I do love my moments relaxing, but the chaos, like yesterday, yesterday was nonstop, which is perfect for my birthday. And like, Seth was falling asleep on the couch at 10 o'clock and I was like, cleaning the house.

I was like, what a fun day. I had the best time. Seth is like, Seth and I are on the couch going, oh my God. And I was like, that is the best thing.

But it's good that you can handle it. Yeah, like, you know, they thrive on that, right?

Other people, I'm the one who shuts down on that. I'm just like, okay, yeah, same.

You'd be on the couch, you'd be like, no more, no more. And I was like, Seth, can I ask you some questions about tomorrow?

And he's like, oh God. Um, what, what made you laugh?

Segments with Seth. I call it segments with Seth. I love that. We're gonna use that.

We're gonna bring point of view.

We're hilarious. I love the, I love the, um, write-up when he was saying about you having these drawers where the toys go and you have a system, and he's like asking Max, where do these go? And he's like, these two drawers. And Ella knew where her toys went and Then he's like, does our 10-month-old know where her toys go? It's hilarious. Hilarious.

He is my comic relief. I will be doing a vlog on Wednesday and I will be getting like so serious and he'll just—

he's sitting all lounge back there. Like I'm up there, I'm like intense, I'm like ready.

And he's lounging back there making his jokes. I'm like, he brings the comic relief, right?

Well, not only that, but he actually has some really excellent points.

He does. He grounds you. Yes, because otherwise you're like a helium balloon, and that string has got to be very, very long because you're off and running and ground you.

Jamie, you nailed it! Well, and I—

my head is like that. Like, he told me yesterday about the car being up July 1st, and I wanted to vomit, and I was like, what?

I thought I had it Yeah, but you know what, you have like July 1st, so yes, all this time.

Yeah, based on when you started.

Yes, give yourself a leeway.

Yes.

Um, but I think a lot of your— the decision-making, like, the decision-making differences between you and Seth—

oh my God, oh my God, oh my God.

Um, I, I think he just makes a snap decision, knows what he wants.

Yes, typical.

Yes, of a woman.

Yes.

However, I think that, um, I've taken a page of from many pages from Ari's book on that same exact topic. I just have to be more concise and be realistic and just think of like, what do I need to do to get this wrapped up? Because otherwise it's just gonna escalate.

Well, he said something yesterday, and, and you're saying that there isn't a wrong decision. Like, you can't make a wrong decision. Like, it's a car. Just in general, in life, like, a decision is not gonna like—

not—

well, I it could ruin your life if we're talking about marriage or something, but a car is not gonna ruin your life. Like, just pick a car.

You're just stuck dragging everyone's friends around, which is the minivan life.

So he was laughing at me because at middle school, the kids all jump in my car, and he is like, you're not basing your decision on anyone else this time. No children, not our kids. Not other kids. He's like, you are picking something for you. And I was like, yeah.

I mean, I do think that you just have to get your checklist and just narrow it down to like 4.

And then live with things you can't live without. Right.

And you know what, in 3 years, there's some other new thing gonna come out that will not— your needs will change. And the beauty of this is that you can—

Excellent point.

You can reinvent yourself 3 years from now. And there really is not a wrong answer. All safety ratings are basically the same. You know, brand new is brand new. It's going to be better than what you have now. You're always going to upgrade.

Yes.

You know there'll be a blog about this.

Yes. Decision making and motherhood.

Yes.

That's the story.

Yes. Oh my God, absolutely. And I used to be worse. I've learned a lot. I used to be worse. Should I stay on that or should I move on? Next question.

It was, what made you laugh?

Does anyone have anything, or should I move on? Yes, I really like the back and forth. We're gonna, we're gonna call it Seth's— we're gonna call it Seth Segments. Segments with segments with Seth.

It's like what Ellen comes up with on her show.

Um, it's your friend Courtney.

Yes, yes, yes.

If it's Seth's voice, maybe Seth should come up with a Marketing terminology.

He likes it. He likes it. Okay, what made you cry?

Oh, so I kept reading and reading, I'm like, do they have any pets? What's going on here? So you really didn't really address the pet situation until sort of the end quarter, and you know, I know that pets play a huge part in most families' lives and I just, I would have liked to have read more about the kids' interactions with the cats before when you had Hope and not learn about Hope, you know, toward the end when you were being introduced to Faith and Joy and Tanner too. I still remember those moments talking to you about Hope and about your thought process during that really hard time, and I know that was an emotional time. It still is, continues to emotional time. But that was the hardest for me because I, you know, I've lived it myself. I've lived it with you.

Yes, it's hard.

And, um, it's something that just, you know, especially how it relates to Max and his needs.

Yes.

You put his needs—

yes, yes, I did.

I did encapsulate the entire definition of motherhood, putting the child's needs before your needs, before the other parents' needs, before the needs of anyone else. Outside of the family. And I think that is a huge, huge lesson because you did the right thing. And I promised you 100 times that I waited 3 years and that didn't work.

I didn't want him to be sad for 3 years, but I want to address your question because I can answer that question. Um, we had 3 old cats, they were elderly, and the 2— when I met Seth, he had 2 boys, and the boys were Seth's cats. I mean, they loved me, but they were all about their daddy, and they were so attached to him. And Hope was mine, and Hope was all about me, and they did not bond to our kids. They were our pets, and there wasn't— they didn't want a ton of interaction from the kids, and they had their people. The boys loved their daddy, and Hope loved her mommy. And when they passed, it was a totally different situation. Because Max picked our cats and the cats bonded to Seth and they didn't— you're shaking your head. Well, talk. You can talk.

The cats and Joy bonded to Max.

I just said that, honey.

You didn't.

You said they bonded to Seth.

Okay, so Max picked Faith and Joy and the cats became Max's cats. He picked them. He came up with their names. They were all about Max. They love me, but they didn't— but Seth wasn't ready. He didn't bond with them, and he was feeling sad, so he was like, it's time to get a dog. It's time to get a buddy for me. He just— listen, after I begged you for 15 years, okay?

He was ready.

Okay, so he was ready. He was ready, and he— and he went with me, and loved Tanner and then he went himself, got Tanner, brought Tanner home and wanted that like alone bonding time because he needed a buddy and guess what? He is Seth's buddy. I mean, he loves all of us but, but the cats just— it's interesting when you have kids and you get pets when you have kids versus when you get pets before kids. So those were our before kids pets that just loved their parents. So maybe that's why I— maybe I— that's why I didn't give them enough book time.

Well, it deserves— the topic itself does deserve more analysis. Yes. Because it's a huge important part of the—

I'm writing that down.

Growing up.

Yes.

And you see now how Tanner has evolved your family into this new active family of doing different types of activities.

Yes.

And how the cats and the interactions, and it's just a whole— their personalities come out, and I feel like it's a definite moment of growth.

Yes.

And it should be. And I think that a lot of people don't realize what animals do for their—

so maybe we can write a blog together.

Oh yes.

Okay, let's do it. Maybe we can add some more pet stuff.

I think it's a good sidebar.

Well, it does a lot for our families, right? So we can relate.

But it's also, you know, mental health, you know, physical well-being, um, you know, it does a lot. It says a lot to speak to your profession. Yes, in terms of being a tool.

Yes, you're 100% right.

Caitlin, what about you? I was just gonna say that there's a big difference, first of all, between cats and dogs. Yes, cats are very— they play favorites. Yes, dogs are like, give me attention, all right, I'm happy. And if you have cats and then have children, it's very disruptive to them because they were your kids.

Yes, they were.

It's not going to be that bonding.

Yes.

I mean, very rarely I would think that would occur unless it was a kitten when you had the kids.

Yes.

Whereas a dog, I think that they can kind of develop that relationship over time. So that completely makes sense.

Yes.

The cats Yes, they tolerated.

Yeah, it's more like, "Woo-hoo!" What did anything— did anything make you cry in the book? Um, you can say no.

Not crying, but I just, I found it very touching, and I hope that you know, both of you, how lucky you are to have like a true partnership when it comes to raising the kids, because every husband is different in what they see as their contribution to the family unit. And I think Seth is more hands-on in a different manner of like getting down in the trenches and, you know, just like telling you, go, I got the kids. Like, not everybody does that.

It's true.

It's very, it's very touching to see that there's, you know, not that dads people who don't do that aren't good, but it's just different. It seems like a very different dynamic than some people have.

I think that Seth's dad gave me a blessing and he doesn't realize it, and I should thank him because he was never home. And so it affected Seth, and he wanted his dad home. So he was like, I'm not gonna do that to my kids. I'm gonna make sure I'm home more than my dad was. And his dad was just trying to provide and was working couple jobs and wasn't being a bad dad. He was trying to make money. I appreciate you, Mr., uh, manager over there.

I have to say what made me cry.

Yes, yes, I was going to ask you.

No, that was different.

Okay, tell us what made you cry.

Um, Max's bar mitzvah. Oh, it ties in family and your traditions within your religion. But it's also him coming of this age and this moment in time that he has to go through and would go through. But all your planning around it, and then the pandemic hits, and then you're on Zoom, and it's just unfolding in front of us. And you had a vision of that day, but yet it became something different, and it went so well. But it also makes you realize what's important and what's not important.

Yes.

Like for that day.

That's an excellent point.

And that you guys were just all together and all like could see each other was just— it really hits home.

Thank you. I'm glad Zoom decided to work.

She's gonna make me cry. I'm not gonna look at her. Oh, um, is there anything that you learned that you can apply to parenthood? Pray.

I, I do pray a lot. I do pray a lot.

I love your little prayers.

You like my prayers?

I do.

I like when you started shifting into the lessons learned. Yes.

The end.

Yes.

Because I think you should take every challenge and thing that comes up, whether it was difficult or really enjoyable, kind of evaluate it and say, okay, what can I take away from this? Yes. Like, I need to calm down. Things aren't that big of a deal. You could tie it in with the permits, but like take away all the frills and the parties.

And we were healthy.

Yep.

Yeah, you still like at the core of it, you were able to do what was most important.

Yes, right.

That was to have that ceremony, to have family be present for it even though they were distant.

Yes.

So I really liked that. Um, also It made me feel like I need to be more proactive about trying to make memories with my kids, especially now that they're older.

I know, I know, I understand.

I see her 5 seconds yesterday.

I get it, literally, I get it.

She went to bed before I say goodnight, so I just, I need to like—

Teenagers are a whole different ball of wax. I dragged him to the sculpture sculpture part.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Explain, but at least they did it with you.

Especially teenagers that drive.

Oh my God, it's—

I can come and go, come and go, go to work, go to school, come back, go out with their boyfriend, come back.

Oh, it gets worse.

Little kids, little problems. Big kids, big problems.

With all their kids, because they're going to be contributing to, and they're gonna be having a say in what, what you're doing. What's important to them and what's important to you might not be the same, so you have to find that middle ground.

And you also have to listen to them.

Yes.

Listen to your instincts, but also listen to them.

Yes.

Like, dragging any amount of children into Walmart is a definite no-no.

That was hilarious.

And number one, you did that.

That was hilarious.

Seth also permits this to happen.

Um, I did that many more times than I wrote about.

To many more stores.

Because that to me is—

because, well, you know what, because I—

this is, this is my thought process.

We're gonna go as a family and we're gonna go shopping and it's gonna be great.

And then I'm like, Seth is like, why do you do this?

I do think it makes for good TV or good vlogging. Oh, I think for your own mental state, probably maybe not so much. There's so much more you could do with that time. That if you wanted to zip it and zip out, or even just go in and just go up and down every aisle, but without the aggravation.

Yeah, I think you're right.

A lot of aggravation for yourself in the light of trying to make fun of it, or not make fun of it, but make it fun for family time.

Family time.

There's a list of things that family time— you can do for family time, and a list of things that's not fun at all.

Yeah, but I think we can all relate to the Walmart trips because with the little kids, like, you're going to buy a bike and Max is like, are you buying all this stuff that she's throwing in the cart? And you're like, I'm just going with it.

Every time you took her out, she filled the shopping cart up with whatever.

And I just learned to just—

put it back.

I just ignored her. I just would ignore.

And then I would start, as she would put it in, I would just start taking it out. And she was so oblivious to what I was doing.

But I think there's, you know, there's times to take them and there's times to leave them.

Yes, yes, yes.

You're good.

You're good at that.

Pressure from yourself. And you have—

Well, it is.

And you have, you know, do it at times when Seth is home or your parents can watch them or they're at a friend's house playing or whatever the case, just to make it easier on yourself.

Well, now it's much easier because now it's who wants to go to Target with me? Who wants to go to Wegmans with me? And it's usually not me.

Not me.

And I'm like, okay, bye. And I can just leave Max with them now because, you know, I'm in a different stage of life. When I started writing that, they were like tiny. Tiny. So like the blogs now are totally different. But I wanted to tell you that it started to be a joke in my house. So when Max had his foot injury and he was crying hysterically and he wouldn't stop, and I was like—

which one?

And I was like this, like pulling my hair, and Ella was like, "Why do you pull Luz off?" And I was like, she just made me laugh. And I was like, oh my God, I can write about this. So it started to be a joke that when things were really stressful, I was like, okay, this is good. I'm going to write about it. I'm going to learn about it.

It's going to be great.

Thank you for reading my book. Thank you for being my book club. Thank you for being my first podcast. And this was so fun. I had no idea what to expect, and I had the best time.