Podcast Episode 368: Play Hotspots, Not Playrooms: How to Reclaim Your Sanity While Kids Have Fun Transcripts

Please note: Transcripts for the No Guilt Mom Podcast were created using AI. As a result, there may be some minor errors.

Myriam Sandler (00:01)

Every time a child does want to play, you remove that first step of freedom. They have to come to me in order to be able to play. So if you want your child to leave you alone for a few minutes, cut yourself out of the equation.

JoAnn Crohn (00:17)

Welcome to the No Guilt Mom podcast. I’m your host JoAnn Crohn, joined here by the brilliant JoAnn Crohn.

Brie Tucker (00:23)

Wah! Hello, hello, everybody, how are you?

JoAnn Crohn (00:25)

I’m using Brilliant Brie forever because the bruh, I just can’t get over it. It’s like bruh. bruh. Hey, bruh. It works well.

Brie Tucker (00:31)

Does I’m trying to think of any the yeah, no no brilliant does the best yeah?

JoAnn Crohn (00:37)

You’re my bruh. Just like our kids call us.

Brie Tucker (00:41)

my gosh. Yeah, I don’t like that. That is not mm-mm. No, that is nailed.

JoAnn Crohn (00:47)

I just call him bruh back. I call him bra back. It’s the brilliance of having tweens and teens. You can just joke with them right back and they get you. But today, this is something that a lot of our community members have told us about is getting their kids to play by themselves, getting them kids to play independently. This is something that I had trouble with when my kids were little too. Like just getting them to do something on their own without my assistance.

Brie Tucker (01:11)

so that you can, I don’t know, shower? So that you can, I don’t know, take up a hobby?

JoAnn Crohn (01:17)

Or like work? Yes! Do you any work from home?

Brie Tucker (01:22)

We were just talking about this yesterday. You had like pictures you showed me on your phone of when you used to try to do yoga when your son was little and how he would literally sit on top of you.

JoAnn Crohn (01:32)

Sit on top of me.

Myriam Sandler (01:34)

It’s like just…

Brie Tucker (01:35)

You’re like,

give me 20 minutes, God, please.

JoAnn Crohn (01:38)

He still literally almost sits on top of me. Like he’s 11 now and I have a couch here in my office and he’ll just come in. Like when I’m working and I’m trying to concentrate on, he’s like, Hey mom, you know, I really liked the show on TV, mom. And I had to do this whole conversation when I’m trying to like, it’s a problem, but I love, I love having kids, but you know, there’s the, the give and take, but our guest, our guest today has so many great solutions for you. If you have this problem yourself and she’s just a

fun and lovely human being. She is Myriam Sandler and the creator of Mother Could, which is a beloved kids activity and family lifestyle community trusted by millions of families. As a mother of three Myriam shares engaging easy to follow video tutorials that offer accessible DIY play ideas, parenting hacks, which we all need, family travel tips, which my gosh, I’m going to talk about one of hers that I saw on her Instagram with her right after this and more. And now she has her first book dropping.

today, which is playful by design, your stress free guide to raising confident creative kids through independent play. And we are so excited to chat with her. And let’s get on with the show.

You want mom life to be easier. That’s our goal too. Our mission is to raise more self-sufficient and independent kids, and we’re going to have fun doing it. We’re going to help you delegate and step back. Each episode, we’ll tackle strategies for positive discipline, making our kids more responsible and making our lives better in the process. Welcome to the No Guilt Mom podcast.

Welcome to the show Myriam. We are so excited to have you here

Myriam Sandler (03:29)

Thank you so much for having me. I absolutely love your energy and it’s what every parent needs, energy. So thank you.

Brie Tucker (03:36)

God, yes. I like to take my energy in the form of liquid. Iced espresso. I moved from like a very milkshake-y coffee when my kids were little into iced espresso now.

JoAnn Crohn (03:48)

Brie, I am converting you. We are going to have you a black cold brew any day now.

Myriam Sandler (03:55)

Guys I need to know how old your kids are because I’m not there yet, and I’m worried now. Oh no

Brie Tucker (04:02)

It’s just the years and years of it has and then you throw in a little perimenopause ⁓

Myriam Sandler (04:10)

It’s done.

to look forward to then. I’m excited. Yeah!

JoAnn Crohn (04:18)

So I wanna, wanna though, like be the counter to this. I still have a lot of energy. Like I only drink one cup of coffee a day. And that’s just cause I like the taste of my black cold brew.

Brie Tucker (04:28)

I only do one but you know me I lose my energy ⁓

JoAnn Crohn (04:33)

It is a big one. I was looking at your Instagram and devouring everything of it yesterday. And I have two nephews who are actually five. One is my sister’s child and one is actually my brother-in-law’s kid. And you were on a plane with your kids with screen free activities. And I want to buy all of those activities for my nephews, like stat. Like some of the things, Bri, like the foil art, Myriam. I had no idea foil art existed.

Myriam Sandler (05:03)

So fun. I I watch my kids do it and I’m sitting next to them like, can I have a turn? Can I have a turn? Not have a turn. It’s so fun.

JoAnn Crohn (05:13)

I would do it too. This is what I had to really stop that. And I’m like, oh my gosh, I have to buy my nephew this. The stickers that only stick to certain things because he is a sticker boy and he will stick it everywhere.

Brie Tucker (05:25)

Color forms from when we were little, Joanne? No? Okay. I’m not that much older than you, but my older sisters make me like, had hand-me-down stuff. So color forms were those little stickers, like laminated booklets, and you had little stickers that you could take on and take off. So like I had like a My Little Pony color form playset.

JoAnn Crohn (05:29)

No. I think I got them.

Myriam Sandler (05:48)

That is so cute. Like a sticker collection. That’s so cute.

Brie Tucker (05:52)

Yeah, we moved from Maryland to Missouri and we drove and I just remember all the non-screen stuff back in the 1983 era.

Myriam Sandler (06:04)

The interesting thing about that is that like, I prefer screens. Not gonna lie to you. When I’m traveling and I’m outside the home, I wanna like hand something over and be like, you do you and I’ll do me. Yeah. Except screens over stimulate my children more than anything. So they will watch, let’s say for like a good five minutes and I’m on my show sitting in the corner like watching. And then after five minutes, they’re jumping.

up and down. And then it took me a while to realize what was happening. And so I did a lot of research and I travel a lot with her family. So I test a lot of products to see what could give them the same amount of entertainment without the over simulation. And so I’ve been able to curate all these really fun activities and toys for myself and share it on mother could on my online community for other parents to also be like,

This is a guaranteed yes. So I think that’s what a lot of people like it.

JoAnn Crohn (07:09)

because you know, there’s nothing inherently bad about screens. They get a really bad rap. But you’re also right that kids, if you’re having them sit in an airplane and you’re giving like a five year old a six year old screen, they are going to get overstimulated. For instance, my sister tells me stories about my nephew watching something like Marvel and all of sudden he’s Hulk smashing every

Myriam Sandler (07:30)

Yeah,

correct. It is true. So imagine that but now in a tube that nobody can get out of. It’s a recipe for a disaster.

JoAnn Crohn (07:39)

⁓ my god.

Brie Tucker (07:42)

And they’re not trying to everything difficult. just have this energy and they don’t know what to do with it. And then we’re stuck feeling like everybody is judging us, going, what a terrible parent. Look at what their kids do because you know that there are some people that have going through their head the laundry list of problems with you as a parent. Right? Like, ⁓ you don’t spend enough time with your kids.

JoAnn Crohn (08:09)

Yeah!

Myriam Sandler (08:10)

100 % and a lot of times, even though we’re like, them that pressure of like us thinking about what they’re thinking adds a lot of pressure to a circumstance that doesn’t need to have extra pressure. So I always tell parents set yourself up for success no matter what you’re doing. So in playful by design, my new book, which I’m very

JoAnn Crohn (08:33)

Yes, we’re so excited about it. It’s beautiful. Thank you. It’s beautiful.

Myriam Sandler (08:36)

So, ideas?

It’s very, very nice. It’s playful by design. had to be beautiful. ⁓ I focus a lot about play in the home, but there is a chapter about play outside the home and how you can incorporate that to make everyone life but easier and a little bit more fun. So

JoAnn Crohn (09:00)

It’s not just the play outside the home that we need to keep kids occupied with. It’s the play inside the home. Stuff where like we’re trying to get stuff done. Because also said nephew, who I will not say his name to protect him in the future. The nephew that you love. I love him and I adore him and he’s so high energy. You know, my sister’s a paramedic at a hospital. Her partner works as well and they get home and they’re just so, so tired.

JoAnn Crohn (09:27)

and said nephew has thrown rocks across the living room and broken one of their TVs because he’s just playing, he’s high energy. He has flushed hot wheels down their toilet and he’s had to get like their whole toilet replaced. And it’s not that they weren’t watching him. It’s like one little second they turn away to see something else and the high energy kid goes and occupies himself. So this independent play.

is so like such a pain point for so many parents out there. And we’re gonna get into your tips, Myriam, right after this.

So Myriam, one of the big things that parents have trouble with is getting their kids to play by themselves. Like even all ages of kids, even I have trouble now with my 11 year old just doing something on his own without coming in and wrecking my focus if I’m working for instance. So like when you’re first trying to introduce independent play to your kids, what are the first practical steps that parents can take?

if they’re right now in this phase of constant interaction and constant entertainment of their kids.

Myriam Sandler (10:40)

So one of the biggest misconceptions about me is that I play with my kids all day because I share kids activities online. And that’s when I knew that I needed to write this book because it’s not that I play with my kids all day. It’s that my kids play all day. I have three kids. I work from home full time. I have a husband, extended family. I have to clean. I have to cook like all of us, right?

So that illusion of, my God, she’s the perfect mom. She plays with her kids all day and probably has a million people helping her do the rest of the things that that isn’t true. So in order to get our kids to play independently, we need to create space that they feel the freedom to do so. Yes. So there is two very important things about this. One is access and two is visuals. So

A lot of the times when our kids take a scissor and they cut their hair and we freak out, that might’ve been their first interaction with a scissor that they found hidden somewhere. In my case, I recommend to parents, leave the scissors as part of their art table. Leave the scissors as part of your home and teach your child from when they’re babies, from when they’re toddlers, to respect the tools that they have.

A lot of people, when I show my art people, they’re like, Sharpies? I don’t understand. They’re like, I don’t understand what’s happening. And I was like, my kids are not going to color on the wall. They’re just not going to color on the wall because they understand that the Sharpies and the markers and the crayons are all in the same. And they’re all meant as writing tools or coloring tools for paper. it’s setting up yourself for success from the get-go. Let’s say now you have

a five-year-old who hasn’t been introduced to these items, it’s never too late to start, right? You start creating space for them to freely explore and creating boundaries around these items. like you gave an example of putting a Hot Wheels car in a toilet, that’s when you start setting up your boundary. Maybe in that opportunity, he’s trying to get attention, trying to

explore his surroundings, experimenting with what would happen. That’s natural.

Brie Tucker (13:13)

wonder what would happen if I flushed the toilet with this car.

Myriam Sandler (13:16)

Correct. That is natural for a child. That child is not being a bad kid. That is a natural instinct of wanting to explore. So imagine if we set up spaces in the home for this particular child with this particular interest that allow him to do that. Maybe it’s a corner of science experiments with safe items that are okay for him to do on his own. Yeah.

Maybe it’s an art table for him to express himself creatively. My 10 year old loves to do costume makeup. So we bought her a makeup vanity and I got her a bunch of face paint. And she comes home from school, instead of going to the TV, she goes to her makeup desk and she creates different makeup looks. So it’s trying to find.

what works for you, what works for your family and your dynamics. And one thing I did in Playful by Design is that instead of giving you like a step-by-step, like you must do this, this, this, and this in order to get this golden child of independent play, it’s a lot of lists of questions. And I really want you to ask yourself, answer them for you and your family to then go on to step two. So it’s still step-by-step, but it’s more tailored to your experience, to your family dynamics and to your

evolution of your family because if you have you buy the book today and you have one child but then all of a sudden you have two children and then you’re like how do I make my space work for two so on and so forth so so yeah that’s how you get to independent play

JoAnn Crohn (14:51)

Yes, creating like this personalized space and like something that I really, really noticed that is different in your approach than is like common, like parenting knowledge out there right now. So many parents are restricting screen time from their kids saying that, you can only spend 20 minutes there and then you have to go find something else to do. Where in that go find something else to do.

It’s like we’re taught boredom is good, but it’s like, what did they do? And what you’re saying is to really notice your child, see what they’re interested in and set up spaces in things that they do like to do so that they go and have something that they can play with.

Myriam Sandler (15:33)

You’re correct. And I really am a big believer that technology is a part of us and it’s only getting stronger in our society. So to make it a bad fruit or make it something prohibited can actually be very detrimental for all of us in the future. That doesn’t mean I’m going to give my nine year old a cell phone and access to Instagram, right? There are many, many, many layers to the boundary. But the TV, for example, I am

the controller of the TV contents. So I can block YouTube, I can block certain things from the television and allow my kids free reign. So my kids, when they have free reign to the television, if they want to watch now or they want to watch later or they want to watch a movie, doesn’t matter when or what, I’ve given them other options within our home that they are really interested in, that they really enjoy.

So that way it’s their choice. It’s not, you can only watch five minutes if you eat all of your broccoli. Yes, right. It’s not the forbidden fruit, but that’s very hard to do if there are no other options. And you might be listening or watching this and being like, but they have so many toys. They have so many options. And that’s when it becomes complicated because I feel like as a society, we feel like more is more.

Brie Tucker (16:36)

It’s not the forbidden fruit.

JoAnn Crohn (16:38)

See you.

Myriam Sandler (16:58)

But in this scenario, less is way more. It’s not the fact that we’re depriving our children of giving them less toys. It’s giving them access to the toys they do have. So when you think about decluttering or purging or giving away some of your kids’ toys, you might think in your head like, my God, I can’t believe I’m taking away all of these items. You’re actually giving them access to see what they have. Yeah. Yeah. And that’s big deal.

Brie Tucker (17:28)

Because everybody gets like that. We talk about this a lot, like the decision fatigue. There’s this overwhelm and it even happens to kids.

Myriam Sandler (17:29)

Yes!

JoAnn Crohn (17:34)

Thanks.

Myriam Sandler (17:37)

It happens to kids. I always give the example, like if you go to a beautiful department store on the mannequin, they have like a beautiful dress and you’re like, my God, that’s the perfect dress for the event that I want to go to. But if that dress was in Iraq with other 50 beautiful dresses, the chances of you seeing that dress and trying it on are much less. You might actually see 50 dresses on a rack and walk away.

And that would have been your missed opportunity to get the dress of your dreams. Yeah. The same thing happens with kids. Like I’m a big proponent of open shelving and parents are like, I don’t understand. Open shelving is a sh** show. Pardon my French. They’re like, like, I don’t, you can see everything. It looks terrible. And I’m like, if you have a hundred things on one shelf, it looks very bad. If you have five, it looks really, it looks like a toy store.

And I get that all the time. are like, my God, your playroom looks like a toy store. I’m like, thank you. Actually, I’ve worked very hard on that. I’ve worked very

JoAnn Crohn (18:39)

very curated environment. it is. Because what you say about department stores, I’ve had that feeling too. Like I don’t go shopping actually, because of that whole overwhelm environment where everything I have to dig through, I don’t enjoy that same whatsoever. I just want that curated environment. And it’s no wonder that kids don’t want that curated environment as well. Now,

Something that you said that was really, really interesting and that I bet a lot of our listeners have picked up on as well is we mentioned boundaries at the beginning and teaching kids how to have those boundaries. I have some very, very strong opinions on that from being a teacher.

Myriam Sandler (19:17)

Yes, I would love to hear them, please.

JoAnn Crohn (19:19)

We’re going to get into right after this. From being a teacher, Mariam, I learned how to introduce things to kids in a way that kids would actually be kind of in a managed control environment without. Yeah, respectful without me being in charge all the time. I think that is a training that is given to teachers. It’s actually a class I have today called classroom management, and it’s not anything that’s taught to parents. Yes.

I want to go into a little bit with you when you’re like introducing say something very, very messy, like an art table with Sharpies. Yes. What’s the process that you go through when you’re first putting this out for your kids? Tell us, teaching them these boundaries.

Brie Tucker (20:04)

How did you keep them from drying on the wall?

JoAnn Crohn (20:06)

Yes!

Myriam Sandler (20:08)

So the difference between teachers and parents is that parents have mom guilt.

JoAnn Crohn (20:14)

Yes, they do. I often say it was so much easier with a classroom of 35 students than at home with my own child.

Myriam Sandler (20:21)

Correct, because you feel that guilt of I’m doing something for myself that I’m not doing with my child or I’m not giving them enough. It’s never enough when that mentality I feel like has shifted from our parents generation to ours. From one generation to the other, our parents were content and for us, it’s this new found mom guilt, parenting guilt.

JoAnn Crohn (20:46)

It’s this whole evolution that’s gone through.

Myriam Sandler (20:48)

100%.

So when I introduce something, I don’t actually introduce it. It’s always been there from the get-go. So if I’m setting up an art area and you’ve never done this before, your child is eight years old. Not eight, they’re not gonna draw on the wall. If you have a five, four, five year old.

JoAnn Crohn (21:07)

Right away

Myriam Sandler (21:10)

It’s

spots. So if this is your first time setting up an art table, you’re not going to start with the Sharpies, okay? You’re going to start with the most washable markers on the market. And you’re not going to teach them the difference between a washable marker and a Sharpie. You’re just going to show them what that tool is meant to do. So if your child explores the first few times,

and draws on the wall, you should take a little Windex and wipe down. Not a big deal. And that’s when you start to create your boundaries. I understand you’re very creative. You wanted to explore, but the markers are meant to write on paper. So they’re going to go away for a little bit. And then we’ll introduce them again when you feel you are ready to use them on paper. So it’s incorporating the boundaries and incorporating the consequences. The biggest thing with

parents and mom guilt is following through. That is the problem. That we’ll be like, if you draw on the wall one more time, I’m going to take them away. then- them all out. Throw them all out. Exactly. Throw them all. But you don’t take them away and you don’t throw them all out.

Brie Tucker (22:25)

And then you feel bad. And then they think you throw them away and then you bring it back later and they’re like, wait a minute.

JoAnn Crohn (22:31)

One extra trick that I want to add into this little arsenal that I used as a teacher, because a lot of times I feel like, you know, the way that we were taught to deal with these things as kids, like our parents would make those things like, you are not responsible enough for this. It is going away and we are never seeing them whatsoever. Like that’s how we are raised. That’s why we do it to our kids. Something that I do like with my nephew, the redirection is real.

Yeah. And for those people who are listening, redirection is just something where they’re doing something and you don’t exactly you don’t like say them it’s not appropriate or you don’t say it’s bad, but you just redirect them to another thing. So if they’re, for instance, writing on the walls, one of the tricks I would use is like, my gosh, like we cannot write on the walls here, help me clean this up. Yeah. And they will clean it up. Yeah. I’m like, you know what we can do, though, we could put paper like

butcher paper on the wall. And that’s the way we can write on the wall. Do you want to write on the wall like that? they’d be like, yeah. And then they’re all writing on the butcher paper on the wall. They get to have their big designs and everything like that. love that. like finding that, that redirection to something like you said, Myriam, it’s an interest they have. They want a bigger canvas. That’s right. And create that canvas. Yeah.

Myriam Sandler (23:45)

It’s feeding into what they’re actually interested in. And as parents, that is really hard to do when we’re taking care of our homes and that we’re trying to do so many things, trying to keep an organized home. And all of a sudden your child has written all over their dresser. Like that is a moment of stress.

That isn’t a moment of like, I know you’re doing so good. No!

JoAnn Crohn (24:12)

No, no!

Brie Tucker (24:13)

That’s enough where you go out to your car, burn on the radio, calm down.

Myriam Sandler (24:15)

That’s right.

JoAnn Crohn (24:16)

Right! Yo! That’s-

Myriam Sandler (24:18)

That’s right. You are right.

JoAnn Crohn (24:20)

There are so many different levels of that. That’s something that I need to do a better job of realizing like as a parent. The amount of shit shows I saw as a teacher were

Myriam Sandler (24:32)

man, ⁓ I can’t imagine.

JoAnn Crohn (24:34)

I mean, there’s just horrible, horrible messes and things that happen. So I think when I saw them in parenting, I’m like, we’re okay. He’s not throwing a desk across the room or is like threatened to knife someone.

Myriam Sandler (24:50)

Great!

JoAnn Crohn (24:53)

It is all perspective and that stress wherever you feel it, it is real. It is real to you and it needs to be validated. So I don’t mean to invalidate anyone’s stress whatsoever in that moment.

Myriam Sandler (25:06)

And that’s the thing, like, even if her child is not riding on the wall, they’re throwing a tantrum. They’re screaming in the middle of the airport. It’s hard. It’s hard to manage. And I think once you have the tools in place to do so, everything is a little bit easier. Setting yourself up for success. It’s having that snack pack ready to go in the moment where they’re having that big tantrum. It’s like, do you want a snack?

So let’s go in the corner sit down and try to calm down if not, then you just carry them like you’re a linebacker, right? And then you go in the corner and you have a snack. Imagine showing up to the airport and being like, it’s gonna be a great day. No snacks, no activities and no tablet, no nothing like that’s guaranteed failure like guarantee.

Brie Tucker (26:01)

It’s gonna be a-

Myriam Sandler (26:03)

It’s going to be 30 minutes and then all of a sudden you’re delayed three hours. Yeah. And you’re on the airplane for two more hours because the air, the air doesn’t work. And there’s so many things that can happen. ⁓ You can’t can’t control. Agree. In the home, the same thing happens. I actually posted a video recently that was like,

JoAnn Crohn (26:14)

and

Myriam Sandler (26:22)

You know that trend that was like she doesn’t know it yet, but blah, blah, blah. I basically took that audio and it was my toddler like happily going towards. I created this little nook in her family room where you can’t really see the toys because it’s a beautiful space for adults, but the toys are there if she wants to go get them. They’re in the little corners that she knows that are there. She doesn’t have to like open a chest or like do backflips to get to them. So it’s her running past the TV.

to get to her toys. And it was like, guys, there’s a way. We just have to give kids the opportunity to do so. One of my favorite things about families is that they’re like, finally bought my dream home and I have a playroom and I can’t believe it. We’re going to have all of the toys in the playroom.

Brie Tucker (27:10)

Man.

JoAnn Crohn (27:11)

It’s a pipe dream.

Brie Tucker (27:13)

Yeah, I think we’ve all been there once or twice.

Myriam Sandler (27:16)

from there literally that day one they go to the playroom where the toys live and they bring them to the living room they correct but that concept is not so easy to understand that concept of why are they taking the toys from their space to other spaces is very hard so i love creating play hotspots so play hotspots are where you are going to be

Brie Tucker (27:23)

because that’s you are.

Myriam Sandler (27:45)

So if you, love to sleep in. I literally have a little shelf in my bedroom that has a few toys so that if my kid wants to be with me while I’m still sleeping, fabuloso, come, you are welcome while I still sleep. And the same thing happens in the living room and the same thing happens in the family room and in the family rooms next to the kitchen, which I spend a lot of time in, as you know. So that’s what I recommend to parents is great.

Finally, you have a playroom, but there’s only one chapter in Playful by Design where it has playrooms. The rest are bedrooms, nooks, minis, outdoor spaces, all of the other possible spaces in home because you’re gonna need it. You’re gonna need it. You should, you should create it. You should create these. Charles, which is very short. We only have a little bit of slice of time where our kids will actually wanna be with us. Let’s take advantage. Let’s take advantage of that. Let them play.

Brie Tucker (28:24)

You’re going to need it.

JoAnn Crohn (28:43)

It’s so interesting because that is a different take on it. Just have toys in little places all around the house. I remember like when my kids were little, we had those benches in our living room that you open it up and that’s where all the toys lived. But like even just having like those benches from Target were like 25, 30 bucks, them in your bedroom, put them in everywhere and then always have a spot to play. You could still sleep. That’s right.

Myriam Sandler (29:06)

100 where.

love the cube storage systems. It’s the same concept of like open shelving, but with a little bit more organization, right? The problem is that a lot of parents are like, amazing, I’m going to buy that. And then I’m going to buy the deep bins that go inside the cubes. And I’m going to make it look really aesthetically beautiful. Except I guarantee your child is going to pull that out, dump it out and walk away. Right? Because it has

way too many options because we are trying now to have all of their toys in this little beautiful looking space. So I say, you go I say no bins or very shallow trays in these cubbies. Yeah.

Brie Tucker (29:47)

Yeah. I so we had the cubbies in my daughter’s room. My son had the one from like Ikea back in the day that had like the rainbow colors and the bins were open. And I remember for both of them, naively, and I should know better. I should know better. Guys, come on, my background was in early childhood. That’s I did before I my kids.

Myriam Sandler (30:07)

Those are great.

It’s different, it’s different.

Brie Tucker (30:22)

I had them all curated, right? Okay, this is the box of your farm animals. This is the box of your my little ponies. Did it stay that way? No. 30 seconds. And then it drive me nuts that it looked messy, but they were happy. And that was the part was I had to really struggle with letting go of me wanting that Pinterest perfect look, because it was back before Instagram. So it was Pinterest perfect. And realizing that

Myriam Sandler (30:32)

⁓ of course.

Brie Tucker (30:52)

They weren’t going to be that way. They weren’t happy that way. I wasn’t happy yelling at them if they were keeping it that way. So yeah.

JoAnn Crohn (31:00)

It was in human nature. That’s

Myriam Sandler (31:01)

⁓ I think one of the most important things about toys and cleanup is to give each toy a home. So if I am the gatekeeper of everything in the house, like I am the gatekeeper of where the scissors live, I’m the gatekeeper of where the plates are, I’m the gatekeeper of the toys, every time a child does want to play, you remove that first

step of freedom. They have to come to me in order to be able to play. So if you want your child to leave you alone for a few minutes, cut yourself out of the equation.

JoAnn Crohn (31:36)

Good guess.

Brie Tucker (31:38)

I was going to say, what’s your number one tip? And that sounds like that is, right?

Myriam Sandler (31:41)

Cut yourself out of the equation. what do you mean, cut yourself out? No, cut yourself out of the equation. Go with your child and set up the space together so that you’re not the only one that knows where the colored pencils are or where the toy cars go or where the magnetic tiles go back. So that if they do bring the magnetic tiles to the living room and they create a beautiful structure, they can take down the structure and put it back into its place.

JoAnn Crohn (32:10)

That’s genius. Parents, you might be a bottleneck. You might be a bottleneck. Yes, 100%. And you need to go get Myriam’s book so you can examples of these spaces that kids can go and take care of it themselves. So beautiful. Myriam, we know your book comes out today, but we’d like to ask everybody this question. What is something excited that you’re excited about that’s coming up for you?

Myriam Sandler (32:18)

Beautiful, beautiful.

man, that’s a hard question on my book release day. ⁓ I’m very excited actually about the book tour because I have an online community. I don’t get a lot of opportunities to meet the people that I’ve been talking to for years. So this is my opportunity to see people in real life, give them the hugs, thank them for supporting me. And yeah, I’m very, very excited about

JoAnn Crohn (33:03)

That is really exciting. There’s nothing like seeing your people in person. It’s just like a different dynamic. Well, that is awesome, Myriam. Thank you so much for coming on. I have learned some stuff. I’m going to pass it along to my sister who has the kids in the play stage right now. I love it. We’ll talk to you later.

Myriam Sandler (33:09)

I agree with you.

Thank you.

JoAnn Crohn (33:25)

So something that she mentioned a lot in this interview is access, access to kids. Cause when she mentioned at the end about parents being the gatekeeper, I’m like, totally right. I did that. I was the gatekeeper. Like, especially the messy toys. Jenga didn’t live downstairs with the rest of the games. Jenga was upstairs on a top shelf of a closet so that my kids couldn’t create messes with it.

Brie Tucker (33:50)

Well, I mean, I think we all do that. I was working in early intervention. I started that as soon as I graduated college. and I had, that was in 02 and I had my first kid in 07. So that’s five years of working with families and kids. And I knew all the right things. And I still tried to gatekeep stuff and all that. And I still, even though I had scissors available for my kids to play with for

for Play-Doh and stuff when my daughter, still remember, clear as day the day she found the sharp scissors and the drawer in the kitchen while I was sleeping. And then when I got up, I’m like, your hair looks a little funny. She took a chunk out of her, she took a chunk out of the dog. Poor dog had like a big, like we’re talking like a four inch chunk of his tail, just gone. That dog was a patient dog. He was patient.

JoAnn Crohn (34:47)

Bye!

Brie Tucker (34:48)

My point being was it never once occurred to me to tell her that those scissors were not her scissors or to even tell her that those scissors were for different things. Like it wasn’t until it happened that I was like, ⁓ boundary needed here. And guess what I’m just trying to say is it happens to the best of us people.

JoAnn Crohn (35:08)

Can’t prevent this from happening. Yeah. So if like something happens like this to you, you can’t prevent it. You had no idea it was an issue to begin with. And when it appears as an issue, that’s where you’re like, you’re very interested in this. Let’s dig into this a little bit more versus I am a horrible, awful mom who should have hit no scissors better.

Brie Tucker (35:29)

you are a my kid is completely off the rails and destructive and all it like most of the time like she said it’s about a curiosity like I just I remember when my kids started playing with the toilet that’s when we bought them a water table got like a water table at like a secondhand store for like 10 bucks put it outside and they never touched the toilet again

JoAnn Crohn (35:54)

No, it was just the interest in the water. like, I’m sure like when my nephew flushed hot wheels down the toilet, it was really cool to see those hot wheels disappear.

Brie Tucker (36:02)

Yeah,

and the water goes down a hole. To me that sounds pretty interesting.

JoAnn Crohn (36:09)

Cool, actually, I’m imagining that now and I’m like, I’m in a happy place.

Brie Tucker (36:15)

and I still love going to the splash pads and if there aren’t kids there, I’ll play with the little toys and hit the buttons and make the water go every which way. Cause it’s fun.

JoAnn Crohn (36:25)

Fun with a bucket fills on the splash pads. You get to hit the button and go, yeah, it’s all fun. It’s all fun. We lose that sense of fun sometimes when we try to maintain that Pinterest perfect aesthetic, but it’s also like not our fault that we’re trying to maintain this Pinterest perfect aesthetic. Some research I was doing for a YouTube video that’s up in the no go mom YouTube channel was like the evolution of motherhood and how in the 1980s there was a huge shift.

in how much time and how much supervision that parents gave their children because of the John Walsh kidnapping thing. my yes. the department store so that every parent became afraid of their child getting abducted. And that’s when we saw parents keeping their kids indoors, the blaming of moms in particular for not watching their kids close enough. through that and…

Brie Tucker (37:02)

The Milk Carton.

JoAnn Crohn (37:19)

Like early 2000s Pinterest came about with these pleasing aesthetics. So not only could we not let our kids play outdoors, but we also had to have these perfect pleasing play areas and everything like that, which really added onto the pressure that moms face raising their kids. Yeah. And this whole thing of intensive mothering. And now in the 2020s, we’re finally starting to talk about it and all the pressures and expectations that are put on moms.

Brie Tucker (37:46)

how it’s made all of us an anxious mess.

JoAnn Crohn (37:49)

Yes, so it’s good we’re talking about these things and there’s ways around it.

Brie Tucker (37:56)

Yes, and I, again, like you said, I absolutely love Myriam’s book. It is so cute. It has so many awesome ideas. If you’re just wondering, like, you know, some of these concepts, especially about the play hotspots, get her book. Check it out. is a worthwhile investment, man.

JoAnn Crohn (38:16)

So many great ideas. And until next time, remember the best mom is a happy mom. Take care of you. We’ll talk to you later.

Brie Tucker (38:22)

Thanks for stopping by.