The Couch Hang: Mean Girls, Mini Vans and Mahjong

0:00Welcome back to The Couch Hang, brought to you by two mom friends, me, Layla, and my friend Megan, where no one has to clean their house before hanging out and we just pop a squat on each other's couch. talking about motherhood as we're living in it. So if you're in the thick of it and you just want a mom friend who gets it, this is for you. Stay tuned every other week on top of the normal Learning to Mom podcast episodes. Thanks for hanging on the couch with us. Welcome back to the couch hang, everyone. I always feel like going, you know that from She's the Man. Welcome, welcome, welcome, welcome, welcome, welcome.

0:38I feel like I've seen that movie one time when I was like 10 and I don't remember anything from it. I feel like everyone has those certain movies that they've watched, like that are pivotal to their childhood. And you're just like, well, this must have been everyone. And then you're like, you feel really bad. And you're like, well, that wasn't mine. Mine was something else. Like, I feel that way. Or like 10 Things I Hate About You or How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days. Like, I don't have deep or 27 Dresses. Like, there's those movies that some of my friends are like, this is. and I'm like I maybe saw it once and I am not good at remembering any details of movies unless I've seen it 50 times the man was up there with mean girls like I thought just everyone yeah well I feel like mean girls play it on ABC family or something like I feel like it was on one of the cables things that I would run through and that's why I would see mean girls more so I feel like there's some of those movies where I'm like it was just on while I was slipping through my channels so but i feel like she's the man i just didn't see it that much like obviously amanda maybe it's just a part of my childhood like soccer yeah soccer that makes sense that definitely makes sense yeah yeah yeah anyways um leila i have i have very important news that i need to share with you and this is it's really nothing to like freak out about but it kind of is okay my husband lost his wedding ring over two years ago i thought you were gonna say lost his job oh my oh my gosh i would not know i probably wouldn't have done this on the podcast lela i just went on an emotional roller coaster i mean granted it was a fast one no it wouldn't be like lela let's press record and then i'm gonna tell you about the most tragic thing that's ever happened my husband losing his job okay my husband lost his wedding ring two years ago and we have looked everywhere for this thing we we officially gave up and if you recall i think i remember it was Was it your anniversary, his birthday?

2:30His birthday. I was considering buying him a new white gold wedding ring. And we got married five years ago. And the wedding ring price tripled. Literally insane. Tell them the numbers. Fully tripled. Tell them the numbers, Megan. He bought the ring for around$500 back six years ago or whatever. It went from$500 to$1 ,450 for the exact same ring. To get the exact same ring. Exactly. And I was like, okay. I walked out of that place real fast. and I'm like, sorry, Jake, it's never going to happen. Okay. Jake had lost something else in the couch and he knew it was in the couch. And so he just like took apart the couch and he's like, Megan.

3:08And I was like, no, you did not. Like I knew by the way he said it and he walked over and he's like, I found my wedding ring. And I was like, he's like, I might cry. I'm like, I might cry. It just felt like we were never going to see this thing again. And we, he found it. but like so is it not was it not size correctly or does he like fidget with it and it like he played no okay because matthew's the same freaking way well warn him because we fully lost that ring because he always takes it off always plays with it always throwing it tossing it so maybe those days are gone though i better be it we cannot lose this thing again we cannot afford to buy another one so it's this or the nothing he's gonna have to just figure out how to keep a ring on his finger my gosh but anyway that was to get those like silicone ones matthew actually like he like basically no he has his night he has that well i want him to wear his nice i don't know i'm like i want you i like he likes the nice one and he bought a silicone one just to look married when he's out of the house because you know we don't need anyone stealing my man but i i i know and maybe he just needs to put it away he maybe he'll just put it away but i'm like i wear my ring no matter what like I wear it to the gym I just it's never where my wedding ring all day no I'm like I wear I put it away at night and I used to oh this is one thing you don't sleep with it this thing never comes off me no and I mean maybe if I have like a huge obnoxious rock that's like I love mine I'm not saying that mine is small by any way yeah yeah like so I can go to the gym but that's also kind of like what I wanted.

4:50Like I didn't want a ring that I couldn't do life in. No, totally. I love the fact that I never take this thing up, but I do take it up in it. No. And I don't know why I just got into the routine taking off at night. I think when I got pregnant or when I've gotten very big in pregnancy, I had to take it off for a while because boy, did I blow up, but I used to take it off and put it next to my sink in the bathroom. and then I was like if this thing falls down the drain we're done and so once I got that realization I now take it off in my closet and it's in my closet so there's no chance of it like going down a drain but I was like what if I would have done that there's an old oh my gosh this is really gonna show the kind of shows I grew up with um it is not I love Lucy Carol Burnett there's an old carol brunette show and that the bit is that her ring or maybe no now it's coming back to me it's like her friend and she tries on her friends like rock and then it flies off and goes down the drain and because of that scene that i watched when i was you know seven years old yeah i live my life nowhere near the drain no and that's so fair that is so fair and i've changed my ways ever since like i like looked at this it just hit me all in one day where i'm like i am the kind of girl who'd be like whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa and then it falls into the sink like i am clumsy like that for sure so like i i have to it would happen in slow motion it oh i can't even imagine you guys anyways all the rings are safe in my home at this time and we are grateful so that's my big update well i have a big update i've been actually waiting for this one yeah text from my husband on oh my gosh okay okay if i got you a minivan what brand would you want let's go let's go let's go let's go let's go let's go let's go so even last weekend you guys have no idea let's go so yeah we've been looking for minivans baby because i wanted to tell you what gotcha congratulations thank you so much i just want to thank this is jesus they get it all the moms i want to thank everyone who's gotten me to this point no it takes a minute it takes a minute to get to that point of like i've been at this point okay i have i thought you were both the sub type okay okay okay it's just him okay explain the history Layla the history is that my husband just like thinks minivans are ugly and he's yeah he is a car guy I will say yeah like yeah yeah I don't care like it just give it give make sure it has four wheels and I will drive it like yes I drive I drove an astro van bus in high school like an eight passenger bus and I went to this like ritzy I mean not super ritzy compared to other parts of the country and stuff but i went to a private private school school kids were driving like audis i'm not kidding there was a few audis in our parking lot like nice and then other just like the average car was nice and here i pull up in my homeschooling eight passenger astro van so i don't care about cars yeah my husband god rest his soul no um he just loves cars so he was like we're not driving a minivan it's so ugly blah blah blah blah blah and the current car situation that we have is um it has a third it's a highlander it's not a grand it's a toyota highlander and i do love it but we outgrew it so dang fast yeah because we didn't foresee our family growing as quickly as we did when we only when we got pregnant early and everything yes we were just like we'll have it first we'll probably take a while like get settled even in our own marriage and it wasn't going to be like oh here's a kid every two years correct yeah yeah that makes sense that makes sense so anyway so our like oldest has to sit in the third row right now and the third row is just so cramped and like she fits because she's a preschooler but like no adults can ever sit back there in order to get her in the baby has to come out like she goes in first I get her buckled in and then baby goes in and in order to get her out baby has to come out and then I have to move the car up get her unbuckled her come out it's like a whole jigsaw puzzle which is like if you're in a parking lot baby goes out onto the ground like that probably just doesn't feel good I I feel yes yeah there's a lot of things um and just not very convenient and all the things and so you know and I've just been like I've been very obviously cars are expensive so i'm like not pushing for a car i'm like this is inconvenient but it works it isn't you've had a very good attitude about it for sure like i was really not the one pushing for i don't want a new huge car payment like you know like yeah yeah yeah so i'll just suffer i'll suffer with inconvenience inconvenience is not the end of it so So I don't know what, oh, I think because my car is like getting to the point where it's, if we want a good return, if we were to sell it, then we need to sell it like relatively soon before it hits whatever mileage.

10:30Whatever. Sure. Yeah. Of course, Matthew knows all of this and it's just in one ear and out the other. to me like whatever you say honey yeah um so then he started looking at it and i think he was really surprised with the cost of like an expedition and everything i'm also just like well what did you think but he also was surprised with the cost of minivans because i think just seeing the cost he in like actually doing research into them he realized that they're they are nice he just always saw that they were like trash vehicles yes yeah and then i was like i've been telling you that they are nice like yes yeah they're still expensive to get a movie van yes like yeah we're and i think that's maybe what his hold up was was it was just like these cars aren't i don't know they don't have whatever they're not nice whatever and then he actually started doing research and was like oh this is a lot better than i thought so that's right anyway oh my gosh okay well what brand did you say well i don't know again it's just like whatever i either the three you hear about all the time is the sienna the odyssey and the kia carnival yeah so the kia carnival is obviously well you know the listeners don't know the kia carnival has stolen my heart for many years now and i just want a kia carnival more than anything more than life itself almost at this point but i'm also being very patient and also kias are not as good of cars as hondas and toyotas like Hondas and Toyotas are statistically better reliable vehicles.

12:02Obviously, Kias do not have that kind of reputation. The Kia Carnival just looks, it is the prettiest minivan, in my opinion. I think it looks most like an SUV. And I think that's why I like the way that it looks. I'm like, okay, it just seems like a cool, every time I see one, I'm like, oh, that's a good looking minivan every single time but also they've only been around for like four years or something like it's a it's a new minivan so there it's not like it's been around long enough to know the reputation at length like okay well how do they perform after 10 years we don't really know what do you have i thought you had a christ we have no we yeah we have a dodge we have a dodge caravan um who was with who him he he the dodge caravan has given us so many issues genuinely but it's much cheaper than a honda or a toyota so that's why we bought it but we've had many repairs and i and when we eventually get a new minivan we will get either we'll get a newer kia carnival or we'll get a used honda or toyota that will be the direction we go in the future once the dodge dies so anyway congratulations i'm very excited for you nothing nothing better than like hitting my car keys and those doors just opening and i go get my car kids was like my plant my plant so we take a family trip and it's with Matthew's extended family and it's like right what is it an eight hour trip or something and Matthew wanted to rent a vehicle for that because it's going to be very hard with the third row we are so loaded on trunk space and essentially the family goes to what we refer to as the farm which is this like it's not a farm it is basically forest a plot of land in the middle of Missouri um that his like grandfathers bought way back when um sure it was very sweet I was like away because there were city folk and they wanted their boys to grow up on the land and so it was like yeah yeah so then we always go to the farm and there's a lot of the farm requires a lot of materials because the farm has nothing like there's no shelter there's nothing and then it also is always freezing so just the amount of stuff you have to bring just to like be there for a week clothes wise with kids anywho we're like we have to rent a vehicle so my plan was honey let's rent that suv let's do it you'll see how great it is even more brilliant i will make him get the kids in and out of the car and the car seats with the suv and that was gonna be my game plan for him realizing that was gonna be that yeah they're like of course suvs are awesome they're so sick but it's like they're so cool for like yeah when And you have a middle school who's in soccer.

15:03Middle schoolers who's in soccer. And you're not buckling them yourself. Unbuckling, buckling. You can trust them in a parking lot. There's just so many things. There's so many. Yes. That's funny because I have a friend whose husband is very anti-minivan. And I was like, you guys should rent a minivan for a trip. And then he'll see how great the minivan is when you guys go on a trip. But, you know, you're like, I'd rather torture him. well it would have been well i think it would just been really eye-opening to be like yes oh this is what you're gonna have to do multiple times a day and this is only with three like what about when we have four yeah you know we have four car seats no i this is i don't know this is the best news ever when do kids go out of the car seats and go into boosters i don't know you're the one that's supposed to know that lela i know i don't know anything because i haven't covered that yet no you haven't gotten to that age yet i will say that our next door neighbor who he just turned six and he's in a booster okay but he has been in a booster okay also some parents do whatever the beep they want and don't follow safety regulations not saying your neighbor does that i'm not i don't even know your neighbor i do but i'm just saying he's like he's or maybe he just turned five i don't know yeah where i'm like i could see some people taking them like i feel like i got out of a car seat way too young probably it was probably not the standard but it's just what happened and i'm like i should probably do some research and actually figure out safety wise what's actually recommended yeah well i'll just go to our go-to She was on it safe in the seat.

16:48She's perfect. Oh, yeah. Nice. Okay. What else do we need to talk about? Yeah, I said dance. Okay. How's Dancing with the Stars? What are you thinking? I just giggle because I'm so delighted when I watch Dancing with the Stars. I just have such a fun time. It's, I don't know, even if we just had week two and they all got so much better, I thought. even like Guillermo, for example, I feel like he did a great job. And I was honestly mad that they all gave him fours. I was like, he deserved at least one five. And I'm mad that no one gave him one five because he actually like, I feel like he was hitting it.

17:30I feel like he was doing it. He gave us a performance. So I feel like their scoring this week was a little bit annoying because you can tell the producers are like, you are not allowed to go higher than a seven this week because some people's performances were definitely better than sevens and they all gave them like three people got 21s which is like the top score that they were giving no one got an eight when i was like some of these people are dancing like full-on professionals because they are and you clearly are not allowed to give them more than a seven because that was off if they would have done this week 10 you would have given them a 10 and that feels a little annoying to me at this time.

18:10It doesn't feel honest. That's so fair. I was giggling at Whitney during the, not Whitney Levitt, Whitney, like Guillermo's partner who's pregnant. Are you eliminated? And it shows the three couples and you could tell she's like, please be us. Please be us. Get me out of here. It's harder than I thought it'd be. like this poor girl they give her guillermo they're like honey we know you're pregnant it's gonna be a short season yeah and then she's he's delightful though he's so funny i was like he's gonna get so many votes everywhere like it's gonna be yeah another andy situation but i do agree have yeah i voted yeah yeah yeah i voted for harry and um i voted for mara oh i am team tank i can't help myself she's my favorite her accent is everything to me i did feel like giada should have left though which i felt sad about but her dance was bad it was just not why were they still on the theme of the cook she was the only one did you see that in the background her set design was like an Italian restaurant yeah and i was like we gotta move on no it was just never gonna yeah it was time for her to go I'm glad that she tried but it was time for her to go well I'm nervous for next week because I'm afraid Tatiana might be on the chopping block and I think she is so cute she did such a great job her dance was so much better this week it was amazing you can tell she settled in her no I was very very proud of her I felt so proud of her after her dance I was like okay and Sierra Miller was so much better this week she definitely like calmed down and that was like really good to see connor wood at the end of his look like he was gonna start making out with his partner that was did you oh my gosh did you see that which is like i have the biggest crush on riley like i'm obsessed so cute yes yes and to the point where like if i was riley's boyfriend yeah i would be kind of shaken in my boots of how that dance ended no like you have the most stunning girlfriend in the world in my opinion yeah and i'm just like oh no he in case no one saw it their faces were like inches away and connor her partner they are the same age there's a lot of things well maybe there's a lot of things but like riley's the youngest pro and he's probably the youngest contestant i'd have to imagine and she is the most gorgeous woman in the world yeah and it's clear that he's falling in love with her and it's just a bummer their mouths were like an inch away from each other and the way he was looking at her he's in love i was like i was like did you practice this or are you just in the moment right now and this is i shouldn't be here for this i honestly i turned away because i was like oh this is so i can't believe it's gone this far like that's how it felt what's gonna happen next week I just it's so fun um did I tell you that I had my neighbors over which was so yes how was that it was so cute so week one I had a dancing with the stars watch party premiere watch party which was really fun and those were my girlfriends and how I came up with the invite list which is lol is I went through the pros instagram and I went there and I was like who of my friends is following the pros to see who would be interested and invested in a watch a premiere watch party and it was very casual of course you see all those reels it's like pov you have your girlfriends over for dancing in the stars and it's cute and they're drinking out of all these like disco balls I had sweet lorenz pre-cut or like pre-made cookies that was the vibe you're all in sweatpants it was it was the same exact vibe for with my neighbors which was really fun yeah yeah and that's so fun we got basically the show was in the background and we all just gapped away yeah no that's so fun though what I'm honestly so good to do with your neighbors I know your neighborhood is definitely very like close-knit like we're trying I don't feel that close we have a lot of young families that we're trying to be yeah and that's really good and my husband is always like we really should invite our neighbors sober and we just never do it i'm like we've lived here for four years like we really need to well that's friendly with them but we just don't do you if they're young are there young families though they're yeah my next door neighbor is a young family and across the streets young like our kids are the same age oh you need to get on that you need to get i know it almost feels a little too odd like it feels like we've waited so long but our kids are now just getting to like the playing age like there's no older kids it's all like the oldest is four like my oldest and so it's like we can't just like let them go or I'm like if there's an eight-year-old I might be like yeah you can go play with my kids like but they've all been so little this whole time that it would have been like if our kids are playing together that means the parents are also having to hang out and I'm just trying to throw my kids in the backyard so I can eat make dinner you know but I feel like we're almost getting to the point where they could really be like oh come over he can come play in the backyard with my kid you know anyways we'll get there but i'm really glad you do that with your neighbors it's very inspiring and so fun i just walked into it which like they were already trying and then we moved and i just know that's perfect all the benefits and we are going out to dinner on saturday which is fun and when i say we it's the wives yeah and then the men are like well when are when do we do something like it's unfair you guys are going out to dinner and oh my gosh okay so pro tip this is so savage of us when there's like six or seven of us you know and it's just like oh the group is going to dinner at this time the yeah the the husbands don't get a say right like whereas if you and i went out to dinner our husbands would be like can you just do it after bedtime but it's like right it's like okay there's six no she already planned this is what time dinner is this is when the reservation is so we purposely do it like right before bedtime so we don't have to do yeah sorry good luck yes a great way to make sure your husband i will be taking the baby yeah yeah yeah that makes sense yeah that's so fun though and we're going to matador gotta love it have you been there no you'll have to let me know i've never been i haven't even like heard of it okay you'll have to tell me i'm so excited i love to like find a new restaurant so you'll have yeah i was actually surprised that you haven't been because i know you're a bit of a foodie kind of sort of yeah you're more of a foodie than i am a little bit i'm more than you are for sure but i'm sure there are people out there that really you know yeah do their thing out there these days but i do like to go in your own kitchen i have like you are a chef i didn't make a really good salmon bowl the other day for dinner delicious and as i'm pregnant salmon doesn't sound great but i was like i know i need to like eat some salmon because it's good for me so i like cut it up into pieces first and then marinated it for a while and i was like i feel like this what did you marinate most of the i just did soy sauce honey and garlic and just like let it sit for a while and then i cooked it in the oven at like a high temperature so it got really crispy on all the outsides and it was small pieces so everything felt like crispy and flavorful and it was very good so good oh it was so good and my daughter tried it and she liked it because i only got the frozen the frozen salmon from costco sure i got fresh salmon from trader joe's okay so it was just like one big fresh piece and i and i got the skin off i paid extra for it to not have the skin on it so i was able to really easy cut it up into cubes okay so then okay okay this is a dumb question no don't be can't you just remove the skin yourself and save the money totally but i just really didn't want to i'm also like this as a being pregnant i'm like that could be what sets me off to not wanting to eat this i totally you know what i mean i was just making sure that i understood because i am not totally good no no you can absolutely do that i was just being prissy about it for sure okay unapologetically the mom club is for those of you who are doing this without a mom friend nearby or who have one but can never actually sit down with her because your guys's kids are always napping at different times if this is your vibe you are going to love the mom club because you longer couch hang episodes and we get to be real mom friends inside so come join me at learning to mom podcast.com slash join so yes yeah anyways okay layla i have to ask you you put mahjong in our um yeah i did to discuss can you please i feel like i've seen things about mahjong everywhere recently.

27:27Okay, thank you. And I'm like, what's going on? Okay, quite literally. No, that is quite literally what I wanted to talk to you about. I wanted to ask you because I felt like I just woke up one day and everyone knew how to play Mahjong and I was over here being, I'm sorry, what are you, what word are you saying? And everyone was like, you don't play Mahjong? I don't even know what you're talking about. So now I know it's a Chinese game, correct? Correct. And I have heard. Yes. And I only know of Mahjong because for my English class in ninth grade, we had to read the joy luck club. And it's all about these four women who play Mahjong every week.

28:10And it goes through their life stories or something. It was, this was 15 years ago. I don't really remember, but I just know that they played Mahjong. And so we learned what Mahjong was in class, but we never like played it because it's a very complicated yes game yes and then that's all i ever heard and then all of a sudden it's cute girls in new york city playing mahjong or oh i can't do that right now i'm playing mahjong and i'm like when did this happen and how in my perspective there was no on ramp either it was just all of a sudden everyone knew how to play that's how i feel i i hope one of our listeners here knows the sitch and can like And how do you go about learning how to play?

28:55Because I'm clearly not in the club. No, I feel like I'd have to join a club. And in my brain, it's the game that is played in the movie Crazy Rich Asians. But that is not verified. Do you know if that's true? I don't know if that's true. The end of that movie when she goes, I guess the second time. And she like plays. I barely know what the scene is. I've only seen the movie once. It probably, it might be though. LOL. I don't know. that's my reference point but it might just not even be that game yeah i feel like i've seen something recently like um like a flyer somewhere in our town somewhere like at a coffee shop or something that i said something about mahjong and i was like huh and then i saw the reels and i was like huh what's going on here could be fun sounds sophisticated i'm like i feel you got to be a sophisticated gal to be playing mahjong yeah i think the vibe i get if other people can do it we can do it what if we start a matchup club we have and this might just be the thing husbands get to golf for eight hours on saturday and we get to play my year i feel like it takes a while i do have a friend that is from china and i should reach out to her and just be like do you know what's going on here i might sound so ignorant on this podcast right now and i don't mean i will say that was not your best look no i have a friend from china no i do i have not talked to her in a long time her her grandmother taught me how to use chopsticks and I'll never forget it and I'm so grateful for that moment in my life that she taught me how to use chopsticks properly to this day I can't use chopsticks yeah it's a flex for me it's not good if yeah it just you just don't even well you're like I don't have that it's fine yeah yeah but anyways um if anyone know if anyone knows Layla and I are very open and excited to learn what's going on this is not a this is not anything negative I genuinely would love to know what's going on and I'd love to be a part of the movement so if you have info send it our way please please that's how I feel about it I'm not kidding I'm just I'm I guess I mean sure I'd love to be I guess a part of the movement sure i guess i'm just truly confused on how it's how it happened how i woke up one day and everyone knew who to play but me it kind of to me it feels like a coastal thing that happened without us knowing because we're not on the coast i don't know because it's like fashion trends are in north carolina so that one adds up the other one's in dallas and they both play really yes and i was like i don't know what's happening that's insane that's insane okay i was like maybe it's just like fashion where like the fashion trends start in la and new york and then they eventually make their way to the midwest you know little good old farm town over here yeah it eventually gets to us eventually um anyways okay that that was uh that was i really wish you knew more and i wish and i wish you knew more as well i know i saw it i was like oh good she's gonna tell me all about it she was hoping i knew about it no um how fun is that that i found that book though couple what was that last week meg i was like do you have any spiritual read recommendations for me megan and she sent this book and i was like that looks so familiar and then today i found it as being one of the books that are like that it's styling my open show like displayed yes i was like that's why it looks so familiar because i see it all the time yes it's so good it has been it is like it is called jesus i trust you and it goes through the litany of trust in 30 days so it's like a quote-unquote 30-day retreat which i feel like i feel like it's an interesting way to put it because I'm like, it really just feels like for 30 days, I'm going to be reading this, but I'm still living my life.

32:57Like I'm not on retreat, but it has been very, very insightful, very helpful. And I just really felt like for a long time, the word trust was just coming up a lot. And I was like, I feel like I need to dissect what this means. Cause I'm like, what does it really mean to trust God? And I feel like I've just been really learning what it means for real and like how to do it and it's been awesome it's been so good that's cool so good so it's kind of one of those yeah when i'm you know so i'm like i'm looking and i'm like okay that's megan's experience with this book do i want that right it's kind of like when you're scared to pray the prayer that's like give me more humility lord and it's just like no I don't really want it so good no it's so good well one of the things was like from the lie that trusting in you will leave me more destitute Jesus I trust in you good and I was like yeah and it kind of walks you through it and I was just like yeah I believe the lie all the time that like if I just don't have God then I can do whatever I want I'm gonna be way happier like he's stopping me from doing all these things.

34:15It's kind of like sometimes how it can feel. It's like, well, I like want to watch this or I don't want to pray or I want to listen to this thing or I want to numb myself. Like I don't want to have to feel all the things because you want me to be transparent all the time, God. And it was just kind of like going through how untrue that is and how it's like, no, a life in Christ will never leave you more destitute. Like that's a lie from Satan. that's been like planted in my heart that I'm believing. And, um, it was really helpful to like undo that one specifically for me. Cause I was like, yeah, I'd rather just like be at a distance from God right now.

34:53Cause I just don't want to like hurt. And I'm like, no, he is my path to healing. It like staying away is only going to hurt me more. Anyways, Megan, that's so good. now it's it's like that every day it's like something i'm just like oh shoot but it's it's made me so much more at peace like i feel like i just went from like living at a constant like high cortisol state i was like waiting for the next bad thing to kind of like happen to like it's really like i'm like way chiller to my kids to myself it's like i'm way down It's insane. I was like, oh, that's where this was coming from. It was less about my hormones than I thought.

35:42It was more about my relationship with God, actually. So, LOL. Good. That's good. Yeah. Well, it's already in your house. So, couldn't hurt to just read the first 10 pages. Yeah. I am reading. Were you ever into the Duggars? Yes. Okay. Yes. We are really making it sound like all we do is watch TV on this episode. I'm reading. Sorry. Which one is it? Ginger. Ginger. I'm writing Ginger's book right now. It's called Becoming Free Indeed. And I will say that it's a little bit older. So it's not super. I'm sure even now she would write that book differently because her faith in her dream is different than what it was.

36:32and I don't know whenever she wrote this book a few years ago. Yeah. But it is interesting and it talks so much about just that organization that they were a part of that was led by Bill Gothard and how like she was able to – many times people in that community when they come out of it, they reject Christianity altogether because they think that's the only way. Totally. And that, I don't know what the word would be, expression of Christianity, if you will. God is very oppressive. And it's all these rules. And rules like women have to wear skirts and all of that. So then they reject Christianity altogether.

37:16Whereas Ginger is still a Christian. And so she's just had to disentangle herself from Bill Goffard's teaching. So it's been interesting. That's so crazy. That's probably really interesting to walk through. Dang. I'm reading that right now. And then we're reading Patreon Book Club, which to be honest, I'm only like five pages into that book. Yeah. I'm going to meet next week and I really need to pick that up. Thankfully, you're a really good reader. What book are you reading? No, the issue is that it's not on my Kindle. So I have to actually pick up a hard copy. that's the only reason that i'm whizzing through all these books right now is because they're and i've stopped no that makes sense yeah yeah yeah so instead of and you can like nurse with a kindle like kindle's a one-handed event yes a book is a lot harder to be you cannot do it with a book you really can't and then the light of course has to go on and then that messes up your circuiting rhythm and instead of being awake for 30 minutes i'm awake for an hour yeah dang it that's too bad what is the book though eat play no eat something grow you did post this it is play grow rest play sleep i don't know it is something like grow it was something like that something play grow and i will know by the end of reading it she will know what it is i will i will but i will say i love the book club and okay then my and yes book club too what did we just read yeah we just read a book that it was my pick and it sucked oh that's too bad because i read it in like three days yeah i don't remember what it was shoot oh was it a good book no it sucked oh it And my Goodreads review literally said, oh, it was Broken Country.

39:10Have you seen? Oh. You've seen the cover. It's like a very popular read right now. Okay. Okay. Okay. Very popular. It's everywhere right now. Okay. And so it's called Broken Country. And I picked it because it was everywhere. And my review is just because it's a fast-paced book doesn't mean it's good. And it is a fast-paced because you're trying to figure out what happened all the time. So you want to read it, but it's not actually a good book. And another thing that was very annoying to me was that there was a lot of, for the sake of little ears listening, S.E.X. scenes. And to me, that just felt like it was overdone and it was a cop out instead of instead of actually giving us substance to how this couple has great chemistry, whether that be their dialogue or I don't know, like little looks or something was just like, here's this S.E.X.

40:02scene. and another one and another one to prove that they have chemistry when instead i was like this is kind of a cop-out like this isn't good writing yeah you know at some point it's like is this just p-o-r-n i didn't get that vibe that's good it was truly just like i don't think this is a good right a good author this is this is all you can do yeah and i say that like cheap yeah it felt that way yes I understand that yeah what are you gonna do tomorrow during um preschool I'm gonna go to the gym and then I oh my gosh this is something I have I cannot find my maternity clothes anywhere where could they possibly be literally where could they be did i accidentally throw like they all went into a bag at some point and i'm like a bag like a duffel bag or a bag like a no like like a trash bag but i'm pretty sure i put them safely away in a closet i but i remember it not being my own closet it was somewhere else because i have a super small closet i was like i need this somewhere else so i've checked all the closets upstairs i cannot find i checked the closet downstairs and my husband's like well maybe it's in the attic so he's gonna check in the attic but there is a chance well I I don't think so I like there's not that much space in my garage either and I'm like I don't see it but I'm gonna have to start like digging through every corner of my home and then if I don't find it I'm like I must have accidentally thrown these away like how did that happen I just don't understand I don't I think they have to be somewhere but I'm like I have a lot of maternity clothes honestly i do too i do too i have a lot of costco yellow tote of maternity yeah and because you need it you're wearing clothes every single day i'm like and i'm gonna be really sad if those are all gone so how are you fitting into like so are you still are you down to like two pants that fit you right now that are not you know well your normal pants or what how are you doing i'm honestly not bad because I haven't really popped that much and I'm pretty far along like I can get really bloated and then I'm like oh my gosh it's happened I've popped it happened and then I wake up to a basically flat stomach and I'm like uh yeah are you in there cute girl like what's going on in there and I like went to the doctor last this week last week and I got we like checked the heartbeat and I was kind of like there was like a little bit of like nervousness because I'm like well because I'm like I just feel like I'm not that big and at this point the baby is like there's a subs of some substance at this point but we heard the heartbeat right away like we found it right away and I was like okay so do they measure you growing they do that thing no not yet early i think it's still too early um but anyways so i'm not too bad yet but i'm like this can't last much longer so i like need my clothes right and they are nowhere to be well i mean you're welcome to my clothes but i don't even know if they would fit because i'm taller like i feel like a lot of pants would dry i know i get i literally get petite size pants oh yeah i have short little work so i appreciate that but i really do need to find that and if not But mama's going to have to go on a shopping spree and that's not going to be fun for the bank.

43:40I know too bad. The problem is that it's like maternity clothes are not fun to buy. It's not like, oh, this is the cutest thing. It's like you get some pants, you get some shirts and you wear them on repeat until you have your baby. Like that's at least how I do it. It's really hard to find. I know. To get your whole style in with maternity clothes. I know. In my opinion. anyways that's i went more actually i'm wearing one of the pants that i got during return during my maternity never oh those are cute like the pants that you graduate that you go into when you first pop and like your postpartum body yes are very similar there's a lot of crap for sure yes so i brought these bad boys back out i love those yeah where are they from tj maxx oh okay nice and i found a few pairs from tg max so i think that's the vibe that you just need to get is they kind of look like jeans but they're yes more sweatpants stretchy yeah i did see a pair of pants similar to that on um anthropology's website where they like stretchy jeans and i was like these are a little expensive but do i make the investment oh which brings me to i am going to be in new york and so i saw that we have not talked about that i tell the listeners if you guys are in new york i'll be in new york doing a live podcast event at saint joseph's in greenwich village on october 10th at 2 30 p.m but yeah we're really excited we're just doing a live recording and the priest is going to be part of the recording father jonah and this is like i know your your listeners are not but aren't you doing a meeting right too yeah yeah yeah we'll be hanging out after um so it's gonna be great it's gonna be super fun but it's it's like the catholic church that has like gone viral on they've been on the news they're all over the internet if you've seen pizza to pews that's like the church that started at super hopping young adults okay i will send you stuff because it's like young adults lined up outside the church doors like the church doors are just overflowing with people at this parish of young adults young and like young adult professionals in new york city and we know that priest's brother who introduced us and then he's like oh my gosh we should totally collaborate and then now we're doing a live recording there we're gonna do like a patreon style like segment based episode so it's gonna be super fun it's gonna be super fun so i'm a little nervous which is when when are you going october 10th is when it is it's a saturday at 2 30.

46:27that's coming up dude uh yeah i know so i really need to find an outfit and also i'm like so you guys going to have a weekend yes we're going friday to monday and i get there before courtney does so i'm gonna have like a new york morning and afternoon to myself. Oh my gosh, Megan. Big city girl. I am so excited. And then I don't get back until Monday evening. That's so fun. I know. I know. And it feels like a really good business trip now where before it was just like, we're going on a business trip in quotation marks, really just, we're going to New York for fun and we'll do some business fine.

47:05But now it's like, we have an event. We're going to New York for a reason. Are you going to do, um, crap. What was that one clothing rental thing that you've done before newly yes i already have my newly order yes i'll send you the outfits that i chose i got them and i think they'll all work depending on the weather which also is like tricky i'm well and it's like this for you don't know is it no i can't really know yeah i know so i'm just like hoping for a classic fall weather maybe it'll happen and if it doesn't we'll have to just adjust the wardrobe a little bit and it's going to be fine. So that's what's going on.

47:49What are you doing? Sorry to get back to a very original question. What are you doing during preschool hours tomorrow? I'm really excited. I'm going to get back into my Bible study at my church. Oh my gosh. Yes. I'm so excited. This Bible study really has just been like so life giving to me. And then I took about probably a year off because one of my children, there's a nursery. You don't have to put your kid in the nursery. You can have your child in the room with you, but this child's temperament is not one to just like sit in color. It would be a wild child in there and I'm not going to disrupt everybody but he is a he what's the word oral process like sensory or orally so like yes i've i pulled over i've had to pull over the car and take stuff out like pieces of toys that he's broken apart and shoved in his mouth like on the side of the road so that he doesn't yeah so i i'm like i'm not sending you the nursery because i will say that the nursery is so is just chaotic there's like a thought all these women it's all these catholic moms and they have like five kids each and then there's like you know two babysitters to watch like 30 kids yeah yeah yeah yeah like he's not i'm not so fair i think we've gotten to the point now where he is not such a flight risk with that so i'm really excited we're gonna try it out tomorrow i am and then i'll have the baby with me in yes yeah yeah yeah um but i'm really really looking forward to that and i am a little bit nervous of how the nursery is going to go actually because lately if i am to leave the house like if my husband is home watching the kids and i'm just like i'm gonna run to the grocery store and just not take any like any kids i'm gonna go totally yeah it's meltdown central from this child yeah or we left um and we had a babysitter like last week meltdown central like i'm a little bit nervous for the nursery that it's gonna be hard to drop off yes whereas yeah are my oldest literally could not give bye yeah literally bye mom yeah won't miss you have fun exactly yeah this one not so much so we'll see how that goes and then we're gonna get all hobby lobby because i got um i mean have you seen all the reels it's so cute it's like you take your kid's handprint it's just their handprint basically on like a really cute paper and then you frame it it's cute i'll have to send to you that's like literally it and it's a frame and then pretty much so i've been doing that craft i still have to do the baby's handprint um but that's cute and then i have some other crafts that i want to do like crafty mom i love i don't know and i i i have this you know the wall in our living room the the one wall like Like there's a, there's the TV, there's a blank wall and there's a window.

50:50And on the blank wall, that wall is so long and I don't want to do a gallery wall. I want, and so I was looking at like huge pieces of art, huge pieces of art. Even if you do super cheap or if I do like a digital download on Etsy, it's actually still very expensive for the size that I need to fill this long wall. So change plans. I'm going to get like the biggest canvas size at Hobby Lobby and I'm going to get maybe like two or three. I have to do the measurements and then my kids are going to paint it and it's going to be like kid art. Cute. And that's what's going to go on our thing. And then have you seen the other thing that you, it's basically like a cork board and then, but it's a cute cork board.

51:41like you take a cute fabric whatever and cover it yeah and then that's how you hang up your kids artwork oh smart yeah okay i want that and that's gonna go somewhere else great very good i was like i feel like our algorithms are different i just have reality tv and this i just have reality tv and this one woman who has a bunch of goats and this one goat has been waiting to give birth for like a week and every day she checks in on Bella the goat and Bella finally had her babies today and it was I was overjoyed that's my only that's my algorithm so I don't have kids crafts but I have Bella the goat and a bunch of reality tv clips you know I'm surprised you don't have like cute cooking videos sometimes that finds its way in is I get some cooking inspo sometimes okay that's sometimes that comes it's like it goes in phases it's like if you watch one video for a little too long and sometimes you watch it because i don't it's not like a topic that you actually want to no i know and then you're like why do that you're you're you are screwed okay thanks so much for hanging and everybody thanks for hanging on the couch everybody wish well no we'll talk to you before your new york trip oh my gosh yes we will oh that's so fun and then it will basically be new york trip i need to figure out what i'm gonna do for my new york nails i'm you you need to do like a brown on you needs to be no brown or red do you ever take your color palette in oh yes always yes i pull it out every time just because I know we'll go with my outfits well I don't want to talk about the yellow nails if you know you know I'm sure none of you know we'll get there that'll that'll be a story for next week okay okay we have to go to bed bye bye thanks for hanging with us mom friend if you want to connect more and not feel so alone in motherhood come join us in the mom club on patreon at learningtomompodcast.com slash join.

54:02I can't wait to become real couch hang mom friends inside.