Hey everyone, welcome to Stepmom side Chats.
We are your hosts, Alyssa and Rebecca. 2 stepmoms.
Who are done pretending everything's perfect.
This is where we talk boundaries, Co parenting, hard
truths, healing, and the stuff nobody says out loud.
If you're ready for real talk, real growth and a little.
Bit of spice, Let's get into it. Hello, Alyssa.
How are you? Hello, Becca.
Yeah, we're a little tired here, guys.
Yeah, Darlene said the other day, and I think she's so right.
She said May is like May Sumber because it's so crazy.
The end of the school year. That's everything we have to do.
Yeah, I've never heard that before.
Have you ever heard that before? Of course it's a cute, cheeky
saying. Of course I know it.
I mean not all you're sayings are cute.
What was 1 you said the other day?
And I was dying laughing. I was going to like screenshot
it but I forgot it what it was. It was something like about
crumbs. Do you know what I'm talking
about? Were we talking about by a mom
saying like you give a mouse a crumb?
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It was so funny.
I was like, this girl's crazy. ANYWAYS, y'all welcome back to
another episode of Stepmom Side Chats.
We're so glad you're here. You guys are here to hear our
chaotic, disorganized nature. That is definitely a listen I
yourself. Did you see your chair before
recording? OK, but it's OK.
I haven't washed my hair. No, we're we're doing everything
we can for you guys. I hope that makes the listeners
know how much we love y'all and we try so hard but.
But that you're also not alone, that we're our lives are really
crazy and chaotic too, and we're doing things last minute, just
like I'm sure all of you guys are, all you moms who are doing
such a great job with the kids. So we are right there with you
in the chaos. And Speaking of chaotic and
crazy, like summer, summer, Speaking of May summer, I'm
just. Stressed.
Wrapping up, doing the school things, figuring out our
schedules and the calendar and like first of all, my schedule.
I know you don't work within the the system, but it is crazy.
Like it's not just regular schedule when school ends, it's
like we switch custody and it changes a little bit.
We don't actually get them back the normal day.
We would, even though it's the last day of school And it's
like, Oh my gosh, how are we supposed to?
How are we supposed to remember all this?
You know what, everyone? I told Becca stepmoms cannot
have a paper calendar because you can't erase highlighter.
Like I highlight the days that we have the kids, but they don't
schedule changes or custody changes.
So I had to throw away the calendar and I just bought a new
one. But I will say like perfect plug
here. The hearth calendars.
OK, you say hearth, I say hearth earth with AH, it's hearth.
It's hearth. It's like a hearth, Hearth and
home is a target to hearth and. Hearts.
Yes. Hearth.
Hearth, hearth. Or we just say I don't know with
an H on the end. You know, but we need to figure
out what it is. What's up with us and us not
being able to pronounce words? Like I feel like we're both
pretty educated people, but I guess we still have some reading
issues. I'm going off of the ads I've
heard at Target. OK, but it.
Oh, well, then you're right. It's a different company, but
it's like the Magnolia one, but they have hearth in hand.
But you know what a hearth is. A hearth is like, oops.
A hearth is like a the on the fireplace.
You have a fireplace hearth, right?
Oh no, I think that's a thing. So it's like.
We don't have like fireplaces really in Vegas.
It's so hot. Well.
Duh. I'm in Texas too, I guess
because I grew up in Michigan. Like that's the thing fireplaces
are anyways, the hardest calendar is the electronic
calendar. We're going to show you guys
because we are very excited. This is the most unique thing
that I think the stepmoms that we don't need anything in life
besides this literally unless we could actually have someone
manage our schedule. But like no, this calendar is
going to be a lifesaver. I cannot wait for everyone to
see it finally. I just said mine last night.
I'm so obsessed with it. We already like mine comes
today. I'm excited.
I know we already like color-coded it and like put cute
pictures up and stuff. It's so cool.
We can't wait to talk more about it.
But yes, the summer, the summer, the summer.
So summers. Summer sounds fun everyone until
you guys realize that the kids are home 24/7, bio kids
included. However, it just adds a whole
other layer when you're a stepmom so you go first.
What does y'all summer schedule kind of look like and how does
it change when summer starts? You know we have less than 50%
right now. When summer starts, we go back
to one week on, one week off, which is great for some things,
horrible for some other things. The good thing that works is
like for camps and stuff, like at least then we're registering
them for a camp and it's all week or whatever.
Or if we want to take a summer vacation, we don't just have
five days with them. You know, we actually have a
good amount of time to take a vacation or take a trip and then
like come home and decompress or whatever.
But you know, it's kind of we actually have them for the first
two weeks of summer for two weeks straight.
Wait, so is it only in the first two weeks that you guys have
them like that? Yes, I don't know who picked
that. That was like a random thing.
I don't know if that's a common thing that happened in the court
system and they suggested it, but it's great.
Like my husband's like, oh, you know, this is like much needed
time. This is like actually important,
you know, bonding time made-up for lost time.
And they've been in school. So.
But I'm like, what the heck am I going to do, Becca?
What do I want to do? I can't pay thousands of dollars
in camps. Let's be honest.
I'm the only thing I'm thinking is like, we have to get Airbnb
somewhere and just live our best life.
I have PTO up the wazoo so. Yeah, I use that.
I know. So for us, what happens is my
stepdaughter who lives out of state, it's I think the Monday
after they get out of school, that's when she comes with us.
And it's supposed to be for five weeks.
But typically it's just stays for six or eight weeks and I'm.
Sorry, I was choking on my water.
Yeah. It's fine, I know.
So yeah, it's really fun in the beginning, but by the end of
summer, I'll just be honest, y'all, I want to pull my hair
out. I'm like, I'm like, when does
everyone go back home? It's just so chaotic.
And it's not like when they're in school, because in the summer
it's like they wake up. Breakfast time, then two hours
later, lunchtime, then, oh, what are we going to do today?
Then five hours later, oh, dinner time.
Oh, I need a stack in between all those things.
So they think that literally we're the camp counselors and
that we should just be doing everything for them.
It's an announcement for everybody.
Guess what, stepmoms? You're not the cruise director
on the Lido deck. Even though you feel like.
You're not the entertainment. You are not.
Oh, and we made a guide. So we need to talk about that
because obviously all of this is condensed into a guide for y'all
because I know if you're taking notes, not that anyone is, but
don't take notes because we made a guide.
So we'll put the link here too. But yeah, I think it's obviously
we fall into this, OK, we have to plan all the things and, you
know, plan, of course we want them to have an outlet, a
creative outlet, you know, or an active outlet like camps and
stuff. But we're going to run ourselves
dry taking everyone back and forth to camp, paying for camps.
It's really hard. You can't do that all the.
Time so expensive, so expensive. I think I paid like $1000 for
both my step kids and it was only for two weeks last summer.
I'm only doing one week this summer, which will be a great
week, but you know, I just can't do it.
Just can't do it. I have a secret tip though, for
y'all VBS camps, You know, like vacation Bible school.
Hey, even if you're not religious, these aren't.
You are now, yeah. Start praying.
This is a godsend, literally because these are normally free.
Free camp. Praise baby Jesus.
Yeah, no, I mean, well, and even if it's you're the one who told
me about that, because I had no idea there was such thing as
like free camps. Back at every church.
So we are members at one church, but guess what?
We're also going across the street to the VBS of the other
church. And then I called my old church
out in a city close to us. They have Avbs to a different
week. We're also doing that one.
Oh my gosh, they are going to be just basking in the holy water
this summer, you know? And here's the greatest part,
the kids don't know the difference between like if we're
paying for a camp or if it's free to them, they're so
thankful and appreciative that they had something planned and
something fun to do. And honestly, these VBS camps, I
don't know what they're called in your state or in other states
like vacation, medical school or church camps.
Same thing, yeah. And they're just like, for a
couple hours during the day. Some of them are only a half a
day too. So if you're like, you know, not
religious, maybe ease in that way.
But this to me is the best because they're so themed and
they're fun. And the vibe is.
So I don't know, when you drop off kids, you ever see how the
vibe is so amped up and they're like counselors or whatever, or
festive and dressed up for it. And yeah, it's just a fun thing.
So anyways, getting into camps, camps is what saves us, but it
also can burn us out because we're driving the kids there.
We're paying for it. I had the terrible experience of
sending kids to camp and step kids to camp and sub kids almost
being kicked out of camp line. There is absolutely no chance
that I can just send them to. I could pay hundreds and
hundreds of dollars for them to be like disrespectful or rude at
these camps or get kicked out and then I don't get my money
back or that's not happening. You know, they, they're
expecting camps, they're expecting trips.
I get it. That's no fault of their own.
That obviously was not my household that started that
though either, so it's hard to keep up with it.
Yeah, we will have, well, my, my stepdaughter and then my
stepson, he just stays as long as my stepdaughter stays.
So it's like full time all summer, like all hands on deck.
And yeah, I know it's, it's exhausting, but I've gotten a
lot smarter, like how you just said, like I try to break it up,
like do a trip, you know, do some camps.
And then I remember you saying about the Vacation Bible school.
So I think I might check that out this week.
It's good to get, you know, them a little, a little prayer and,
you know, some Jesus in their life and for me too, you know,
So yeah, I know. It's just it's so much more
noise. There's more scheduling conflict
for me. I know it's been really hard
because we have like a custody schedule with the one that comes
for the summer, but it's kind of flexible, which has its pros
like that's so great. Y'all get along enough to, you
know, have some flexibility. But for me and my Type A
personality and let's say you know me, I want to know the day
you come and the day you leave. I need to know.
And I'm like that about everything in my life.
And you know that like I'm crazy, like type A personality.
So for me, the summer is just like a mental fuck, to be
honest, because I'm just like, so like, when are we, when are
you leaving? Not even that I necessarily like
want you to leave. I just need to know like, I
don't like not knowing. That is the most stressful part
of being a stepmom for me is like just always being in
constant limbo and no one ever knowing what's going on.
And they're like, Oh, well, you know, we're going to figure it
out soon. And I'm just sitting here
totaling my thumbs. I'm like, well, can we, you
know, pump the gas? Well, I don't think stepmoms
need to feel guilty about this. It's very normal and natural for
us all to be overwhelmed. And like, the mental load just
gets so heavy so fast because there's constantly planning
meals, period. We could just stop there.
That's that in itself. How much are we going to eat out
out? Like that's a budget problem.
How? Which meals are we going to eat?
For me, I have kids between ages 1 and 10, so I'm making like 3
different kinds of meals. I know, don't come at me
pediatricians. I know I should just force my
toddlers to eat the stuff the 10 road eats.
But it doesn't happen. Easier said than done.
Figuring out activities, period. That's it.
Figuring out activities. So something that we did put in
the guide though, you know, y'all want to look into is how
we're figuring out activities. What do we do?
There's different tiers and layers of activity.
So there may be we're sending them out for camps, but what are
we doing the days they don't have camps?
We can't just pay for camps and we can't always arrange
transportation. So what are we doing at home?
What are we doing for the board days?
Where's the board bucket? You know, there's certain things
that we had to think up to get creative.
Someone just have to get creative and usually, you know,
the childless set moms too, they're going from no kids to
full time kids in the summer or like for us, it's going from
like one or two kids to like four or five like people with
kids then they have so many kids.
So it's also, you know, managing boredom among a wide age range,
which can be really overwhelming, and then
coordinating custody schedules it.
Well, and it's just like handling the different parenting
styles amongst the households too, especially kids that are
typically with their moms. And I know this is a lot of
stepmoms stories. You know, the dads get the kids
for the summers and so the kids come, but they come from this
other household and there's a whole different culture and set
of rules, norms, expectations that these kids come from.
And then they step into your home and it's your home.
And so you have a whole different set of norms, rules,
expectations, and you have to like adjust because something
that you might expect out of getting a child in your home is
not what bio mom expected out of her child at her home.
And so there's a lot of like tension, I feel like in the
beginning and a lot of like growing pains the first week or
two in the summertime is what I've come to find because here
I'm like really crazy about bedtime.
You know this I my toddler needs to be asleep and I swear if
anyone wakes him up, Becca is going to be the devil.
And at their house they don't have to think about that because
they don't have younger siblings and so they just get a party all
night long in the summer. Nope, not at my house.
So. No, it's the same at my house
too. And childless step moms.
I know I feel like we neglect y'all too much but so here's
something that y'all can take away.
This is a blessing for y'all where it's a curse for us.
At least you're, you know, think about this, you could be dealing
with kids that come over and, yeah, they want to stay up late.
They want to do the late fireworks shows.
You can't make all that happen when you do have a kid at home.
So, you know, you can really lean into that if you have step
kids and you don't have littles yet at the home or you don't
want littles in the home. Yeah, do the night activities
that maybe they sleep in or maybe they nap the next day or
something just because they're tired and, you know, live a
little at night. I want to talk about the
pressure to make summer magical. We are not the cruise director
on the lead of deck. We're not the free camp
counselor or entertainer at camp.
Yeah, I feel like you and I, and you can correct me if I'm wrong.
I feel like you and I are very similar in this aspect, though
during the summer, we do want to make the summer magical.
We are always doing the most, like we are trying to, you know,
plan all the outings and things. But I think that's just because
we're trying so hard to be good stepmoms and try to make sure
that they're not missing out on things that maybe the other
household is doing or their friends are doing.
But I think social media has created these unrealistic
expectations, not only of stepmoms, but of just regular
parents too, of what summer is supposed to look like.
And oh, there needs to be an outing every single day.
There needs to be an expensive activity.
Like there needs to be all these things.
And honestly, financially speaking, it's just not feasible
to be doing an activity every single day.
I think that's the main point too, is just we don't need
something every single day. And maybe you do have to have
something every day. Like for me, if I only have them
for a week and then we don't have them for a week, I can make
something happen today. But it's looking into like, is
it going to be a craft at home that we're doing all together?
So or you know, are we doing something big?
We're all going to a camp this week or something.
But it's scaling back where you need to for your sanity.
We don't want to build resentment.
That's the big picture for summer.
No resentment. Let's leave this summer feeling
happy. Maybe a little over overworked
and a little tired, but not resentful.
Yeah, yeah. No, not resentful.
And I think something that has helped me is planning ahead.
I'm a really big planner and this personality trait of mine
actually is a positive thing in the summer because I plan ahead.
I already have them signed up for one week of camp this year.
The week right after they're going to do a sports camp.
I just need to finish signing them up for that.
Then we're going to go on a trip for a week that's already 3
weeks. So I'm like.
Wait, this is also where that digital calendar comes in.
I love it and it's so big so you can like it's hands on.
I don't like doing the digital calendar on our phone because
you put so many things on there and they kind of go away.
But so yeah, subtle plug again. I'm just obsessed.
I cannot wait. Yeah, I know.
My son is so excited about it. He came home and he was like,
Becca, where's my soccer on the calendar?
Like, can you make it blue? And I was like, yeah, sure.
That's another thing telling and if you don't have the calendar
or you can't get it for whatever reason, that's fine.
And we can get like a discount code for all of y'all if that
helps. But writing it on the fridge or
whatever. If y'all make little a summer
thing, a calendar written out somewhere, put it physically,
like visibly for the kids so that they know what they're
looking forward to, then it's a win for you because you're cute
and creative and you know it's exciting.
But also you don't have to hear what are we doing today?
What are we doing next week? What are we doing later today?
Oh yeah, I think the big one. Do your kids do that or your sub
kids or any kids? My kids literally like, I'll
take them to the trampoline park in the beginning of the day and
we'll get home and they'll look at me and my husband be like, So
what are we doing next? We literally look at them.
And literally. Are you serious right now?
Like we're not doing anything. We just spent $200 on a stupid
trampoline park, but it's. Not their fault.
It's so not their fault. Like if the other house wants to
fully entertain them and always put something in front of them
always like in between the trampoline park and the skate
park, you know, give them an iPad, then they're wired to not
know how to entertain themselves and how to function or play by
themselves. So we what all we can do is we
can't try and retrain them. You know, I think the board
bucket is a great thing where that's one way to kind of and
train the brain. You go into the board bucket, if
you're like, before you ask what can I do or what are we doing
next? You have to go into the board
bucket and find something to do. Yeah, I like that.
And that was a little segue. I wanted to ask you, what do you
do about electronics during the summer?
Because I feel like this is a hot topic in parenting in
general. Do you let your kids have the
iPads? Do they bring iPads back and
forth from their mom's house? How does that work?
We have their laptop here, they do take back and forth but it's
like a school 1 and they had to keep it all summer.
And it has. Games on it, and they're
technically they're like school games.
So for the little one, it's like adding, it's like math and
reading kind of. But he thinks they're really fun
games and he's all into it, so I'm OK with that.
Yeah. Yeah.
Honestly, stepmoms if you need it, give them the iPad, put them
in front of the TV. Your sanity first before the
kids you know. Entertainment 100%.
Yeah, No, I think that's something that we should
definitely, you know, relieve ourselves of the guilt of screen
time, especially in the summer. It's so hard.
And most moms are working still. I know you're working through
the summer still, right. Like you have, you know.
Oh. Yeah.
Oh yeah, People are still dying. Hospice doesn't end.
Oh, my God. Oh, you knew I'd like that.
So yeah, it was so funny. And sorry, side note.
So I texted her one day. When was it?
It was like, I don't know. It was like a big holiday, guys.
I think it was Christmas Eve. And I was like, oh, sorry,
working right now. And she was like, yeah, Becca,
people are still dying. Like I have to go tosses care.
I was like, OK, Merry Christmas. You have to have humor in it.
It's just an inside industry joke.
It's not as heartless as it sounds.
But now I used to be, I think it's funny.
Remember, I was a wedding planner after college.
That was the best. I honestly will go back and do
that after my kids are bigger because it's nights and
weekends. But everyone would be like, are
you coming for, you know, 4th of July?
And almost like people will get married on 4th of July.
People are still getting married.
And definitely New Year's Eve. Yeah, all those things.
So I just kept the same joke running.
But you know, so anyways, back to our summer.
So answer this. So emergency reset ideas.
What do you do when the kids are overtired, overstressed, bored?
You don't have something planned for that day?
What's your emergency? Is it like get out, get like ice
cream? Or is it like, do you have like
a pool send them out to the pool or you know, what is the
emergency we have to have a go to because in case of emergency
you can't just sit and think, OK, now what should I do?
Like it's emergency, it's urgent.
What are you going to do? Where you guys send them?
Their mom's house. No, just kidding.
No, usually, I mean, I'll just take them to like McDonald's and
we'll get an ice cream. This is actually an idea another
mom gave me is go do your errands that you normally have
to do, right. So whatever errands you have to
get done that day, take them with you though, which can be
frustrating because they're, you know, there and probably
bothering you, whining, complaining, etcetera.
But the take them on your errands.
But in the beginning of it, tell them, hey, if you guys are good
and you guys, you know, listen and don't complain too much at
the end, we'll go to 5 below and then we'll go get a dollar ice
cream. And so I've done that a few
times and it's fun because I'm getting them out of the house.
I'm getting my errands done and I'm also giving them an
incentive to be good while we're out in public.
And then we go to 5 below. They can pick one thing.
So it's cheap and it's like, you know, a little craft or thing
that they can do later that day, and then we go get ice cream for
a dollar at McDonald's. And so that's worked really
well. Key, you can take them and get
something, but it has to be some kind of craft or something that
they can do. Free tip for everyone out there.
I know Target has those big coloring houses.
Those were a huge win with my one year old, my 3 year old, my
7 year old, and my 10 year old because 10 year old is not
Target built it. Yes, the 10 year old builds it.
The middle, the middle 2, they color it.
The little 1, he crawls in and out of it and then when it's all
built, it's all colored. You still keep it and you play
with it. They have one that's like an ice
cream truck. They have one that's like a
little fork house and you can get two of them.
They're like $10 or something. Maybe 30 at the most for like
the big ones. Really.
And this is at Target. Yeah, I got one that was like a
Target store, and we are not affiliates for Target, so this
is not a plug. But now this saves one of our
weeks in the past, I think it was like Thanksgiving break or
something, and we had a few of them.
So then once they were all built and colored, they got to play in
them together like a little village.
It was so cute. But I will say.
I'm going to use that. My emergency is utilizing
grandparents. We have grandparents that are
about an hour away. I can call them up.
They're retired. They don't work and I say hey
like. I'm on my way.
Halfway, Yep, I'm packing up the kids and this is an urgent quick
thing because I can pack them up and get driving.
We'll meet at like a local, some place where I can give them a
treat while we're waiting for grandparents.
And then it's awesome and then go to grandparents for the
night. Then that's a real reset because
they come back and they're not sick of me and their dad
already, not sick of the littles, the babies running
around. But that is another great free
camp. Everyone utilize the
grandparents. Please.
If you have them, use them. Definitely another one that, and
I don't know if I told you about this last summer and I'm going
to use it this summer, is movie days.
During the summer, Regal Cinemas has dollar movie days and
they're like older movies. Not like too old though.
AMC has $3 movie days so and Cinemark has something so just
look into it or go to your theater real quick and ask like
what are your discounted movie days?
Yeah. And then they have like a $5
snack box. So they get like a drink, a
little snack, a little fruit snack and popcorn.
And you get out of the house. And in Las Vegas, it's so hot.
So like, we just want to do things mostly indoors or out of
pool. So that's one thing that I'm
going to try to utilize a couple times this summer because, you
know, you run out of ideas. I know.
And Boston, obviously it's very hot too.
But part of our thing is we always have those inflatable
water things in the backyard, like the sprinkler system.
We put it under the trampoline for fun.
For something different, we have the inflatable water slides,
which have been used for years. They never pop.
It's a one time high. It's amazing.
And then we have a little splash pad.
So we make our whole backyard like this little Watertown.
You know, the littles are in the splash pad, the big boys are on
the slides usually or the trampoline.
And then honestly, we asked the neighbors to come over or we'll
send the kids. We have tons of neighbor kids in
our street, so they'll go pick up some friends and I'm like
sure, everyone can hang out out back.
I can see them all. I'll bring out popsicles.
Don't come inside. Yeah, yeah.
And it's awesome. They'll be out there all day.
So that's another thing. These are not very big expenses,
but if you buy multiple things, they stay outside all day.
Water table for little ones too. Yeah.
But I don't know what you do if it's is it cold anywhere in the
summer? I don't know.
Canada. Are y'all cold up there?
I don't know. I hope not.
No, it's so hot in Las Vegas. And then, you know, even though
it's expensive, I think going to the water park, your like local
water park at least one day is good because they get exhausted.
They're so tired. It's the best.
Stepmoms, how are you coping with transition day?
I'll tell you how I am. I'm lighting my big ass candles
to calm my big ass anxieties and honestly it changes the whole
mood of the house. Same chaos, just calmer vibes
and way better energy. We're obsessed with big ass
candles from big ass luxuries. Yep, the ones from Shark Tank.
If you want to try one, use code stepmom at checkout for a
discount. That's code stepmom at checkout.
Big ass candles because stepmom life comes with big ass
feelings. Let's talk about get out real
quick the get out pass OK, get out changing.
This is our whole thing let's get out of the house get out
everyone let's go let's go get out everyone get out so you
talked about a water park. Water parks can be kind of
pricey. Get out pass.
They do have local water parks on some of these.
This is a pass that has free visits.
It's a yearly pass. You pay one per person.
So I bought one for each of my kids and then one for myself and
my husband. But we have a water park in town
here that is on it. So we will all get to go for
free one time. There's an indoor water park
here that's on it. And I really, yes, we don't have
an indoor. Water park on it.
I love those so much. That one's my favorite splash
shack. It's really cool.
But then where I'm taking the kids to go do something for
Father's Day for my husband is paint pottery.
That's an amazing thing to do when it's hot.
That one on the get out pass. It's monthly.
So we get to go once a month. We're going to make grandpa
coffee mug. We're going to make dad a coffee
mug. I mean, it's really fun and
that's something that you know you don't have to pay for.
It's amazing. But there's also like laser tag
bowling. There's just so much to do.
There could be like the zoo in your town.
So this is not a huge expense. It actually saves you a lot of
money in the return and then it does all your scheduling for
you. So this is what I'm using for my
emergency basis. Like what am I going to do with
the kids today? Or you know, I forgot I didn't
have anything scheduled for this afternoon.
You can get on the app and then you're like, OK, what do?
What do we have free passes to you?
Just don't do those. Then it's free.
It's stress free. It kind of made the planning for
you so. Yeah, no, that's what I do too.
Yeah, I love it. I've been using it for literally
the last six years I've been using it.
And you told me about it a few years ago.
And then I got it when we were in San Antonio because there was
a pass down there too. Like that's like South of Austin
and it's not far to go to. And so you can get a pass.
Like we go to Dallas all the time to visit my family and
there's a pass there for other events.
Yeah. And why I like it is because
usually, like the water parks are about like $50.00, right,
For just one day, one time. That's about how much the pass
is anyways. So it's like you pay for it
itself and then you get all the other things with it.
So yeah, no, I do think it's a really good investment.
And like Alyssa said, it's just easy.
If you're like, crap, I don't know what to do with these kids
these day, this day. And like you just wake up and
say, OK, let me choose one of these things.
We were able to get a discount for y'all, a small discount if
you use the code stepmom at checkout.
But that being said, we actually do use this ourselves.
It's something we actually used even before we got to meet with
the company. They had a previous name and
everything and so this was just something we begged them like.
Yeah, no, I've told, I told people about it before, even
this. So yeah, something you guys
should look into. But yeah, summer guys is hard.
I mean, sometimes summer makes stepmoms count the down the days
until school starts. And there's nothing wrong if
you're that type of stepmom, it doesn't mean you hate the kids.
It just means that this nonstop giving over and over again, it's
so exhausting, not only for regular moms, but for stepmoms
too, because we're giving to kids that aren't ours.
And we talked about all that about that all the time.
And that's a different mental load than caring for your
biological kids. So it just really hits a lot
different for stepmoms in the summertime.
I do think the stepmoms need to have their own summer routine.
Some of these things like if y'all are members.
I've talked with you guys about this one-on-one about having
something for yourself so that you don't lose yourself in the
process. The most important part is not
building resentment over the summer and remind yourself to
have grace for yourself like you are able and you're allowed to
go have a girls night, have a scheduled girls night or go see
a movie on your own. Like go have some quiet time
alone, go somewhere. One of the members, she said
when I asked her, what is your thing that you like to do that
you feel like since you become a stepmom has been taken from you.
And she said it was having her alone time to a go to the gym.
That was her morning thing. And then in the evenings to read
her book. So I've been on her about this
and she's reading her book now and reading again and taking
some time to herself. And I think that that's most
healing. And that's the best way that
we're not going to burn out as caregivers.
I've talked about this before, but in Hospice, we learned about
caregiving, never burnout. And usually when a patient
passes away, the next sick person in the family is the
loved one. And you know how they say, like,
people die of a broken heart? No, they actually were burdened
by caring for someone so intensely.
And I don't want to see, you know, stepmoms burnout because
we're thinking so hard about how we're going to entertain the
kids this summer. How are we going to survive the
summer? How are we going to keep the
house clean the summer? How are we going to feed the
kids this summer? What what are you doing for
yourself? Add that into the list.
You know, if it's buying that calendar to give yourself sanity
for scheduling, do it. If it's quiet hour in the
evening, you know, putting your phone away and not scrolling but
reading or diving into some show that distracts you, do it.
If it's girls night, you know, schedule it.
Also solo errands. I know you're talking about like
going out and running errands and throwing the kids kids in
the car with you, but sometimes getting out for errands, That's
like a tiny win for stepmoms. Oh yeah, When I can go to Target
by myself, it's like a treat. And it's like so fun.
I don't know. It's like a vacation.
Literally like a vacation. My note for stepmoms here is
that you don't have to participate every single summer
memory to be a good stepmom. You don't have to plan every
single thing, and you don't have to participate in every single
thing. You can still be a good stepmom.
Yeah, you're still a good stepmom no matter you know what
you are or what you're not doing, you know, be confident in
in who you are as a stepmom and the activities that you do plan.
Try not to over function too much.
It's good for kids to be bored. I think in today's society, we
don't let ourselves as adults be born very often, but we
definitely don't let kids be bored.
And it's good for their brain development to be able to, you
know, have some creative thinking time during the day of,
oh, what can I do? Build a Fort.
Like that's what me and Alyssa you started back in the day.
Like you don't need to be on the iPad or have a constant activity
that's not real life. And so I think it's important
that even though it can be annoying, that they learn how to
have different creative outlets for themselves to to do when
they're bored. I want to talk lastly about
couple time. You know, the differences
between expectations and discipline with partners, loss
of privacy in the summer, all of this stuff.
How much summer affects your relationship?
Your spouse, your partner, your husband, whoever it is.
Kids constantly impact our intimacy, our connection, our
routines, our conversations. That's heavy.
What are we doing to compensate for that?
You know? It's also especially hard for
the childless stepmoms who suddenly feel like an outsider
in their own home. This is more apparent all day
because the kids are home or they're having to schedule more
for the kids. I feel like your house kind of
stops being yours for like 3 months you know?
That's when yes, yeah, I always when when I do finally get the
schedule and I know that the day they're going to leave, people
are going to come for me this, but I don't care.
I plan my I plan my cleaning lady.
I'm like, oh, you leave Thursday the 10th.
I'm not. I'm like Friday the 11th.
I don't think anything. Wrong with that.
Treat yourself my clean I do and I get the deep clean and it just
makes me feel so much better and less resentful.
I know it costs money and and I know, but there's always things
we spend our money on right, like maybe don't get Starbucks a
lot that month. I don't know because that stress
of having to clean up after kids, your husband, pets, all
those things, it can make you feel really resentful of what
summers look like for a stepmom. So I feel like when you can look
forward to, oh, they're leaving, OK, see you next summer.
Oh now my house is clean because I don't have to spend 3 days
cleaning. That's a great idea and that's a
great reward for stepmoms, for everything, for the end of the
summer, for everything they put up with and they scheduled and
they did. I wish we had like when you find
a cleaning company that we can get a discount for step moms for
that. I do think going into the summer
and I'm big on having conversations with our partner
before something happens that you can set expectations, but
there's conversations that need to be had before the summer,
like expectations with discipline.
Discipline changes with step kids as they, you know, go
through different grades or, you know, summer versus the school
year and you're going to run into discipline being needed to
be had more frequently in the summer because they're home,
they're not at school. And then just going to bed, you
know, after homework and dinner. So figuring out who's doing the
discipline now let's reset. Maybe we didn't do a lot of
disciplining during the school year.
What are we going to do this summer?
What does discipline look like in our home this summer?
And then alone time. Hey, just a reminder, you know,
I like to have those retreats. I like to step away and have
alone time. I'd like to have alone time with
you also. So maybe.
Let's keep go back to the date nights when the kids leave or
when they come back and bring a babysitter into the house for
that, having the conversation about responsibilities.
Summer changes things again like cleaning in the house, the
dinners. If we are entertaining these
kids all the time, we're probably not going to be doing
making all the dinners. So maybe things shift just for
the summer and you change like make the make the.
Dinners easy. I am queen of easy, Y'all, I'm
going to tell you guys this, and you guys probably might already
do it. I don't know, Alyssa can tell
me. I buy a rotisserie chicken on a
Sunday, and what I do that day is we have a chicken dinner and
I get green beans and chicken. Oh, that's a chicken dinner.
And the next day, oh, guess what we're having?
We're having BBQ chicken sandwiches now all I'm doing is
shredding the rotisserie chicken onto a little Hawaiian rolls,
putting some BBQ sauce. Here you go dinner.
Then the third day I still have chicken leftover and it's my
last day to use it. Now I'm doing chicken Alfredo.
See three meals, guys, that's. So cute.
That's amazing. I love that I just.
Try to you just try to make it as easy as you can on yourself
because I I hate cooking guys and that's like one of the
things I dread the most in summer is everyone asking me
what meal is next. I'm like leave me alone.
I know, I know, you need to tell me some of yours, but yeah.
Well, one other thing too, I don't know if anyone has kids
that love to cook. I know these older step kids and
teenagers sometimes like my ten. Well, I guess he's almost 11
year old stepson. He loves to cook, loves to bake.
I put him on it and he loves it. It keeps him busy.
He likes that sense of responsibility.
And then I get out of the kitchen, I get to go be with the
littler kids or be with my other stepson.
So that's a major win. But if it's not cooking, split
up the responsibility household it.
Maybe they need to clean the bathrooms.
That is our job in this house is the toilets because they're
boys. I'm a girl, my daughter's girl.
We don't do the same things in the bathroom.
It looks. Yeah, very different.
When the boys come out of bathroom, then when?
Girls. So gross.
So they're totally fine with it. They think it's so funny because
they love poop talk and stuff and so they clean the toilets.
Wow. OK, Well, I'm glad they like it.
Yeah. They're totally fine with it.
And so if that, you know, gives them something to do for 20
minutes, we are talking survival by minutes.
You guys not what are we going to do for six hours?
We need a 20 minute thing. Here's a scrubby brush.
Go find something to clean. Yeah, whoever cleans it the
fastest gets a prize. You know all those little things
I want to go into text I didn't send because we had some good
ones this week. OK, so this stepmom writes a
bill says if they could text the bio mom, this is the text they
didn't send. They said I don't want your
role. I just want the constant tension
to stop. And send send that text.
Yeah, I know, right. That's so.
I mean, I think that's just like a mature way of saying it.
Like, I don't want your role. I just want the constant tension
to stop. I, I would be interested to see
what like more of the details and dynamics are behind this.
But I think a lot of stunt moms can relate to this is we're not
trying to take your role as bio mom.
Like, please actually do all the things.
We just don't want it to feel contentious every time we're
around each other because it's not good for you.
It's not good for us, and it's not good for the kids.
So period. It's definitely, yeah, I like
that one. Oh my gosh.
OK, this one says just because I'm home doesn't mean I'm
available for child care. Don't send it.
That's so true though, because, OK, I can definitely relate to
this because I work from home. I maybe need to go in once every
three months, like into a physical place.
So I work from home. And that's so true.
People in general, they think that just because you work from
home, you are just the babysitter and you don't have
real things to do. No, I have so many things to do,
if not more. So yeah, I agree with you,
stepmom. You are not the free babysitter.
OK, here's one to end on because this is like the catapult to our
episode today. Being a stepmom in the summer
feels like emotional overtime. Oh my gosh, so true.
Send it. I know Alyssa and I are bad.
Yeah, for like, yeah, just send it just.
We're not coaches. Yeah, no.
Never. Well, anyways, I hope everyone
feels like they have some kind of support for this summer.
You feel a little bit lighter going into it.
Hopefully by time we have this episode coming out, there's
still time to sign up for camps, get the summer guide, get
yourself an electronic calendar. We can put the link to the one
that we have with a discount code.
Get yourself the Get Out pass. That's going to be a lifesaver
in a number of ways. And remember to have those talks
with your significant other. Have those talks about
expectations, discipline, all those things to prep yourself
and prep your marriage for survival.
That's it. Book yourself a trip and a spa
day and a maid for when the Yeah.
And drop all your summer meal ideas and summer hacks because
we don't know it all so we need ideas too.
So drop them in the comments and we'll see you all next week and
hope you guys have a good rest of your week.
Bye, bye bye. That's it for this week on
Stepmom Side Chats. We're Alyssa and Becca, your
stepmom besties. Before you go, if something we
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Keep giving yourself grace, you're doing better than you
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