Why Am I Jealous of Talented Kids? – Ep. 312
June 24, 2024
Listen Now:
In the special segment “Gripe Water,” Shanna and Laura share the hilariously petty parenting problems that have been bothering them lately, diving into parenting jealousy, bedtime books and more! Also, Shanna reports on the newest temporary additions to her family, and Laura talks about choosing to celebrate her birthday unconventionally. Finally, they share their BFPs and BFNs for the week. Shanna’s kids are 5 and 8 years old, and Laura’s kids are 5 years old and 3 years old.
Topics discussed in this episode:
-Fostering kittens when you have kids
-Going to Disneyland with your family
-Bluey credits and autoplay
-Feeling jealousy and FOMO as a parent
-Frustrating kids’ books
-Reading chapter books to your kids before bed
-5-year-old doing wordplay and taking words literally
-Frying cheese as a snack for your kids
-Finding a snack that your picky eater likes
This episode’s full show notes can be found here.
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Big Fat Positive: A Pregnancy and Parenting Journey is produced by Laura Birek, Shanna Micko and Steve Yager.
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Episode Transcript
Laura
Welcome to Big Fat Positive with Shanna and Laura. This week, we have our weekly check-ins, we have our special segment, Grapewater, where we get to complain about FOMO, autoplay, and chapter book confusion, and we close with our BFB as a BFNs for the week. Let's get started! Hey, hey, it's the Big Fat Positive Podcast coming at ya from Laura's closet and Shanna's kid's closet.
Shanna
So fancy, so fancy.
Laura
Yes. So Shanna, this is episode 312. And I'm going to ask you what I've asked you 311 times before, which is what have you been up to this week?
Shanna
Oh, good question. So thought provoking. I've never heard it before.
Laura
Real left field question for you. Are you prepared?
Shanna
I don't know. I don't know. OK, this was a big, exciting week for us. Because last week, I was talking about how I wasn't getting enough snuggles from Jasmine, and I spent all this time looking at kittens online. And you, my friend, my kitten enabler, maybe should foster some kittens. And I was like, great idea.
Laura
Yes, I have been known to be a kitten enabler.
Shanna
Mm-hmm, very much so. And I appreciate that. I appreciate that. So that idea got in my head. And as a whirlwind whips through the ocean, this idea whipped through our family. And within two days, we had two little kittens, or have currently have, two little kittens in my office that we are fostering and they are cute.
Laura
Okay, I was going to pretend I didn't know, but of course you told me right away because I am the kitten enabler, but I get first dibs at kitten pics. So you are fostering these two little cuties. Tell me more about that. And is this like fulfilling your deep parental need for baby snuggles?
Shanna
Oh, so much. So much. These kittens are six weeks old. They're really tiny. One of them, I think, might be a runt of the litter because she's especially small and she's less than a pound. Her sister is more bright-eyed and like, you know, a little bit bigger. But, oh, I've been getting so many purrs and so many snuggles. And it's just like, oh, it's great. It's great.
Laura
Okay. But tell me, how's your postpartum anxiety doing?
Shanna
Oh, that got immediately triggered again. I was like, oh yeah, I forgot about that, right? When I got Jasmine, I was like, oh my gosh, thinking of the hundred and million ways that she could die in my home and on my watch. So I'm definitely feeling that, especially because the little one has already gotten sick and we had to take her to the vet and get her medicine. And so I'm a little worried about her, but it has elicited me this nurturing vibe of, you know, really taking care of a tiny little thing. And it really brings me back to the newborn phase of my kid's life and just wanting to like really care for this little kitten and make sure that she thrives and stuff. So I am actually loving that aspect of all of it.
Laura
Okay, so you say you're fostering them. What's the plan here? Because I have to admit that when I told Corey that you were fostering kittens, he was like, no, they're not. They're getting two more kittens. They're not, they're not fostering. They're never going to be able to give these kittens back. Are you kidding?
Shanna
Oh, I know. It's already so hard. I'm really in love with them. I've already posted in my parenting group online being like, hey, everyone is three cats, too many cats. And everyone is chiming in. Most people are like, no way. Three cats is perfect. One lady is like, I have 11 cats and, you know, so everyone's giving me encouragement to adopt two more cats. And Steve and I are going back and forth. Almost every day I wake up and I'm like, no, we're not adopting these cats. I cannot have three cats in the house. Then the next morning I wake up and I'm like, oh, but I love them so much. They're so cute. And it's a bit of back and forth. But yes, I am in love with them and I don't know what's going to happen.
Laura
When do you have to decide? Like, is there an end date to your fostering? Or is it like until someone wants to adopt them? Like, what's the deal?
Shanna
Well, we have to return them in two weeks because we are going out of town to Redondo Beach. And the shelter happens to be right on the way down to Redondo Beach. So our plan is to return them, drop them off so they can get their surgery and ready for adoption. And that's it. So that's kind of like the date I have in mind. Like, oh, my gosh, I have to decide.
Laura
Wow. Tick tock, Shanna. Tick tock.
I know.
Shanna
I know you know the fun thing about fostering is that you can allow your kids to name the kittens whatever they want because there's no long-term commitment to whatever weird names they come up with right girls you each get to name one cat whereas last time we had lists going for Jasmine and we all wanted to be happy so I just let them have a field day with naming these kittens okay so what did they come up with One of them, the littler one, she's a dilute calico, which is pretty cool. It's like a calico, but like muted colors. So pretty. Yeah, it's really pretty. And so Elle named her Coco, short for Calico, and then informed me that her actual real legal name is Chloe. So she's Chloe, aka Coco.
Laura
Okay, I love that she has an alias already.
Shanna
Yes, exactly. And then Cece named the other one, which is a Calico Tabby, very cute kitten, Tiny Tail. She named her Tiny Tail. So cute. Which is funny because she has a bigger tail than the other cat.
Laura
So here's another question for you. So do you find that having these little beings around that you're nurturing and that triggers that maternal instinct, does that bleed over to your parenting of the humans in your house? Do you find yourself parenting them differently because of these little kittens?
Shanna
No, not so much.
I really funnel all of that nurturing and tiny baby snuggles to the kittens. And then what happens is that I feel like I'm constantly correcting my kids about being gentle with the kittens. That's kind of how it works out. So not, not too much, but that's okay because, you know, I get plenty of love and snuggles from my kids already anyway.
Laura
So that's okay. That's sweet. Well, I'm here for it. I think three cats is more than I have. You also have a dog. Poor Sasha. Getting forgotten. Poor Sasha used to be the light of your lives. Now she's like kittens. She's so sweet. But you know, then it would be three cats and a dog, an elderly dog. Mm-hmm. Yeah, it's a lot. So, you know, that's definitely something to take into consideration, but, you know, you don't have to decide yet. That's right. Just enjoy the snuggles.
Shanna
I'm going to enjoy the snuggles and see what next week brings, and I'm sure I'll have an update at that point.
Laura
Alrighty.
Shanna
But for now, that's it for me, and I want to hear what you have been up to.
Laura
Well, Shanna, it's official. I'm officially a year older this week. Happy birthday! Thank you, thank you. It wasn't a milestone birthday or anything, so I really didn't know how I wanted to celebrate it. Like, I didn't think I wanted to throw a party. That seemed like a lot of work. It just didn't seem like, oh, something I had to make a big deal out of, right? But, you know, I wanted to market. I wanted to do something special. And I was thinking about it. Like, what do I want to do on my birthday? And I was especially thinking about it because Corey was like, what do you want to do on your birthday? Like, give me help. Poor Corey. May is a gauntlet for him. It's our wedding anniversary first, then it's Mother's Day usually, then it's his mom's birthday, which is either like the day before or the day after Mother's Day usually. Then it's my birthday.
So it's like this man is buying a lot of presents and planning a lot of things. In the past, I've been like, well, suck it up, dude. You signed up for it, you know, that sort of thing. But this year, I actually kind of felt for him. I was like, you know, it's okay. My birthday is the last thing on this list of celebrations for the month. done well so far, like you don't need to go out of your way to do something for me. He's like, well, you know, you want a massage, you want this, you want that. And then I remembered that my friend Marilyn had sent me four Disney passes that were expiring at the end of June. Oh, right. And I had been trying to figure out a time to go but you know school schedules and all this stuff nothing was ever lining up right and then there were you know weekend crowds and all this stuff and I was just I just kept pushing it right.
And so finally I just get a sort of idea in my head a little bug in my ear that's like go to Disneyland for your birthday you want to go to Disneyland for your birthday. Okay. And my reaction to it was interesting, like looking back, analyzing it, I went through this whole range of emotions. Like, first of all, my first thought was like, that's a kid's thing. That's the thing you do for the kids. But then I started thinking about it, I was like, no, actually, you You really like Disneyland too, Laura. The truth comes out. It's not just for the kids. And now that the kids are getting a little older, you can actually like go on some rides with them. If you remember that first time or maybe it was the second time we went to Disneyland with Sebastian when he was like eight months old or 10 months old or something. And I didn't get to go on anything. Oh, right.
Because he was either napping or nursing, and it was just like, I literally went on It's a Small World, I think, and that was the only ride I think I went on the whole time. And I was like, you know, I can now go on fun rides. Both the kids like fun rides, maybe not roller coasters, but, you know, they are into the more adventurous rides. And I could actually have fun at Disneyland. And I looked at the weather forecast and it was going to be gorgeous, like high of 70, sunny, perfect. And it's a weekday, right? And it's a weekday. So in theory, it would be less busy, although I mean, to be fair, anytime I think between April and September at Disneyland is just busy. So I would, you know, the forecast on crowd, I think it's crowdforecast.com or crowd calendar, you can like look up projections about how busy it's going to be. It was saying it was like packed.
So but not it was like the second to highest level. So that was the consideration. And then there were all these things like I don't know about you, Shanna. But I immediately think of all the reasons not to do something when things come up. And I found myself doing this. I was like, well, you know, when we go, we'd have to take the kids out of school. Like, you know, that's our child care. That's our time away. Like they need to be in school and for Augie, you know, it's like a whole process because he has to do like a work from home packet to like make up for his day off. Oh, wow. And all this stuff. Yeah. If you don't do one of those like home study, I don't remember, what do they call them? Uh, independent studies. That's what they call them. If you don't do an independent study packet, they don't count your absence as excused. And then they lose money.
They get money for every student that's at school that day. So they lose money from the state. So I was like, we'll have to do the independent thing. I was just like, excuse, excuse, excuse. And then finally, I was just like, wait a second. Fuck it. It's my birthday. If I want to go to Disneyland, I'm going to take my kids out of school. I'm going to make my husband take the day off work. And we're going to go down to goddamn Disneyland.
Shanna
Yes. Plus, you have that new sweet ride, that van with the TV screens. I mean, that's a vacation in itself.
Laura
Hell yes. So, spoiler, we went to Disneyland. It was very fun. I'm not going to go through the whole day because we've done that before. But I will say that the van was half the reason my kids were excited to go. They're like, we get to watch the TVs. They were so excited, Shanna. Oh, that's cute. Let me send you a photo of Sebastian on the way home. By the way, Corey was like, oh, we'll just turn on the TVs for their drive home and they'll fall asleep. This is at 7.56 PM is when I'm sending this photo. So we spent a decent chunk of the day at the park, but went home at a decent time, too.
Shanna
Mm-hmm.
Laura
Do you think they fell asleep watching those TVs, Shanna?
Shanna
Oh, heaven's no. Oh no. Well, he does have a tired look in his eyes, but they are wide open.
Speaker 1
He was so tired.
Shanna
He was so tired with his headphones on. Yeah. Oh my gosh.
Laura
So apparently these TVs, you have to either play it through the speaker system and you can only have one thing showing, or you have to have the headphones. Luckily, we had these headphones from like a plane trip.
they're sitting in their car seats, which have high backs, right? And these big old headphones, and they can't even like really hold their heads properly because they were in 7th Heaven, they loved it. And yeah, we just had a nice day. One interesting thing about the day was that it was kind of spent split up in a weird way because the kids didn't want to ride the same rides, you know? So we just kind of split up and we kept training, we'd meet up in the middle and have a little family time and then I swapped which kid I was with and we'd go to other things and it was very fun. One thing I will say is I did not get cake that day and Augie was very upset. He was like. But mama, it's your birthday and you didn't even get cake. Oh no. Which was so sweet.
But the next day Corey did have a cake ready for me and we had delicious cake and sang me happy birthday and yeah, it ended up being a really nice birthday.
Shanna
That's so sweet. Did you stop in a store on Main Street and get a button that says it's my birthday so everyone could wish you a happy birthday?
Laura
Oh, you better believe it, Shanna. That was honestly half the reason I wanted to go on my actual birthday too, because I wanted that mandatory happy birthday from every cast member. If people don't know when you go to Disneyland, you can get buttons that say different things. And if it's your birthday and you have a birthday button on, Theoretically, like, all staff members who notice or, sorry, cast members who notice have to tell you happy birthday. So I was very stoked about that. And my favorite one was at Star Wars Land that when we were waiting to go on the Millennium Falcon, me and Augie, when we went and got strapped in, the ride operator said, Happy Origin Day, ma'am.
Shanna
Oh, that's great. That's great. Well, my birthday is coming up and it does sound nice to get so many birthday wishes. So maybe I'll do the same.
Laura
I highly recommend it. But yeah, that's it for me this week. And I think we should move on to our special segment. Let's do it.
Shanna
We're back, and this week's special segment is GRIPEWATER, where we use this opportunity to vent and carp about the things that are really eating at us lately. Laura, you're up first, and I want to know what's your first GRIPEWATER.
Laura
Okay, Shanna. My first GRIPE is Bluey Credits and Autoplay. Do you know what I'm talking about? Have you experienced the problem I'm about to describe? Like, are you immediately like, oh yes, I know what you're talking about, or are you not so sure?
Shanna
I am not so sure because I have turned off auto play on all of our streaming services. So the kids actually have to hit the button to continue. So I'm curious what your experience is here.
Laura
So I think this is specifically something that happens on Disney Plus, although it may happen on other platforms. And I think it happens on like many shows, but it's especially obvious on Bluey because the episodes are so short. So, you know, Bluey episodes are like five minutes long, right? Ish. And they have credits that are like three minutes long or something right they have like there because they do them in about every language you can imagine right just keeps going and going and going. And normally the autoplay notices when the credits come up and then you have five seconds and it moves on to the next episode right right. My gripe is when you go back to rewatch an episode that you've already watched Which is something my kids want to do all the time like we still haven't watched all of bluey because they just want to watch specific episodes You know like they like keepy-uppy.
They love rain the one we're like Bluey and her mom are trying to like build a little dam. It's oh that episode so good I could like write a thesis on that episode. It's so good. It has so many like layers I'm just going to share one real quick. One little thing I read about rain. I was like looking up rain because I thought it was so cool. That it's like the one bluey episode that doesn't have any dialogue, right? It has like a very brief dialogue in the beginning with Bandit and Bingo leaving, right? They're going off somewhere. And so bluey and chili are just left at the house and it starts to rain and bluey just decides to make like try to dam up like a little rivulet of water that's going down their front walk. They don't even say like this episode of blue is called rain because like there's literally no dialogue after that point.
Yeah, that's right It's just a little subtle thing but the storyline is that bluey keeps trying to find more things to help dam up this river and Chili is frustrated because she keeps running in the house with money pause and, you know, and being and chili just wants to relax and she can't. And then in the end, she realizes like, oh, like I should go help her and they both like go out and do it together. And it's very sweet and touching and all that stuff. Right.
Speaker 1
Mm hmm.
Laura
But there's one scene where Bluey is trying to run into the house to get more stuff and chili is doing her best to block her in the doorway, like trying to stop her from getting past. And someone online brought up the fact that that was a mirror to what Bluey was trying to do with the water. That Bluey was trying to stop the water from flowing, but you can't stop water from flowing, it's its nature. And Chilly was trying to stop Bluey from playing, but it's Bluey's nature to play. And so she was trying to damn up Bluey's nature, but she couldn't. She eventually realized she couldn't and just let her do it. Wow. Anyway, okay.
Shanna
So deep. I love that show.
Laura
Sidebar. OK, so good. It's so good. OK, but we're watching these. We want to watch these episodes over and over again. So when you go to rewatch them, the little indicator to show how far you've watched is like three quarters of the way down because the episodes five minutes and there's like two or three more minutes of credits. So when you click on them, it skips all the way to the credits.
Shanna
Like it thinks you left off there and want to continue watching.
Laura
Yeah. And then the autoplay thing comes up and you have a five second timer to go to the next episode. And so like what inevitably happens is I click on it thinking, okay, the kids can watch their thing and I can go clean up the kitchen or whatever. And then I hear, mom, this isn't the episode I wanted. And I'm just like, oh no. It's just the autoplay thing. And then I'm trying to scrub and like I can't get it done. I will say the one good thing that's come out of this is that Sebastian has picked up the phrase, it's a bug. So I'll be like trying to fix it and I'm explaining to kids like, it's a bug. I can't, okay, I'm trying to pick the right episode. I promise, I promise, like leave me alone. And Sebastian goes, it's a bug, it's a bug.
Shanna
Oh, that's so cute. I just imagine him thinking like there's an actual bug in the TV causing this problem.
Laura
I'm sure he does. I'm 100% believe that that's what he thinks. And I'm not going to burst his bubble about it yet. He can carry that one into college. when someone will correct him and he'll be embarrassed. No, I'm just kidding. But yeah, my gripe is that like Disney, this has got to be one of your most popular things on streaming, right? And I know that when you're, I'm a programmer, right? Like I understand the problem. The problem is that you want autoplay to work at the credits and they probably have a marker for everyone's credits and it just works the same on every show. But I feel like they need to program in that if you have gotten to the credits, it resets to zero. It's marked as unplayed. I know other parents out there have this problem. Please write in and tell me I'm not alone. Because it fills me with so much rage.
Shanna
Or at least include a restart episode button there that you can go to. It really bothers me when streamers don't have that. And you have to like rewind it if you want your kids to rewatch it. And some of them are so slow. I'm just like, oh, come on.
Laura
Yeah, 100%. Yeah, this could be solved by if you could long hold on it and just say, like, start from beginning. Because there are some, I think Amazon has a little start from the beginning button that you can navigate to. So Disney, you have more money than God, OK? If you wanna hire me, I'll learn how to do Apple TV programming, okay? Just someone fix this problem, please. For my sanity and my ears from hearing my kids yell at me. So, yeah, that is my first gripe.
Shanna
We're gonna send it to Disney.
Laura
All right, Shanna, that feels like a weight off my chest. Hopefully Disney will take some action. But in the meantime, what's your first gripe?
Shanna
My first gripe really has to do with myself and my reaction to certain things in my life. Okay. And I'm curious if anyone else feels this or if this is just like a weird Shanna. a thing. So I've been feeling a lot of jealousy and FOMO lately. And I think when you're a parent, sometimes you get that feeling when you're scrolling social media and you see other people and their, you know, their activities with their family or whatever curated thing they've put online, or maybe like the families in your neighborhood, you see things they have and you want them right like a pool or something. No, that's not what I'm talking about here. Okay, those things nip at me like here and there little, little bits, but that's not what I'm talking about here. Laura, what I find myself constantly jealous of is children that I am coming across in my kids' lives.
And what it is I've realized is that it's the kids that are like the prodigy children, right? Like the really naturally gifted kids. When I go to tumbling with L, it's like, oh my gosh, those kids are so... flexible and limber. And of course, I was never like that as a kid, right? I was always like struggling to touch my toes and still am. And I'm like, I wish I was limber. And it's like, Shanna, what are you even? Why are you even like worrying about this? Like you are an adult now. You don't need to be like jealous of some kids abilities or like kids on America's Got Talent who are like amazing singers. I'm just like, oh, I get so jealous of these kids that just have these special abilities.
Laura
So wait, are you jealous of them personally? You wish you had those skills? Are you jealous because your kids are not naturally limber or whatever? Do you want these things for your kids or do you want them for yourself?
Shanna
I want them for myself, or I want them for myself.
Laura
You know what? I think that's actually way healthier. I think that's a good answer. I think that if you were really sad about it for your kids, that would be a little bit harder to deal with, but like I had to percent get the like, man, I wish I was born able to do the splits because I have had those feelings too. I will say that I haven't had them too much lately because my kids are not in as many organized sports, you know, other than parkour, but I definitely am not like, Well, you know what? That's not true. I saw a little girl holding on to like they use pipes as monkey bars, right at this parkour class. And she just went all the way across this long pipe, you know, hanging from it by her hand.
Shanna
Uh-huh.
Laura
Never in my life could I do that. I never had the grip strength, the upper body strength to do monkey bars or any of that stuff. And so I definitely looked at her and was like, damn, that would be cool. That would be cool to have. So I see it. I see where you're coming from.
Shanna
Okay, good, good. I'm glad I'm not alone here. Elle came home the other day with like a QR code that led to a class video, like her class put together this play with singing and songs and all this stuff. It was really cute, right? It was all adorable. And then all of a sudden her little friend starts singing a solo and I'm like, what? Hello? Like her voice was so good. And My first thought is, wow, she's a great singer. My second thought is, why wasn't I a great singer when I was a kid? And I'm just like, oh my God, Shanna, stop, calm down. Like, let's just appreciate the children and their abilities instead of making it about myself.
Laura
Yeah, I feel like... This must be some kind of byproduct of the age we grew up in because I feel like the nineties especially were so focused on like prodigies and people with natural talent. Like I specifically remember once telling my dad that I wanted to be an actress because that was a thing for a while for me when I was a kid and I was really like obsessed with becoming an actress. And he said to me, well, sweetheart, you can't sing and you can't dance. So how are you going to be? You need to be able to sing and dance if you're an actress. I was like, and I don't think he meant it in like. I don't think he was trying to be mean. He was a very literal person, you know, in his mind. So he probably just was like stating a fact.
Shanna
Right.
Laura
And maybe he thought it was implied that that meant I should go learn to sing and dance. But what I got out of it and held on to was like, oh, I just wasn't born a natural singer or dancer. So I guess, you know, I guess I shouldn't try. But I remember being so bitter and especially once I was an adult and realized like he could have been like, well, let's get you into singing classes or let's get you, you know, that was a more proactive way to or like let's practice singing. Let's practice dancing. But no, it was just I wasn't a singer and I wasn't a dancer. Like I felt like there was so much emphasis on like these innate qualities. It was this, you know, not the growth mindset time. It was the you either have it or you don't time.
Shanna
Absolutely. Absolutely. That fixed mindset is absolutely what I grew up with. You know, and it was no one's specific fault. It's just like the product of the times and me myself and my perfectionism and all this stuff is like, oh, I can't do that. Or I wasn't born flexible like, oh, but the other girls are and, you know, so that it definitely triggered some of those things even now. So I guess just dealing with my past issues.
Laura
Okay, so, Shanna, if you could wave a magic wand and give yourself one innate talent that you don't have or didn't have as a kid, what do you think it would be?
Shanna
Ooh, good question. The first thing that comes to mind is probably singing. I really have always thought it would just be awesome to be a great singer. Fine singer. I never really took lessons. Just, you know, I was in choir and shows and stuff. Definitely never that growth mindset of like maybe you can learn to be better. But I think it would be wonderful to be an awesome singer. And I am trying to encourage CeCe with that because lately she's really been hooked into being a singer when she grows up. She keeps saying, I want to sing when I grow up. And I'm trying to be like, great, you know, I think the first step is practicing matching pitch and like, let's get you in some lessons and like, let's do things to foster that. So I'm trying to learn from my past and bring that into my parenting now.
Laura
And what happened was she got to learn how to stand in a line for three months.
Shanna
Yeah, that was a bust. We're gonna pursue other avenues.
Laura
Yeah, I mean, I think if I could go back in time, wave a magic wand, I would choose to know how to stand in a line, innately.
Shanna
Yeah, you're not a good line standard. No, but seriously, what about you? What would you choose?
Laura
Oh, well, I can't take yours, because that was the first thing I thought of too. Like you, I'd say you're more than a fine singer, Sean. I think you're a good singer. And I imagine that if you like took voice lessons and really worked on it, you would be a really good singer. And I feel like I'm kind of similar. Like I feel like I'm an okay, okay to good singer, depending on how much I've been practicing. And I know that when I do voice, it gets so much better. When I was in high school, I went to a theater camp essentially for four weeks at Cal Arts, California Institute of the Arts. And during the theater camp, it was, you know, it was a residential camp. So it was ever all theater all the time. And we had voice class, I think three times a week. And I remember going into that thing that I'm not a singer. My dad has told me I'm not a singer.
And I have this very clear memory of when my mom and my brother came to pick me up from the camp. You know, it's like a three hour drive home to Fresno. And I was probably talking their ear off about all the life changing things that happened at the camp. And I started singing one of the songs that we sang in the voice lessons or whatever. And my mom and my brother both like craned their necks around to look at me and they were like, holy shit, Laura, what happened to your voice? And I was like, what? Really? And they're like, you can sing. They're like, do it again. And I was like, what? And so I like started doing it again. And they're like, oh my god, your voice is so good. And I was just like, what? And I'm like. And then he's like, my brother was like, we got to get home and jam. He brought his friends over with their guitars. And he was like, you got to hear Laura sing.
So I know it's possible.
Shanna
That's amazing. I love how supportive they were.
Laura
Yeah. But not to steal yours, maybe flexibility too. I could never do the splits. And it was just such a point of sadness for me as a kid. Everyone else is doing the damn splits and I could never do them.
Shanna
Yes. I did the splits one time. I tried out for cheerleading my freshman year of high school and on stage during my tryout. I got down to the splits and I like felt things ripping and my inner thighs. I was like, oh, and I never did them again. I think I pulled some serious muscles. So yeah, I hear yeah.
Laura
Well, Shanna, I think it's okay to have a little FOMO of the kids. It's not hurting anyone. It's not like you're going out and imposing anything upon your kids just because you wish you had been born with other innate talents. And I should say you were born with many wonderful innate talents.
Shanna
Aw, thank you. You too, you too, my friend. Aw, thanks. Okay, Lord, do you have another gripe water for us?
Laura
I do. Okay, so five minutes seems to be a theme a little bit of my gripes. My last one was about bluey episodes being five minutes long and, you know, the whole fiasco that happens because of the credits there. This one is about a book series that I have come to despise deep down in my soul and I cringe every time the kids try to bring it out. Can you guess what I'm talking about, Shanna?
Shanna
Is it those compilation books that are like Paw Patrol five minute stories, bluey five minute stories that are actually a lot longer than five minutes?
Laura
Yes, Shanna! Five minute stories? Are you fucking kidding me? Those are 20 minute stories, okay? The kids love these things because they have all their favorite characters in them. We have, I think we have a Ninjago one. We have a Frozen one. We have a Star Wars one. We have all these five minute stories. The biggest lie, I thought false advertising was illegal, right? Five minute stories, Ninjago. No. It's a 20 minute boring ass story of Ninjago that your kids are gonna make you read and then after like the 20 minute story is over, they're like, again, one more and you're like, no, this was our book. You don't get three books when we're reading our 30 minute story from our five minute story books.
Shanna
Yes, because it is many stories within one larger book, right? So they're just like, the book keeps going, right? And you're like, no. Yeah, that's we've definitely had to navigate that.
Laura
I will say my sub gripe is a little subset of the main gripe of the five minute story compilation books is that they end the stories inevitably on like a left side page. And then they immediately start a new story on the next facing page. That's right. And so I haven't even read the last paragraph when the kids are like, that one, let's read. Oh, I love this one. I'm like, no, no.
Shanna
That is hilarious. My girls do the same thing. Although I do like the bluey one that we have.
Laura
OK, we don't have that.
Shanna
I feel like if I read with with swiftness and efficiency, I can get through it in five minutes.
Laura
Well, I thought so too, Shada. So I thought I would time myself while taking a voice memo.
Shanna
OK.
Laura
So I'm sending it to you. We're obviously not going to listen to the whole thing on the podcast. But you can see the timestamp on it.
Speaker 1
OK, five minute story. Frozen. Five minute. What? Five minute. They're called five minute stories. Let's see if they're actually five minutes long. OK, we're going to read the first one. Frozen. I want to read.
Laura
This is the beginning. The kingdom of Arundale was a happy place. The king and queen had two young daughters.
Shanna
All right, let's see. Eight minutes and 36 seconds. That's not cool.
Laura
That was trying to talk at speed, Shanna. I was like, you know, I wasn't trying to rush through it because it's bedtime and you don't want to be like, Anna and Elsa were from a town called Arendelle. You don't want to be like, and then there was Olaf and then there was Sven. So you have to kind of talk quietly. I did get through it in eight minutes and 30 seconds. I will say it felt like 20 minutes. Also, I will say that I think that's one of the shorter ones in that book. The castle gates were open for good for the first time in a long while. Arendelle was a happy place again. And Queen Elsa and Princess Anna were the happiest of all. They had found their way back to each other.
Shanna
Before you even get to the end, he's like, I want this one.
Laura
I want this one. Kid. So yeah, I understand that these are really easy gifts to get people. They're in Target. We have received many as gifts. And when we first got them, I was like, amazing. We love books as gifts, but I have turned on them and now they are my gripes. So buy or beware. Five minute stories. They lie.
Shanna
Look, here is what I used to do, especially with the Paw Patrol once. Oh my word. Edit, edit, edit, edit. I would like turn the page and be like, and now they're setting up the stage for the play. Turn the page and then the stage crashes. And you know what I mean? Like just cut out so many sentences from those paragraphs. But you know, as we've talked about before, you can only do that so long with your kids and they start reading and it's like, read it all, you missed this.
Laura
No, I've tried. I've tried. But they because I think Corey doesn't care as much. He reads the whole thing. And so now they know when I'm skipping, even if I they have like a photographic memory or I mean, it's it's wild how much they remember. If I try to skip, they're like, you skipped, you skipped. And I'm like, huh. I did it on purpose, kid. Oh my gosh.
Shanna
Maybe those books need to disappear.
Laura
They might end up under the couch, yeah.
Shanna
Yeah.
Laura
All right. Okay, that was my final gripe. Shanna, do you have one more? I do, but I think we should come back after the break with it. Good idea.
We are back and Shanna has one more thing to gripe about. Shanna, gripe away.
Shanna
Okay. This is also book related. You really got my mind on books here. Here is my gripe. I don't know if you guys have started reading chapter books yet. I think you have with Augie, right?
Laura
Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. We've read a couple like the Dory, Phantasmicory.
Shanna
All right.
Laura
I've been saving this for a BFP, but the Wild Robot series has been one we've been really liking.
Shanna
Ooh, Wild Robot. We haven't encountered that one, so I will have to check it out. So my gripe is very specific to reading chapter books to your kids. when you alternate bedtime with your partner. Because I love that you're laughing. So because it sounds like you can relate to this. OK, so 100 percent. The kid wants to keep the consistency of reading their chapter book right and hearing it night after night. And so I'll put Elle DeBad and read her a chapter of Diary of a Wimpy Kid or whatever. She loves those books. So I'll read her a chapter of it. And then it's time for her to go to bed. And then the next night, Steve comes in and he reads the next chapter or two. And when I return the following night, I have no clue what's going on in the story of Diary Morty Kid. I've missed so much. I have to pick up from nowhere.
And then like it's one of those things where I'm just reading the words and my mind is checking out. But I like being involved in the story and knowing what's going on. So that really bugs me.
Laura
Yeah. I've been starting to think like, I did this one night actually where Augie didn't want to come to bed yet to read his books he wanted to play. So I was like, I'm going to catch up on the wild robot because I don't know what's going on. So I just start reading the wild robot. I'm like, oh, okay. Ross is getting to know the ducks. Okay.
Yeah, so I'm like, do we have to dedicate a little bit of every day to catch up with where they are on the chapter books?
Shanna
Oh, that is funny. That's a great commitment. And I really feel like that's a never have I ever parenting addition thing, right? Like, never did I ever think I'd spend my spare time catching up on kids chapter books. But yeah, you know, I want to like know what's going on or L will be like, oh my gosh, remember that funny thing that happened? I'm like, no.
Laura
Yeah, no. That was on my night. I thought your gripe might be bookmarks falling out.
Shanna
Oh God, we don't even use bookmarks. It's all page bends over here, because we cannot handle bookmarks.
Laura
It's so funny, because I don't know when it was, college or something, I stopped writing in books, I stopped bending corners, I started being very reverent with my books, and I forgot you could do that. I literally, I forgot you could bend a corner. And so I kept putting a bookmark in and then be like, where were we in trying to flip through? And then one night I got into Augie's room and I'm opening up Wild Robot and there is a dog-eared page. And I was like, oh, a solution.
So, I do know there's a lot of people who would shudder to think of bending the ear on a book, but at this point, it's the way to go. We have fully moved on to that, and it's made it a lot easier.
Shanna
Oh, good, good. I do feel bad sometimes, like if it's a nice book, like it's got kind of like the coded glossy pages. It feels like, ooh, I can't do that. Sometimes CECE will want to fall asleep in the middle of reading just a regular old picture book, you know, like, I don't know, Night Night Construction site. She'll like, bend the page. And I'm like, no, no, we don't bend pages in picture books. Okay, that's where I draw the line.
Laura
I think we'll be able to find the crane truck page again. Don't worry.
Shanna
Yes, exactly. All right. Well, I think that's my last gripe for today. I feel good having vented about all this stuff. I hope you do too, Laura. But I think it's time to move on to our BFPs and BFNs.
Laura
Yes, it is.
Okay, so we close every episode with a Big Fat Positive or a big fat negative from the week, and Shanna, I'm dying to know, do you have a BFP or a BFN?
Shanna
Well, I have to say, I think this is a little bit of both. So, I'm not sure where I land really on this, but it's been interesting. Lately, CECE has been very tuned into the words people use and the meaning of them and calling people out on the things that they say metaphorically that she thinks should be literal. So it's irritating in some ways, right? To constantly be like nitpicked about what you're saying. Like, for example, I was looking for the girl's shoes the other day, like we were rushing around to go somewhere. And then I see them under the table, the kitchen table. And I say, oh, everyone's shoes are under the table. And Cici says, everyone's, everyone's, even Jasmine's, even Sasha's, even the picture frames. And you know, and it just goes on. I'm like, ugh.
So it's a BFP and that I feel like she's smart enough to have that clever take on language, right?
Laura
Yeah, I mean, yes. I can see that that is a sign of intelligence, that she is grasping that. I can also see it being irritating AF.
Shanna
Yes, I feel like I can't say hardly anything anymore without her kind of like zoning in on one little thing and nitpicking it or telling me I'm wrong about it. Yesterday, we were walking into ride aid. I needed to get a prescription and she was with me. So we're walking through the parking lot up to the store and she goes, I wonder what prescription you're getting. And so I said, I'm getting this prescription for Elle. And I told her what it was. And she said, I didn't want to know. I didn't want you to tell me. And I said, oh, I thought you said you wonder what it was. She said, yeah, I said, I wonder. I wondered. So she was telling me the distinction between wondering about something versus wanting to literally know about it. It is crazy making in a way. I'm just like, I'm sorry.
Laura
That's not the way I think about language five-year-old. Sorry. It's a very black and white view, right? Like she obviously understands the exact meaning of words, and then it's this correcting constantly, which is very irritating. Obviously, it's not quite to this level, at least not yet. But we do joke all the time, like Corey and I will just say to each other, actually, actually, because that's his favorite word. Actually. You know, he's always correcting us with actually. And it's just so funny to me because you also end up in a spiral because your knee jerk reaction is to then correct their correction. You know, like I could see myself being like, well, when you wonder out loud, it's implied that you actually want to know. So, and you can just see escalating to a point of just no return.
Shanna
Absolutely. And I have gotten to the point where I'm just kind of like, oh, OK, it really bothers L because CECE does it to her too. And L is like, stop correcting me. And they get in like bickering matches about this stuff. And I'm just like, oh, my gosh, honey. You just gotta say, oh, okay, and let it go. The other word thing Cici's doing is what seems like she's mishearing what we're saying. So I'll say something like, oh, can you go get me a bowl? And she'll say, what's a mole? And I'm like, no bowl. She's like, no, you said mole. And I'm like, no, I said bowl. And she's like, no, you said mole. And I'm just like, did I say mole? Like what? Did I? I don't know. But I think she's fucking with me. Like she's doing some kind of like, like wordplay something and it's getting into my head. I'm like, did I say that? I don't know if I said that. Maybe she's got like some hearing loss.
Maybe she's actually not hearing. So all in all, it's kind of like making me spin out a little bit. I don't know.
Laura
Oh my gosh. Well, I think it's definitely worth getting a hearing check just in case because it sounds like to me like maybe she heard mole and she just doesn't have the understanding yet to really realize that like her perceived reality is an absolute truth, right? Hmm. Good point. Augie's the same way. If he notices something, no, that's what it is because he observed it. And it turns out having existential conversations about the variability of perception with a five-year-old only gets you so far, you know?
Shanna
Yep. Yep. Can't dive in too deep on that one. Oh yeah, man. Gosh, I guess I did say more. Well, I made a mistake.
Laura
Well, yeah, it is annoying to have someone correcting you all the time. I feel for Elle because you're an adult and you also have that whole unconditional love for your child thing, you know. But Elle being the big sister, that's got to be just so irritating.
Shanna
Yes, she really does not like it.
Laura
I'm feeling bad for my brother because I feel like I 100% went through this phase. It might have lasted 10 years. I don't know.
Shanna
Oh my goodness. All right. Well, that's mine. What do you have for us this week? Did you say this meek? Oh, I don't know. Did I? Did I stop it? Laura, you're messing with me.
Laura
No, okay. This week, I have a real BFP, a real life-changing BFP. I sent you a picture of it, and I'm gonna tell you what it is.
Shanna
Well, should I look at the picture first?
Laura
Yeah, why don't you look at the picture and tell me if you can tell what it's supposed to be.
Shanna
Oh, I... What in the... What hell is that? Okay, this is a frying pan with crispy something that looks like a snake of sorts. Is that hash browns in the shape of a snake? It's cheese snake, Shanna. It's a cheese snake. Snake. Oh my god. Okay. Why is this life changing? Tell me everything.
Laura
Okay. It's life changing. I was exaggerating a little bit, but it was a very big BFP for me this week, because as you know, Augie, super selective eater, does not like to try new foods. He has not really been eating cheese for a while now. Like Sebastian, give him a bowl of shredded cheese and he will go to town. Augie not so much, right? And so, It's been one of those things where I've been like, man, cheese is such an easy snack and lamented it for a while. So on this particular evening, Sebastian was like, I want cheese for dinner. I'm like, okay, great. I'll make cheese. He's like, I want cheese snake. I want cheese snake. And I was like, what? He was like, I want cheese snake. And I'm like, am I under, I was like, like hiss, like the animal snake. He's like, yeah, yeah. Okay. And my first instinct was be like, I don't, that's not a thing kid. I don't, I don't know what you mean.
In retrospect, I'm thinking maybe he meant like a stick of cheese, like a string cheese stick or something. But he said cheese snake. And then I was like, you know what? I've often made little like cracker chip type things out of shredded cheese. You just fry them in a pan and they turn crispy and they're actually really delicious, right? They're just little cheese crepes. You can do them in the oven too, like on a piece of parchment paper. And I was like, all right, kid, I call your bluff. I'm going to make a cheese snake. And I got the shredded cheese out of the fridge and I sprinkled it onto the pan and then with a spatula shaped it into a snake shape. And I have to say I was surprised at how well it worked. I did not think it was necessarily going to work. Took like 30 seconds to make, super easy. I made a couple of them, put them on the table, and Sebastian was super excited.
Cheese steak. Starts eating them. And I told Augie, it was like, oh, you know, they're probably going to taste like chips or crackers. They're really crispy. But I didn't do my, you should try it. You should, you know, what any of that, because I can't do that with him. And any pressure, anything, like any comments means pressure to him. So they were just on the table and I'm going about eating my dinner and I noticed him pick up a snake and kind of give it a look and then he took a nipple and he goes mmm yummy that child eat to cheese nakes and I was just like score you know like doing the little internal dance trying not to look excited.
But you know when you get like a hair brained parenting idea and 99% of the time it just doesn't work out the way you think like I'm gonna make this amazing educational activity for my toddler and you spend 90 minutes putting it together and then you bring it out and they play with it for two seconds and it's done. I thought cheesemakes were going to be like this, but I figured the risk reward was, you know, fine. The calculation was there because it didn't take much time to make. It didn't take much, many materials. And if they didn't like them, whatever, we just wasted a little bit of shredded cheese. So I'm here to report that cheesemakes worked out great in our house. And maybe you want to try it with yours. And you don't have to do snakes. You could make other shapes.
Shanna
I know, right? I'm already thinking about all the things I could do. Cheese, unicorns, or maybe that's a step too advanced to start with. I don't know.
Laura
The snake was an easy shape, I have to say.
Shanna
Yeah. I'm impressed by how much it looked like a snake. You've even got the tongue sticking out and everything, so good on you.
Laura
That was a happy accident, yeah, but yeah. So if you are looking for some new things to try with dinner, I highly recommend Cheese Snake Crackers.
Shanna
Yes, definitely going to try that. That's a great tip.
Laura
But yeah, that's it for me and I think that's it for the show.
Shanna
I think it is. Listeners, do you have any gripes that you want to get off your chest? Share them with us. We will take them on for you. We will listen. Laura, where can everyone find us?
Laura
We are on TikTok, Instagram, and Facebook at BFB Podcast. We have a website, bigfappositivepodcast.com. And if you want to send us an email, you can always throw a voice memo in there. We love those. Just send them to contact at bigfappositivepodcast.com. And finally, if you want to get some exclusive content from me and Shanna, and you want to join the absolute coolest group of people on the internet, just search Facebook for Big Fat Positive Community. You got a request to join because it's a private group and you have to answer the two membership questions, so we know you're not a robot. Once you do that, you'll be sent straight through to all the amazing, wonderful supportive conversations we're having in there.
Shanna
Our show is produced by Laura Birek, Shanna Micko, and Steve Yager. Thanks for listening, everyone. Have a big, fat, positive week. Bye. Bye.