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Hello and welcome to the momentum podcast, the show dedicated to inspiring, uplifting and empowering women on their journey through motherhood. I’m your host, Tanya Valentine, and I’m so grateful for your time and attention today! 

I know both of these things are so valuable to you, and I want you to know, I don’t take it lightly that you are using your time to tune in today.

And it is my hope that you will take away at least one thing from today’s episode that will help improve your life!  Life can be challenging, and I promise you that these challenges are temporary.  Although it might be difficult to see when you are in the middle of it, these challenges are happening for you.  They are making you a stronger, more compassionate, empathetic person.  Know that the challenge is here for your growth, and it’s preparing you for your next evolution.

Speaking of challenges, ever feel like your family’s schedule is a chaotic whirlwind of last-minute scrambles and forgotten to-dos? You’re not alone! This week, I sit down with Jessica Eastman Stewart, productivity expert and host of Joyfully Managed Life, to discuss the power of weekly family meetings. Jessica shares practical tips for making these gatherings simple, low-pressure, and even fun—yes, fun!

From tackling the invisible labor of running a household to reducing stress and strengthening family bonds, Jessica offers insight into how intentional planning can transform your home life. Tune in to hear strategies that will help your family communicate better, get organized, and create more ease and joy in your everyday lives. Let’s get started!

Tanya: All right. Welcome, Jessica to the momentum. Podcast thank you so much for coming on today.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Thank you for having me. I'm so excited to talk about this.

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Tanya: Me, too. We're talking about family meetings, weekly family meetings, and we were talking a little bit before I hit record how this is something I've been thinking about doing, but I've never actually planned it or followed through with it. So I'm so excited to learn from you today because I do think that this is something that would

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Tanya: help bring more ease into the home.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Yeah.

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Tanya: So what inspired you to start holding regular family meetings? And how did it impact your own family dynamic.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Yeah. So

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: first, st I'll say that when we 1st started this, my husband and I had some pretty little kids. So when we 1st started weekly family meetings. It was very much just the 2 of us talking about the logistics of life, and our kids are older now. They're 8 and 10, and so they do participate in part of the meeting these days. But we started with it just focusing on.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: you know, the logistics and the priorities of our family life, and so honestly, it was

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: just inspired by the fact that our lives were so complicated. You know I mean, just yesterday morning my husband came in to my office and was like, Okay, we've got, you know. Are you? Are you doing orthodontist today? Because I have a meeting? And then we have, you know, Flute, I'll take care of that, and then tomorrow I have a Zoom Meeting for the basketball team, and so I was wondering if you could do.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: The practice, you know, like the logistics of family life is just so complex. And so we were starting to drop some balls. You know, we were starting to realize that

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: we were not as organized as we wanted to be about what was going on in our lives, and we just needed a space to get a little bit more together. And so that was kind of the inspiration for starting this.

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Tanya: Yeah. Yeah. And that's the funny thing like becoming a mom and having a family, is it? Just?

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Tanya: It's so chaotic.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Yeah.

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Tanya: So I like the idea. These family meetings kind of helping to like coordinate some of that chaos so like balls won't be dropped. And you know things won't be forgotten about so why do you believe weekly family meetings are a valuable tool for busy families?

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: I mean, honestly, just because of what you just said. There's just so much going on, you know.

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Tanya: There is.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Whether it's like home stuff, you know, like our literal, the shelters we live in, and the fact that they need attention right, you know to children, logistics to parenting priorities to, you know, money to like relation. I mean, there's just so much that

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: needs to be thought about and discussed, you know, to keep a family running, that this is one of the tools that helps us do that much better than kind of the ad hoc way. We were previously doing it.

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Tanya: Yeah. And it really, it is like running a business, isn't it? And.

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Tanya: It's so much better. I feel like moms

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Tanya: many times end up. We just feel like we have to take all of the responsibility like it all falls on us.

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Tanya: But I love this idea of having a family meeting because it's an opportunity

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Tanya: put it all out there on the table like this is. These are all of the things that are on my plate, or it should be our plate, because.

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Tanya: We're all like a family. We're all a team. And yeah, I love the opportunity of

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Tanya: just presenting that to everybody. So everybody can see, like all of the things that you're you're responsible for as a mom, or all the things that are possibly going on behind the scenes. And then that's the opportunity to

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Tanya: get help like.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Yeah, right.

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Tanya: Delegate. Yeah.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Absolutely. You know, one of my favorite books is fair play by Eve Rodsky, and I'm a certified facilitator for this method. But it's really just a book and a concept and a practice about trying to make the running of a home a little bit more visible, so that we can

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: be more intentional about how we split that work among the adults in the home, and I think that weekly family meetings are a really good way to move towards a more intentional split of that labor, you know, and most families a 50 50 split isn't exactly going to be the right fit in any given chapter, but.

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Tanya: Yeah.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Without intention, you know, we often fall into some of those kind of you know, just

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: old structures of the the mom, feeling really responsible for that, that

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: might have worked better when women weren't also holding full-time jobs in many cases, you know, or part-time jobs. And so weekly family meetings definitely allow, making visible more of the work of running a family and a home, so that we can be more intentional about who is holding. Which of those things.

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Tanya: Yeah. And I would imagine it would help with relationships, too, and prevent resentment.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Yes.

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Tanya: Absolutely.

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Tanya: Yeah. So that one person isn't doing all this work and not feeling valued because they're underappreciated because of things that all the things that they're doing, that nobody like sees

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Tanya: So yeah.

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Tanya: what do you think so like for me? I told you this is something like I've heard about like years ago, but I've never, and I've always said like I wanted to do it. But then I don't plan to do it, and then I don't do it. So what do you think are some of the most common barriers that prevent families like mine, like myself?

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Huh!

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Tanya: From starting, or even maintaining family meetings, and then how can they overcome them?

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Yeah, absolutely. So. I think one piece is just the idea that meetings are for work. You know, it's a very formal thing.

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Tanya: And so.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Doesn't fit into the home life. And so they want their home life to be more, less structured. And so this kind of doesn't fit with that concept of how they imagine home life to be. So that's 1 piece. And I think that another piece is just. It's another thing to manage, you know, and folks.

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Tanya: Yeah.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: And just very overwhelmed already with all the things. And so they're thinking, this is just another thing I have to plan for. Get.

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Tanya: People want.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Board to do, and then remember to do. And so that that is all true. It is work to create this structure. I would say that in my experience. And then the experience of you know hundreds of people that I've talked to about this concept. It makes things easier, but it it does require that startup energy, you know. It's just like I.

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Tanya: Yeah.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: A friend the other day. I have an instant pot, and I was like, do you have an instant pot? I love this thing. I use it all the time. I've had it for years, and she was like, I'm a little overwhelmed by the whole concept. And I told her, you know when I 1st got this instant pot. I think it was 6 months before I finally used it, because I needed to like wait until I had enough energy to be like, okay, what are all these buttons? And what am I doing? And I think that there's something about you know anything new requires just some intentional effort

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: to think about what I want to do. How am I going to get people on board? So that energy is sometimes hard to come by if you can get it together and create the structure. I do think it really does pay off. But I'm not going to pretend that starting a new thing in your home doesn't require some intentional energy, that is, you know, you got to find to be able to pull it together.

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Tanya: Yeah.

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Tanya: but well worth it. Once you put in the work on the front end because it's gonna actually buy you time in the future. Yeah, yeah.

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Tanya: So speaking of putting work in on the front end.

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Tanya: how can families keep these meetings simple and low pressure? So they don't feel like just another item on the to do list.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Yeah, I think one thing is having an agenda is really helpful. You know, our brains are really good places for having ideas and really pretty terrible places to keep them so having, even if it's just a post-it note on the microwave that just says, in our weekly family meeting we're going to talk about these 2 things. Now.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: I think the other thing related to that is trying to do too much to start. So people think you know this meeting is going to be where we talk about everything that we ever might want to talk about, and that can make it so that your 1st meeting can take away too much time and feel overwhelming, and you kind of lose.

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Tanya: Yeah.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Momentum. And you're like, Oh, my gosh, I'm kind of is this meeting ever going to be over? So I think starting small

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: is really important. So I would recommend that people that to me, if if we're ever in one of those red zone moments of life where things are just bananas, and we are so stressed, and we don't feel like we have enough time to talk about all the things we would love to talk about. The one thing that we always make time to talk about in our weekly family meeting is the calendar. And so if you're

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: calendar.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: just talk about the calendar for the week. So just sit down and spend 5 or 10 min saying, Okay, what's coming up this week?

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: And that is where you're gonna identify any potential problems. Right? So you know, oh, I have an early meeting. I normally take the kids, can you take the kids on Wednesday? Right? Like you just figure out.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Who's doing softball practice? Right? So you look at the calendar and identify any like, you know, logistical issues. Then the other thing you're thinking about is, do any of these things on the calendar require pre-work, you know. So if Kid is going to birthday party next weekend.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: there might need to be a gift acquired, you know. So who's on deck for that? Right? We're having our in-laws over for dinner on Sunday. What are we going to cook. And do we have what we need for that? Right? So you might also identify essentially like work that needs to happen before anything that's on the calendar. Oh, there's another spirit week. Children have to wear a.

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Tanya: Oh, my God!

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Wednesday, you know. I know.

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Tanya: One coming up next week.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Exactly. And so you know. So that is it. So if if all you do is just talk about the calendar, this work is already happening right like somebody is already thinking about all of this, but having the conversation together can also make an intentional choice to say, Can you take the lead on that, because I'm going to take the lead on this and make it much, more, much more helpful. And together. So I would suggest, folks just start small and.

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Tanya: I love that. Yeah.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Do the calendar, if nothing else. And then over time you might have ideas that we're going to talk about all these other topics, and that can be great. But I would say, maybe even make your agenda like. Say, if the only thing we talk about is one thing, it's going to be the calendar. If we have more time, we will also talk about the broader list of all the things that are in our head that need to be done

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: and clarify. Who's doing? What like are you? Gonna return that to the store, you know. Are you know who? Oh, are? The thing fell off the wall like, what's the next step to like? Fix that, you know, and.

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Tanya: Yeah.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: You know. Oh, that picture needs to be hung. Can you take the lead, you know, like, so that might be. The next thing on the list is just what are all the things living in your head, or when you look around your house that need to be done or talked about. Maybe that's the.

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Tanya: Yeah.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: If you've got a little more time, you're gonna just clarify. And my husband and I, we just have a simple legal pad on a clipboard, and it says, You know, Jess, in one column, John in the other column, and together in the other column. And you know, as we are talking through the meeting. We're just jotting things down like Jess is. Gonna get that birthday gift. John is going to order the new toilet paper holder because the other one broke

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: right? And then together are things that we either need to decide, you know. Like, let's make a decision about.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: You know whether we're going to travel for Thanksgiving, you know, that's like a thing that isn't just a task. It's like a deciding thing or a discussion we need to have. And it needs to happen together, or like I cut my husband's hair so he'll be like, Hey, can you cut my hair this week, you know, and so we both have to be there for that, unfortunately, you know. So you know, that goes on there together. So those are the 3 categories. And we just simply as we're talking through the calendar. And what needs to be

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: done? We're just capturing like, oh, yeah, you're gonna do that. You're gonna do that. You're gonna do that so that we've got an easy list of what needs to be done that week.

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Tanya: Okay, I love that. And then I just, I'm curious.

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Tanya: So whose idea was it to start the family meeting? Is it yours or your husband's.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Oh, absolutely me. I'm definitely.

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Tanya: Sure.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Systems person in our life. So I, you know, and I would call myself kind of the president of the family meetings, and we use that language, you know, to talk about who owns things kind of, you know, in our home. So, for example, my husband is the president of Cas. So if it has to do with like

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: cats needing to go to the vet or needing food or a litter box needing to be cleaned or new litter need to be ordered. He's the president of all of that. I'm also the president of like gifts. I'm the president of like reading emails from

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: the school, you know. So we have clarify, you know, whereas you know, he's the president of like children's extracurricular activities, like he generally takes the lead on, you know kid needs to go here. Kid needs to go there and then he, you know, alerts me when, hey? These are conflicting, and I need you to do this one. So I can do this other one, you know. So. But I'm definitely the kind of driver of these meetings, because, you know, I'm kind of the Systems person in our in our family. But my husband has

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: gotten on board both because he's just a great human, and, you know generally will support me if I say I'd love to try this idea, but also because we've both realized how much less last minute stress exists in our life because we take the time to spend, you know, between 10 and 40 min, you know, depending on the week and what we have going on to like, just get ourselves together for the week in a conversation.

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Tanya: Yeah. So was it hard to get him on board? Or were you just like, did you just present this idea to him? And he was like, Okay.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Yeah, he's he's kind of an easygoing guy. So it wasn't that hard. But I do think that for folks who are worried about getting someone on board. I think some of the strategies you can try. One of them is just ask them to try it with you. You're not asking them to commit to having a weekly family meeting for the rest of their lives. What you're asking them to do is say, Hey, can we try to have a weekly family meeting once a week in February, you know, and then see if it's helpful, you know, and we could decide.

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Tanya: Okay.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: So essentially, you're not. You're not marrying the idea. You're dating the idea. You're just seeing how it goes. And you know you're also going to tweak it. You're going to, you know. So, for example, we used to do meal planning as part of our meetings. We talk about. What are we going to eat for dinner in the coming week? And we decided at some point that wasn't that helpful? It was. We didn't need to do that together. We were fine, with just one of us owning it so over time we've kind of passed that responsibility back and forth, and sometimes

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: he's the lead on meal planning, and sometimes I'm the lead on meal planning right now in our lives. I'm taking the lead on meal planning, and he does

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: the cooking most of the time. So that's what our our division of responsibility looks like. But for a while we were doing that in the meeting. And we, you know we're just like, we can just skip this part like we don't really care enough to like. It's it's fine with us. If he makes a plan. And he's like we're gonna have Lasagna on Monday. And you know, Tacos, on Tuesday, like, I'm like, that's fine, you know. I don't need to actually do that together.

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Tanya: Yeah.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: You're gonna try different things and then realize like, Oh, let's add this or remove this or do this differently, you know. So really, you're just saying like, Hey, let's try this, and then I'd love to get your feedback on whether it's helpful, and then we can figure out. You know how to make it better, or you know, maybe it won't work for us, and we can quit. But just give me a chance to try it. It's something I'd really like to try. I think, that can help get people on board when they might be a little bit hesitant. You could also set a timer.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: You could also say, Hey.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: we let's just do 15 min of getting organized with what's going on in our lives, literally set a timer, and at the end of that you're going to stop, you know, and you're going to be more organized at the end of that 15 min than you were to start, even if in a perfect world, all the things you need to talk about would take you longer. The 15 min is a good start. So those are a couple of things you can try.

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Tanya: Okay, I love those tips. And then what tips do you have for involving children?

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Yeah.

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Tanya: In a way that makes them feel included and even excited about family meetings.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Yeah. So I think 1st is, most kids, unless they're like, you know.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: teens or older preteens. I think they're probably not going to be there for the whole meeting, and even teenagers. I you know I don't have teenagers yet, but I don't anticipate my teenagers when they're that old being involved in the entire meeting, because there's just going to be some things that my husband and I want to talk about that don't involve the kids right? So I suggest invite inviting them to part of the meeting, you know. Maybe at the end

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: they come in for the last couple of minutes, I think making it fun could be that there's popcorn at every meeting, you know, popsicles, or you know there could be.

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Tanya: Candy.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Like always exactly candy. Another thing is, you know, to keep us focused during our meetings. Our kids are generally on screens, to be honest, you know, and we started that when they were little where we knew that we needed to have some focus time. And the kids watching a show was a way that we could get that focused time. So our kids were really into it. They're like, Are you starting your meeting yet?

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Tanya: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Because we're ready for Dora when they were little. And so that worked for them. But you know, I know some folks who actually do these meetings during

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: the workday like the traditional. You know, they're like Thursday at 4 pm. Like, we've got flexible roles. And we do that because our kids are, you know, at school, or in some sort of after school program, right? Or I know some folks who have grandparents support. So you know, the grandparents come over every Saturday morning for a couple hours. They like retreat to Panera, and like have some like.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: you know, pastries, and do their meeting. So there's lots of ways you can think about the timing of it.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: But in terms of the kids coming in for part of it, I think that you can make it fun, too, by, you know, there's a book. It's called Rules for Happy Families, and there's a chapter about weekly family meetings in there that I thought was really helpful. It's by a guy named Bruce, and one of the suggestions he has is that there's like some

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: like somebody starts welcoming everybody in the house to the meeting by doing like a you know, like a drum roll on the kitchen table, you know, like.

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Tanya: Okay, that's cute.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: You know, and then everybody hears it. They know it's time to come to the table, you know, and have that conversation. I think, having an agenda is really helpful, and it can be really simple. I think that you know the kids, you'd want them to be able to articulate something that is important to them, and like, talk about.

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Tanya: Oh, yeah.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Going on in their lives and then get the update. So you might, for example, maybe the adults have talked about the logistics of the week. Then they can look and see if there's anything the kids need to be in the loop about like, Hey.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: you know, Daddy's gonna do ballet on Thursday, because mommy's gonna be out of town, hey? We wanted to ask your thoughts on, what should we get for Rj's birthday this coming week like, do you have any quick ideas? What is Rj, like? And oh, Rj, likes spider-man? Okay, great. We'll write that down on the list, because, you know, Daddy's taking the lead on getting a gift for Rj, and now we know that Rj really likes spider-man. So you can kind of update them on what's happening this week

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: anything that was discussed. Maybe you, during the meeting made a decision. Hey? We're gonna do Thanksgiving at grandma's. And you know, Christmas with Nana. We wanted to let you know. Do you have any questions about that? You know, so they can essentially get the the waterfall of updates from the meetings the adults have. If there's anything that you want to keep them in the loop about. So that's 1 part. The other part could just be questions like.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Hey, what's something each of us are proud of this week, and everybody, including the adults, goes around and says, You know, hey, I'm proud that you know, I got out for 3 walks this week. That's something that really makes me proud. Or you know, the Kid might talk about. You know, I got to a new reading level at school. Or, you know, I got to a new level in my video game. You know, whatever it is that they're proud of. Everybody can share something they're proud of. You could also ask people to share

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: a goal or something that they're, you know, looking forward to this week.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: you know, just as a way to connect with each other and.

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Tanya: No.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: So, you know, if I share, you know, this is actually a real current example is that I have a goal. In the month of January, of going for 3 walks each week, and I told my family that and my kids have been saying like, after dinner, like, mommy, you want to go for a walk, you know.

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Tanya: Keeping you accountable. Yeah.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: And there's.

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Tanya: That.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: But I like, you know.

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Tanya: Yeah.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Like I might not have made that choice. But they're like, Hey, you want to go for a walk. And I'm like, Yeah, so I think, keep it simple and just ask one or 2 questions and over time, just like getting adults on board. Maybe you want to talk to them about family priorities and money topics, and who's doing what I mean?

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: But in the beginning I would just say, Make it simple. What are you proud of this week. What's something you, you know, want to do this week, or something you need support with this week, you know. And here's some key updates about what's going on in the family life that we wanted you to know, you know. So that's how I would get kids involved to start, you know. And you could also, just I mean, when we 1st started, our kids weren't involved at all when they were like 2 and 3 years old, you know. So

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: yeah, I think that it's okay. Yeah.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: When kids are really little like, they don't need to be a part of this, you certainly could bring them in and say, What's something you're proud of, and you know what's something you would like to do this week, you know, and like a 3 year old, could certainly be like. I want to go to the Park, and I'm proud of, you know. I went to the Park, you know.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Little ones might say that kind of stuff, and that could be good to like, build the habit right? But you know, it's okay to start without the kids, even for a couple months while you're getting your in. You know things going, and then say later, we'll bring the kids into this. But for now we're going to prioritize the the part of this that just gets us more together, you know, and then later, we might bring in the stuff that is building our family culture and all of that.

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Tanya: Yeah. And I love the idea of involving the kids and having them see this

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Tanya: and teaching them the skills

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Tanya: that I think come with this, like the skill of just communicating and planning and problem solving. Yeah, I think like, this is not something that we did as a family like my family

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Tanya: same.

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Tanya: I was a child growing up, and I just feel like it would just help set them up for success.

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Tanya: cause. I feel like just the skill of planning. It's such an essential skill to to be able to learn. Oh, my gosh!

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Tanya: Oh.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Yes, I mean exactly

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: exactly just all of those little things. Because, for example, like in the meeting, one of the skills that we've had to develop is deciding.

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Tanya: Decisions to decision.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Yeah, yeah, so exactly. So like sometimes in the meeting, we will realize, you know. Oh, something's on my mind, is we got to figure out summer camps

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: right, you know, or you might say we got to decide if we're going to say yes to that invite. We got to go on that trip with those other families, you know. Are we going to do that camping trip? Like, you know, these essentially decisions will pop up and you have to decide sometimes in the moment.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: do we just do we actually have that conversation right now and make that decision, you know. And sometimes the answer is. Yes, like, let's talk about that for a few minutes and actually land that plane. Let's decide. Like, are we going camping? Are we not going camping right. And sometimes you realize, oh, that's a whole big thing that we need to talk about. And so it actually goes on the list

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: of things to do this week, right? Like it's like on the list of things to do together is decide about camping trip. Right? So my kids see us have those moments and say, You know what? We're not going to be able to have enough time to have that entire conversation. So let's write that down to make sure we do make that decision, but we're not going to do it right now. But sometimes you're like, you know, what? We could just have a 2 min conversation right now, and just

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: decide, you know, and move on. So even those kinds of structures can help build those critical thinking skills about, you know how to not get caught up in like, Oh, my! Gosh! Somebody just brought up this very complicated thing. And now we're going to be talking about that for the next hour, like staying focused on the bigger picture and clarifying like when to just go down that bird walk and like.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: have that conversation. And when you need to like, write down the conversation for the future.

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Tanya: Yeah, that brings up for me, that's prioritizing to another great skill. Yeah, awesome.

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Tanya: So how can family meetings help parents reduce stress guilt and overwhelm.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Yeah, I mean, I think here it's mostly the fact that it's 2 parts. One planning is is so helpful to reducing stress, right? Like nobody has ever planned a week and then had it go the way they expected in history. Right? We know that there's going to be things that happen this week that we cannot.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: We don't know yet an email that I'm going to get a text that I'm going to get a call that I'm going to get like. We just don't know all the things that are coming up, but people who have planned are still better able to pivot than folks who haven't. They're able to, instead of this vague sense of like, Oh, my gosh! I have so much going on! They've generally got something written down about what they need to do, and they can then look at that plan and be like, well, that still needs to happen. So I'm gonna be up late tonight doing that.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: But that is definitely going to be next week now, because of this new thing that just popped into my life, that is now more of a priority. Right? So the planning reduces stress. Right? The other thing is role. Clarity reduces stress. That's true at work. And it's true in family life. When we know

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: we have decided that you are responsible for that. And I am responsible for this.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: So much less stress is created right? So you end up with like less of that last minute like Oh, my gosh! There is a birthday party happening in 45 min, and nobody thought about the present until right now.

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Tanya: Hmm.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: You know. And now we're like running to target. And it's like stressful.

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Tanya: Yeah.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Like, you know, it's so much easier to have thought ahead. And then, like, Search the Internet for spider-man Legos, you know. And then, just like that is like a 4 min task compared to like a whole trip to target that we have to do at the last minute, right? So it honestly just saves time because you're able to do the efficient version of things instead of the last minute version of things, and that clarity of who's doing what is just a huge

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: thing that you know makes any team, whether that's a family team or a work team when they have that they're working so much better together.

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Tanya: Yeah, I agree. Yeah, not. It helps with

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Tanya: it doesn't all fall on one person, which

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Tanya: I feel like happens in a bicycle.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: It really does. Yeah.

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Tanya: Yeah, so can you share an example of a specific problem or challenge that a family meeting helps resolve in your life.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Yeah, I mean, absolutely. So. You know whether it's that like example of like the last minute birthday present that now we've got to like spend an hour on instead of the 4 min version that we could have spent on if we'd done it 3 days ago. That's an example. I mean. Another example is like literally forgetting to pick up a kid because you're like, I thought it was you. And you thought.

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Tanya: It was me.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: You know. And now we're getting a call from the after school program. That's like, Hello.

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Tanya: Everyone.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Way, but you're like, no, but I'm getting on my way right now. So all of those things have been so much more helpful. I also think you know, planning ahead saves money right? So when you're.

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Tanya: Yeah, like.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: When you, you know, instead of just having that random like thought in August, like, we've got to figure out our holiday travel plans like when you have that weekly family meeting, it creates a space where you know it's not a hundred percent. But it's more likely that you're going to like, bring that up and be like, Oh, yeah, we got to talk about that soon and like capture it that somebody needs to think about that. And you're going to save money from not doing that. 2 months later, you know.

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Tanya: Yeah.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: All of all of those things are made easier by this just intentional pause to clarify what is going on and what we need to do.

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Tanya: Yeah, yeah, so what tools or resources do you recommend to help families plan, structure, or stay consistent

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Tanya: with their family meeting?

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Yeah. So I mean, one tool is, I have a guide to weekly family meetings. It's got lots of tools. And so I made a code for everybody listening to this podcast so I want your audience to be able to get it for free. So people can go to just weeklyfamilymeetings.com. The code is momentum or momentum, and so folks can get that for free. So that's 1 tool. But I think the other things are having an agenda.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: and don't overcomplicate this. It can be a post it with 2 or 3 topics on it right? And you can clarify like, you know, when we if we run out of momentum or steam halfway through, we at least went in the priority order, you know. And so that's good. So, having a written agenda. Instead of just saying, Let's sit down and talk about life like having an agenda to.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: We're gonna start with calendar. Then we're going to go to to do's, you know, and then you can add other things there. So you know. And here are some things that other people do. Some people like to talk about money at these meetings, you know they like to. If they're tracking their budget somewhere, they want to take a look at that, you know. Have conversations. I would put that lower on the list, because I think that in the average week you could probably skip that and still be okay in many cases, but some folks

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: like to do money, one of the things that we put on the list, and sometimes we spend time talking about and sometimes we don't is like kid priorities.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: This is where we just call the question about anything that

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: we're thinking might need attention with our kids, you know. So this is where we say things like.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: I don't think our screen time plan is going. Well, you know, like we need to figure that out, you know, or is it time to potty train the little one, you know? Like, when is that gonna happen? Or I don't like how the kids are just throwing their bags on the floor when they come in at the end of the day. Like, should we get some hooks or something? You know, it's just all of these little kids, or like we're worried about so and so's reading, you know, like, that doesn't seem to be going. Well, you know, what could we

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: do about that right? Or just anything related to caring for your kids and raising your kids.

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Tanya: Bedtime.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Yeah, just like, you know, is it time for them to make their own breakfast, you know, like, okay, what would that look like? Right like this is the space to have all those conversations. So sometimes we say, you know what there's not much to talk about here, and sometimes we're like, yes, the thing I'm worried about is this, and, like you, you know, either have a conversation or write down like, figure out what to do about this, you know, as like a thing that needs to be a talk to

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: at some point later. So I think, having that agenda can be really helpful. I think

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: you know some people like I mentioned like meal planning could go on your agenda if that is like a helpful thing to talk about. So those are some of the, and you could add honestly anything else. So let me give an example. You might be in a chapter of life where a specific long term project needs regular conversation. So let's say you are like planning a home renovation like you might need to put that topic on your agenda like every week, for like a while, right? Because

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: every week

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: to be something. Or if you have a kid applying to college that might be like college applications might need to be there every week, so that you could say like anything we need to talk about with college applications right now, you know, and maybe the answer some weeks is, no, we're good. We ended up talking about that yesterday. So we're all updated. But sometimes you're like, Oh, yeah, good point. We need to do XY, and Z. So I think your agenda can also change over time. But having that agenda is key, and then.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: I think, having a regular time, you know. Put it on your calendar set in a reminder so that you're, you know, like, in our house, like, you know, we have reminders that are done by our A. LEXA device that I can't say, because it'll then trigger it.

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Tanya: Oh yes, yes.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: And you know, so it it, you know you could say that. You know, every Saturday morning at 10 am. Like, remind us to have our family meeting, you know, and it'll be like announcing, you know, you know.

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Tanya: Instead.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Little systems to help. You remember when you want to do it, you know, but also you can tweak it. Maybe you try, you know, doing this meeting on Sunday evenings, and then that stops working because, you know, it just isn't a good time. And then you decide. Let's try Saturdays now or Thursday afternoons, you know, so you can put it on your calendar, but also hold that lightly because it might.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: It's changed.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: or in a given week. Your Saturday morning won't work because you have a big, you know, basketball tournament for the kids. And then that's going to be Saturday afternoon that week, because, you know, Saturday morning is just not a thing. So you know, be flexible, but also put it on that calendar to help you remember, to actually do it, and use reminders and other systems to support you, to make it happen.

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Tanya: Okay, I love this. So I wrote down, have an agenda and start small, like, just focus.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: A single.

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Tanya: On the calendar. What's going on that week like don't so don't over complicate it. Having a regular time. I love the idea of using a LEXA. Because I also think that that will double, as that will help get my kids excited about it because they love a L.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Yeah.

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Tanya: And they love to do like announcements on there. So I think that they'll love, maybe even having a job to ask her to

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Announce it.

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Tanya: Yeah, to remind us every whatever day and time we decide on. So I love that having a regular time using a LEXA reminders. And then being flexible because things happen. And sometimes we just need to trial and error. And yeah, there are just seasons of life like you said, like.

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Tanya: sometimes it's basketball season. And that Saturday morning slot is gonna have to be moved to a different time.

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Tanya: Yeah. So I love that.

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Tanya: And then for families who are oh, and then to your guide, I'm I'm excited. We're gonna include that in the show notes for everybody to access?

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Tanya: And so for those families who are hesitant to start, maybe. What would you say? What would you recommend? One small action? They can take this week to begin implementing family meetings in a meaningful way.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Yeah, I would just say, don't even call it a family meeting. If you're worried that you're I mean you could dive right in if you're like me, you might be all into systems, and you've already got like a document open, and you're like jotting down your ideas, and that's great. Go for it. But if you're feeling like I could see myself being unsuccessful with this, because I'm trying to do too much, or I'm worried that I can't get the people in my house on board. With this

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: I would just say, ask this weekend for the other adults in your home if there are right, and if there's not a single families can do that, single parents can do this too, just on their own, just getting their calendar open, getting a place to write down tasks and just getting organized for the week.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: But if there's other adults that you're involving in this, just say, Hey, could we spend 10 min talking about this week's calendar and what's going on, and just ask for that, you know. And then just sit down and say, Okay, tomorrow is blah blah on Tuesday. We've got this.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: and then just spend 5 or 10 min doing that conversation and clarifying you could write it down, or.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: you know, just talk about it honestly, it'll be better just having had that conversation. So just start with that. And then later, you can say that was really helpful. Can we do that again?

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: You know.

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Tanya: Okay.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Hey, you know, can we actually write down everything, you know, so that I, you know, helps me remember, like we, you know, last week we talked about it. Could we actually write down who's doing what that would be super helpful for me? Right? And then you can kind of move into, hey? Our calendar conversations are going really well. Could we also include just like General to do's that are living in our heads so we could get those organized like. For example, I'm thinking about this.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: could we talk about anything that needs to be done this week? So just kind of build up and kind of add to it over time.

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Tanya: Yeah, I love this. And I'm gonna tell you what. Well, I love it for so many reasons. But for me, I think that this is going to be helpful with my mental health, because I'm doing all of these things, but on my own, and I'm not communicating it to anybody else in my family. I'm just like taking it all on.

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Tanya: and I really think it will be helpful to communicate this with Chris. My husband. Just so he sees like this is all that I'm I think it will help, and I'm sure, and I'm sure I am not alone in this. So that's why I'm like saying.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: You're fine.

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Tanya: Loud to anybody else.

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Tanya: That's that like feeling the same way, like.

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Tanya: I do think maybe you'll feel a little bit more appreciated, and maybe also you'll get a little bit more help.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Yeah, absolutely.

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Tanya: Sleeping.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: You know exactly.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: And over time, you could even add, like, you know, relationship could be on the list of like, how are things going between the 2 of us, and you can go

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: than logistics, you know, and that's a space for somebody to be like, you know, that interaction we had last week didn't feel good, you know, or Hey, I'm feeling a little underappreciated, or you know, hey? I would like to do more date nights, you know. So you know, you can over time add those kinds of topics that are a little bit deeper about, you know, are we having the relationship we want to have, and you know, hey, how are your how?

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: How are you doing, you know? Do you have any goals for this week that I can support you with, you know, and I can hear my husband say, you know what I really need to get back into the peloton, and that then allows me to say, you know, on Tuesday morning, hey? Are you gonna have time to do peloton today? You know.

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Tanya: Yeah.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Support him with that right.

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Tanya: And what can I do? Yeah, what can I do to support you? Yeah.

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Tanya: exactly. So you can add all of those more deep things start with the logistics because it's just a little easier. But over time this can be a space to talk about some of the bigger things that are happening in our lives, and I think that can be really, really meaningful for folks. So.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Yeah, that's 1 of the things I love about it.

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Tanya: Yeah, I. It really comes back to that connection. Yeah. And I think it can help bring families closer together for sure.

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Tanya: So this has been wonderful, Jessica, thank you so much. Where can people find you? And are there any other resources you'd like to mention before.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Absolutely.

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Tanya: Up here.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: Yeah. So I'm at Jessica eastmanstewart.com. If you go to Jessica eastmanstewart.com slash freebies, there's a whole bunch of free resources as well, so folks might. Those are all about getting more organized at work and at home, so folks can find some great stuff there. I'm on Instagram at joyfully managed family, and on Linkedin, at Jessica, Eastman Stewart. So on joyfully managed family. I'm sharing more things about kind of getting organized and having more fun at home and on Linkedin. It's more about getting organized and having more fun at work.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: And I also have a podcast it's 2 or 3 min a week. So it's really short. They're very quick tips. So it's called joyfully managed life. And yeah, they're just quick little tips about things that make life a little more easy and joyful. So if folks are listening to podcasts which I imagine they are, if they're here

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: like, you know, little short tips, then joyfully managed. Life might be a good fit for you.

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Tanya: That's such a neat idea. I love that. Okay, Jessica, thank you so much for your time. Today, I'm really excited for our listeners to learn from today's episode. And if it works for them to start implementing all the ideas and tips that you gave us today, I know I am going to. I think it really will help bring my family closer together, and

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Tanya: just help with the whole family dynamic, and make things go a little bit more smoothly. So thank you.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: I'm excited to hear how it goes.

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Tanya: Yes.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: For everybody folks can. Definitely, you know. Email me. If you sign up for any of my freebies, I'll send you an email with it, and you can just respond. But I'd love to hear from folks about how it's going. I love to see how people are, and also just answer people's questions if they're struggling with things, so I hope folks will be in touch. It's been lovely to talk about this. I could talk about weekly family meetings all day long, so thank you for having me, and I'm excited to get to meet some of the folks in your audience.

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Tanya: All right. Me, too. Thank you so much. I'll talk to you soon.

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Jess Eastman Stewart | jessicaeastmanstewart.com: All right, bye.

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Tanya: Bye.