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Welcome to the Carpool podcast with Kelly. Trigger warning if you're with kids, but the sizes are marked as a six and a seven. Do you know, like, you know I had to say the trigger warning? Oh yeah, um, six, seven. And Liz. People love, when I talk about my Pathfinder, people love to ask like all Nissan's crap out on them. It's like, number six, stop 10 for new car reliability, okay. Your mom time off starts now. Welcome back to the Carpool podcast with Kelly and Liz. Happy Wednesday. Huh? Okay, a little tired there. Sorry, I'm a little tired. Um, yeah, this like past weekend rocked me. My husband was out of town for the like marine stuff and my kids. Let me just, let me just be a really original mom who just complains about how tired she is. The other night, my longest stretch of sleep was from 830 p.m. to 1130. And then someone was up, someone was screaming, someone needed me. So I was like exhausted and Maddie was coming home that next day. And he was able to get on an earlier flight and I called him and I'm like, the way you are my night and shining armor right now. For coming home to save me from this situation. And he was like, all of that's all I ever want to be as a night and shining armor. And I'm like, this is to my husband who's been deployed five times. This is the most heroic thing you've ever done in your entire life right now. Well, yeah, I'm glad he's home. Yeah, me too. We had, well, first of all, I just wanted to say thank you guys all for the incredible feedback on our Christmas episode. Everyone seems to just love the tips that we shared and I feel like we really got people in the spirit. I'm feeling so Holly Jolly. How about you? What's your Holly Jolly meter at? No, I would say my Holly Jolly is pretty good. Like I have been using it excuse to like throw a Santa hat on and like wear a Christmas sweater. I don't feel like I really thrived in the decor this year and now I really I'm going to be like a early November Christmas girl moving forward because it is so much freakin work to put all these Christmas decorations up and to have them because like day after Christmas like January one. I don't want to I don't want to see any Christmas decorations. Like I love I love to enjoy them. So I'm going to put them up early because I'm going to enjoy them. I want to be sick of them. So I don't really feel like I did a very good job like my Christmas lights like on my tree right down on your notes. I think I did but you're right. My Christmas lights have or my Christmas tree has a strand burnt out. We didn't put any lights up outside like it's gotten too cold. I can't believe how much money people are spending to put up to have someone professionally install Christmas lights on their house like we don't do that. So I'm just like decor wise. I'm not feeling very. You have notes. You have notes for yourself and I think that's fine. I've worn my Christmas sweater three times since the podcast. So you could say I'm getting my money's worth out of that thing. And I'm loving seeing the ugly summer pots take over my mentions on Instagram. So good job on your only summer pots. It's I'm feeling highly jolly and there's still so much hollowness and jollowness to have. I need to take inventory. I think I'm done with I think I am done with presents and I think I know how I'm organizing them. More on that later. Sorry. I'm like looking over there at said things. But yeah, I'm just I don't know. I'm I'm I'm I'm feeling it. I'm feeling I'm feeling the Christmas spirit. I'm hoping for a little bit more snow. I'd love a white Christmas if I could really paint my perfect picture. And I'm genuinely looking forward to Christmas break. You know one of our episodes that we did last year was how we plan to like get the most out of our Christmas break. Things we plan on doing because Christmas break. It rocks me because it's just it throws everyone off their routine. And it's like such a it's like such a temporary thing like even summer I think is easier because you're settling into what like the new routine is going to be Christmas break. I find so hard because you know the kids get off school around like what the 21st 22nd. And then you have a couple of days of like not a lot and then you have the craziness of like Christmas. And then you have the week between Christmas and New Year's of like not a lot and then they go back to school. So it's like every day every week is so different where as like the summer it's longer you get into a rhythm. So I remember I had a horrible Christmas break last year. I know I've spoken about this at length. I mean you would have thought like I mean it was traumatic for genuinely some of the looking back as probably having some postpartum depression because I was only about like two and a half months postpartum. So maybe that was part of my problem because it's like why was I so bad. So I'm thinking about like you know things we're going to do. I've been excited because I have found I've seen some like activities come across my desk some day camps come across my desk. So like on the 23rd there's this like arts this kids art camp from like 8 to 12. I signed George and had a up for it. I'm like it's perfect. Like that's so fun. Get them out of the house something for them to do. So I'm kind of going to I love busy toddlers tip of she prints off the month of December's calendar and then she hangs it on the fridge and she like puts like I mean her kids can read so she just like puts what's like what what they have going on. My kids can't really read yet. So I'm thinking about just like doing emojis but I want to make a physical calendar for the kids to look at. So like they can know like what what's happening like you know like this day we're going to do gingerbreads this day we're doing breakfast with the Santa this day we're going to Christmas at GGS this day we're going to Christmas at Grandma Barbies like they need that. Yeah because I feel like for them during their break they have no idea what every day is going to bring and I think that can be a little unsettling too. So and you also like you also don't want to like give them too much of like oh well we're going to be going to do breakfast with Santa in five days because then they're like oh well are we going to go do that now and it's probably good for them to physically see and be able to count that down. I agree with you. But yeah I just want to I just want to take like the 1520 30 minutes and really plan out my days and like if it's a day that I know we don't have anything and it's going to be a day of rest like I just want to have that day planned it's like it's a day of rest like we're going to reset because we have a busy weekend or it's like we're I don't know I need myself I myself need to do it because I know it's in my head what we have but I haven't yet really like looked at it logistically of like where we need to be how many days in a row do we have things how many naps are we basically going to be skipping how many days in a row. So I need to do that because I need to have a redemption. I mean this is my redemption era. Tangible takeaway alert something that I have done from Thanksgiving because we were just going to be gone all day and I couldn't fathom like how many diapers I needed for two kids. I have an extra diaper caddy. I have a diaper caddy packed with diapers and wipes in the trunk of my car and I'm keeping it loaded all of December because between all of the random events that were attending. I at the very least know I have plenty of diapers and wipes in the back of my car. No that I'm going to be taking that that that tangible takeaway because I agree of course I have like my center console stash. I need to work all day sometimes. We're gone all day and I should have a extra bottle like an empty extra bottle for Libby maybe some snacks in case you know you get to somewhere and then like they can I need my like heads some snacks change of clothes. Yeah change of pajamas because you never know if you're staying out too late and you want to be able to put them on. How late are you staying out and like I feel like if they're Christmas pajamas and like then it's a middle of the day thing and you have an accident and it's like OK they're still festive like it's. Yeah I'm deaf and yeah packing the diapers and wipes and just not having to think like taking one thing off your plate I'm taking that that's a great great great tangible takeaway. Something else I wanted to talk about was I touched on this on my Instagram story and it's just like a mindset shift that I had that really just totally changed how I think about my days in my housework I guess you could say. And there it's kind of like two parts of this theory. Theory one is blooming where you're planted. Theory two is going deep not wide and what that means is you know when you have. And I noticed that the most with Libby's age because I see this 100 times I find Libby's age nine to 18 months. Hate it's my least favorite age. I know they're so cute and thank goodness they are because that's about all they have going for them in my opinion like they are such. Terrorist at least not terrorists that's not the right word. They're so busy and they're so dangerous like Libby is always trying to like get into things and like climb on things. They're just dangerous and Libby is especially dangerous because Libby moves Libby is such she moves like a two year old. She's very advanced. Yeah. Very advanced like climbing walking running but she's like 15 months old so she like doesn't have any sort of awareness. And she's also my fourth so like I mean my attention is already getting split four different ways like it is just she's very hard right now. So like if I'm with her in the kitchen there I'm not getting I can't rinse a dish. Literally the only thing I can do is sit with her in her high chair because if I get up she will climb out of her high chair like she's crazy. And I've of course gone through this with all of my kids and a mindset shift that I had was OK instead of like trying to clean the kitchen because that's what the dirtiest. Like let me just where does Libby need to go where is a safer place to go with Libby. What is Libby doing right now and what can I get done where Libby is now I'm a busy body. I just like to get things done. That's I mean I I'm the kind of person who like I don't relax till the house is clean like I don't need to relax first and then clean. I need to clean then relax and I just like to get things done. And also like I just told you I'm chasing around my 15 month old. I'm not relaxing. So I might as well be doing something because I'm not just saying they're relaxing. So I started like so for example this weekend I was in Libby's room because like that's where she was safe wanted to be. She was playing with a baby doll you know climbing on whatever the bed that was in there. That's like not that high off the ground. It's fine. And I was looking around and I'm like you know this room is pretty clean like there's really not much to do here. I'd love to be clean in my bathroom or the kitchen instead. But I said no this is where I am. I'm going to bloom where I'm planted. What can I do. I changed her sheets. Did her sheets need to be changed. No. I mean yes and no like they could always be changed. Change your sheets. I went next her windows because she had fingerprints all over them. I wiped down her baseboards. Like when was I ever going to get around to doing that. Yeah. And then I went through some of the kids clothes. I picked out there. This was on Friday I was doing this and I picked out their church outfits for Sunday. Which like I normally don't do in advance but like that's I was around their clothes. Yeah. So I was like this is what I'm going to do right now. And just that little shift you know it makes me feel more productive in my day. And we also had we also talked about this a couple weeks ago when it comes to bath time because I find bath time to be a joy because that's when I can get a lot of I can do a ton of things in my bathroom. Like I can maybe curl my hair. I can fold laundry. I can clean my bathroom. Like I can get so many things done there. I love when they take a bath. So I just think that's a really important mindset shift to try to have is don't worry about what's on the to do list. Like don't worry about what's the messiest. Focus on going deep because that's that's the opportunity that you have in front of you. So like if your kids are in the basement playing well it's not like going why would be cleaning up the toys. Like that's silly because they're playing going deep would be dusting or like vacuuming or deep cleaning the bathroom somewhere or doing the baseboard. It's like focus on doing things that aren't going to get trashed right away. I'll say because then at the end of the day we'll clean up the toys and then you'll have clean baseboards and a clean floor and it's a win-win. I just think when you're just with your they just watching a kid play or like that's just the circumstance you're in. I find myself to be so much happier with my circumstance when I am doing something productive because when I'm just scrolling on my phone and it's not a good looking for near kids. I don't like doing that as much and I know I do it more than I would like to. But then I'm also irritable. Even if I'm trying to do things productive on my phone like for work or scheduling appointments or whatever just something about the screen if they come up or they need me I'm irritable because I'm trying to get this done. But if I'm cleaning baseboards and they come over then I might be like hey why don't you help me with this. Why don't you this is what I'm doing. Like you can just like it just offers opportunities and I am just so much happier when I am moving and getting something done with my kids around. So am I. So am I. Today's episode is brought to you by Quince. These days I'm all about quality over quantity. You guys know I am decluttering my house and so if things in my closet are not well made and versatile they're not worth it to me. I'm getting rid of them and that's why I love Quince. The fabrics feel elevated the cuts are thoughtful and the pricing actually makes sense. Quince makes high quality wardrobe staples using premium fabrics like 100% European linen, 100% silk and organic cotton poplin, lightweight cotton cashmere sweaters perfect for the changing seasons and can't miss seasonal colors and prints for spring. Versatile well made pieces that make getting dressed simple. Did you also know that Quince sells kids clothes and like home goods? I just got some of these linen blackout curtains for my bedroom and they're wonderful. They are great quality really thick willy-willy rail made and they look amazing. Quince is always my go to when I need really anything. I go to see if it's available on Quince first because you're going to get the best price and the best quality. So right now go to quince.com slash carpool for free shipping and 365 day returns. That's a full year to wear it and love it and you will now available in Canada too. Don't keep settling for clothes that don't last. Go to qince.com slash carpool for free shipping and 365 day returns quince.com slash carpool. Today's episode is brought to you by Alma. Where do you want to be a year from now? Who do you want to be? And maybe more importantly, who's on your team helping you get there? Because the right therapist, someone who makes you feel comfortable, challenges you in the right ways and has the clinical skills to support you can make a huge difference. That's why I tell you about Alma. Alma is on a mission to simplify access to high quality affordable mental health care and they've built a nationwide network of over 20,000 diverse therapists. What's great about their platform is it's easy to find someone who fits your needs. You can browse their therapist directory without even having to make an account and you can filter things like insurance, gender and therapeutic approach and more. And affordability matters. 99% of Alma therapists accept insurance and people who find a therapist through Alma save an average of 80% on the cost of sessions. They even have a free insurance cost estimator so you would know exactly what you'll pay up front. A year from today isn't that far away. Get started now at helloalma.com slash carpool. That's helloalma.com slash carpool. So that was great. Another thing I wanted to tell you was I have hacked Hattie's clothes. This is so random. But I was in Libby's room, we were going through clothes, I was going through Hattie's clothes over there and Libby's room, okay, long story. I'm so proud of Hattie's wardrobe right now because it is, I love to dress Hattie in colors. I love to do like mixed patterns. I just think like mixed patterns on little girls is like so sweet and precious. And like I'm kind of, I feel like I'm really getting good at it. Like, you know, like star pants, striped shirt or like, I don't know. I just feel like I'm kind of mastering the mixed patterns. And I love, well, let me back up. Now that I have two and two, I really do kind of think about like everything that Hattie wears, Libby's going to wear, everything that George wears, Fred's going to wear. So I really am kind of looking at it from the lens of like this needs to last two kids. And now that Hattie is in a size six-ish, they're kind of lasting two seasons because like she's like the sizes are, and I'm just trigger warning if you're with kids, but the sizes are marked as a six and a seven. Do you know, like, you know, I had say the trigger warning. Oh yeah, dumb. Six, seven. Anyway, so like, it will probably fit her next year. So I'm going to get two seasons from her, two seasons from Libby. Like, I'm good to invest in the pieces. I love Bowden, T, Hannah Anderson. Yeah, like those are my rider dies for Hattie. Obsessed, especially Bowden. Like it is my favorite. Bowden is so expensive. Like, I would never, I would never, I think I've bought one thing new from Bowden from Hattie. But she has a ton of Bowden because I buy Bowden on one Facebook marketplace. I love when they do a lot, like Bowden lot. Yes. I love a lot. I got her eight pairs of leggings for $40. That's $5 a legging Bowden leggings. Like basically robbed at gunpoint. I'm surprised that the police weren't called when I picked up that Facebook marketplace order. And I found a Bowden resale group, like a mini Bowden resale group on Facebook. I'm loving these Facebook groups. I'm joining them left and right. T collection, Hannah Anderson, little sleepies. Like, let me just join them all. And I have found some amazing pieces for Hattie on these groups. And I'm telling you, it's less work than buying it online because all you do in these groups, and you know, they're all a little different. They're all their own group rules. So you kind of got to figure it out. But all you do is someone posts something and you say sold and you give them your PayPal email. And then they PayPal invoice you when you pay it. And then the PayPal invoice sends them your address. So like literally I have to get my credit card out. And I'm just like done. Yeah, that's really nice. I need, I'm like trying to find, I want to look into this because that's a really good idea to just like join Facebook groups. So I'm getting them for cheaper. Especially when you know you love the brand, then you feel so good about pulling the trigger on it. Totally. And I love the brand and the quality is good. Like it's, it's good quality. So I feel fine buying it. And I'm telling you, like they're just such good pieces. So that has been like a really fun. Yeah. I don't even want to tell people because then everyone's just going to like steal it from me. So just know if you have like this is so cute. I need to stop like now I know I'm looking and I'm like, oh my gosh, I need. I love it. I love it. And so what also I did this weekend was, you know, as I was just like, you know, sorry, I have a question. Are all these Facebook groups the same where you just say mine or I want it or whatever? Here's the first thing you have to read. I was, I don't know. You've got to read the groups. Oh my gosh. Look at this coat coat with mittens. Very good use condition. This Bowdoin coat is happy size. Oh, see 11 comments. See it's done. It's toast. Well, how does it have 11 comments? So they just like, if it falls through, I'm next. Yeah. What are people saying? Yeah. Oh my gosh. They're all so cute Elizabeth. Like I'm just gooped over it. And you know, I tried to, I used to be on this Poshmark grind Poshmark. I'm sorry. I think it's scam. I'm not paying $7 in shipping. And I think the prices are too high. This is like 22 ships. This is a mini Bowdoin cream applique cotton long sleeve shirt size 1011 never worn only washed $22. Yeah. Poshmark you pay for shipping and also they take 20% from the person selling it. The person who's selling is like trying to list it for even higher so they don't feel like they're being, they're not Poshmark isn't taking so much from them. Yeah. Like they're trying to sell it for 15 and Poshmark is going to take $3 and they're like, okay, fine. I'll sell it for 18 so I can get the 15 that I want. And I feel like if you, it will also be a great place for you to resell your kids stuff. Yeah. Well, you have active shoppers on whatever brand it is that you're trying to sell. Um, anyway, what else? Oh, so then I also this weekend was like feeling so productive. I took a page out of the marketplace mom. If you're not following her on Instagram, she's inspiring follow and I put two lots together. I was cleaning out friends pajamas. I found four three T pajamas that don't fit him anymore. I said three T boy pajama lot sold sold quick. Obviously underpriced it. Don't care. It's out of my life. Yeah. It's out of my life and I had enough money to buy my hamburger at dart ball. Oh, I played dart ball this weekend. And remember I told you, um, Tyler nailed it. Tyler goes, it's a, Tyler goes, it's a fun game. I just don't really like it. Yeah. Totally. Um, dart ball. So basically it's darts, but we throw, we throw underhand. It's a big, it's, it's, it's big darts. The big board. It's a big dart. It's big darts. Um, but the problem is it's like, if you, if you hit a certain part of the board, you're out and, but then like, if you hit other parts of the board, you're not out and you can keep going. And it's like, I want to, I want to throw four darts and take my best one. Like that, that would be more than that for me because I just kept getting out on the first try. Our team, we got, we, we did not do very well, which was fine because we wanted to be done with it. But anyway, all's to say is thanks to my boy little sleepies pajama lot, I was able to cover my dart ball meal and then some, did you pay, did you pay for it with the cash that you got from market? Yeah, that feels good. I stopped at the mailbox on my way to dart ball, had my cash. Yeah, it feels good. And now that's out of my life. And I, you know, I kept some money in the bank. Yeah. Anyway, I'm just like loving marketplace. Like it is just so, and like, what a great, so like that's what I'm saying. Like when you're next time, you're like stuck in a basement or like a room with your kids and like, what could I be doing? I don't know. Look around and see if there's anything you listen up for on marketplace because that's productive. Yeah. So productive. Okay, Liz. I know we have an interview at the end of this episode. So do you want me just to go into industry news? Do you have anything else you want to talk about? No, I am really excited to get into this interview. So let's get into industry news because I do know that that is pretty juicy. Okay. Now it's time for industry news where I spoke a hot to tea going on the auto industry and consumer reports had a big old list come out and they unveiled the top 10 best and worst car brands for 2026. Now, what is best and worst means the ratings are based on the averages of new vehicles overall score, which factors in results from road test safety assessments and reliability and owner satisfaction. Out of the 31 car manufacturers, these are the top 10 best and worst car brands. So it's not by model. It's not. It's not by model. I'll say that. It's just like, it's like, it's like an overall average. You know what I mean? Yeah. Number one for best really surprised me. Do you want to take a guess? No, I'm looking at it right now. Okay. Number one is Subaru. Shocking. Okay. Shocking. Mm-hmm. Not shocking that they're on the list. Shocking that they're number one. Number two is BMW. Also a little shocking, but proud of them. And actually BMW and Subaru got the same score. Then why are they one and two? I don't know, but they both got an 82. Hmm. Okay. Number three is Porsche. Number four is Honda. Number five, Toyota. Number six, Lexus. Number seven is Lincoln. What? Yeah. Number eight, Hyundai. Nine, Acura. Ten is Tesla. So like big names that are not on here is outside of Lincoln. There's no American brands. There's no GM. There's no Ford. There's, that's kind of crazy. Kia is nowhere to be found. Tesla. There is Tesla. Oh, Tesla's an American brand. You're right. Kia was nowhere to be found, which was kind of shocking. Kia was number 12, but I'm so surprised. I'm so surprised. I was just, I was just noticing that Lincoln was seven and Ford wasn't on it. Okay. Now this is the juicy stuff. Let's get to the worst. Well, well, can I just say, cause I'm looking at like they go up to like 20. Lincoln was number seven. Ford was number 18. So that's kind of up there. Yeah. That is up there. Now for the worst car brand is, is, is the worst number one or is the worst 10? I don't know. It says worst car brands in descending order. What does that mean? Okay. I'm looking, tell me what the first one is and I can, I'm looking at a different report card than you. Oh yeah. You are Jeep is number one is the worst. Yeah. Okay. So Jeep is the worst and that tracks Jeep can't get anything together. Like leave it to Jeep to have a car that people love the Wrangler and do anything else but focus on that Wrangler. They're moronic. This, the, the worst ones, this is not looking good. Number two is Land Rover. Yep. Number three, GMC shock. Yes. Jeep and Land Rover doesn't surprise me. GMC being three surprises me. Forrest Dodge doesn't surprise me. Five Alpha Romeo, who cares. Six Rivian doesn't surprise me. Seven Chrysler doesn't surprise me. Eight Chevrolet kind of surprising. Nine Mercedes Benz shocks me. Yeah. That's was like the most shocking to me to have BMW be number one slash two and then Mercedes be nine as the worst. Yeah. Ten is Volkswagen doesn't show. I mean, I don't know, whatever. Yeah. It's not good. It's a lot of American. It's not good. So. It's really interesting to go onto the consumer reports and see what happens. I'm going to go into the consumer reports Instagram because they like break it down into like a chart format. So you can see like we did the top 10 in the worst 10, but then there's like 10 in between those list. I want to see what's on their Instagram. It's a much easier way to digest this. Yeah. I was on like Yahoo's version of that. That was painful for me. And then they also, they also ranked the car brands, car brands ranked by new car reliability. Oh yeah. Let's get into that. Can I get there though? Because I'm just like, do you want me to do it because I've got, I've got it pulled up and that's fine. You can get there, but I want to follow along. Okay. Number one car brands ranked by new car reliability. Number one is Toyota. Number two is Subaru. So Subaru is like up there for everything. Number three is Lexus. Number four is Honda. Number five is BMW. Number six is Nissan, which people love when I talk about my Pathfinder, people love to ask like all Nissan's crap out on them. It's like number six, stop 10 for new car reliability. Okay. Number seven is Acura. Number eight is Buick. Number nine is Tesla. Number 10 is Kia. First of all, shout out Buick. I'm telling you Buick needs Buick has momentum and they need to keep moving. I'm proud of Buick. Oh, 11 is Ford. Kia is number 10. That's another one that people love to act like they always, they always crap out. It's like, because you've had one bad experience with it or my dad said, I never drive, never to drive a Kia. They're so quick to buy like a Chevy that's linked at 42 versus a Kia, which is at 49, which I mean, I'm not saying I like both of those cars, but if like people make me want to throw something at them when they just are like, oh, I'd never buy a Kia. And then it's like, why? Have you seen their interior? Well, it's just like, do you have, can you, can you provide any data to back up that claim? And if you're like, oh yeah, I know, like it's number 10 and I only want to drive a car that's number one. I'm like, oh, that's fine. Like I get it. You're a Toyota person. Like that's, that's fine. But to be like, oh, I'd never drive a Kia. Those don't last. And then buy a Chevy. That's crazy thing to say. If you want to buy a Chevy. 17 on the list. Yeah. Yeah. But then isn't it interesting that, that Lincoln goes to 20, even though they were number seven on overall. So that, so people just must like Lincoln's cars. They are good cars. And Rivian was the worst at 26 and Jeep was the third worst at 28. Jeep sucks. Anyway, quite interesting. Okay. So we have an interview. We're continuing this series of home making, budgeting, making things from home, just like all things like how can we stretch the budget, get creative in our interview, in our motherhood, in our home making, in our cooking, all the things. So we have Morgan Taylor Price, Morgan Taylor at home on Instagram. She is a mom of almost four. She literally could be having her baby right now. She's passed her due date and she made time to come on our podcast out of breath. Yes. But she did make the time nonetheless. And it's a great interview. A lot of tangible takeaways. They are a single income making it work. She is with her kids. She is frugal, talks about the changes that they made to cut back their grocery bills and what they're doing. She tells us a lot on the podcast, but she also has a lot of great tips on her Instagram as well. Oh, she's like one of my new, for sure, my new favorite follows. She inspired, I finally, I know what I'm asking for for Christmas after this episode because I decided what she said is what I'm going to ask for. Oh, yeah, me too. Literally after the episode, Kelly, I think we both texted mom, like an idea for Christmas because mom texted me. She was, what do you want for your birthday? And I told her and she was, Kelly said the same thing. Okay. I swear though, mom, if you're listening and you don't just get me and Elizabeth the same one, because if she tries to do this thing where she gets us a slightly different one, slightly better model, but yeah, she will say. It is a great interview. Thank you guys for turning into the Carpool podcast. We will talk to you on fry. Yay. Welcome Morgan. Let's get into our interview with Morgan Price. Morgan, welcome to the Carpool podcast. Hi. Thanks so much for having me. We're so excited to have you and we're so excited to have you specifically for this series of homemaking, stretching our budget at the grocery store and all things like motherhood. You are a mom of almost four. Yeah. By the time this podcast comes out, you could have a baby. Yes. It was just so crazy. Which is so crazy. So crazy. And you're stay at home mom. Mm hmm. Yep. I'm a mom of almost three kids, almost four kids. Yep. And your content creator. Yeah. That just somehow like slipped in there a while back and that's just been part of my life. It always does. It always to the good ones, it always does. I think your content's great. I, there's so many things I want to talk to you about. I want you though to sell me on needing a smoker because I saw when you smoked all that pork and this is what I'm telling my husband, I need a smoker. We do love it. I did grow up with a dad who like is obsessed with barbecue and now owns a barbecue restaurant. And so it was like a very much part of my life growing up, but we do love it. We don't use it like all the time, I would say, but we're very glad that we do. Like I Thanksgiving, my mother-in-law just decided last minute that she didn't have enough oven space for turkey. So we like smoked the turkey just because we had. And it was fine. Yeah, totally. Hmm. I've never considered a smoker. But I feel like it's one of those things you don't need to use it all the time to make it worth it because you're batching it. So what are my favorite, like I guess new series that you have on your page right now. And I feel like it's kind of your hottest take is you don't like freezer meals. You think freezer meals, I think your direct quote was disgusting. I feel like it's always like mushy and then like, so they lack texture and then like flavor. I don't know. I feel like with my first baby, I like had like this whole menu of freezing meals and I'm like, okay, I'm going to make all these before she comes. And then she came and we ate like one of each like kind of really that was a very good. That was a very good. We'd rather just make her own dinner. And so I think it's not worth the time or the energy to make them all ahead of time. But you think it's worth prepping the proteins or making the proteins in both. So I like to prep like the meat ahead of time. So like that really saw I prepped a whole bunch of sweet pork in the crock pot and pulled pork on the smoker. And then I took it all and I put it into like family size portions like what our family would eat in the meal. So I'm not like freezing like five pounds of pork at a time. Like it's like a pound of pork and then I vacuum seal it and put it in my freezer. And so then we can pull that pork out and we can make sandwiches. We can make nachos. We can make tacos. We can make enchiladas. Like you can make so many different things with that meat and it's just it's already cooked. And so then like the hard part is kind of done for you. Kind of like how you've talked about prepping like ground beef before and like taco meat. It's the same thing. Like the other day I went to Costco and bought four rotisserie chickens and then I came home and chopped them all up, froze them and then that I can just pull out and use for so many different things because chicken goes in a million things. And it was like take some big step out of cooking things. So then it's just easy just to throw things together later. Well, then it's like you're like combining versus cooking. Like then you're just combining things. And I mean you're saving on the dishes and it's got to be more cost effective because then you can hit things on the sales or buy bigger portions of them and then make them into smaller portions. I think that's really smart. Yeah. Okay. You said something that kind of is making me question a lot about my life. You said you vacuum seal. Yeah. I mean, I'm supposed to be vacuum sealing before I freeze meat. Yeah. It lasts so much longer. Like I went through and like do you clean my freezer before I started this? And I found meat that's like two or three years old that's like has no freezer. Like it's totally fine. Like I could totally use it. It's still in my freezer. Wow. Whereas the meat that I'm like, oh, we'll get to it really soon. I'll just put it in like a freezer zip top bag. Like that stuff all had freezer burn and I had to toss it. Well, and I that was on my list to talk to you because I prepped with that protein. I put in a gallon bag that technically said freezer on it and I can tell you it's a little freezer burn. Now we're going to tough it out at the Stumpy household. Yeah, for sure. But yeah, I'm not thrilled with it. And I think that that's a really good, like I actually might ask mom Liz for a vacuum sealer for Christmas. Oh yeah, no. I feel like it's one of those like. That's a good one. Yeah. And I love thinking about gifts. One time we had debt free mom on and she did a whole series on like things you can ask for for Christmas that will save you money. I was like, oh, that's like a good concept. And I think a vacuum sealer is like a perfect. It's like the epitome of that, right? It's like it's a little bit of an investment, but wow, is it easy to use and operate? Like it's like a laminator, right? Yeah. Yeah. You just like put the end in and like push the button and like suck the air out and then seals it and then toss in your freezer. Okay. And I imagine it also probably saves a little bit of room too. Yeah. So when I vacuum seal things like I vacuum sealed them flat so then they can like stack. So it sounds like a chunk of me like it's flat and since it's like totally sealed instead of a bag, I can throw it in the sink of like water and it's not going to like leak into the bag. Whereas like a zip top bag, like I'm not going to do that because I'm scared that water is going to get in. Right. So it thaws out so much faster because it's flatter and it's just like totally watertight. Okay. So that's if we get no other tangible takeaways from this podcast, that is, I'm sorry if I sound like an idiot. I didn't know about this. So that's very good. We're learning. We're learning. That's why Morgan's here. Yeah. Morgan is here to spread awareness. Morgan, take us back a little bit. So you're a stay at home mom to three. You started creating content kind of tell us about the driving factor to creating the content and also I guess just like wanting to save more money, especially when it comes to like the grocery bill. Yeah. So way back like before we had kids, I have a degree in photography and I was like a wedding photographer and like a portrait family photographer and love that. And that was like mostly in like the summers I felt like so in the winter and during the off season, I would substitute to school because it was like super flexible. I could do however much or as little as I wanted. And it was great when we were first married. And then I had my first daughter, five and a half almost six years ago. And I like, I really wanted to stay home. Like that was my goal. And so I stopped substitute teaching. I still did a little bit of photography just cause I kind of could. But we like without that income, we realized that like, okay, things are getting a little bit tighter. And so my husband works in agriculture and like, there's just not a whole lot of money in that. And so things were tight. Like he could support us fully, but things are just tight. And if we ever wanted to like buy a new car or buy a house or anything like that, like we just need to be able to save more. So we went through all of our bills and I'm like a pretty like frugal, simple person as it is. So like there wasn't a lot of just like frivolous spending that we were doing to cut. And I felt like all of our bills are pretty like set in stone. Like you really couldn't change like your power bill a whole lot and stuff like that. I felt like groceries is where we could, we could cut at that point. We were spending like $600 a month for just the two of us. And I thought that was like pretty decent, but then I like started to like actually like focus in on things. I'm like, oh, we can cut this a lot more. So I started like meal planning for a week or two at a time and grocery shopping for all that at once. So it felt like the less often that I was in the grocery store, like we just saved so much just by not going very often. And so I would do that. And then I slowly started building up our freezer supply of just like backup food. So I would stock up on meat when it was on sale. So like that pork that I showed in that row was all like pork cushion that was just on sale at the store. So I bought like three big packs of it and just smoked it. So I just like started stocking up on me. And then that turned into, I would only meal plan with the meat that we had in our freezer. So every meal that we were eating, like we were instantly saving money because that meat I had bought on sale at some point. And then I'd also start stocking up on like just like shelf-sable stuff. Like I always have pasta, I always have pasta sauce and like that's first up and I just try to only buy it on sale and just buy a lot of it. And we now are a family of five, almost six. And now we're spending about $600 a month. And that's seven years later. And so like, I feel like just the little things, they just kind of add up. And you're able to save a lot. I first of all, like, I can't, like you being out of breath is just, I feel for you so much. This belly, I feel like I'm like, how are you doing? I'm like, I feel fine. I just feel big and uncomfortable. Totally. I know. I think that's a good process though, to kind of start with the meat, be strategic about what you're buying, how you're storing it. And to your point, like the better you get at cooking it and freezing it, the more variety you'll end up having in your life, which I think will make it an easier plan to stick to. Like I think it can be tough, like, you know, if you only are finding one type of thing on sale or if you're only, if you're buying it, if you're buying the meat that's on sale that week and then also trying to cook with it. It's so much of the same. So I love that. I love that, like buying on sale, sticking in the freezer. And then that's what you're pulling from. Because then that gets way more cost effective because then that's such a, then you're buying the lower cost items, like the canned goods, like some of the grains and turning it into different kinds of meat. The meat is like the most expensive part of your meal, right? And so like, if you can save money on the meat every time, like that's going to add up so fast. I love that. Also, just like allows you to be so creative. Like I have really been trying to use more of what's in my like fridge or pantry before going out to buy something. And of course, through ChetGBT with the help. I've been so much more creative and like coming up with new things and just like new ways to make things and new recipes. And it's, it's actually a lot more fun and it's more of a challenge and it kind of uses your brain a little bit more than just making the same thing over and over. Totally. Totally. Well, and kind of like a theme we've been talking about lately is, and I would love to like hear your take on in your experience with this, is I do kind of feel like our generation doesn't really know how to cook very well. I think we can follow a recipe. I think so much of the food we're buying are these like quick, easy, like already cooked things that when you go back to the basics, I think we're, I think we're feeling like this task of cooking from scratch is so overwhelming because we weren't really taught how to cook from scratch. You know what I mean? Yeah. It's definitely like a skill set that like you have to build. Like our grandma's just like, that's just what they did. And like they, if they saw like what we were cooking and what we were buying today for food, they'd be shocked. Yeah. And exactly. So what are some of your like favorites or best things that you stopped buying at the store and you started making them from scratch? Um, well, my husband eats yogurt and granola every single morning. Like he's a man of habit and he loves it. And one time I'd like ran out of granola and I was like, Oh, well, granola's pretty simple, right? It's just like oats and like whatever. So I like made it and then he ate it. And then I went and bought the store bought granola next time and he was like, wait, I really liked that other granola. And I'm like, Oh, well, it's probably half the, about half the price to make it. So I've been making granola for years and it's so easy. And a couple of years ago on 4th of July, I volunteered to make potato salad. Cause I'm like, I feel like my potato salad is the best potato salad. Like everybody does. Right. I was like, I'm going to sell it for 4th of July. And then it got to be that morning and we had no mayonnaise and I was like, okay, well we left 30 minutes from the store. So that's not really an option. And so I was like, I'm pretty sure mayonnaise is easy to make. So I started making mayonnaise like from scratch, which is so easy. And I've made it ever since. So it's been like over two years. Okay. I was just like whipping up mayonnaise just because, and it says pantry space. Cause I feel like I was always stalking of a Costco with like the big jugs of mayonnaise and it was like, they're huge and they take up so much space. And I'm like, now I don't have to do that cause I can just whip up a jar whenever we need it. How long does it take to make? Oh, like two minutes. I love mayonnaise. It's, I have made homemade. I've made homemade mayo before. It's pretty easy. It's crazy. It's just like an egg and olive oil in an immersion blender and you're basically there. Yeah. That's so crazy. And like think about all the ingredients that are in the mayonnaise at the store. Like I haven't looked, but I'm assuming it's a lot. Yeah. And you can like garlic in or like other things if you want to make like, oh, garlic, like a holy. Yeah. Yeah. Now it's an a holy. Yeah. And now we're making a holy. From scratch. Easy. I love that. I'm getting hungry. I know me too. Okay. So I want to talk about your Instagram. Okay. So you have 93,000 Instagram followers. Congrats. It's incredible. Thank you. Or a full-blown content creator. Um, single income family making it work and you have affordable meal plans for moms because I think some people might be listening to this and being like, okay, congratulations. You who were able to figure out meal plans and cut your grocery bill. That sounds really intimidating to me. So if someone wanted to fill out your weekly meal plan on your Instagram, what can they expect to get from that? So that meal plan is actually a meal plan like subscription. So I have a lot of moms that are like, I would love to like make more meals during the week, but like, I just don't want the mental load of having to figure out what to make. And so I like have gone through and like, I think there's like 60 something recipes that I'm always adding more of just like easy family friendly recipes. They're all 10 ingredients are less and every week it's a subscription. It's like less than $10 a month. They get 10 recipes a week to choose from. So like, if you don't like soup and don't make the soup, like, I'm not just going to give you five recipes because that like every family has preferences. And so, and then you just pick what you want and then it has like a pre-shopped Walmart list. You just click and it has all the Walmart ingredients that you need. And you just like Adam DeCart and check out. And so then it takes away like the planning and the shopping and you just like, don't think about it at all. Because I feel like that's where a lot of people get hung up on meal planning is that they just don't know what to make and they don't want to have to think about it. And it's just the mental load that as moms, like we carry so much mentally. That's just one more thing that we don't want to think about. So it just takes that away. Okay. I love that. I just filled out your email. I totally agree. I hate meal planning. Yeah. It's not the best. It's just like that. It's like that trope when it's like you get to the store to buy something, you're like, I cannot remember anything that I've made for dinner literally ever. Yeah. I know. I know. Well, I feel like that could be a good segue to our segment, which is ditch the drive-thru where we give the audience an easy dinner recipe to mix it up to get it to get them out of their dinner rut. Can you give us a little sneak peek of what we could expect on the email list or just like your go to ditch the drive-thru? I feel like it's going to be good. Yeah. So one of our families favorite things. So like we love like burgers, right? But sometimes like you just get sick of like a traditional hamburger. We love to do burger bowls, but not like the ground, not like the sweet potato one that you see everywhere. Like we do like you put french fries in the bottom or tater tots or whatever your family likes and then seasoned ground beef and then cheese and then lettuce and pickles and like all your toppings. You could go all out and do like sauteed onions and bacon and then like a really good burger sauce on top and like my kids love it because you just serve it like buffet style so they could put whatever they want. They could eat on a plate all separate if they want. They throw it all together. Like it's like, let's go back for a second. You said the basis french fries or tater tots. That's where I, that's where I'm already interested because sometimes it's too much of like a lettuce base and I'm not, that's not really, it's not a salad. That's not really cutting it for me most days. So I like the idea of a starchy potato base. And so it's basically like loaded fries. Yeah, essentially. Yeah. And then your kids can just eat whatever they want. Like all my kids love it. Like I have my oldest daughter, like she loves just like plain hamburger, which is like so bizarre to me sometimes because she doesn't want sauce on it or anything. She just wants plain and that's crazy ground beef. And I'm like, perfect. You can eat whatever you want. You can eat the ground beef and then she'll eat like the tomatoes and the cheese and like the other stuff on the side. But like it's so nice and like my husband loves it. It's like bulky and it's like hearty because you have all those like potatoes and whatever you want at the base and as much meat as you want. And yeah, you serve it with a face down and everybody gets what they want. And it's great. And you can like, that's another thing that you can batch cook is that ground beef. Like you can have a ton of that in your freezer, warm it up real quick, throw some tater tots in the air fryer and like dinner shot and dinner's done. Yeah. I make this a lot when I, cause I always have ground beef, but I don't always have tater tots or french fries, but I, so if I like need to get rid of potatoes, I just cut up potatoes into little square into little cubes. And that's my base. But the, the, the potato over the sweet potato base is such a game changer. Yeah. I'm not a huge potato person. I like love me some good crunchy french fries or tater tots. Me too. Me too. In the right context, I like a sweet potato, but I'll take a fry over a sweet potato fry personally. And then you need like a good sauce for sure. Yes. I'm like, you need like a good sauce. So are you making your fry sauce or are you buying it? I'm usually making it just like mayo, ketchup, a little bit of mustard, dill, pickle juice, some like paprika. And then if you're not Kelly, we're Chester, Shire sauce. Totally. And then I know I'm so sound or like a barbecue one with like just mayo and barbecue sauce mixed together is super yummy too. That's like your favorite dipping sauce for fries. I also feel like you could swap that. You could do that with pork. You could do that with chicken. I mean, it's, yeah, it's kind of all penciling for me. It's a bowl. You just put whatever you want in it. Yeah. That's, that's what I'm talking about when I'm saying like, if you have the meat prepped, like that's dinner on the table as long as it takes the tats day or fry. Yes, exactly. And then you chop everything while there's a cooking and then you're good to go. And you're like, that's still homemade because you made the mayo. You made the ground beef. Like you make like, okay, so you air fried the tater tots, like everything else is homemade makes you, nothing makes you feel better than or like more B. A. Then like having a home cooked meal. They're like, totally. This was all freshly made. That's good. This is where you can find more again. You can find her at Morgan Taylor at home and that's Taylor T. A. Y. L. E. R. We'll leave her, her handle in the show notes. Anything else like anywhere else people can find you? Are you mostly just on Instagram? Mostly just on Instagram. I started to tick tock this year, but that's a journey. We're working over there, but tick tock Instagram. Yeah. Instagram is where I can find me. Well, go and find her. Content might be a little light because she'll be having a baby soon, but she's got a lot of very good content already on. And Morgan, thank you so much for joining us and good luck with the baby. You've got that. I mean, you're an old hat at this point. Number four. Yeah. Yeah, we got this. No, we do. You've got this. Thank you so much for joining us. Yes. Thank you for having me. Bye girls. Thank you for listening to the carpool podcast with Kelly and Liz. Make sure you're subscribed so you never miss an episode. And if you enjoyed riding with us, tell everybody you know, there's room in the car for everyone.