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You're listening to The Decluttered Mom Podcast. A podcast built specifically for busy moms by a busy mom. I'm your host, Diana Rene, and in 2017, I had my second daughter, and it felt like I was literally drowning in my home. Okay, not literally. But I felt like I couldn't breathe with all of the stuff surrounding me. Over the next ten months, I got rid of approximately 70% of our household belongings, and I have never looked back. I kind of feel like I hacked the mom system, and I'm here to share all the tips, tricks, and encouragement. Let's listen to today's show.

Welcome to another episode of the Decluttered Mom podcast. I'm going to do something a little bit different today that I have never done before, but a couple of podcasts that I listen to do this once a quarter usually, and I find it interesting and I was like, hmm, maybe you will try it for me, and if you guys think it's interesting, great. If you think it's weird, that's great too. Just let me know so that we don't keep doing them if you don't like them. But I thought it would be fun to do my favorite things episode, and so these are just things that I'm currently loving. They could be physical items, they could be concepts, they could be books, they could be all sorts of things, and so I thought it would just be a fun thing to do and, as a reminder as we get into this, it's important to remember that, even though I teach decluttering, I always remind that just because I teach decluttering doesn't mean I don't own any physical items, because that would be a minimalist and I am not a minimalist, which we have talked about before. So, while I don't want you to just go out and buy everything that you hear on a favorite things episode, I think it's also just a fun thing, because when we are decluttering and when we are simplifying, it's because we're making space for the things that we do truly love and we're getting rid of the excess for the things that we don't care about, and so these are just some of the things that I do truly love right now. Okay, so we're just going to jump right in.

So the very first thing is I don't know how to say it, so we're starting off strong. It is an electrolyte packet and it's either called element or LMNT and I don't know, and I've tried to figure it out before and I can't figure it out. So it is a powdered packet that you put in water and it's to add electrolytes to your water and it's just something that I feel like I could drink like so much regular water in a day and I still feel dehydrated. And if I just drink one of these a day and then the rest is just plain water, then I feel so much more hydrated, I feel like I have less headaches, I feel like I have more energy and no, this is not an ad. None of the stuff on here is an ad. So just let's remember that I buy this every single month.

It's something that I keep actually on auto-ship with Amazon because it's something that has improved just my daily life over the last year so much. It's pretty salty and I have to put it in a bunch of water. I don't remember what the actual recommendation is for how many ounces, but I don't do that. I do way more water. So I put one packet in like a big 32 ounce water bottle and that works really well for me. I can handle the taste of it at that point. Not that it's bad when it has less water, it's just it's very salty, and so it's something that I really love. Watermelon is my favorite flavor by far and then my second favorite flavor is the raspberry. I had to think about that for a minute. I do like the orange Also. I have not tried some of the other flavors because I'm a creature of habit, but that's. That is going to be the number one thing on the list of my current favorite things.

Okay, the next thing that I'm loving right now is my Kindle, and I've been loving my Kindle for a long time, but I find that when I am reading on my Kindle, I read so much more Like I love the idea of a physical book, and there are so many people out there that like fully reject Kindles because they're, or any e-readers because they're like I just love the feel of like a real book. That used to be me and then I. There are a couple of things I don't like having to figure out the light situation, especially if I'm trying to read and trying to get, you know, trying to sit with one of my kids while they're trying to go to sleep, or things like that. Having like a book light is often late, oftenly oh, my goodness, we're creating new words right now it is often too bright because they're like me and they don't really want to sleep with light on. So that's one thing.

The second thing is, ever since I've had vision issues over the past couple of years, books like the print you guys is too small and for a while I was wearing readers and that was helping, but then I okay, now we're going on a tangent, but that was when I wore contacts and now I don't wear contacts anymore because of some other things. We're not getting into it because then that's going to take like an hour to explain the side tangent. But I wear glasses now and I can't wear readers with the glasses. And I know you can get glasses with readers in them, but I can't do that because of the type of lens I need for my glasses because of my vision issues. So that's fun, right.

So the Kindle is nice because I can enlarge the font and if you guys ever looked at the size of the font, you would laugh at me. And every time like my phone, even like if I text someone, the font on my side of things is so large that it's like something a 80 year old woman would have on their phone. He had a phone. And so anytime I take a screenshot of something and I send it to someone, they're like why is your text so big? And I'm like, oh yeah, I forgot that not everybody has their phones set like this. So I like the Kindle because it has the backlight and it has the ability to change the size of the font, and I just think it's comfortable. Like I read in bed 99% of the time, and I think it's more comfortable to hold a Kindle laying down in different laying positions than a book, because you have to use two hands for the book. I actually put a pop socket on my Kindle and that's changed the game even more, because then it's even easier to hold in in whatever way I'm laying. And this sounds really lazy, but that's just you guys, that's just the truth of it.

Okay, so the next thing that I am loving is my walking pad, and this is something that I wanted for a long time and I just finally got this in this fall, this last fall, but I've been wanting it for a couple of years, but I just could never, like I would start researching them and I could never find one that had mostly good reviews. Like I swear, every single one I looked at had equally terrible and good reviews, and I was like I do not want to go through the effort of trying to return a walking pad. And if you guys don't know what a walking pad is, it's just basically like an inexpensive treadmill that doesn't have like the front part that comes up where you could like rest your arms, if that makes sense. It's just the. It's just like the pad part that has like the spinny thing that you walk on and it doesn't go super fast so you can't like run on it. It's just for walking. So I got it because I have an adjustable standing desk, which I got that in 2020. And I love that too, because sometimes I just need to feel I just need to stand up while I'm working, and so that's helpful. But I also want to be able to sit down so I can adjust it. So with the walking pad I can have it fully up so that I'm standing up and I can walk.

And why I love this is because I, in my job, I do a lot of listening to videos and trainings, because I have to learn how to do all of the things that a business owner needs to do, and I'm constantly learning because it's not anything I learned in school, and so I will usually walk on my walking pad while I am listening or watching these trainings, but also I do I am on a lot of zoom calls and so if there's a call that I don't necessarily need to be talking on very much, then I will be on that call while I'm using walking pad and it's just a really great way to be able to move throughout the day. Otherwise, I find I can like go a whole day and I look at my Apple watch and I'm like I walked like 300 steps. This is not good, okay, and that kind of goes into my next favorite thing, which is not a physical item, but it's daily morning walks, and this is something I've been doing now since last summer and I have found that when I'm doing this it sounds so simple and Like I get it, I get how I get how it sounds. It sounds so silly and simple, but when I am more physically active I sleep better, I have a better mood overall. I just feel like I have more energy, like all the things that like duh Diana, like obviously that's how the human body works, but for me I've always Really pushed myself, like I was an athlete in high school and then after that I like didn't know what to do, because in high school it was like you had practice every single day and if you didn't have practice you had a match, and so I and I played tennis and so it was like forced physical activity or movement.

And then, once I got to college, I was like, oh, nobody's making me run, nobody's making me Exercise, and so often I just wouldn't do it, or I would like go to the gym and I would try to do like those like high-intensity workouts and things like that, and it always made me feel like crap, like, for whatever reason, especially as I've gotten older, I cannot do like intense cardio and if I do Intense cardio I don't get like what people call like the runners high where you like, feel amazing after and you feel on top of the World and you have so much energy like I feel like crap and I want to fall into my bed and I don't know why, but Maybe I'm just getting older. But I have found that if I just walk like, I feel a hundred times better in so many areas of my life, and so it is a daily non-negotiable for me to walk minimum 30 minutes, but I really shoot for 45 to 60 minutes and I am able to most days Because of the walking pad. So if it's a nice out, I will go walk outside because that's my preference. I feel like the time goes by faster. You know, I can wave hi to people as I'm going, like I feel like, you know, working from home, sometimes it's nice to like see other people and be in the world, but it's just nice to be outside and in nature, often go hiking for it, and so that's that's something that I really love. But I really hate walking outside if it's freezing cold and it's windy and icy and that's not fun to me, and so I don't know that it's really fun anyone. But I Enjoy using the walking pad then, and I'll do it in the morning while I'm listening to a training or on a call or something like that. But even in the summer, if I do a walk outside, I might also Additionally do the walking pad later when I'm doing something that I don't really.

That is hard for me to just sit down, and I think that I think also, you know, something that I haven't thought about a lot, but speaking this out loud, I'm kind of realizing is that because I have ADHD, like it's really hard for me to just sit and focus, especially if it's something that is Not super interesting to me, but it's something I have to learn, right. And so if there's something I have to learn and it's hard for me to just sit and watch and listen, I find that I take it in easier when I'm moving, and I think it's because my brain is busy Focusing on managing the walking. You know, my body is doing that. I don't have to think about. I'm not so what's the word? Restless, I guess, and I'm able to focus more on the thing because I'm already keeping my body busy doing something else, and so that's been a benefit of the walking pad, also for me specifically. But yes, so daily morning walks is one of my favorite things. I never thought I'd be that person. Maybe I need to become a mall walker. Isn't that what people do when it's not nice outside? Okay, maybe not.

The next thing is that I'm really loving right now is pre-cooked meat. This sounds weird. I I hate cooking. I have never pretended to love to cook. I don't like cooking. I don't like baking. I mess it up all the time, I get frustrated, I get paranoid about the chicken not being cooked enough, and so I cook it so long that it's just not good anymore, like there's just there's so many things about cooking and baking that I Don't enjoy that any time I can find like any type of convenience hack, it means I'm I'm a hundred percent more likely to actually follow through on cooking, because it's not something that I I it's. It's hard for me to get going when it comes to cooking. So something that I have been, something I've always done, is I if, like, I'm going to cook a pound of ground beef, I'll cook three pounds of ground beef at once and then I will freeze two of the pounds separately, like one pound in one bag and one pound in another bag, and freeze it, and so that way the next time I need cooked ground beef ground beef I have it and I can just thaw it and use it, and so I've done that for as long as I can remember.

But what I'm talking about is like store-bought pre-cooked meat and a lot of people use, like, rotisserie chicken. They'll get a rotisserie chicken and they'll chop it up and they'll put it in the fridge and they'll use it throughout the week. We can't do that because of food allergies in my house, so I've never found a rotisserie chicken from a store that has been safe for my daughter. So that is not an option. But more and more food companies are coming out with pre-cooked meats, especially at places like Costco, like Kevin's is one of them. I was about to say he like I know him personally, like there's actually someone named Kevin. The company Kevin Kevin's has a lot of pre-cooked meats. So they have like chicken, they have carnitas, they have this like steak and broccoli thing.

So like all of these pre-cooked meats that you just warm up on the stove top and then a lot of them come with sauces. Some of them I use the sauce, some of them I don't, and I just use the meat however we want, and there's usually quite a bit of it. So we may like heat up the chicken and have chicken and rice and vegetables and then the next day I'll use the rest of it to make really easy like chicken burritos or something like that. You know what I mean. So it's just, protein is the number one. Raw meat I can't handle. You guys, I will avoid handling raw meat at all costs. And so if I have pre-cooked meat that I can just put into a recipe that's easy, then again I am 100% more likely to cook, and a lot of these have a longer expiration date, and so I can just keep a couple in the fridge at all times and if I don't want to cook, then I can grab those and use them. Do I only use this meat? No, but it's reserved for the days that I'm just really not in the mood to cook or I'm really struggling to like get going with cooking.

Okay, another thing that I am really loving is inexpensive fresh flowers, and again, this is something that has been kind of an on and off thing for me for the past couple of years. But there was a day, like probably two years ago, where I was at Target and there was a bouquet of mini carnations you guys, it was like five or six dollars and I looked at it. I was like those are so pretty. And I looked and I saw there are mini carnations and I was like, oh, everyone makes fun of carnations, but you guys, mini carnations are like the prettiest flowers and they last freaking forever. And so I remember buying them and putting them in the little vase and being just like feeling like every time I walked into my kitchen I was just happy because I saw these fresh flowers. And so over the years I've noticed Target and I've noticed are another grocery store I go to frequently King's Supers. They have so many more inexpensive bundles of flowers where you can still buy the $35 bouquets but you can also just buy these little bunches of flowers for between like $4 and $7.

And so now it's become kind of like a weekly ritual for me to buy one or two of these little bundles of flowers and just putting them throughout the house in little like mason jars and things like that. So I'll put like one on my office desk and I'll put one in the girl's bathroom and I'll put, you know, one on their nightstands and I'll put a little bit of a bigger one in the kitchen and it's just something that I feel brings a little bit like of life to our home and joy, and it's just like little drops of sunshine that I just enjoy having around us. Okay, the next one is Like something I have had for I don't even know how long, but I have to tell you guys about it because it's something I use literally every day of my life and I don't know what I would do if it broke and I couldn't find another one. So that's how much. I love this, and it is a extra long heating pad that Wraps around your shoulders and so it covers the entirety of my back and I am tall, you guys. I am almost six feet tall. I don't know if that surprises you or not, but it covers the entirety of my back and then it wraps. I'm showing you right now, like you can see, it wraps around the shoulders, down Around, so you can like wrap it around your neck if your neck is sore or tight. It comes around the shoulders and down and you guys, it's just, it's almost like my. It's just so Comforting to me that even if I don't have like a sore back which is not often, I have it on like I have I sit in a recliner and I put my Heating pad on and I cover myself in my blanket and like it's just this like really cozy thing that I Feel like I'm getting this warm hug and I just feel so comfortable and it's like it's just something that I do Do every single day of my life. And it's also amazing if you do, you know, pull a muscle or you have something that you're just need a heating pad for because it is so big so you can kind of wrap it around. It's just, it's amazing. I don't know what it's called. If you just if you look on Amazon, you type in like extra long back and shoulder Heating pad. There's so many of them now. When I first bought this, it was the only one I could find, but now there are so many copycats out there that there's just there's a lot of options.

Okay, and the last thing that I am loving right now is a book that I am rereading, that I first read years and years ago when it first came out, and it's called atomic habits and it's by James clear and I believe that this is like the best Book on habit-forming that anybody could ever read. So I know we're still in January, we're in that like new year kind of new goal type feeling and setting. So if that's you and you really want to learn how to Create habits in a way that's actually sustainable, that will actually stick, then atomic habits is just, it's a mind-blowing book, but it's just so good. So I listen to this on audible, which I know. I was just talking about Kindle and I feel like I should clarify I love Kindle, but I usually only read like for fun books on Kindle and then anything for business or personal development. I Get on audible or on the Libby app for libraries, Because for those I prefer listening to those, and so I guess audible is another one of my favorite things, and Libby so there's two more, but it's something.

It's a book that I try to Relisten to every year, and I like to do it in the beginning of the year because that's usually when I am I'm like feeling extra Excited about goal setting and creation and all that, and so that is a really, really good book. I highly recommend it literally to anyone, anyone, in any situation. I think it's a great read and it's just it's. It's it's mind-blowing and it totally shifts your perspective on what needs to happen to be able to make new habits in your life. Okay, I don't know if this was fun for you, it was fun for me, but let me know if this is something that you think is a good idea, and maybe we can do it like twice a year or once a quarter or something like that. Or if you're like this wasn't my favorite, let me know that too, because I don't want to create content for you guys that you're not enjoying. So if this was, you know, fun or helpful to you, then great, let me know. But otherwise, I will plan on seeing you on next week's episode of the decluttered mom podcast.

Thanks for hanging out and listening to The Decluttered Mom Podcast. If you enjoyed this episode, it would mean the world if you could write a review or share this episode with a friend or your Instagram stories, and if you're on Instagram, be sure to follow me at the dot decluttered dot mom and send me a DM to say hi.

I'd love to hear what you thought about today's episode. I hope you'll come back next week and hang out with us again.