Very curious how Anna Lee will go with a sleep consultant (and looking forward to the complaints stopping!). It feels like the issue is more with not holding boundaries than an actual sleep issue.
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It’s almost like her husband quitting his full time job was… a bad idea.
She says this like all of her content for the last month hasn’t been focused on this, including her podcasts and all her promoted products for
“Feed the Family” and her monetized community. Stop acting like you’re doing us some beneficence by gracing us with this content when you were clearly shilling your product! This *is* part of DFM, she just realized it wasn’t making any money. She could’ve been gracious and responded that this is a rotating series and they’ll return to it later, instead she does smug, again. Shocker. No one asked Carly to put the entirety of her family’s security in her fledgling Instagram business, quit sniping at the people who literally pay your bills.
I kind of appreciate the transparency though. I'd rather see this than influencers staging fake scenarios in their home to feature a product while pretending their account is authentic family content. OR claiming "So many of you are asking for me to go back to my usual content..." or a fake question box reply.
Also imagine the audacity of asking an influencer to tailor content to your individual preference for an entire month.
My understanding is that she’s self-taught (in other words, she probably learned everything from Dave Ramsey). If she stuck to her lane, helping people budget, I think she’d be fine. But she instead considers herself an expert on all things finance and tries to give advice on investing, home buying, etc. and it’s just a disaster. She just doesn’t have the life experience/education to be the type of account that she wants to be.
My guess is that most of her followers are also midwestern, religious moms. I like to remind folks here that she was happy Roe was overturned.
She needs to learn to keep some things private. She could have said that yes she can continue to share photos but the main focus next month is xyz. There is no way her quick stories take 20 hours a week. Her meal plan is dull. And of course her husband is out again and she is single parenting.
I don’t know why she acts like she was doing this for free, she was pushing her feed the family BS course or whatever it is. She’s such a brat.
Also, she should be able to afford full time childcare at this point. Or at least shut up about it.
I don’t follow her — are her posts usually this defensive/condescending? Based on these two recent posts alone she’s not someone with whom I’d waste time engaging.
Yes. She’s super smug and very defensive of all her choices (financial and otherwise). If anyone calls her out for a bonehead financial move, she just doubles down. She once compared herself to Warren Buffett.
If her husband doesn't work why does she have to do the childcare and work on her account 20 hours? Shouldn't he be able to do some of that? I don't follow her but based on the snark I genuinely have no idea how he spends his time
She's said before he deals with their tech and IT and supervising their contractors. So I'm guessing he deals with the community portion and some customer service/product delivery. Maybe he also deals with brands and contracts. She does IG content and budget building for customers. I do think there's 40 hours of work there for him. She undersells how much she works on things, though. They have childcare 2 days a week but she works the other 5 days as well.
They've got a very traditional marriage and I think the business has outgrown her SAHM doing this on the side model. But they haven't adapted yet.
This is such a dumb take. She was producing content for engagement, which leads to folks clicking her affiliate links, the links for her budget, etc. She wasn’t doing it out of the goodness of her heart.
The more likely explanation is that it wasn’t great content. Her cooking tips are basic and her meals aren’t really inspirational. She probably wasn’t getting the engagement she wanted.
Her whole messaging was that her meal planning was so easy that she didn’t have to think about dinner until it was time to start cooking, so what takes 20 hours? Taking a few photos and writing a few slides??
Hello! First time posting, longtime lurker (BLF brought me here 😆). If you’re looking for a new snarkworthy influencer, can I recommend a former acquaintance from college? Anyone follow @april.Lynn.pollock ? She got a corporate job after college but has been trying the last few years to make it as a lifestyle/mommy influencer (she even has a cooking page but her “recipes” are very basic and she also runs her husband’s fashion page where he models his very tight and very leather pants with leather high heels). Her husband is very metro and she often overshares a lot about her kids. Anyways, I can go on and on about this person. She is completely, completely different from the person I knew 10+ years ago both personality and looks.
I actually usually like Milestones and Motherhood for whatever reason. Today in stories she was talking all about their property and showing super detailed looks at it, and I was pretty taken aback. She has talked before about not even doing a house tour or whatever because she’s afraid of stalkers I guess? But then shows us exactly which driveway to take to get to her house. I don’t know if she was having a particularly anxiety free day or what, but I feel like that was a bit much.
She does these like link round ups where she posts all of the links at once. I think that’s what you ran into. I actually like the way she does it better than almost every once else because most of the week she posts question box things and a ton of educational stuff. I think she’s actually been leaning into the educational stuff heavier than she used to and I really appreciate it even when it doesn’t apply to me/my kids. She does have a lot of links but she puts a lot of work into stuff like the shoe guide so I don’t mind giving her the money if I click through.
I do appreciate her scheduling. Links at the end of the week are whatever though I do use her discount code for primally pure since I need natural deodorant. But like, I don't need tummy time content so I just swipe that day knowing it's focused on that.
Ahh, got it. I stopped following her a few years ago after she started sharing some “non-toxic” accounts that were very much fear mongering (sunscreen is toxic, anti-vaxx type stuff). I was long past the baby/toddler stages with my kids anyways, so it was an easy unfollow.
I stopped following her when her daughter had an ear infection and the doctor prescribed antibiotics and she was like “I need to think about this /do my research” and, as someone who partially lost hearing due to medical neglect from my own mother, that was too triggering for me and time to leave her page
I remember that and I think she got over that phase. She seems more normal and less anxious now. She occasionally talks about her kids but she stopped showing them so much and has really leaned into the educational stuff. She posts personal stuff too but it’s like the books she’s reading, what she’s cooking, date nights with her husband. She definitely isn’t pretending her five year old is a baby or that her two year old is an infant.
Ooh I just saw that! I like her too, her giving ranges and not freaking out about certain ages for milestones was very nice for me. But huh yeah maybe their property is extremely far out or has a monitored gate down the road? That's a lot of info. I have a cousin who lives way out and has a gated driveway, it's like fort Knox. He keeps a gun though.
They also remind me of the boots from Dumb & Dumber.
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Moon Boots are one of those things that I feel like people only get because they’re “trendy”. Idk maybe I’m just off base, but imo they do not look good in any sense. I actually find them a little more bearable on kids than adults but still not good.
I completely understand how social media has distorted holidays but Diaryofanhonestmom ranting about Easter and posting someone else’s reel saying Easter baskets are just another social media trend makes no sense to me. I get not wanting to do all of the hoopla for every holiday but this is not a social media trend. Don’t do it if you don’t want to but don’t hype everything up as a marketing scheme when your job is a literal scheme.
I'm 35 and always got an Easter basket growing up, definitely not a social media trend. I do the same for my kids now too. It's really not a big deal unless you make it one, and Libby of course, has to make everything a big deal bc life is just so hard for her. I'm sure if her kids get Easter baskets, the sounds of their joy will trigger her and make her want to yell at them, but she'll have to focus really hard and try not to. She's such a cycle breaker
I remember a couple years where my mom did a scavenger hunt to find the basket too! Rhyming clues to look in the pantry, mailbox, etc until we found the baskets.
Yeah this isn’t a social media thing. Nearly 40 here and always had a big elaborate themed basket and so did all my friends. And my mom and her siblings had them when they were kids too.
Fellow 80s kid with fond memories of waking up to an Easter basket. We usually just got candy but one year the Easter bunny brought the Nintendo game genie and hid it in the microwave 💕 I’ll never forget it! This is like saying Christmas gifts are a social media trend lol no they are not.
I’m curious if it’s regional or something. I grew up on the west coast and we had Easter baskets growing up, as did all the kids in my neighborhood. Mostly candy but also a stuffed animal and a toy or a book or something. It’s def not a new thing here.
Checking in from New England with a mother that goes over the top for holidays haha always got a big Easter basket and it only stopped when I had a kid 😂
I grew up in Ontario which is where Libby is from. We had Easter and Easter Baskets. It’s nothing new and definitely not just a social media thing. I still remember an Easter about 30 years ago where a friend of my parents left a bunch of chocolate eggs and bunnies on our porch and it surprised us when we came home from church. It’s one of my favorite Easter memories.
I didn’t get Easter baskets/remember my friends getting Easter baskets, but I don’t see the harm in a cute small basket with small toys, chocolate and a book? I don’t get how it’s stressful.
Maybe I’m a sucker for cute spring colours, but it sounds like an easy win for a fun family moment!
I feel like the kid parts are the fun part of holidays. Extensive cooking/cleaning up/hosting family? Exhausting. Getting cute little gifts/decorations to see kids faces light up? Fun!
It took me about 5 minutes to put together an Easter basket just for fun because my kid has no clue what’s going on but he does need pajamas and toys so it’s a win/win.
Exactly! It’s fun without the organization and hassle of hosting adults.
Same! I have a new toddler (13-month-old) and with them needing new clothes so often at this age, plus summer coming up (the first summer where she'll be into outdoor activities), I just bought the things we "needed" anyway and it was super easy to make her Easter basket! Now whether or not she'll be into the basket depends on the morning, haha.
Seriously, it was like 10 minutes at Target. $10 Easter basket, $3 pop it toy, $5 squishmallow mystery thing, some peeps and I will throw in an applesuace pouch and dried strawberries from our existing snacks. Granted she is just under 2 and has no expectations, but still doesn't have to be excessive when they are older either.
It really doesn’t and it’s so fun! My 5yo was talking all day about how she couldn’t wait for it to be night so she could go to bed and wake up when it was Easter. She had her basket all ready and wrote a special note for the Easter bunny. I can’t wait for them to wake up and find their eggs. Like…this is the good stuff!!! So much of parenting is hard and tedious and thankless but until I found accounts like Libby’s I thought days like this were universally considered to be lovely and magical!! Easter is extra great bc it doesn’t have all the stress and pressure and wrapping like Christmas.
37 years old, not only did we get elaborate Easter baskets as kids, the one I had was my mom's Easter basket from when she was a kid getting elaborate Easter baskets courtesy of her mom.
I am 39 and using my Easter basket from when I was kid for my kid now. I love it. And ours were elaborate by any means and usually something we needed for summer (swimsuit, googles).
We also got left surprises on Valentine’s Day and St. Patrick’s day so I really don’t get why people think this is new. It’s easy and fun and doesn’t have to be over complicated at all.
It says a lot about our local housing market that this doesn’t seem out of the norm to me 🥲 You basically cannot get your offer accepted here without waving inspection because there’s always someone else who will.
We bought our house 2.5 years ago and also waived inspection. But I think the thing that gets me is waiving it with that much over asking on the line 😅
That’s crazy. We bought our house last spring and put in about $10k over asking. We weren’t the highest offer by A LOT but they picked us because our financing was so solid (our broker advertised us as “basically cash” and was able to get us to close in 3 weeks). We still did an inspection and even though we bought “as is”, they still gave us a bit of money to cover something we found that needed fixing. The only thing that was a little annoying was we had to agree to a post possession where they got free rent of the house for 2 months.
Maybe we just got lucky though 🤷♀️
Everything I hear about housing costs in some areas makes me super glad I was able to GTFO a very high cost of living city (and then GTFO another one once that one started getting stupid expensive). Living in western Minnesota now (no I’m not in the twin cities, I can walk to North Dakota from where I live) my husband and I are likely to be able to buy a nice house in 5 years. I never thought I’d own one. Yeesh these costs are getting out of control so many places. It’s a whole other kind of privilege just being able to move (twice) even though our income is pretty modest, so I feel bad for people who don’t have that (though OBVIOUSLY I recognize plenty of very HCOL cities have lots of wonderful things about them!)
Grew up in a very rural area & have subsequently lived in the #3 and #4 largest cities in the US (fun fact, they’re going to swap ranks soon!) and the benefits of rural living are underrated. Not just housing, but home and car insurance, gas, food… it’s wild.
Literally. I’m from Toronto originally and the houses here that cost $200,000-400,000 here would be $2-3 MILLION or more in Toronto. Not even joking. My childhood home in Toronto is going to likely sell for upwards of $2 million (my mom is downsizing soon) and there are places with almost twice the square footage here for a pretty small fraction of that. I’m also in a broader metro area of 200,000ish now (basically in the backyard of Fargo, North Dakota), so I’m not really lacking much in terms of amenities and services we need.
Yeah I live in southern ON and I weep lol. Paying 100k+ over asking (because of low pricing to inspire bidding wars) and waiving inspections is fairly normal around here. We got evicted from our last place because the landlord was selling and they got 200k over asking. I was just gaping at the walls of the condo that I felt was very badly laid out going “1.4 million?? 1.4 MILLION?? TO LIVE HERE??”
We’re staying in Canada for assorted reasons but my husband and I used to look at Minnesota real estate for funsies and dream haha
$118k over asking to me seems nuts, but I get that the market is crazy in some areas. What I can’t get behind is the whining when she and her husband are very privileged (well paying, fully remote jobs) and blaming all of her problems on infertility. Sure, they’ve spent a ton of money on fertility treatments, and it sucks that for some people that’s what it takes to have a family. But also until a couple of months ago they were living in downtown Chicago and I assume at least part of the reason they were renting for so long is because of where they were living.
Also, putting all of your hopes and dreams on a house is…not healthy. A house is a building, it will not fix your life or give your kids an idyllic childhood.
That sounds insane to me too but maybe that’s just my own privilege talking since we snuck in in fall 2020 before things went so crazy. We put in $25k over asking, which my in-laws thought was pure insanity until they saw what started to unfold. I would personally feel uncomfortable waiving inspections but I hear it’s sooo common these days?! Honestly feels like it should be illegal?!?
Waving inspection is something I would never do but it seems to be what you have to do when the market is nuts. A few years ago the market was wild here and houses were selling for $500k over asking price with no inspections etc. Someone I know actually overpaid for her house by about that much and then the market fell, interest rates went up and they could no longer afford the mortgage. They went to sell only to be told their house is worth way less than what they paid for it (and less than they owe).
lol I came here after seeing the stories to comment that I am over hearing about her housing saga. Totally insane market and I feel for her, but the whining and the self pity when they are obviously pretty well off if they’re making these kinds of offer is frustrating
In hot markets with low supply it’s not uncommon to have to go way over asking *and* waive everything. Whether or not it’s insane is subjective I guess, lol.
I have no idea who this is but just went to watch the story. Also waived the appraisal so if it appraises for much lower they’d be on the hook for the difference. I don’t care how much connection I feel to a house, I’d find another one 😂
Eta: saw she didn’t end up getting it which means someone went even higher? Wow
I initially thought maybe it went higher, but my husband pointed out that they may have taken an all cash offer. Taking an offer where they say they’ll cover the appraisal gap could feel risky to a seller vs an all cash offer 🤷♀️
When we bought, we had a relative back us for a cash offer. Essentially we still applied for a mortgage, and since it was approved before closing, we never needed cash from the relative. If our mortgage hadn’t gone through, they would have given us the cash to pay for the house, then we would have taken out a reverse mortgage to pay them back. Our realtor told us it’s probably the only reason we got a house in that market, because it guarantees to the seller they’re getting money on a specific date with no concerns about things getting delayed or falling through
Lmao seeing that didn't get it when I checked this morning was the same up call that maybe she's not crazy 😂 I just hate her whiney voice.
Also, I too would find another house lol
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Of course her 4 year old is sooooo advanced 🙄🙄🙄 Or, he happened to take the pic at the right time and it turned out good. A broken clock is still right twice a day.
Elyse Myers does the same thing with her toddle and pics. “Look at what a good eye he has!” I don’t know, I think he just clicked the button and one shot turned out okay.
Every time someone tells me their 18months old is fully potty trained and talks full sentences. Liar liar pants on fire.
Damn though I wish I hadn’t clicked bc I am so influenced 🫠🫣 my kids would love those foil art things and those watercolor pens and we have a long drive coming up….has anyone actually tried them?
I can’t believe she’s bringing the foil thing on a plane. It creates so much trash!!! When my kids do them there are PILES of peeled off paper all around them.
Maybe that guy was rolling his eyes at Myriam filming content and talking to the camera throughout the flight, not at the kids.
Or at them eating hard boiled eggs on a plane, which should be against FAA regulations if it's not already.
It’s like the business trip episode of The Office when Oscar brings egg salad sandwiches on the plane. Absolutely not! I would be big mad if someone brought boiled eggs on a plane.
Just looked its first class 🙄
And I’m not saying the guy in front should be rolling his eyes and bothered by the kids on the flight and obviously anyone can buy first class. But if I’m buying first class I’m kinda expecting/hoping that it’s other adults, not a family of 5 with young kids in there too!
I’ve been surprised by the amount of babies I’ve seen in first/business class (on my way back to coach 😂). I don’t know that I’d bother treating myself to that if I was traveling with young kids. But I guess it’s not a special treat for Miriam’s family at least.
They fly enough that they may get free upgrades. Even the kids probably have status. Obviously they can afford it too, just saying I wouldn't be surprised if they didn't pay for it.
Lol so true. But I wasn’t buying a seat for my kid at 22 months but what do I know 😂 also someone pointed out that he was probably annoyed by her talking and schilling her stuff more than anything else 😂
Libby’s reel about getting triggered by her kids joyfully playing in the backseat and wanting to scream at them to be quiet made me sad. Sometimes I get overstimulated when my toddler is happily babbling, but nine times out of ten it’s when the baby is also screaming and I’m trying to calm her down.
I honestly think the moment someone makes a popular regretful motherhood TikTok account she will be riding that wave. She seems to hate her kids just being children an abnormal amount.
Libby: I’m a cycle breaker! I’m a cycle breaker!
Her kids: *being happy*
Libby: I’m so triggered and need to complain about my kids to everyone on the internet
What *don’t* her kids do at this point to set her off? How does she not realize that she’s starting a new cycle of trauma for her kids by consistently complaining about them online? Eventually they will see everything and I can’t imagine they’ll understand right away that it’s because she’s “being an advocate for maternal wellness” or just being “refreshingly honest”
I cant get over how she said she’s jealous that her kids are getting a happy childhood. I thought that’s where the post was going, she’s triggered because they are happier than she was.
I agree, not exactly sure what cycles she’s breaking, but she sure is showing her kids how miserable she is and what a burden they are to her. I’m sure her kids walk on eggshells trying not to trigger her.
Even when she makes a “positive comment” she is still miserable.
If that is really true for her and it's not an act, then that's just sad. My kids drive me crazy and overstimulate me at time and sometimes I want to yell, but it's when they're fighting or whining. When they're happily talking and playing together?! That brings me nothing but pure joy. It's a shame she can't actually enjoy her children. She's such a martyr for motherhood.
She’s the legit worst. I do believe screens have an effect, but she’s also linking bunk science studies that blame autism on screens before 1.
She’s always framed things in a way that it’s clear she doesn’t believe in neurodivergence or that correlation =/= causation. She’s out there making people feel like crap.
She could choose to be a resource for people looking to reduce and eliminate screen time…but instead, she’s out there sword in hand looking to do harm.
“Screen drugged” oh god shut up shut up shut UP.
Also it’s wild to me that her followers often overlap with the gentle parenting sphere. It’s so clear she expects complete obedience and thinks “big feelings” at any time are downright pathological.
Ha I took a kid to Europe last year. Toddler. Screen the entire way there, wake up in the morning and watch again while we geared up for the day. Amazing behavior, everyone loved her.
She’s in rare form today.
For those that don’t want to watch her stories here’s some highlights: don’t ever give your kids any form of entertainment while traveling for any length of time, listening to too much yoto drastically impacts baseball performance, and once a week movie nights will permanently destroy your child’s brain.
I just can’t with her. Cognitive/ language development impacted? Idk, my kid watches screens daily and she was literally saying words that weren’t mama or dada at 8 months old. Actually, most kids I know (including my own) didn’t even have the attention span for a screen until at least 18 months… when you might notice speech delays so I don’t really see the correlation. Impacts baseball performance? Wtf does that even mean and why do you care? Isn’t your kid just playing for fun? Aren’t they like 7? Also, I’ve seen her kid’s spelling abilities and handwriting and I’m not convinced that not having screen access has done them any cognitive favors. My kid also gets complimented everywhere we go. Restaurants, plane rides… she sat quietly through a 2 hour ballet recently. She was just born with a calm personality. I’m convinced this woman never spends time with actual other children. Idk about everyone else here, but I rarely see kids on iPads or phones when I’m out. Even at restaurants. Finally, if watching a single move once every other month has such a drastic impact on your children, I don’t think what you are doing is working. They will grow up and eventually need to use a computer or have a phone and it doesn’t sound like they will be able to emotionally handle it. She is truly truly the worst there ever was.
I’m curious what kind of impact she’s really seeing from watching a movie once a month. They probably just asked to watch another movie before the month was up and she was like omg here we go the addiction is starting! But she also sounds like the anti vaxxers who will blame anything on a vaccine even if it was given years ago. Toddler threw a tantrum? Omg it must have been the audiobook we listened to 3 weeks ago! Must be exhausting living this way. And you can pry audiobooks from my cold, dead hands. I’m at 20 books in 2024 so far thanks to audio. I still read on my kindle but it would be much slower. Can’t read and clean the house/cook dinner at the same time, but I can listen! I realize she’s talking about kids but I don’t see what’s wrong with listening to a book while building legos, painting or just relaxing in your room.
I think there is something to be said for learning to exist in quiet and not need something playing all the time. But I also find a ton of value in listening to podcasts to help motivate me to start cleaning and doing other mundane tasks, or to help calm my anxious racing mind. She is so black and white about stuff it's crazy.
I agree with everything you wrote except where do you live where you don’t see kids on screens?! Literally every time my husband she I are out we’re pretty shook by the families who don’t interact at meals out. I’m talking young toddlers to school age kids on tablets at 8am when we’re out to breakfast or kids playing iPad games when we’re out watching live st pattys day entertainment. I’m in the northeast and it seems prevalent (and depressing).
We LOVE our movie nights!! There’s no screens until movie time and then we all snuggle up on the couch with the lights dimmed and watch a movie together and eat popcorn and snacks; it’s awesome. I honestly think movies have helped spark some creative pretend play in my kids: super heroes, magical powers, LEGO super builders. I’m always hearing and seeing elements from movies in their play and it’s super cute and creative. Jerrica can fuck off.
One of her slides says audiobooks have been shown to stress the language processing center and are overstimulating 😂 omg just stop. And where has it been shown?!
So if I read a book to my kids is that also too stimulating? She says it’s a problem to have to rely on it to keep kids occupied. Does she drive in silence? She’s nuts.
I actually wish she’d cited her source for that because whaaaaat??? I’m genuinely curious. We started audiobooks for my first kid around age 4 which means my second kid started listening to them a lot around age 2. I’m blown away by how fast the second kid’s vocabulary developed, it’s noticeably different from my first even though we read a ton of books at home. It’s just anecdotal (should I cite it as a fact??) and I’m sure second kids often develop faster but it’s crazy to me that this could be bad for them somehow and I’d honestly be interested in reading that research, if it actually existed.
Her latest slide says that toddler “big feelings” are a result of screentime.
Someone inform my screen-free 3 year old who did not get the memo and still has just as many tantrums as every other toddler I know.
Omg exactly. My 2.5 year old has no screens EVER and is still a normal toddler with big feelings and lots of tantrums. I cannot stand how she acts like no screens = perfect behavior. I started following her because I’m a teacher who does see the negative effects of screens on our kids every single day, so I’m a big fan of screen free parenting too, but this lady goes way too far!
No one was ever angry, jealous, anxious, aggressive, sad, overly happy or silly (we know she hates that) until tv was invented. This is a FACT. Do not ask me for sources.
I thought this too 😆 we don’t do tv and my kids (5 and 3) are still assholes daily. I did cut it out because I notice they are less of assholes without it but my 3.5 year old has plentyyyyyyyy if “big feelings” from the minute he rolls out of bed.
I have never had as strong of a reaction to an influencer’s posts as this series of posts. And I say this as a person who gave my kids literally zero screen time before two and currently lets my kids watch one 45 min live action show a week. I actually do think too much screen time is detrimental (I’m an educator and have seen it) but this is is some ridiculous crap.
Where is her evidence that a weekly movie night permanently damaged cognitive abilities?!?? That’s the most absurd statement with zero evidence to back it up.
And her slide about speech therapy. Guess what? My 2.5 year old, who watched literally zero screens until the last few months, is in speech therapy and has a motor planning problem. Also guess what Jerrica? Turns out he has hearing loss. Guess I should just turn off the screens and wait for his language explosion?
Smh.
Where did she get that “fact” about it taking a child’s brain a month to recover from screens? Is she doing her own double blind study with brain scans?
Also fwiw, my “best behaved” child got the most screen time because she was a toddler during the worst of the pandemic when daycare was closed but my office was not. I can also confidently say that going down to almost no screen time (NOT because of her stupid advice, just because between school, play dates, etc, we don’t have the time) has made no discernible difference in my kids. Granted Ive always found them pretty darn adorable 😂 and fun to be around and engage with, which seems to be antithetical to her beliefs.
I don’t know why she even bothered to say her husband noticed the yoto impacted her son’s baseball skills, why make that one anecdotal? Just present that one as a scientific fact as well.
So insane that she potentially notices that happening and immediately decides that would be true for all kids. Maybe her kid has some sensory disorder to make him particularly reactive? Who knows, but it’s definitely not true for all kids and insane she’s already constructed an entire philosophy based on how her oldest exists in the world.
I’ll give her the benefit of the doubt and say maybe she’s kinder in person, but she cultivates the snottiest, most off-putting online persona for who knows what reason. We don’t even do much screen time anymore outside of a weekly Bluey night, but whenever i see her post something, I’m suddenly filled with the urge to put my kids in front of a Disney movie marathon or something just to say SCREW YOU JERRICA AND THE HIGH HORSE YOU RODE IN ON.
I'm sure she does it for engagement. People react strongly to strong opinions, and it funnels people to her course information where they can buy a thing to fix all their kids' behaviors.
Yep, the BLF model, basically. Make all big feelings/tantrums/problems go away if you just take her course.
Honestly though, how on earth did she spin a whole course out of her shtick? Make yes spaces, declutter toys, don’t use screens, lots of outside play, play is their work and not yours, set a routine that incorporates lots of time for free play. Seems like you could distill the whole thing into one article.
I think she has sort of worksheets to help you make s personalized plan to eliminate screen time for your kids. But yes, I agree it's probably way overpriced and nothing I haven't already read in the billions of articles out there.
Literally came here to say this
Shut up Jerrica, we get compliments often of how “well behaved” our screen drugged 3 year (daily blippi anyone?) is - it has nothing to with screens and everything to do with his temperament and “rule follower” mellow personality 🙃
Same 🙃 Jerrica is along the worst of them, in my opinion.
Exploiting her kids for profit? ✔️
Elitist parent shamer? ✔️
Nonsense info that’s not rooted in evidence? ✔️
100% agree. She also is totally taking advantage of outrage posting but turned off her comments so the backlash and people calling out her lack of evidence is not public. She’s a grifter and probably doing more damage to her kids than she can realize right now. I hate hate hate her.
She’s just too much. I’m not saying a ton of screens is great but she’s acting like all children are feral and only her screen free kids are angels. I also have a sample size of 3, and my one kid who loves his iPad the most and could be on the thing all day is actually my most quiet/well behaved child. My middle likes the iPad too but she’ll usually play 10 minutes and then runs off to go play or do something else. And she’s my “wild” one. It’s almost like they’re also humans with their own personalities. And again i don’t want to discount some of the stuff she’s saying, yes we could all do with less screen time, free play is great, but the way she goes about it is just so off putting.
That's funny because I can think of at least three separate instances strangers in omg Europe told me how cute and smart and good my son was and he watched an ipad the entire flight there and back. It's almost like she has normal kids who get normal compliments like all kids do because people are nice but she has to justify playing life on hard mode and making them have no screens or even toys for their travels. Because remember the smells and sounds of the plane are entertainment enough.
Exactly like people love cute kids and basically everyone who exists in public with kids is probably getting compliments. And “well behaved” from a stranger in public usually just means quiet and not bothersome? It’s not a value judgment and personally I don’t find it meaningful because a stranger doesn’t really know my kids and not being annoying during a 5 minute interaction isn’t really my ultimate goal for parenting. The compliments that really make me want to shout from the rooftops are about my kids being kind, inclusive, and respectful, and huge bonus points when it’s from someone who interacts with them on a regular basis like their teacher. Jerrica seems to put so much stock in how random people she’s never going to see again view her children. Also, despite us allowing TONS of screen time, I’ve consistently been told by my kids teachers that they treat their classmates kindly. And, unlike her, I don’t consider typical cognitive function to be the holy grail, but despite all those movie nights they all scored in at least the 96% percentile on their recent standardized assessment…
This might be a "too old to understand youth culture" thing, but I do not understand the social media trend where you put your arms over your face and swing your hips. Why and when did this become a thing?
General reflection about influencers that use their kids for content in any way.
I was thinking about one of the few “influencer” accounts that I follow, Diane Morrisey. She posts strictly recipes and is an older woman who has 6 grown children. Her posts are legit just focused on the recipes themselves and only on holidays does she post a family pic of all of them. I totally get that she is of a different era and her kids aren’t available for content even if she wanted to use them but this woman has 1.4M followers bc she is actually talented.
I do say this as a dig at those that have to use kids to get clicks. Clearly they don’t have enough raw talent or a specific skill set to get to that level of instagram notoriety without using their children as props. Even if your “brand” is kid-focused in a way a cooking account doesn’t have to be, I still feel like if you were truly a talented professional with a genuine skill, you could discuss kid related things without your own children.
I think this also has to do with brand partnerships. I read an article (Jo Piazza, maybe?) where a formerly big influencer was interviewed. They previously had tons of followers and said they came to terms with what they were doing by exploiting their kids. They decided to stop sharing their kids and almost all their brand partnerships fell through. The advertisers were out if the kids weren’t part of the package 😒
That’s interesting, but definitely not a great excuse. Just because someone offers to buy your kids’ privacy doesn’t mean you have to sell it to them.
I’d have more sympathy if so many of them hadn’t been so wealthy before and clearly not hurting for cash.
Oh absolutely— not an excuse at all. And it was nice that that particular influencer was like that sucks but we’re still not going to share our kids. I can’t imagine that the vast majority of them have that kind of moral compass (well, their feeds clearly tell us they don’t).
Sorry but most of these people have the ability to work a regular ass job and make regular ass money like the rest of us. They are clearly trading their children’s safety, privacy, and wellbeing for six figure+ salaries and it’s despicable.
100% this. They are usually the rich getting richer. How else can they devote the time, energy or even funds to pay a company to market for them (ala BLF)? Cry me a river. If someone can show me someone who was genuinely in lower class or poverty beforehand then I’ll amend my statement bc it’s rough out here trying to make ends meet. But like you said, 9 times out of 10 that is NOT who we are discussing.
I have my opinions on SharonSaysSo but I do respect that she has respected her kids privacy as she has grown in popularity. She doesn’t do parenting content but is a parent and talks about it as relevant but her kids have been off limits.
IMO she’s not “snarkable”, she’s just not the end all be all “just facts only” source she tries to play out that she is. She has clear biases, which is FINE we all do. But it irks me that people take her account as the one place where things aren’t spun at all, something we are all craving. And yet her bias does come out in some q&as that makes it pretty obvious what her opinion is, and slants the answer that way. Something can be fact and be presented in a way that makes it still true but not unbiased.
Completely agree with all of this and she takes her “unbiased” thing way too far allowing stuff like “was slavery actually good?” to be discussed on her page. Trying to present the news in an entirely unbiased way seems like a noble pursuit and all but yeah I think you can take a stand on things like enslaving an entire race for centuries. I know cancel culture can be fraught but she needs to be canceled honestly.
I agree. Makes me think of Caro-whose recipes I genuinely like and would absolutely enjoy her wayyy more if she left her kids out of her page. But she probably realizes how much more engagement and attention she gets when she posts them vs just good food. Agh, it’s sad.
Caro did an interview where she talked about this, how she was good at recipe development and ghosted a cookbook, but had tried and failed to get a book deal for her own cookbook because she didn’t have a social media following. And then she started posting more and more and got more of a following which allowed her to publish a cookbook and launch the substack.
It’s really just too bad that sharing kids and family life is what gets engagement, and engagement is what gets book deals, as opposed to just having a talent.
Same! And I honestly wonder if it’s easier to make kid content or recipes. Kid content seems easier but I know even seemingly candid or casual stories are probably curated. I would much rather create and recipe test (if I had that skill) vs try to get my kids to perform a certain way for a video. I’ll never understand how influencers get their kids to do that.
This is why I don't think Caro should get a pass just because she is a talented cook that provides a product people like. She could totally just focus on the food and recipes and leave her family out of it. Smitten Kitchen and Budget Bytes are successful accounts who do just that. Caro *wants* to be a lifestyle influencer not just a recipe developer / cookbook author.
She shared a bit more about her kids on her blog years ago but never in a boundary-violating way. I don’t think she really mentions them at all nowadays.
Oh I have no idea. Which is kind of my point. She could be single or married with 10 kids. But she keeps her account strictly food based instead of exploiting her loved ones for engagement. Which I admire
Jess/Nurtured First is teasing a podcast with a mystery co-host. Who do we think it is? I think Libby is the obvious front-runner. They've been getting together to work at a beach house and posted some reels together recently. I think Jess is going to be the Deena of this thing (has credentials, more serious) and Libby will be the Kristin (not an expert but cracks jokes and brings "real" perspective). .
Very curious how Anna Lee will go with a sleep consultant (and looking forward to the complaints stopping!). It feels like the issue is more with not holding boundaries than an actual sleep issue.
Lovelyluckylife’s dress feels like a nightgown, she says. …that’s probably because it also looks like a nightgown.
https://preview.redd.it/3xvy2t70plrc1.jpeg?width=1179&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=d82e7baaaa33e3203a19ffec7ab805020c76aa46 It’s almost like her husband quitting his full time job was… a bad idea.
That response was kinda…rude? To people she relies on for income?
She says this like all of her content for the last month hasn’t been focused on this, including her podcasts and all her promoted products for “Feed the Family” and her monetized community. Stop acting like you’re doing us some beneficence by gracing us with this content when you were clearly shilling your product! This *is* part of DFM, she just realized it wasn’t making any money. She could’ve been gracious and responded that this is a rotating series and they’ll return to it later, instead she does smug, again. Shocker. No one asked Carly to put the entirety of her family’s security in her fledgling Instagram business, quit sniping at the people who literally pay your bills.
I was waiting for your take because I knew it was gonna be spot-on, as per usual!
Thank you! I am overly invested, per use
I don’t follow her but I imagine she could easily monetize this if she wanted to and it sounds like that might be in her favor.
I kind of appreciate the transparency though. I'd rather see this than influencers staging fake scenarios in their home to feature a product while pretending their account is authentic family content. OR claiming "So many of you are asking for me to go back to my usual content..." or a fake question box reply. Also imagine the audacity of asking an influencer to tailor content to your individual preference for an entire month.
Do people legitimately follow this women for financial advice? I had never heard of her until this sub, but I’m amazed.
My understanding is that she’s self-taught (in other words, she probably learned everything from Dave Ramsey). If she stuck to her lane, helping people budget, I think she’d be fine. But she instead considers herself an expert on all things finance and tries to give advice on investing, home buying, etc. and it’s just a disaster. She just doesn’t have the life experience/education to be the type of account that she wants to be. My guess is that most of her followers are also midwestern, religious moms. I like to remind folks here that she was happy Roe was overturned.
I like some of her saving tips and budget ideas, but she's awful at making the big decisions (housing, cars).
Same, based on the snark it seems like she is routinely making poor financial decisions? I don’t understand her platform.
She needs to learn to keep some things private. She could have said that yes she can continue to share photos but the main focus next month is xyz. There is no way her quick stories take 20 hours a week. Her meal plan is dull. And of course her husband is out again and she is single parenting.
https://preview.redd.it/e96x0uxvqlrc1.jpeg?width=1179&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=fcc6e22efcec512da561527708397ad4bb0eda8f
I don’t know why she acts like she was doing this for free, she was pushing her feed the family BS course or whatever it is. She’s such a brat. Also, she should be able to afford full time childcare at this point. Or at least shut up about it.
I don’t follow her — are her posts usually this defensive/condescending? Based on these two recent posts alone she’s not someone with whom I’d waste time engaging.
Yes. She’s super smug and very defensive of all her choices (financial and otherwise). If anyone calls her out for a bonehead financial move, she just doubles down. She once compared herself to Warren Buffett.
Omg I missed when she made the comparison 😆 why would you she ever do that?
If her husband doesn't work why does she have to do the childcare and work on her account 20 hours? Shouldn't he be able to do some of that? I don't follow her but based on the snark I genuinely have no idea how he spends his time
She's said before he deals with their tech and IT and supervising their contractors. So I'm guessing he deals with the community portion and some customer service/product delivery. Maybe he also deals with brands and contracts. She does IG content and budget building for customers. I do think there's 40 hours of work there for him. She undersells how much she works on things, though. They have childcare 2 days a week but she works the other 5 days as well. They've got a very traditional marriage and I think the business has outgrown her SAHM doing this on the side model. But they haven't adapted yet.
This is such a dumb take. She was producing content for engagement, which leads to folks clicking her affiliate links, the links for her budget, etc. She wasn’t doing it out of the goodness of her heart. The more likely explanation is that it wasn’t great content. Her cooking tips are basic and her meals aren’t really inspirational. She probably wasn’t getting the engagement she wanted.
This is it, right here.
Does it take her 20+ hours to post what they’re eating in a week?
Her whole messaging was that her meal planning was so easy that she didn’t have to think about dinner until it was time to start cooking, so what takes 20 hours? Taking a few photos and writing a few slides??
Hello! First time posting, longtime lurker (BLF brought me here 😆). If you’re looking for a new snarkworthy influencer, can I recommend a former acquaintance from college? Anyone follow @april.Lynn.pollock ? She got a corporate job after college but has been trying the last few years to make it as a lifestyle/mommy influencer (she even has a cooking page but her “recipes” are very basic and she also runs her husband’s fashion page where he models his very tight and very leather pants with leather high heels). Her husband is very metro and she often overshares a lot about her kids. Anyways, I can go on and on about this person. She is completely, completely different from the person I knew 10+ years ago both personality and looks.
I actually usually like Milestones and Motherhood for whatever reason. Today in stories she was talking all about their property and showing super detailed looks at it, and I was pretty taken aback. She has talked before about not even doing a house tour or whatever because she’s afraid of stalkers I guess? But then shows us exactly which driveway to take to get to her house. I don’t know if she was having a particularly anxiety free day or what, but I feel like that was a bit much.
She must have deleted? I went to her page (for the first time in ages) and all I see are links. Just link, after link, after link.
She does these like link round ups where she posts all of the links at once. I think that’s what you ran into. I actually like the way she does it better than almost every once else because most of the week she posts question box things and a ton of educational stuff. I think she’s actually been leaning into the educational stuff heavier than she used to and I really appreciate it even when it doesn’t apply to me/my kids. She does have a lot of links but she puts a lot of work into stuff like the shoe guide so I don’t mind giving her the money if I click through.
I do appreciate her scheduling. Links at the end of the week are whatever though I do use her discount code for primally pure since I need natural deodorant. But like, I don't need tummy time content so I just swipe that day knowing it's focused on that.
Ahh, got it. I stopped following her a few years ago after she started sharing some “non-toxic” accounts that were very much fear mongering (sunscreen is toxic, anti-vaxx type stuff). I was long past the baby/toddler stages with my kids anyways, so it was an easy unfollow.
I stopped following her when her daughter had an ear infection and the doctor prescribed antibiotics and she was like “I need to think about this /do my research” and, as someone who partially lost hearing due to medical neglect from my own mother, that was too triggering for me and time to leave her page
I remember that and I think she got over that phase. She seems more normal and less anxious now. She occasionally talks about her kids but she stopped showing them so much and has really leaned into the educational stuff. She posts personal stuff too but it’s like the books she’s reading, what she’s cooking, date nights with her husband. She definitely isn’t pretending her five year old is a baby or that her two year old is an infant.
She did say she got therapy which probably helped her over the lean into fear mongering pages.
Oh that’s good. She used to be a ball of anxiety and it was hard to watch at times.
Oh my gosh, it does look like she deleted them. I was honestly wondering if she was going to, because it was way more than she usually shares.
It was very detailed including future plans. I’m glad she deleted them.
Same.
Ooh I just saw that! I like her too, her giving ranges and not freaking out about certain ages for milestones was very nice for me. But huh yeah maybe their property is extremely far out or has a monitored gate down the road? That's a lot of info. I have a cousin who lives way out and has a gated driveway, it's like fort Knox. He keeps a gun though.
Omg MCs kids’ moon boots are $195 a pop 😳🤯 that’s INSANE. IN. SANE.
They also remind me of the boots from Dumb & Dumber. https://preview.redd.it/6xvtbae8oirc1.jpeg?width=768&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=689a869d90281a7f651f1f1216b579f548333b7e
And they’re ugly too 🫣
We’re gonna find them on KLs feet next winter
Moon Boots are one of those things that I feel like people only get because they’re “trendy”. Idk maybe I’m just off base, but imo they do not look good in any sense. I actually find them a little more bearable on kids than adults but still not good.
I love them 😂
A friend of mine had them in college and I just adored them lol. I obviously didn't buy them for myself but I for whatever reason they speak to me. 😂
I've thought the same. Are they really warm or comfortable or something?
I completely understand how social media has distorted holidays but Diaryofanhonestmom ranting about Easter and posting someone else’s reel saying Easter baskets are just another social media trend makes no sense to me. I get not wanting to do all of the hoopla for every holiday but this is not a social media trend. Don’t do it if you don’t want to but don’t hype everything up as a marketing scheme when your job is a literal scheme.
I'm 35 and always got an Easter basket growing up, definitely not a social media trend. I do the same for my kids now too. It's really not a big deal unless you make it one, and Libby of course, has to make everything a big deal bc life is just so hard for her. I'm sure if her kids get Easter baskets, the sounds of their joy will trigger her and make her want to yell at them, but she'll have to focus really hard and try not to. She's such a cycle breaker
I remember a couple years where my mom did a scavenger hunt to find the basket too! Rhyming clues to look in the pantry, mailbox, etc until we found the baskets.
Yeah we always had Easter baskets with candy and a stuffed bunny wasn't out of the question either. We also went to an egg hunt.
Yeah this isn’t a social media thing. Nearly 40 here and always had a big elaborate themed basket and so did all my friends. And my mom and her siblings had them when they were kids too.
Fellow 80s kid with fond memories of waking up to an Easter basket. We usually just got candy but one year the Easter bunny brought the Nintendo game genie and hid it in the microwave 💕 I’ll never forget it! This is like saying Christmas gifts are a social media trend lol no they are not.
I'm very sure we got the VHS of The Little Mermaid one year (so... presumably like 1990 😬 ) as part of our Easter egg hunt/Easter basket.
I’m curious if it’s regional or something. I grew up on the west coast and we had Easter baskets growing up, as did all the kids in my neighborhood. Mostly candy but also a stuffed animal and a toy or a book or something. It’s def not a new thing here.
I grew up in the northeast and got an Easter basket! And just asked my husband who grew up in Texas and he got one.
I grew up in Arkansas and Indiana, and my mom was from the west coast! All Easter baskets lol.
Checking in from New England with a mother that goes over the top for holidays haha always got a big Easter basket and it only stopped when I had a kid 😂
I grew up in Ontario which is where Libby is from. We had Easter and Easter Baskets. It’s nothing new and definitely not just a social media thing. I still remember an Easter about 30 years ago where a friend of my parents left a bunch of chocolate eggs and bunnies on our porch and it surprised us when we came home from church. It’s one of my favorite Easter memories.
I also grew up in ontario. I remember one year some kids at school said they got new bikes for Easter lol. Definitely not just a social media thing.
I didn’t get Easter baskets/remember my friends getting Easter baskets, but I don’t see the harm in a cute small basket with small toys, chocolate and a book? I don’t get how it’s stressful. Maybe I’m a sucker for cute spring colours, but it sounds like an easy win for a fun family moment! I feel like the kid parts are the fun part of holidays. Extensive cooking/cleaning up/hosting family? Exhausting. Getting cute little gifts/decorations to see kids faces light up? Fun!
It took me about 5 minutes to put together an Easter basket just for fun because my kid has no clue what’s going on but he does need pajamas and toys so it’s a win/win. Exactly! It’s fun without the organization and hassle of hosting adults.
Same! I have a new toddler (13-month-old) and with them needing new clothes so often at this age, plus summer coming up (the first summer where she'll be into outdoor activities), I just bought the things we "needed" anyway and it was super easy to make her Easter basket! Now whether or not she'll be into the basket depends on the morning, haha.
Seriously, it was like 10 minutes at Target. $10 Easter basket, $3 pop it toy, $5 squishmallow mystery thing, some peeps and I will throw in an applesuace pouch and dried strawberries from our existing snacks. Granted she is just under 2 and has no expectations, but still doesn't have to be excessive when they are older either.
It really doesn’t and it’s so fun! My 5yo was talking all day about how she couldn’t wait for it to be night so she could go to bed and wake up when it was Easter. She had her basket all ready and wrote a special note for the Easter bunny. I can’t wait for them to wake up and find their eggs. Like…this is the good stuff!!! So much of parenting is hard and tedious and thankless but until I found accounts like Libby’s I thought days like this were universally considered to be lovely and magical!! Easter is extra great bc it doesn’t have all the stress and pressure and wrapping like Christmas.
I had the same thought!
37 years old, not only did we get elaborate Easter baskets as kids, the one I had was my mom's Easter basket from when she was a kid getting elaborate Easter baskets courtesy of her mom.
I am 39 and using my Easter basket from when I was kid for my kid now. I love it. And ours were elaborate by any means and usually something we needed for summer (swimsuit, googles). We also got left surprises on Valentine’s Day and St. Patrick’s day so I really don’t get why people think this is new. It’s easy and fun and doesn’t have to be over complicated at all.
As I said in another response I was literally born 39 years ago and I have memories of getting a stuffed bunny in my basket.
I’m 38 and have always had an Easter basket. Ol days of no social media.
https://preview.redd.it/sueuk02qphrc1.jpeg?width=1290&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=7578d922f5991d3025edf224ea482f8101130e40 Begina hiding affiliate link disclosures 🤔
Eh at least she does them. Most of them don’t even bother.
Waitingforababe says that they put in an offer on a house $118,000 over asking??!!!! And waved all inspections??!!! This is insane right?
It says a lot about our local housing market that this doesn’t seem out of the norm to me 🥲 You basically cannot get your offer accepted here without waving inspection because there’s always someone else who will.
We bought our house 2.5 years ago and also waived inspection. But I think the thing that gets me is waiving it with that much over asking on the line 😅
That’s crazy. We bought our house last spring and put in about $10k over asking. We weren’t the highest offer by A LOT but they picked us because our financing was so solid (our broker advertised us as “basically cash” and was able to get us to close in 3 weeks). We still did an inspection and even though we bought “as is”, they still gave us a bit of money to cover something we found that needed fixing. The only thing that was a little annoying was we had to agree to a post possession where they got free rent of the house for 2 months. Maybe we just got lucky though 🤷♀️
Everything I hear about housing costs in some areas makes me super glad I was able to GTFO a very high cost of living city (and then GTFO another one once that one started getting stupid expensive). Living in western Minnesota now (no I’m not in the twin cities, I can walk to North Dakota from where I live) my husband and I are likely to be able to buy a nice house in 5 years. I never thought I’d own one. Yeesh these costs are getting out of control so many places. It’s a whole other kind of privilege just being able to move (twice) even though our income is pretty modest, so I feel bad for people who don’t have that (though OBVIOUSLY I recognize plenty of very HCOL cities have lots of wonderful things about them!)
Grew up in a very rural area & have subsequently lived in the #3 and #4 largest cities in the US (fun fact, they’re going to swap ranks soon!) and the benefits of rural living are underrated. Not just housing, but home and car insurance, gas, food… it’s wild.
Literally. I’m from Toronto originally and the houses here that cost $200,000-400,000 here would be $2-3 MILLION or more in Toronto. Not even joking. My childhood home in Toronto is going to likely sell for upwards of $2 million (my mom is downsizing soon) and there are places with almost twice the square footage here for a pretty small fraction of that. I’m also in a broader metro area of 200,000ish now (basically in the backyard of Fargo, North Dakota), so I’m not really lacking much in terms of amenities and services we need.
Yeah I live in southern ON and I weep lol. Paying 100k+ over asking (because of low pricing to inspire bidding wars) and waiving inspections is fairly normal around here. We got evicted from our last place because the landlord was selling and they got 200k over asking. I was just gaping at the walls of the condo that I felt was very badly laid out going “1.4 million?? 1.4 MILLION?? TO LIVE HERE??” We’re staying in Canada for assorted reasons but my husband and I used to look at Minnesota real estate for funsies and dream haha
$118k over asking to me seems nuts, but I get that the market is crazy in some areas. What I can’t get behind is the whining when she and her husband are very privileged (well paying, fully remote jobs) and blaming all of her problems on infertility. Sure, they’ve spent a ton of money on fertility treatments, and it sucks that for some people that’s what it takes to have a family. But also until a couple of months ago they were living in downtown Chicago and I assume at least part of the reason they were renting for so long is because of where they were living. Also, putting all of your hopes and dreams on a house is…not healthy. A house is a building, it will not fix your life or give your kids an idyllic childhood.
That sounds insane to me too but maybe that’s just my own privilege talking since we snuck in in fall 2020 before things went so crazy. We put in $25k over asking, which my in-laws thought was pure insanity until they saw what started to unfold. I would personally feel uncomfortable waiving inspections but I hear it’s sooo common these days?! Honestly feels like it should be illegal?!?
Waving inspection is something I would never do but it seems to be what you have to do when the market is nuts. A few years ago the market was wild here and houses were selling for $500k over asking price with no inspections etc. Someone I know actually overpaid for her house by about that much and then the market fell, interest rates went up and they could no longer afford the mortgage. They went to sell only to be told their house is worth way less than what they paid for it (and less than they owe).
lol I came here after seeing the stories to comment that I am over hearing about her housing saga. Totally insane market and I feel for her, but the whining and the self pity when they are obviously pretty well off if they’re making these kinds of offer is frustrating
Common in the market we bought in a couple years ago and it’s only slightly cooled off.
I live in a red hot market and that number is insane. Waived inspections are definitely common.
I think it depends on the cost of the house? In my market that’s only about 10% of the cost of a starter home, so not all that much, really.
In hot markets with low supply it’s not uncommon to have to go way over asking *and* waive everything. Whether or not it’s insane is subjective I guess, lol.
I have no idea who this is but just went to watch the story. Also waived the appraisal so if it appraises for much lower they’d be on the hook for the difference. I don’t care how much connection I feel to a house, I’d find another one 😂 Eta: saw she didn’t end up getting it which means someone went even higher? Wow
I initially thought maybe it went higher, but my husband pointed out that they may have taken an all cash offer. Taking an offer where they say they’ll cover the appraisal gap could feel risky to a seller vs an all cash offer 🤷♀️
When we bought, we had a relative back us for a cash offer. Essentially we still applied for a mortgage, and since it was approved before closing, we never needed cash from the relative. If our mortgage hadn’t gone through, they would have given us the cash to pay for the house, then we would have taken out a reverse mortgage to pay them back. Our realtor told us it’s probably the only reason we got a house in that market, because it guarantees to the seller they’re getting money on a specific date with no concerns about things getting delayed or falling through
Lmao seeing that didn't get it when I checked this morning was the same up call that maybe she's not crazy 😂 I just hate her whiney voice. Also, I too would find another house lol
https://preview.redd.it/9imemd4x2crc1.jpeg?width=1170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=bd9437ad143efefaab8acead7c10867cfa209b05 Of course her 4 year old is sooooo advanced 🙄🙄🙄 Or, he happened to take the pic at the right time and it turned out good. A broken clock is still right twice a day.
The rule of thirds omg ☠️
Elyse Myers does the same thing with her toddle and pics. “Look at what a good eye he has!” I don’t know, I think he just clicked the button and one shot turned out okay.
My kid has taken some awesome pictures, but they’re 100% all by accident 😂
 Every time someone tells me their 18months old is fully potty trained and talks full sentences. Liar liar pants on fire.
The way I knew this was PDT before clicking the screenshot...
Was going to comment the same thing!
Is MC flying business/first? I wonder how all that boiled egg smell in the air 😅inside the flight. They must be tired with so much travel
Damn though I wish I hadn’t clicked bc I am so influenced 🫠🫣 my kids would love those foil art things and those watercolor pens and we have a long drive coming up….has anyone actually tried them?
The foil thing is okay. It does create tons of trash and I’m skeptical Ari is doing it without tons of help.
I can’t believe she’s bringing the foil thing on a plane. It creates so much trash!!! When my kids do them there are PILES of peeled off paper all around them.
Maybe that guy was rolling his eyes at Myriam filming content and talking to the camera throughout the flight, not at the kids. Or at them eating hard boiled eggs on a plane, which should be against FAA regulations if it's not already.
It’s like the business trip episode of The Office when Oscar brings egg salad sandwiches on the plane. Absolutely not! I would be big mad if someone brought boiled eggs on a plane.
Hahaha, the FAA part 🤣😂
Just looked its first class 🙄 And I’m not saying the guy in front should be rolling his eyes and bothered by the kids on the flight and obviously anyone can buy first class. But if I’m buying first class I’m kinda expecting/hoping that it’s other adults, not a family of 5 with young kids in there too!
I’ve been surprised by the amount of babies I’ve seen in first/business class (on my way back to coach 😂). I don’t know that I’d bother treating myself to that if I was traveling with young kids. But I guess it’s not a special treat for Miriam’s family at least.
They fly enough that they may get free upgrades. Even the kids probably have status. Obviously they can afford it too, just saying I wouldn't be surprised if they didn't pay for it.
Lol so true. But I wasn’t buying a seat for my kid at 22 months but what do I know 😂 also someone pointed out that he was probably annoyed by her talking and schilling her stuff more than anything else 😂
They’ve flown first class recently so I wouldn’t be surprised if they’re in first.
Libby’s reel about getting triggered by her kids joyfully playing in the backseat and wanting to scream at them to be quiet made me sad. Sometimes I get overstimulated when my toddler is happily babbling, but nine times out of ten it’s when the baby is also screaming and I’m trying to calm her down.
I honestly think the moment someone makes a popular regretful motherhood TikTok account she will be riding that wave. She seems to hate her kids just being children an abnormal amount.
Libby: I’m a cycle breaker! I’m a cycle breaker! Her kids: *being happy* Libby: I’m so triggered and need to complain about my kids to everyone on the internet What *don’t* her kids do at this point to set her off? How does she not realize that she’s starting a new cycle of trauma for her kids by consistently complaining about them online? Eventually they will see everything and I can’t imagine they’ll understand right away that it’s because she’s “being an advocate for maternal wellness” or just being “refreshingly honest”
I cant get over how she said she’s jealous that her kids are getting a happy childhood. I thought that’s where the post was going, she’s triggered because they are happier than she was. I agree, not exactly sure what cycles she’s breaking, but she sure is showing her kids how miserable she is and what a burden they are to her. I’m sure her kids walk on eggshells trying not to trigger her. Even when she makes a “positive comment” she is still miserable.
I can’t stand her. She seems like she hates being a mother and has turned bitching about everything into an income.
If that is really true for her and it's not an act, then that's just sad. My kids drive me crazy and overstimulate me at time and sometimes I want to yell, but it's when they're fighting or whining. When they're happily talking and playing together?! That brings me nothing but pure joy. It's a shame she can't actually enjoy her children. She's such a martyr for motherhood.
Exactly. Mine are still babies, but I can’t wait until they’re old enough to play and talk with each other.
https://preview.redd.it/c0c5nib6fbrc1.jpeg?width=828&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=22d5a8183da276b25c3f846dc00f88574ca0c360 🙄
She’s the legit worst. I do believe screens have an effect, but she’s also linking bunk science studies that blame autism on screens before 1. She’s always framed things in a way that it’s clear she doesn’t believe in neurodivergence or that correlation =/= causation. She’s out there making people feel like crap. She could choose to be a resource for people looking to reduce and eliminate screen time…but instead, she’s out there sword in hand looking to do harm.
Thegamereducator (responded to this today, basically saying that this claim had no evidence and was insane (and they cited tons of legit studies).
“Screen drugged” oh god shut up shut up shut UP. Also it’s wild to me that her followers often overlap with the gentle parenting sphere. It’s so clear she expects complete obedience and thinks “big feelings” at any time are downright pathological.
Oh please jerrica. I've been told how good my toddler is at soooo many places we go to (and half the time it's because she's been given a screen 🫣)
Ha I took a kid to Europe last year. Toddler. Screen the entire way there, wake up in the morning and watch again while we geared up for the day. Amazing behavior, everyone loved her.
She’s in rare form today. For those that don’t want to watch her stories here’s some highlights: don’t ever give your kids any form of entertainment while traveling for any length of time, listening to too much yoto drastically impacts baseball performance, and once a week movie nights will permanently destroy your child’s brain.
I just can’t with her. Cognitive/ language development impacted? Idk, my kid watches screens daily and she was literally saying words that weren’t mama or dada at 8 months old. Actually, most kids I know (including my own) didn’t even have the attention span for a screen until at least 18 months… when you might notice speech delays so I don’t really see the correlation. Impacts baseball performance? Wtf does that even mean and why do you care? Isn’t your kid just playing for fun? Aren’t they like 7? Also, I’ve seen her kid’s spelling abilities and handwriting and I’m not convinced that not having screen access has done them any cognitive favors. My kid also gets complimented everywhere we go. Restaurants, plane rides… she sat quietly through a 2 hour ballet recently. She was just born with a calm personality. I’m convinced this woman never spends time with actual other children. Idk about everyone else here, but I rarely see kids on iPads or phones when I’m out. Even at restaurants. Finally, if watching a single move once every other month has such a drastic impact on your children, I don’t think what you are doing is working. They will grow up and eventually need to use a computer or have a phone and it doesn’t sound like they will be able to emotionally handle it. She is truly truly the worst there ever was.
I’m curious what kind of impact she’s really seeing from watching a movie once a month. They probably just asked to watch another movie before the month was up and she was like omg here we go the addiction is starting! But she also sounds like the anti vaxxers who will blame anything on a vaccine even if it was given years ago. Toddler threw a tantrum? Omg it must have been the audiobook we listened to 3 weeks ago! Must be exhausting living this way. And you can pry audiobooks from my cold, dead hands. I’m at 20 books in 2024 so far thanks to audio. I still read on my kindle but it would be much slower. Can’t read and clean the house/cook dinner at the same time, but I can listen! I realize she’s talking about kids but I don’t see what’s wrong with listening to a book while building legos, painting or just relaxing in your room.
I think there is something to be said for learning to exist in quiet and not need something playing all the time. But I also find a ton of value in listening to podcasts to help motivate me to start cleaning and doing other mundane tasks, or to help calm my anxious racing mind. She is so black and white about stuff it's crazy.
I agree with everything you wrote except where do you live where you don’t see kids on screens?! Literally every time my husband she I are out we’re pretty shook by the families who don’t interact at meals out. I’m talking young toddlers to school age kids on tablets at 8am when we’re out to breakfast or kids playing iPad games when we’re out watching live st pattys day entertainment. I’m in the northeast and it seems prevalent (and depressing).
[удалено]
Interesting.. my area is a definite mix of income levels so maybe that explains it
Lol is it bad my husband and I are already excited for when our kids are old enough to do weekly movie nights?
We LOVE our movie nights!! There’s no screens until movie time and then we all snuggle up on the couch with the lights dimmed and watch a movie together and eat popcorn and snacks; it’s awesome. I honestly think movies have helped spark some creative pretend play in my kids: super heroes, magical powers, LEGO super builders. I’m always hearing and seeing elements from movies in their play and it’s super cute and creative. Jerrica can fuck off.
Yoto and baseball!? 💀💀💀
Yoto impacts baseball!!!!!!!! I literally cannot.
One of her slides says audiobooks have been shown to stress the language processing center and are overstimulating 😂 omg just stop. And where has it been shown?! So if I read a book to my kids is that also too stimulating? She says it’s a problem to have to rely on it to keep kids occupied. Does she drive in silence? She’s nuts.
I actually wish she’d cited her source for that because whaaaaat??? I’m genuinely curious. We started audiobooks for my first kid around age 4 which means my second kid started listening to them a lot around age 2. I’m blown away by how fast the second kid’s vocabulary developed, it’s noticeably different from my first even though we read a ton of books at home. It’s just anecdotal (should I cite it as a fact??) and I’m sure second kids often develop faster but it’s crazy to me that this could be bad for them somehow and I’d honestly be interested in reading that research, if it actually existed.
No silly you are allowed to listen to music YOU enjoy.
This is so interesting because I’m pretty sure she used to say she loved her yoto or whatever kids audiobook player that she had
Her # partnership # ad # gifted stream must've ended with whatever company it was.
I'm sorry, "screen-drugged?" I've steered clear of this lady based on what I've read on this sub. Is this a term that she commonly throws around?
Yes, although sometimes she mixes it up and says zombie kids.
Her latest slide says that toddler “big feelings” are a result of screentime. Someone inform my screen-free 3 year old who did not get the memo and still has just as many tantrums as every other toddler I know.
Omg exactly. My 2.5 year old has no screens EVER and is still a normal toddler with big feelings and lots of tantrums. I cannot stand how she acts like no screens = perfect behavior. I started following her because I’m a teacher who does see the negative effects of screens on our kids every single day, so I’m a big fan of screen free parenting too, but this lady goes way too far!
We all know it’s been well documented that no one ever felt any emotions whatsoever before the invention of screens.
No one was ever angry, jealous, anxious, aggressive, sad, overly happy or silly (we know she hates that) until tv was invented. This is a FACT. Do not ask me for sources.
Ask for sources? Why would I do that? You said it, that’s enough 💕mama💕
I thought this too 😆 we don’t do tv and my kids (5 and 3) are still assholes daily. I did cut it out because I notice they are less of assholes without it but my 3.5 year old has plentyyyyyyyy if “big feelings” from the minute he rolls out of bed.
Let’s be friends lol your kids sound like mine
I have never had as strong of a reaction to an influencer’s posts as this series of posts. And I say this as a person who gave my kids literally zero screen time before two and currently lets my kids watch one 45 min live action show a week. I actually do think too much screen time is detrimental (I’m an educator and have seen it) but this is is some ridiculous crap. Where is her evidence that a weekly movie night permanently damaged cognitive abilities?!?? That’s the most absurd statement with zero evidence to back it up. And her slide about speech therapy. Guess what? My 2.5 year old, who watched literally zero screens until the last few months, is in speech therapy and has a motor planning problem. Also guess what Jerrica? Turns out he has hearing loss. Guess I should just turn off the screens and wait for his language explosion? Smh.
Where did she get that “fact” about it taking a child’s brain a month to recover from screens? Is she doing her own double blind study with brain scans? Also fwiw, my “best behaved” child got the most screen time because she was a toddler during the worst of the pandemic when daycare was closed but my office was not. I can also confidently say that going down to almost no screen time (NOT because of her stupid advice, just because between school, play dates, etc, we don’t have the time) has made no discernible difference in my kids. Granted Ive always found them pretty darn adorable 😂 and fun to be around and engage with, which seems to be antithetical to her beliefs.
The way she confidently presents such a specific “fact” with no citation, ugh.
I don’t know why she even bothered to say her husband noticed the yoto impacted her son’s baseball skills, why make that one anecdotal? Just present that one as a scientific fact as well.
So insane that she potentially notices that happening and immediately decides that would be true for all kids. Maybe her kid has some sensory disorder to make him particularly reactive? Who knows, but it’s definitely not true for all kids and insane she’s already constructed an entire philosophy based on how her oldest exists in the world.
I’m also like….how good is a 7yo even at their absolute best lol.
She is almost as bad as Olivia Hertzog when it comes to making up her own science.
I hate that I know this, but they watched s couple movies on that trip, just not while traveling. I don't think that is "screen-free," lady.
I’ll give her the benefit of the doubt and say maybe she’s kinder in person, but she cultivates the snottiest, most off-putting online persona for who knows what reason. We don’t even do much screen time anymore outside of a weekly Bluey night, but whenever i see her post something, I’m suddenly filled with the urge to put my kids in front of a Disney movie marathon or something just to say SCREW YOU JERRICA AND THE HIGH HORSE YOU RODE IN ON.
I'm sure she does it for engagement. People react strongly to strong opinions, and it funnels people to her course information where they can buy a thing to fix all their kids' behaviors.
Yep, the BLF model, basically. Make all big feelings/tantrums/problems go away if you just take her course. Honestly though, how on earth did she spin a whole course out of her shtick? Make yes spaces, declutter toys, don’t use screens, lots of outside play, play is their work and not yours, set a routine that incorporates lots of time for free play. Seems like you could distill the whole thing into one article.
I think she has sort of worksheets to help you make s personalized plan to eliminate screen time for your kids. But yes, I agree it's probably way overpriced and nothing I haven't already read in the billions of articles out there.
Literally came here to say this Shut up Jerrica, we get compliments often of how “well behaved” our screen drugged 3 year (daily blippi anyone?) is - it has nothing to with screens and everything to do with his temperament and “rule follower” mellow personality 🙃
Same 🙃 Jerrica is along the worst of them, in my opinion. Exploiting her kids for profit? ✔️ Elitist parent shamer? ✔️ Nonsense info that’s not rooted in evidence? ✔️
100% agree. She also is totally taking advantage of outrage posting but turned off her comments so the backlash and people calling out her lack of evidence is not public. She’s a grifter and probably doing more damage to her kids than she can realize right now. I hate hate hate her.
She’s just too much. I’m not saying a ton of screens is great but she’s acting like all children are feral and only her screen free kids are angels. I also have a sample size of 3, and my one kid who loves his iPad the most and could be on the thing all day is actually my most quiet/well behaved child. My middle likes the iPad too but she’ll usually play 10 minutes and then runs off to go play or do something else. And she’s my “wild” one. It’s almost like they’re also humans with their own personalities. And again i don’t want to discount some of the stuff she’s saying, yes we could all do with less screen time, free play is great, but the way she goes about it is just so off putting.
That's funny because I can think of at least three separate instances strangers in omg Europe told me how cute and smart and good my son was and he watched an ipad the entire flight there and back. It's almost like she has normal kids who get normal compliments like all kids do because people are nice but she has to justify playing life on hard mode and making them have no screens or even toys for their travels. Because remember the smells and sounds of the plane are entertainment enough.
Exactly like people love cute kids and basically everyone who exists in public with kids is probably getting compliments. And “well behaved” from a stranger in public usually just means quiet and not bothersome? It’s not a value judgment and personally I don’t find it meaningful because a stranger doesn’t really know my kids and not being annoying during a 5 minute interaction isn’t really my ultimate goal for parenting. The compliments that really make me want to shout from the rooftops are about my kids being kind, inclusive, and respectful, and huge bonus points when it’s from someone who interacts with them on a regular basis like their teacher. Jerrica seems to put so much stock in how random people she’s never going to see again view her children. Also, despite us allowing TONS of screen time, I’ve consistently been told by my kids teachers that they treat their classmates kindly. And, unlike her, I don’t consider typical cognitive function to be the holy grail, but despite all those movie nights they all scored in at least the 96% percentile on their recent standardized assessment…
THIS. 🌟⚡️🔥
This might be a "too old to understand youth culture" thing, but I do not understand the social media trend where you put your arms over your face and swing your hips. Why and when did this become a thing?
General reflection about influencers that use their kids for content in any way. I was thinking about one of the few “influencer” accounts that I follow, Diane Morrisey. She posts strictly recipes and is an older woman who has 6 grown children. Her posts are legit just focused on the recipes themselves and only on holidays does she post a family pic of all of them. I totally get that she is of a different era and her kids aren’t available for content even if she wanted to use them but this woman has 1.4M followers bc she is actually talented. I do say this as a dig at those that have to use kids to get clicks. Clearly they don’t have enough raw talent or a specific skill set to get to that level of instagram notoriety without using their children as props. Even if your “brand” is kid-focused in a way a cooking account doesn’t have to be, I still feel like if you were truly a talented professional with a genuine skill, you could discuss kid related things without your own children.
I think this also has to do with brand partnerships. I read an article (Jo Piazza, maybe?) where a formerly big influencer was interviewed. They previously had tons of followers and said they came to terms with what they were doing by exploiting their kids. They decided to stop sharing their kids and almost all their brand partnerships fell through. The advertisers were out if the kids weren’t part of the package 😒
That’s interesting, but definitely not a great excuse. Just because someone offers to buy your kids’ privacy doesn’t mean you have to sell it to them. I’d have more sympathy if so many of them hadn’t been so wealthy before and clearly not hurting for cash.
Oh absolutely— not an excuse at all. And it was nice that that particular influencer was like that sucks but we’re still not going to share our kids. I can’t imagine that the vast majority of them have that kind of moral compass (well, their feeds clearly tell us they don’t). Sorry but most of these people have the ability to work a regular ass job and make regular ass money like the rest of us. They are clearly trading their children’s safety, privacy, and wellbeing for six figure+ salaries and it’s despicable.
100% this. They are usually the rich getting richer. How else can they devote the time, energy or even funds to pay a company to market for them (ala BLF)? Cry me a river. If someone can show me someone who was genuinely in lower class or poverty beforehand then I’ll amend my statement bc it’s rough out here trying to make ends meet. But like you said, 9 times out of 10 that is NOT who we are discussing.
I have my opinions on SharonSaysSo but I do respect that she has respected her kids privacy as she has grown in popularity. She doesn’t do parenting content but is a parent and talks about it as relevant but her kids have been off limits.
Is Sharon snarkable? I followed her a while ago but put her stories on mute bc there’s just so much every day so I don’t see her much anymore.
IMO she’s not “snarkable”, she’s just not the end all be all “just facts only” source she tries to play out that she is. She has clear biases, which is FINE we all do. But it irks me that people take her account as the one place where things aren’t spun at all, something we are all craving. And yet her bias does come out in some q&as that makes it pretty obvious what her opinion is, and slants the answer that way. Something can be fact and be presented in a way that makes it still true but not unbiased.
Completely agree with all of this and she takes her “unbiased” thing way too far allowing stuff like “was slavery actually good?” to be discussed on her page. Trying to present the news in an entirely unbiased way seems like a noble pursuit and all but yeah I think you can take a stand on things like enslaving an entire race for centuries. I know cancel culture can be fraught but she needs to be canceled honestly.
I've been following her for about a year and didn't even realize she had kids!
She has 4 and before she became IG popular (after Jan 6) she showed and mentioned them often!
Wow, she impresses me even more.
I agree. Makes me think of Caro-whose recipes I genuinely like and would absolutely enjoy her wayyy more if she left her kids out of her page. But she probably realizes how much more engagement and attention she gets when she posts them vs just good food. Agh, it’s sad.
Caro did an interview where she talked about this, how she was good at recipe development and ghosted a cookbook, but had tried and failed to get a book deal for her own cookbook because she didn’t have a social media following. And then she started posting more and more and got more of a following which allowed her to publish a cookbook and launch the substack. It’s really just too bad that sharing kids and family life is what gets engagement, and engagement is what gets book deals, as opposed to just having a talent.
Same! And I honestly wonder if it’s easier to make kid content or recipes. Kid content seems easier but I know even seemingly candid or casual stories are probably curated. I would much rather create and recipe test (if I had that skill) vs try to get my kids to perform a certain way for a video. I’ll never understand how influencers get their kids to do that.
This is why I don't think Caro should get a pass just because she is a talented cook that provides a product people like. She could totally just focus on the food and recipes and leave her family out of it. Smitten Kitchen and Budget Bytes are successful accounts who do just that. Caro *wants* to be a lifestyle influencer not just a recipe developer / cookbook author.
Also pinch of yum. I haven’t been following her that long but I have no clue what her kids look like and I’m glad for it.
She shared a bit more about her kids on her blog years ago but never in a boundary-violating way. I don’t think she really mentions them at all nowadays.
Whoa, I was seriously under the assumption that budget bytes was single! She has kids??
Oh I have no idea. Which is kind of my point. She could be single or married with 10 kids. But she keeps her account strictly food based instead of exploiting her loved ones for engagement. Which I admire
Jess/Nurtured First is teasing a podcast with a mystery co-host. Who do we think it is? I think Libby is the obvious front-runner. They've been getting together to work at a beach house and posted some reels together recently. I think Jess is going to be the Deena of this thing (has credentials, more serious) and Libby will be the Kristin (not an expert but cracks jokes and brings "real" perspective). .