Clutter-Free Kitchen Tips When You Have Kids with Katy Wells

Katie Ferraro (0s):

So in 2021, we designated July 1st to be National baby-led weaning Day in honor of Jill Rapley. She's the founding philosopher of baby-led weaning and co-author of the original baby-led weaning book. And Jill Rapley really advocated for waiting until Babies are ready to start feeding themselves before we start solid foods. And that occurs around the six month mark. So July 1st is National Baby-Led Weaning Day because it's six full months into the year, right? If your proverbial baby was born on January 1st, then on July 1st your baby would be six months old and very likely starting to show you those reliable signs of readiness to eat. So if your baby is starting solid foods with baby-led weaning, I would love to celebrate with you too.

Katie Ferraro (41s):

If you're on Instagram, tag me in your stories at babyledwean team. I love to see your babies learning how to safely start solid foods with baby led weaning and happy Baby-Led Weaning Day.

Apron Baby (52s):

What is the situation underneath your highchair? Like these days, starting solid foods can be messy, but having a quality splash mat underneath the highchair can make a world of difference in minimizing the mess. I feel like in our house we've probably tried every type of splash mat under the sun from like washable picnic blankets to I even did restaurant greed floor mats there for a while. But hands down, the best splash mats are the waterproof splash mats from Bapron baby. So the Bapron baby splash mats are made from this really lightweight, super durable material and they're big enough that the catchment area is adequate if your baby's got some range, but they also packed down super small. So you can take these splash mats with you in your diaper bag. If you're out at a restaurant or feeding on the go, you can get 10% off the bapron baby splash mats with my affiliate discount code KATIE10 at https://bapronbaby.com. I think it's definitely worth investing in at least one quality splash mat. Some of the apron ones I've had for seven years at this point, and they're seriously as good as new. That code again is KATIE10 redeemable at https://bapronbaby.com. If, you want to snag some splash mats and keep that situation under the high chair, a little bit less messy.

Katy Joy Wells (2m 9s):

The definition of minimalism is just so nuanced and everyone looks at it differently. And I didn't like the kind of invisible rules like you can only have five shirts, If, you have more than five shirts, you're not a true minimalist and kind of just this different, I'm like, what says who? And so over the years I've really evolved to calling myself a simplifier that really aligns with me now. But regardless, I love minimalism still. To me, minimalism isn't a destination we arrive at, it's really a vehicle that helps us get to the destinations of contentment, of happiness, of freedom from stuff and stress. And for me it's about removing all the noise and everything standing in the way of that destination.

Katie Ferraro (2m 51s):

Hey there, I'm Katie Ferraro, Registered dietitian, college nutrition professor and mom of seven specializing in baby led weaning here on the the Baby-Led Weaning Made Easy podcast. I help you strip out all of the noise and nonsense about feeding, leaving you with the confidence and knowledge you need to give your baby a safe start to solid foods using baby-led weaning. How do you feel about the level of Clutter starting first in your kitchen but then in your larger household? Because I know since you've had a baby, there's just more stuff in your life. And my guest today gets it. Her name is Katy Joy Wells and she is a clutter expert.

Katie Ferraro (3m 34s):

She helps families, empty nesters, new parents, you name it. If you've got a clutter problem, Katy is your gal. In this episode we're gonna talk about some of the basic clutter-free tips that Katy gives to her clients, things that she also employs in her family. I do have to say that like today was a particularly disastrous morning for my family. My house is absolutely destroyed, my Zoom background, I had to like reposition my camera because it's so destroyed in the rest of my house. And Katie's house is like spic and span and it was inspiring to say the least. She's a minimalist and she's gonna talk a little bit about what minimalism means to her as well as tips for getting your clutter free situation together even though you have kids.

Katie Ferraro (4m 17s):

So with no further ado, here is Katy Joy Wells. I hope you guys enjoy this interview about some Clutter free kitchen Tips when you have kids. Here's Katy. Hi Katy.

Katy Joy Wells (4m 29s):

Good to be here.

Katie Ferraro (4m 30s):

Okay, I am so interested in your very unique area of expertise. I definitely personally need your help. I wanna hear a bit about your backstory though, like how did you come to be known as the Clutter Queen or maybe it's the declutter Queen. Tell us your story.

Katy Joy Wells (4m 44s):

So unlike a lot of other kind of declutter experts or declutter gurus, whatever you wanna call them out there, I wasn't born organized and not long. So my oldest son now is eight, but not long after I had him, I really feel like my Clutter came to a head and it felt like probably already existing Clutter problems were magnified because I brought another human being into my house, right? And I was just drowning in Clutter every day, toys, baby stuff, all the stuff everywhere. And to make matters worse, hindsight 2020, the Clutter was making my stress levels a lot worse, my chronic anxiety way worse. And I was also struggling with depression and I just felt like a failure in all aspects of life.

Katy Joy Wells (5m 25s):

Like a, like a bad mom, a bad wife. Like I felt like I just couldn't show up. And during this time when I was really just at a mental health low after becoming a new mom and again struggling with the house and everything, my family happened to be involved in a really intense car accident. And luckily very gratefully, me and my sons were okay, but for about 18 hour period, I didn't know if I was going to go home from the hospital that day, a widow or not. My husband took the brunt of the accident and Katie, I'll never forget as I was sitting in the hospital going through all the different, you know what's gonna happen, like one thing became just crystal clear to me in that moment and it was, I'm already struggling, I'm already at my rock bottom.

Katy Joy Wells (6m 8s):

How am I going to show up for my kids and you know, be potentially a, you know, sole care provider for them if I'm already really struggling? And it was really in that moment where I decided I needed to go all in with decluttering my house because it just became so apparent how it was holding me back. It was sucking up my time, my energy was impacting my mental health, my stress levels. And you know, the story has a good ending. My husband survived and he's fully recovered now. But then, you know, the, the problem became how do I make this like sustainable for a busy full-time working mom? And then I had my second son, how do I make sure the Clutter doesn't come back? And so I went through a lot of ups and downs and tried a lot of systems and methods out there and just found that a lot of 'em weren't like practical for busy people, families, busy parents.

Katie Ferraro (6m 54s):

Okay. How do you mean? Cuz I've, I like read that in some and heard some of your story. I have goosebumps just hearing the story about your husband and I, I wanted to know if he was okay. So I'm glad that you shared yeah that, and I don't know a lot about other systems and stuff, but like tell me what the deficit was in those systems for you at that time. Yes, with little kids dealing with a totally stressful situation, what was it about the other systems? I'm not familiar with them, that wouldn't work for a busy mom.

Katy Joy Wells (7m 17s):

So I think a lot of people when were struggling with clutter, a lot of women's and families that I've worked with, and this is me too, like my go-to is like I'm gonna hop on Pinterest, right? And like look up all things organization. So my first mistake was I tried to organize a Clutter. I went and spent hundreds of dollars at Target and bought bins thinking I could organize my way out of a cluttered life. It's simply not possible. You can't, like the mess is back, it doesn't really do much. It's like a surface level tactic. It'll help for a little while, like a few days a week. But ultimately like there's just too much. And the second is like checklists, like thinking checklists or like a particular strategy is gonna get you to the finish line. And again, those tend to be really surface level like I and a lot of us, I needed to dig deeper and understand like yes I have a Clutter problem, yes I can get rid of stuff but why do I have a Clutter problem to begin with?

Katy Joy Wells (8m 6s):

And one particular strategy off the top of my head, I was looking at the time, very famous book, you probably heard of her Marie Kondo, the Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up. Her method is like going through every item from one category at a time, putting it all in one big pile. And I'm like, first of all, I don't have an entire weekend to go through my cluttered wardrobe.

Katie Ferraro (8m 25s):

I also have children that walk behind me and undo like all the, I tried that, yes. And they were just like making it worse. And I was like, oh this is not for me.

Katy Joy Wells (8m 34s):

And part of it was like, okay, I kind of just wanted an excuse like this isn't gonna work for me. But also like on paper and like, like practically speaking, I tried it once with my wardrobe with my kids and my bedroom and wardrobe with me. It was a disaster. And I was like okay, this isn't sustainable. And like I couldn't even get short-term let alone long, long-term results with that. So I think those are the top things that a lot of methods really just don't resonate for a lot of busy families.

Katie Ferraro (8m 60s):

Okay. So did you just then go make your own method? Like how obviously this has evolved over time. Your children are older now but you're still dealing and I love that you teach about like the toy mess, I need to hear more about this. So like how did you kind of come into your own system?

Katy Joy Wells (9m 15s):

I really dialed in on roots of Clutter. Again, there are so many different variables. A lot of us have more than one. It's not like a lot of us just think if I just were more organized or if I just had a strategy or checklist. But again, a lot of us tend to over consume, over purchase, tend to have a mindset of more is better and all these different things. And we can declutter, we can simplify, we can streamline systems, routines and habits and things like that. Habits' a big part of it too, right? Ultimately I was looking at this as like a one time a year s you know fix for a 364 5 day a year pain point. And I was like this actually needs to be a lifestyle just like exercise, just like eating nutritious food and all these other things.

Katy Joy Wells (9m 59s):

And so that was a big avenue of it too versus letting it build up and become so overwhelming and then like rage decluttering again once or twice a year. It wasn't fitting the bill. I

Katie Ferraro (10m 8s):

Hear that term that you use rage decluttering in a lot of your content. And I'm thinking like back to you in the hospital, like I can think of all the things that are going through my head if my husband's on his deathbed and we just got in a head on car crash and I don't know that decluttering my house would like pop up there. But I know that sometimes when I'm faced with like a hard decision to make, I will go clean my house as a distraction from doing like the thing I need to do. Yes. How can we make sure that we're not like just popping in and dipping in to like organizing decluttering as a diversion tactic from the real things that we really should be doing.

Katy Joy Wells (10m 43s):

Like using it as a form of procrastination. A hundred

Katie Ferraro (10m 45s):

Percent. Like that's the only time I ever do anything close to what you're talking about.

Katy Joy Wells (10m 49s):

That's interesting. Well I would say embrace it. At least you're doing it.

Katie Ferraro (10m 53s):

I just wanna say that the people who help me with work are listening to this podcast and they're like, this is why she never gets anything done. This

Katy Joy Wells (10m 59s):

Is why she's always late on the deadline. Yeah, shes procrastinating. I think obviously you have the awareness behind it and so sometimes, you know, I would say you're the exception for most people decluttering can feel overwhelming or stressful because it takes a certain amount of cognitive like awareness we ha it takes like literally brain calories to make decisions and when we're already stressed and when you're already overwhelmed we need to go make more decisions, right? And no, it's like no I'd rather turn on Netflix and just like chill out and turn my brain off. So that's interesting. I mean as far as a form of procrastination, it could

Katie Ferraro (11m 36s):

Maybe positive, I mean it doesn't have to be a bad thing sometimes. Like whoa Yeah, at least that one closet is clean. And I know for our parents who are listening primarily they are our parents' caregivers baby six to 12 months and they're starting that transition to Solid foods and like a lot of relatively new parents, rightly surprised, amazed, overwhelmed by the amount of stuff that today comes along with having a new baby. What Tips do you have for new parents for minimizing Clutter when it comes like to baby gear in general?

Katy Joy Wells (12m 3s):

Okay, so let's start with I think the main problem. So looking back for me and a lot of my students, a big challenge when it comes to bringing baby into home is we accumulate a lot of stuff. Some of it's gifts from well-intended family members, some of it we think the baby will use, but a lot of it is stuff like I need like six different sippy cup. You know, you purchase one, the baby doesn't like it or like pacifiers or whatever it is. Like which, which one is my baby gonna gravitate towards? So then instead of having a few, we end up with all of these different things within, you know, the same type of category. And so once you dial in and your baby decides you know what they like and what they actually use, I think we need to chalk up the rest of the things that we invested our time and money in and let it go and be at peace with that.

Katy Joy Wells (12m 45s):

Sometimes we bring things into our home and think I need to keep this forever or it's a waste of money. But my motto is it's more wasteful to hang on to something and not use it than it is to pass it forward to someone who will use it. There's another parent, there's another child out there who can use it. And so when it comes to the cost of things, maybe you can borrow from a friend before you invest in something. Maybe you can sell on consignment and repurchase if your kiddo decides they wanna try it in the future when they're a little bit older depending on what that is. And I think from like a gift giving perspective, cause I know that's big for a lot of parents, it's like we appreciate it of course but sometimes it can get overwhelming. Hey

Katie Ferraro (13m 22s):

We're gonna take a quick break but I'll be right back.

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Katy Joy Wells (14m 33s):

Yes, my house is full of things that I didn't want there in the first place. Like I have an aunt who just yes like goes to the dollar store and brings more crap into my house that like I don't wanna turn around and give someone, I never know what to do with it too. So my follow-up question is like what's the ethical recommended, environmentally friendly way to get rid of the stuff that, sorry sometimes just ends up in your house cause people give it to you and you have no intention of using it.

Katie Ferraro (14m 52s):

I

Katy Joy Wells (14m 52s):

Let it go immediately within 24 hours typically. I mean a lot of those things like from like that you talked about are little toys that are really designed for the landfill anyway, which is the unfortunate matter. Like they're probably not open-ended, they're probably not quality toys, they're probably just little plastic things and the pieces get lost. So I usually donate those or I have a permanent donation bin caddy in my house. It's changed everything. It's an invitation to be filled this, it's a designated spot for things to go when I decide we're finished with them, you

Katie Ferraro (15m 21s):

Know who gets to put stuff in this bin? I feel like my kids would like take my dinners that they hate and the clothes I buy them like it'll all end up in the donation bin.

Katy Joy Wells (15m 29s):

You know I will say after this is probably year three or four of having a permanent one, my husband adds to it. I don't even have to ask him. And my sons have one in their closets and believe it or not Katie, they will add toys, they will add clothes that they don't want anymore. It's actually funny, I bought my son a new shirt and I looked, I looked in his closet to see if he put anything in a donation bin a few days later and there was that new shirt. He clearly didn't like it, he didn't want it but I was like you know what respect like mad props

Katie Ferraro (15m 56s):

But also, yeah I get that one. I'm returning getting my money back. But what's the deal on that with like the new clothes? Do you teach your kids If, you get something new, you need to get rid of something that doesn't serve you any more? Spark joy. I don't know what the language is but like is it one in one out kind of situation with clothing?

Katy Joy Wells (16m 11s):

Yeah, I would say so step one is creating a physical boundary around clothing. So is that a dresser drawer? Is that two dresser drawers? Is that like an entire closet And respecting that physical boundary, right versus me saying you can't have more clothes because I said so kids can identify hey here's a dresser, if it's overflowing there's too much I need to let something go. So once that physical boundary you determine, in my case it's a dresser for each of my sons. Once it starts to get a little filled right and it's harder to open the drawer, they know it's like a one in one out rule.

Katie Ferraro (16m 43s):

What about the back to the gear stuff? Like for example in our, in our world in infant feeding, I work with a company called Easy Peasy. They make the original silicone suction mats and bowls and they have, I love those. Oh I love them too. A game changer. And you know any product designed by a mom like her Lindsay who founded the company or twins' like splattering the place all over the place. And now from a developmental standpoint, we really know that having suction mats and bowls, especially for early eaters, it helps anchor them. It helps promote independent eating. Like we're promoting these not only as utilitarian things you put your foods on in hygiene but they're also developmentally appropriate. And so we move Babies up the scale. So there's products for six to 12 months and then we size up to a different line at 12 months cuz the shape of your baby's mouth changed and the volume of their cup needs to be slightly larger.

Katie Ferraro (17m 25s):

What do we do? You know you're gonna maybe have another baby. Yes. So you don't wanna throw out the infant line from six to 12 months And then I would nice. I think feel like right now people don't care as much about gender stuff. Like there's a lot of neutral options so you're not saving pink or blue whatever. But like when you maybe gonna have another baby, do you save that stuff or do you get rid of it and then get it again? What's recommended there? If, you don't know how many kids you're gonna have and you've got something like feeding gear you need to plan for.

Katy Joy Wells (17m 51s):

Yeah, I hear that. That's a great question. And I'm in the same boat too, like we have two who are six and eight, I don't know if we'll have a third, I don't know if we'll be expanding. And so here's some Tips. Number one, create some type of price point like what's your bottom dollar? So if it's gonna cost more than the dollar amount you determine to replace something, then you'll keep it. So maybe that's 20, maybe that's 50, maybe that's 75, maybe that's a hundred. And then kind of dovetailing with that Katie going back to the physical boundary thing, I easily could have kept three large garage ice totes of baby clothes but instead I said one is plenty and that was my physical boundary for anything like zero to 12 months clothing, you know bur cloth, all that kind of accessory related.

Katy Joy Wells (18m 36s):

And also just kind of asking yourself the question, does it make me feel like burdened by the thought of hanging onto this? Do I have the physical space? Do I wanna store this or is it just like let it go maybe if I need it in the future, if we do expand our family I could you know, borrow from a friend, find on a local buy nothing group again, go back to the consignment store and get it for a Cheever price. Or maybe it's just one of those items where you're like listen, I invested too much in it. I'm dedicating the storage space to save it for maybe baby.

Katie Ferraro (19m 3s):

I have a set of quadruplets and a set of twins. So like I'm very into like saving as little, we have seven kids in two rooms. Like the physical boundary message is so important cause like there's just not space for you guys to have four pairs of shoes like it. We physically don't have the room. So I like that reminder. And I love your suggestions about the price points. I was working with another family that has triplets the other day and the Moms have three older kids. And so when I was asking them like some of the gear, like they had had a big gap agewise before having the triplets and I was like, you know, where did you, you had to go back and get all the baby stuff and then you had to get three of it, like a hundred percent buy nothing groups like that was so yes helpful to them. Can you talk a little bit about the utility of buy nothing groups? Cause I feel like they're way more prolific now than when I had Babies.

Katy Joy Wells (19m 47s):

They are, yeah, buy nothing group started, I don't know, 15 years ago. But they're all across the world now and the idea is they're, you know, someone can create one in each city. You're like the administration, you get approved and then it's this Facebook group. They're only on Facebook to my knowledge. They try doing an app thing. I don't think it worked out so well. So just look on Facebook and the idea is everything's for free. So when you are finished with something and don't want something, you post it and guess what? I use it all the time. It's a great way to pay it forward, get that dopamine hit, right? It's, there's nothing like passing along something that was meaningful to you at one point to someone who's in need or who really wants it. And also on the flip side of that coin, you have an amazing community of people who, hey raise your hand.

Katy Joy Wells (20m 29s):

Hey you know what, anyone have any whatever of those plates, I sold mine a long time ago and we ended up having another kid. I want those silicone mats. Does anyone have any for free? You'd be surprised. Katie. I know. Well you've used them at what you can get for free. I'm talking like furniture. I mean people when they move especially they just wanna need to get rid of of things sometimes. It's astonishing and so, so cool I think to connect with a community of people around that as well.

Katie Ferraro (20m 55s):

So in your podcast the maximized minimalist, you cover a lot of really unique topics about simplifying and streamlining lives. And I love You recently did an episode Six Ways social media causes us to overspend. Do you refer to yourself as a minimalist and what does that term mean to you?

Katy Joy Wells (21m 13s):

Initially when I kind of went from Clutter and hoarder to the other side of things, I was like I need to get out of Clutter. I kind of went to the other extreme, which to me was a minimalist. And over time as I started to declutter and understand the benefits of decluttering and minimalism, I just found that you know, the definition of minimalism is just so nuanced and everyone looks at it differently. And I didn't like the kind of invisible rules like you can only have five shirts If, you have more than five shirts, you're not a true minimalist and kind of just this different, I'm like what says who. And so over the years I've really evolved to calling myself a simplifier that really aligns with me now. But regardless, I love minimalism still. To me minimalism isn't a destination we arrive at.

Katy Joy Wells (21m 55s):

It's really a vehicle that helps us get to the destinations of contentment, of happiness, of freedom from stuff and stress. And for me it's about removing all the noise and everything standing in the way of that destination. And so again, this is why social media, physical stuff, mental Clutter, it's just a lot more holistic than just you know, stuff in our homes.

Katie Ferraro (22m 18s):

One thing we try to stress in our content is that giving your baby a safe start to Solid foods does not mean you have to go out and get a whole bunch of the gear right? And so much of the gear marketed to parents in every little subsection of parenting, especially in the feeding space, it's so gimmicky, it's so unnecessary, it's downright dangerous. I love that you said design for the landfill like that really is true. So when you meet new clients and they're starting to feel this pressure, like in order to be a good parent, you know the whole shoppable lifestyle stuff, they're all on social media. Like I gotta amass things because my child is heading into this next stage. For example, starting Solid foods. How do you get them to reframe their mindset around new stage time to get a whole bunch of new gear?

Katy Joy Wells (22m 60s):

I think leading a simpler life is counterculture. You have to understand the big why behind why you're interested in doing it in the first place. For me it was very much for my mental health. It wasn't so I could have a home like an after photo I could show on Instagram like having a like an easier to tidy cleaner home is like a great side benefit, but it's really not a big motivating reason for a lot of people to actually like shift their habits and behaviors in ways of thinking. And so I think If, you wanna simplify, get used to doing things differently and being comfortable doing things differently than your maybe your friends and your family and people you follow on social media. Comparison is one of, I think with today's day and age with modern technology, it's one of the biggest reasons so many of us are really stuck in this hyper consumerism mode.

Katy Joy Wells (23m 46s):

Like, oh this person on Instagram recommended this and this person on Pinterest and this podcast hosted this. And like we get so confused, it's like information overload and everyone's selling us something at all times. And so sometimes just reducing the inflow of that information and it's like, no, if I have a question related to this topic, I'm going straight to Katie. If it's you know, baby led weaning, if it's about decluttering, I'm going straight to Katie Wells and like again reducing the Clutter. I think that's been really profound when I started my decluttering journey when my kids were, were younger is just like reducing the noise and understanding that more isn't better. If more was better, I would've been happy where I was but I wasn't, I was miserable.

Katy Joy Wells (24m 29s):

And if we have the mindset of keeping up with the Joneses, who by the way are probably up to their eyes in credit card debt and aren't as happy as they appear on social media or wherever you're watching them. Like it's just, it's not worth striving for anymore. I am like all about freedom and again that's counterculture.

Katie Ferraro (24m 47s):

Hey, we're gonna take a quick break but I'll be right back.

Katie Ferraro (25m 28s):

Let's talk about kitchen clutter. Like literally as I was writing the questions for this interview for you, I was to have my laptop early before my kids got up, like the entire previous night's dinner, taco bar dishes, all stre about, cause I just, I do not have the energy to take care of it. Then I wake up the next day, I'm like, oh crap, I gotta make three more meals for all these people. Like I have no inspiration when my kitchen is totally destroyed and I'm like, God, I actually like even like cooking. Like how do you handle that? Like when there's kids and there's so many meals and you feel like you just finished one and once you clean up for that If, you even do it's time to do another one. Where do you even start with the kitchen mess? That's probably the biggest pain point for most of our parents, I would say.

Katy Joy Wells (26m 6s):

Yeah. And yeah, kitchens, again, they're a gathering space, especially when kids are being introduced to foods. It's like snack time every like 30 minutes it seems like you know at times and someone's always hungry and so it's a really easy place to just accumulate a lot of stuff. So one strategy I swear by are doing what I call daily resets and they're called daily resets for a reason. Ideally you do them daily or maybe every other day. But a lot of us do these anyway, especially in the kitchen. It's where you basically reset the space back to its baseline foundation, right? Anything that doesn't permanently live on the kitchen counters, kitchen tables, kitchen islands after a meal or after you know a gathering time in the kitchen gets put where it belongs, dirty dishes go in the dishwasher, clean dishes if they're running, rinsed outta the dishwasher, get put away, things like that.

Katy Joy Wells (26m 51s):

And these if done pretty consistently take minutes compared to letting the mess get bigger and bigger and bigger and get overwhelming. And then guess what? Procrastination kicks in. And at least for you, Katie, you go to declutter, organize another spot in your home maybe.

Katie Ferraro (27m 6s):

Yeah, I'm like this is too much. I'm gonna go just like clean up the bathroom or something small. Yeah,

Katy Joy Wells (27m 10s):

You're like, I'll go the bathroom's easier.

Katie Ferraro (27m 11s):

Not that I have a big kitchen, it's just like a big mess in a medium-sized kitchen.

Katy Joy Wells (27m 16s):

Yes. Yeah. And mess is gonna happen too. And that's the other thing I think as a parent and we're trying to simplify, it's like, well the end goal is perfection or the end goal is to have this perfectly tidy home or perfectly clear countertops. You're gonna be stuck in this constant, you know, resentment toward your family because you clear the kitchen counters and then stuff lands back on 'em. So, so part of it is just like lowering the bar for expectation and understand we don't live in a museum and our homes don't have to be perfect in order to bless us and our families. So anyway, those resets, I do them multiple times, two to three times, mostly after meals in my kitchen, even if I'm tired because my motto is leave it the way I wanna come back to it.

Katy Joy Wells (27m 57s):

And on those nights where I'm like, ugh, these kids made a mess. You know, get them involved. Kids, I mean obviously not a young child but If you have older kids or partners that can help even just bring their plate to the kitchen counter, teach 'em now it's gonna pay off down the road. I

Katie Ferraro (28m 12s):

Was just laughing at the partners here who could help part because I don't know, If, you guys listening caught it earlier when she said that her husband like put something in the donation box. I was like, oh my gosh, you have a husband that actually like sees the Clutter or the mess. Cause I swear to God my husband is so invisible to it, like it's a gift. Like I wish I could walk through the living room with the good trillion magnet tiles all over the floor like he does and like just not see it

Katy Joy Wells (28m 32s):

Care. And it didn't

Katie Ferraro (28m 33s):

Be bothered by it. Like how do you get there

Katy Joy Wells (28m 36s):

Time? You know, when I started decluttering my husband's like, I will like golf clap from the sidelines for you. Like I'm not interested. And also Katie like, don't you dare touch my stuff. And like, I'm like, all right, you know? So once he felt the benefit of just me doing the resets and me decluttering, he got on board a lot quicker. So Cheryl, like for your husband, you could be like, Hey, what's in it for you? What's in it for you? If I'm not every night cleaning up these magnet tiles for 20 minutes, maybe that, you know, what's, how's that gonna impact our relationship? And I think just sharing what's in it for them is big because oftentimes again we do it passive aggressively slamming the cabinet doors hoping they notice and that usually doesn't work very well.

Katy Joy Wells (29m 17s):

Yeah,

Katie Ferraro (29m 17s):

It does not work. I can confirm that. So curious if for you, Katy, as a mom and Clutter expert, are you also inclined to be a meal prepper? And if so, do you have any Tips for our listeners about organizing meal prep? Because lots of busy parents, a lot of working parents just trying to juggle cooking for their new eaters, plus all the other responsibilities of motherhood. Meals are extra stressful because they happen every day and these children want to eat multiple times a day too. Like the nerve, you know,

Katy Joy Wells (29m 45s):

The audacity. Yeah. You know, funny enough, I feel like before all the blogs and everything, I've been meal planning and meal prepping since like I, for like 16 years. I'm dating myself here since I was like 20, 19, 20. Which I don't know how that happened. I just, it happened. And so that was helpful to have some skillset. You know, when my first son was born eight years ago and subsequent second son, I think the biggest advice, one, two words that saved my motherhood when it came to cooking Katie. All right, all the listeners out there, three, three words sheet, pan meals,

Katie Ferraro (30m 17s):

Dude I know. We had Ellie Krieger on the podcast, like the most famous dietitian in the world and she has like one pan dinners. I'm gonna link to that one. Yes. Game changer dishes wise, I'm like, dude, I don't have to make three different things, I just make one thing. And your baby, by the way can eat all those meals in that sheet Pan episode. So good reminder. Yes. Do you do 'em every day though?

Katy Joy Wells (30m 36s):

No, no. I, we OD'ed on them after about a year. Same. But you know, I, I'm the type of person I can eat the same thing like every day and I don't get sick of it. I, for like a year, my husband's like, mm, can we switch things up? And I'm like, yeah, sure. You know what do you right

Katie Ferraro (30m 49s):

Ahead craving for dinner tonight. I know I can eat the same thing every day. But then my kids are like, you know, we've had this pasta three days in a row. It's like, but I put like different things on top of it. My daughter's like, yeah

Katy Joy Wells (30m 58s):

Like sprinkle different cheese.

Katie Ferraro (30m 58s):

Like I did put an egg on top of leftover pasta for breakfast this morning. They're like, mom for real? I was like, nice. There's a lot of pasta. No, but they don't like it so like it's a problem. Yeah. Okay. But meal prepping besides one sheet, one Pan sheet meals, like what else works for you guys?

Katy Joy Wells (31m 11s):

So I also noticed I was wasting so much time every Sunday, well that's typically the day we meal plan looking for recipes. So I, what I did is I kind of got like these five by eight inch cards. I think that's the size and I have the recipe on the front. But here's the beauty on the back, I have everything required, I have all the ingredients. So if I'm like boom, you know, like this whatever chicken and asparagus sheet, Pan meal and whatever all the herbs and things I need, it's on the back and it's just like helped me save so much time. And so I just copy that into a lot of them now are saved in a little digital like food app I use. But just having everything in one spot versus like, oh I have 1800 cookbooks and they're, yeah, I can

Katie Ferraro (31m 54s):

Even remember what app it's in, you know like gosh where's that recipe from? Do you mind sharing what app tool you use to organize the recipes?

Katy Joy Wells (32m 0s):

I'll send it to you after it's, it's one of those things I've had forever but like, I don't remember what it's called but I'll send it to you. I think it's free too. Or like super, you know, a couple blocks or something. I

Katie Ferraro (32m 9s):

Feel bad for my kids. It's like, you know when you're growing up like, oh my mom used to make this one type of like pasta bolognese. I never make the same thing twice cuz I can't ever remember where the recipe is. I feel my kids are growing up in this like very disjointed world of like, well one time she made bolognese and it was good, but other five times it was bad. Like being organized about the recipes is like total life goals. Also I cook for Babies, so like no salt, no sugar, like then they love it. So cooking for older children that have opinions, I'm sometimes just like, I'm not interested in your feedback tonight about dinner, but that's maybe more of a mind shift thing that you know when your kids get older and there is a little bit more resistance. I know that's a pain point, but I love that you were pointing out that also when they get older that they, they can help a little bit more or you get them used to systems where when you come home from school, this is where you put your bag.

Katie Ferraro (32m 51s):

Like kids like routines and you can start those habits when they're Babies as well. And I know a lot of our Montessori parents are like really big into like, the kids make the mess but then they clean the mess up. Which has always seemed like amazing to me. Do you have any thoughts about incorporating, you know, even younger children in the cleanup tidying routine?

Katy Joy Wells (33m 10s):

Yeah, I say you know, if we're talking really young, modeling is the most important thing. Sometimes as parents we're just like, clean up the mess. You know, just, just do it. But it's like, well how, you know, sometimes the kids are overwhelmed by the sheer volume of things which like, just like you talked about, hello the sheer volume of dishes the other night, I don't wanna do it. So we have this expectation sometimes it's a little bit higher, you know, for our kids, but they don't have the skillset or you know, cognitive ability to understand how to do it. So like when they're really little, I used to do with my kids like magnet tiles for example. We had tons of magnet tiles. So okay river, you do green, I'll do red and Levi will do purple. So starting off really small, which guess what I still do as an adult, if we have an overwhelming declutter project, what do you do?

Katy Joy Wells (33m 55s):

You do one box at a time, right? You break it down into smaller chunks and we kind of made, made it fun, made a game of it. And if you have non-readers then you can label bins that are in the toy space with pictures, you know, so they, they're more at, they know where things go, right? And that's just really simple things you can do early on that'll become, be more likely to become a life skill that they use literally their whole life. I like

Katie Ferraro (34m 19s):

Thing bag these tiles by color and kid, we do a lot of stuff with laundry baskets. If I'm like, this is too overwhelming, but I just want it out of like the living room, go get a laundry basket and whoever fills up their laundry basket first and puts it back in the toy closet, you win. Like I, you kind of play off of, of their competitiveness and at least absolutely like the walking around, picking it up all day like I can't handle it. I'll organize it at the end and put it back up high where it needs to go. But could you guys please just get it off the ground? Like, and even very young children can get that, especially If you and I'm not making a very fun game out out of it. The game is just like, fill up the laundry basket and get it outta my sight before bedtime please.

Katy Joy Wells (34m 53s):

But you can put on fun music. I mean we used to have like a Disney playlist or whatever music or movie they're into that's like, you know, we, and we do it as a family too a lot of the times like I'll kind of get started with them and then Katie like I'll just slowly, quietly back up. And so sometimes just getting started and then removing yourself from the situation, they're gold. So it's not like you have to be involved every single time.

Katie Ferraro (35m 14s):

Hey, we're gonna take a quick break, but I'll be right back.

Katie Ferraro (36m 8s):

Katy, I love these Tips, thank you so much for sharing your time and your talents with our audience. Where can we go to learn more about your work and to support your business?

Katy Joy Wells (36m 16s):

So would love to invite your listeners to come hang out with me on my show, the Maximize Minimalist, just like you we're nearing 3 million downloads. And again, in my world, we're not about perfection. We are about creating a easy to tidy, easy to manage home that is supportive and that makes it easy to focus on who and what matters most in your life. So that's a great place to get started

Katie Ferraro (36m 39s):

And I just wanna say thank you cuz I love that you're not about perfection. You're one of the few cluttering people I follow. Yes, because I love, it's about, it's about good enough. Like that's right,

Katy Joy Wells (36m 49s):

That's hundred percent

Katie Ferraro (36m 49s):

Your message and to me that feels very doable. Like no one's here to make perfect amazing food for their family every day or live in a museum as you said, it's about doing what's best for your family and for yourself so that you can get through the day and maybe even enjoy some of the parts of parenting. So thank you so much. Amen. And then as far as the courses, the programs that you offer, if listeners want to work with you, how do they go about doing that?

Katy Joy Wells (37m 11s):

Yeah, come check out my website, htpps://katyjoywells.com or I have everything linked on Instagram too. I have quite a variety of programs. So if you're depending on where you are on your declutter journey or what's, you know, your lifestyle right now, different programs might work best and it's laid out really clearly and

Katie Ferraro (37m 26s):

I love that spaces, you're a real life mom too, cuz I feel like some of the other clutter people, I'm like, well this would work for my mom who doesn't have seven small people running around behind her messing the house up. But I, I think your approach is very doable for parents who are feeling overwhelmed and knowing that listen, I have to keep doing this for next however many years. I might as well get a system in place that works for me. And teaching my kids about what's important in the modeling stuff. I've learned so much from you. So thank you again for all the work you

Katy Joy Wells (37m 54s):

Do. Thanks Katie. Thank you.

Katie Ferraro (37m 55s):

Well I hope you guys enjoyed that interview with Katy Joy Wells. I feel like I could have talked to her forever and like can we go room by room in my house and you give me suggestions on what needs to be done. I do think I would be embarrassed if she came to my house and saw the clutter, but we were talking after the fact and a lot of her audience is actually empty nesters. And I'm saying my parents have finally gotten to that point. I graduated from college you guys 23 years ago and my mom finally did the If, you don't come get this last box of your college stuff outta my garage. It's going in the trash can. I was like, dude, mom, what? What are you doing for the last 23 years? I'm kidding. And I have other siblings that have more crap in her garage than me, but she's threatening to throw everyone's stuff out. So I think there's definitely like a good base for the empty nesters who need decluttering info.

Katie Ferraro (38m 37s):

But definitely as parents and especially newer parents, I really appreciated what Katy was saying about some, you know, real life practical Tips and that it's kind of counterculture like we live in this shoppable lifestyle. Everything you think you're gonna buy that you think is gonna make your life better. She was talking about buying all the target bins for me, it's Container Store whenever there's a sale. I don't know why. I just think my house is gonna someday look like the container store and then just waste a ton of money on overpriced organization stuff. So I also forgot to ask her about mismatched organization stuff cause there's a lot of organization stuff in my house, but none of it matches. But I guess that's better than having no organization stuff. Anyway, show notes.

Katie Ferraro (39m 17s):

https://blwpodcast.com/346. Thank you to AirWave Media for being our network partner. If, you guys like podcasts that feature food and science and using your brain. Check out some of the podcasts from AirWave. We're online at https://blwpodcast.com. Thank you as always for listening. I'm gonna go declutter a very small part of my house so I don't have to take care of the kitchen, which is also a disaster. Bye.