Control the Chaos by creating systems in your home! 3 Time hacks for busy moms with Special Guest Heather Steinker from Chaos N’ Cookies

Welcome back to the No Problem Parenting Podcast, where we choose to deal with and overcome the behavioral challenges within our home. Hey, parents, I'm Jackie Finneman, your host, and it's so good to be back doing this again. It's been a couple of months and, you know, just all kinds of things happen and sometimes something's got to give. So I am just excited to start getting some of these interviews that I've recorded in the last couple months out to all of you. There's just so much good stuff coming your way. And today I have like probably one of the most fun guests I've ever had on the podcast, Heather Steinker. She's a productivity coach and she's going to share three hacks with us today to simplify things for moms and dads and just your everyday busyness of your life. Now, following the crumbs and the chaos is a full-time job as a productivity coach for Heather. As a busy mom of three and the founder of chaos and cookies keeping moms from crumbling is heather's main objective after gaining 10 years of experience as a director of marketing helping to build multiple six and seven figure businesses for other women she created the chaos control system to equip moms to overcome their own objections so they can live the life they want to live and start the business that they've always wanted to start. The family playbook or standard operating procedure is the tool that every mama

needs to save time and stress less when chaos ensues at home. You're going to want to check out her website to get that family playbook. It's amazing. For new business owners, Heather also helps simplify systems on social media and other business platforms to automate processes to get their businesses up and running quickly and efficiently with how-to tutorials and hands-on coaching. She's helped hundreds of women to be more productive and self-sufficient in their homes and businesses, allowing them to reclaim control of the chaos. Super excited to hear about her three hacks today. You guys are going to love them. And so let's get started. Welcome to the show, Heather.

Oh, thank you for having me. I'm super excited to be here. We are going to talk about busy moms and how to reclaim control in the midst of chaos. You have a podcast called Chaos and Cookies, which I think is so fun.

So let's get started by just telling my listeners a little bit about how you became a coach and your journey to coaching, and then what made you decide to start the podcast? Sure. So Chaos and Cookies is a play on words. obviously like a little alliteration, uh, chaos, because I've got three young kids. They're all under the age of eight. And I, it's just chaotic when you have little kids and you're working and you run your own business and then cookies, because no matter how many times you clean and how much there's always crumbs, you always, or there's crumbs that disappear right after you clean. It's like, Oh my gosh. So that's why chaos and cookies is the name and keeping moms from crumbling is the tagline and, uh, and trying to just help moms and business owners be more productive and be more efficient and just get more done at the same time while not feeling like they're spinning their wheels all day and then sitting down and being like, I got nothing done.

So, and then just eating the bag of cookies. Yeah. Yeah. And then you feel guilty about it.

And then it starts all over, you know, and so trying to get over that and give some grace and also just trying to help them time block and find some time in their day. What's best so they can free up space for them, for their business, for their kids, whatever it is that they really want to do. And so I started becoming a coach after I got out of the legal world. I was a director of marketing for 10 years, uh, for a legal firm.

Um, and it was great. It was an outside sales position. I created lots of relationships. It's just once kids were here, it just pulled at me to be home.

And I didn't want to really spend my nights with attorneys at dinners and stuff. I'd rather spend it with my kids. So I was writing out a non-compete and I got into health and wellness coaching, which my degree is in exercise science. So it was nice to be able to go back to that realm.

Um, I'm a former college athlete and I played soccer. So always, you know, athletic and love sports. And I have had several spinal surgeries since I was, uh, 19, uh, for a genetic condition called spondylolisthesis. So I have fusions from my L four down to my S one.

I had my last one four years ago when my youngest was four months, um, postpartum. and after that, I just wanted to help others get better, feel better, turn their life around, like get off the couch. There are things you could do, but then I, a lot of my clients were saying that they didn't have the time or they were having a hard time fitting in the lifestyle that they were learning. And so then I wanted to help others with coaching and time blocking and finding the right time for them. So that's kind of how it all came to be.

That is so cool. And I love that you talk about having systems that you can put ahead of the chaos, which I really like that because step two of my no problem parenting is prepare for the worst. And even though we can never prepare for the worst and hope for the best. Yeah, exactly. And even though we can never be fully prepared, there are some things that we can do to become more prepared.

And I just like, I like how you say it though, to like put you ahead of the chaos, because sometimes we know our kids are going to like, they're throwing, if they're tired or they're hungry or whatever, but we have to make the target run before we go home. And so we just, we can predict and we can prepare that it's not going to go well, right? The kid's going to throw a screamer or have that melt on in the middle of the target or the grocery store or whatever.

And so, yeah, but there are some things that you can do to kind of prepare for the chaos that's going to happen. So today we're going to talk about three hacks that you have for moms that are going to help them sort of get ahead of that chaos, right? Oh yeah. Oh yeah.

I've got three really good ones that help you with your home and functioning and also getting your kids a little bit more self-sufficient. How did folding laundry in your car go viral and evolve into setting up these systems and these routines and all this for your family, but also for your business as well? that's exactly what happened is uh with the folding laundry it created this buzz where then people wanted to see how else I could make the house more functional and give more tips on how to be more efficient and so the viral laundry thing is that uh when the pandemic started I always had some sort of helper because of my back issues and my husband was always traveling and so I didn't really have to do laundry, which is my kryptonite. I hate it so much. It's not really doing it. It's folding it, putting it away. It's terrible. I don't know why just, I don't like it.

I will refresh a cycle, like a no man's business. And so I was folding laundry. I finally got to it. I had like a bunch of baskets because I had realized that now that I don't have my helper, the laundry will not get done unless I do it. So in the kids stuff. And so the kids went back to school in person and it was my time to pick them up from school. And again, not something I was used to because I was always working. And I was right in the middle of folding all this laundry on the floor of my living room. And I'm like, the alarm goes off. It's like, okay, time to go pick them up. And of course, when you do a carpool lane, you get there early, you wait, and then you wait for 45 minutes. Cause you don't want to get them at the last, you don't want them to be last to get picked up, but getting there first means you've still sit and wait. And I was just like,

man, I was on a roll. And when I get home, they're going to jump all over it. I'm never going to get to it. And then whatever. And I was like, you know what? I'm sitting still at my house because you can't really do too much while you do folding laundry, unless it's quizzing your kids or something like that. You sit in one place. So I was like, screw it. I grabbed the laundry basket full of clothes and I just take it to the car with me. I put it in my front seat. I drive to the carpool lane and I just park on the side and I'm like, Nope, I'm just going to fold it here. I got to sit in one spot. Might as well not come and sit in my car, leave my laundry there and like scroll social or answer emails. I'm going to fold my laundry and read emails or listen to a podcast or whatever the case may be, or maybe make an important phone call.

And by the time I got like, when it was time for me to start moving my car, I had folded all of my laundry because I'm sitting in one spot in my car opposed to home. And as I just snapped a shot, like, Hey, just folding some laundry in my car. And people are like, that's so smart. Like I sit there and do nothing or I scroll social. Why not just fold it? And there's so many perks. And as I was driving up to pick my kids up from school, I had to roll the window down, give them the codes so they could radio my kids out. And this one woman was like, is that your laundry? I said, yeah, I was folding it. She's like, that's genius. That's so smart. I was like, well, I have to sit here. Might as well get some laundry done. And so I go to the next, the next person.

And it was a gentleman. He was the PE teacher. And I roll the window down, give him the code, whatever. And he's like, is that your laundry? I was like, yes, it's my laundry. And he's like, awesome. I've got to tell my wife about this. This is incredible. Like she always never wants to do it. And this is great. I said, Oh, I'm so glad that this was helpful. And all of a sudden now I've got people that are like, all I do is laundry in my car. That's it. And so why not?

And so what, what kind of leads us into the hacks for home is what's nice is you have all of your laundry folded. It's not like I was in a big car or anything. You, I mean, there's no method. You that like, you can't like, you can't really group them together very well in your car, but at least it's folded, but you can get home. And now the kids are unpacking their bags and things like that, hand them their laundry that's folded and say, go to your rooms and go put it away. So then it's already there you, and then it's done. And so it's just a nice little hack that, you know, it just saves you time and it makes sense and it gives your kids some responsibility. And so one of the top things that I really like to teach clients and talk about is,

uh, do you know, like the shoe racks that hang from the closet wrong? They're like boxes and they look like an accordion style and they usually have about five to seven slots for like shoes. Right. Right. Okay. So if you grab one of those and put one in each of your kids' closets and it ties into laundry a bit, because you can always set out what they need.

each slot should be a day of the week, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday. And what's helpful if you have three kids that have three different things, there's sometimes crazy sock day or hat day or some strange day. And my kids wear uniforms. So now if like they get to wear something off the day, it's like, don't be the kid that doesn't get to participate.

So you look at it on Sunday, you go into your kids' rooms, you grab their outfits that they need to wear. You set aside everything for the week. Like my kids have PEs on certain days, so they have to wear their uniform to school there and you stick them in the slots ready to go for the week. So then in the morning, a, they know what clothes to grab B you're not sitting there arguing with them. Like it's freezing outside. You're wearing a tank top, right? Or like, where's your, you're wearing shorts. It's cold, right? It's brilliant.

It's super brilliant. Yeah. So they learn the days of the week and they learn the days of the week and they know exactly. And there's no arguing about what they're going to wear.

They get to pick it out before and everything's prepared and they would remember. And even if it's like a dollar, you can slip it in the pocket, like anything they would need for the day. Maybe it's a dollar for like, maybe they have concession or I don't know. They can put it in the pocket there.

So you can prepare everything for the week ahead of time. so then they can be out and dressed and they're not looking in their drawers. Aren't a mess. Cause they're not digging through everything.

So it's such a great idea. Yeah. And then it's like, you know what you're supposed to wear today. You picked it out.

It's in the Monday slot and you do it each week. And so that's a really great way to also give them their folded laundry. Like we'll put that in a Monday, go put that in a Tuesday. I love that.

Well, I actually was saying too, Like if you go to watch your kids at sports and stuff, and you have a bunch of moms and they're at gymnastics, say, and those it's an hour, bring your laundry and have a laundry folding party. I mean, you, I mean, you fold your underwear in front of people, but you compare, you can make jokes, but you can fold your laundry while you're watching them play gymnast or do gymnastics or sports.

If it's an environment that suits it. Yeah. You can fold your laundry and have some conversation and whatever. Why not?

Yeah. I mean, like you could literally form your, put all your minivans or your hatchbacks or whatever in a circle in the parking lot of gymnastics or hockey or whatever. I'm thinking, why didn't I think of this years ago? My son's too old now. He does his own laundry. Uh, but yeah, like, like have them in a circle and everybody's doing their laundry. And then if you need, you know, like, Oh, this doesn't fit my kid anymore. Do you need, you know, a pair of pants?

Yeah. Right. I was like, Oh, do you need this? Or, Hey, I mean, that's great too. And, And also they make these collapsible laundry baskets and you can put like one or two in your car and you can stack them.

So they're not taking all the room and those come in handy because if you were to do laundry and you need to move it to the back, you can put the ones that are still needing to be folded and you have the folded. Or what's nice is you can put the groceries in there in those laundry baskets. So they don't flutter around in the, in the back. And then you can pick up the laundry basket with all of your bags of groceries and take it inside.

so laundry baskets in your car are really a great multifunctional tool and then um the second hack that's really great could be in the kitchen and so i love my favorite cookbook is cook once eat all week uh by cassie joy garcia she doesn't have an affiliate link but shout out to cassie i love her so much um i got to interview her on my podcast and she mentioned this this hack that i was doing halfway and so she brought it full circle for me and i love it so much so she does meal prep, right? Because this book teaches you to take three ingredients for the week, make meals for the week, and it'll teach you how to prep it, set it aside. And then, you know, once you go to cook it, it's like 20 minutes. It's an amazing cookbook. Well, when you go to make the meals, not every, you're going to buy one onion probably for one meal, right? Well,

then you got to go find the onion. If you're going to go cook it, it takes a lot of time when you go cook and to grab all the things from all the places. So if you go out, grab like a bin or some sort of container, you can put everything you're going to need spices, the special equipment. If you need like a cheese grater or something, you can put it all in the bin and you put it in the refrigerator. So then when you go cook the meal, you pull it all out and it's right there.

So you don't have to go and hunt for all the spices and things. And you can also be like, Ooh, I needed cumin and I don't have any, I got to go get some before I go make this dish. but it's all in one spot. So then you just grab it and start cooking. I have it for baking as well.

I have all my baking stuff in like this cube in my pantry. And when I want to go bake cookies, I just grab the bin because my flour, my sugar, all that's in there instead of picking it all and like carrying it out. Right. That is a great hack as well. Yeah. I'm going to have to check out her cookbook. I, you know, constantly looking for ideas and it drives me crazy when we've had cook, cook once, eat all week. It's phenomenal. It saves you so much time. And she gives you cooking styles in there, which is always helpful. If you don't know how to cook, I didn't know how to cook before I found it. And now I feel so much more comfortable and she gives you dairy-free at all, like gluten-free options. It's amazing. So, uh,

when we were speaking, she gave, she was talking about how she groups it all together and it's super easy because then you're not spending 20 minutes getting everything and then having to go put it back. I mean, it's, and then you could just move it to the next thing. So that's the second trick you can use in your home just to kind of just grab and go. And the third thing is about organization with toys and things. So I'm a type of mom that likes to keep her house very clean.

I have three young kids right now. There's seven, six, and four. There's lots of toys. just because you have toys doesn't mean you have to look like a toy store and you there's different decorative things you can get but if you put some sort of decorative storage in each room of the house somewhere whether it be a shelf whether that be an ottoman except for your bedroom your bedroom and maybe in the bathrooms right uh to keep it you know separate from your space right unless it's like a baby and they sleep in your room or something obviously you make adjustments for your lifestyle, you put the bin by the door entrance in the room. So there's two reasons why one, when a guest walks in, they're walking in seeing the space because you're trying to clean your house for guests. Then when they walk out, like it's just, it's on their way out, right? So it's their back is to it when they walk into the room. A second reason is because if you're cleaning up stuff, you're going to walk out. You can drop it in the bin and walk out. So you're not going back and forth. It's just more efficient. You pick it all up, you put it there and it teaches the kids, like there's a place for it and they can do it. Cause when they it's like, mom, I'm hungry.

I'm going to go eat. And they walk out the room. It's like, grab a toy on the way out and drop it. Right. So it's in their path. So that's really good. And it makes it habit for them too. So So it's not, you're not always having to ask or tell them to pick up a toy because they just like event.

I mean, initially you are, but eventually they're just, it just becomes habit for them. Eventually. Yeah. And then also if you keep like a main bin or some sort of cube, I keep one in my living room or my kitchen.

Cause it's open space. And as I go out throughout the day, if I see things that were left out, I'll put it in there, leave it and say, all right, before bedtime, get the bin. This needs to be emptied. So then they take the stuff that's in there and go put it.

but I'm collecting as I go. If it doesn't have its own spot or actually if it has its own spot, just put it in the bin and make them go put it away. But at least it's out of your space and you're not stepping on things or, you know, like your kid is prone to losing things and you know that he doesn't know that it's on the coffee table, but I do. So I'll just put it here. So I don't have that tantrum later. Uh, so that's another way that you can keep it organized. Um, Or, and another, I guess, bonus tip is with toys and purging.

You know, I hold on to things. I'm nostalgic. But if you're trying to make donations and things, you clearly don't do it with your kids around unless you're doing a lesson like, hey, we're too old. Let's put it here.

But it's called toy purgatory. So my kids, like, of course, right? If you do the clean out for the toys, they have this newfound love for something that they haven't even seen. And then you're like, oh, you're kicking yourself.

You're like, oh my God, now I got, this has got to stay. So pick and choose when you do this. But if you're going through toys and you see something that they haven't played with in quite a while, but you're like, hmm, they could still ask for it. Let's just see.

So you put it in toy purgatory. Don't forget where your toy purgatory is. Like pick a good spot where you know, and no one else and you keep it there. And after say three months or six months, you can put a limit on it.

If they don't mention it, it's gone. That's it. If they mention it, it gives you an opportunity to be the hero because they don't know where it is. You do.

Oh, I don't know what that could be. We could look for it. And then what? One day it just appears.

It's like, look what I found. And now you're the hero and you didn't get rid of it. You're not seeing you have to go buy it again. That's so toy purgatory where you can keep it.

It's a holding space for them. Yep. I absolutely love it. That is absolutely perfect.

I love the hero part. Cause as moms and dads, we need to any chance we can become the hero, mostly mad at us all the time. Right. Or annoyed with us.

So that's a hundred percent. You always need to have a win, like your own win, like pat yourself on the back. Like, good job, mom. Like, like they don't know it, but I do.

And so that's even better. Yeah, it's perfect. Actually it is. And it's fun.

I love it. Parents, you should definitely go check out Heather's chaos and cookies podcast. and you're also a coach for mamas, right? So tell us a little bit about that and how we can get ahold of you.

Yeah, so I have two sides of that. So I have the chaos control system, which is like a manual for your home. And so if you were ever to need, I mean, how many lists do we make when we're moms? And then you throw it away and maybe we're just going out for the day and we're leaving with a sitter or even with dad, we make lists for dad.

And you make that list out all the time. And so this is a manual for your life that you can then fill it out and leave. And I can coach you through on how and what you would put in there. And it gives you peace of mind.

It's there for emergency purposes. It's there for just an everyday situation. It's called the Chaos Control System. And it's the family playbook is the volume.

I've got a free pocket playbook that you can grab and download. It's an editable PDF. So you can do it on your computer if you wanted at chaosandpookies.com.

You can also find it on social. And then I also do business coaching when it comes to efficiency and automation. So I teach my clients. They're either new to business or they've been in for a while and they're now so busy that they need to make things quicker.

And so I teach a lot of flow desk. I teach a lot of like how to build an email list, how to time block and content create and how they can create more buzz in business that way. So we do a lot of creative, creative brainstorming. And we also, I'll do, I do a lot of how to tutorials.

I teach an Instagram bootcamp where I show you how to use Instagram. I teach you what button to push, why you would push that button, how you would share like a post to a story instead of just talking about it. I do a lot of how to's that way. So that is awesome.

Well, I'm going to put the links to all of those things in the show notes. Thank you so much, Heather, for being here today. Oh, thank you so much for having me. This was super, super fun.

Okay, everybody go check out Chaos N Cookies. That's chaos with the letter N, cookies.com. She has all kinds of information, free resources, and her chaos control system.

I mean, literally every mom needs this chaos control system in their life. So go check her out. All of her links are in the show notes as well. And then finally, I'm going to include one last link in the show notes, and that is for our upcoming webinar.

turning behavior problems into no problem, even in the midst of chaos, confusion, and COVID. So all you moms and dads out there, hopefully you'll be able to join us on February 11th at 1 p.m. Central Time. I'm hoping that that time will accommodate the parents that are, you know, napping their kids or on their lunch breaks from work. So be sure to click on that link and get registered for this free workshop. Until next time, hugs and high fives, parents. You've got this.