Building Relationship in the Kitchen with Amy Knobler

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Casey O'Roarty 0:00
Joyful courage, parenting podcast episode 33

I am really excited about today's show, and I think that you all are going to love it. Hi. Welcome back to the podcast. I am your host, Casey o'rourdy, and today I am talking to Amy knobbler, and we're talking about cooking with our kids and being in the kitchen and the fact that every single day people want dinner, which I don't know if that's a big deal for you. Maybe you are a lover of cooking. I envy you. I am not, and maybe I need to shift my mindset around that. Actually, I definitely need to shift my mindset around that, and when I do, I'm generally less irritated and resentful when it comes time to cooking for my family. But anyway, Amy is a professional chef, so she obviously loves cooking. She was raised cooking, and she's raising her daughter in the kitchen as well. And you know, when she came to me to ask about being on the show, I thought, You know what? This is the perfect this is a great fit for the podcast, because, you know, we're all parents looking to build relationship, looking to have healthy, happy families, and part of that is the way that we feed them, and not only the way that we feed them, but the way that we connect with them, right? Gosh, isn't that what I talk about like every week on the podcast, connection and relationship. Well, that transfers over, as you'll hear us talk about in the podcast, that transfers over into how we invite them into the routine of cooking? Do we invite them into the routine of cooking? This is absolutely a place where I could do some work, I could do some internal work around my own mindset, like I said, but also around how I am, or I'm not inviting my kids into the kitchen, because, you know, full honesty, I'm not, I'm not inviting them in, and then I am responding really poorly when they don't want to eat what I cook. So I think that spending some time here is going to help all of those things, right? Spending some time really inviting them in, getting curious about what they want to eat, exploring together tastes and, you know, things that we love, things that we don't love possible entry points around like, what are you willing to try? What might be fun to cook, and the most important thing softening my inner micromanager when it comes time to actually be in the kitchen together, because I know that part of the reason my kids don't want to be in the kitchen is because that is not a safe space for them, and that's on me. So anyway, listen, listen in listen to Amy. She has so much wisdom, and it was such a fun conversation, and I'd love to hear what you're inspired to do with this information. How are you inspired to create an invitation around cooking and around the kitchen? What are you already doing? Will you share that with us? Get into the live and love with joyful courage Facebook group and let us know what works for you around this topic, because there might be things that don't come up in this conversation where you're finding success and that community, that Facebook community, it's all about supporting and celebrating each other. So share your celebrations, share your challenges around this topic, and let's have some good conversations. But for now, listen to my conversation with Amy. All right, let's meet her. You. Amy,

hey there. Amy nobler, welcome to the joyful courage podcast.

Amy Knobler 4:09
Thank you, Casey. I'm so happy to be here.

Casey O'Roarty 4:12
I am so happy that you are here too, and I'm so excited for what we're going to talk about. But before we get into that, will you tell the listeners a little bit about yourself and about your family and just how you got into parent education?

Amy Knobler 4:29
Absolutely. So. I am. I live in Pasadena, California with my husband, John, and my daughter Claire, who will be nine in a couple of months, and I have kind of a mixed background before my daughter was born, so you know, more than I'd say, 12 or so years ago, I started my own business as a personal chef, and that entailed preparing meals for clients in their homes. And that was. It extremely rewarding for me, because I had always wished I could get paid to cook. It had always been my passion, and I had my own business. I was doing things on my terms, and I was feeding people, which was, you know, incredibly rewarding for so many reasons. But what I found was the most rewarding part of it is when parents would tell me that their dinner time hassles and stress had completely gone away because they could share my food with their family and actually talk and connect and spend a little time together out of their busy lives, meal preparation and food shopping, and all of that is such a hassle and a burden for so many families, it's just drudgery. And so I was providing a service that helped people improve their family time. And I never expected that to be the outcome. I thought I would really enjoy just cooking for people, because I was cooking, and it turned out there was this totally other, other thing that came out of it that was just made me so happy. And so when I became a parent, I found myself struggling with the mealtime obligations, with the shopping, with everything that I had helped all these other families to fix in their life, and I decided that the what I really wanted was to pull my daughter into the kitchen with me and share my love of cooking with her, and find a way for us to accomplish all of these cooking and mealtime obligations together. And it has just been probably the most joyful experience over the last nine years doing this with her, I suppose more accurately, it would be about eight. She was able to start helping me when she was about a year old, and I know that might really surprise some people, but maybe we'll talk more about that in a little bit. But she has really been in the kitchen, even doing the simplest of tasks as a really young toddler, and it's been extraordinary to see how it's helped our relationship to grow, and how she has grown as a person. And that's what I really want to share with other families, that something that we all unfortunately are obligated to do, which is prepare meals, feed our families somehow, that we can turn it into an opportunity for connecting with our kids and hopefully make something special out of it, even if cooking is not your favorite thing to do,

Casey O'Roarty 7:30
oh my gosh, so excited to talk about this, because I know that I'm not alone when I say that my kids really are not interested in cooking with me. I can't imagine why, but and I also, I have this love hate, right? I have this love hate relationship for being in the kitchen. And what we were talking about before we started recording was, you know, I didn't grow up with parents that invited me into the kitchen. We had a lot of fast food. We or or it was just we weren't really invited in. I remember later in high school doing some cooking with my stepmom. But, I mean, I got to college and I was like, how about I just buy a flat of tomato soup and a package of Top Ramen? And that was pretty much, but I mean, and now as a parent, it's either like, I can kind of sometimes tap into, I'm so grateful that I get to cook for my family, right, and make it a loving act, sometimes, most of the time, I'm like, finding myself in resentment that they want To eat so often and regularly, and every day

Amy Knobler 8:42
it's they do keep growing. You have to keep putting food in. It's

Casey O'Roarty 8:47
like, five o'clock every day. Everybody's like, what's for dinner? And I'm so bad Amy. I'm like, I don't know, what are you gonna make?

Amy Knobler 8:57
Which? You know what? That is, a perfectly fair question. I know your children are a little bit older, that that is a great goal to get to, and we can share about I

Casey O'Roarty 9:07
could work on tone, I think when I asked that question, yeah, for sure. So you so you write about using positive discipline tools in the kitchen. You're a positive discipline educator. That's how we're connected. Yay. What do you mean by, you know, using positive discipline tools in the kitchen? What are the ones that you love? What what shows up in the kitchen? You know, I think the kitchen is just a metaphor, right? Or whether we're trying to get out the door, going to bed, or, you know, cooking meals just becomes another place to be in relationships. So talk a little bit about the tools in the kitchen that you use well.

Amy Knobler 9:47
So I do have a few that I find sort of emerge again and again. I would say, you know, I'm not sure how many of your listeners, you know, have review reviewed the collection. Question of tools, such as the pack of tool cards. It's something that I refer to often when I realize just how many tools, which in my mind are are vehicles for teaching life skills. Yeah. And you

Casey O'Roarty 10:15
know what? Listeners, I'm going to put a link to the tool cards in the show notes. There you go. Okay, carry on. Carry on.

Amy Knobler 10:22
So what you know as as these tools, in my mind, are used for teaching life skills, I think the kitchen is one of the most fertile grounds for teaching life skills that you could possibly imagine. A lot of it is on the part of the parent, which is something that people might be surprised to hear, and I will give you a specific example of that, and then also, a lot of it is on the part of the child, giving them opportunities to practice and mess, make a mess, and mess up and try again. So let me give you a few specifics. One thing that I will say was something that showed up again and again for me was when she was little. I so I'm sorry she being my daughter, Clara, yeah, when Clara was little, say a young toddler, say anywhere from the age of about, you know, 12 months to four years old, even she was an incredibly and still is an incredibly tactile learner. The way that she loves to experience something is with her hands or with her feet. Even, you know, loves to get her body in there and really make huge messes. And you know, that's something that I think an awful lot of people resist, not only in their home in general, but especially in the kitchen, because the place your mate brain automatically goes is drudgery. I'm going to make a huge mess, and then I have to clean it up, and if my kids help me, that's going to be tenfold. And so one of the things that was a chore for me to really get past was not worrying about making a mess. I realized when I let go, which is one of the tools that we tried to encourage parents to work on, let go and sort of not project your own worries or fears into into an outcome. I saw the absolute joy that came out of watching my daughter experience messy kitchen activities, how how incredibly important it was for her, because that's really how she learned. And and so that's something I always try to encourage parents, is to learn to let go a little bit of the control and of the desire to keep things perfect, because there is so much to be learned in the mess.

Casey O'Roarty 12:59
It's so true for the so true and so hard for some. Yes. I mean, it's perfect. It's about control. It

Amy Knobler 13:07
is, it is. And I know for sure that's going to be easier for some people than others, but I could tell you all kinds of great tricks for how to mitigate the mess. You know, I got really smart about it. I figured out that the only thing that Claire needs to wear when we want to bake bread together is underpants or a diaper, and she could be totally naked for the rest of the whole experience. We don't have to worry about her clothes getting messy. We put a bunch of newspaper under her feet, which makes it so easy to just clean everything up at the end. You know, you've just a little planning ahead goes such a long way well. And

Casey O'Roarty 13:43
you know what's coming to mind? What I'm remembering is that I I'm gonna give myself props, because I remember when my kids were really little, we had a big Tupperware, like a low sided Tupperware, that I would fill with oats. I And they dried oats and the and put some measuring cups in, and the kids would mess with so they weren't actually cooking with me, but I gave them something to do close by, yes, which was really helpful when they were young. And you know, when they poured it out, it just became an opportunity to say, oh, it's fun to pour, let's keep it in the box.

Amy Knobler 14:26
That's absolutely, I mean, that is in in, in my opinion, that's kind of an important thing that you're teaching, which is that, you know, there's you're teaching about keeping things. Sorry, I'm kind of I lost my track. Pause for a second.

Casey O'Roarty 14:46
You're good. You're good. No, is the oats. So I'm giving them the opportunity to stay connected to what I'm doing.

Amy Knobler 14:52
That's it. So it makes me feel valued, because you are including them in something that whether. Or not. It's actually related to the meal you're making. It gives them the feeling of importance and inclusion, and it's just validating that they have as much right to be in the kitchen doing something as you do.

Casey O'Roarty 15:12
Oh, and that leads me right into the next little piece that I want to talk about. So you know, it's just showing up again and again on the podcast, no matter who I'm talking to, We frequently talk about how powerful the relationship that we grow and nurture with our kids, how powerful it is as a tool in influencing behavior. And that's what I'm hearing in this conversation too, is that piece around connection, connection in a shared experience, connection and building skills, connection and saying, Yes, I want you with me right now,

Amy Knobler 15:49
yes to all of those things, absolutely. I mean, that's, that's really what, what I have felt in my experience with my daughter, that when, when we whether we're working on something truly together, which is how it was when she was little, obviously she needed much more supervision. She needed help with things like measuring, counting, things like that that we would do sort of partnered. And now, as an older child, she often will do things side by side with me, each of us doing something independently, but checking in and chatting and just spending that special time together, and it is one of the most reliable ways of keeping us connected, even on days when we might not get to spend a whole lot of time, really, together. It it's something that I think she feels like she can always count on. She knows if she says, Mommy, I want to cook something, she knows I am going to go right into that kitchen with her and start doing something, even if I'm just emptying the dishwasher while she is preparing something. It is. It's just been a constant, and it's been so meaningful in regard to influencing behavior, I would say that it's been extraordinary to watch how much slowly giving her more independence in the kitchen has boosted her confidence out in the world. She she used to be a bit more of an introverted kid, and she has, over the last couple of years, become so much more comfortable in her own skin and sure of herself, and she's trying things out in school that I've never I never would have thought she'd do before, and I truly think it has a lot to do with building her skills as a little chef. She She's so happy to talk about what she's capable of. She feels so capable, and that's what can come from just spending that time together.

Casey O'Roarty 17:56
Yeah, well, and I can't help but think to myself, well, yeah, if I was somebody's personal chef for a while, maybe I'd be like, come on into the kitchen.

Amy Knobler 18:08
Well, I should definitely speak to the fact that lots of people don't have either any great affinity for cooking, or perhaps don't have a real natural inclination for it, or just downright hate it. And I totally understand that, I guess, what I want to say is, you don't have to love cooking to enjoy the process of still having to prepare even a very simple meal, but doing it with your kids. Yeah, it's more the end result that you're looking for that special time that you're spending together, where you're gonna have these conversations that you that might come really easily, that you might not have had if you were in, you know, a different situation. You know, I know you've talked about it before, how kids will will just casually tell you things because they're sort of in the flow of doing something. Joy, right?

Casey O'Roarty 19:03
That becomes so great when they're teenagers.

Amy Knobler 19:06
Oh my gosh, I can only imagine.

Casey O'Roarty 19:10
Yeah, I'm thinking to myself, like, oh my god, don't move. Don't say anything, don't do anything to block this flow of information, right now, yeah, and I can see, like, cooking, you know, would be another one of those, you know, side by side, kind of parallel activities where there's not a lot of pressure of a parent's face right there in front of you, absolutely, yeah. So you've written, I've, I've read a couple things that you've written about inviting really young kids into the kitchen, and you spoke a little bit into, you know, the mess part, but what are some other foundational tips for making the kitchen a friendly place,

Amy Knobler 19:47
sure. Well, the first thing I would say is, I know I touched on it already, but that parents should really adjust their expectations so I would I. Would not focus as much on whether what you intend to prepare a meal or something otherwise on whether it comes out perfectly, or even really comes out at all, because while I totally understand everybody needs to get their dinner on the table, this is something that will improve over time. And so if you're kind of just getting started with wanting your little one to work with you in the kitchen, you might need to take a little bit of time to think about what they're capable of and what you could prepare that they could contribute to in a meaningful way that also you would be moderately happy to eat at the end, you know. So, so that's a kind of a good way to think about it, and that's something that, that's one thing that that I'm working on, which is, you know, providing recipes and specific instructions about how really young children can complete certain tasks in a way that still makes a meal that everybody

Casey O'Roarty 21:01
would be happy to sit down to. Love that, yeah, idea, and I know that, you know, there's tasks that we wouldn't guess. I remember when I first started to study positive discipline and reading Jane Nelson talk about even our youngest kids can make scrambled eggs. And I remember that as well. And I was like, Are you kidding me? But sure enough, yeah, it's true. I mean, it's not like you send them into the kitchen with the eggs and say, like, good luck. You know, you're there supporting and guiding and celebrating and cleaning up with them when it needs to happen. That's

Amy Knobler 21:41
the time when little kids love cleaning. When they're that young, they think it's a huge game, and you totally have to capitalize

Casey O'Roarty 21:49
on Nasher.

Amy Knobler 21:50
Yeah. I mean, I can tell you just a handful of things that parents generally probably wouldn't think of letting their little ones do, but that they can if you supervise, it's, it's a really great, great way to give them the feeling of empowerment. Yeah, little kids can definitely measure dry ingredients. They can be taught how to level off. You know, you take a scoop of flour, you level off with a knife. Their motor skills might not allow them to do it cleanly again. That comes down to adjusting expectations. But it doesn't matter how many times it takes, as long as you get the flour in there and think about how much fun it is for them, yeah, you know, they love rolling dough or squeezing dough, or, you know, anything related to dough, whether it's bread, cookies, pizza. I mean, even if it doesn't, what I would always do with my daughter was tear off a little piece of the dough and say, This is your dough, and she could do whatever she wanted with it, which included sticking her toes in it, you know. And I knew it didn't matter, because it was hers, and I didn't have to, you know, they can even, even three year olds. I have worked with three year olds to cut soft pieces of fruit and cheese. They can even use a plastic, you know, knife that's got a really blunt little blade, but just it's, again, not looking for perfection. You're just looking for them to get it into pieces. And they feel so accomplished when they see that they can do this. Of course, whisking and stirring. They love that. And so these are small things that we generally tend to be like, I'll just do it because I'll get it done quickly and easily. But these are little steps that if you give it to a child, it totally

Speaker 1 23:36
changes their whole outlook on wanting to

Casey O'Roarty 23:39
participate in the kitchen, I love that. So some of us, some listeners, might be thinking to themselves, wow, it's too bad that I've tainted the space, and now I maybe have older school age kids, or, you know, teens that it's like, you know, the invitation is not looking so great, and, you know, and another piece here too, and I often say this to parents, I'm sure you do is when there is super resistance, when that you make the invitation and it's a genuine invitation, and you're met with no thank you, recognizing too that the relationship might be needing some repair, certainly, right? And then, so I well, okay, so now I'm going into a whole nother question. So I guess my first question is with the older kids. You know, what are some baby steps for drawing them in that you would suggest for parents,

Amy Knobler 24:43
well, there's a couple things that I would suggest. I would I would absolutely inquire about their interest in cooking or and, or just their interest in food, and find out, even if they gave you one. An idea of one meal that they would be either very interested or at least willing to try preparing themselves or preparing with you, something that is entirely of their choosing, which is something that we like to talk about in positive discipline, which is involving the children in the conversation, empowering them with some control. And since this is sort of a an invitation that we would like them to accept, giving them some freedom and choice about it is probably one of the best ways that I could convince a reluctant child to give something a try, especially if you really are sincere about not putting boundaries on things. You know, there have been a number of times when my daughter wanted to, you know, make some crazy concoction that, in all honesty, I could have probably told you from the beginning. We knew we wouldn't be actually eating. But when I think about what she gets out of the experimentation, that's how I learned to cook. And yet we forget these things. So I would say, you know, invite them to think up something that is entirely their own, that they would like to try cooking. The great thing is that there are just so many incredible resources out there now online, especially depending on what your child is like. If they enjoy watching videos, you can look up videos together, whether on Food Network or on YouTube, to see how something is prepared. If they're if they're book kids, then you could take them to a bookstore that has, I know bookstores are harder to find these days, but you can still go, yes to a bookstore with a nice cookbook selection, and, you know, looking at beautiful pictures, it's just so inspiring to give you ideas. So that's one thing I could suggest. The other thing I would suggest, which is certainly true for little ones, but I think could even be true for older kids is tapping into what you know, their their senses are like. So as I mentioned before, I always knew that my daughter was a real tactile learner, so there's always going to be an enticement for her to come into the kitchen with me if she knows we're doing something that might involve dough or something squishy, or something that involves using a kitchen utensil where it's a very tactile experience, say, like a like a potato ricer, the idea of squeezing something through there, if you know that your children, I

Casey O'Roarty 27:36
do not even know What a potato ricer is, is that Amy, normal people know that. Listeners Do you know that?

Amy Knobler 27:44
So what the funny thing is, it's a super old school tool that all of our grandparents would have used. It basically looks like a big garlic press, and it's, you know, what, a garlic press.

So imagine a large garlic press where you can fit a piece of a cooked potato in there. You press it right through, and it turns the potatoes into pieces that look like little pieces of rice. And that's how you make the best, fluffiest mashed potatoes, by breaking up those fibers. Wow. So kids, they love that kind of thing, especially because it makes really good potatoes.

Casey O'Roarty 28:25
Yeah.

Amy Knobler 28:26
So you know, if you know your kid enjoys tactile experiences, that's one way to approach it. Let's say you know your child is, is has a keen sense of smell. I mean, all of the senses really are so involved in the cooking process that perhaps you could engage a child by asking them to help you, or asking them to think of something that might involve using different kinds of herbs, you know, something that where they could really engage their sense of smell to to think of some creative way to make a meal or make a dish. So, you know, that's and if you're not too sure what they what those senses might be, which, which might be predominant for your kids, then you could just ask, you know, yeah, older kids might, might find that an interesting question to think about, and, I think that sort of tuning into those things can make the invitation more enticing as well. You know, I don't know that I would necessarily hit them over the head with this is a great way for us to spend time together. Yeah, you

Casey O'Roarty 29:35
have to do this, right. W, not helpful. I Right. And if you're and so going back to that piece, like parents, if you're finding like, well, if you're finding yourself saying, my kids just they just won't do it, they just won't do it, then that's a great awareness to have, and a great place to start to get curious around what is happening within your relationship. Relationship with your kids, and then, you know, in positive discipline, one of our, like you mentioned, special time in the kitchen, like with an agenda, is not so smart, but wanting to build relationship in the kitchen may require you to look at how much time you're spending throughout the day, or, you know, looking, you know, longer a whole week. You know, when was the last time that child had one on one time with you. And how can you make that happen? Not necessarily in the kitchen, but the more we can build relationship, the more likely it is that they will say, Yeah, I would like to come and help and learn from you, and you know, not be criticized the whole time for making a mess or doing it wrong.

Unknown Speaker 30:37
There you go. Hello.

Casey O'Roarty 30:39
That's would be what my kids would say, Oh, my God, I do my best.

Amy Knobler 30:43
I you know, I think that it would be also great to approach it from the frame of mind of what we might learn from them. Because honestly, one of the greatest things that my daughter has taught me when it comes to cooking together is how important it is to have an open mind. And, you know, she often will start to concoct something without necessarily knowing what the end result is going to be. And frequently. Now, I am so surprised by how good these concoctions turn out.

Casey O'Roarty 31:14
Oh my gosh, you know, well, and I keep thinking, I keep having these like flashes of the kids on the Cooking shows, like the Top Chef Junior or whatever. And I haven't watched an entire episode, but every time I see that, I'm thinking, oh my gosh, how do they know how to do all that stuff? And really, it's because somebody opened up the space and said, trial and error over and over, make a mess. See what you can do. You're capable, you've got this. It's so exciting. And just celebrated every single fail along with every single yummy morsel that was created by that child. We

Amy Knobler 31:52
have had definitely our share of failures, and you know, because we've taken the approach of finding it generally really funny when things go wrong, it's always an opportunity to laugh, which, of course, is just such a huge way of just instantly connecting with your kid over with humor. You know, some children are not going to be as easy going. I totally understand that, I think, as a kid, even I myself, was very focused on the end result being perfect, wanting it to look like the cookbook, or at least wanting it to be super delicious. And my daughter happens to not be as focused on that. She's really more into the whole process and is happy when the results are good, but also can laugh it off when they're not. And I would like to think some of that comes from just having had a pretty open trial and error kind of environment in our home, but some of that also is just temperament, you know. So that's another, actually great thing to mention is that if you know what your child's temperament is, it's it's also helpful to sort of help you figure out what they might be able to contribute. You know, if you know you have a child who likes to do things very precisely and perfectly, you know that might be a perfect opportunity for them to learn how to dice up vegetables. Because, you know, they might be able, they might enjoy the process of cutting things into very small, precise little pieces. If you know, you have, you know, like I was saying before, a kid who's a tactile learner, they might be the perfect ones to do a messy job. You know, maybe something like mixing, you know, raw chicken into a marinade that some other kids might be totally grossed out at that prospect, you know, so it kind of it. There are so many possibilities if you, if you have a little bit of a sense of the kind of kid you have,

Casey O'Roarty 33:59
yeah, what I'm hearing is like, entry points. Yes, you know, thinking about it like, where is a good entry point? Like, what it keeps coming to mind for our house is like, Oh, we could start with sweets.

Amy Knobler 34:11
Absolutely, that

Casey O'Roarty 34:13
would be a good entry point, something my daughter does like to play with. She has friends come over and they want to cook. And I gotta tell you, everything inside my body's like hell no, but don't say that out loud. And I say, Sure, of course, see if we have the

Amy Knobler 34:29
ingredients. And how does she, Jen, really do? It's all about process.

Casey O'Roarty 34:33
She does fine. You know, sometimes it turns out, sometimes it doesn't. There was a cream puffs recipe gone bad ones, but that's fairly ambitious. It was extremely ambitious. And I had to leave the room because I wanted to be like, are you guys kidding me? But I kept it, you know, I had to leave the room and just let it be theirs. But I bet they had a blast. They did, they did, they did. And, you know, Amy, do you have some recipe like some good. Kid friendly recipes that we could share on the in the show notes, absolutely yes, awesome, because I think that, you know, there's the conversation, but then having a starting point for parents to, you know, to recognize that there are some pretty simple, there's some pretty simple recipes out there, and, yeah, and to kind of highlight those, because I don't know about you, but, well, you not you the chef, like you, the rest of you that are listening, but sometimes it's even just wrapping my head around, what should I make? You know, when I think that it's I, you know, often I have, I have, like, three go to things, and my kids are, like, so over burritos. But you know, so it's good to have also some new ideas. Um, yeah, so that would be great, and we'll share that with the listeners.

Unknown Speaker 35:53
Absolutely.

Unknown Speaker 35:54
You got it, yay. Well,

Casey O'Roarty 35:55
thank you so so much. I have one last question,

Amy Knobler 35:59
yes,

Casey O'Roarty 35:59
my last question that I've been ending with is, I would love to know what when you hear joyful courage, what does it mean to you?

Amy Knobler 36:09
Wow, to me, I would say that it's finding the joy in taking risks without without having any idea what the outcome is going to be for a lot of people, that's not necessarily a joyful experience, that can be really scary. And I too, have certainly struggled with that. And I've I've definitely been trying more in my own life to find the enjoyment in not knowing, because you absolutely never know where something could lead you to a really fantastic place. True

Casey O'Roarty 36:53
that. Thank you absolutely that. Thank you so much for coming on the show. Amy,

Amy Knobler 36:59
thank you for having me. It's such a pleasure. So

Casey O'Roarty 37:01
let our listeners know. Where can they find you and your work.

Amy Knobler 37:06
So I have my website, which is www dot connect and respect.com so that's the name of my business, which is my positive discipline classes and coaching, as well as my blog, where I talk about cooking, specifically, my blog, which is called cooked to connect awesome and so. And there, I also talk about doing individual parent and child cooking lessons, cooking classes. So there's, there's a lot I can do to help families with cooking specifically and parenting in general. Awesome.

Casey O'Roarty 37:45
I might need to get in touch. What about social media? Are you on your social media yet? Where can we find you?

Amy Knobler 37:52
You know, my website is almost finished, and I will be getting myself out there as soon as that happens, so I can provide that information to you with an update. If that's okay,

Casey O'Roarty 38:04
that's great. And by the listeners, by the time the show notes, or by the time the show goes live, I'm gonna, I'm gonna light a fire under Amy so that I can have some links to where we can follow her on social media. Well,

Amy Knobler 38:15
my website will definitely be ready when this goes live, so I guess you could say social media to follow.

Casey O'Roarty 38:21
Okay, perfect. Well, thank you again, Amy, and have a beautiful, beautiful day. Keep enjoying the kitchen.

Amy Knobler 38:27
Thank you. Thank you so much.

Casey O'Roarty 38:36
Hey, so what'd you think about that isn't? Amy, so fun. I became inspired. I was inspired by that conversation, and I'm feeling a little less angsty about inviting my kids into the kitchen, and I know that I'm going to have to do a little bit of work to convince them that it is a safe place, that they will not be criticized by their micromanaging mom if they try to help out some updates on the information shared at the end of the show. Amy's website is now live, and the address is cook to connect.net cook to connect.net you can email Amy at Amy at Cook to connect.net and in the show notes, you're gonna see a PDF from Amy that she created especially for you that has some pointers and tips about bringing the kids in the kitchen, as well as a really simple, yummy recipe that is kid friendly, parent approved. Amy also has set up a Facebook group that you can find. It's called cook. To connect again, the links, all these links will be in the show notes. All right, so, um, yeah, it's a gray day up here in Washington State. I hope it's sunny where you are, please, please, please, get in touch. Let me know what you thought of the podcast. Any feedback is good? Feedback. If you're loving the show, please head on over to iTunes and write a review or give me five stars. That would be awesome, because then I am more exposed to more people, and more people can be on the joy of courage podcast train. Woo. Also. What else did I want to tell you about? Okay, so last week I told you about the map. The Maslow program. I'm going to, again, put the link to Maslow in the show notes. This is a two week online coaching offer that I am thrilled to get to be a part of. The program is called common, connected parenting program. It's just small, short, little things you can do each day to bring more empathy into your parenting, and you get coaching support, personalized coaching support through text and video. So if you want to check that out, look in the show notes and check it out. All right. Big Love to all of you, and I'll be back next week with some more podcasting. All right. Bye.

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