Erin Tomlinson 00:00:00  People have these thoughts or feelings about what homeschooling is, and I think it’s a little bit to do with programming and how we’re told, you know, this is what happens when you homeschool your kids. They’re these latchkey kids. They don’t speak. They’re sitting around the table and we’re mending socks or whatever it is. But that is not at all what homeschooling is.

Katy Ripp 00:00:18  Hey there, fellow rebels, welcome to #ActuallyICan, the podcast where we say a hearty hell yes to designing life on our own terms. I’m Katy Ripp, a lifestyle coach, business mentor, and serial entrepreneur here to guide you through the wild ride, defying what society expects of us and embracing our authenticity. On this show, we dive deep into taboo topics like death, money, spirituality, entrepreneurship, unapologetic self-care, and personal development, all while swearing and laughing along the way. Expect down and dirty conversations, plenty of humor, and a whole lot of exploration, leaving you feeling empowered to be your truest self. Whether you’re craving a good laugh, seeking unconventional self-care tips, or simply looking for some camaraderie, you’ve come to the right place.

Katy Ripp 00:01:05  We only get this one short life, so buckle up and let’s design yours on our own terms. Ready to dive in? Let’s go. 

I think that there’s so much around homeschooling that people don’t understand. And much like sobriety. You guys are like normal people that homeschool their children. I think that there’s like major misconceptions about this. So I sort of want to give you guys a chance to, like, tell me what you love about it. Tell me what you have learned through this process. Tell me. Kind of like what made you think, actually, I can fucking do this. I don’t need anybody’s permission. I can just do it. Any kind of pushback you guys have gotten, I think everybody’s like, biggest question is, are your kids going to be social? So welcome. Kensey and Erin. I am so excited to have you guys. You know, I both love you so much on so many different levels, but I would love if you guys would give me a little intro.

Katy Ripp 00:02:06  So, Erin, maybe we could start with you.

Erin Tomlinson 00:02:08  Sure. Erin Tomlinson I know Katy because we are I think we’re chronic entrepreneurs kind of. And our brains work a little bit differently where there’s really no slowing it down, no stopping, and exchanging ideas really brings us joy or brings me joy. Anyway, I don’t even I can’t even tell you how long I’ve known you or how we met, but I know it was through all the Cross Plains peeps, I’m sure. And yeah, lot has changed probably since we first met. I’ve stopped drinking too. It’s been about a year and a half and yeah, I’m homeschooling my kids. But yeah, you motivated me for that too. I have to thank you. I think you got me actually sober, curious, like, oh, maybe I could just stop drinking, too. And here we are.

Katy Ripp 00:02:51  But there was no time that you were, like, working for the man.

Erin Tomlinson 00:02:55  Oh yeah. Yeah I was doing pharmaceutical sales. I did it for about 16 years.

Erin Tomlinson 00:03:00  You get the company car, you get all these little benefits. And to think that you are going to leave those behind with the big salary was unquestionable. Like why would you do that. And I think I had always wanted to work away from being under the thumb of somebody else telling me what to do and how to do it and when to do it. And so I was always trying to make other businesses on the side to overcome that income, so I could leave the full time career.

Katy Ripp 00:03:26  And you did.

Erin Tomlinson 00:03:27  It. Did. Yeah. I’m doing real estate now, which I think is great. And again, it’ll work its way into the homeschooling conversation because now I can show them that you don’t have to necessarily go and work for somebody if you don’t want to. You can. But there’s other ways of making money and doing what you love and doing it when you want to do it too.

Katy Ripp 00:03:44  Yeah. Because actually you can. Yeah.

Erin Tomlinson 00:03:47  Exactly.

Katy Ripp 00:03:48  Exactly. Okay. Well, welcome. Thanks for being here, Kensey, my friend.

Kensey Hering 00:03:53  I’m Kensey Hering. I’ve known Katy. Oh, boy. Let’s see. I started at Harbour Athletic Club when I was still, like, nannying and in college.

Katy Ripp 00:04:02  So would this be, like, was Myles little?

Kensey Hering 00:04:05  Yeah. I babysat Myles and Madeline when they were, like, three. You guys had just gotten Greta.

Katy Ripp 00:04:11  Oh my God. So she’ll be 10 or 11 this year. Yeah. So a while. Yeah. Lots of paths have crossed since then.

Kensey Hering 00:04:18  Yes. Very much yeah. 1909 coffee shop. Yeah. I just always adored working for you. It was always so fun.

Katy Ripp 00:04:27  Dabbled in some entrepreneurship as well.

Kensey Hering 00:04:30  Yes, I do a Wild Fawn boutique. I have an online clothing store, and then I do some pop ups here and there. And yeah, now I just stay home with my kiddos and I homeschool them.

Katy Ripp 00:04:43  Okay, so let’s talk about homeschooling. One of the reasons I wanted to have you guys on here is because I really do think that there’s so many misconceptions about homeschooling out there like this probably has for me personally, had a lot of similarities to sobriety, because I think that there’s lots of misconceptions about sobriety, but also that there’s like not normal people doing it right.

Katy Ripp 00:05:05  Like you have to be some sort of like wacko in order to stay home with your kids, homeschool them. Right? Like you’re all wearing long skirts and bonnets and like, the generalizations. I could go on and on, right? Like, mute, their mute, mute, you know, they have no social skills. What do you do for Jim? I mean, all these, like, really naive questions or ignorant maybe is the right word. I think some of it comes from naivete, but others does come from ignorance. And one of the things that, like I admire about the both of you is basically you just both said, fuck it, I’m doing this anyway in the face of that. And I think that that’s So I don’t really love to use the word brave because it is just like you just made a choice that was aligned with your values. So like, that’s not necessarily brave. It’s just like it’s just authentic. And I think that we lack that these days. So I’d love to just like have a conversation about it.

Katy Ripp 00:06:06  Tell me about like I mean first maybe tell me about how you even thought about it or decided it or how it crossed your mind. I’m guessing it took a little bit, maybe, of convincing of yourself and maybe convincing of other people. So I’m just going to kind of let you guys roll and we can ask questions as we go. Is that cool? Yeah.

Erin Tomlinson 00:06:26  I think for me it was I had done some, you know, self-development and I really dug into who I am. And and once you start going down that path, you really take into account all the things happening in your life and how you want your child’s life to be different than what you grew up with. And again, not saying mine was bad, wrong or terrible, but there’s just certain things that you want them to thrive, and you want to be able to give that to them and cut off some of those generational patterning. My kids are in private school. So you think this is great? Things started to go haywire with the school we were at.

Erin Tomlinson 00:06:58  So then you start to think, oh my gosh, you know, what are we going to do? We’re just going to switch to another school. We’re going to go to public school. What are we going to do? I wasn’t entertaining public so much just because faith is part of our life, and it was important for us to have that as a portion of the program. But it was like the day before they were supposed to go back to school. My stomach was just retching and saying, you can’t do this, you can’t put them in this situation. There was instances with bullies at school. There was all different things. And I kept thinking, my kids are not going to have my values if I just shuffle them off to somebody else to teach them for eight hours a day. And so, to my husband’s dismay, I said the day night before, I said, I can’t send them tomorrow we’re going to homeschool. And he was like, I’m sorry, but excuse me. What? What is.

Kensey Hering 00:07:44  That? What? What’s this?

Katy Ripp 00:07:46  What was that?

Erin Tomlinson 00:07:47  Oh, right before school was supposed to start. But I think the driving force was, you know, if we were to switch to a different school, there would have been problems there, too. For me, it wasn’t just spent 100 and it would have been what I want for my kids anyway. My son is a little bit advanced, so I can keep up and tailor what we’re doing to his needs. And the same goes for Charlie. Charlie’s more artistic. She just can’t sit for eight hours a day and, you know, be told what to do. So that was kind of how we rolled into it. It was unconventional a little bit later in their school career, too.

Katy Ripp 00:08:17  Can I ask? Well, yeah, age of the kids would be great to like, give us some context because you guys got different age kids here and what are ages?

Erin Tomlinson 00:08:26  My daughter’s almost ten and then my son is 11, so fourth and sixth.

Katy Ripp 00:08:31  Okay. And you can see.

Kensey Hering 00:08:32  My son will be seven in September. So he could kindergarten last year. And he’s it’ll be in first grade this year. And then our daughter is five and she’ll do kindergarten.

Katy Ripp 00:08:44  Okay, Erin, since you brought it up, husband, everybody’s got to know. This is the dramatic part, right? Like everybody’s gotta know how the fuck you did that. What did he say? Like, how did that go down? You know.

Erin Tomlinson 00:08:58  It wasn’t wonderful. It was a little harder than I thought it was going to be. And I’m going to skip back a little bit to what you said about people have these thoughts or feelings about what homeschooling is. And I think it’s a little bit to do with programming and how we’re told, you know, this is what happens when you homeschool your kids. It’s they’re these latchkey kids. They don’t speak that, you know, they’re sitting at around the table and we’re mending socks or whatever it is. But that is not at all what homeschooling is on.

Katy Ripp 00:09:25  It’s on.

Erin Tomlinson 00:09:26  Yeah. The bonnets and the aprons. Yes. And the long skirts. Exactly. And for me, it was, you know, when I went down this whole self-development path for me or like, self-discovery or whatever you want to call it, it was like, I want to do things differently. I don’t need to go with the whole herd. I’m going to be the black sheep that’s going to do things different. And this was one of those things. So it wasn’t necessarily convincing. Matt. In the beginning, he wasn’t super wild about it, and I think he had a lot of concerns and didn’t know how it was going to go and didn’t really even have any exposure to homeschooling. But I will tell you, over the course of the year, he has seen such a dramatic change, not only with me, but also with the kids. And even when he’ll throw his little quizzes out to them, they’re Johnny on the spot with some of that stuff because again, he’s not here to see, so he doesn’t really know.

Erin Tomlinson 00:10:17  And I don’t, at the end of the day say, okay, today’s lesson plans were, you know, A to Z. And we talked about genitalia and algebra and what.

Katy Ripp 00:10:26  He’s not the principal.

Kensey Hering 00:10:28  Thing. They are for my lesson plan.

Katy Ripp 00:10:32  Mr. Tomlinson. I just write for your.

Erin Tomlinson 00:10:35  Approval, sir.

Katy Ripp 00:10:36  Yes, for your approval, sir. Not exactly.

Erin Tomlinson 00:10:41  So I could look back on that part at the beginning. Part was a little bit challenging, but over the course of the year and even now, I think his response and you know, what he would tell you about homeschooling is completely different. And I’m grateful for that, because when you are taking a risk or you’re doing something against the grain, you are going to get, you know, even people in closest to you like, are you sure? What the hell?

Katy Ripp 00:11:02  What don’t you think that’s the most like the most pushback is the people closest to you?

Kensey Hering 00:11:08  Oh for sure.

Katy Ripp 00:11:09  Yeah. Tell me Kensey.

Kensey Hering 00:11:11  Well we’ve been doing it for well I guess our kids went to like Orchard Ridge Nursery School for a little bit in Madison.

Kensey Hering 00:11:19  The two older ones did and they loved it I loved it, we loved it. There was nothing wrong with it. And then it came time for Ryder to go to Faucher, who was coming up on, you know, being a for care. And I don’t know, I think I have like looked at this probably since he was like three years old being like homeschooling. Okay, what the heck? And I never even imagined myself staying home with my kids, let alone homeschooling them. So. And my mother in law works at our school district. All my nieces and nephews go there. My husband and I went there kindergarten through high school and like my husband’s aunt works there like just all over to her and works there. Yeah. And yeah, my husband was just like, you want a what? And I was just like, okay, hear me out. And he was like, no, I want them to go to school. And I was like, okay. But it’s not how it was when we were there.

Kensey Hering 00:12:19  Like it is. So it’s not like that at all anymore. And I just was like, well, I know them. And we actually writer went to 4K for a couple of months from like, so we started off homeschooling and then in October we like pass the school on our way to anywhere. It’s on the highway. And one day he was like, I kind of want to try going there. And I was like, okay. So we got him signed up and he went the next week. He liked it. And then all of a sudden January hit and he was like physically hitting me, kicking me, punch me just to go. And I remember he would wake up in the middle of the night and be like, do I have to go? Is it time to go? I don’t want to go. And then he like hid outside of our house from the bus and I was like, where are you? Where are you? And he like, finally came out from around the corner and he was like, I just don’t want to go.

Kensey Hering 00:13:12  And I was like, well, do the school would call me even if you didn’t show up or you’re just gonna stay out here all day. And he was like, yeah. I was like, okay, well. And I think that was just my gut feeling of like, okay, no, like he is a pretty smart little dude and he’s very common sense. And he I asked, I said, what do you want to do here? Like what’s going on? And he was like, how many times do I have to tell you before someone will listen to me? I want to do home school again. And I was like, okay. And I pulled him out. I didn’t tell anybody. I just did it. And I mean, I consulted my husband for maybe five seconds, but.

Katy Ripp 00:13:53  Just out of courtesy. Yeah, I guess. Right.

Kensey Hering 00:13:56  And I remember he was like, well, you can’t just let him choose every day. Like, it’s just something you do. You go to school, you don’t like it.

Kensey Hering 00:14:03  And it’s like, yeah, but not to this extent. I was like, he comes off that bus and he’s such an angry little boy. I’m getting the worst of him in the morning and the worse of him in the afternoon. And then that’s all I get. It’s like, I don’t want that. I don’t want to spend my mornings being rushed and be like, get out, get out, get out, go go go. Bye. And so here we are and we love it. We enjoy it. And yeah, my husband was like, well, I don’t want him to be Weird. And I’m like, dude, all of us are weird. Our kids are weird, whether you like it or not.

Katy Ripp 00:14:38  We made weird children.

Kensey Hering 00:14:41  And so, I mean, our kids are some of the most social, outgoing kids that we know, and they don’t stop talking. So no, they are not mute children. Sometimes I wish there was a mute button for a little bit, but everybody thinks homeschooling is weird.

Kensey Hering 00:14:59  All of our friends kids go to school in public school, and I don’t have anything wrong with our school district. I like it, I love it, but there was just something deep down that was like, I don’t want to do this. We’re going to try this and we’re going to see how long it goes.

Katy Ripp 00:15:15  Both of you have said you trusted your gut as a very intuitive person. And the more I get into, like really peeling back the layers on myself and trusting my body and trusting the feelings I have and that kind of thing. The fact that you both separately said that you trusted your gut, and while trust your gut is sort of a cliche, it is also like there’s like gut brain access and like things that we do between our gut and our brain. And, you know, that’s where that actually came from. But how much of that was I’m just doing this right, like both of you have said, like there wasn’t really a question. I’m just doing it. You said you started thinking about it.

Katy Ripp 00:16:01  Kensey at like three years old, you know, when Ryder was three. How long do you think it took you to, like, know that that was the right answer for you and you to Erin?

Kensey Hering 00:16:11  I would say like once, gosh, even Remi was enrolled in, like, Orchard Ridge Nursery School for like a week two years ago, I guess, and I decided, okay, I’m gonna homeschool writer. He’s not going to 4K. And so then all of a sudden I was like, okay, but this doesn’t make sense that I’m sending one child to a preschool, and then I’m keeping this one home. And so I guess I decided, okay, I want that slow morning with them. Like, I literally every day hear the bus go by and I’m like, oh, we’re all still here. And I just, I think the slow mornings are just my absolute favorite thing. And that was my gut feeling of, I don’t want to sit here and yell at my kids from the time that they wake up, get dressed, do this, get this.

Kensey Hering 00:16:55  Come on, you gotta eat. Come on, come on, come on. And there was this thing that I thought of. When our kids are newborns, our babies are newborns. It’s. You center your whole entire schedule around their sleep. And then as soon as they hit four. Okay, 7 a.m., you’re up. You’re out the door, you’re going to eat this, you’re going, do this, do this. My kids are not ready to eat at 7 a.m.. I’m not ready to eat at 7:30 a.m.. The amount of times that I did not eat breakfast before I went to school, just because I don’t want to eat that early, and I’m not ready to start my day that early. And it’s just, I don’t know, I think the gut feeling, I think for a while there, it was really hard because my mom and my mother in law were like, oh God, like, I’m just so worried about them. And it’s like, well, sorry, we got Doris stomach problem, but.

Katy Ripp 00:17:46  Got the meat of what I want to get into because, you know, I have this like first circle, second circle theory in my world. And for me, it’s like around starting a business, right? Like you started a business. And the first circle are like the people that love you the most, right? Like mothers, mothers in law or, you know, in theory. Right? Let’s just say that parents, siblings, immediate family. Right? Like friends from high school, best friends, you know, whatever. And it’s that like first circle and then you have this second like core of, you know, second circle of or second layer, I guess, of friends, acquaintances. I kind of call them like your Facebook friends, right? Like the people that you don’t necessarily hang out physically with. But, you know, they’re acquaintances, they’re customers or clients or whatever. And that second circle is usually your most supportive. And the first circle is not. And this took me a really long time to like, embrace.

Katy Ripp 00:18:43  But once I did, it saved my poor tender heart because I was like, oh my God, my heart keeps getting stomped on because nobody that I thought would be my biggest supporters in my business are. And I think that there’s lots of theories around this. One of them is like, to your point, Kensey, I’m worried, right? Like it does come from a place of love, right? Like it comes from a place of, I just love you so much. I don’t want to see you fail. I don’t want to see the kids get hurt. Like it does come from a place of love. And then there’s kind of another place where it comes from. Where this doesn’t fit into my mold.

Kensey Hering 00:19:17  My normal.

Katy Ripp 00:19:18  What am I going to tell my friend? They’re going to be what? Right then it’s fear, right? Like then it’s fear of judgment. So there’s sort of a place of love and a place of fear, and they’re kind of in that first circle. Does this make any sense to either one of you? Oh my gosh.

Kensey Hering 00:19:33  Yes, very much.

Katy Ripp 00:19:34  So. I’m just curious. Like what that first circle. Right. Like the first person in our first circle for all of us probably is our husbands. Right. Like so you are. Yes you are. You know, like okay by proximity. They are the first ones. But, you know, you sort of get over that hump. Right? And I’m sure that they had like some fear of judgment and fear of, you know, whatever. Then there’s the mothers and the mothers in law or, you know, parents, grandparents, siblings. Tell me about that kind of experience. And before we get too far into that, I want the listeners to understand that in no way does anybody think that the people that you’re about to talk about are bad people, right? Like they all just have opinions. Every time somebody like goes to talk about something that is about somebody else, we’re always like, well, they’re really good people. I know that it came from a good place or whatever.

Katy Ripp 00:20:32  Like, I understand that, right? Look, we understand that your parents are nice, your family is nice or whatever. It’s just that it comes from a different place. So anybody care to share?

Erin Tomlinson 00:20:43  Well, I think to that point there’s a lot of projection of I came from this. This worked for me. You’re doing it different. Like you said, there’s this unknown of how is that even going to look. And yes, these are my grandkids or these are my nieces and nephews. What’s up with that? You know, I don’t want them to be the weirdos. What’s happening? So I think a lot of it comes from just people’s own experiences in life. Personally, I didn’t get such a bad rap from that first layer you’re talking about. My sister was supportive. I think she’s even dabbled with the idea in her own mind. I think about my mom. She was really supportive because as I mentioned earlier, my son’s, you know, he has some extra ability and that wasn’t being catered to.

Erin Tomlinson 00:21:25  So she saw that as, oh, this is great, I think you should do it. My dad offered to teach things. He’s like, what can I teach? So I want to get involved. And that’s amazing. Yes. Can we do economics? I’m like, okay, not that economics know anything but that. And then thinking of my in-laws, I think, again, it was foreign to them, but they know that I am cut from a different cloth and whatever I do is going to be okay, and the focus is always going to be the kids if they’re happy or if for some reason they came to me and said, this homeschooling thing is not working, I’d be like, okay, let’s look at other options. It’s totally fine. And I think they know that too. So I didn’t have from that first layer as much of a question as I did, maybe from some of the periphery layers of, you know, like what you said, well, they’re going to be socially awkward and they’re in sports.

Erin Tomlinson 00:22:12  They have cousins. They talk to more adults now than they ever have in their life. So luckily for me again, Matt, my husband was a little bit like not my jam, but I’m just grateful that, you know, he had his pinnacle and said, this is really a unique experience and pretty cool that we can offer it to our kids.

Katy Ripp 00:22:29  So I definitely want to get into that, like that part of it. So we’ll get out of this negative loop right now in a minute. Kensey, how about you?

Kensey Hering 00:22:38  Yeah, I would say the most pushback. I mean, I feel like my husband is we don’t enjoy confrontation. We don’t like we’re always just like, oh, so awkward anyway. But he definitely was like, what do you mean? Like, how long? What’s gonna I don’t why why? And I mean, I’m the one that does all the research, reads all the books, does all this, like, does just anything. Like if I’m scrolling on my phone, I’m most likely looking up homeschool ideas or Y or any of that.

Kensey Hering 00:23:08  And so I just told him I was like, you know, you don’t have to be here and putting him on the bus like, you’re not here to do that. You’re not here to get them off the bus like I’m the one that has to do that. Not you. And not that it’s me, me, me. But I just said I was like, Ryan, there’s something just at the bottom of my stomach that every time I put him on that bus, I’m like, oh no, like, come back to me, come back to me. So yeah, he was just like, okay, do what you want to do, but we’re going to go to public school at some point. And I was like, okay, yeah.

Katy Ripp 00:23:44  One of the things that like, as you’re kind of both talking about it and Erin, I think you and I have had this conversation when you were even thinking about it. I also take care of kids, right? Like I do the schools, the appointments, the paying of the fees, the dropping off, the picking up, the, you know, registration for sports, the, you know, all of that stuff.

Katy Ripp 00:24:08  And so, you know, I suppose somebody out there not probably very likely not the audience that’s listening to this, but somebody out there like that husband should have an equal vote. I don’t know. I don’t know that I totally like for as much work as goes into it. Right? Like there is a decision around the kids that when you’re doing the majority of the work that comes with it, I think that you do get to sort of make the decision, not in a way that like not in a malicious way, but in a way that like, I appreciate your opinion. However, I’m still doing this, right. Like, that’s.

Kensey Hering 00:24:48  Exactly what I mean. I remember I was a text message at like 2:00 on a random weekday and I was like, I understand your concerns, but those are not valid. Like they are valid.

Katy Ripp 00:25:03  But nice try. They are.

Kensey Hering 00:25:05  Valid. But I mean, Ryan is such a social person and like his group of friends is our group of friends and they’ve all been friends since elementary school and all that stuff.

Kensey Hering 00:25:15  And it’s like, yes, I adore that. I want our kids to have that, but our kids do have that. They have that without going to school, they have that. They have friends. They have, you know, they’re loved by so many people. But yeah, I was just like, you know, I not saying that you don’t know what’s best for our kids because you do, but you do in a different way. Like I know what’s best for them in a little bit deeper way, I guess.

Katy Ripp 00:25:43  Well, it’s more intense when you’re the mom especially.

Kensey Hering 00:25:45  And that’s what I was just like, sorry, but I’m going to listen to him on this one. I’m sorry. And he was just like, whatever.

Erin Tomlinson 00:25:53  Well, and you, like you said earlier, you’re the one that’s the responsible one of picking up. I was getting the same thing. I would drop off. Mornings were disaster. Every. Nobody was happy to be up and moving around. And then on pick up, they were exhausted from sitting and doing whatever anybody wanted them to do for eight hours a day.

Erin Tomlinson 00:26:09  So it’s not ideal. And you know what else I’ve realized? Nothing is permanent. So if we decided to homeschool and for some reason it wasn’t working, we could always revisit and say, okay, this is an ideal. Let’s figure out a different plan or vice versa. I think historically you go to one school and that’s it. You never move. But outside of that reality, you have people moving in and out of school districts all the time. So new kids joining school, new kids leaving school, it’s not I don’t know, I just don’t think anything is super permanent. Just like a job. People used to stay at jobs for.

Katy Ripp 00:26:41  The generation of people, staying in a job for 38 years and being really proud of it are over, right? Like people change careers like or jobs like every four years, but careers like every seven now. I mean, I’ve been in 42 different jobs. So for us to like, expect that people stay and do the same thing for 12 years of their formidable lives is sort of a lot to expect of a kid.

Katy Ripp 00:27:07  Yeah. So, Kenzi, I want to give you a chance. Like, I know you’re both your mother in law, and your mom worked for the school, so was there, you know, outside of, like, the normal pushback. Was there anything outside of that or siblings first circle stuff?

Kensey Hering 00:27:23  Well, my mother in law and then my husband’s aunt work at the school. My mom will help out, like with lunch duty. But yeah, my mom, I mean, when I told her, she kind of was like, what? I, you know, she just oh my goodness. She was like, how what? What do you mean you’re going home school? And I was just like, you know, it’s just what I want to do. And I feel like I’ve always done different things than my siblings have, and I just don’t see any problem with that. I guess I look into things just like, you know, a little bit more, I don’t know. But yeah, she was just like, I don’t think this is a good idea.

Kensey Hering 00:28:03  And I remember probably like that initial I typically just spring things on my mom where I’m just like, oh, hey, guess what, Rhonda? Yes. And then, you know, she’ll go home and she’ll probably lay awake for hours at night thinking about this and worrying about it. And like two weeks later, she came over and she was just like, oh, can I stop by? And I was just like, yeah. She sits down. She’s like, kind of quiet. And I’m like, yes, what are you thinking? And she, you know, I just don’t think this is a good idea. And she goes, you know, they need a schedule. They need this. They need a routine, they need some structure. And I was just like, okay, yeah, they will get it here. And I mean, our house is pretty chaotic. We have four kids, three dogs and yeah. So it’s just crazy. But we find, I mean, we have a rhythm.

Kensey Hering 00:28:59  We do kind of the same things every day. Our kids know, like what we’re going to do. And so it might not be the same thing every single day or be written on the wall, but they know what we’re going to do. And then as far as my mother in law, she a poor woman do she actually found out because, you know, I wasn’t going to just, like, flat out tell her because I was like, I don’t know how to tell you. I guess I don’t know. But she found out from my husband’s aunt, which is her sister, who works in like, I don’t know, like the behind the scenes. So she was like, oh, I see Brian and Kensey pulled their kids from school and I was like, whoops. And so she was just like talking to me. And she goes, we’re carrying on like a really normal conversation. She was like, yeah, because, you know, your kids aren’t going to school. And I was like, no surprise.

Kensey Hering 00:29:53  And she was like, why? And I was just like, I don’t know, like, this is just we’re doing this where that’s what we’re doing. And I was just like, you know, my main thing was Ryder can’t sit at a death rate eight hours. He barely can sit down for point two seconds. I mean, he’s just like, what are we going to go do? Where are we going? I want to go outside, you know? And so yeah, she was like, well, what about friends and what about that? And I was like, they have friends. And I also kind of want to have a say in who your friends with. Like there’s some kids where I’m like, oh boy, okay, let’s not go there.

Katy Ripp 00:30:28  Definitely on their own at school. Right.

Kensey Hering 00:30:30  Like, yeah, I mean, I feel like sometimes our kids can be a little bit of followers too. And it’s kind of like what’s not. So yeah, my siblings were just like, okay.

Kensey Hering 00:30:45  I mean, and everybody’s super supportive about it now. I mean, they or they just don’t ask. And I think my mom had such a hard time with it because she would take me back to school shopping and we’d get new outfits. And you had the first day of school and you had, you know, all the holiday performances and yada yada yada. And it’s like, well, they don’t even celebrate. They aren’t even able to celebrate Christmas or do Halloween or anything like that now. Like as what we got to. Yeah. And so it’s kind of like I’m going to keep those traditions. It’s just in a different way. We’re still going to go get school supplies. We just don’t need all of the things. And my mom does a thing with all ten of her grandchildren where she takes them back to school, clothes shopping. And I was like, you can still do that tradition, mom. Like, there’s nothing like going to school. Our kids still need clothes like.

Katy Ripp 00:31:38  Like.

Katy Ripp 00:31:39  And I would still actually really appreciate that if you did that. Yeah.

Kensey Hering 00:31:43  And she was like, oh, okay. And so I think my mom gets so hung up on like.

Katy Ripp 00:31:48  Tradition.

Kensey Hering 00:31:49  There’s not going to be a tradition. There’s not. And it’s just like, yes, there is because I’m going to we still have Valentine’s Day parties. We still do like we still we just do it at home and it’s just us and it’s fun and it’s so. Yeah. But now she does say, and so does my mother in law will be like, how’s it going? Like, how’s school going? And so I think it’s taken them a little while to be like, well, how do I ask questions? How do I make sure?

Katy Ripp 00:32:12  Yeah.

Kensey Hering 00:32:13  And they’re all in sports through our school district. Like we do all the things we go to, the things we are at the school all the time for to watch my nieces and nephews play sports. And so we just we’re not in a classroom there.

Kensey Hering 00:32:27  That’s it.

Katy Ripp 00:32:28  One of the things you said before about your mom, this is the misconception, right? Like you’re either in bonnets and long skirts, mending socks or it’s a fucking free for all right? Like where people are like, there’s no structure, there’s no framework. It’s a total fucking free for all, you know, like you’re obviously laying on the couch eating bonbons, watching Days of Our Lives while four kids are running around doing nothing. Right. They’re like or chained up in the basement, right? Like there’s like, no grounds. No, it’s either completely rigid or complete chaos. And so let’s bridge the gap. Can you guys help me bridge the gap for everybody listening, can you tell me like, also, there’s probably moms out here like myself. I will be very honest. It would be very tough for me to wrap my head around being around my summers, really even, like, driving me crazy, right? Like wrapping myself into a schedule where I’m with my kids from sunup to sundown.

Katy Ripp 00:33:28  Very little break, you know, and maybe this is a total misconception, too. So tell me, like what a day to day feels like? Sounds like, looks like what’s like the favorite thing. You know, it sounds like kind of everybody’s misconceptions in your first circles have changed, right? Like husband’s opinions have changed. And tell me what that progression has looked like.

Erin Tomlinson 00:33:52  So for us, it was really the beginning of the year was focused on not schooling, so it wasn’t we’re going to do eight hours of workbooks or I’m going to school, ma’am, at the front by the, you know, bulletin board, and we’re really going to hammer this out. It was basically it was like a, a detox basically from school, getting out of the thought process that we have to have something going for eight hours a day, because that’s not at all true. Then it was, what are you into? What are you interested in? What should we go try? I mean, we went and learned how to harvest honey from a beekeeper and, you know, put the garb on and did the whole thing.

Erin Tomlinson 00:34:26  We had a neighbor who was an electrician. He taught us about that. We’ve had you know, we’ve just went out and done things with other homeschool groups where we’ve been at places that are usually super packed when other school kids are there, but when nobody else is there, it’s super. It’s the Kennedys, like, yes, yes, because I’m almost waiting for summer to be over because there’s crowds everywhere. But there wasn’t a huge schedule. But there’s things that the kids are responsible for every day, which includes we get up. It’s a slow morning like Kensey described, which is so peaceful and great. I can have some coffee. We make sure all of our chores are done. We have breakfast together, we do workbooks. I can go work out if I want, and the day could be nothing in the morning. No school related or it takes it. You know, we kick off in the morning and get everything done. But school can also be we’re making cookies. And so my daughter’s responsible for all the measurements of that stuff.

Erin Tomlinson 00:35:20  Or we have to go out and feed the chickens and get the eggs. And you know, we even broke it down, like how much chicken feed costs and how much we could get for a dozen of eggs, like, all those things are homeschooling. And it’s not. Again, that was part of the deal with my husband too, is just it’s not going to look and feel like a regular school day. It’s going to be so different, and they’re going to be learning all kinds of things that are actually practical to real life, in addition to some of this reading, writing and math. So it’s not really a free for all. But we do get outside. And when I asked Gunnar what was his favorite part of homeschooling and he did say it was we get to go outside whenever we want, which I think if you really look into how much time boys should be outside, it’s it’s 7 or 8 hours a day or something. So they should be out and being active as opposed to sitting in a desk all day.

Erin Tomlinson 00:36:12  So try to do a lot of that stuff too.

Katy Ripp 00:36:14  But the first thing that comes to my mind is like, what a commitment on your level, like on your end, like as an adult, as the mom, as the teacher, as the instructor, as the, you know, whatever role you put yourself in, that’s it’s a that’s a lot. I mean, I.

Kensey Hering 00:36:33  Always look at it as a.

Erin Tomlinson 00:36:34  Season. It’s going to be a season where I make a commitment. And what’s going to end up happening is I’ll it’ll pay dividends at some point down the road, I’m sure. But I still do get like, to your point, being with my kids all the time is it’s not what it seems like. I said, I can go to the gym if I need to, or they’re older now. So if I need to go to a showing, they can either come along and see how it goes or they can stay home, you know, and do their own thing. But yes, if I had this with littler kids, I don’t know.

Erin Tomlinson 00:37:01  I mean, obviously Kensey can speak to this, but you do have your autonomy still. You just have to find your pockets and work it out with your partner. How that’s all going to go, because I still work and, you know, you just got to fit it all in. But yeah, it’s a commitment. But like I said, I look at it all in seasons. This is an investment period.

Katy Ripp 00:37:19  You must look at everything as a learning opportunity.

Erin Tomlinson 00:37:22  Now 100%. We’re going to Yellowstone. Guess what? We’re going to have so much to learn and so much to talk about. It’s going to be great.

Katy Ripp 00:37:30  Yeah. When you I mean, because I don’t use everything as a teaching moment in my children’s lives, right. Like, it’s not that I don’t do it on purpose. I just it just never really crosses my mind, right? To be like, this is how we pay for things, you know, like so much of that they learn by osmosis. But like talking to you guys, I’m like, oh, I’m missing some, like major teaching opportunities for my kids too.

Katy Ripp 00:37:55  So thanks for bringing that to my attention.

Erin Tomlinson 00:37:59  We’re here for you.

Katy Ripp 00:38:01  Yeah. Kensey, how about you? Because your kids are little and you’ve got littler ones, right? Yeah. I don’t know if you said this before. You’ve got two others.

Kensey Hering 00:38:10  Yeah. So we have a soon to be seven year old, a five year old, two year old who will be three in October and a one year old. So, yeah, I think, you know, when people heard that I was going to homeschool, they were like, how? Like how? And then when we got pregnant with our fourth, they were like, really? Yeah. And so I feel like, what are you doing again? I never used to even see myself staying home with my kids, and now I’m obviously home with them a lot. I still get plenty, plenty of breaks like my mother in law is always helping us out. My mom and dad. My mom is always helping us out. My husband, if I say, hey, I want to go to the coffee shop when you get home, it’ll be like, okay.

Kensey Hering 00:38:59  And he tags in. So yeah, you kind of just I mean, I have a very good village that keeps me sane too. But also we are always on the go. My husband and I parent way better on the go. So yeah, we’re busy, but we’re staying. But we’re choosing to be busy. And like, I mean, kindergarten is a life skills. Like there’s really not a lot of bookwork, there’s bookwork, but it’s more of like, I mean, baking and cooking. We did so much of and it’s just like, you know, you’re doing your main counting that way. I mean, Ryder would so much as take out his tackle box and sort his lures and count and stuff and it’s like, well, there you go. That’s cool. And like, habits and household life skills. So like, I mean, a writer can do a full load of laundry by himself. He won’t fold it or put it away because Ryan and I don’t like to fold it and put it away.

Kensey Hering 00:40:01  Right.

Katy Ripp 00:40:01  We’re also teaching them that. Yeah.

Kensey Hering 00:40:04  But the fact that he can start our washing machine and put it in the dryer and start it is kind of like, cool.

Katy Ripp 00:40:11  Yeah. It’s amazing. I mean, my parents told me that that’s why they had children, right? It was to do chores, right?

Kensey Hering 00:40:17  I used to say that to my mom all the time.

Katy Ripp 00:40:20  My grandkids, I see it to my kids. Oh, yeah.

Kensey Hering 00:40:23  But yes, life skills like grocery shopping. Like we. Yes, we count that as school. Like, yes, that is something that they need to learn to do. And I mean to take all four of them is not like my favorite number one thing to do, but it’s we gotta do it. They need to learn that you go to the grocery store and you have to get groceries. You need to purchase them. You can make a list and you have to take.

Katy Ripp 00:40:48  Four kids with you someday.

Kensey Hering 00:40:50  Yeah. And you know, you always get those comments in the store that are like, wow, cans are full.

Kensey Hering 00:40:58  And where are they off school today?

Katy Ripp 00:41:00  Like, yeah.

Kensey Hering 00:41:01  Yeah, they’ll always ask Ryder, oh, no school today. And they’ll be like later. So we typically like our mornings are spent like, you know, we get up. Everybody kind of just sits and chills for a bit. Probably watch some type of cartoon. We’re not a screen free family. And then we eat breakfast together and then we typically it’s either we’re going somewhere, we’re doing errands, or that we come home for lunch and then our little kids will lay down, and that’s when we typically will do school. And it takes us like an hour maybe to do all of our stuff, which is just so nice. this year might be a little different because Ryder is in first grade, and so it’s just like, okay, let’s we’re going to really focus on some book work because there is stuff that you have to be able to to do. You have to.

Katy Ripp 00:41:57  Commit. And this is like reading time, right? Like you’re teaching reading, which you know, fascinates me because I don’t know how anybody teaches anybody how to read, but it’s a whole different story.

Katy Ripp 00:42:08  One of the things you said before, Kensey, that totally like, I kind of got stuck on it a while, that you parent better on the go. I have never heard that before and like Dale and I are way better parents on the goal. We were way better parents on the goal than we were at home when our kids were little. I mean, we don’t parent our kids at all anymore. That’s so fascinating. I’ve never heard that term before, and I love it because we were just I just couldn’t be home. That’s the part that would really, I think I’d feel like trapped in my house if I felt like I had to be in here. The other misconception here that I’m like, also trying to wrap my head around is you’re not doing school from 8 to 4.

Kensey Hering 00:42:46  No.

Katy Ripp 00:42:48  Right. Like, you can do it any time and it doesn’t take that long. Like we all know that the amount of time that people waste in an office and or in school is colossal. It’s just like so much of it is wasted.

Katy Ripp 00:42:59  So if you know, if you can pack it into one hour, why not do it?

Kensey Hering 00:43:04  I mean, even my niece, I’ll never forget my niece was over because we typically. So we start school next week. So we do it early and then we can end whenever. But I mean, whatever. But there’s my niece was over one day and she was like, wow. Like a lot of my time is wasted standing in line or waiting on other people to get it together. And I was like, oh, bless your heart. But yes.

Erin Tomlinson 00:43:29  That’s preparing her for adulthood. Also, though, you know.

Katy Ripp 00:43:32  To say that like also.

Kensey Hering 00:43:36  Yeah. And I mean and I.

Katy Ripp 00:43:38  Guess.

Kensey Hering 00:43:39  I don’t judge anybody for putting their kids in public school. You do you. I don’t have to. So I’m gonna try this out and tell my husband like get a job. But yeah I mean my best friends go to public school and I remember telling them from the start, like, please don’t think like me making this decision is going to judge you being like, well, you’re sending them to public school.

Kensey Hering 00:44:05  I don’t care what you do.

Katy Ripp 00:44:07  Yeah.

Kensey Hering 00:44:08  As long as your kids are safe.

Katy Ripp 00:44:10  Really like sobriety for me.

Kensey Hering 00:44:13  Yeah.

Katy Ripp 00:44:13  It’s like here, if you are drinking, it has nothing to do with me. And my sobriety has zero to do with you. Period. same with homeschool, right? Like I don’t care that your kids go to school. I don’t care that your kids are staying home. And I don’t think you’re sitting here judging me because my kids are going to school, right? Like you do. You all do me And we’re too busy mending sacks we have. No, we.

Erin Tomlinson 00:44:37  Cannot focus on your family.

Katy Ripp 00:44:39  Sorry.

Kensey Hering 00:44:39  Mending socks?

Katy Ripp 00:44:40  We don’t even have matching socks.

Kensey Hering 00:44:43  I, mother in law, takes our baskets.

Katy Ripp 00:44:46  Are you guys proud to part? When you started to market chickens for pigs, you can start to barter your socks. Well, good.

Erin Tomlinson 00:44:54  Matching socks for Kensey.

Katy Ripp 00:44:57  Oh my God. Tell me, Erin, you had mentioned something before about homeschooling groups. Have you found a, I don’t know, a tribe?

Erin Tomlinson 00:45:06  Oh my gosh, it’s like speed dating really.

Erin Tomlinson 00:45:08  It’s so fascinating because that was the other thing. I have a weird thing about commitment and just there’s some groups that you have to be, you have to show up once a month or twice a month. If you don’t.

Kensey Hering 00:45:19  You’re out that you have to pay for. Yes. Oh really? Oh yeah.

Erin Tomlinson 00:45:25  Oh yeah. But the question was, did I find my tribe? I have friends that homeschool and we get together and do some things. So it’s really wonderful. And it’s also a good network of people who can say, hey, this is going down. You might want to be interested. One of the things my kid did this summer kids did was log rolling, because one of the homeschool moms like, you got to get in on this. And I was like, fascinating. Yeah, we’ll just we’re we’re going to I want to see people’s faces rolling. We’re log rolling. Yeah. It’s fascinating, but, yeah, for the.

Katy Ripp 00:45:53  Day.

Erin Tomlinson 00:45:54  It’s been interesting. Some people I’ve really jived with and other groups it hasn’t really worked out.

Erin Tomlinson 00:46:00  But again, everybody is doing homeschool differently. That’s a whole nother thing. Not you can’t. You will never get the same answer from two people that they’re doing homeschool the exact same way. It’s all different. People do it at their own pace. People are involved in groups. People are doing online programs. It’s fascinating. The sock thing, totally sewing and darning and all of it. But I this year my focus since last year was the first year I will invest some more time in reaching out to some different groups and see if it’s a match for us or not, but and if it’s not, that’s okay too. You know, we have a couple people. And. Yeah, exactly.

Katy Ripp 00:46:35  I mean, there’s so many groups and, you know, and inside the groups, there’s groups. And, you know, I mean, there’s such a world out there that when you don’t know about it, you just don’t know what you don’t know. And I think when you get into it like that, and I’ve actually I think I’ve reached out to both of you at one level or another, maybe last year, and you guys are too new to it or whatever, but like, we’d love to have, like, give space for people for homeschooling or like come and make, you know, whatever.

Katy Ripp 00:47:07  We’ll teach you how to make espresso or, you know, something like that. We’ve had like entrepreneurship classes from the schools reach out to us, but never like, I don’t know anybody else in a homeschooling group. So, like, there’s so much I think there’s also like a lot of possibility for community connection if you own a business. Right, like you had an electrician, right? Like how what a cool partnership to have. Yeah, I think that’s amazing. How about future for you guys?

Erin Tomlinson 00:47:35  Well, I’m kind of a day by day gal myself. That’s always a loaded question. Are you? What, are you kids going to go to high school? What are they going to do? And I’m like, yeah, you know, that bridge is a little away. So once that once I get to it, I will absolutely cross it. But again, I think that’ll be a just a pow wow moment where we say, hey, how have things been going? Do you want to go to school? If you do, then we’ll try it.

Erin Tomlinson 00:47:58  But again, the thing I think about is gunner might be already through high school classes by the time he’s ready to go. So what’s the point? You know what I mean? Yeah. So I don’t know. It’s up for debate. I’m going to keep doing it as long as we all are enjoying it. And, it sounds like you are I. Yeah, yeah. Very much.

Katy Ripp 00:48:18  How about Kensey? You’re. I mean, you’re kind of far away from that, right? Like, I’m assuming that same answer, right? Like, as long as everybody’s.

Kensey Hering 00:48:24  Yeah, I’m going to keep doing it until I can’t, or they don’t have any interest. I mean, our daughter is a very, like, social person, and I feel like a lot of kids gravitate like a lot of I have older nieces and nephews and whatnot, and their friends gravitate towards our kids. And when I don’t think my kids understand, it’s like they will not be in your classroom. They won’t like they won’t be.

Kensey Hering 00:48:54  But yeah, we’ll be doing I’ll do this until someone tells me I can’t, I guess, or forces me not to. Or if our kids, yeah, are just like, I don’t want to do this anymore. Yeah.

Erin Tomlinson 00:49:06  One thing I did want to say that I think may or may not get lost in this conversation. We talk a lot about schooling and socialization and all the things. But the one thing that and Katy, I think you’ll appreciate this. And even Kensey too, there is a mental health component with our children when we have them one on one or we have them on two. You know, I have both of our kids or a couple of our kids were able to work through disagreements, emotions, all of it. And we’re able to do that one on one. One of the misses that again, school is not bad. We covered this. If you go to school, that’s fine. But I’m grateful because I can have these. I don’t want to call them like mental health conversations, but I can focus on whatever it is that you’re going through and we can address it in the moment.

Erin Tomlinson 00:49:51  It’s not that you’re coming home from school. You had a bad day. I find out about it maybe five days later from a teacher, etc. we’re able to kind of nip it in the bud. Or if you’re not feeling 100, you’re a little bit emotional today. Let’s take a day off or we do something different. So I think that’s another piece of this homeschooling thing that I’m really grateful for, because I don’t think I had that. And I don’t, you know. No, I think it’s kind of a mess.

Katy Ripp 00:50:14  This is like.

Kensey Hering 00:50:14  Yeah, I agree with that. We tend to not do school on Mondays because we’re coming off of a weekend And our Mondays are just very slow and probably some rest in there just to like, chill out and ease our minds. And then instead of expecting my kids to be like, okay, you need to do this. And it’s like, I’m tired. Like sometimes you just even us as adults, it’s like, I’m tapped out. I can’t do this anymore.

Kensey Hering 00:50:44  Even just simple day to day things. We tend to not do school on Mondays. And sometimes, you know, our kids will be sometimes, especially Ryder, he’ll kind of be just like, okay, I’m done. And like the middle of a lesson. It’s like, okay, well, there’s no point in forcing this and arguing with you and then having you be like, well, this is just I don’t like this. I don’t want to do this. And you just come back to it. So like, that’s what is really nice. And then there’s some days where he’ll be like, oh, let’s do another lesson. Oh, let’s do another one, let’s do another one. So then it’s like you’re six days caught up. Yeah. Right.

Katy Ripp 00:51:17  So that’s a perfect segue into my question is like, I’d love to know about, like, any changes you’ve noticed in your kids or yourselves. Like, what is this experience like taught you? How has it changed your perspective? Any enlightening moments?

Kensey Hering 00:51:32  I enjoyed my kids, surprisingly, but instead of like, you know, some people are, you know, like you even said, not that this is a bad thing, but I’m ready for school to start and I just don’t like there is days where I’m like, okay, go away.

Kensey Hering 00:51:51  Like, don’t touch me. Why are we all so obsessed with me? But like, my kids are constantly outside and I adore that because that’s what they need. Especially writer. He has to constantly be doing something with his hands, but I would say he is like, I mean, he seriously was so, so grumpy for that short time that he was going to school all day. And it was just, I mean, he can hold a grudge, Like, do you sent me to school? Like I’m not happy about it. And then I would just say, like, I’ve learned a lot. Like, there’s so much that you never were actually taught in school. Just like. I mean, we do kind of Charlotte Mason type learning, I guess. So it’s very, like slow pace. There’s some art in there. There’s, you know, faith is a big thing. Like, I mean, just learning a lot. I would say I’ve learned a lot myself. Like science wise or earth wise or nature wise or just all of those things.

Kensey Hering 00:52:55  It’s just like, oh, okay, cool.

Katy Ripp 00:52:59  Learn all that stuff as an adult and really be able to like, absorb it rather than like just spit it back out for somebody and then go on your merry way. I mean, every time I learn something new, I’m like, God, I feel like I should know this. Yeah, I.

Kensey Hering 00:53:15  Like.

Kensey Hering 00:53:16  Well, I just think of, like, you know, like nature study is a big thing that we like to do. And so it’s as simple as like looking through a bird book and being like, how many birds of these can we name? And then, like, there’s one book that we have that has bird calls in it or like their songs, and so the kids will hear it and be like, I think that’s an oriole. I think that’s a Robin that’s like, well, let’s go get our book. And so or the fact that they can name, like their plants and their trees is kind of like, oh, that’s cool.

Katy Ripp 00:53:48  One of the things you said too, was like just getting to know your kids. Yeah. Like knowing them on like a level of time that the rest of us don’t get, right? Like, I don’t get eight hours a day with my kids to really get into their emotions or like to know how they deal with some sort of adversity. I mean, I, you know, I get it in the summer, maybe if I’m, you know, if I catch them at the right time. But you know what a gift it is to, like, really know that your kids needs to use their hands, right? Like, or one of them is artistic, right? I don’t know if my kids are artistic, right? Like they go to art class. Yeah. I mean, they could be like, you know, a sketch artist that’s like in the closet. And I would have no idea, right? But, like, you know, if you’re in it every day with them kind of in the trenches with them, I feel like you could get to know them on a totally different level.

Erin Tomlinson 00:54:46  Well and accommodate their curiosities. For example, gunners really into maps and atlases and geography and all that stuff, which I had no idea. And now we can cater to that. That’s exciting for you. Let’s find other avenues where you can do research and really get your fill of that. But to Kensey’s point, you do really get to know your kids more. And I think the other reason why I did this was because I saw everybody’s kid. I off to college. Oh, can you believe they’re graduating? I’m like, oh my God, your kid is that old already, like what’s happening? And I knew that people were going to steal all that time if I didn’t get Ahold of it myself. But yeah, getting to know your kids on a whole different level, buying gifts for them is totally different. I thought I knew what you liked, like, now I can really cater to you, really into X, y, z, and I can get a gift that speaks to that.

Kensey Hering 00:55:32  Oh, so we’re like in a moment of, I mean, writer will be seven in the fall and he’s not into like the little trucks and like playing in the dirt all day. And it’s just kind of like I even said to my husband the other day, I was like, we need to find something for him to do. I feel like he just wants to be. He could play sports all day long. And so, yeah, I mean, he could play catch in batting and do hockey and jump on the trampoline all day long. And so yeah, you do figure out what they want to do. And I feel like also I figured out how they learn the best. Like I’m a very okay, you have to show me like you can’t just tell me. And my husband is like, trying to tell our son, like, hey, you can bat like this, or hey, you can do this. And Ryder finally was like, I don’t know what you mean. Like, all you’re doing is talking, like, I don’t know what you mean.

Kensey Hering 00:56:25  And I was kind of like, hey, like, you gotta show him. You can’t just tell him. So. Yeah. And our daughter could, like, look at something. I mean, for example, the other day they were doing drawing and Ryder was doing it, and then Remy was doing it and Ryder could not do it, and he was just like, oh, this is I, this is just dumb. And I was like, okay, well, it takes like, I’m not a good draw. I never just sat and drew though, but it takes a little bit of patience. And here Remy comes and is like, look at my hippo I drew. And we’re just like, oh dang, that’s pretty good. And then, you know, he took a little bit more patience and just to see him be like, wow, I can do this. And just to be like very proud of himself is just like, it’s fun, it’s fun. I enjoyed that, like.

Katy Ripp 00:57:14  All these thoughts running through my head. One of them is like the fact that you’re teaching them how they learn, right? Because we we really only get taught one way in a traditional school setting. And if you don’t learn that way, you don’t learn like there’s just no way around that.

Kensey Hering 00:57:31  Yeah, well, I told the kids are at at the older tours at VBS and I was like, oh, we’re gonna go to Vacation Bible School this week. And writer goes, if I have to sit in a chair all day, I’m going to be mad. And I was like.

Katy Ripp 00:57:46  Got it, dude.

Kensey Hering 00:57:47  I was like, nope, you get to move your body and he goes, you promise? And I was like, yes, buddy, you’ll be able to stand.

Katy Ripp 00:57:54  I mean, so good to know, right? Like the other thing that’s like really going through my head. And it took me a really long time to get this for myself. I’m almost 46 and it’s like I’m still struggling with, you know, the Basically the school time, right? Like, you know, you’re out of school for a little while.

Katy Ripp 00:58:12  I worked in the school system for a while, so I was on that 730 to 4:00 schedule forever. And then of course, my kids are in school, so it’s 730 to for that. Like that’s hour days. And it took me a long time to realize, like I run out of gas at noon until about three. And so I just like am not productive at that time. But I used to, like, force myself to be productive because that’s what I thought we should do, because that’s the schedule we’ve always been on. That’s what we’ve traditionally been in as Americans. And I just like I had to kind of get out of my own box and say, okay, well, I just don’t work that well. But I do get like another spurt of creativity or inspiration or energy or whatever between 6 and 8 at night. Well, in my mind, I just couldn’t do anything after noon because after 4:00. Nope. Like there’s nothing because that’s the end of the day is 4:00. And so what you guys are basically teaching your kids is like work when you feel like working, right? Like that’s what we should be doing as adults.

Katy Ripp 00:59:19  It’s like work when you feel like work. Now, do I understand that society is like, doesn’t necessarily work that way? Yes. But you don’t have to be that way, right? Like, I don’t have to be that way. I usually take off from 12 to 3 every day. I just, I nap or I eat lunch or I work out or a nap.

Erin Tomlinson 00:59:41  It’s finding your strength. Like, where are you the most? Yeah, if mornings are your jam, God bless. Get after it. If not, there’s nothing wrong with it.

Katy Ripp 00:59:48  It’s fine. Like it’s fine. It’s totally like you don’t need to apologize. You don’t need to do anything around that. And I think what you guys are teaching your kids that it’s okay to be that way, it’s okay to be different than everybody else. And I love it.

Kensey Hering 01:00:05  I also think like, you know, back to like, judgment or whatever. I feel like people are saying, well, what happens when they get a job and they have to wake up at a certain time? I can tell you right now, if we have a hockey tournament and we need to be there at 7 a.m., guess who was the first one up? Like, okay, let’s go, let’s go.

Kensey Hering 01:00:24  We need to go. It’s Ryder. Well.

Katy Ripp 01:00:26  And do we need 12 years of practice to get up? No. Yeah, like you just get up. I mean, I have a flight at 3 a.m. in the morning. Do I have to go to school for 12 years to get up at 3 a.m.?

Kensey Hering 01:00:40  Well, it’s just like that.

Katy Ripp 01:00:41  So it’s like. It’s like.

Kensey Hering 01:00:43  Major, they understand that there’s some things that you just have to do. Yeah, I feel like that plays in with chores too. Like our kids will, especially Ryder. He’ll be like, well, I cleaned up the living room. Can I have some money? And it’s like, well, no, that’s just cleaning up your space. Like, that’s life you have to do. And then when he just did things without being asked, it was like, well, here, thank you. You did it without being asked. It’s not. You cleaned up other people’s stuff, you know, you did that.

Kensey Hering 01:01:11  So here you go. So it’s not just I feel like everybody thinks that they should have expectations and they always need to be met. And I just then started.

Erin Tomlinson 01:01:19  Telling them, like, I just did the dishes. I just did the laundry.

Kensey Hering 01:01:22  I folded.

Erin Tomlinson 01:01:23  It, I put gas in my car, you know, and then after a while it’s like, oh, you know.

Katy Ripp 01:01:27  Doing that to Dale.

Kensey Hering 01:01:29  I am the chronic. Like, we have two vehicles and my husband has a work truck and so he always has his work truck. I will purposely take a different vehicle so I don’t have to stop. And two seconds later my husband will get in the car and it’ll be like really one mile till empty. I’m like, good thing the gas stations on a mile away.

Erin Tomlinson 01:01:50  But then yes, oh.

Katy Ripp 01:01:53  Oh, I want to give you guys a chance to like, say anything about homeschooling to anyone out here if somebody wanted to explore it, right? Like somebody wanted to get into it.

Katy Ripp 01:02:04  Get after it. What kind of advice would you give? Also, are there any resources we can put in the show? Notes that if anybody is like looking to get started or any kind of curriculum you guys use or anything?

Erin Tomlinson 01:02:16  Okay, I have a couple resources I don’t. Again, there’s a Facebook group, there’s all kinds of things. There’s many Facebook groups that you can lean on if you want for resources. There’s 100 or 1000 hours outside as a podcast and a book. Super great. The book has like activities to do throughout winter, summer, spring and fall. So you can come up again.

Katy Ripp 01:02:36  You say that again, Erin.

Erin Tomlinson 01:02:38  It’s 1000 hours outside. They have a podcast, and then they have a book and the book that I just took out from the library, it talks about a new activity to do every single day it caters to. Maybe I don’t know what the age is younger to maybe ten, 11, 12, but there’s something new, a new activity to do every single day, like fall, winter, spring and summer.

Erin Tomlinson 01:03:01  So you don’t have to come up with things if you don’t want to. Pinterest out school is another resource, so your kids could log in and learn from somebody else online. There’s one on one classes. There’s group classes. I’m trying to think what other resources I know of.

Katy Ripp 01:03:17  But I didn’t really ask about curriculum a whole lot. Like, are there only a few homeschool curriculums or are there thousands?

Erin Tomlinson 01:03:25  Oh my gosh, I don’t really even know. But we just I get workbooks off of Amazon and that’s what we do.

Katy Ripp 01:03:32  Okay. So like how does that go back to I maybe that’s another question is like how does this go back into credits for school.

Erin Tomlinson 01:03:39  So you only if you’re homeschooling you have to have what is it 875 hours per year per child. And that’s it. And you just enroll in September. There’s like a time frame between September and October and roll.

Katy Ripp 01:03:52  With.

Erin Tomlinson 01:03:54  It’s like the state says, like, hey, I’m going to be.

Katy Ripp 01:03:56  Homeschooling.

Erin Tomlinson 01:03:56  Like.

Kensey Hering 01:03:57  DP.

Katy Ripp 01:03:58  Okay, Department of Public Instruction, I think it’s called.

Kensey Hering 01:04:01  Yes.

Erin Tomlinson 01:04:02  Yeah. And then you would just record your hours. We just have a calendar and we write, you know, maybe math and, you know, 30 minutes or, you know, we went to see this guy talk about the bees. So we did that for two hours or whatever. You just kind of log all your activities. Okay. But nobody’s been coming to my door to check up on what I’ve been doing. And how often are they doing it? Yeah, exactly. Just the principal comes and check every once in a while.

Kensey Hering 01:04:27  I guess we just think, like, attendance. Yeah. What you said. And then if you average it out from, like, how many days in a year and then whatever, it’s like two hours a day. Yeah.

Katy Ripp 01:04:39  Okay. Back to resources. Anything can see you got that.

Kensey Hering 01:04:42  I feel like I mean, gosh, I don’t know what it’s ever going to look like if we get to, like, sixth grade and all that, but and I’m like a curriculum hoarder, like, there’s so much out there that is just like there’s a lot out there.

Kensey Hering 01:04:58  there’s a lot of different teaching styles that you can do. There’s a lot of, you know, different things. And I would say the book called Wild and Free, I can’t remember who it’s by. That was so good. It breaks down like how important like outside time for kids are, like just for their health. Their mental health, like all of it. And then it breaks down like different learning styles that you can do or like how many are out there. And then we do like the good and the beautiful for for math. And it’s great. We love it. It’s open and go, which I sometimes I don’t have time to plan things. And also I never liked math. I wasn’t very good at it. So this is just straightforward and it’s everything that you need. That felt a little fluffy for Ryder, where he was just like, get to the point. So then for him, we’ll do like Beast Academy, which is kind of like a comic book type deal, and then they just have like other ways, but then like family style.

Kensey Hering 01:05:58  So like all of our geography is family style and it’s through like books, like literature. But yeah, there’s so much out there. But yeah, that the Wild and Free Book and then Homeschool bravely was such a good homeschool bravely was honestly my just my moment of being like, you know what? I can do this. It doesn’t matter who else is gonna it doesn’t matter what my mom thinks. It doesn’t matter what my in-laws think, like it’s not their kids. I don’t have to please them. I don’t have to do anything that they want me to do. These are my kids. This is my life and not. So, yeah, I can do this whether I have two kids or four kids. Yeah. So that was a really good book. Just any homeschooling book. They’re all good. It’s all what you kind of make it. Yeah, and there’s tons of Instagram profiles to follow, but also it can be really overwhelming, especially if you’re like looking into it. And I have a couple of friends who have pretty little kids or acquaintances and they’re like, when should I start looking into it? It’s like, if you’re thinking about it now, just look into it because it takes a lot of courage to finally be like, okay, I’m going to do this.

Kensey Hering 01:07:10  And especially around like the school year when people are be like, oh, what grade are you doing? What? When does school start? And it’s like, well, actually I homeschool and it took me a little while to get out of being almost embarrassed. And it’s like, well, why am I embarrassed? Like, why am I embarrassed? But it’s also like, I mean, sometimes people kind of look at you like, what’s? And so, so yeah, there’s tons of resources out there though. But yeah, it can be very overwhelming. So it’s kind of do what works for you. There’s tons of curriculum that is just so pretty and so beautiful, but it’s also like, okay, is this realistic? Can I do this?

Erin Tomlinson 01:07:50  There’s also.

Kensey Hering 01:07:50  Teachers Pay.

Erin Tomlinson 01:07:51  Teachers, which is a website. That’s a.

Kensey Hering 01:07:53  Good one.

Erin Tomlinson 01:07:53  And sometimes you can pay for stuff like, oh, it’s Saint Patrick’s Day, let’s do something around that. And you can go in there and get a couple worksheets.

Erin Tomlinson 01:08:00  We did some summer ones like crossword puzzles and all kinds of things. But yeah, that’s a really great resource too, just for worksheets and.

Kensey Hering 01:08:07  Yeah, just for like, I mean, a lot of holiday stuff. So the whole month of December we do like Christmas school. So it’s all like that fun type of stuff. But yeah teacher pay teachers. That was such a good one. That’s a really good one.

Katy Ripp 01:08:19  Oh my God, I love this so much. You mentioned Instagram before and I always feel like people, you know, when you hashtag home school you’re going to get 450,000 different profiles. Is there anybody that you guys like really like that we could add in here. Maybe just like one each.

Kensey Hering 01:08:39  Oh little schools, a little school of Smiths or something. I’d have to look at it that she has some good ideas for like unit studies or just like they have some cool like all about my body or to learn like they have the human body space one. And I think the coolest is like me on the map or whatever.

Kensey Hering 01:09:01  So it takes you to like where you live, what your village looks like, what your town looks like, and then it goes bigger and bigger to like cities. And so yeah, that’s a good one for some resources.

Katy Ripp 01:09:13  Erin. Anything.

Kensey Hering 01:09:14  Kristy.

Erin Tomlinson 01:09:15  Faith I think she was one who was kind of like unapologetic about this is what I’m doing. Stop asking questions. Like, I can ask questions about what you’re doing to. And yeah, and so she’s one of those badass people that I thought, yeah, like, this is so funny. Why do I just rip the band aid and do the dang thing?

Katy Ripp 01:09:31  It’s. Yeah.

Erin Tomlinson 01:09:32  Yeah. Well, and.

Katy Ripp 01:09:33  You said before, like, it can get super overwhelming, right? Like, you can get analysis paralysis, right? Where you’re just like, oh my God, there’s so much information out here. But just do it. Like, just if you’re thinking about it. You don’t have to do it forever. That’s the other thing is, like, you don’t have to stick a stake in the ground and tie yourself to it.

Katy Ripp 01:09:52  Just you can do it for a while. If it doesn’t work, just move on, do it some other way.

Kensey Hering 01:09:57  Even looking up like curriculum and stuff on YouTube and watching them like flip through it is like just really helpful because there’s not like a, there really is not a store that you can go to and physically handle the curriculum and like look through it to see anything. You all you have to do it all online.

Katy Ripp 01:10:19  Sounds like a business opportunity.

Erin Tomlinson 01:10:21  Yeah. Of course. Look at Katy’s wheels turning.

Katy Ripp 01:10:23  Yeah right.

Erin Tomlinson 01:10:24  Always go in these Facebook groups. So and sometimes people are selling old things or you ask to get a business.

Katy Ripp 01:10:31  Right.

Erin Tomlinson 01:10:31  Yeah. But I mean, like I said, I do workbooks off Amazon Spectrum. I mean, you can go to Barnes and Noble and pick those up. Yeah.

Kensey Hering 01:10:37  So I mean something as simple as like cutting skills like that. Like. Yes Barnes and Noble has tons of them, tons of them. And yeah, we do a couple like geography and science ones too, that are really good off of there.

Kensey Hering 01:10:52  And I mean, there’s even I mean, confidence in math is a math curriculum that is on Amazon. And it’s not you don’t have to it doesn’t have to be expensive. They literally say, like, if you have a library card, you can get by with that.

Katy Ripp 01:11:07  Oh, yeah. I mean, you know, that goes with anything, right? Like you can’t do yoga unless you have, you know, a perfect yoga outfit or. Yeah, whatever. Like that’s just not true, right? Like you can homeschool your kids without anything if you really wanted to write.

Kensey Hering 01:11:20  Like just being like, present is like a big like being present and learning life skills is such a big thing. I mean, Ryan or I went, I mean, I went to college for a little bit, but then I was like, yeah. And I mean, he’s an excavation. So it’s like some of the things that he does, I’m like, how do you learn that? Like, I don’t know how.

Kensey Hering 01:11:42  I mean, there’s not a curriculum in this world that is going to teach writer what he wants to do, and I know that for sure. What’s going to teach him is spending time with going and sitting with Ryan, which is probably one of my favorite parts, is, you know, we can go to Ryan’s job site, we can go hang out with Grandma and Grandpa. We can go, right, or I’ll go and get the oil change with my father in law. And he’ll be like, do you know? And it’s just like you’re learning so much more than your.

Katy Ripp 01:12:11  Village, right? Is also like, if they’re bought into it, they also get to participate in the teaching moments, right? Like it’s fascinating. It’s fascinating because they’re making me really envious.

Erin Tomlinson 01:12:25  Freedom is the jam too. It’s great. You don’t have to be somewhere at a certain time. You can do it differently. You can talk about entrepreneurship. You can talk about growing tomatoes like it doesn’t. It’s not like if you actually.

Kensey Hering 01:12:38  That’s my favorite.

Erin Tomlinson 01:12:39  Part is.

Kensey Hering 01:12:40  How many like famous people are actually homeschooled. It’s actually quite, quite wild.

Katy Ripp 01:12:46  Yeah, well, like all of the Olympic gymnasts are. Yeah. Or a portion of their, you know.

Kensey Hering 01:12:52  And I think it’s like Ryan Gosling or someone, he was at one of the award ceremonies and he was like, actually, I really want to thank my mom because she put up with me. But she also pulled me out of school because I was swearing so bad, and she homeschooled me. And let me figure out, you know, that I wanted to be an actor if she let him, you know, dive so deep into filming that. Look at where he is. So it’s like, I don’t think people realize, like, once your kids can hone in on their interests and really give it a go, you kind of can tell what they’re going to want to do, but they’re also going to be really good at it.

Katy Ripp 01:13:28  Yeah, well, 10,000 hours, right? Yeah.

Katy Ripp 01:13:31  Giving them 10,000 hours basically. Yeah.

Kensey Hering 01:13:34  Yeah. The freedom is the freedom is huge. Yeah, we adore that.

Katy Ripp 01:13:40  I love it. This conversation went way better than I thought it was going to go. Not that I thought it was going to go. I mean, like, not that I did not think it was going to go bad. I thought it was gonna go amazing. But like, just so much more fascinating than I thought, right? Like I had misconceptions. I had the misconception that it was like, we’re going to sit for eight hours at home and I’m gonna, you know, here’s your lunch, lady macaroni. You know, whatever. I just like that’s how I kind of thought about it. And you can do it differently, right? Like we can do anything differently. And I’m, you know, I’m a huge preacher of that in the, like, real world. So why shouldn’t we be able to raise our kids that way? And the answer is we can actually.

Erin Tomlinson 01:14:22  Actually we can.

Katy Ripp 01:14:23  Actually we can also like I’d love to check in with you guys again, maybe at the end of the school year and you can maybe tell me what you taught this year and like, I’d love to hear about Yellowstone and all the great things on top of it. Would you guys be willing, if anybody was interested in reaching out to you as a resource, would you guys be willing to share your information? I mean, we will share it when we put it in the show notes, but I’m like a.

Erin Tomlinson 01:14:49  $0.99 a minute. So I don’t know if you want to put that caveat in there for whatever randomness.

Katy Ripp 01:14:55  I come up with. Yeah. Yes. And we have a homeschool hotline, please. Yes. Right. Yeah, I absolutely I would love it, I could talk I.

Erin Tomlinson 01:15:06  Was actually thinking about this podcast and I thought, you know what? There’s so many that like it just gets me so excited. I am passionate about it, I love it, I’m excited.

Erin Tomlinson 01:15:15  Not everybody’s.

Katy Ripp 01:15:16  Into it. Might be willing to do like a seminar now, like it’s seminar, but like in my office, like a roundtable, like anybody interested in homeschooling their kids, whether they’re you’re just had a baby or you’re they’re in 10th grade, like, want to come and talk about it?

Kensey Hering 01:15:33  Yes. I could talk all day.

Katy Ripp 01:15:35  Yes.

Erin Tomlinson 01:15:36  I will share my insight in trade for homegrown wheat or flour. I’m really on the hunt for that.

Kensey Hering 01:15:42  I’ll take some sour dough starter bolting.

Katy Ripp 01:15:44  Yes. How are those? Turn ugly. That’s your payment. Into my office is sourdough starter and homegrown wheat. Yeah, and we will darn your socks. That’s right, I will not. My mother in law will in my apron. Yep. Totally. And please wear a long skirt or I think.

Kensey Hering 01:16:05  What’s the other thing is people are always like, oh, the jumper, the denim jumper. You always have a jumper on my,

Katy Ripp 01:16:13  Oh my God, I love it so much. I would really love to do that.

Katy Ripp 01:16:16  I think that that would be really cool. And I think that there would be like if you could reach out to the right people. Right? Like if we all just shared it like, hey, you don’t have to apologize for thinking about it. Just come. Yeah.

Kensey Hering 01:16:28  I think like what people sometimes hear is like, you can do it. Like you’re literally not going to screw up your kids. What’s going to happen? You’re not going to screw them up like you’re either going to put them in the hands of someone else for eight hours, and they could screw them up. So what? I mean, I guess I’d rather screw my kids up and then anything.

Katy Ripp 01:16:48  And not even to say we don’t have to worry.

Erin Tomlinson 01:16:50  Like things happen like Mount Horeb.

Katy Ripp 01:16:53  Yeah, my kids are with me.

Erin Tomlinson 01:16:54  So I don’t have to worry about if someone’s doing something, but.

Kensey Hering 01:16:57  I’m not saying that it can’t happen at, you know, at target, Beltline or anything like that. But I think about, oh my God, like to be that person and to think like, I would be going psycho like crazy.

Kensey Hering 01:17:11  And so yeah, to think about that too is another reason. But you can’t always just fear everything that’s going to happen. But yes, that is one huge thing for me. And also like.

Katy Ripp 01:17:23  Well, and I think it is for a lot of mom. Right. Like especially like first time moms. Well all moms right.

Kensey Hering 01:17:30  But I think teachers can only do so much. Teachers hands are really tied by the government and what they teach and how they teach it. And, you know, there’s some teachers who don’t agree with it, but they love teaching so much that they’re like, I’m going to stick it out because I love my interactions with the kids. And that’s amazing. That’s awesome. But yeah, there’s some things that are so much.

Katy Ripp 01:17:56  Of that too, is like, there’s something wrong when there’s an exodus of teachers leaving, right? Like, I hired a teacher. I know people that.

Kensey Hering 01:18:05  Or just so many that have been teachers, like, I mean, just some people that I follow, not that I like really personally, no, but that have been a teacher and stopped to homeschool their kids is kind of wild.

Kensey Hering 01:18:18  Like it’s just. But yeah. Or just to know like that other people like, you can do this, you can do this, you can start off really slow. You’re not. Your kids aren’t going to be behind unless you just don’t do anything with them. Yeah, I mean.

Katy Ripp 01:18:34  They’re still going to pick stuff up.

Kensey Hering 01:18:36  Oh, God.

Katy Ripp 01:18:37  Yeah. Good and bad stuff. Totally. Right. Yeah. Well, and again, this isn’t, like, imperfect. Perfect. This is like, that’s not the sliding scale is like, public school is imperfect and homeschooling is perfect or vice versa. Yeah. This is that’s not the sliding scale. It’s just there’s just a line between, you know, like we do this and they do that, right? I mean, it’s all like we all have our kids best interests at heart. I mean, full stop. Like we’re trying our best, right, with whatever we’re doing. You guys, thank you so much for being here. Really.

Katy Ripp 01:19:15  Thank you. And that’s a wrap on today’s episode. I hope you enjoyed diving deep into the world of living authentically with me. Before you go, don’t forget to connect with me on Instagram. Shoot me a message at Katy Ripp. I’d love to hear your thoughts on today’s episode and connect with you further. And remember, if you want more details on today’s episode, or just want to explore more about designing your life unapologetically, head on over to my website at Katy Ripp dot com. There you’ll find all the juicy details and resources you need to keep the inspiration flowing. Lastly, if you’d like to join me on the show, whether it’s to tell about your experience of designing your own life, to share your expertise, or if you’d like to participate in lifestyle coaching live on air, don’t hesitate to reach out. Your story could inspire countless others on their own path to living authentically. Thanks for tuning in. Until next time, keep living boldly designing your life. And remember #ActuallyICan.