Stay ConnectedTruth: Kids don’t come with a handbook! But what if there was a parenting handbook that aligned with your healthy living values?
In each episode of the Healthy Parenting Handbook Podcast, mom of 4 Katie Kimball interviews experts in fields like nutrition, medicine, psychology, parenting, technology, entrepreneurship, and more to give parents tools to raise healthy, independent kids.
Intentional parents, here comes clarity about what you can DO to keep your kids physically and mentally healthy!
Copyright: © 2024 Healthy Parenting Handbook with Katie Kimball
What if one of the best things you could do for an anxious, frustrated, or struggling kid is...do a little less?
I know. Every parenting instinct in us is screaming, “Help them! Fix it! Tell them it’s going to be okay!”
But Dr. Kathryn Hecht says there’s a problem with that last one: We’re not wizards. We actually don’t know that everything is going to be okay, and our kids are smart enough to know it too.
So what can we say instead?
In this episode, Dr. Hecht gives us an incredibly simple formula that combines empathy with confidence, plus a 10-second parenting rule that might be harder to practice than it sounds. We’re talking about how to help kids do hard things, tolerate frustration, become more independent, and build real confidence without throwing them into the proverbial deep end.
And I love this because we’re not talking about manufacturing scary experiences for our kids. We’re talking about the everyday stuff. Buttons. Homework. Birthday parties. Trying something new. All those little moments when we have to decide: Do I swoop in, or do I give my child a chance to discover, “Oh. I can handle this.”
If you want to raise kids who see uncertainty less as a threat and more as something they can navigate, keep listening. This one is practical enough to use today.
Resources We Mention for Raising Brave Kids
Check out my new book at raisinghealthyfamilies.com/pickybook!
Affiliate links used here. Thanks for supporting the Healthy Parenting Handbook!
What if one of our most loving parenting instincts is accidentally making our kids less confident?
Oof.
As parents, we’re wired to help. To reassure. To rescue. To make the crying stop in the grocery store before everyone in aisle seven starts judging us. (You know what I mean?)
But child psychologist Dr. Kathryn Hecht says kids aren’t nearly as fragile as we sometimes treat them.
In fact, they need age-appropriate challenges to build what she calls “handleability”, that deep-down belief that says: This is hard, but I can handle it.
I absolutely loved this conversation because it gets right into the practical question so many of us are wrestling with: How do we raise kids who can actually handle hard things?
We dig into:
Dr. Hecht has this incredible ability to take clinical psychology and turn it into language that makes you think, “Ohhhh. I can actually use this with my kid.”
And I have a feeling you’ll finish this one looking at your child’s next hard moment a little differently.
Resources We Mention for Raising Resilient Kids
Check out my new book at raisinghealthyfamilies.com/pickybook!
Affiliate links used here. Thanks for supporting the Healthy Parenting Handbook!
“Structure” might not be the most exciting word in parenting.
In fact, if you’re anything like me, it might sound a little too much like schedules, color-coded charts, and someone who actually knows where all the matching socks are.
I am not that person.
But here’s what I’ve learned: structure isn’t about controlling our kids. It’s one of the ways we care for them.
I was recently talking with an 11-year-old who, I realized, didn’t really have a bedtime. No adult was telling him when it was time to sleep, and he was regularly falling asleep in class. That hit me hard.
Kids need choices, absolutely. But they need choices inside a fence. They need adults who create boundaries that say, “You’re safe here. I’ve got you.”
And mealtime is one of the best places to practice this.
In this episode, I’m sharing six practical habits that can make meals healthier, calmer, and far less exhausting for parents. We’ll talk about:
You do not need to implement all six ideas tomorrow. Please don’t.
Listen for the one that makes you think, “Ohhh. We need that.”
That’s probably your action step.
Resources We Mention for Mealtime Habits for Families
Check out my new book at raisinghealthyfamilies.com/pickybook!
Affiliate links used here. Thanks for supporting the Healthy Parenting Handbook!
Have you ever looked at your kid’s schedule and thought, “How are we supposed to fit all of this in?”
School. Sports. Music practice. Homework. Clubs. Family stuff. That giant project they somehow remember at the most inconvenient possible moment.
And then we wonder why our kids feel stressed…while we’re over here acting as the family calendar, reminder system, transportation coordinator, and human push notification.
In part one of my conversation with productivity expert Megan Sumrell, we talked about time debt and why so many of us keep carrying unfinished tasks from one day into the next.
But this time I wanted to ask a different question:
Can we teach our kids to avoid that mess before they become adults?
Because I did NOT start life with excellent planning habits. Megan didn’t either. So if we can give our tweens and teens some of these skills at 12, 15, or 18 instead of making them figure it out at 35 while juggling work and kids…yes, please.
Megan shares a very practical system for helping kids actually see their time, instead of treating everything that isn’t happening right this second as some vague place called “later.”
And parents, there are some really good ideas in here for us too.
In this interview, we dig into:
One idea especially made me stop and think: Megan intentionally blocks time on her calendar for problems she doesn’t even know about yet.
Because something always comes up, right?
The internet dies. A teacher assigns something unexpected. A project takes twice as long as you thought. Somebody needs a form filled out by tomorrow morning. (Naturally.)
Instead of pretending those surprises won’t happen, Megan plans for them.
And that may be one of the most practical ways I’ve ever heard to get out of the constant cycle of, “I’ll just squeeze it in somewhere.”
If you want your kids to head toward high school, college, and adulthood knowing how to manage their own responsibilities without you constantly chasing behind them, this conversation is packed with skills worth teaching now.
Because the goal isn’t to raise kids who can cram more into every day.
It’s to raise capable humans who can look at their time, make good decisions, and know when the answer needs to be, “I actually don’t have room for that.”
Resources We Mention for Time Management for Kids
Check out my new book at raisinghealthyfamilies.com/pickybook!
Affiliate links used here. Thanks for supporting the Healthy Parenting Handbook!
Have you ever moved the same task from Monday’s list to Tuesday’s list...then Wednesday’s...and by Friday you’re pretty sure that task has taken up permanent residence there?
Meanwhile, you’ve accomplished 47 other things.
So why do you still feel behind?
My guest Megan has a name for this: time debt. And once she explained it, I started seeing it everywhere.
It’s a lot like financial debt. You begin today already owing yesterday, and tomorrow you’ll owe today too. Pretty soon, no amount of crossing things off feels like enough.
For parents, especially moms carrying work, kids, appointments, meals, household responsibilities, and all those invisible things somebody has to remember, that can get exhausting FAST.
But here’s where this conversation got especially interesting.
What if the problem isn’t that women need to get better at productivity?
What if some of the productivity systems we’ve been told to use simply weren’t designed with women’s lives or biology in mind?
Megan and I dig into some fascinating territory in this conversation, including:
And that last one may be the hardest.
Because we parents are very good at asking, “How can I fit this in?”
We’re perhaps not quite as practiced at asking, “Should this be on my list at all?”
If you’ve ever ended a very productive day wondering why you still feel like you failed, this conversation may give you a completely different way to look at your calendar, your expectations, and that task you’ve moved to tomorrow for the fourth time.
Resources We Mention for Time Debt
Check out my new book at raisinghealthyfamilies.com/pickybook!
Affiliate links used here. Thanks for supporting the Healthy Parenting Handbook!
Have a great summer! We'll be back in late August with new episodes of the Healthy Parenting Handbook.
Affiliate links used here. Thanks for supporting the Healthy Parenting Handbook!
If you thought choosing a sunscreen was as simple as looking for the words “mineral” on the front of the bottle, this episode might surprise you.
In this conversation, Autumn Blum and I dig into the sunscreen label details that most parents never hear about—and some new ingredients to watch out for.
In this episode, you’ll learn:
If you’ve ever felt overwhelmed standing in the sunscreen aisle, this episode will help you understand what really matters and what to look for on the label.
Resources We Mention for Choosing a Safe Sunscreen
Check out my new book at raisinghealthyfamilies.com/pickybook!
Affiliate links used here. Thanks for supporting the Healthy Parenting Handbook!
I was once called the Wikipedia of sunscreen by a morning news anchor.
I consider myself a total sunscreen geek!
Wait until you see my jaw drop in this conversation with cosmetic chemist and Stream2Sea founder Autumn Blum. She taught me things I had never considered before!
In this episode, you’ll learn:
This is one of those episodes that will absolutely make you think differently the next time you reach for a bottle of sunscreen.
Resources We Mention for Sunscreens and Coral Reefs
Check out my new book at raisinghealthyfamilies.com/pickybook!
Affiliate links used here. Thanks for supporting the Healthy Parenting Handbook!
If you’ve ever looked around your house thinking, “Why am I still doing everything for these capable humans?” — this episode is for you.
I’m deeply passionate about helping parents raise kids who are not only healthy, but independent, resilient, and prepared for real life. And honestly? Chores and family responsibilities are one of the most powerful tools we have to make that happen.
In this conversation with Hunter Clarke-Fields from the Mindful Mama Podcast, we talk about why chores are about so much more than getting help around the house. They help kids build confidence, ownership, problem-solving skills, and even better mental health.
We also talk about:
And yes — I share the exact chore system we’ve used in our family for over 10 years.
Whether your child is 4 or 14, it’s never too late to start building the life skills they’ll carry into adulthood.
Resources We Mention for Chores for Teens
Check out my new book at raisinghealthyfamilies.com/pickybook!
Shop Perfect Supplements at raisinghealthyfamilies.com/perfect
Affiliate links used here. Thanks for supporting the Healthy Parenting Handbook!
If your family does not deal with food allergies, it can be easy to assume this episode is not for you. But after this conversation with Kathlena, The Allergy Chef, I think every parent will walk away with more empathy, awareness, and practical tools for helping all kids feel included.
Kathlena’s stories are powerful, heartbreaking, and deeply hopeful. We talked about the hidden isolation many families experience and the surprisingly simple ways we can make our homes, classrooms, and communities safer and more welcoming for everyone.
In this episode, we discuss:
This conversation is such an important reminder that connection matters more than perfection — and that small acts of thoughtfulness can have a lifelong impact on a child.
You can watch Kathlena in action at this year’s #LifeSkillsNow summer camp. She teaches teens how to turn basic ground meats into an amazing variety of dinners. Her workshop is SO GOOD! Don’t miss out – register now.
Resources We Mention for Including Kids with Allergies
Check out my new book at raisinghealthyfamilies.com/pickybook!
Affiliate links used here. Thanks for supporting the Healthy Parenting Handbook!
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