This is a podcast about raising kids, told from both sides of the table: a mom who's been through it all and her son sitting right across from her. No experts talking down to you, no perfect answers, just an honest, easygoing conversation between two people who actually lived it, together.
A reward chart works for about two weeks. Then your kid figures out the system and starts negotiating. This week Nicole takes two real stories off the internet — one parent whose sticker chart turned a five-year-old into a tiny contract lawyer, and one whose 13-year-old laughed at being grounded — and shows where each of them went wrong. Short version: the carrot is a real tool, but it is not the main tool. And a consequence the child had no say in is not a consequence, it is a sentence. ━━...
25 Oct 2026
Parenting Tools EP 6 - Helicopter Parents
A four-year-old who argues like a courtroom lawyer. A daughter who whined until her mother gave the whining its own name. This week Nicole explains the one move that stops you fighting your own child: stop treating the behaviour as them, and give it a character instead. It sounds like a gimmick. It isn't. Once the behaviour has a name, the child can see it too, and nobody, parent or kid, wants that character in the room. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ THE STORY THAT STARTED IT From Reddit: a parent...
17 Oct 2026
Parenting Tools EP 5 - Naming The Game
A four-year-old who argues like a courtroom lawyer. A daughter who whined until her mother gave the whining its own name. This week Nicole explains the one move that stops you fighting your own child: stop treating the behaviour as them, and give it a character instead. It sounds like a gimmick. It isn't. Once the behaviour has a name, the child can see it too and nobody, parent or kid, wants that character in the room. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ THE STORY THAT STARTED IT From Reddit: a parent ...
13 Oct 2026
Parenting Tools EP 4 - Should AI Raise Your Kids?
We asked ChatGPT for the greatest parenting hits of 2026 — then put every one of them in front of Nicole, who raised six kids. Pro, no, or mid? Spoiler: the robot does better than you'd think. It just keeps leaving out the part that actually makes it work. Ian reads the list. Nicole votes. Thumbs up, thumbs down, or the dreaded sideways thumb. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ THE LIST #1 CONNECTION BEFORE CORRECTION — MID Getting down to their level, eye contact, "look at me, I want to talk with you,...
11 Sept 2026
Parenting Tools EP 3 - The Three Steps
Your kid does something you don't like. What you do in the next ten seconds decides whether it stops there or becomes the next five years. This week Nicole strips parenting back to the three steps that come before every tool and technique you've ever read about, and Ian spends the whole episode trying to poke holes in it. Nicole raised six kids. Ian has none, which makes him the perfect stand-in for everyone about to try this for the first time and wondering what happens when it all goes wro...
24 Aug 2026
Parenting Tools EP 2 - Using games instead of Timeouts
Every tantrum has a window before it becomes a tantrum. In this episode the guru breaks down how to spot that window, the arms crossing, the shift in mood, what she calls "the funk", and how to redirect it with a game instead of a consequence. Push-ups, laps around the house, the quiet game, a timer the kid can actually see. Then Ian puts her on the spot with a grocery store scenario and finds the limit: once you've set a boundary and the kid crosses it, the game stops being the tool. Plus t...
23 Jul 2026
Parenting Tools EP 1 - One Person in charge
In this opening episode, we introduce what Parenting Tools is all about: real talk on the joys, the messes, and the little things nobody warns you about. Expect laughs, a few home truths, and the kind of parenting wisdom that only comes out when a mother and her grown son finally sit down to compare notes. Pull up a chair and join the conversation. This is just the beginning. A Mom Has Fun production.
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