Kendra Adachi, THE LAZY GENIUS KITCHEN: Have What You Need, Use What You Have, and Enjoy It Like Never Before

2022-05-05  ·  31:39  ·  Kendra Adachi  ·  Podcast Audio

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[0:41]Kendra Adachi is the author of the lazy genius kitchen.
[0:44]Have what you need, use what you have, and enjoy it like never before.
[0:48]Kendra is the New York Times best-selling author of the lazy genius way, and her podcast,
[0:54]the lazy genius podcast, has over 13 million downloads, and covers everything from
[0:58]cooking chicken to making friends, and by the way, I was just a guest on this podcast,
[1:02]although I had a terrible cold, although I'm a little congested today too, not that
[1:05]it matters.
[1:06]But anyway, I was on that podcast recently, and it was one of my favorites.
[1:09]We had a great time, although I had to leave early because my son was sick at school.
[1:14]But to have a listen to her podcast, the lazy genius podcast for my episode, just to
[1:18]give you a taste of it.
[1:19]Anyway, back to the lazy genius kitchen.
[1:22]As a systems expert and professional permission giver, Kendra helps others stop doing it
[1:27]all for the sake of doing what matters.
[1:29]She lives in North Carolina with her husband, and three kids.
[1:32]Welcome, Kendra.
[1:33]Thanks so much for coming back on Momstone.
[1:35]Have time to read books.
[1:36]This time to discuss your lazy genius kitchen.
[1:39]I'm so happy to be here.
[1:41]What a treat.
[1:42]I love being on your show.
[1:43]Thank you, as always, for sanctioning laziness and putting corners and picking what we can focus
[1:52]on and what we can to this lazy genius principle is actually genius.
[1:55]So there you go.
[1:57]Thank you.
[1:57]I've always had, I've never had anyone say it that way before.
[2:00]Thank you for sanctioning laziness.
[2:01]But yes, I'm here for that.
[2:03]I'm here for that always.
[2:05]Well, it's sort of tongue in cheek because of course you're not lazy and none of these tactics
[2:09]are lazy.
[2:10]It's all about deciding what we're going to invest the effort on.
[2:12]Exactly.
[2:13]Exactly.
[2:14]None of us can invest all the effort and all the things.
[2:17]So you got to choose some to let go of.
[2:20]Yes.
[2:21]So before we get into the lazy genius kitchen method, I wanted to go over as like a
[2:26]little primer, some of your lazy genius principles, which you outline again in this book.
[2:31]So just for people who might not know, some of the things you espouse deciding once,
[2:37]limit your decisions by making certain choices once and then never again.
[2:41]This is like my downfall.
[2:42]I rethink everything all the time.
[2:47]I'm like, I book a flight and then I cancel it.
[2:49]I decide to, I mean, I, yeah, you know, that's the beauty of the principles.
[2:55]There are 13 of them.
[2:56]And guess what?
[2:57]You don't have to use all 13.
[2:58]If you're like, guess what, decide what, I'm going to be lazy about decide once.
[3:02]That is not for me.
[3:03]I don't know.
[3:04]You can't.
[3:05]Fire to that.
[3:06]I, I, you're doing that right.
[3:08]Some things I do better, like letting people into my crisis, I clearly let the world into
[3:12]every crisis I have, setting house rules, building the right routine, living in the season,
[3:18]being kind to yourself.
[3:19]I could do better and scheduling rest.
[3:21]I could do better.
[3:22]But anyway, I love these 13 principles and they are aspirational and very useful.
[3:29]So there you go.
[3:30]You know, some of them spill over like essentializing, which is one of the things in the
[3:37]lazy genius kitchen.
[3:39]So start by telling listeners a little bit about why apply the lazy genius principles into
[3:46]kitchen and meal planning and all the rest.
[3:48]And then we'll go from there.
[3:50]Yes.
[3:51]Well, I have been waiting for this book to be written for 20 years of my adult life.
[3:56]Seriously.
[3:57]Like, can someone teach me, I know that there are cookbooks and this is not a cookbook.
[4:01]I think that's, that's really important to say from the, from the front is that this is
[4:04]not a cookbook.
[4:05]There is a single recipe and the whole thing that, no, there's two, there's two recipes
[4:10]in the whole book.
[4:11]But the point of this is not to give you another cookbook because we all probably have
[4:16]plenty of those and we have access to the internet and lots of recipes.
[4:20]And recipes are amazing and they are so important.
[4:23]But what I needed was someone to teach me everything else.
[4:28]Like I can know, I can learn how to, you know, cut an onion and cook chicken.
[4:33]But no one is teaching me like how to choose the chicken that is best for me and the season
[4:39]that I'm in or how to like figure out what day the week I'm supposed to cook that chicken
[4:44]and like keep the flow of like all of the three plus meals a day that we eat generally
[4:51]at home.
[4:52]And if you have, obviously, if you have a family in that you live with, it's like all
[4:56]of those mouths to feed.
[4:57]It's just so much to manage that I never felt like cookbooks really taught me how to
[5:02]manage everything outside of the actual cooking.
[5:06]And I've been waiting for this book to be written, waiting, waiting, I'm like, hang
[5:10]in.
[5:11]I guess I'm just going to write it.
[5:12]So the reason that we need this book that we need the lazy genius kitchen is because there
[5:17]are so many decisions that go into keeping your family fed, keeping your kitchen like
[5:26]reasonably ready for the next meal you have to cook in.
[5:28]I don't want to say keeping your kitchen clean because that might actually not be
[5:31]a priority for every person to keep it clean all the time.
[5:34]You just want it to be sort of functioning and ready for you at the next time you need
[5:37]it.
[5:38]Just so many things that happen in the kitchen, you know, we hear, we hear that phrase,
[5:44]the kitchen is the heartbeat of the home.
[5:47]But for most of us, I think that our heartbeat is, it's like, our kitchen is a cardiac
[5:50]arrest.
[5:51]It's like, it's always like, there's no, it's like too fast.
[5:53]Heartbeats way too fast.
[5:54]It's like panicking all the time.
[5:56]So what I want to do is help people have what they need in the kitchen because not all of
[6:03]us need the same things in the kitchen.
[6:05]Sometimes what you actually have, like learn to use what you have in the way that makes
[6:09]sense for you.
[6:10]And then you're going to enjoy your space more.
[6:12]So that is the hope of the lazy genius kitchen.
[6:15]And I applied all 13 principles, but a couple of them were like, big time heavy hitters
[6:21]in this book to help people kind of go through the process of lazy geniusing the verb,
[6:27]lazy geniusing certain parts of your of your kitchen life so that you can enjoy it more.
[6:33]And I love it.
[6:34]It's like illustrated.
[6:35]It's color.
[6:36]It's like so pretty.
[6:37]It's a really beautiful resource that I hope that you want to pull out and look through again
[6:41]and again.
[6:42]It's gorgeous.
[6:43]I love it.
[6:44]I even love in the back how you have all the different ingredients for different cuisines.
[6:51]I've spelled out.
[6:53]That was super helpful.
[6:54]Like here, all these, yeah, all these like cheat sheets.
[6:58]And that's true.
[6:59]And the combinations of things like you will never go wrong if you pair tomato and mozzarella.
[7:04]You never will.
[7:05]You never will.
[7:06]Yeah.
[7:07]I really wanted, see, that's the thing is that learning to be in the kitchen is truly a lifelong
[7:12]process.
[7:13]It really is.
[7:14]I mean, people who are incredible cooks still are curious in the kitchen.
[7:18]And there are so many variables.
[7:20]And so to expect that you're going to learn everything all at once is incredibly unrealistic
[7:27]and way too hard on yourself.
[7:28]I always make the joke that like I, I have no idea how to poach anything.
[7:32]I'm a great cook.
[7:34]I love cooking, but I don't need to know how to poach in order to be a good cook.
[7:37]Like you don't have to know everything in order to be good at what you're doing.
[7:41]And so to give yourselves kind of like permission and freedom to focus on your own journey
[7:46]of learning.
[7:47]And yet at any point, when you are rating the lazy genius kitchen, you are, you know,
[7:53]at most probably four hours from the next meal that you have to figure out.
[7:58]It's always right there.
[8:00]The next one is always right there.
[8:01]So because of that, I definitely wanted there to be a lot of things that were just like
[8:06]quick wins, dependable, like lists, resources because it's, we can't have all like philosophy
[8:12]and permission.
[8:13]Like you're doing great in the kitchen and everything's fine.
[8:16]No, you actually do need to like learn how to make dinner because you have to do it now.
[8:20]So it marries, it marries both of those things.
[8:23]And I'm glad you, I'm glad you mentioned that list because I love that.
[8:25]It's like these are ingredient combinations.
[8:27]They will never ever steer you wrong.
[8:29]Yes.
[8:30]So great.
[8:31]Oh my gosh.
[8:32]I know.
[8:33]I felt like there are all these times, especially during the pandemic in the last couple
[8:36]of years, I just was like crying, being like, I can't, I'm so sick of meals.
[8:42]I can't do another meal.
[8:43]I can't think about what to make.
[8:45]Nobody likes anything anyway.
[8:47]Like or then it's unhealthy or then it's this or like I can't and then like it's never
[8:53]over.
[8:54]It's never over.
[8:55]you can never cross dinner off the list because then dinner comes back.
[8:59]It comes back.
[9:00]It does.
[9:01]It's like why even write it down because you're right, it like it always comes back.
[9:05]And what I don't, but here's the thing that I find so, so ironic and also it can,
[9:11]it can feel a little bit hopeless is the fact that dinner always does come back.
[9:16]And yet I think that all of us, I don't ever like to say all of us actually, I think
[9:21]most of us, but I would assume all of us, especially people who are listening to this,
[9:24]who are most likely moms, we do want to connect with our families around the table.
[9:31]We see the value in a meal together, even if it's takeout me, like being around food
[9:38]together, being around a table together.
[9:41]And at some points in our cooking lives that those meals don't just come from a bag,
[9:47]you know that we're making them with our family sometimes, the expectation of doing that
[9:51]every meal is unrealistic.
[9:53]We need to let that go.
[9:54]But like that is a priority to us, that is something that we see value in that really matters.
[10:00]And so it can feel really helpless when dinner is never over and no one likes what you make
[10:06]and you always have to make another decision and you're having to choose between something that's
[10:11]easy or simple or something that's like really nutritious, something that if you've got like I cannot
[10:17]even I feel so not bad for like my heart opens up for people who have families with different
[10:23]dietary needs. You know, like you had this kid with celiacs and this kid is allergic to dairy and
[10:29]you poor soul. So it's so hard. It's so hard to feed people and yet it can be easier with the
[10:37]right tools. And that's why I want this book to be and as many hands as possible because I really do
[10:42]believe that you can take the bits that you need from it in the season that you're in to actually
[10:50]enjoy your kitchen more. It's not that you're going to walk into it. You're not going to walk into it
[10:54]every single day and you know be I know or be Martha and just be like I know what I'm doing
[11:00]and everything is effortless all the time which that's on TV. That's not even real either. You know,
[11:04]like we can't have that expectation and yet I do think that we can achieve more
[11:11]groundedness and fulfillment in the kitchen more often than we do now. Like that's the thing,
[11:16]right? It's just a little bit more than we do now. Like let's just start small. That's a lazy
[11:20]genius principle. Start small. Like you don't have to go from takeout every day or frustration at
[11:26]every dinner to, you know, deep fulfillment in a roast chicken seven days a week. That's not realistic.
[11:32]But this book has tools that can take you from like, well, what would happen if we did one day?
[11:38]Like what does that look like? And just start small and start to develop those muscles of
[11:43]enjoyment in the kitchen with the right tools. And then you get to focus on that value that we all
[11:49]have of life around the table. So you have this five step method, right? Prioritize, name
[11:56]what matters. Essentialize, get rid of what's in the way. Organize, put everything in its place,
[12:01]which I want to talk about. Personalize, feel like yourself and systematize, stay in the flow.
[12:06]So let's go back to organize because I feel like I keep moving things around, right?
[12:11]I keep putting the sippy cups, which I don't even know why we're still using because my youngest
[12:15]child is seven and a half of this for seven. Like we should not be, you know, not sippy cups.
[12:19]So the kind of don't spill so the milk is like, whatever. You have a whole tour of that,
[12:22]even though I keep having it. So, but I move it around and like it's here. And then it's there.
[12:28]And then I can never find it. And then the spices move. And then like the snacks now are lower,
[12:32]but that's clearly not the right place because now they're eating more snacks. So
[12:38]help me with the organization. How do you do it? Like, what are the tricks? What, what should we do?
[12:44]The reason that organize is number three and not number one is because of that. Because if you
[12:51]organize first and that's what we want to do, that's what we think our solution is, is we're frustrated
[12:55]in our kitchen. And it's like, well, I can't find anything or, you know, everything's in the wrong
[13:00]place. Let me, let me reorganize. And usually we also are very go bigger, go home. It's like,
[13:07]reorganize the holding, dang kitchen like how it works. It's not just like a drawer. It's like,
[13:12]you change one thing and you have to change everything. And then you're sort of like in the middle
[13:16]of piles of plates and sippy cups in your kitchen. And you're like, what, what, why did I give myself
[13:23]so that is a very familiar. That's a very familiar picture that a lot of us I think can relate to.
[13:27]The reason that organize is number three is because if you organize what you don't need for
[13:33]purposes that do not serve you, you are just being busy and you're just making noise. Okay.
[13:39]So you just said it yourself with the sippy cups. It's like, okay, name what matters. Maybe
[13:44]what matters in your kitchen, you can tell me, but maybe it's with the, the way that it
[13:50]operates and how you can find things, you know, if you want to say, is your priority that you can
[13:56]find what you need immediately? Is it that everything looks pretty? Is it that it's more that
[14:01]you get frustrated by things not matching? I felt that at recently, I opened up my cabinet that
[14:08]has like the plates and the bowls and all the things. And I realized I was like, okay, we don't
[14:12]have grown up plates. Everything we have is plastic. Literally. Everything in our kitchen right now
[14:17]is plastic because we got rid of the plates that we, my husband and I have for 20 years since we got
[14:22]married that are just, they look like they're 20 year old plates, not in a cute way. So I've been
[14:27]like keeping an eye out for their vintage. They're like sort of vintage. I wanted, I've been looking
[14:34]for like grown up plates and I haven't found anything I really love. And then I just ended up
[14:40]being in a kitchen with all plastic stuff, but it was all different colors. It's like different,
[14:44]you know, little sets from Target. Like none of the colors really match or whatever. And I was
[14:49]finding the joy of even like putting food on a plate in a bowl, no matter the meal, really
[14:55]discouraging because I was like, I don't want to eat breakfast off a Peppa Pig plate.
[15:00]I don't want to do that anymore. I'm a grown up. This is not, this is not meeting, this is not feeding
[15:06]my soul. So all that to say, there was a time just a few weeks ago where the priority was, I want
[15:13]our dishes to be as functional and pleasing to my kids as they are to me. And so we got rid of all
[15:20]the like chipped character plastic stuff. And I had them, the kids like give their input,
[15:24]like I'm thinking about getting these bowls or pink ones or blue ones, they're like a muted
[15:28]pink. It's, you know, it's, that was the priority, right? That was the priority. We name what matters
[15:33]first. Then essentializes number two, you get rid of everything else. What you think is that when
[15:38]you replace your set of pots, you get a new stock pot, you get a new knife, you get a whatever,
[15:43]you feel bad getting rid of the thing that was still serviceable. And so you keep both. And then
[15:49]you have more stuff to store. Yeah. And that's, that's a problem. So essentializes step two,
[15:54]which is to get rid of what's in the way. If my priority is that all of our dishes make
[16:00]my kids happy and me happy and they all sort of look like they belong to the same family,
[16:04]I'm going to get rid of the pepper plates. I'm going to get rid of the bright red plates that
[16:08]don't fit and sort of the muted color palette that we ended up going with from the plates from
[16:13]Target or whatever it is. And then because if I don't get rid of those, I'm still struggling with
[16:17]the same thing. All I did was add, all I did was add. I didn't take away what was impacting
[16:24]what actually matters. So once you get rid of what's in the way, then you organize, then you put
[16:30]everything in its place. So back to the sippy cups. Yeah, it's like, okay, what matters about
[16:35]how my kitchen operates? And you could even answer this. And then it's like, okay, well, what's in
[16:40]the way of that? Is it that I'm keeping things that I don't really need anymore? Or certain things,
[16:45]like do I really need these sippy cups? Or maybe I'll keep one just in case we need the one for a
[16:49]trip or something, but I don't really need a whole cabinet dedicated to these because my kid is seven
[16:54]now, you know, like, right, but we have a hard time getting rid of things, but then we just keep
[16:58]organizing what we don't need. I have to say, getting rid of all the plastic that you were talking about,
[17:03]those cute little plates and everything, that was a huge milestone. And I feel like that was a
[17:07]couple years ago, but part of it is selfish because if you have the plastic, then you can't microwave.
[17:12]And I feel like the microwave, which I shouldn't admit, is like a huge weapon in my arsenal of
[17:17]admit it. The microwave is amazing. No, everybody, your microwave is a huge microwave.
[17:21]I know I shouldn't be using the microwave, but I use the microwave and I'm sorry, but I do,
[17:25]but anyway, you can't use it on plastic plates. So that would, that would undermine my efficiency
[17:30]efforts if I, you know, but I see your point. So Kendra, last time you were on this podcast,
[17:37]the lazy kitchen was just about to come out or maybe it'd just come out or something like that.
[17:41]And since then, it's become a best-selling book. And New York Times bestseller,
[17:46]you have a podcast, lazy kitchen podcast, which is super popular and all sorts of followers and
[17:53]all this stuff. How has this changed your life? And like when you were bopping around your kitchen,
[17:58]like, how does it change anything? Does it change anything or not?
[18:03]That's a great question. So yeah, the first, so this, the book that comes out this year is the
[18:07]lazy genius kitchen. And then the first one was the lazy genius way. And, and that book was like,
[18:12]I still honestly can't get over that it was New York Times bestseller. Like, I still
[18:20]am moved and humbled that it continues to sell like steadily every single week.
[18:25]That's amazing. I mean, it really is. It's just, it's publishing is, I mean, you, you know,
[18:31]because you talk to authors constantly, but like, you know the sort of the arbitrary nature
[18:40]of publishing in many ways that like, one author selling 10,000 books is incredible
[18:46]because they're a first-time author or they don't have a big platform or whatever. Like 10,000
[18:49]books is actually a significant number of books. But then, if you're Michelle Obama and you sell
[18:55]10,000 books, that is a severe disappointment, you know, obviously that's a very extreme example.
[18:59]But like, there is such a spectrum of what it means to be a successful author. And I struggle,
[19:07]I'm a very competitive person. I'm a recovering perfectionist. And I can be really hard on myself
[19:13]with unreasonable expectations. That is why principle 13 is to be kind to yourself in the lazy genius
[19:18]way. But all that to say, I think that in some ways the success of the lazy genius way
[19:27]was so beyond what I hoped that it has almost grounded and anchored me in my life
[19:36]in the ordinariness of it, even more. Because it's like, I don't even know how to say this
[19:44]without sounding weird. But I believe so much in being the same person everywhere I go.
[19:50]That's like just part of my narrow is to be the same human. And so when people meet me in person
[19:57]who have followed me on the internet, and they're like, you're exactly-
[20:00]the same. And it's okay if you meet someone that you know, you fall in the
[20:04]internet and you meet them in person that are not exactly the same. That is okay
[20:07]because different people have different energies. They have different ways that
[20:10]they foundries that they set and how they share themselves online. So
[20:14]it's not that I am better so to speak because it's you're meeting the same person.
[20:19]It's just what I know to do and everybody has different ways that they know how to do things.
[20:24]All that to say, I think that the success has actually been like, man, I feel
[20:30]incredibly just really humbled to be a voice that encourages people in their lives.
[20:37]And when I get messages about like these principles changed my life in this small way,
[20:42]like this thing, like it's it's it's it's just really honoring and it makes me want to
[20:48]not necessarily, I was going to say like pay attention to how I can even live my life better.
[20:52]It's not really about that. It's that I want to continue to create content and resources and help
[20:57]for people that is reflective of an ordinary life because that is what most of us are living.
[21:07]If I get too untethered and my I I do live a very ordinary life and if I get too untethered
[21:15]from that, if I get too distracted by what actually is unimportant in this work, which is like the
[21:23]any cloud or credibility. It's not that it's unimportant completely like it matters. It's very it's
[21:28]very helpful and awesome and humbling or whatever. But like that's not the most important thing
[21:34]at all. That's not the most important thing. And if I get too untethered from the
[21:37]ordinaryness of my life, then my my work is no longer helpful to people because most of us are just
[21:44]doing our best. We're just tired of dinner that's on repeat. We still have laundry. We we just
[21:49]still have homework and kids and my sixth grade boy wants to try out for the track team and it's
[21:55]going to change our whole lives if he makes it because practices every day after school until five
[21:59]o'clock and I'm like what are we going to do you guys? So like we all have we all have these things
[22:06]we have to keep up with and it is just such a sincere honor to be able to find tools and
[22:11]systems and permission for people to to live that way as more themselves with more margin and
[22:18]more life and more enjoyment. So it's I don't know if that's exactly the question you were asking
[22:23]or the answer that you expected with the answer that I'm giving. It is such a humbling thing to
[22:28]have a book be what this book has been. I mean it really has just been an honor.
[22:34]I had no expectations. I was just curious. So if you were sharing it, you know it's funny when you
[22:40]build a brand around things being a certain way you can't then change the whole way.
[22:45]Right. Absolutely. Exactly. It would be very incongruent. Yes. Yes. It would be very off brand.
[22:51]You would be found out probably. But you've now expanded the whole lazy genius brand into other
[23:01]areas. Like you have nail polish. That's so cool. I love that so ridiculous. I'm looking at the set.
[23:08]I was like, wait, these are great colors. I totally want the lazy genius mini system from
[23:13]doing that as awesome. I'm going to give that as a gift by the way. That's really awesome. Excellent.
[23:18]Like Mother's Day. Anyway, how did that come about and what else is up for your sleeve? Oh,
[23:24]man. Yeah. It's the internet is the internet gets a bad rap. And as we all know, and I am obsessed
[23:31]so much with the internet because it has connected me with people that I just would never
[23:36]be able to be next with. And that's true for all of us. And I've just became friends with the
[23:40]founder of Olive and June. I heard about, I was like in April or May in the beginning of 2020.
[23:47]So we were all at home. We were all very sad. And I was like, I don't know what to do with my days.
[23:54]Like I just feel we all felt really untethered even though we were like at home. And I've never
[23:59]cared about my nails in the lazy genius way. I actually write in print. I'm lazy about my nails.
[24:03]Like that's one of the things I'm lazy about. I don't care. And so I just ended up getting
[24:08]I ordered a system because I thought, well, why not? We're in a pandemic. Just do it. And I loved it.
[24:13]It's because it is sort of the lazy genius version of nails because the system comes with all
[24:19]the tools that you need, but nothing you don't. It's just the essentials. They give you the right
[24:23]order. That's another lazy genius principles to go on the right order. They tell you what order to do
[24:26]things. So it just felt very at home to me like how it worked in the colors are beautiful. And
[24:32]I just ended up, yeah, the founder saw my post about the nail polish. And we just connected
[24:37]really quickly. And she's great. She's become a friend. And then over the last few months,
[24:41]she was like, I think we need to do we do a collab. We need a lazy genius color. And it turned
[24:46]into a trio. Yeah, there's a TLG because a lot of their colors are initials named after people.
[24:50]So there's a TLG for the lazy genius. There's a bright red orange that's called you're doing
[24:55]great because I say that a lot. You're doing great. It's like a top top nail polish. And then this
[25:00]beautiful like rosy tan called star small. And it's just so fun. It's so, I made the joke the other
[25:07]day that anybody who knew me in high school would be floored by this because Kendra was not
[25:16]what you would call fashion for any scenario in any universe. So the fact that I have a nail
[25:23]polish named after me is just like, it's utter ridiculousness. But so much fun. It's so much fun.
[25:30]I feel like if I were to do a mom some have time to nail polish, it would just be the quick dry
[25:34]top coat. That would be my, that would be my nail. Wait, what were you liking high school? Oh, man.
[25:42]So I were overalls most of the time and not cool overalls. Where were you, where were you,
[25:47]where did you grow up? Like, where'd you go to high school? I grew up in North Carolina. I was
[25:51]I've lived in the same city my whole life. Okay. Where I am now, I was born like three miles from
[25:55]where I'm sitting. So I see my kindergarten teacher in line at like TJ Maxx sometimes like it's
[26:01]kind of well. But yeah, I grew up in North Carolina and I was homeschooled for actually freshman
[26:06]and sophomore year of high school. And then I started going to high school as a junior. And I,
[26:11]I don't recommend that plan. I don't recommend that at all. It was so like, what do I,
[26:16]I don't know how to be a person. I don't know how to do this. I didn't know what to wear. I didn't know.
[26:20]And I always was nervous to be seen honestly, which is kind of ironic considering my job now.
[26:29]Yeah, I just was, I was a very hidden person. And so I thought, yeah, like overalls I didn't
[26:35]wear makeup. I had a terrible haircut. I was voted most dependable in high school zippy. Like that shows,
[26:43]that shows like my, my aura. Is that was a non makeuped overall wearing dependable person?
[26:53]Which is actually a little bit on land right now. There are worse things at their plenty of them.
[26:58]It actually is, it is congruent with who I am minus the nail polish part. So that's the piece.
[27:04]It's like, well, we didn't see that coming from Kendra, but here we are. I have to go pull
[27:08]out my yearbook. I don't even remember what I was voted or whatever. I have to I'll pull it out
[27:13]later. You know, not that I have time for this. But anyway, I want to, I want to guess what that is
[27:16]because I know you had to be voted. You could, you were on the ballot for multiple things. I bet
[27:21]your name was in the line. I think it was some joke about what a bad driver I was.
[27:26]By the time I graduated, I had like failed my road test multiple times gotten in accidents.
[27:30]Like I had a, yeah, I don't have a lot of spatial awareness. I have strengths. They do not lie in
[27:36]that area. I can't even like, I'm like, I'm still walking into people all the time. I have like
[27:41]no spatial. I can't tell when someone's close. I'm constantly like walking into people. It's terrible.
[27:47]It's, it's a weakness. I'm like, literally impaired in that area. But if I just sit here on zoom,
[27:53]nobody will know. Anyway, wait. So to just tell everybody about your podcast also really quickly.
[27:59]Sure. And then I know where I'm instead of time. Yeah, it's called the lazy genius podcast. Everything
[28:04]is the lazy genius something. So it's pretty easy to find. But the podcast is the lazy genius podcast.
[28:10]Yeah, we're over 250 episodes now, which is so fun. It's so much fun. But the episodes come
[28:16]out every Monday and they're around 20 minutes. They're really small. Short. That's not the word.
[28:21]They're really short. And the titles are really specific. And so if you, you can just scan the
[28:28]archive and go like, oh, that sounds good. So there are things that are super practical like
[28:32]how to lazy genius kids chores and paper. How to organize paper in your house. How to deal with
[28:37]homework, how to do with like changing over kids clothes, like all kinds of things, adult screen
[28:42]time, kids screen time, there are tons of things about time management and the kitchen. There's
[28:46]also some permission giving stuff about, you know, relationships and when you're trying too hard
[28:51]at the wrong things. And so it kind of covers the, the gamut, but all through that lens of being
[28:57]a genius about the things that matter and lazy about the things that don't to you.
[29:03]Because that's the whole thing. We all have different things that matter. So we need tools that
[29:07]work for everybody no matter what they choose. Well, that's so cool. And I know that you're also
[29:12]doing a go into other people's kitchen thing on Instagram for like different influencers,
[29:16]which is a great idea. But I feel like you totally have a TV show coming. This is my like,
[29:22]do you? Is it our networks? No, it's not already in the works, but we shot one that, I mean,
[29:28]we, when is this episode coming out? Do you know? I don't know. You don't know. Okay, great.
[29:32]It's totally fine. I, because we did, we shot a, we basically shot a TV show, a self-funded crowd
[29:39]funded TV show that won't be on TV. It'll be on the internet. A couple of lazy genius kitchen. And it
[29:44]is, I don't know that I've ever been more excited or more proud of anything I've made. And I love
[29:51]the lazy genius way, the book. And I love the lazy genius kitchen, the book like I'm obsessed with
[29:55]both of them. But this series is like, it is so sparkly.
[30:00]It is so fun, it is so helpful.
[30:01]It's like a, I mean, they're like 20 minute episodes.
[30:03]Like it's a real, helpful, so much fun show.
[30:08]I just cannot wait for people to see it.
[30:09]So those will start to be released mid-April.
[30:13]We made six episodes, a six episode series.
[30:16]That is simple.
[30:17]So I can't wait.
[30:18]I can't wait for people to see them.
[30:20]They'll be so fun.
[30:21]That's amazing.
[30:22]Congratulations.
[30:23]Thank you.
[30:23]Thank you.
[30:25]All right, well, Kendra, thanks for coming on.
[30:27]Thanks for the lazy genius.
[30:28]Everything I'm about to go pick up my lazy genius
[30:31]Manny system right now because I haven't done my nails
[30:33]since before the pandemic, not kidding at all, not a joke.
[30:37]Anyway, you'll be so happy when it comes.
[30:39]It's going to be so much fun to do your nails.
[30:41]My mother will be happy every time she sees me.
[30:43]She's like, cool.
[30:44]Absolutely horrified, you know.
[30:46]She's had the same manicure lady since I was born, you know,
[30:48]this is like red, any way, whatever.
[30:51]It's amazing.
[30:52]It's amazing.
[30:53]Have a great day and thank you for coming back on.
[30:55]Thank you for having me, Zippy.
[30:57]Okay, bye-bye.
[30:59]Hi, I'm Zippy Owens and you're listening
[31:01]to the award winning podcast.
[31:02]Moms don't have time to read books.
[31:04]If you like this podcast, you will love my new anthology
[31:07]called Moms Don't Have Time to Have Kids.
[31:10]Check it out and you'll hear from 49 authors
[31:13]about all sorts of things.
[31:14]Moms don't have time to do.
[31:15]All the authors have been on this podcast.
[31:17]Also, check out my TikTok at with Zippy and Tracy.
[31:20]My other podcast, Sex Talk with Zippy and Tracy.
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[31:26]And of course, my new publishing company called Zippy Bux.
[31:30]And now back to our daily author interview site
[31:32]and a quick hello from some of my kids.
[31:34]Hi, hi, hello.
[31:36]Enjoy the show.