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ASK ME ANYTHING: Your Youth Ministry Questions Answered! · Ministry Coach: Youth Ministry Tips & Resources

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Today we're doing an Ask Me Anything episode and answering the questions that you gave us online.
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: ["midnight's the Best Song For You"].
• 0:18
  Speaker 2: Welcome to the Ministry Coach podcast.
• 0:20
  Speaker 2: Today we have a super special episode.
• 0:22
  Speaker 2: This is an Ask Me Anything episode where we sent out the question if there was anything you guys wanted to know that maybe we haven't covered or maybe you just wanted covered more so to go ahead and ask that question and we put that on YouTube, instagram, facebook and you guys responded.
• 0:38
  Speaker 2: So we're gonna do our best to answer as many of those questions as we can.
• 0:42
  Speaker 2: We're not gonna be able to get to all of them.
• 0:43
  Speaker 2: If this is a format that you guys do enjoy, then maybe we will answer the rest of them when we have an episode down the road.
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: But if this is our first time meeting and you're like what the heck is going on, my name is Jeff Lascola.
• 0:55
  Speaker 2: This is Kristen Lascola and this is a place where we talk about all things youth ministry.
• 0:59
  Speaker 2: We help you grow your youth ministry in size and in health, so let's jump right in.
• 1:03
  Speaker 2: This is the first question, and this comes from Jesse Howell from YouTube, who says most of the time I've seen youth pastors make their young people leadership team into their members only click, which in turn really harms the youth group severely as a whole.
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: How do I, as a pastor of young people, keep the leadership team from being a giant click of godly destruction?
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: Ooh, that got intense at the end.
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: Godly destruction.
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: Well, of course we like what a shame if something that was meant to be bearing fruit in your youth ministry turned into godly destruction, then it was at that point you'd be like we shouldn't have even had a student leadership team.
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: And you know, I think I think Jesse kind of hit it on the head it's the youth pastor turned it into that.
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: And so I think, as the youth pastor, you're going to be pivotal in how you steer the culture of your student leadership team.
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: We always talk about how every youth group needs a student leadership team.
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: It's so good to have a core group of students who are invested and learning and committed and setting an example, and it really does reverberate to the rest of the group.
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: I've had a year where I didn't do it because it's like running another youth group.
• 2:17
  Speaker 2: I was like I am tired and I paid for it.
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: It really did feel different because everyone was the really core magnetic group pulls everyone else to the center, you know what I mean?
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: Like it was like this gravitational pull when they're invested and they have jobs and all of that.
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: So, yes, let's do it, but, like Jesse said, let's not make it toxic.
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: And I think when you call a student, you're a leader.
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: All of a sudden they can become very like oh really, and the power goes to their head because they're not mature enough to handle the term leadership necessarily.
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: They almost feel like being a leader means you do less.
• 2:58
  Speaker 1: Oh yeah.
• 2:59
  Speaker 2: The minions below.
• 3:00
  Speaker 2: You do more, so I'm up here now.
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: You guys do all the work.
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: And so that's why it's up to us to definitely nip that in the bud and redefine it.
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: And so here's what I do Almost at every single student leadership meeting that I have.
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: I talk to them about serving, and I said that is what godly leadership is.
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: Is it serving?
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: It's not being served.
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: Our theme verse for our student leadership team is for even the son of man did not come to be served, but to serve and give his life as a ransom for many, and we talk about that all the time of like.
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: We are signing up to be the ones who serve the most, and here's what that looks like.
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: I'm like you guys your number one focus should not be each other, should not be me.
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: It should be new students, fringe students, shy students, disconnected students, and I am asking you to make a B line for those people, and I tell them the reason why is because the level of inclusivity and love that you show those students that could be the thin line between whether they come back to church or not I said, guys, I could preach my best sermon, we could play our most fun game, I could give free pizza and I could give free pizza and ice cream away, but if nobody talked to them, nobody loved them and nobody saw them.
• 4:24
  Speaker 2: They'd be eating pizza and ice cream.
• 4:26
  Speaker 2: Oh well.
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: And nobody wants that.
• 4:30
  Speaker 2: No, I said, you know, they might not come back and you might.
• 4:34
  Speaker 1: I said just think about that for a second.
• 4:36
  Speaker 1: The power of you could one hello, one, comes, sit next to me, one, what's your name?
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: One, be on my team is the difference between somebody growing in their relationship with Jesus because they're gonna come back, hear the word of God.
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: Dots will connect, they'll become part of a community.
• 4:55
  Speaker 1: So all that to say, jesse, I think what we need to do is teach students.
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: You are the servants of the group and we're not a holy huddle little team like oh, you guys are all my favorite people.
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: Chris Brown, who's our senior pastor at North Coast Church, he said I used to tell my leadership kids don't talk to me at youth group, don't talk to me at events, I'm not here for you.
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: You guys are good, you guys know the ropes, you know everyone, you're totally comfortable.
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: My time and effort is going to be best spent on the vulnerable, the new, the shy, the fringe, all of that, and I need you guys to follow suit.
• 5:32
  Speaker 1: So don't glom on to me.
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: You guys do, you, and we'll hang out another time, but we've got to be others focused during this time.
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: So I just think if you teach that mindset, it might be impossible to have this little click of, well, we're the in crowd.
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: It's like If you're the youth pastor teaching them what leadership truly means then and then modeling that week after week, then it would be hard not to have clicked.
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: Now what we do want is for others to look and say, hey, being involved looks super fun, I want to be a part of that.
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: So if we're modeling it correctly, it shouldn't be like whoa, those are the kids that are cool and snobby and exclusive and they are favored by the youth pastor.
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: The youth pastor picks them for everything or let's them slide and they don't have to follow the rules and they walk in like they own the place, like we all know that vibe of like you know.
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: But if they can see the leadership in a healthy way Whoa, like there were kids playing worship and there was kids working in the snack shack and there was kids Helping run a game or setting up, like I want to be involved and so modeling it like ooh, that's, that's enticing, not like, ooh, I don't want to be a part of the yeah the bratty kids.
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: You know and you have a lot of say, and how that culture Develops.
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: You have to just be very, very intentional with it.
• 6:59
  Speaker 2: So if you guys don't have a student leadership team yet, make sure you check out our episode about how to launch a student leadership team, and we're gonna move on to the next question.
• 7:07
  Speaker 2: This is from flower full 29, also from YouTube, who says help.
• 7:12
  Speaker 2: It is it's year two of being a youth leader and I am lacking confidence in everything pertaining to ministry.
• 7:19
  Speaker 2: Any ideas?
• 7:20
  Speaker 1: That's a hard one, like to just feel not confident in your job for that long Flowerful.
• 7:27
  Speaker 1: It has definitely got a wear on you and so I'm sorry to hear that, because you know, I think we all as youth pastors try to put on a face like I got this.
• 7:35
  Speaker 1: But yeah, maybe deep down we kind of are like that.
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: I hope I'm like that imposter, imposter syndrome of just like I'm not equipped for this and I felt that way for a really long time.
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: So I get it.
• 7:49
  Speaker 1: So here's what I would say to you.
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: I would say, see if you can identify I know you just said in ministry in general.
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: Okay, well, let's break it down because there's lots of different parts of ministry.
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: There's planning events, there's teaching, there's discipling, there's writing curriculum, there's all kinds of stuff.
• 8:05
  Speaker 1: So identify the different parts of it and Scale it on one to ten.
• 8:09
  Speaker 1: How confident do I feel in teaching?
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: How confident do I feel in leading my volunteer team?
• 8:15
  Speaker 1: How confident do I feel in being up front and on stage?
• 8:19
  Speaker 1: How confident do I think I could plan a camp, whatever it is, and then look at the areas that you scored the lowest on your self-assessment and then just like, hit the books, learn, learn, learn, and obviously you're following our YouTube channel and I hope that you've found a lot of it to be helpful in this, like in building your confidence in certain areas.
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: But you've got to just keep learning, learning, learning.
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: So if you are not confident, you're teaching, find someone who is a good teacher.
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: Have them, listen to your messages and debrief it with you, maybe help ask them to give you their best tips on how did you go from being an okay speaker to a good speaker, a good Speaker to an excellent speaker?
• 9:02
  Speaker 1: What was that journey like?
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: Sit down with someone, have them, like I said, analyze your messages.
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: Read every book you can on youth ministry, like that's what I did.
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: I'm just like go online.
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: What are all the youth ministry books?
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: I'm gonna start reading them.
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: So there's a lot out there and every single one of them has influenced and shaped my ministry in a different way, whether it was Doug Fields or Kurt Johnson or Rick Lawrence, reggie Joyner, like.
• 9:30
  Speaker 1: There's so many incredible authors on the subject of youth ministry and I never left empty-handed.
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: So you've got to put in the work of reading, reading, reading and gathering those ideas.
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: Go to conferences.
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: Conferences will light a fire under you and you get to meet all these youth pastors and see what they're doing and hear like different workshops and what's working for people and where to focus, and whenever you go to conferences there's tons of resources too, there's companies you never knew existed that could help you with a particular issue.
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: So, just like, try to just cast your net wide of all of the knowledge and then start putting it into practice and see if you can move those numbers up one or two points.
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: Hey, I was about a three, like getting up in front of people on stage and doing stuff, but the more I practiced or learned from people who are really good at it or got communication tips or I don't know, go on YouTube, maybe there's a whole workshop on it, I don't know and then you can move that from a three to a five, that would be a total win and continue to take that long view.
• 10:32
  Speaker 1: But here's what I do know is that proficiency usually breeds confidence, and learning results in proficiency most of the time.
• 10:41
  Speaker 1: So if you could become proficient in certain areas of your job and just feel like I got this, I own this, I was made to do this, I can do this in my sleep.
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: When you start to get proficient, you start to get confident.
• 10:54
  Speaker 1: So even if you don't feel proficient and you keep failing, failing, failing okay, dissect the failures.
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: What did I learn?
• 11:01
  Speaker 1: What will I never, ever do again?
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: Failure is the best teacher, because you never want to feel that again, and so you need to go back and say what can I do to avoid this same outcome because, I hate this feeling, right.
• 11:14
  Speaker 2: Right, all right.
• 11:17
  Speaker 2: Well, thank you, flowerful29.
• 11:19
  Speaker 2: If your confidence lacking is in sermons, we do have an episode on how to gain more confidence in speaking, so make sure you guys check that out, all right.
• 11:28
  Speaker 2: Next up is Kari Johnson from YouTube, who says how do you have an effective check-in station for students when they arrive?
• 11:35
  Speaker 2: Should we give out name tags?
• 11:37
  Speaker 2: Also, should we give out gifts to first-time students?
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: All right, good, good question, and I feel like this one comes up a lot actually.
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: So, kari, I'm sure there's other people wondering the exact same thing.
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: I will start with the name tag thing.
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: I feel like name tags are like I think they need to end it at fifth grade.
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: I think that anything above that, it just to me feels a little children's ministry, which is totally fine for children's ministry, but in student ministries I just feel like they may have graduated from a name tag yeah, I'm always shocked when they do it for adult events.
• 12:18
  Speaker 2: Me too, and I never wear them oh we're doing this, okay, yeah, because it does feel like they get caught in my hair and then I have that problem.
• 12:26
  Speaker 2: But it just seems very kiddy, yeah it does.
• 12:30
  Speaker 1: We're forced and all of that, and I mean I would much rather go up to a kid and say what's your name, then be like hi, jeff.
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: So no one name tags for me, but I'm sure there's differing opinions out there on that, but you asked me, so that's my opinion on it.
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: But okay, check in.
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: So check in is a couple of options here.
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: So right now we have a computer check in station that links to our software system.
• 12:59
  Speaker 1: The software system our church uses is called rock and it's a people tracking software system database that our entire church uses.
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: And I'm sure there's like right before that we were using one called arena, there's one called Shelby I'm sure there's, or maybe Shelby doesn't exist anymore.
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: That's one that one's old, but there's tons of people tracking software.
• 13:21
  Speaker 1: If your church has one, see if there's an option to do computerized check-in.
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: Maybe call your rep for the software and see like, hey, do we have an option to do a systemized check-in system?
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: Because it could be a feature on your software system that you just don't know about.
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: So check that first if you guys even have a people tracking software for your church.
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: Now, if you don't, it's not like all hope is lost, because if you're a smaller church, maybe you guys have.
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: You know a very simple way of tracking people.
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: What I used to do is, before we had the software system, before the students came in, I would put a little yellow attendance card on their chair, just a blank one, an attendance card and a mini pencil, a little golf pencil, and, like students would come in, you know, hang out.
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: And then when we sat down to start the service, they knew the first thing you do is fill out your attendance card and then I'd have a student leadership kid come and collect them all and then we put them in a pile, have all the kids stand up and we do some kind of fun elimination, like I'd pick a name, like if you're wearing a hat, sit down.
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: If you're a boy, stay standing.
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: If you're in black jeans, stay standing.
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: It's you Rowan, yay.
• 14:39
  Speaker 1: And they'd get a piece of candy.
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: That was the incentive for them to actually fill it out and not turn it into a paper airplane, or Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck and all the other names.
• 14:48
  Speaker 2: Right they're down names.
• 14:50
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and so then you know, we'd collect all the pencils and stuff like that.
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: And then what I would do is I take that stack of yellow attendance cards and then I would go and put it into my own Excel sheet.
• 15:01
  Speaker 1: So it's a weekend attendance and I'd have all the dates up at the top and then I would just start going and writing their names in and then I'd put a little X next to the date.
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: If they were present, if there was a new student, you know, I'd add them, and then I was at least able to see wow, like that one kid Kennedy, she was really regular and then all of a sudden she stopped coming.
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: I should, I should reach out, you know.
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: So on the attendance card I would just put name and grade, because the software system at the time it didn't do check-in, but we still had a software system so I could look up her phone number.
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: I didn't have to keep that in my attendance sheet.
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: So hopefully your church at least has a way to file people's personal information, so that you get a new student, you get all their information, you put them in the software system and then all you would really have to do is keep track of their name and then you just save that and then you update it the next week and then next week and the next week, and then if you see a kid and they haven't been there in a long time after you've reached out and they moved or whatever, then you just delete them.
• 16:08
  Speaker 1: And so that worked for me for years and that's how I did it until we upgraded our system to do it computerized.
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: But it was at least a way to track and not just like, ah, okay, so then Tuesday midweek program that's a little bit different, because we go to small groups and so it would be really weird to have attendance cards on chairs during our midweek program.
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: Maybe your midweek program would work great for that, but we're too big and it's just it would be way too chaotic.
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: So what I do is I print out those Excel sheets for the small group leaders, so it would be like Jeff's small group and it has your 12 boys in there, and I would print that out each week and I put it in your small group folder and then you would just check who was there and who was not under, or just who was there under the date, and then you'd put it back in your folder.
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: If you had a new kid who wasn't on that yet, you would just pull out a new info card.
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: So I have these junior high info cards that I put in the folder and it says like students names, students date of birth, address, phone number, parent email, small group leader, whatever.
• 17:17
  Speaker 1: They put it back in the folder and then we add that kid to the database and then I'll add that kid to the Excel sheet and so it'll be updated for the leader next week with the input and attendance.
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: So I take it out of the folder and say oh, this person, this person, this person, I'll update it in there, add any new kids, print out a fresh one for next week and put it back in the folder.
• 17:38
  Speaker 1: So those are like the two systems midweek versus weekend attendance.
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: And even though we do have computerized check-in, I don't use it on my midweek.
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: So again, it would just kind of be chaotic.
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: There's like new kids coming and nobody knows and like it's just way easier to have small group leaders do attendance.
• 17:58
  Speaker 1: It's like we're all here, we've all settled, I can see who's here and now I can be responsible for going through and checking people.
• 18:06
  Speaker 1: Just weekend, I don't know why.
• 18:08
  Speaker 1: It's just easier to do computerized check-in, but midweek they're all over the place, like we have the whole church to ourselves, so I can't really funnel them to a computer.
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: You know what I mean.
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: So that's why.
• 18:21
  Speaker 2: Okay, and then a follow-up is the gift thing.
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: Kind of okay.
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: So if they're a first time visitor on our midweek program, that is when we have our Snack Shack open.
• 18:31
  Speaker 1: So I say, any first time visitor, you can get a free item from the Snack Shack.
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: And what I'll usually do is I'll pair them with one of our student leadership kids.
• 18:39
  Speaker 1: So I'll be like hey, Mason, this is Brandon, Can you take him to the Snack Shack and show him around and he gets his free item like okay, sweet, Sometimes I've done it to where, like the friend who brought them, maybe can have something too.
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: If you're smaller, that could be a good incentive.
• 18:55
  Speaker 1: And then on the weekend I actually don't, I don't give them anything, but you could give them a candy or something like that they love candy Wow.
• 19:08
  Speaker 2: Make sure you check out the episode we did.
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: Here's why can I tell you really quick, no-transcript.
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: I'm not a big fan of giving swag to new people Like I don't think you want-.
• 19:21
  Speaker 2: Doesn't have to be swag though.
• 19:22
  Speaker 1: I know, but a lot of youth pastors would give them like a sticker or a mug or whatever it's like.
• 19:28
  Speaker 1: Well, you might not want something with our name on it.
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: I don't even know us yet, you know.
• 19:32
  Speaker 2: No, that makes sense.
• 19:32
  Speaker 2: I think there's other options that you could probably do that would be useful for them.
• 19:37
  Speaker 2: But anyway, we did a whole episode on that.
• 19:40
  Speaker 2: So, if you wanna check it out, some options to give first time students.
• 19:44
  Speaker 2: I think some of them do have the swag your ministry logo, but other ones of them don't, so make sure you check that out, all right.
• 19:51
  Speaker 2: Next question, and the final one we're gonna be able to do tonight.
• 19:54
  Speaker 2: This is from Jennifer Carey from YouTube, who says what did your first year of ministry look like when you were pregnant or on maternity?
• 20:02
  Speaker 2: Any pro tips?
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: So the church was so gracious, gave me three months paid maternity for both pregnancies.
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: So we have two daughters, and each time I got three months I worked right up until like I mean, I had scheduled C-section.
• 20:21
  Speaker 1: So I would work right up until then and then take-.
• 20:24
  Speaker 2: You're so extra with your scheduled C-section, I know Can we pencil it in for this day?
• 20:29
  Speaker 2: It was for medical reasons.
• 20:32
  Speaker 2: Yes, for medical reasons.
• 20:33
  Speaker 2: Plus, she's extra.
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I would work right up to it and then, once we had the baby, then I would take that three months off.
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: So the first time around, jeff filled in.
• 20:47
  Speaker 1: Woo hoo, go, jeff.
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: Yay.
• 20:50
  Speaker 2: Attendance, just knows dive bombs.
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: Yeah right, you did a great job.
• 20:54
  Speaker 1: So he filled in for three months.
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: So what I would recommend is really setting up whoever's going to fill in for you whether maybe it is your husband, maybe he can do it A super volunteer.
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: The second time I went on maternity leave it was our associate pastor, who just sort of absorbed my job with the help of my team and my interns.
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: So he wasn't just like, ah, I'm doing everything, but he was kind of the face and the leader of the group, but major heavy support from the team as well.
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: So here's a couple of tips.
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: Number one for whoever is filling in with you, I'd recommend scheduling as many guest speakers as possible.
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: We like whoever like.
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: That'll probably be the hardest part for whoever takes your job during that time.
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: So I would, If they're not used to doing it and creating a sermon every week and all that yeah and I would like, and especially for like students, like even if they're used to teaching, teaching for students and students, you don't know, it's like a totally different thing and it takes a lot of effort.
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: And we did an episode last week which Jeff will link in that it was like video stuff, like how what to do when you can't.
• 22:07
  Speaker 2: I couldn't think of what we did last week.
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: I could tell by your face what to teach or video supplementation to use when you just can't teach.
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: So it'd be like, maybe schedule a guest speaker, have the person filling in for you, teach and then do another guest speaker and then video.
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: Well, there's a whole month of teaching right there.
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: That was four weeks, so then could you just wash and repeat that for the next three months or however long you're getting for maternity, and then you know I would plan those things out for them too.
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: I would say like, hey, here's a series.
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: Maybe you send them some notes of sermons you've already done in the past that you're ready to use again.
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: I hope you do save your sermon notes and sermon packages.
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: You could go to lifechurchcom and send them the notes from that.
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: I think it's hard to just say, well, just teach on love this month, like, oh, like.
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: Building four sermons on love from the ground up, that's kind of rough.
• 23:04
  Speaker 1: Give them something tangible and then keep the events to a minimum.
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: I'd say one or two very easy slam dunk events like dodgeball and pizza night or movie night, beach day or beach night or I don't know just something to where they don't have to do a ton of shopping and planning and rent a bus and we're going here, you know.
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: So try to keep the events to a minimum until you get back and keep them nice and easy.
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: And then, once you actually have the baby I don't know what your situation is like with your spouse or with family nearby, with childcare and all of that.
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: The way that Jeff and I did it is, once the baby was three months old I would go back to work and we would just divide the day up.
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: So I would go to work from like roughly nine to three and I just kind of wouldn't take a lunch and then Jeff would have the baby for that amount of time and then I'd get home and we would literally switch and then I'd take the baby from three to eight bedtime and he'd be working in his office from like three to nine or sometimes three to 10.
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: And we would pause and have dinner together and then we would try to do like bedtime together, like put the kids down, read a book or whatever.
• 24:21
  Speaker 2: I obviously had the flexibility in my schedule to be able to do that, so if one of you has that, then that could work out to your advantage.
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: And then we would try to make like Sunday our like fun family day, like let's all hang out together and do something.
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: So it is a grind, for sure, it's not.
• 24:39
  Speaker 2: But it's a season.
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it is.
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: And then when the kids got a little older, there'd be days where I could actually bring them with me to the church and they could play, like on a indoor playground or a children's classroom, and I could bring my laptop and get stuff done and check in on them and whatever.
• 24:55
  Speaker 1: And so, yeah, you just kind of take it season by season of what can you do, and so, I don't know, every situation will look a little different based on your church and your spouse and how good you feel after pregnancy and delivery and all of that.
• 25:12
  Speaker 1: But it's definitely doable.
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: I thought I have to quit my job.
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: No, I don't, we just worked it out and it works out really well.
• 25:20
  Speaker 2: Yeah, also congratulations on your pregnancy.
• 25:23
  Speaker 2: That's awesome.
• 25:24
  Speaker 2: Well, thank you, Jesse, Flowerful, Kari and Jennifer.
• 25:28
  Speaker 2: We appreciate you guys asking those questions and, for those of you that also asked, we do appreciate that you asked them.
• 25:33
  Speaker 2: We just didn't really have enough time to do them all today.
• 25:35
  Speaker 2: If you guys did like I was saying before, if you did like this format, let us know.
• 25:39
  Speaker 2: Maybe this is something that we can do again and we will go back and maybe answer some of those other questions that we didn't get a chance to.
• 25:44
  Speaker 2: Some of them, I think we actually are gonna be turning into full episodes.
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: Yeah, they were gonna take a long time to answer.
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: So great content ideas, guys.
• 25:52
  Speaker 2: Thank you, yeah, so keep your eye out for that.
• 25:53
  Speaker 2: We didn't have a community comment of the day, because those were the community comments, but we do have a question of the day, and this is which category do you fall into when it comes to toilet paper?
• 26:05
  Speaker 2: And it's maybe not the thing that you think I'm gonna say, but it's how do you put the toilet paper on the roll?
• 26:11
  Speaker 2: Because this, maybe I'm just like really a stickler on this, but toilet paper should be water-fold.
• 26:20
  Speaker 1: I knew that's what you're gonna say.
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: What else other question is there?
• 26:23
  Speaker 2: Other people put it the other way.
• 26:25
  Speaker 2: No.
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: I know, but you said this might not be the question.
• 26:27
  Speaker 1: You think it's gonna be, and I was gonna be like it's not the over-under question Scrunch or fold.
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: It's a scrunch, of course.
• 26:35
  Speaker 2: No, we're not gonna touch that question.
• 26:37
  Speaker 2: We're just gonna touch the fact that some people don't care.
• 26:41
  Speaker 2: So you're one of three people.
• 26:42
  Speaker 2: You don't care how the toilet paper's on there you need to have it water-fold or the really weird serial killers who have it go the other way.
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: What other way?
• 26:53
  Speaker 2: Like opposite of water-fold.
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: Oh, I thought you already said that.
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: I thought you were on the third category.
• 26:58
  Speaker 2: Okay, which are you?
• 27:00
  Speaker 1: Okay, I don't care, that's your answer.
• 27:04
  Speaker 1: I do it waterfall for you, because the times that I haven't, you never can let it go and you always have to bring it up.
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: I'll send a picture and it's like can we care about more important things Like this is so dumb.
• 27:18
  Speaker 2: No, we can't get past that.
• 27:19
  Speaker 2: We can't get past anything.
• 27:21
  Speaker 1: Wow deep.
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: Well, I mean, I guess I do prefer it, and I think it's just because now that's how it always is.
• 27:29
  Speaker 2: And it's easier.
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: And so it's weird if it's not but I don't.
• 27:32
  Speaker 2: Someone in our house if it's not you, it's one of our daughters continues to anti-waterfall it.
• 27:38
  Speaker 2: It's driving me insane.
• 27:39
  Speaker 2: It's all a plot against you.
• 27:41
  Speaker 2: That's what I think.
• 27:42
  Speaker 2: Put your guys' answer in the comment section below.
• 27:46
  Speaker 2: Are you in, I don't care, a waterfall or the anti-waterfall, I don't know what that one would even be called.
• 27:52
  Speaker 2: You guys don't even deserve a name.
• 27:54
  Speaker 2: Well, thank you guys for watching and listening and we'll see you next time.
• 28:00
  Speaker 1: Today we're talking about eight.
• 28:04
  Speaker 2: Today we're talking about simple ways to.
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: Today we're talking about simple tips, simple.
• 28:10
  Speaker 2: Today we're talking about.
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: Today we're talking about simple ways to.
• 28:14
  Speaker 2: I don't know when we sent out some questions.
• 28:17
  Speaker 2: No, we didn't.
• 28:18
  Speaker 1: Well, that's my answer.