Mutha Life

Episode 111. Kari recaps a wild few weeks: back-to-back kid birthday parties, hosting a big dinner, and finally hitting her limit (cold and all). She unpacks the "plastic plates vs. glass plates" framework she's using to figure out what's actually okay to let drop as a parent, and the lesson she learned throwing an IRL meetup with Dr. Aegean Chan of More Than Nine: hire the help. Then she gets into it: why she loves being a mom and hates "the mom space," the Pete Davidson comments about female creators and what they reveal about how society values women's work on the internet, a BBC piece on parenting-advice overload, and a quick reflection on last week's Luke Cook episode and what positive masculinity sounds like in practice. Full show notes with alll the links: muthalife.substack.com Music by: Ronen Landa

EPISODE 110. Actor Luke Cook (Chilling Adventures of Sabrina) sits down to talk about growing up the youngest of five in a Presbyterian family in Sydney, the panic attacks that hit right as his career and his relationship with his now-wife Kara both took off, and why he's packing up his family of five and moving to Australia's Gold Coast (they're already there and loving it). We get into the entrepreneurial side of his life, the conundrum of being both "hot and funny" in Hollywood, and what division of labor (and your sex life) really looks like raising three boys under five. Funny, unfiltered, and surprisingly tender. Full show notes with alll the links: muthalife.substack.com Music by: Ronen Landa

EPISODE 109. It's Archival Erin Lim Rhodes. Erin is the golf and wrestling-loving host of E!'s "The Rundown," and long before that, a broadcast journalism grad who moved to Singapore with $500 and a hunch. We get into growing up the "peacekeeper" middle child of a Filipino father and multi-generational Mexican LA mother, meeting her husband through prolonged eye contact at church (he later baptized her), a pregnancy timed almost too perfectly for her producers' comfort, and the postpartum depression that hit after a rocky breastfeeding wean. Also: how golf became her hobby and her belated Disney adult conversion. More than 2000 episodes - 10 years - in to E!'s The Rundown and she's just getting started BABY! Full show notes with alll the links: muthalife.substack.com Music by: Ronen Landa

EPISODE 108.  Two years ago, Brittany Ishibashi sat in this chair and told me she was only taking jobs close to home, two or three days at most, because she couldn't picture being away from her kids. This week she's back, and she just spent a year in Austin playing Joy, wife to Woody Harrelson's character, in Apple TV's Brothers, opposite Matthew McConaughey and Holland Taylor. We get into what it actually took to say yes: loosening her grip on the house, letting her husband run things his way, being seen as more than someone's mom, and not missing a single recital across a year of flights. Plus the set stories (fake cake with McConaughey, Woody being Woody), and learning mahjong between takes. Brothers premieres September 23 on Apple TV. Full show notes with alll the links: muthalife.substack.com Instagram: @mutha.life  Produced by: Mutha Life Music by: Ronen Landa

EPISODE 107. It's a solo episode babyyyyy. We're back in the school year swing, and I'm ramping up to my first ever Mutha Life in real life event, plus some incremental facelift changes to the show you may have noticed. Also: a tribute to my favorite ever camp counselor, a rant about skincare ads applied to fruit, a nostalgia detour into the white pages and yellow pages, and a genuine ask for your thoughts on tin can phones and smartwatches. Then, a new segment: Parent Conversations in Pop Culture, covering Michelle Obama's refreshingly honest take on not missing the baby years, and why Emma Grede saying she's a "three hours a day" mom deserves way less backlash than it got.  Full show notes with alll the links: muthalife.substack.com Instagram: @mutha.life  Produced by: Mutha Life Music by: Ronen Landa