Welcome to the blog series “Here’s to You, Stellar Parent” where we celebrate incredible parent figures from all walks of life and happenstance who have shaped, molded, and been in our corner to raise and support us for the better.
There is no one shoe that fits all in parenting and this space is to showcase the importance of parenting, to better learn from and be inspired by them, and to be reminded of their role that deserves to be celebrated.
Today I am happy to share my interview with none other than my dear friend, Rhiannon de Vries.
Rhiannon is mother to two children, Atticus who is three years old and Adelaide who is 14 months old.
Rhiannon is married to Christopher, whose interview I shared a couple of weeks ago, and is a stay at home Mom.
Rhiannon really likes reading about things that she feels are important. She likes reading fiction sometimes, but mainly she really likes when people recommend to her books that change the way that others think. She also likes FaceTiming with her family a lot.
One fun fact about Rhiannon is that she does group presentations about Health at Every Size (HAES) and Intuitive Eating. So if anyone wants her to chat with them, she’d be more than happy to. Personal business plug 😉
(For more info, go to the end of the interview.)
Rhiannon’s current TV shows are The Office and Brooklyn 99 as they are her classic favorites, but right now she’s watching Modern Family which she thinks is really good.
The following is my interview with Rhiannon, which was an absolute joy to take part in, and I hope you will enjoy and learn from it as I did.
How do you measure success in your role as a parent?
I think knowing that my child feels that they are a real person is really big. It’s something I’ve been thinking a lot about, how a lot of times kids are treated less than because they’re younger and are a child.
But I’m trying to make sure that my kid feels confident and able to make their own decisions and that it’s their own life that they’re living. That’s really important to me and that I’m giving them the skills to be able to be a good, long-term person, not just a short-term, good three year old. I think that would be my main focus.
What have you found that has been key in raising your children?
I think that having a lot of people around has been really important and has helped my kids to be the people that they are. Both of my children learned to talk really little and that makes me proud, but I think it’s mostly because life exists all the time and we have a lot of adults in this house; so we talk all the time and they’re exposed to the world more than if you’re trying to isolate yourself and be the perfect Mom who can do everything all by herself.
I think then it’s harder to be a parent and also it’s harder on the kids, because then they’re not exposed to real world situations and people. This has been really helpful to me as a Mom as well, to have a lot of support all the time, because parenting wasn’t meant to be an isolated experience.
So it’s been amazing to see how this has helped my children and helped me as well to have a community. 
Rhiannon with her kiddos, Atticus and Adelaide.
Photo credit: Christopher de Vries
Who have been positive influences in your life towards how you strive to parent?
My Mom and Dad are really, really good parents in a lot of ways. Plus we lived close to my grandparents and my Dad’s family when I was growing up, and so having a lot of cousins, aunts and uncles, and all of those people around was really good.
Also it’s really interesting the more I’m looking into how to be a good parent and how to teach my kids to be good adults, I’m learning things that when I look back I notice that my parents did some of those things. I mean of course I remember them telling me when something was bad or not to do certain things, but with all of the big things in my life I remember them mostly letting me make my own decisions.
I knew if they didn’t like my decisions but they knew it was my life and I think it really helped me and shaped who I am, how I feel about myself and about my children. So I really try to emulate my Mom and my Dad a lot in those kinds of things.
Also I’ve read some books that have been very influential, they’re not people but they’ve helped a ton. A friendly acquaintance made a comment on one of my FaceBook posts that I just thought was interesting and obviously her parenting style was very different than mine at the time and I didn’t really get what she was saying. So I asked if she had any books about what she commented on because I was interested to know where she had learned about this concept she had mentioned.
So she recommended “Free to Learn: Why Unleashing the Instinct to Play Will Make Our Children Happier, More Self-Reliant, and Better Students for Life” by Peter Gray, “The Self Driven Child: The Science and Sense of Giving Your Kids More Control Over Their Lives” by Ned Johnson and William Stixrud, PhD., and the third book Christopher talked to you about in his interview, “Punished by Rewards” by Alfie Kohn.
Those three books really changed the way I thought about kids, how kids learn, and changed my perspective from this is my baby to this is a person who is a human being and is going to be so. Those are really good books!
Can you tell us one special thing about each of your children?
Ooo yes! Atticus is extremely verbally creative, he can tell stories and stories and stories. He is very good at making up his own reality, playing pretend, and even involving you in it. Like he’ll go into detail on who he is, what he looks like, and he can just go and go. He also likes to make up songs all the time which is cute.
Especially because Monika, Christopher’s Mom, always talks about Christopher making up stories when he was little and my Mom always talks about how I would make up songs and sing songs all the time. So it’s very cute that he does both of those things.
Adelaide is the happiest kid I’ve ever met! It’s insane. Ever since she was little she has had this sweet, sweet temperament and she’s very smiley. Also she’s getting very good at talking at such a young age, especially being 14 months old, like she likes to copy everything people are saying. She’s very, very verbally bright and she also really likes to be artistic, more so than Atticus. Adelaide loves to draw!
They’re both really great, so friendly, sweet, and brilliant.
What is one aspect of parenting that you feel is sometimes overlooked or undervalued?
My answer is the parents’ mental health. So for instance in our situation, living with another family right now, has been really cool. Krystal and I get along super well and we bounce ideas off of each other, we’ve learned a lot of things together during these last two years of living together. We have read several books together and everytime we read something interesting we talk endlessly about it. It’s been really good!
But we’ve discussed a lot about how when we learn things about parenting, there are so many people that say this is the right way or this is the right way. Or that if it’s stressful for the parent, than it’s not the best way for the children.
Like an example would maybe be like sleep training. So if it does not stress the parent out for the child to have no sleep schedule, the child is not going to suffer really from not having a sleep schedule. Children will sleep intuitively, they’ll figure it out, grow up, and be fine. They’ll learn how to sleep when they need to and it’ll be fine. But if it’s stressful for the parent to not know when their child is sleeping, then it becomes important to worry about that.
Because if you as a parent are stressed out and concerned that you are doing the wrong thing all the time, then that’s more harmful for your children. You’re projecting stress more on your children than if you just say, “You know, I’m a good Mom and I’m going to do what I need to do, and I’ll be ok.”
So prioritizing your own mental health in both how you decide to parent and your parenting techniques or just in general like I talked about before with having a community, doing things for yourself, making sure that you are ok with yourself, if there’s a day that’s really hard that you let your kid watch a movie even if you think that that’s not a good thing that it’s ok to prioritize yourself, because the better you are mentally, the better parent you’re going to be, and the happier your children are going to be. It then makes for a better environment.
Then you’re more prone to act more clearly rather than merely knee-jerk reacting to everything. Which again doesn’t serve anyone else at that point.
Exactly!
Rhiannon and Christopher in their natural stance & habitat.
Photo credit: Jenny Pasterfield
What is one piece of advice that you’ve been given that has helped you the most in parenting?
Maybe not helped me the most, but the first thing that comes to mind is if your child is driving you crazy and you can’t figure out anything, then help them go outside or in the water. Like give them a bath or help them go outside and they almost always will calm down and it will help to make things better.
It’s worked for us. There’s just something about the water and the fresh air that helps kids when they’re stressed out. And if the kids are stressed out, that’s usually when they’re acting out.
Out of everything you teach your children, what are some of the most important lessons you hope they’ll carry with them throughout their lives?
Well one is definitely how much the Gospel of Jesus Christ can bless their life, that’s a huge one because of how it has been life changing for me. But I think that comes along with everything in time.
Also that they can accomplish things, like you don’t have to always do what everyone else is doing. That they can set their own course of what they want to do and build from that point in taking the steps to get there. I think that’s a really good skill to have, and one that I wish that I had when I was younger.
Amidst the demands and roles of life, how do you take time to care for yourself?
Well I sleep in every morning which is really good. I get up at night and I decided that very early, because I’ve breastfed both of my babies exclusively, and so when they were very young I thought how it didn’t make any sense to take turns getting the baby between Christopher and I, because then we’d both be tired and I’m the one that has to feed the baby anyways.
So it’s always been that I would wake up at night and then Christopher will take the kids in the morning when they wake up and I will sleep. So that’s been really good for me having that structure, knowing that I will get enough rest because I will sleep in in the morning.
Also, having a set bedtime for the kids is really nice, because knowing that by 7:30pm I will not have to deal with my children anymore and I can do whatever I want until bedtime is really big, as silly as that might sound.
And then also when I take opportunities to be by myself sometimes. Christopher and I parent together a lot but sometimes when I need some down time or to regroup for a few minutes, it helps a ton. Like one night, I didn’t get as good of a sleep as I usually get and so by the end of the day every noise was extremely overwhelming and irritating, so I knew I needed a few minutes. So I went and laid in my bed listening to a General Conference talk with my eyes closed, and then I was fine. Just recognizing that before I snap that I need to take a break is huge.
Having the awareness of the need to regroup is important, while just as important is having that awareness and support of your spouse and partner. It’s a huge way to elevate your stresses and care for yourself in the ways that you need.
Yes! Also when Christopher is at school and whenever things get kind of crazy, Disney or Pixar Shorts are really good, because then it’s the same concept of putting on this five minute clip, I get to go lay down, and then I’ll come back and we’ll be ok. That way the kids aren’t stuck watching a whole movie but also I get the help and regroup moment I need. It works really well!
From left to right: Christopher, Rhiannon’s husband, Atticus, Adelaide , and Rhiannon.
Photo credit: Rhiannon de Vries
What is one piece of advice you want to emphasize for new parents?
I think the community thing, like don’t feel that being a good parent means that you’re doing it all by yourself. There are different things that need to happen and it’s ok for other people to help you do those things, and receiving and allowing as much support as you can handle.
Also going back again to the mental health thing, if it stresses you out to have people in your house, that’s ok. You can tell people to not come to your house. But if you can think of ways to have help, like if there’s a time of day that you’re bored and it would be cool to have someone to talk to. Or if you don’t feel like doing laundry, or anything like that.
So it’s important to be clear about what stuff you do want support with and what stuff you don’t want support with. So use your community and be ok with being clear about the help you need. It’s ok if one week you want someone to come over every day, and then the next week you don’t want anyone over.
Learning how to talk with people and communicate beforehand, especially if you’re a new parent, cause you never know how you’re going to feel, you might want a lot of help or you might not want help for a month. You need to make that clear with your community and make sure they know that, and letting them know that you’re not trying to be harmful or hurtful, you’re just trying to make sure that you’re ok and that’s fine. As long as you talk with people about this beforehand, then no one is going to have hurt feelings about that.
As a new parent, it is important for you to be ok and to be happy.
For sure, having that clear communication in setting those boundaries and expectations with what’s to come is very important. And even though you don’t know how things are initially going to play out, it’s good to have a game plan while also knowing that if it doesn’t work out, that you’ll rework it together and try a different route. It’s ok to do that because for the most part, the people in your community want you to be ok, they’re going to be understanding of your needs and wishes during this new phase of your life, and more or less, they have all been there in some capacity and want to respect your experience, while offering that helping hand.
Yeah exactly. So I think it’s very important that it’s not selfish for you to try to prioritize how you’re feeling, because how you’re feeling really does affect your baby and your whole family as well. It’s ok for you to say that if you’re feeling better, your child will be happier, because it’s true. So it’s fine to prioritize feeling better, that’s ok. 
Atticus and Rhiannon
Photo Credit: Rhiannon de Vries
What is one piece of advice you want to give to struggling parents?
Probably the same thing honestly. I know when I’m struggling as a parent, if I was able to take that advice, it would help me a lot. And it’s easy to give advice when you’re in a good headspace and you’ve just read books about it and you feel really pumped about it.
But in general I think my first answer kind of stands. The better you feel, the better it will be for your children and for your whole family. So trying to take time to find out how you can feel better is the best thing to do.
I mean it’s also hard to know what to say in this matter because if you know someone that is actually struggling, it’s hard to say outright to prioritize your mental health to that person if they’re having a really hard time. That’s not super helpful, but I mean I guess in that situation I would try more to be part of that community that they could lean on and trust.
But all in all, I really do think that the best thing is to prioritize that you feel ok. Then everything else will work out.
What has proven to be most effective in how you raise and nurture your children?
I guess living your life with your kids there. It’s like what I said before about how I measure success is that your child knows that they’re a real person. So in some ways I think that it’s ok to do certain things because they’re kids and to choose kid-friendly activities and to do children things, like things that you know they’ll find interesting is all really good.
But also to not feel like you have to change your whole life because you have a child. You don’t have to stop doing anything in your adult life and what you think is important because it’s not child friendly. I read an article about this that was really good where they said that a lot of people feel that they can’t do anything in front of their kid like work in front of their child, or be on their phone because that’s bad, so that when you’re with your child you’re 100% with you child only.
Then they get stressed out because they have all of these adult things they need to do but they don’t have time to do them, so they try to cram them into time where they should be taking time for themselves, then it just ends up being a mess.
This article went on to question where these people came up with this mindset that you can’t do adult things around children? Because in the whole of the world, adults did what adults did and children were around and that was it. Because of this culture that we live in now where we have time to do stuff, why is it so different for me to work and to let my child know that it’s time for me to work on my computer, than it would be if it was back in the day where I had to work the field or we’ll starve?
It’s ok to live your life and be a person and let your child see what adults do. It is of course important to be involved with your child and being present with them, but not trying to make everything only be about the kids. I think this has been really good and helpful for me in raising my kids and has helped them progress. I think that has had a lot to do with it, with giving them a lot of exposure to the adult experience has helped them a lot.
So it helps in normalizing certain things and teaches them the happenings of day to day life so it doesn’t come up as a surprise later, because it’s already a consistency and a routine. But like you said, there’s still that balance of what you need to do as an adult, but it doesn’t mean the child is any less important either because you also spend that present time with them.
Yeah because if our whole purpose is to teach our children to be people, then we need to set a proper, realistic example for them. I think we have this weird thought process in our heads that in order for our kids to learn things we have to teach them those things, but in reality our kids learn by watching us be people, and it will in turn teach them how to be people.
You don’t have to teach your kid every single little thing. I’ve been seeing the example of sports a lot lately where people say how they were in sports and it taught them they could do hard things even if they didn’t like it, or it taught them other characteristics and life lessons, which it’s true sports can teach you those things, but you learn those things even if you’re not specifically put in a position where you have to learn them as a child.
If your kid had never experienced what it’s like to be late to something, they have no concept of what harm can happen if you’re late, then it’s impossible for that to happen. Like your child will naturally learn even if you never outright say like if you’re late, you’ll get fired. They’ll learn that themselves. Or say somehow your child never grasps the concept of having to be on time for things, then they would get their first job, they would go late, and then they would get in trouble and they would never be late again.
They do learn things from experience and from life. But we have this weird thought process that we think we need to teach them, when if we just let them live life then they would learn it.
Adelaide and Rhiannon
Photo credit: Rhiannon de Vries
Well it’s like you sometimes you have these different baby or toddler programs that you feel you need to put your child in or you’ve failed them, or you create this Pinterest schedule of what they’re going to learn every day that then gives this unspoken pressure of checking things off the list of what they’ve learned by a certain time frame, or by the next pediatric appointment, or before they go to school, and you’re stressing over if you’ve taught them everything that they need to know. But like you said, if you just let it come naturally and live your life, you won’t have to schedule every little lesson or concept in. You really won’t have to worry about those things for the most part.
Yeah, I mean even if you’re going to send your kid to kindergarten, why do they have to know all these different things before they go? Kindergarten is there to teach them. If you want you kid to go to kindergarten, they don’t have to know their ABC’s before they go, they will learn that there. You don’t have to stress about it.
Now your child may show an interest in reading and ask you to teach them the ABC’s before they go to kindergarten, and if so great. But if not, they will learn it in time. It’s not a big deal. You don’t have to worry about how your kid is doing and how you can make them into what you want them to be.
Just live your life, let them live their life, and it’ll be fine.
They’ll be molded and shaped over time anyways.
Exactly, like if your child learns how to read when they’re four or when they’re seven, they will still know how to read when it’s important. It’s the same with everything.
If the first time you ever learn how to multiply is when you need to multiply, then great, you’ve learned to multiply when it was necessary. I could honestly talk about this all day.
Well it is important. Like you said, I don’t know where this has come from either, or maybe it’s come with social media because it’s so easier to compare and to see the progression of things, or the highlights versus the behind the scenes of how it all came to be. So there’s these unspoken pressures that all of a sudden we put on ourselves, again going back to what you said earlier, that leads to you stressing yourself out, you’re depleting your mental health as a parent, and then it’s not doing any good for the environment of your home, and it’s just this constant cycle of nothing good.
Or how it affects your child’s long term education. It doesn’t help anything. What does it really help? Nothing.
What has been the most difficult part of parenting thus far?
I think mostly not being able to do whatever I want to when I think of it. Like when you are sick, you can’t just sleep all day. Or when you’re super tired, you can’t just have a nap. Or Krystal and I have had to laugh because there have been times that I’ve needed to go pee for an hour and I’ve been in my own house, but I just haven’t had a moment to pee.
And so your time gets taken over and it’s a little bit stressful.
What has been the most rewarding part of parenting?
I think everyone says this, but watching your child learn and master new skills. Even though we know our children are learning stuff all the time and that they are constantly progressing, like how everyday they’re different, but when the skills are a physical thing that you can see for yourself, that is really cool.
I especially love when I can see my children being very sweet to other people. Like when Atticus is especially happy he’ll give someone a kiss and sometimes it’s even to random people. Like we went on vacation a couple months ago and we rented a van and drove around the south island, and Atticus was very excited.
So the girl who was giving us the tour of the van was telling us stuff, Atticus then kissed her on the knee. And she was so happy and she remembered us a week later when we came back with the van. She was just going on about Atticus kissing her knee. But he’s just like that, Atticus is so sweet and loving.
Adalaide is too, like sometimes she’ll want to kiss me, and it makes me very happy knowing that my children are loved and they’re happy, which makes it all so rewarding.
Especially when I stop to think about how there are a lot of children in the world who are not super supported and loved and it sucks, and to know that my children are is very important and special to me. 
From left to right: Rhiannon, Adelaide, Atticus, and Christopher
Photo Credit: Victoria Ecclestone
If you could go back to when you first became a parent, what would be one thing that you would say to yourself?
Probably the advice that I gave earlier for a new parent, I didn’t really think about that when I first had a baby. That being a good parent doesn’t mean doing it all by yourself and that having a community around you is really important.
I think I really took for granted a lot the fact that I had a lot of family around and I kind of had this mindset that I had to do everything or else I’m not a good mom, like I had to prove that I know how to do everything or else I’m not a good mom.
I would tell myself that I am a good mom and it’s ok for you to be tired and to let Grandpa hold the baby in the morning. It’s ok to have a community and to let them do things for you that they love and want to do.
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Thank you again for taking part in and reading my interview for my blog series, “Here’s to You, Stellar Parent” with my dear friend, Rhiannon de Vries.
As mentioned earlier, Rhiannon is a Certified Holistic Nutritional Consultant who focuses as a Health at Every Size (HAES) & Intuitive Eating Educator. She has her own health and wellness website called A Brave New Foodie, and you can also follow her on Facebook and Instagram. She gives fantastic insights into helping you recreate how you perceive your body image and teaches you how to take proper care of your health.
Be sure to check out her website at the link below, follow her on her businesses’ social media pages, and reach out if you are interested in a session or a group presentation to learn more about her work and research.
https://abravenewfoodie.com 🎉
Rhiannon instructing during a group presentation.
Photo Credit: Vicky Markham
What is a childhood memory that you most cherish with your family?
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If you have someone in mind that you think I should interview for this blog series, please let me know by contacting me either through my work email: stephanietracy26@gmail.com, or through my work Facebook page: Stephanie Tracy Writes.
About the Author
Hi there! I’m Stephanie Tracy, a freelance writer, blogger, and copy-editor for hire. I specialize in physical and mental health, parenting, and self-development. I create engaging, inspiring and useful content to help businesses progress in making their viewers into customers. When I’m not writing, you can find me happily playing with my toddler, walking in the park with my family, or indulging in a movie marathon with my husband.