37 Transcript: The Lost Art of Showing Love Through Hospitality (Callie Blount)

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J: You're listening to the Vibrant Happy Women podcast, episode number 37.

C: This is about having a good time and celebrating your life and the people that are around. And it's really more important the way people feel when they're in your home than the way your home appears to them.

Intro: Welcome to the Vibrant Happy Women podcast, stories of vibrant women living happy lives. And now, your host, Jen Riday.

J: Hey there, welcome to the show, I’m Dr. Jen Riday and I'm so glad you're here. Are you kind of like me and most other women in that you feel pulled in way too many directions and you're kind of desperate for more down time so you can recharge? Do you wish you could be more patient and calm with the people you love? Well, you're in luck. This week, we are offering a Black Friday coupon code to give you $100 off the Vibrant Happy Living membership. Vibrant Happy Living is all about helping you become your calmest, most grounded and centered, happiest self. Imagine waking up every Monday knowing that there's a brand new guided meditation from me waiting for you in your inbox along with a message that will uplift you and inspire you. We cover all kinds of topics that will help bring greater peace to your life, including self-compassion, abundance, relationships, simplicity, and on and on. So if you're interested in finding greater peace and having some time each week to give yourself that permission to recharge and really take care of yourself, then join us in the Vibrant Happy Living membership. You'll need to go to jenriday.com/blackfriday to get your $100 coupon code. Then on Friday, you can jump over to vibranthappyliving.com and enter your coupon code to get your $100 off the annual membership. Again, to get your coupon code, go to jenriday.com/blackfriday.

On last week's episode of Vibrant Happy Women, I spoke with Andrea Wenberg all about claiming your seat at the table and realizing that you're already loved. I loved how Andrea talked about not being a victim of what other people think of us and deciding to love others more than we fear them. She had such an amazing message, and if you haven't listened to that, be sure to go back and do so. This week, well, it's Thanksgiving and I have an amazing episode for you today. I spoke with Callie Blount about the lost art of hospitality and how to bring it back. Callie talked about how the enemy of good is perfect. We don't need to host the perfect meal or the perfect Thanksgiving, but instead, it's more important that we show love. People are going to remember how you made them feel more than what you did or how your house looked. So as you contemplate getting together with your loved ones this week, just remember it's all about how you make your guests feel; that's the art of true hospitality. Callie is truly a breath of fresh air. She's so full of energy and positivity and you're going to love this episode so let's go ahead and jump in.

Welcome to Vibrant Happy Women, I'm Dr. Jen Riday, and today, I'll be talking with Callie Blount and Callie is a food stylist, blogging over at lovecooks.com. Now, Callie loves beauty and people and hospitality and creating, and she has fun with the food stylist thing, making things like 3-tier cakes, southern buttermilk biscuits, or even a vegan pecan pie; she can do it all. Callie lives in Nashville with her husband, Jake, and their little dog, Bigsby. Welcome to the show, Callie.

C: Ah, thank you so much, Jen, I'm so excited to be here.

J: I am so glad you're here too. And let's start out with your favorite quote to start the show.

C: Yes. Okay, so my favorite quote is from Helen Keller and she said, “Life is either a grand adventure or nothing else,” and I just believe that. I believe that every day is a gift, every day is an adventure and it's meant to be lived fully and lived well.

J: Awesome. And I could tell by your voice that you're really an enthusiastic person and energetic.

C: (Laughs)

J: And you… you do live it as an adventure. So… well, let's dive right into your low point, something you've struggled with and overcome.

C: Yes, great question. Well… and, you know, Jen, we talked little bit about this when we were getting to know each other earlier but, you know, I'm a very… tend to be a very type A personality. You know, I love to work hard, I love to get projects done, I love to produce excellent things. And I graduated with the journalism degree out of college and Birmingham and really thought I had my life planned out. I thought, “I'm going to go and be a writer. I'm going to be the next Anna Wintour at Vogue. Watch out world!” and started working at a magazine and really was unhappy. And I was so taken aback by that, Jen, because I'm a very positive person, I'm a very outgoing person, but something in my spirit was off. And it was one of the first times in my life where I really had to address, “Okay, what is that feeling and how… what do we do about it?” So at the time, I was in a season of prayer with my church, really praying about what to do and I felt like I needed to quit my job. Now, for those of you who are very stable type personalities, you liked the 9 to 5 lifestyle, that hit home with me because I was like, “No, like I'm meant to do this,” but also knew there was something more. So I ended up leaving that job and going on staff at a church in Birmingham. And through that season, got to be a part of a creative team that was so incredibly inspiring to me, and my world got opened up to all these different areas of creativity, whether it was video, whether it was, you know, graphic design, whether it was production, and being a part of all those worlds. And, at the time, because I was single and my mom wasn’t cooking for me anymore, I got real into cooking and started a food blog. So from there, just fell in love with food, food photos, and styling food, and ended up becoming a freelance food stylist through that whole process, left the church and became a food stylist. But, you know, that journey was definitely plagued with ups and downs. I mean, there were days where I was on top of the world, shooting, and then there were days where I was like, “What have I done!” you know, like, “Is this what I'm supposed to be doing?” But knowing (unclear) [06:14] deep in my spirit was resonating with this job that I had to follow.

J: So tell us more about what a food stylist… what does that mean?

C: Yes. Okay, so I get that question a lot, and the funniest response to this question, Jen, I feel like is, particularly if I'm in like a very southern grocery store, is, “So you're that person that like sprays DW40 on the chicken, right?” I’m like, “No, not quite.”

J: (Laughs)

C: My job is to make food look beautiful. So, you know, for example, many of you probably are on Instagram, you watch the recipe videos on Instagram ‘how to’ videos. I do those with brands like Southern Living, Cooking Light, Health, I really enjoy that. I make food look beautiful for editorial, for magazine covers, for newspapers, just every sort of realm of media where you can… you know, there's a celebrity holding a turkey on the cover of a magazine, there's a food stylist behind that celebrity making the food look beautiful. So my job really is to celebrate food and present it in a beautiful way.

J: That's amazing. So you went from having a 9-to-5 to being a food stylist. And…

C: Yes.

J: … do you feel like most of the time it's fulfilling and… and feels like what you were called to do?

C: You know, Jen, it's the coolest thing. So, you know, a little bit of a backstory on me. I was raised in a very southern household with a very southern mama who I absolutely adore, but grew up in this culture of, whether it was a wedding or a funeral or a baby shower, her motto was, “Well, you got to eat and so you might as well be eating at her house.” So this culture of these beautiful tables and beautiful spreads and there's just this enjoyment of food and of people, and not really realizing how much that idea of southern hospitality, of celebrating food and the amazing things that food can do for you until I started food styling. And knowing that there's something about this love of food this love of people, and this love of beauty that really resonates in my spirit that brings me such fulfillment.

J: So tell us more about how you grew up then. You said your mom was really into hospitality, tell us more about how you grew up.

C: Oh my goodness (Laughs). First of all, I’m going to preface this with, I grew up in southern Alabama, so hot summers, hot winters; they were Christmases where it's like 750 outside.

J: Mm.

C: I mean we are straight-up dressed in flannel onesies and it's… we're sweating. So the back story being that, in the south, there is such a culture of hospitality. My mom is a hospice nurse and I grew up with her… you know, for those of you who aren't familiar with hospice, that is end-of-life care for people, and she would invite her patients over for our family Thanksgivings. So I distinctly remember one Thanksgiving where she had a precious girl that was in her care that she invited over and my mom had done it up. You know, there was the whole beautiful buttery roasted turkey and southern cornbread dressing with sausage and, you know, Sister Schubert rolls and the best sweet potato casserole with mountains of marshmallows and melted butter and pecans. And looking over at this table spread with this beautiful food, and this little girl's face was just shining with joy. And it was like, in that moment, I knew that it was more important the people sitting around your table than the food that was necessarily being served. So my mom modeled for me just this culture of hospitality. I mean, seriously, Jen, I'm not kidding, she called me like a couple nights ago and was like, “Callie, I'm just real concerned I'm not going to have enough time off, you know, to get the Christmas decorations up.” She loves decorating for Christmas and I grew up with these elaborate Christmases; beautiful decorations and beautiful tablescapes and homemade gingerbread houses. And, for her, it was her way to love us well and to create an environment of beauty and a food that I just love.

J: So hospitality is love for your mom. And would you say that's true for you as well?

C: Oh my goodness, you know, I… I will tell you, growing up, I didn’t quite realize how much it was sinking into my spirit until I got older, and I realized that the best way to love somebody is to cook for them. You know, my husband and I just recently moved into a new house here in Nashville and we decided to… you know, the cost of professionally painting a whole house can be quite expensive, so we decided to invite our community and to help us paint our walls. And this is a really stretching experience for me, Jen, because I grew up in such a beautiful… my mom would do these lavish beautiful spreads and I thought, “How on earth am I going to do that with boxes everywhere and, you know, like tools and paint cans and..?” But I just decided, “You know what? I'm just going to choose to be vulnerable and just invite people in.” And I will tell you, Jen, we had the best time. I mean, we got pizza from Costco for lunch and… we, you know, scraped up a sandwich straight for Publix, you know, but we at work and I will never forget those memories. And what I realized in those moments was that hospitality is more about the people who are sitting in your living room than it is about you looking fancy or like the coolest hostess in the world. It's about loving them Well, and making them feel special. And that has kind of set the stage for, I feel like, what I do my career and what I get to experience with my community here in Tennessee.

J: Mm, so lucky; I can hear that you love it.

C: I love it, yes, absolutely.

J: So for those of us who… you know, I have 6 kids and hospitality doesn't come easy…

C: Mm.

J: … what advice…? Not necessarily hospitality does it come easy, but then I panic and think I have to clean my house and…

C: Sure.

J: … freaks me out.

C: (Laughs)

J: What advice would you have for someone like me?

C: You know, one of the best pieces of advice I can give to you (and I can give to myself) is don't stress. Like, this is about having a good time and celebrating your life the people that are around you. And what… you know, kind of what I said earlier, you know, it's really more important the way people feel when they're in your home and the way your home appears to them. So keeping in mind who's coming over and what is important to them and what's going to make them feel loved. And that's kind of why I said earlier, you know, one intention I've kind of said about my table when I have people over for dinner, for a coffee or breakfast, is knowing them well enough to go, “Okay…” you know, for example my friend, Mallory, is vegan so what can I make for her that's going to make her feel special? And if I don't know how to make it, it's not a big deal, I'm going to buy it from Whole Foods, you know? Or, you know, my friend, Jenna, is from Texas and I know that she loves Texas beef; you know, she was raised on a cattle farm. So I'm going to do something different for her than I'll do for my friend, Victoria, who's from New Mexico and loves green chilies and enchiladas. You know, it's just trying to know people well and make them feel loved while they are in your home; and that's really the most important thing. So like I said, don't stress… it could be popcorn in a movie and somebody's going to have a great time, and then your baseboards can be dusty and they're not even looking at them, you know what I mean? Like, just embrace the friends that are in your home.

J: Mm, that's great. And I think you sound like an extrovert, am I right?

C: Yes, oh my gosh. Yes, my husband can tell you, when I'm not around people, I get a little stir-crazy, sort of like, “I think I just need to go up the road to the store to talk to somebody,” yeah. (Laughs)

J: Okay (Laughs), that's great, that's great.

C: Yeah.

J: Well, so is there ever need for you to have quiet time where you're not always entertaining or thinking about helping others or being a good friend?

C: Yes, yes, absolutely. Sorry to interrupt you on that I just did… it really hit me, you know, I'm sitting here in my dining room while I'm talking to you and this is my favorite room in our house because this is actually where I come in the mornings to just be still. And there's something to me about settling yourself before you start your day, it's been really key to me, I think, being able to love people well. And, you know, my favorite morning routine is just to make a cup of coffee, to come in here and to read my Bible and just pray for a second and just think about what is on my plate for today. Because I think when you are extroverted, when you do love to entertain, when you love hospitality, there tends to be a never-ending to-do list in your mind, right?

J: Mm-hmm.

C: I mean, it's like there's always something to do, there's always something in the future. And I've really tried to make it my intention in the mornings to really settle in on, “Today is the day that I have. Today is my grand adventure. I'm not promised tomorrow, but today I have the chance to love people, to be kind to them, to have a good time with whatever situation I'm in, and to let my intention be, you know, today.”

J: Nice, “Today is the day,” I love that.

C: Yes, absolutely.

J: So tell us more about something that's exciting you in your life today.

C: Mm, that's such a good question. You know, to be honest, it's our house. You know, we… Jake and I scrimped and saved and worked so hard for years to be able to be in this house and we are beyond excited about it. I'm so stoked about our dog, Bigsby. My friends can tell you, I'm like the awkward dog mom, just like texting them dog photos when they really don't care; you know, it's like 2 o'clock in the afternoon and they're getting a picture of my dog like drinking his water bowl, but I just love him, you know?

J: (Laughs)

C: So he's a half-wheaten terrier, half poodle mix, we couldn't be happier with him and he's actually asleep at my feet right now as we're talking. And just so looking forward to him and this fall and Tennessee and being in our home and we're hoping to plan, you know, friends giving of some sort and just enjoying this place.

J: Mm, that's great, congratulations.

C: Yeah, thank you; thank you.

J: And let's shift right into talking about some of your favorite things. Well, unless you have a struggle you'd like to tell us about, a current struggle.

C: Mm, you know what? I think that the struggle with me is probably always the idea of balance.

J: Mm-hmm.

C: Because I think when you are an extrovert and you do love to be around people, sometimes you can err on the side of like getting a little too crazy with your schedule. (Laughs)

J: Mm-hmm.

C: I don't know any of your listeners out there understand that, especially when you add children into the mix; which I did not have. But one thing that I am kind of learning and processing from is to really, at the end of the day, land on the side of relationship and the people around you. You know, there are always going to be instances where you can Swiffer the floor instead of having your girlfriend over for a bowl of soup, but I want to land with the soup. You know, like I really want my intentions to land with the people around me and the ones that I love and to really make that sort of my way of feeling balanced.

J: Oh, that's great; land on the side of relationship, hmm.

C: Yes, absolutely.

J: Cool. Well…

C: Yeah.

J: … let’s talk about your favorite things. What is a favorite habit that contributes to your success, Callie?

C: Oh my gosh, Jen, that's such a good question. You know what? I actually pray all the time. And I know people, there are prayer warriors out there and I… yes, I honor you, but I mean like I just really try to still myself throughout the day and really try and maintain a place of peace in my spirit, if that makes sense.

J: Mm-hmm.

C: Like to really be sort of prayerful intentional because I am the personality type that will make impulsive decisions and just jump on board or whatever parties happening, but trying to you, as I mature as a woman, to be in a state… more of a state of prayer during the day and to think through that side of myself, and I'm really enjoying that journey.

J: Okay, that's nice.

C: Yeah.

J: Stay in that place of peace, that’s great.

C: Yes.

J: And a favorite easy meal.

C: Favorite easy meal, my favorite question, oh my gosh. Okay, so I'm going to give you several options because they're all different people…

J: (Laughs)

C: … with all type of dietary needs out there. You know, one of my favorite easy lunches is a roasted veggie bowl. And what I mean when I say that is we will… my husband I love to make quinoa; we’re big quinoa people (shout out to all the quinoa people).

J: Mm-hmm.

C: And when we make our quinoa, we make it with chicken stock. So make a big pot of quinoa then take whatever vegetables you have on hand and toss it in a bunch of olive oil and then whatever spice you love; Jake and I love Indian food, so for, us it's curry powder, it's cumin, its chili powder. It could be minced garlic, salt and pepper. You know, it could be paprika and cumin and garlic powder. Whatever spice, you know, rocks your world, makes you feel good inside, toss that, roast them in an oven at 425 for about 30 minutes until they're nice and roasty-toasty. And then we love to make all different types of dressings to go on top. So my current favorite one is actually sort of like an Asian-inspired peanut sauce, but we do ours with sunflower seed butter. So sunflower seed butter (or you could do peanut butter), olive oil and then a little bit of soy sauce, a little bit of honey, whisk that all together, maybe a little bit of lime juice, top your veggie bowl with that and some sesame seeds on top… top, maybe some crunchy kale chips or just something for some crunch, and that is our favorite weekday lunch go-to meal.

J: Mm! Can you share a recipe with us?

C: Oh, girl, absolutely! I have all kinds of fun recipes on my blog on Love Cooks, but for the veggie bowl, I can totally send you the specifics on that guy.

J: Mm, yes, we will put that on our show notes page at jenriday.com/37. You said you had more than one easy meal here we're going to share?

C: Yeah, another… oh, girl, I could just keep on going. One of my other favorite meals out I’ve been making… making lately is turkey pumpkin chili. Now, I know when you hear a pumpkin chili you think, “Mm, not so sure about that.” But those of you who don't eat a lot of dairy (which in our household, my husband can't really eat dairy so we just kind of try and avoid that a little bit), it is the perfect way to have a creamy chili without having to add cheese. And this is why; pumpkin is an amazing asset to any kind of baked good. It gives it a moistness, it gives it that sort of fall flavor, and when you add it into a chili, it makes it taste creamy. So my… and I can totally send you this recipe. This… that recipe she comes from the whole foods, but my favorite easy weeknight meal is turkey pumpkin chili. And basically, all it is is a bunch of sautéed, you know, garlic, onion, red and green bell pepper, some jalapenos if you like it spicy, and then add to that some, you know, just white ground turkey, brown that turkey meat and then you add in canned tomatoes, some… a can of pumpkin. You can add in… I actually add in a, you know, chopped sweet potato, so that's sweet potato even adds to the sweetness of the pumpkin and it's so good, a bunch a… a bunch of chili powder and then some cumin. And just let that simmer on the stove for about 30 minutes and you are good to go. And I promise you, this stuff smells like heaven, and your family, your loved ones, they are going to love it.

J: Mm, I need that one for sure; I love pumpkin.

C: Yes.

J: Yum! Man, you have creative things on here already.

C: Oh, I love it. It’s… you know, food is just the best, you know? Julia Child has a quote and she says, “People who love food are the best people,” and I just believe that. I think people who can celebrate food really are the best people and I just love being around that.

J: Yeah, that's so fun; I'm coming to your house for Thanksgiving.

C: Come on, I would love it!

J: (Laughs)

C: Oh my gosh, let me know. You know, we don’t have a guest room bed yet, but we definitely can find an air mattress for you so you are more than welcome.

J: (Laughs). I'm teasing, but that sounds amazing.

C: (Laughs)

J: Okay, and what's your favorite kitchen gadget?

C: Oh my gosh, Jen, buying a Vitamix blender has changed our world.

J: Really?

C: We love… yes. Now, I had wanted a Vitamix for years and so when my husband and I finally got engaged, I thought to myself (this is really superficial), I was like, “This is my chance; I can get a Vitamix.” And his parents actually gave us; that is our wedding gift, it was a Vitamix. And this thing is amazing for many reasons. One, you can make your own nut milks; you can make almond milk, pecan milk, whatever kind you want. You can make your own nut butters. You can make smoothies like a boss. I mean, you can put of chunk ice in there, it's going to blend it up in about 10 seconds. You also can make soups in a Vitamix that warm while you're blending them, so they cook on their own. So you can make like broccoli cheddar soup in the Vitamix and it cooks it while it's blending. I mean, that tool I do use everyday really just religiously and love our Vitamix.

J: Wow. Well, so I have to confess, I bought a Vitamix a few months ago. (Laughs)

C: Really?

J: And I haven't used it right, and I'm skeptical. So if I'm just starting out, what should I make first? (Laughs)

C: Oh, that’s such a good question. So, one of my favorite things to make in a Vitamix is smoothies. Do you… are you a smoothie person?

J: Sometimes.

C: Okay. Let me share my ultimate yummy delicious smoothie.

J: Okay.

C: Okay, listeners, everyone, prepare thine self.

J: (Laughs)

C: Okay, so I recently discovered this stuff called powdered peanut butter. Have you ever seen this? It’s like…

J: I’ve heard of it, yeah.

C: Okay, so there are many brands out there. I like the PB2 one that you see like at Publix or, you know, wherever you choose to go. There's also one called Naked PB (and I know I'm saying the word Naked southern, it's N a k e d PB).

[Laughter]

J: Naked, okay. (Laughs)

C: (unclear) [22:47] and you can but that on Amazon, everyone. And, yeah, so I love to do the Naked peanut butter, the… you know, powdered peanut butter, a scoop of chocolate protein powder; whatever protein powder you like. I really actually like… there's this brand called Sunwarrior that's like a… they do like a vegan protein powder that's really actually really good, it's called protein plus; I can send you the link for that.

J: Mm.

C: So scoop of your powdered peanut butter, scoop of your chocolate protein powder, half a banana, you know, a handful of ice, and then I love unsweetened vanilla almond milk in there. And then this is also a good place to sneak in some grains if you want to do like a green smoothie. So what I will do is take a bag of spinach and put it in the freezer so it gets really, really cold, it's like ice, and then put some of that in there. Vitamix, start it on low so that it all kind of works together, and then gradually increase the speed. Because that's the thing with the Vitamix, you can't just go straight into high mode because it will like buff up; you don't want to do that. So you want to like start it out low then go to medium then go to high. And by the time you get to high, your smoothie should be nice and frothy. And that is one of my all-time favorite because you have like… it's like a peanut butter chocolate shake.

J: Mm.

C: And it's so good; I would highly recommend that.

J: Yummy! Thank you, that sounds amazing.

C: Yes, you're welcome.

J: A favorite book that you’d recommend to our listeners.

C: Oh my gosh, I love to read. There's a book called ‘Bread and Wine’ and it is by Shauna Niequist. And I'm not relating an attempt to spell her last name, I think it's N i e q u i s t; it's on Amazon. This book really changed my world in a lot of ways. I highly recommend it because this book is all about how important it is to eat at a table with your loved ones and what it means to share bread and wine with people and how important it is to our world, to our community, to the betterment of humankind, it's so important. And it's kind of become… of course, it resonates with me because that's kind of my life motto, but I just love her and I love this book; I would highly recommend it, especially going into the holiday season.

J: Mm, okay, ‘Bread and Wine’ by Shauna Niequist; excellent. And the best advice you've ever received.

C: ‘The enemy of good is perfect.”

J: Mm.

C: My dad, when I was growing up, obviously I've told you a little bit about myself, I was very type A and I loved art, I love creativity. And I remember working on art pieces and my dad would come in and say, “How's it going, Callie?” and I'd be like, “Oh, no, just frustrated that this line isn’t straight,” or, “This, you know, flower isn't perfect,” or, “The color doesn't seem to be what I want it to be,” or, “This cake I'm making has, you know, sunken in the center,” or what have you. And he would say, “You know, Cal, the enemy of good is perfect.” And that really set me free and I actually think about that a lot of times when I'm on shoots, you know? Because sometimes, especially you're working with, you know, advertising clients where the, you know, the whipped cream has to be perfectly swirled or the pie has to be perfectly sliced and, you know, the pecan is the flawless one, you know, I can get so wrapped up in the perfection of it all, and I hear my dad's voice in my head and him… him saying, you know, “The enemy of good is perfect,” and thinking, “You know what, Dad? You're right.” At the end of the day, it's more important that we're kind of people, that were good to people, that our work is good because perfection doesn't really exist.

J: Right, right, it doesn't.

C: Yes.

J: Right, that's great. And if you had to create a 3 to 5 part formula of actions or beliefs that maximize your happiness, what would that include?

C: My 3 part verbiage that I was marinating on this morning was encouraged, feed, and inspire. I think that, of course, it's important for me to feed people, that matters a lot to me; because you get so much more out of feeding people and inviting them to your table than I think you could ever expect. And I like to make it a discipline to try and feed people once a week, whatever that looks like, because that's important and that matters to our world. But the second thing, encourage, you know, I think in our world of female entrepreneurs, we can do ourselves a disservice by comparing ourselves to others and not encouraging other women to be successful. You know, I really believe we're in this world together. You know, as female creatives, as female podcasters, as female businesspeople, doctors, lawyers, wherever you are, we're all operating in this thing together, and I think we would do well to really encourage each other in each other success; that really makes a difference. And then the last thing is inspire. You know, I love beauty; I truly do. I'm a magazine fiend. I mean, when you come over to my house, Jen, you're going to see there's piles of magazines everywhere just because I love beautiful images, I love just sitting outside on our back porch and I'm watching like 3 birds and a squirrel having a party out there right now, you know? I just love being inspired by nature and I think anytime that you can get inspired, just carving out time to just gaze upon beauty and be inspired by nature and inspired by art or maybe you're visiting an art gallery or you're, you know, reading a book that's beautiful, I mean, there's something about that the feed your spirit and that just makes me feel so happy.

J: Hmm, and that matches so well with what you're doing for your career; so, good for you.

C: Yeah, oh, thank you; thank you. I'm just… I'm so happy to be where I am; I’m really, really blessed.

J: Well, I have loved this interview and your energy and your positivity, and we'll say goodbye in a minute, but before we do, give our listeners a final parting challenge.

C: Mm, listeners, you are so valued and you're so loved. And I would just encourage each of you to go out there and practice hospitality. Go out there and get a little bit out of your comfort zone and offer to have somebody over at your house for pizza, offer to take a friend to coffee, offer to open up your home to, you know, all watch the new episode Gilmore Girls together, whatever it is choose to land on the side of community. And I think you're going to be better for it and the people around you are too.

J: The world will be better. Oh, I love what you're doing, Callie. Thank you so much for being on the show. And I'll remind our listeners they can find links to everything you talked about by going to jenriday.com/37.

C: Mm-hmm.

J: And remind us again where our listeners can find you online.

C: Absolutely. Okay, so you can find me on Instagram, I am Luv Cooks (L u v C o o k s) luv-cooks.com, which is l u v – c o o k s.com, and you can also check out all my fun food styling work on callieblount (b l o u n t).com.

J: Thank you so much for being here, Callie.

C: Thank you, Jen!

J: Take care.

Thank you so much for joining us today. And be sure to join me next week when I talk with Jill Savage about how to become more compassionate with your family simply by being more compassionate with yourself and practicing greater self-care. Also, don't forget to go to jenriday.com/blackfriday to get your $100 off coupon code for the Vibrant Happy Living annual membership. Have a wonderful week and a Happy Thanksgiving. Take care.

Outro: Thanks for listening to the Vibrant Happy Women podcast at www.jenriday.com.