TMPLBND - Trista's PL8STORY Podcast Episode 32 with guest Chanelle Neilson of Moms Who Know Podcast

TMPLBND

[00:00:00] Trista, Host: [00:00:00] Welcome to this week's episode of Trista's PL8STORY Podcast. I'm Trista Polo from iwokeupawesome.com and I am your host.

Each week we learn the story behind that vanity plate. The one you saw driving down the road, what did it say? What did it mean? Why did they choose it?  

This week, we meet Chanelle Neilson. She's from Southern California and she's the host and creator of the Moms Who Know podcast. Chanelle is the author of Parenting with Purpose , which has been translated into Chinese. She's worked in the fitness industry for 20 years and she's a Certified Yoga Instructor.  

Chanelle loves sunshine, healthy living and dark chocolate. Chanelle's also the mother of five kids and married to her best friend. She loves helping moms take care of themselves and grow so they can take better care of their families. Let's meet Chanelle and hear her plate story.  

Trista, Host: [00:00:53] I'm so excited this week to have Chanelle Nielsen from Southern California. She is a [00:01:00] fellow podcaster, an author, and her license plate, TMPLBND, has some very cool stuff behind it. Welcome Chanelle.  

Chanelle Neilson: [00:01:08] Thank you so much. I'm excited to be here.  

Trista, Host: [00:01:10] Yes. I'm excited for you to be here as well. So your license plate, temple bound. It's T M P L B   N D. Yes. Tell me the story behind it.  

Chanelle Neilson: [00:01:21] Yes. So we had talked about it and we're pretty thrifty. We thought we're never going to do a, you know, a vanity plate because I don't want to pay for that.

But, The story is that we wanted to have a family motto. And we had heard   this idea of having a family motto and we thought it was really cool. We heard this one woman, their family motto was, it will all work out. And I thought that's so cool. Like just to have something that your family comes back to.

And I thought of my own family growing up and we didn't really have any kind of motto. And I just wanted that for our family. And so we [00:02:00] talked about it and we came up with this motto of temple bound and then my husband wrote out and he said, what if we put this on our license plate? And, even with my thriftiness, I thought, okay, I really liked that because it's gonna keep it front and center.

The kids will always remember this family motto because it's so easy to do something like that, do a mission statement or a family motto or whatever, and then forget about it. Right. And so I thought if we, if we have this family motto, if it's written down, if it's where our family can see it, if other people ask us about it and we have to explain about it, which happens then that's going to keep our motto as something memorable as something that guides us, and that will truly be our family motto. So that's kind of the story behind why we went with the vanity plate.  

Trista, Host: [00:02:50] I love that, you know, that is, something that I call keeping things in existence.

You can write the best goal statement, the most [00:03:00] amazing mission statement you can make the most, you know, Huge declaration of your life. But if you never think about it again, it doesn't really have a lot of power. So by putting it on your license plate, you're keeping it in existence over time, which of course has to have made it much more meaningful and more present in your lives.

Chanelle Neilson: [00:03:19] Yeah, it definitely, it does those things. And then we, we can't forget about it. You know, it's just a constant reminder. We also printed it on our garage door, which is usually where we go in and out. And so there's a big sign. So as we leave every time we're leaving the house going in the van, you know, we're seeing it.

And so it's just, it's not even that we're always thinking about it. It's not one of those things that you always think about when you see it kind of blends into the background and yet it's there, it's in their consciousness. so we have five kids. If you were to ask any of them, maybe not the youngest, he's three, but any of the other four, what's our family motto.

They would know. Whereas I'll tell you before we would [00:04:00] say what's our family motto. And they would say no Nakey bums on the couch. No that is not ourfamily motto that's not what we're going for here... I mean, we don't want that either, but that's not our family motto. Right.  

Trista, Host: [00:04:12] Right. And that wouldn't fit on a license plate.

Chanelle Neilson: [00:04:15] Exactly.  

Trista, Host: [00:04:17] That would be a conversation starter though.  

Chanelle Neilson: [00:04:20] Oh, for sure.  

Trista, Host: [00:04:21] Yes. Yes. So tell me, I I'm clear what the other motto, no nakey bums on the couch means. Can you share a little bit about why you chose temple bound as your family motto?  

Chanelle Neilson: [00:04:30] Yes. Okay. So we are members of the church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. sometimes people call us Mormons. And the temple for us is really like a symbol of our worship. And, the temple is where families where we go to be married. And so it's where our families start, but we also have a different theology than probably a lot of religions in that we believe that families can be together forever, literally that we are in the [00:05:00] temple sealed together as families for not just while we live on earth, but after this life.

And so there's really two meanings to temple bound. One is like you would see on the old, covered wagons, like California bound. So like we're going to California, we're going to the temple. And that means we're going there to renew our worship. We want our kids to go there to be married. This is the place for us, but it also means bound as in bound together.

So temple bound, like we are united through this, you know, temple through what we do in the temple. We're United through this marriage ceremony, not just my husband and I, but our entire family are together. And so that's really, the meaning of that. And because the temple is a sacred place in our religion, there are certain standards that you have to live by to go to the temple.

There are, you know, not everyone. [00:06:00] In fact at our churches on the signs, it says visitors welcome. But at the temple, it doesn't say that. It's not a place for everyone. It's for people who have qualified themselves to be there. And so that idea of going to the temple actually means a lot more than just going to the temple.

It means preparing yourself to go there. So it affects the way that we live our daily lives as well.  

Trista, Host: [00:06:23] I really love that because it has so many meanings. it's just two simple words, but it has so many different meanings that you can bring into so many conversations with your kids. As you're raising a family.  

Chanelle Neilson: [00:06:37] Yeah, it's  

Trista, Host: [00:06:38] beautiful. I love that. And it's what kind of car is it on? There's a story behind that too. Isn't there?  

Chanelle Neilson: [00:06:45] We drive a Nissan NV, which is a 12 passenger van. we had four kids in six years. We wanted our kids really close together, fit in a minivan for a long time.

And then seven years after our fourth [00:07:00] was born, we had a surprise number five. I was almost 40. Yeah. At the time. And, All of a sudden the minivan was really tight. My husband is six foot 10. My kids are all quite tall. I have two teenagers. My, tallest son is about six, five at this point. And still growing.

I mean, cannot keep that boy in pants or shoes. He's just growing like crazy. Anyway. So leg room, as you can imagine was a real problem. No one wanted to sit in the back of the minivan and now every seat is taken and it got really cramming. And so we thought, okay, I guess it's time to move up and I'll tell you the nicest thing about this big van is if the kids are fighting, we're like, go sit in a different row. You don't have to sit by them, just go So it's a big black Nissan NV. It's great.  

Trista, Host: [00:07:48] But it, your kids, when we talked before the podcast, you said your kids kind of get teased.  

Chanelle Neilson: [00:07:54] Yes. Okay. So this is definitely, If you know much about [00:08:00] Mormons, this is like a stereotypical Mormon car because, you know, Mormons are kind of known for having big families.

And we have this big van and sometimes I'll drive the kids with their friends and they think it's a hoot to just have, you know, kid after kid, after kid get out of the car and, other kids will see the license plate and see all these kids getting out of the car and just like, what are you guys all about?

You know? And depending on the kid and depending on the day, sometimes they think it's funny. Sometimes they think it's embarrassing, but as a mom, I love it. You know what tell, tell what you believe, stand up for that. And I think that there's something to that even if, even if you're having a bad day and the answer is, Oh, it's my crazy parents.

Then, you know, answer for yourself. And I think, I don't know. I guess that's the kind of mom I am. I like my like,  

Trista, Host: [00:08:51] like own your answer, own your answer. No matter what it is own it.  

Chanelle Neilson: [00:08:56] Exactly. That is exactly right trust. So that's what I'm getting at. [00:09:00] Just say what you think. Yeah. I love that.  

Trista, Host: [00:09:03] And you know, you have 5 kids and you really take your parenting very seriously, so much so that you've written books, you have a podcast. So let's talk about the books first. Your one book is called Parenting with Purpose . Yes, 14 practical lessons to help you see the big picture and focus on what's really important. I love that. So I would love to know, I haven't read the book, but I'd love to know. What's your favorite, favorite lesson and that you use most out of the list of 14.

Okay. And you can give us a little synopsis of the book first, just to level set us since everybody might not know about it.

Chanelle Neilson: [00:09:39] Sure. Well, I would love to tell you kind of the backstory of this book, and then that will kind of lead into is my favorite. So I started podcasting over in China. I lived in the U S but my podcast was for a Chinese audience and it was on parenting because they thought automatically I must be a good mom. If I have 5 kids because of in China, you know, they [00:10:00] had just loosened the restrictions to have more kids. So I did this parenting podcast and it really took off in China. And then I got a book deal, and wrote this book. And so they asked me to write a book.  

I was asked to write a book on parenting and I thought, okay, what can I tell parents in China, you know, I, I lived in Taiwan, but I've never even been to China. So how do I know what they're doing? And so I thought I want to write a principle based book that's based on things that are universal, so that the things that we talk about in the book are things like love, respect, work, service, making decisions as a family, having fun together, things like that, that are really principle-based so that it would have that application. I tell a lot of stories. one of the things that I think is very needed in this book and that I use like every day is there's a chapter on.

I forget if it's the chapter on love or if it's a separate chapter on forgiveness, [00:11:00] they go hand in   hand. but the idea that we need to forgive our kids and to model that for them, when they act like little Rascals, which they do quite often, and we need to apologize and own our own mistakes and to show that to them often.

And, I think for me, that has been, that was a really important chapter for me to write and to think through and to articulate because it takes a level of humility for us to apologize to a 15 year old who's, you know, been all up in our face and then we lost it. It's so easy to think that punk kid, you know, of course this happened because he blah, blah, blah, but all reality, we can only control ourselves.

I tell a story in this chapter. My husband, is my husband's great love that guy. but one morning I went in, he had told me a situation where, he was in a meeting and a woman [00:12:00] thought that he was leading the meeting and someone said something and someone took it another way. Basically, a woman thought that he should have stood up for her more.

And she wrote him a scathing email. I think you should have done this for me. You should have stood up for me more. And he told me this whole story and I was like, well, the nerve of her, because that's where my mind goes. You know, she should've stood up for herself. What's your problem? Well, the next morning I went into the office and he had left open on the computer, his, His reply to that email and being the good wife I am, I just, it just was open and I had to look at it and he said, he said, I'm so sorry. I could have done better. And in the future I will be more sensitive and more aware. And I'm like, wow, that's amazing. Right. So then I went on with my day. I went to the school and, I'll just tell one of these stories.

A few things happened that day, but one of the things is I parked at the school. I parallel parked my car, which is not a skill I'm good at. And especially not in that big old van, because it's [00:13:00] very hard to do. And I kind of, I got too close to this other car. I didn't hit it, but she didn't feel like she had a lot of room to get out.

And so when I came out from doing my errand at the school, She said, Hey, you parked way too close to me and I can't get out. And I'm like, you had enough room sister. You're fine. I'm just telling all my secrets today. I, I, that was my, the reaction. And, she was wearing a uniform for a local dentist office. I went home and I thought, you know, look at my husband. Like he was able to just apologize. See what he did wrong. And here I am just being a brat to this other lady. And so I called the number of that dentist office. And I asked for the woman and I, I said, I'm so sorry. Like, I'm not good at parking. I didn't do a good job. And I, I probably shouldn't have parked there and I apologize.

And she just was so thankful. She told me her whole story. She had so much going on. She [00:14:00] just had newborn twins. She had to go home and nurse them and do all these things and get back to work. And she said, you calling just made my day. Now this isn't a book about parenting because it's kind of an analogy of what we need to do and what things open up for us when we apologize when we see the wrong, even if we don't necessarily think we're in the wrong.

Trista, Host: [00:14:21] I love this because most people, even if you thought afterwards, well, it probably was a little harsh. I probably could have given her a bit of a break taking that a little less, whatever. Mostly of us would not take that step in call. We would just say, I forgive me myself. You know, just move on. Never think of that again.

So I love that you took that next step. And you did take responsibility for how you behaved, because like you said, we can only be responsible for ourselves. It's the only thing I can control is me. I can't control you. I can only control me and my reaction to you and the way I treat you [00:15:00] and my contribution to you.

Chanelle Neilson: [00:15:02] Yeah. And I've got to say, I don't do that all the time, you know, and that's why I got write about it in a book and immortalize the good thing that I did once being, I am definitely a work in progress.

And I feel like that's one of those things that so hard for all of us, but for me in particular to do. But it's one of the things that in parenting, and especially as I've gotten older and my kids have gotten older and I'm raising teenagers that is so needed as parents is that element of continually forgiving them continually going back and apologizing.

I did that again. I'm so sorry. I'll try harder. You know, even if it's things that we feel like weren't that big of a deal and so easy to justify and talk myself out of it, but that's really one of the most crucial parts of parenting because every time that we we have those little interactions, those little tiffs with our kids, we're kind of tearing the [00:16:00] fabric of the relationship, but when we go back and we apologize and we forgive we're sewing it back up and that's what we got to do every time. Sew it back up stronger.  

Trista, Host: [00:16:08] I really like that.   You know, we want to teach our kids the best, but we can't always be expected to do the best. We just can always be expected to do our best. Right. So I think that the apology and the owning your mistakes and being responsible for your actions, even when it's with your kids, I think that's really powerful.

Chanelle Neilson: [00:16:28] Yeah,  

Trista, Host: [00:16:29] definitely. That's awesome. So we'll let people check out the book for the rest of the principles. I'm sure they're all just as powerful and have as much impact to create even more, you know, good positive upbringing with still owning yourself. Right? Cause that's part of your whole philosophy, at least from your podcast, like still keep who you are, you know, be an amazing and powerful parent, but also be an amazing and powerful person too, right?

Chanelle Neilson: [00:16:56] Yes. Definitely. One of the things that I almost [00:17:00] named my podcast in fact was moms are people too. And, even though it's called Moms Who Know , and it's geared towards moms . It's definitely this idea of living intentionally and deciding how you want to be, how you want to live, what you want it to look like. And then going forward from there.  

Trista, Host: [00:17:16] Yeah. Let's talk about your podcast. how long have you had that?

Chanelle Neilson: [00:17:20] So that's been running for a little over three years now and, the audience has grown and grown. And we have of just, you know, people who are really connected with it. And I love that and I love my audience and I, it's really interesting to see, the people who it attracts, you know, originally I had in mind, young moms, because I thought that this is what I need when I was a young mom. And that's what yeah. And geared it towards.  

But what I'm realizing is my messaging is really about, Well, like I said, taking care of yourself as a whole person, it's about making things simpler and not feeling like you have to do it all. And [00:18:00] it has a broader application than I thought. I recently had a grandma reach out to me and say, you know what? My grandkids are living with me and you'd think I would have had this stuff figured out by now, but I don't. And your podcast helps me so much the second time around as I'm doing all this. And so I think it's cool to see, just what it does for moms to have someone in their court.  

Trista, Host: [00:18:23] I love that.  

Chanelle Neilson: [00:18:24] Yeah.  

Trista, Host: [00:18:25] And probably you could even rebrand it and I noticed some of your guests are pretty specific to moms, but it sounds like you could actually even rebrand some of the content to be for more general non, not necessarily mom audience.

Chanelle Neilson: [00:18:40] I actually have a surprising number of men who listen, It always surprises me, but there are some episodes they skip, you know, we, we had a, a lady doctor on talking about lady doctor things, you know, they just skip on by those. But there's a lot of, you know, episodes with universal application.

We're talking about things [00:19:00] like habits and how to, how to create amazing habits or, a recent episode was talking about how to declutter your physical surroundings, your mental and emotional. It was a great episode. There's all kinds of things on there that you're right, that have a broader application to more people.

But when it's, when it's a question of what to put on, it's always like, well, does this serve my moms? And if the answer is no, then it doesn't go.  

Trista, Host: [00:19:27] I was looking through your, episode list and, and I agree with you, you have a lot of really great stuff, including how to stop peeing your pants after you have a baby, right a great one for moms.

Absolutely. But I did notice a lot of the stuff that look really universal. Who is somebody you really enjoyed having on your show recently?  

Chanelle Neilson: [00:19:48] Benjamin Hardy. And if you're not familiar with him, he wrote Willpower Doesn't Work . He for a long time was the number one writer on Medium . And he. He's just someone who I admire so much. [00:20:00] His work is so good. And he just came out with a new book called Personality Isn't Permanent. Oh my gosh, you guys, life changing.

  So the whole premise is the idea that, we aren't stuck as we are, we are personalities even, you know, we, we think, Oh, I'm, I'm introverted, I'm extroverted, I'm a white or a blue and the old color coding test, or, you know, an Enneagram three or whatever you are.

He says, we're not stuck in those things. And if you look back to how you were 10 years ago, you were a different person and you need to use your imagination to think of who you're going to be in 10 years and you get to decide and that's the powerful part right there. And so we had a great conversation around that because you know, who do you want to be in 10 years? And then live into that right now. It's, it's the little decisions you make every day that will allow you to be that future self. So that was just an [00:21:00] amazing mind blowing conversation. And I got to read his book before it came out. and, and just jumped on the personality isn't permanent bandwagon. Cause I thought it was so good  

Trista, Host: [00:21:09] I love that, you know, I've always said I reinvent myself about every five years.  

Chanelle Neilson: [00:21:15] And it's true. It's true.  

Trista, Host: [00:21:17] Yeah. And you know, I I've been looking a lot as I'm I just turned 49. Right. So now I'm, I can see 50 off in the distance. And so I'm just starting to look at my life and my past and who I've been.

But I agree with you. There's an opportunity to invent yourself on purpose instead of because your life happens. And it's very empowering to have done work on myself so that I don't have to just be a six and a half, seven year old running around in an adult body.  

Yes. Yeah. It's a good book. I'll save some of my audible credits for it.

Chanelle Neilson: [00:21:54] Do... definitely do I have to, you said something so powerful just then, is that you reinvent [00:22:00] yourself every five years and here you are almost 50. Not yet, but almost. And. One of the things that happens to us as we grow older, we get stuck in these patterns and we don't continue. And so just cheers to you for continuing to do that, you know, because it's so easy.

And I think, you know, as a mom, too, okay, well, I'm a mom. I've had my kids, I'm done now. I'm going to turn and look at them, let them grow. And my growth has done, but in reality, whoever we are we get to choose. Do we want to be the same person in five years? Or do we want to, like you said, reinvent ourselves and that's what I choose and I choose growth. I choose continued progress.  

Trista, Host: [00:22:40] I'm About to speak about a book that I read as a kid, it's called Hope for the Flowers . And it was by Trina Paulus. It was published in 1972. And I think it's out of print, but it was all about a Caterpillar who believed they're just really must be more to life than just [00:23:00] this.  

I love that. I'm trying to remember the name of a book I want to reference. Maybe I'll put it in later, but there's this book that my mom made me read when I was a kid and it really stuck with me. And the premises, it's about a Caterpillar and he's looking for the meaning of life and his friends are all like the meaning of life. It's over here. We're, we're heading to it now. And it's this big, huge stack of caterpillars, all climbing over each other to try and see the real meaning of life. And so he decided to climb this Caterpillar mountain. It's just all these caterpillars trying to get higher and higher. And he finally gets to the top and there's nothing there.

Like everybody's continuously, always searching, searching, searching, searching. And then of course, a friend of his who became a butterfly, right. Went off and found it for themselves, invented themselves into who they were meant to be instead of following the pack and trying to figure out who you are based on who everybody [00:24:00] else is.

And. So that probably, you know, spurred my reinvention cycle. Just always looking inside, who am I? Who am I meant to be? Who am I capable of being? that whole saying when the student is ready, the teacher will come.

Chanelle Neilson: [00:24:15] Yeah. And I think that's so true. Like we, if we're open to it, if we're ready, then those lessons come and it just clicks. And then we know, okay, this is where I'm headed. This is what I need next.  

Trista, Host: [00:24:27] You're a mom author. You're a mom podcaster. You said that you do a lot of stuff on Facebook lives. Like clearly you have a community that is thriving and growing. Where do you get your inspiration, your learning your growth from.  

Chanelle Neilson: [00:24:42] Oh, I love that question. So many places.

So I'm always interested in learning more about business. And so there are a few, you know, business podcasts. I love to listen to podcasts, quarantine that doesn't happen very often these days because you know, I press play and then a kid comes in and needs me. And [00:25:00] so that doesn't happen as much, but I do love to, to read.

And so some of my favorite most inspirational Benjamin Hardy, who I already mentioned. I really like high performance habits, which is Brendan Bouchard. and. Yeah, I think those are the ones that I'm going to mention as well well, as any, you know, inspirational material, but I try to just soak it in and read as much as I can and listen, and learn.

And I love learning through stories. I think that it, it just, you know, it's great to read nonfiction and those kinds of things too, but when you can connect.Through a story it's so powerful and you just suddenly get this lesson in a totally different way.  

Trista, Host: [00:25:43] I completely agree with that. Whether it's somebody telling their story or it's an allegorical story, I love learning through story as opposed to instruction  

Chanelle Neilson: [00:25:55] and yes,  

Trista, Host: [00:25:56] yes.

Now you've written some other books besides [00:26:00] the one we talked about. And some of them are aimed at kids and more story mode. Can you share the other books you've written?  

Chanelle Neilson: [00:26:07] So all of my other published books are actually children's books. And I have a book series called McKay and Coco, which is, my son, Tyler, his middle name is McKay and it's based on him.

He wanted a dog so bad. And we were my husband and I are just not dog people. And we said, it's never going to happen. And that's what happens to this boy in the book and on his birthday, he wishes for a dog and then he goes out, he doesn't get a dog. He gets other things, but not this dog that he dreams of.

He goes out side and he hears a barking noise and it's a dog that only he can see and his parents can't. And so then it's a book series about his adventures with this invisible dog that he has to feed on his own with no parents helping clean up for on his own and do all the things to take care of a dog without his parents, helping [00:27:00] him.

So when my son, we did end up getting a dog. I thought we never would, but we have a dog now and it's all him. Like he does all of the work to take care of it. But for years I told him, that's your dog. Your dog is cocoa in the book. That's the one, the only dog you will ever have is this fictional dog.  

Trista, Host: [00:27:20] Now, what is your real dog's name? Is it cocoa?  

Chanelle Neilson: [00:27:23] No, our real dog is Harley and he came pre named. our neighbor had him and his daughter moved in with him and was allergic. And so they needed a place for this dog to go. He's a little bit older, and a German shepherd. And so he came to live with us, but not with us. He's in the garage, in the backyard. He's not in the house.  

Trista, Host: [00:27:44] My dog has her own chair in my office. She heard you say, you're not dog people.She moaned. Right when you said, you know, we're not really dog people. She goes.  

Chanelle Neilson: [00:27:54] Oh, tell her I'm working on it.  

Trista, Host: [00:27:55] I'll let her know that you're working. We're all works in progress.  

Chanelle Neilson: [00:27:59] Yes. [00:28:00] I mean, I said I would never have a dog and yet here I am with a dog and every time I say hi to this dog, every time I see him, I'm not to the point where I take him on walks yet. So  

Trista, Host: [00:28:10] That's ok - listen. Yeah. However far along you are, it's good. You gave him a home when he needed one and you were of service to the family. So high marks on all sides.  

Chanelle Neilson: [00:28:21] And then my son is living his dream. So  

Trista, Host: [00:28:23] that's wonderful. It's a win win for everybody.  

Chanelle Neilson: [00:28:26] Yeah.  

Trista, Host: [00:28:27] I am a dog person. In fact, I have relationships with people where I'm actually closer to their dog.

Chanelle Neilson: [00:28:34] How funny.  

Trista, Host: [00:28:35] So what else do you want us to know about you? The person behind the plate TMPLBND.  

Chanelle Neilson: [00:28:42] one thing that I love about having that plate in general is it's a conversation starter and it's so fun. We've met people who we never would have met, who come up our van also. until recently you couldn't sell NVS at a normal dealership in California. So when we bought this van, we had to have it [00:29:00] shipped in from Georgia. They can only be sold as commercial vehicles. There's a few more on the roads now. So we have a van that attracts attention and then we have the license plate that attracts attention. But to me, I love that because I do love connecting with people. And I love meeting people and it's really fun for people to have a question to come and ask you, because then that leads to, you know, a new friend, a whole conversation, and this connection wouldn't have had otherwise.

And so I think that that's something I want people to know about me is I love it when people talk to me, it's the funnest thing, you know, podcasting is great and I love that, but sometimes you don't get to hear back from your people, right? You're just, you're speaking into the void and you know people are listening, but you're not always sure who, and so it's so fun when people email me or message me on social media or whatever.

And you get to hear back from these people. Because I guess for me, it's all about that connection [00:30:00] and I love that. Hearing back, whether it's about a license plate or a podcast or a book or whatever, that's what it's all about. For me,  

Trista, Host: [00:30:08] I feel the same way. I mean, this whole podcast started because I was curious, then it became this... wow. It's like a window into people's souls to talk about their license plate, who would have thought that would get us into all the topics we've covered today. Right. And so, but I agree with you. I don't ever really know who's listening unless they reach out. But I do love connecting with people, for sure.

Chanelle Neilson: [00:30:33] Yeah. So  

Trista, Host: [00:30:34] that's really fun. so what's next for you on the horizon?  

Chanelle Neilson: [00:30:37] Yeah. So I just started writing for medium.com, which is exciting. And I I'm writing more long form blog posts, which is something I haven't done in the past.

I just completed my first summit and it was amazing. And so I'm going to continue on with online summits. That's been a lot of fun, but I'm also [00:31:00] narrowing down what I do. So it's exciting to see what happens.

it's easy to, you know, just get invested in so many things. And I find myself doing that and I'm like now honing in, I speak and I write, so that's what's next for me, those are the things that I do. And I have different avenues for doing those. But that's that's what I do that. That's who I am, I'm a writer, I'm a speaker, I'm a mom.

I love my dark chocolate and that's what I'll be working on.  

Trista, Host: [00:31:25] That's all really, really good stuff. I appreciate you being here on the PL8STORY podcast. I would like to turn the tables and give you an opportunity to ask me a question.

Do you have a question for me before we wrap up?  

Chanelle Neilson: [00:31:36] Yeah. Tell me a little more about your dog. I would love to know about, how long you've had her and her name and what kind of dog she is,  

Trista, Host: [00:31:45] but you're not even a dog person. That's a generous question.  

Chanelle Neilson: [00:31:49] You are going to help me increase my love for dogs. It's like I said, it's something I'm working on.  

Trista, Host: [00:31:55] That's amazing. Okay, good. So my dog's name is Bella. [00:32:00] When we adopted her, she was being fostered because she was a rescue from a kill shelter in, I think South Carolina or Southern North Carolina, somewhere in the Carolinas. And I had two dogs that I loved very, very much that passed away on the same day.

And I, I was gonna, I was just not ready. I was never going to have a dog again. And cause they were my kids. They were my family, you know? And I think that you go through your own grief process. Nobody should ever tell somebody how they should grieve or get over a loss or how big a deal the loss was to them. So, you know, people would send me pictures of dogs, here's a dog you should adopt, this'll fix it.

You know, and I always really resented that because, you know, I'm, I'm going to grieve in my own way and it is not going to be, to replace them.  

So I was watching, I was scrolling through Facebook while my husband was driving us to Thanksgiving one year and she popped [00:33:00] up on my newsfeed as a dog needing a family and I started to cry. And I said, okay, that's her? Cause there was like something there. And I didn't know what it was. I'd seen a zillion dogs already.

Like I told you, people were already sending pictures and sending me links and trying to, you know, find me my next dog. I definitely wasn't looking or shopping for a dog. I don't know how she ended up on my newsfeed. Facebook knew something I didn't, but because of that emotional reaction, I knew that she was the dog for me.

And, yeah, so we adopted her, we picked her up from the foster family that had had her for about six weeks. She's lived with us for about five years or so. maybe close to six, she's an Australian cattle dog mix. So she has a lot of spunk. She's extremely opinionated, very communicative. She can tell you with her eyes that she's very upset with you or [00:34:00] happy with you or ready to go for a walk.

and my husband wanted a teacher to howl cause he had a dog that howl, when he was a kid. And so he started trying to teach her to how she can now. Whenever anyone in earshot sings, happy birthday, she sings with them and every time, yeah. And every time you get to the, you, you know, she just looked up, she's like, Oh, are we singing? Are we singing.  

Chanelle Neilson: [00:34:25] See, this is good for me to hear. This is so cute because dogs have their own personality and I, I need to hear it.  

Trista, Host: [00:34:33] Yes. Thanks for asking. I will always talk about my animals it doesn't take much prodding on that.  

Awesome. Well, I really appreciate you being on the PL8STORY podcast  

Chanelle Neilson: [00:34:45] awesome. Well, thank you so much for having me.  

Trista, Host: [00:34:47] Yes. Thanks Chanelle. It was great to have you.

Thank you for joining us for this week's episode of Trista's PL8STORY podcast. Please subscribe to Trista's PL8STORY podcast to get the [00:35:00] story behind all those vanity plates, driving with you on the road. And if you would like to nominate the owner of a license plate, including you... Or visit any of our partners and sponsors come and see us www.pl8story.com. That's P L number eight story.com and give us the details.  

If you enjoyed this episode, please drop a review and give us a share. I'm Trista Polo wishing you well on the road to your next adventure.