Susie Allison, a former kindergarten and first grade teacher, now stay-at-home mom, is also the

genius creator of the account Busy Toddler that has amassed almost a million followers on

Instagram at the time of this recording. Susie shares her tips on keeping toddlers happily busy

with independent play based on projects that will cost $5 or less using many things you probably

have in your home already. And today, Susie shares with us so much of her wisdom about getting

kids to play independently, schedules, TV, time, childhood development through play and learning,

and what her advice is for parents who are trying to keep their littles busy during a quarantine

or any time you're spending many hours at home. Susie has been featured on the Today Show,

People, Time magazine, and I'm super grateful to have her as a guest on Mint Arrow Messages today, too.

All right, today, my friends, I have someone I am so excited to talk to.

I met her in person just a few months ago, and she's as delightful as you would hope she is.

Her name is Susie, and she is the creator of busy toddler.

Say hi, Susie.

Hi.

And tell us just in general what you do and what you're about. So I'm all about

fun, easy play. I run an Instagram account called Busy Toddler and I help parents make it to

nap time each day or right now help us through school closures. Help us through life. Help us through

life. Because life's gotten a little weird right now.

Yes. My mission is just to share play and to share fun activities to do with kids, to help parents,

to help kids, to help everybody make it through the day. Just a little happier.

So awesome. And I found you, I'm going to say maybe like a year ago. And I just felt like it was so helpful to me as a mom

with young kids to have all of these activities all of a sudden at my fingertips that we could

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