Life | Anyone else late to the New Year?

A wobbly start to the year brings us back to the table—a finished attic buildout, an eighteenth birthday, an ice storm that turned our home back into Fort Smith, and knee surgery that reset expectations. 

We’re also previewing the Italy series and what you can expect from a new story-first Italy series featuring Rome, Florence, Venice, and the Tuscan countryside.

Want a breakdown? Here you go…

• being honest about inconsistency and choosing to start anyway

• finishing the upstairs build and hosting a teen party

• a sudden knee setback, surgery, and next steps

• ice storm adventures with boys, a side by side, and a kayak

• feeding a house full of teens and finding joy in the mess

• why plans bend when family needs rise

• previewing a story-led Italy tour through Rome, Florence, Venice, and Tuscany

• a recommendation to John Mark Comer’s imaginative prayer episode

• inviting listeners to share what life has thrown at them

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“Before I forget…”
 John Mark Comer | Imaginative Prayer Episode

Hosts:  Amy Kathleen Smith | Insta @astoriedtable | www.astoriedtable.com 

Edited by:  Ben Hill* | http://benhillsound.com/ | https://www.linkedin.com/in/benhillsound/

*starting with episode 60

Transcript

Welcome To The Story Table

SPEAKER_00 0:01

Life happens at the table, like in those rare family dinners when everyone's actually home, or when you finally get to go and catch up with your friends. We don't get enough of those. Those moments that we all wish would happen more often. But that's the feel that I want here. That place where you get to finally shift out of survival mode. So what do we talk about here? Nothing, everything, you know, the kind of nothing that turns into everything good. Sometimes it'll be just us here, and sometimes a friend will join. Welcome to a story table. I'm Amy Kathleen, and I'm so glad you're here. Well, if you know anything about creating a podcast, you know that everyone tells you you need to be consistent. You need to have a plan. Your audience needs to know when they can expect you to be there so that you can create a sound base of listeners and build downloads and do all the things that great podcast marketing tells you to do. Clearly, I don't pay attention to any of that because this has been the most haphazard effort. And it's not because there's not a lot of heart behind it, but uh life just happens. And that's really and truly kind of what I'm hopping on here today to share with y'all is in case you're not aware, life happens and it happens a lot. So we're jumping back in. I've decided I'm not gonna delay anymore. You're gonna hear in a minute about the slew of things that have happened. Um, just to be just completely open and honest and relatable with y'all. And I'm kind of curious to hear some feedback on uh how much of this stuff you can relate to. So looking ahead past today, whenever we come back, I'm actually really excited because that's gonna start our tour of Italy. Can you believe it was a year ago that we were packing up and getting ready to go to Italy? And I gosh, I I said that out loud just the other day. And it made me sit for a minute, go, oh, oh, to do it all over again. Oh, that was a that was a wild trip. We fit a lot in, and you're gonna hear all about it. I won't be, I can't wait to, I can't wait to fill you in on Florence and Venice and all the love that we found in Tuscany. I love some Tuscany now. And we're gonna be kicking it all off in Rome, actually. But this week, before we get started with all that, like I said, I just want to start with a little bit of life for a second. What the heck happened the beginning of this year? I'm really wondering this because I did not start my 2026 on my A game. I don't know that I've started any year off with my A game, but I felt like by the end of January, I felt like I just showed up late to something again, except this time it was for the new year. But the whole time getting started on this podcast was on my mind. Like I actually couldn't wait to get started. I just couldn't seem to start. And it just seemed like life kept getting in the way. And it's not bad, like all these things, they aren't bad. It's just stuff. It's just the everyday stuff that we deal with. And I'm just kind of curious if it does happen to you as much as it happens to me. I'm sure it does. I don't think I'm special by any means. I think that we all deal with this. But you know, I was recovering from the holidays, like most everybody in January. And we were also trying to finish out this build out upstairs, which by the way, if you haven't followed along on Instagram, um, my Instagram is a story table. I was gonna say dot com, but that would be the website, just at a story table is where you can find us on Instagram. Um, we have built out this upstairs that was all just just huge attic space that we always intended to do something with, but we hadn't finished out yet because we never really knew what we were gonna do. And we were just saving up the money to be able to do it as well. So we were finishing up this huge project, and you can go on Instagram and you know how they have those little, those little buttons across the uh my profile. So if you go to like my page, um you'll see the little buttons and one of them it says like making home. And I decided I was gonna track it all, and it was so much fun to do. So if anyway, if you want to see like from start to finish, like the before, the after, and everything in between, it's there. So go hop on there, and I'm sure we're gonna talk about that probably after all the Italy stuff. But we were able to get this whole upstairs done. And I was real excited about the timing because our oldest turned 18 this January. And I still I'm a little bit beside myself, a little sad, but actually not so much. I feel like every friend that realizes that Luke's now 18 is like, oh my gosh, I can't believe it. I'm like, yes, we did it. It's been such a long haul, and we're not done. I mean, I don't know that we'll ever be ever be done, but uh, it is a feat to me that we have that he has conquered so much. Uh, and he's 18. He's an adult by some standards, not necessarily mine, but you know, it's a it's a big milestone, and we're just so proud of him. So we finished out this upstairs. He was able to have the coolest birthday party. And uh, I say that loosely. I don't know, does 18-year-old? Yeah, I guess they have birthday parties, but a bunch of guys were over here and they just had so much fun up there. And we had a bunch of silly games, those kind of minute-to-win-it games that you find on Instagram and such. And uh, it was just a great time. It was such a great time, a lot of laughs. So we had all that going on, but at the same time, I woke up on his birthday, and my knee was not working anymore. Well, it wasn't working right, and uh it just seemed to keep getting worse. And so I was thinking, golly, something's just not right again. So, for those of you who don't know, about five years ago, uh, yeah, it was 2021, we went on a ski trip with some friends, and um, and I had to have I had an accident and had to have knee reconstruction after. And all the time it's just like over the years, we've rebuilt it, PT'd it, you know, really done a lot of work to get it strong again. And it's just never quite acted right. And so this day I woke up and it was like, yep, nope, this is not good. So the knee had to even be put on the sidebar for a little bit because we had an ice storm hit Louisiana. Now, something like this happened actually that same year, five years ago. The ski trip that we had was the same time that like the polar apocalypse hit the south. I don't know if y'all remember that. Those of you who live down here, I know you remember it. It was absolutely crazy. So we were all kind of bracing ourselves for that again. Ended up not being the case. It was just a lot of ice, not snow, not even sleet. We usually get like a sleet snow mixture sometimes here. This was straight up ice. I mean, it was coming down, hitting everything hard, and just froze. So the kids were out of school for a whole week. And it was really interesting because, you know, where we live, we do live in the city, but we're like kind of right there on the outside. We're we're near this river, and the spot that we live in has got a little bit of country to it. And so, being that I'm a country girl born and raised uh in the middle of a cotton field, like this is I I love it here. It's great. I feel like I have my own little piece of the country right here on the outskirts of the city. And um, and so whenever something like this is going on, where uh the snow's coming, um, my country roots come out. And I came after two boys who were significantly older than me. And so my two sisters that were before them were pretty much out of the house. So I was kind of the punching bag uh for many years and um uh ended up being a bit of a tomboy, you know, not complete tomboy, but I had a good bit of tomboy in me. So coming after these two brothers and all their friends, um, we did some pretty crazy stuff. So my boys take advantage of that side of me. And as soon as like we know that ice or anything's coming this way, snow, whatever, they're like, are y'all gonna go to the camp and get papa side by side? I'm like, oh yeah, dad's already on it. I've reminded him many times. So before the ice even got here, we had the side by side at our house. And we put this tiny, not tiny, it's like a kid's kayak. We we bought it um going into Dick's Sporting Good one day. Um, we live on a lake, and so this little yellow plastic kayak was perfect for like one kid, maybe two, to hop on and be able to like paddle themselves around. This thing has turned into the biggest toy and it has lasted. It has now had to be put to rest, but it didn't make it through this uh snow uh or ice storm. But this little yellow kayak has been the best time on the lake and even in the pool. But we tied it up behind the side by side, and we live next to this church that has a giant parking lot, and the boys would drive down there and they would just kind of ride each other around on this kayak. So, for some of you moms out there, I'm I know that y'all have nervous hearts and I love y'all dearly. And I know that the idea of boys on side by sides and pulling kids behind on a kayak just kind of probably freaks you out. I'm sorry for that. I am, I'm not a nervous mom. I am a cautious mom in that you better believe every single one of those boys had a lesson and a talking to and a threat that they better be careful and how to operate these things. And uh, and so we really do try to navigate this and equipping them to have fun, but be smart too. I always tell the boys like, be smart, don't be dumb. I don't know if that's the right thing to say, but they just kind of get it bluntly for me sometimes. But y'all, we had so much fun. We started off with like our three boys, and then of course, like our fourth comes. Um, he's he calls himself the fourth Smith boy. We love him dearly. And then after that, like we had two more come, and then I'll be darned, like they would leave the house and then just more would come back on the side by side. But here's the thing we don't have a lot of kids that live around us. So that found them there pushing their limits on how far away they were going to get certain friends. Now, these kids lived in the vicinity of us, but anyway, it was kind of a whole deal. But by the end of it, I think we had about eight boys here for a few days. Um, that was interesting, to say the very least. So, needless to say, I was uh doing a lot of cooking that week and a lot more cooking and supplying up more snacks for everybody. It really was a great time. If y'all know me, that is so right up my alley. Like I love these kids just being here and just, you know, taking up the space in this house and being able to like feed them and love on them and um and we had some interesting things happening here. We had um the boys learned how to set ice on fire, did not realize that was a thing. Apparently, it is. Uh they did have adult supervision, though it's my husband and he's the big kid. So uh, but you know, that happened. And I think well, we had a couple of polar plunges uh that happened in the pool until it started icing over. Um, and that was chaotic and dumb. But they did it anyway, and I let them. Uh, but yeah, we had all kinds of crazy boy fun happening over at this house. And the whole time, yeah, my knee's still not right, and it's just swelling up more and more. And so once the ice is finally gone, once all the boys are finally gone out of the house, it was a nice reprieve. I'll be as as much as I love having them here. I do have to be honest, like it was nice to kind of have my house back to just our five, and uh, and it was good. I'm sure y'all can all, you know, you've you've been there before. When you have company, you love having them. And then it's just kind of nice to get back to normal again. But once the ice was gone, uh finally, and the kids were back in school, I finally got to the doctor, ended up getting an MRI, and found out that yeah, it looks like we might need to just scope it and go back in and clean some things up because clearly some things are not right. And uh just to fast forward a little bit, like the surgery, it did go great. Um, and all things considered, like my typical, oh, you're a redhead, didn't come out this time. Have y'all ever heard this? Like, I've I've heard it more recently over the past few years, but apparently us redheads have a bit of a um stigma, a reputation. And uh, and the way I've seen that is that we we do lots of different things that people don't do. And I've verified this because my niece, who is a ginger at heart as well, not at heart, actually on her head, like she's a ginger, um, is the same. Pain blocks, like nerve blocks, they burn up out of our system. You know, it's like they don't even, they were never there. For me, that hasn't always been like sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. But anyway, there's just all these really weird things that happen. And so I just kind of warned doctors, I'm like, whatever you've heard about redheads, I do it all. But this time, y'all, like it was good because like this is maybe TMI, but like I didn't get sick after the post op recovery, which is a huge thing I normally do. And so that started off really good. But the surgery, it did go well because they were able to address three of the four things that they thought they might have to fix. They did have to do a little more than they expected, but it was good and it has offered like immediate immediate, you know, relief because the pain was it sucked. Um, but now we're gonna have to go back into surgery for another one to fix the fourth thing. And then they also found a fifth thing. And the fifth thing, that one kind of stinks. It's my ACL that was replaced before. It's hanging on by a thread. And so I have to be honest with you, like I don't remember many things from post op, but I do remember the doctor saying that, and I do remember looking at him saying, like, do I really have to we have to do go in again? And he's like, Yeah. So um I have decided that that's okay, that's what it's gonna take, you know. Um, it's also been weirdly validating because all these times that I have told any medical professional that has dealt with me in this knee situation that, like, something's not right, something's just not right. It's not, it's clicking, it's doing this, it's doing that, and like no one could put their finger on what it was going on. Once they got in there, it was a train wreck. It was a train wreck. But I know that between that procedure and the one another one we'll have probably after the summer's over, um, that there was some serious stuff going on in there. And um, and when we do this, I am praying for 100% recovery that I don't ever have to deal with this again. And I can just go back to being the like boy mom who has boys who like to go on fun adventures, and I want to be right there with them. So, anyway, that's my hope. Um, but anyway, I thought, all right, so we have all this post-op downtime, right? That's when I'm gonna be able to work on the podcast. Nope. Because we've had kids out for the ice storm, and then we had like Mardi Gras slash winter breaks happening, and then we just had a water main break in our city, which meant we were doing virtual in the home again. I was like, oh my goodness gracious. We were braced for a week to have to do that, but thankfully we only had two days off, uh, or I guess on for me, um, because they were able to figure it out and the kids went back to school. So I'm thankful because they're also off for spring break next week. So when you think about like, it's just been like one little thing happening after another. So why even tell you about all this? Why not get into like the podcast, the fun stuff, the Italy stuff? And mainly because I'm quite sure, like you get it. We plan, we prepare, we even pray over all of it, and life still happens. It's crazy. I mean, it's just it's nonstop and it's kids, it's just it's family, it's kids, it's all the things, but you know, we're all there. And I just realized that like sometimes you have to realize like something's got to give. But dang it, like, why does it have to be the thing that we're actually excited about doing? You know, it's like the the the things that we want to do, they're the ones that get cut first. But oh well. I really do. I love hearing from y'all, whether you're using the text feature that we have now, which is if you're looking at the show notes, um, it's at the top there. And you can text that number and it comes straight to me. It's really cool, or you can just DM me on Instagram. But I love hearing from y'all because you know, the thing is, like we're all navigating through this life with each other. And um, and sometimes it just it's fun to talk to a friend who can relate. Okay, so back to the fun stuff of this idea of the Italy trip. Okay, so it's so hard to believe that Italy was about a year ago. And I've always wanted to share bits and pieces of it with you because I've had so many conversations with people who are either planning to go or who would dream about going. And we've been able to talk about just kind of what I learned through the process and what we experienced while we were there. And it's always been so much fun to talk about. And everybody always gets excited about their plans or their potential plans. And I just thought it would be really cool, a lot of fun to just bring those conversations here. But I was talking to a friend of mine and I was like, How do I do this? You know, I this feels so silly to just share about a trip on a podcast. And she goes, and now she knows me so well, she knows the shows that I like to watch. And one of my favorite shows, I believe it's on um HBO, but it's Stanley Tucci searching for Italy. And now, Stanley Tucci, if you can't picture him in your head, he is the guy, like the announcer on Hunger Games. He was also Julia Child's husband in that Julie and Julia movie. It came out a while back, like a long time ago. I think around like 2010. Great movie if you haven't seen it. Um, and then oh, my favorite Devil Wears Prada. That's one, like if I'm sick in the bed or if I'm laid up after a knee surgery, I'm pretty sure actually, I think I did watch Devil Wears Prada. Anyway, that's Stanley Tucci. And so he has this uh show, Tucci Searching for Italy, and it's so great. It's so cool because he goes into each little region of Italy and you get to find out about the people and their story and of course the food. But of course, he's not like cooking the I mean, he is cooking the food with them, but um, you're he's not teaching your recipe, you know, he's not teaching you what you need to uh do the next time you're in that area, but he's just sharing the experience with you. And so my friend was like, Why do you love watching Stanley Tucci? And I told her all those reasons. And she goes, That's all you're doing. You're just sharing that with other people. I'm like, oh look at there. Don't you love when you have a friend that can like point out something so simply to you and you're like, Oh yeah, oh yeah, that would be cool. I think people would like that. So this is it. This we're gonna give this a try and see how it goes. Okay, so if you remember the last time, the last round of trying to restart this podcast, I'm still laughing at the fact that I buck all the system rules when it comes to producing a quality podcast. Anyway, I had started this little segment at the end that's like, hey, before I forget, and it's just where I fill you in on whatever has crossed my path that I've really enjoyed and I thought you might like too. Okay, I love it because this one actually happened today. And I've actually sent this to several friends. I think I even sent it to Smith already today. So I'm like, oh, this would be perfect. This is what I need to send. Okay, so I don't know if y'all know who John Mark Comer is, but um, he is a pastor in Portland. I think he's in Portland. Y'all, I I wish I knew more exact about um who, when, or where people are, but I just I I take in what I like and I share what I share, and I don't really pay attention to a lot of details. But um, this one is from his podcast. It's called uh it's the John Mark Comer podcast. And I am gonna link this in the show notes just so y'all have it. But this one is called Imaginative Prayer, and I liked it so much because I have been familiar with this concept. It was uh kind of done in a different way where I experienced it, but I knew exactly where they were going on this, and I loved it. Okay, here's why I like this, and here's why I thought you might enjoy listening to this podcast. So he takes a teaching of just like imaginative prayer, and it starts out, and it's actually not John Mark Homer, it's um his his friend uh Josh Porter is the one who's doing the sermon. Um, but he's funny, like they're they're funny, they're like a almost like a dry humor, but they're great. Anyway, so he's talking about this idea and he he starts out with just like these um explaining it from like a science standpoint. Okay, I'm not a science nerd, but like I appreciated that it was interesting, like what he was talking about. He takes that and then he kind of weaves that information and those experiences he walks you through uh into like theology. And you know, where is it rooted in the Bible? And how can we how does it make that connection? And then he finishes with basically kind of showing you like, here, here's what this looks like. Here's what this looks like in my world, and here's what it could look like in your world, and here's how we apply all that to kind of our daily, weekly, regular life. And I thought it was so cool because it was just approachable, it wasn't weird, it was um, it was really enjoyable to listen to. And so I don't remember, I haven't actually, I'm gonna be honest with you, I haven't totally finished the episode yet. Yep, I've got about 10 more minutes left on it. Um, but it's like uh, yeah, so it's about probably maybe 40 minutes or so. But it was a great listen, and I am gonna put that in the show notes for y'all to click through in case you're looking for something just good in your ear. Because that's exactly how I found it. I was like, okay, God. Um, I've got some things I've got to do around the house this morning, and I just want something good to listen to. Can you help me find something good? And then I clicked on this and it ended up being something good. So, anyway, all right, well, that's it for this week. Um, thanks so much for hanging in there. I know this has been highly inconsistent, and I just appreciate y'all rolling along with me and just letting me pop into your podcast library there from time to time. So hopefully we'll get more consistent. Hopefully, life won't keep getting in the way. But I can't wait to hear from y'all, and I hope to talk to you again soon. Y'all take care.