In this Joy Moments episode, we’re talking about how the tiniest things can hold the biggest feelings. Lacey shares a simple moment from a hectic morning: trying to get Iris dressed for daycare, she tucks a tiny “I love you” note into the heart-shaped pocket of Iris’s shirt. That little scrap of paper travels with Iris all day, gets lost and found again, and turns an ordinary Thursday into what she calls “the best day ever.”

We connect that note to the ones our parents used to leave for us—lunchbox messages, dashboard surprises, doodles on napkins—and how those small, tangible reminders of love stay with us for years. We also talk about Christmas trees, ornaments, and even a listener story about a tree named after a loved one, and how those traditions quietly hold our stories. Together, we land on this: joy doesn’t have to be big or polished. It can be a note in a pocket, a name tag on a tree, or an ornament that makes you smile every single year.

Timestamps

1. 00:00 – Welcome and today’s Joy Moment theme: tiny notes, big feelings
2. 00:30 – Iris’s heart-pocket “I love you” note and the “best day ever”
3. 03:00 – Remembering the notes our parents left for us
4. 05:00 – Christmas trees, ornaments, and a tree named “Eric”
5. 08:00 – Reflection: small, tangible reminders of love
6. 09:00 – Prompt for you + how to share your Joy Moment

Mentioned in This Episode

1. Joy Moments submission form – joyfulsupportmovement.com/submit
2. Family traditions around Christmas ornaments and named trees

Tell Us

What is one small, tangible reminder that you are loved—a note, an object, an ornament, or a routine—that brings you joy when you notice it?

If you’d like to share it with us, you can submit your Joy Moment at joyfulsupportmovement.com/submit.

Welcome to Joy Moments where we spread moments of joy throughout

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the world to create some lovely joy

ripples, in everyone's everyday life.

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I'm Lacey, your co-host who has a

baby you will here in this episode,

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violet is wanting to get her own

joy moments in here with Sarah.

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Hi Sarah.

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Sara: Hi Lacey.

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I am excited to have your daughter joining

us 'cause she is many joy moments for me.

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Lacey: She is a delight.

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I, I, I almost get angry at how

delightful she can be because,

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we're not really sleeping very well.

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But then she's so happy, so

I'm like, I can't even be that

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mad 'cause she's a delight.

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And so now I'm tired and frustrated,

but also happy at the same time.

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And so she, you know, it is what it is.

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Sara: That's life in a nutshell.

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. Lacey: I mean, if there's anything that

I'm used to is a lot of big feelings.

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Rachel is a friend of our house, we have

a lot of Miss Rachel, and one of the

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songs is called Big Feelings and it was

playing, and I looked at Joe and I said,

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I'm not afraid of your big feelings.

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And he looked at me and he said,

I am afraid of your big feelings.

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To which I said that is

the correct response.

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Sara: I'm trying not to laugh too hard

'cause I know it'll spike the microphone.

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I could witness, I could witness

that so clearly in my head.

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Lacey: That's true.

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Fair enough.

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Absolutely.

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I'm really excited to

share my joy moment today.

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and it features my other daughter, Iris.

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the mornings my husband drops

her off at daycare, so there's

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like two camps in the morning.

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There's Joe and Iris going

out into the world, and then

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there's Isaac, violet and me.

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And we get Isaac on the bus, us We've

heard me how much I love my husband,

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Joe, but he is not a morning person.

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So in the mornings I am usually the

one like getting everybody moving.

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Like, Hey, are you doing this?

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You need to do this.

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How about this?

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Get dressed.

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I picked out this outfit for you.

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and I, we've learned things

that motivate Iris, one of

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which is beating Joe downstairs.

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That's very important to her.

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So we always have that in our back pocket.

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I rem I, one of the t-shirts I got

her for Christmas had this little

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like heart pocket, like, it was like

a, where a pocket on a shirt would

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be like if you like a pen pocket, if

you think, but it's a little heart.

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And it was cute.

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And I thought, oh, she can put stuff

in there, and that kind of thing.

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So I picked that up for her to wear and I

put it down in her like pile of clothes.

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Mm-hmm.

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not moving.

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And then I try to sell.

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The shirt.

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I was like, see it's got this pocket.

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So I run into the office really quick

and I just wrote, I Love You on a little

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sheet of paper and like decorated it

a little bit and brought it back and

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folded it up and put it in the pocket.

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I said, you can look at it

if you, when you get dressed.

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And that was motivation.

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So she got dressed really fast and

then opened it and looked at it

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and I said, it says I love you.

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And she.

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I thought it was the greatest thing.

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So then she folded it back

up and put it in her pocket.

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Went and found gel.

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She pulled it out and folded it, showed

him, fold it back up, put in her pocket.

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I thought that was the end of it, right?

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I'm like, oh, good thing.

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Well, when she comes home, she

comes running in and she's like,

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mommy, I lost the note, but then

I found it again, so it's okay.

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And I was like, okay, cool.

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That's fine.

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Again, thinking that's it.

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Later that night, Joel looks at me and

he was like, I need you to know, she

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told me today that today was the best day

ever because of your note and that she.

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Just loved it so much.

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It made her feel so special and so seen.

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and she's, I am very effusive

with my words of, like we

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say, I love you all the time.

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I tell them how much I love being their

mom all the time and that kind of stuff.

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been particularly effusive lately,

like, you're the best mom in the world.

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And I'm like, cool.

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I hope you think it that way

in 15 years and all this stuff.

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And that night she was very effusive about

like how wonderful of a mom I was and.

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It's because she loved that little note.

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And as, as I was saying that, I was like,

well, my mom used to write me little

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notes and like when I would pack, she

would pack my lunch, there'd be a note.

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And I even have two instances

in my mind of when my mom left

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a note somewhere unexpectedly.

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So like one time she left it on my.

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She was at my house and she

left it on my desk at my house.

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And then I had some series of

appointments that she took me to,

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and she put the note on my dash, like

on the, under the windshield wiper

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of my car, and it said, I love you.

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And I was like, oh, know, I

know now what Iris is feeling.

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I know that feeling of like

having that tangible thing

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from somebody that loves you.

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So just, I'm riding

that high two days later

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Sara: That makes my heart happy.

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it's triggering all these good memories

of me receiving and now I've got

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this whole thing of like, Ooh, should

we just always be writing notes and

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slipping them into people's pockets?

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Like little joy droplets

all over the world because.

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That is the power of the joy Ripple.

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Imagine how she showed up at daycare

that day with that note in her pocket.

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That is so beautiful.

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I'm trying not to cry 'cause it's way too

early in the day for me to start crying.

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Let's not break that seal.

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Lacey: I didn't realize

she would love it so much.

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Like she literally, like Joe was like,

she said something and she was like, what?

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Today was special.

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Mommy wrote me the note,

like I was like the note.

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And then yeah.

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Violet, we do hear you.

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You're heard.

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Keep going.

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Sara: Her girlfriend that, and that

just again, goes to the power of.

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Joy doesn't have to be big.

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It's not necessarily winning

the lottery or going to France.

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it can be your mom writing you

a note that says, I love you.

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That goes in your little heart pocket.

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I have a similar memory, so my dad

was actually, worked out of the house

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when I was little, so he was the one

who would help me pack my lunches.

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Sometimes he'd actually draw on the

paper bag and then other times he would

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do a napkin and he loved to draw Snoopy.

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so I would pull out little notes with

drawings on them and yeah, it did.

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It made the day feel really

special ' cause it was a one-to-one.

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So you are a great mom, Lacey.

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I love that.

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Lacey: I don't often feel like a great

mom as, as we started this episode

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with how much Miss Rachel is in our

house Screen time is always a battle.

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so.

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I need to hear that right now, you know?

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'cause I'm got Miami CCF s

stuff coming back in and, and

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that really affects as a mom.

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And so it is nice to hear that.

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Sara: Can we have another podcast

called Compliments where people call

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in and they need compliments and we

just shower them with compliments.

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Lacey: I did see your post

about favorite compliments.

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I realized one of my favorite compliments

has shaped who I see myself as.

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one time one of my dad's business partners

called me Vivacious after meeting me, and

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I'm like, well, that's who I wanna be.

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that is who I aspire to be

all the time, vivacious.

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Sara: That makes me happy.

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you were telling me about our recent joy

moments, the snippet about the birds that

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went a little viral on TikTok and you told

me somebody called it wholesome and I was

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like, yes, that one nestled into my heart.

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I was like, yeah, that's it.

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I wanna be seen as wholesome.

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In my intentions and my

joy and spreading it well.

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So you commenting on my threads post

actually is a perfect segue into my

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joy, which is like a little Russian

doll, like nesting doll of joy.

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So follow me with this

Russian nesting doll.

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. So I am back on threads.

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I've learned how to show up in a way that

feels better to me and kind of shield

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myself from the stuff I don't like.

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Lacey: Violet is officially joining us.

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Sara: So I made a post on threads as I

was taking down the ornaments on my tree.

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And I realized I love going to

other people's houses and seeing

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their trees because everyone's is

unique and it is such a reflection

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of them and their history and

it most ornaments tell a story.

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And so I went on to threads and I asked

people if they still had their trees up.

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I said, share an ornament

and the story behind it.

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and I got.

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Amazing responses, and if anybody's

interested, you can go to my Threads,

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account steps with Sarah and check it out.

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So I picked out one and it's

a little, it's, it's sad

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and joyful at the same time.

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so there's a picture of a tree and

then there's a name tag in the tree.

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And this woman, JL Shepley, she said my

local garden center names their trees.

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The tree we picked this year hadn't been

set up yet, so it didn't have a name tag.

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Told the guy to just pick

the first tag on the pile.

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It was Eric, which is the same

name as the son of a lifelong

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family friend who died recently.

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Go to share with his mother that

Eric would definitely be present

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with us this Christmas and future

Christmases, because I keep all the

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name tags and use them as ornaments.

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So, okay.

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I just have to unwrap the joy here.

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I love that there is, a

tree store someplace that

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names their Christmas trees.

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Love that.

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That is joy.

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And then that this synchrony of them

getting the name of somebody who had

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passed away recently And then that

they keep all the name tags on their

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trees to remember all their past trees.

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Again, Russian nesting

doll of happy memories.

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So I loved that.

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Lacey: Have you listened to

the episode with my dad yet?

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Oh, sharing the middle.

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Sara: I've listened to half of it.

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I loved the part about getting the treat.

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Lacey: Through the door.

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Sara: Yes, I love that part.

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Lacey: I had a realization while talking

to him about how much our tree at their

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house, but really my house is very much

a story of Joe and i's life together.

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because we were both Christmas people.

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He proposed to me in front of our

Christmas tree with a Christmas ornament.

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and then every year since

then, we've gifted each other a

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Christmas ornament for that year.

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anytime we travel somewhere, we try

to get a Christmas ornament for it.

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So it really is.

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We gave out Christmas ornaments

as our, favor at our wedding.

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So every once in a while I get a text

from somebody when they're putting up

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or taking down their tree that they're

putting up the, or my, my, wedding.

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So it really is like a moment every

year where I get to kind of celebrate.

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Joe and I in a way of our

love and relationship.

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It really does tell the story.

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We've got lots of like

Indian Luna ones on there.

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There's some from when I was

a baby and he was a baby.

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of course now we have all kinds of kids,

and my kids are the most sentimental

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people I've ever met in my life.

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And so when we were putting it

up, they would take one at a time.

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Mommy, tell us about this ornament.

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Tell us about this ornament.

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And it was very sweet.

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Sara: Oh yeah.

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I'd never really thought about the

power of story with the Christmas

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ornaments in the Christmas tree.

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And yeah, that made me

really happy this year.

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Lacey: I now wish that we had named

the Christmas trees with my parents.

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they had personalities, you know?

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So if you can be like,

do you remember Jerry?

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He was a heck of a tree.

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Sara: I like this.

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This is fun.

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Oh, this is the kind of stuff that

gets me going through the day.

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Lacey: when we did get a real

tree, we don't anymore 'cause

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it's too hard with kids right now.

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But when we did, I would cry every

year when we took it down because

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I was sad about like that tree

leaving our house, Joe and I.

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So I love that that's a way

honor that tree in a future year.

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when she gets to be like four or

five, we're gonna do real trees

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again, and we're gonna name 'em.

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It's decided.

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Sara: Oh, you could do like a little

paper chain with the names and

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then connect every year the name of

the tree, and then put the year on

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the back, and so it becomes like,

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Lacey: Oh my gosh, I could cry

right now thinking about it.

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Okay.

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Sara: okay.

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Lacey: Obviously it's very clear.

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This all means a lot to me.

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Thanks for, spending some time

with us today here on Joy Moments.

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I hope you got to take a little bit

of joy and put it out in the world.

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Sarah, do you have any closing thoughts?

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Sara: I wanna say it's been a rough

morning and just recording joy moments.

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Brought me joy.

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And so if anyone out there listening

got just a blip of joy from

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listening to us, that's amazing.

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And I know I'm gonna smile when

I listen to this later 'cause I

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will have forgotten everything.

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So hello to Future Me.

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You're awesome.

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Lacey: Remember, if you have a joy moment

you would like to share with us, if you

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go to joyful support movement.com/submit.

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Go to submit Joy Moments and other things

like Q and A's for No Shame and our game.

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thanks

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Sara: Thank you, Lacey.

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Thank you, Lacey.