Local Mom – Tracie Krieger

Name: Tracie Krieger

Where did you grow up: Cleveland, Ohio

Town you live in now: Palm Beach Gardens

Why you love living there: I love being able to walk my dogs any time, day or night, enjoy this beautiful community (especially Kolter’s ARTISTRY), and see other dogs and kids. To be BAREFOOT because the weather is ALWAYS nice, and I love PBG for all the great shopping, restaurants, schools, friends… all of it!

Tell me about your kids: Charlotte, 22, is a Musical Theater Major at The University of Oklahoma, Ben is a singer/songwriter at NYU (check out Ben Krieger on Spotify!), and my youngest is 16 at Oxbridge Academy

Favorite things to do with the kids locally: They’re older, so we love to go OUT – Coolinary is our favorite!

What’s your ‘day job’? How did you get started with it?  I run Tracie’s Music Together LLC – a licensee of Music Together Worldwide based in Princeton, NJ. I am a small business based in PBG where I offer mommy-and-me music classes for ages 0 – 5 in PBG, Jupiter, Tequesta, North Palm Beach and West Palm Beach. We offer almost 40 weekly classes at parks, synagogues, churches or community centers. We have around 400 students per semester. I started this job when I was TAKING my daughter Charlotte to class when she was 18 months old. I fell in LOVE with it, so I started doing it myself for fun and for some shoe-shopping money. As my kids got older, I started teaching more and more, and I found more demand for it. So, I hired more teachers, expanded, got divorced, expanded some MORE, and then met Loren Klein from ZenHippo, a collective of local experts offering wellness and mindful play programs for new parents, caregivers, babies and toddlers. We now partner to provide classes throughout the year across Palm Beach County. 

What is your best parenting advice.  Lay it on us.  My absolute best “hindsight is 20/20” advice is to LET THEM STRUGGLE. Period. End of story. DO NOT SAVE THEM. My first therapist told me, “Tracie, when they’re whining, SIT ON YOUR HANDS”.  Metaphorically and physically, this works. Sit on your hands!  They may be little problems for little kids – but this becomes big problems for big kids. Don’t save them! When you save them, you don’t teach them anything – except maybe that they have to rely on you and that they can’t do things themselves! If you let them struggle and figure things out, they will build confidence and self-reliance and grow up to be happy, successful, independent humans. Remember, happiness isn’t the absence of problems; happiness is the ability to cope with the hard stuff that inevitably will come your way.  This might start off with not being able to open your own juice box, but later, it turns into completing a school project, having a tough conversation with a friend, preparing for an important interview, managing the college application process, buying a house, all of it! 

SIMILARLY, if you can deal with your OWN ‘PAIN’ when your child is struggling, you will have unlocked the key to parenting success.  We often want to control or save our children because we can’t deal with our OWN discomfort around a situation.  But, if you can SIT ON YOUR HANDS even if it’s HARD, you will be doing them the best service ever! 

Oh and one more advice thing: what goes in is what comes out! So, if you’re always angry and stressed, think about that. If you’re kind, happy, and loving, think about THAT! What goes in is what comes out!

What do you do for self-care? Burn Boot Camp in Jupiter.  Massages whenever I can, and any kind of facial at Lickstein Plastic Surgery Med Spa in PBG

Karaoke – what are you singing? MADONNA. always.

Anything else you want to share? My middle son will be releasing an album soon! Follow him on Instagram!! @benkriegermusic 🙂

Would you like to nominate another mom?  If so, what is her name and email and why? Jackie Viscusi – baby sleep consultant!