Darien mom turns into TikTok star for parenting hacks

DARIEN — Shannon Doherty understands daily life can be busy striving to harmony operating a business and boosting four small young children. Insert a pandemic to complicate factors, and the 36-year-aged Darien mother wanted to appear up with some hacks to get by means of the working day.

Which is when she decided to share her suggestions on TikTok.

“To be straightforward, I was not guaranteed what it was at first,” mentioned Doherty, who owns Darien’s Coco+Lala clothing retailer.

“I imagined it was just one thing that young ones used to share films of them dancing,” she stated.

Considering that signing up for in March, Doherty now has 160,000 followers, 6 million likes, and an estimated 40 million views. Previously this thirty day period, just one of Doherty’s mom hacks, a wholesome sanitation station, was featured on “Great Morning The us.” Doherty mentioned she was approached by the show’s editor immediately after she observed Doherty’s TikTok. The movie has now gained additional than 400,000 likes.

A person mother hack Doherty shared on TikTok was “Random things in our laundry room that just make sense.” All those merchandise incorporated a purse for loose transform, a sign that can be flipped to say “clean or dirty,” a smaller Keurig coffee maker, and a lonely sock bin. That TikTok got just about 15,000 likes. A further similar video clip about laundry home hacks acquired practically 40,000 likes.

Doherty claimed she attempts to incorporate humor with valuable suggestions for how to juggle staying a operating mom.

“I consider to imagine of resourceful suggestions that no one else is pointing out. And we have four children, so I’m jogging all-around and most of my strategies have gone by way of trial and error — they in fact perform,” Doherty reported.

Doherty reported she also attempts to clearly show she’s a real person who isn’t excellent.

“If I’m cooking, and I burn up the cake, I clearly show that,” she explained.

Some of her most popular concepts contain self-serve stations for her children’s foods and desires, like a breakfast station, a snack station in the fridge, and a lunch station. Through the summer season, she also experienced a poolside self-provide sunblock station.

One more well known video clip confirmed a inventive way to get her small small children into the grocery cart via the swinging again alternatively of lifting them about the aspect. A further activity gave Doherty a probability to just take a brief nap while the kids “draw mommy sleeping,” which drew extra than 150,000 likes.

Doherty’s good results has attained her 14 regular sponsorships and has increased publicity for her retailer, which also sells its goods on-line and has spots in Darien and in Westerly, R.I.

Doherty does not typically display the faces of her little ones, Leontine “Lala,” 6, Colton “Coco,” 5, Fallon “Peaches,” 3, and Hunter, 1, on TikTok. Doherty claims some men and women are hesitant to expose their young children to the internet, but she says social media “isn’t going anywhere.”

“It’s likely to be portion of their life,” she said. “If I can harness it and instruct them to use it responsibly, they can use it to their edge and not have it try to eat them alive.”

When the pandemic very first closed schools and companies in March, Doherty used Coco+Lala to raise awareness with her “Spread Really like Not Germs” shirt and hashtag. For just about every “Spread Love” shirt bought, Coco+Lala supported Share Our Strengths #NoKidHungry campaign to give 10 foods for youngsters who wanted foodstuff.

TikTok was a different way Doherty claimed she and other individuals ended up able to interact when staying trapped at dwelling throughout the pandemic.

“We’ve been owning so significantly exciting with it. It was a excellent way to be connected to people,” she stated. “I’ve satisfied a whole lot of mothers this way. It was a enjoyable way to stay linked and be carrying out one thing.”

Inspite of her sudden TikTok fame, Doherty stated her youngsters still preserve her grounded.

“I say to my daughter, ‘Did you convey to your friends we posted a new TikTok movie?’ And she suggests, ‘No, mom, that is embarrassing!’” Doherty reported, laughing.

“I say, ‘Embarrassing? But I’m so cool.’” she additional.

Shannon Doherty can be identified on TikTok @theshannonldoherty.