Melissa Joan Hart of 'Melissa & Joey' talks work, parenting and how she manages both [Exclusive Interview]

Actress, director, producer, clothing designer, mother, taco enthusiast.

Melissa Joan Hart is all of these. Best known as beloved characters Clarissa on Nickelodeon’s Clarissa Explains It All (1991-94) and Sabrina on ABC’s Sabrina the Teenage Witch (1996-2003), Hart most recently starred in ABC Family’s Melissa & Joey — which debuted in 2010 and was just cancelled after four full seasons.

Amid building her acting career, Hart took on many other roles, with one in particular being motherhood. She and her husband, musician Mark Wilkerson, have three sons together, ages 9, 6 and 2. Hart has been outspoken online about motherhood, sharing photos of her family on social media and offering parenting tips and hacks.

On Aug. 13, Hart spoke with TheCelebrityCafe.com from Philadelphia about parenting, how she limits the stress of things like balancing schedules and planning meals, as well as about Melissa & Joey and what she has going on in her professional life.

TheCelebrityCafe: To start, what’s your secret to managing a crazy schedule, between your own activities and those of your kids?

Melissa Joan Hart: Keeping a good calendar is I think key to keeping your household running smoothly. When you have kids’ playdates and sports coming up and homework assignments and Back to School Night and things like that, I think a calendar is super important and that’s how I keep my family running. Because we’re in a different city every day practically, so with me moving around and working and my husband working, it gets to be overwhelming, but there are a lot of great mom hacks, too, that can help keep things organized and whatnot.

I'm here today to talk about Old El Paso's new mini taco boats, so I think that's a great way to bring things back at dinner time. When you have a busy school day, you get the kids out the door, you're packing their lunches and having to help them with homework and going to soccer and then you come home and you want to reconnect with your family — a great way to do it is over dinner time. The mini taco boats help make it fun for the family and healthy for moms.

TCC: So is that why you’re in Philadelphia now, to promote Old El Paso’s new offering?

MJH: I'm in Philly, because... we're going to hand out the mini taco boats [later today] and you can enter the sweepstakes to win; If you post a picture of your family eating your tacos and then you do #tacoboatsweepstakes, then you can enter the sweepstakes to win a year's worth of mini taco boats.

TCC: How can parents get their kids involved in the dinner making process, so that they appreciate it more?

MJH: That's what I always love about taco night. You can put out a lot of things on the table that are both healthy and fun for the kids. Then they can create it themselves — kids love to have control of things, they love to win the battles. My kids are super picky eaters, so if I have the mini taco boats — one serving is four of these — you can do whatever you want with it.

We got pretty creative. We have yogurt, fruit, we have veggie sticks and a whole Philly spread with the pretzels and dips and stuff. Today, here in Philly, we're going to be giving out the ones with the ground beef. You can put all kinds of — you can put salads in it, a little cheese on top, my kids love to use sour cream, that kind of thing.

TCC: How do you stay connected to your kids during the busy school year?

MJH: Well, I think that's when dinner time is important. I think that's the one time families really have to sit down together and talk about their day and get ready for the night time, kind of wind down and turn off the TV, turn off the electronics. Then take the level of the intensity of the day down a little bit and sit around a fun dinner and reconnect with your family and your kids, and figure out what happened to us during the day.

I know for me, if I asked [my kids] “how was school?” they're just like "good." So if I say, “who was bad today in school,” that usually helps. They really like that, they'll go "oh so and so got sent to the buddy teacher, or the principal's office, or they didn't do their homework.” They love to tell on their friends a little bit and that's how I get them to start conversations.

TCC: Since, as you said, your kids are picky, how do you decide what to make for dinner every day?

MJH: It's difficult, yeah. I like to schedule out the week. On the weekends I sit down with my husband and figure out what we're going to do for the five weekdays and then the weekends can take care of themselves sometimes. So we each take two nights. I take two nights, he take two nights and then we figure out the other night as we go along, with like leftovers or whatever.

But meal planning is I think one of the biggest stresses and I think the taco boats are an easy way to sort of take that off the table — have one night that's easy and fun for everybody.

TCC: How do the parent-child relationships you’ve experienced through your roles compare to your own?

MJH: Well, I've always played the child really. On Clarissa and Sabrina I always played the daughter or the niece, and then in my last show I was playing the aunt, so it was a little bit flip-flopped, but I wasn't the maternal aunt. I wasn't the one really doing the right thing, I was the one doing the wrong thing, the kids were kind of teaching me as we went along.

But there's no book on it. There's really no right or wrong way to parent. It's really individual and there's a lot of talk right now about pacifiers on my Instagram. With the Beckhams and stuff right now — when do you give up the pacifier and all these other things that people think are rules or things that they can voice their opinion on on social media.

For me, I have a two year old that likes the pacifier and every time I post a picture of him, people get irate over it, there's fights that break out on my Instagram, so it's funny. But it's what’s individual to you and your child, and parenting styles. I think a lot of friendships are made and lost because of different parenting styles.

TCC: Where do you get your style from?

MJH: I think we all get our parenting style from our parents. We either do what they did that we liked or try to avoid what they did that we didn't like. But I think ultimately it comes down to tough love, we have to lay down the law, teach them right from wrong and discipline them and if we don't, they become spoiled brats and I use the example of Varuca Salt with my kids from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. I always say “you're acting like Veruca right now” and that kind of makes them go, "oh, okay, I won't do that."

TCC: Going back to the subject of social media, You're really active online... why do you make that part of your life?

MJH: I think it's fun, everybody enjoys doing social media. I look at Instagram as a family scrapbook kind of thing. I used to love to scrapbook, I still do them when I can, but it's an easy way to share photos of friends, family, fans. And even, sometimes my husband finds out things like that I'm in Philly with his son and we’re watching the sunrise by the river, my husband is going to see that when he wakes up on Instagram.

TCC:How do or will you keep your sons in check regarding social media and technology?

MJH: They're already getting overwhelmed with screen time. We did an “unplugged” week this summer and that was big, that was hard. The first day was really difficult, finding those activities that can keep them entertained. We try to use it as screen time is more of a reward. My son is here with me this morning so he's getting some good screen time today. But I try to use it as a reward, if you do ten minutes of drum practice or ten minutes of homework, you get 10 minutes of screen time, that kind of thing. We let them use it when we travel a lot, that's when we try to limit it to.

We don't have to worry about social media and that yet but when I do, I'm definitely going to be looking toward the schools and teachers and libraries and all those things that have information on the best ways to do this — the doctors, pediatricians — on how to best limit that stuff and how to keep an eye on it.

TCC: Is there anything you learned while playing Carissa or Sabrina that helps you in your life as a mom and working actress today?

MJH: Actually, my last role, Melissa/Aunt Mel on Melissa & Joey, was the opposite of being a good mom, she was an aunt who is taking care of her kids, so to play that role I pretty much did everything that was the opposite of a maternal instinct to play that character.

I think Clarissa and Sabrina taught me a lot through my life, they were sort of my best friends since I had to get to know them very well, spend a lot of time with them. It all prepared me for where I am today, but I was the oldest of eight kids and I think that's what really helped me become the mom I am.

TCC: Speaking of Melissa & Joey, looking back, how do you feel about its success and how it ended?

MJH: I think it did really well. It was the kind of show that was like the Little Engine that could, it just kept going and that's because the fans really liked it. I think it was really funny, I think they wrote the show so smart and I think we did really well for how many different networks and channels and shows there are on TV right now.

TCC: What was the fan response to Melissa & Joey getting cancelled?

MJH: There was a campaign going for a little while, people were trying to save the show. But once those decisions are made, they're made because there's no broadcasting time left for the show. But that was really sweet, people really took to the show and it was really the fans that drove that show and kept it on so long.

I think it was really well written and I think it was a wonderful show. I really enjoyed being part of it, but six years is a long time and four long seasons, and that's all anyone can really ask from a TV show so I couldn't be happier with the way it ended.

TCC: They're bringing back a bunch of 90s shows right now, what are your thoughts on a Sabrina return?

MJH: I don't know. I think it's hard to revisit those things. I like to move forward. It's great to think about the past and watch the shows from the past but I think that sometimes, if you don't do it right, it can be really sad. So I don't know, it would really depend on how the writing was or something if I was going to do a reboot.

TCC: Besides acting and being a mother, you’ve produced, directed, you have a clothing line — did you just fall into those different roles or did you consciously decide to do a little bit of everything?

MJH: The clothing line was something that came up organically because I had children and I was really interested in the garment industry. My parents were entrepreneurs, I loved the idea of the business world. This was my first time really going into it — I had a candy store before but I learned a lot from that experience.

And so now, with the clothing line, I'm really trying to enter the business world and it's something I can do at home, when the kids are at school, and I'm loving it. We just launched our fall line this week and it's King of Harts, you can find it at King of Harts Kids. I'm having a blast with it, just designing the clothes, doing the marketing, all the social media and whatnot.

TCC: Did the clothing line slowly come to fruition or was there a particular moment that sparked you into starting it?

MJH: One day, New Year's last year, 2014, I just said you know what, I really want to do this. I've been thinking about it for a long time, since my first was born. So I went out and sought a designer and a team that knew the garment industry and really could lead us in the right direction. It's just my husband and I — a lot of times celebrities slap their name on something that someone else has made, but this is us making this, going to factories and feeling every piece of fabric. It's really exciting and fun to see these creations come alive.

TCC: Is there something that you haven't done yet that you want to tackle next?

MJH: No, not yet. If I continue with the clothing line, I'd like to go to girls' clothes eventually. I don't have little girls, so I love the idea of little girls' clothes, but the thing is boys really need their clothes right now. There's not much out there for boys, especially cool graphic tees that don't have licensed characters on them. So that's what we decided to focus on was graphic T-shirts.

TCC: What's next for you?

MJH: I completed a movie that will be out in the spring called God's Not Dead 2. So I’m excited about that, we just finished shooting that in Arkansas.

TCC: Anything else in development?

MJH: There's a lot of things in development that I'm not allowed to talk about just yet but hopefully later this year I'll have stuff for you.

TCC: Where can people go for more of your tips?

MJH: For me, you can go to my social media pages at MelissaJoanHart and for Old El Paso's sweepstakes, you can go to OldElPaso.com or you can just upload a picture of your family having some fun and do hashtag tacoboatsweepstakes.