Please give a warm welcome to Jennifer Morrison! Jennifer is a Yoga instructor, relationship coach, body worker, and dancer. She also happens to be a lovely, warm, open human being. Jennifer takes us through her journey from Taos, New Mexico, to Southwestern Wisconsin sharing with us her experiences and life lessons along the way. We talk about family and defining home, balancing how to follow your calling with the need to feel grounded, and continuing to find purpose and meaning and excitement for new things in middle age.

Please welcome Zoe Ellerbusch to the fire! It has been a long time since we've gathered and Zoe is such a wonderful guest to bring us back together. Zoe is a licensed Professional Counselor who specializes in work with children and adolescents. In this episode we talk about the new challenges both children and parents are facing parenting today as well as COVID's lasting effects on our youth and how to negotiate technology (an issue most of us didn't grow up needing to navigate). Zoe also shares with us her life journey that led her back to her roots and finding her passion.

Please welcome Kirsten Layer to the Fire! Kirsten was one of the first friends I made when we moved to Viroqua and she's one of my favorite people I've ever met. The two of us could talk about almost anything but I thought it would be fun to start with a conversation about sex education. Kirsten is the Healthy Relationships & Sex Ed teacher at Youth Initiative High School so we talk about our experiences with sex ed when we were in school and how things have changed since then. We also talk about why Healthy Relationships is so important to emphasize when teaching sex ed and how it is a detriment to both men and women when it's left out of the discussion.

Please give a warm welcome to Dena Eakles as she joins us around the fire today. Dena is the owner of Echo Valley Farm near Ontario, WI. We talk about Dena's journey from Pennsylvania to Chicago to rural Wisconsin and how she followed a calling to the work she does now. Dena is a deeply spiritual person and she shares how that guides her in her life and the choices she makes as the farm continues to evolve. We also talk about Dena's work as an activist and what she's looking forward to in the coming years. You can learn more about Dena and the Farm on her website: www.echovalleyfarmwisconsin.com

Please give a warm "Welcome Back!" to Martha Buche. Martha was on the podcast last year and in many ways it felt like we barely scratched the surface of Parenting, Parent Development, and Child Development. In this episode we dive a little deeper into the authoritative and interpretive stages of parenting (early elementary school thru middle school), but we touch on a little bit of everything else, too. I share what I'm learning as I move through stages of parenting and we talk about the beauty and wisdom that is on the other side of parenting challenges.

**Martha is coming back for another episode (Part 2!) next week so I'm re-releasing this episode in case you missed it the first time.  Martha Buche (or Ms. Martha as she’s affectionately known in our house) is here today! Oh my goodness could we all use a bit of Martha in our back pocket. Martha is an early childhood educator extraordinaire and she is here to talk about child development and parenting. We talk about what children need to grow and develop but also what parents need to grow and develop. It was such a fun, informative conversation and in many ways we barely scratched the surface. I’m already calling for a Part 2!

Happy New Year everyone and Welcome back to Women's Fire. I squeezed in a recording last week because it felt important and timely. My guest is Dina Yehia. Dina is from Egypt and has had a front row seat to the Isreali-Palestinian wars since she was a child. Dina now lives here in the Driftless area and is working with others in the region to promote the Palestinian perspective and calls for peace in the region as a member of Driftless Palestinian Solidarity. Dina shares her knowledge of history and current perspective of the conflict and what she thinks is the way forward.

Vicky Reeves is a fellow female podcaster in the Driftless area, and also just so happens to be a delightful human being. Vicky shares with us her journey from being a Presbyterian elder by the age of 16, through Buddhism, to where she is now as a life coach and spiritually curious woman. We talk about burnout, how taking care of others starts with taking care of ourselves, and how embracing our pain points is the key to joy and love. I truly loved recording this episode and I hope you will love it, too. You can find out more about Vicky on her website: shinefreely.com

A warm, cozy welcome to Prudence Tippins! Prudence is here to talk about her journey through menopause. It was a transformative experience for her as she discovered the lack of information about this stage of a woman's life and ended up doing a lot of research on her own. She shares gratitude for her journey along with information she wishes she would have known along the way. This is a really great conversation and I hope you all leave feeling informed and inspired.

Yay! Joy Miller is here everyone! Let's give her a warm welcome. Joy is a farmer and owner of Keewaydin Farms in rural La Farge, WI. During COVID she began getting requests for people to be able to come out and be in nature at their property and these were the first seeds that were planted for what is now Driftless Curiosity. In the episode we talk about how Joy never saw herself as a farmer until she fell in love with one and how this role has left her with deep connection to the earth, one she wants to share with as many people as she can. For more information on the work Joy is doing in the world and how you can get involved you can check out driftlesscuriosity.org.