In the face of deep poverty and great challenges, compassion, determination and friendship has lead to over 100,000 individuals having access to clean water in Guinea, West Africa. Learn about Motherland Rhythm Community’s ongoing BioSand Water (BSF) filter initiative which is transforming lives in West Africa. BSFs are based on traditional slow sand filters removing pathogens and suspended solids from water.

Communication is often tricky for women, and needs to start with how we talk to ourselves. Through discussion, interactive exercises and reflection we will first learn to shift our relationship with ourselves. For the latter part of the workshop we will establish a number of strategies for bringing our authentic selves to relationship with friends, family and community.

Understanding how our minds got “here” can increase our sense of efficacy (“I am confident”), agency (“I am able”), and compassion (“I am worthy”). Reviewing landmark research on ACES and resiliency, we will calculate our ACE and resiliency scores, learn what it says about our health and target areas to focus. We’ll look at the results of this work in under-resourced communities and the take-aways for us all.

Women's space is powerful and needed in women's lives. This class will equip you to offer women's circles for the women in your life and have more structure for your own personal practice. You will learn about holding space for women, the lineage of the Red Tent, the basic structure of ritual creation, tips about facilitating ritual, how to set up the physical space, as well as songs, chants, and meditations.

In this session, we will gather together in circle, acknowledging ourselves, our teachers, and each other, as well as past, present, and future beings on the land beneath our feet. This awareness brings us into conversation and nurtures our relationships with plants. We will utilize the seven senses (breathe, listen, feel, see, touch, smell, taste) to connect with the plants in our presence and imagination.

We will explore ways we can contribute to supporting the health of the places where mushrooms grow. We will begin with a grounding presentation about environmental challenges happening locally and more broadly, share stories about actions we have taken, or plan to take, to help ensure the mycelium world will thrive into the next generations.

This is an illustrated talk about making a community sourced-cookbook, and the lessons I’ve drawn from testing hundreds of mushroom recipes, to wit, how and why mushrooms behave differently in the kitchen than other foods.

Drawing from her own experiences, Caro offers practical strategies and techniques to cultivate curiosity in artmaking and deepen our relationship with the natural world. How can we dive deeper into our personal relationships with non-human kin? How can we become citizen scientists and explore nature in our own ways?

For established or in-progress business owners, project starters, creatives. We will apply the principles & ethics of permaculture to the world of herbal business, project creation and beyond! We can utilize the tools and framework of permaculture design to map our individual stories, uncover our soul work & recognize the value of community support as we undergo this journey in putting our work out into the world.

Many laws impact herbalists, whether it be state practice acts that may limit the ability to practice a healing art without conventional licensing, or federal and state product laws, including labeling or health claims issues that may restrict free speech or signs and symbols. In this workshop you’ll learn basic concepts to assist in educating herbalists on these issues.

Effective resistance requires endurance, resilience, and the discipline to stay healthy through stress and challenges. We'll explore herbal remedies, spiritual practices, nourishing foods, and self-care tools to create a heart-healing toolkit for navigating tough times. Prioritizing self-care, being prepared, and embracing support are essential for overcoming adversity and empowering ourselves and the world.

Through a lens of Black and feminist frameworks, we will learn how herbs can be utilized daily and intentionally to support our human nervous systems. We will expand our capacity to access our breath for transformation and explore how herbs can be used in simple yet effective ways to create healing spaces. The focus will be on healing for women, black people, brown people, and communities of color.

In this talk, Sarah will take us on a meander through the world of wild mushrooms, with an eye towards the intricate relationships mushrooms have with a surprising array of wildlife, including, ourselves. Using this lens of ecological awareness, we’ll challenge ourselves as foragers to examine our own role as active stewards of biodiversity, recognizing that natural areas everywhere are in crisis.

In today’s world of rapid technology and unending stimulation, shifting cultures of herbalism compound the difficulty of balancing life's demands in a big loud world. In the face of all this noise, how do we maintain our true connection with the plants themselves? Come reflect on many of the issues facing us today while also honoring the simplicities that make us herbalists.

What is the story we are weaving for our granddaughters? All of our granddaughters? Will they want to cultivate what we are seeding, in their lives, in the soil, in the world? Sit with Venice Williams as she shares the stories of her ancestral grandmothers, and invites us to explore, more fully, what we are, and may not be, sowing for the women who will follow us.

Truffle-forming fungi, cryptic, charismatic, and living right here in the Midwest. This includes genera like the genus Tuber with its rich culinary legacy as well as many, many other truffle-forming fungal species with fascinating and important ecological histories. This presentation will explore and introduce you to the diverse fungi which produce truffles and can be found in the Midwest region of North America.

I turned to the social sciences to learn how to communicate about invasive species and other sensitive, multi-faceted topics in science. What I learned completely transformed how I think, how I reflect on society, and how I conduct myself as a scientist. Join me in an open conversation about how we interact with science and each other.

This experiential workshop invites us to enter the mycelial forest of grief, where loss is not something to fix or avoid, but to compost. Through embodied practices, communal ritual, and deep listening, we'll honor personal, collective, and ecological grief, allowing what is dying to be laid down with reverence.

We will explore a traveling library of mycology books on many themes and handle fresh mushrooms. Creative tools will be provided. Recipes, poems, observations, facts, quotes, stories and drawings can all go in. All experience levels are welcome. We may then allow our pages to be digitally recorded (or not) and then take ours home or give them away.

A trip through the faerie portal into the realms of plant intelligence. A slide into the center of the Earth to reconnect with plant wisdom. A flight on magic carpets of pollen into the heart of green blessings.

Preserving our heirloom garden seeds & indigenous wild seeds is the cornerstone of any localized food movement. In our time together we'll explore ways to building a sustainable seed community. Topics to be touched on include basic seed saving info, seed libraries, hosting seed swaps, useful tools & best practices for harvesting/storing seed.

The Midwest Women's Herbal Conference has been a source of inspiration for me for over a decade. While honoring the amazing women who have shared their wisdom at the conference, this workshop highlights my favorite teachers, presentations, and experiences and their impact on my journey of growing and wildcrafting herbs, medicine making, clinical practice, self-care, family care, and community tending.

This workshop focuses on songs that propel us into the Light. Learn songs about healing, peace, love, and building community. This is music that affirms us in our own truth, body, and spirit. We will also learn songs that are widely known among women's circles.

It has been theorized that one of the biggest obstacles to the feminist movement stems from the wound of sisterhood: women distrusting or undermining each other. Is this just the nature of women, or is this a learned behavior? We will uncover the roots of this issue by exploring communities of women throughout western history. By tending to our roots first, we will see our gardens of sisterhood flourish.

Learn how to make clean, safe water using BioSand Filter technology. BioSand Filters are based on traditional slow sand filters, removing pathogens and suspended solids from water. Helen will share how her nonprofit, Motherland Rhythm Community, builds and delivers these life-changing filters in Guinea, West Africa, and show you how you can do it too.

In this session, you'll learn about the science and scientists working to help protect the landscapes and mycelial species we value as well as the ways mushrooms are helping solve sustainability challenges. We'll talk about what we can do individually and collectively to support and nourish the diversity of living things in the places we live. Go home feeling empowered to protect what you love!

The life of a woman contains many initiations. Recognizing these rites of passage through ritual and ceremony is important in our journey to wholeness. This workshop will help you to bring ritual into your life and the lives of the women around you. We will focus on Menarche, Motherhood, and Croning. We will discuss ways to ritualize these important moments in the life of a woman.