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In this episode, Sophia Mills talks to Karen M. Ricks, a Christian wife, Worldschooling mom, nomadic chef, and a certified yoga instructor. Teaching for over 25 years, she has been a Montessorian since her own preschool days. She holds Montessori teaching certifications for guiding children from infancy through elementary. She has cooked professionally, in restaurants, commercial kitchens, and private homes on four different continents over the last decade and a half.

After 10 years of teaching in central Japan, where Karen founded and operated her own international Montessori school, she sold it all to begin a nomadic life of full-time travel with her family. Karen spreads her message of embracing a Slow Food Lifestyle, a lifelong love of learning, and education for peace by teaching people of all ages how to #PLAYwithYourFood and why they need to share that gift with those they love. You can learn more about her, her family’s edible exploits, and the lessons they are learning on their Culinary Worldschooling Adventures as they gallivant around the globe over at Our Kitchen Classroom. com.

GUEST INFORMATION/LINKS:
Website: https://OurKitchenClassroom.com
Facebook: https://facebook.com/ourkitchenclassroom
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/karenm.ricks/ (#OurKitchenClassroom) YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/c/ourkitchenclassroom
YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@YogaWKaren #PLAYwithYourFood Community: https://www.facebook.com/groups/WePLAYwithOurFood/
Subscribe to Our Kitchen Playground: https://ourkitchenclassroom.com/subscribe-to-our-kitchen-playground/

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In this Heart to Heart episode, Tonya Cajuste tells a story of a child who is overwhelmed with academics and how her family worked through these challenges. Join in to understand the impact of academic pressures and learn some ways to navigate scenarios like this one.

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In this episode, Sophia Mills and Sofia Scher interview Dr. Michelle Alden. Dr. Alden is a parent coach, licensed professional counselor in Idaho, and author. She has developed a program used in Idaho to help parents who have youth with severe behavior and mental health issues. Dr. Alden's passion is helping adoptive families to work through the challenges. She have worked with at-risk kids for more than 20 years, the last 10 years specifically in the homes and coaching parents navigate difficult situations directly in their homes. Dr. Alden's believes, like John Bowlby - an attachment expert - said, "if we love children, we must cherish their parents."

Dr. Alden wants to empower parents to parent and a key is giving the parents the tools and skills they need to help their children to work through and overcome the challenges they are facing. She offers parents the skills they need to build a bridge to the family they want and be in charge in their home and with their children.

GUEST INFORMATION/LINKS:

Main Website: healthyfoundations.co (not .com)
Coaching resources: parentingchallengingkids.com
Book: Parenting Emotionally Distressed Kids

The Playroom for Parents (entry level parent coaching group)
Courses for professionals and parents with ADHD Kids
The Parenting Bridge podcast

Social Media
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HealthyFoundationsFamilyProgram
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/healthyfoundationsfp/
Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@healthyfoundations7631
LindedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dr-michelle-alden-24558656

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In this episode, Sophia Mills interviews Jenniel Taylor, a Psychotherapist, Life Coach and Founder of the Shades of Trauma Healing Podcast. She has a passion for helping adults heal from the impacts of childhood trauma using a judgment-free, culturally sensitive, and trauma-informed approach. To provide a holistic therapeutic plan, Jenniel utilizes talk therapy, spiritual applications, and somatic (body awareness) interventions to support clients. She embraces joy, playfulness, and laughter in her personal and professional life and encourages her friends and clients to do the same.

Taylor understands the impacts of adverse childhood experiences on children's development, and uses the ACEs questionnaire with every client intake. Taylor has studied with the Arizona Trauma Institute to become a Certified Clinical Trauma Specialist, and has specific training in Parenting Traumatized Children.

GUEST INFORMATION/LINKS:

Resources referenced in the epsiode: Coregulation Games to Play With Your Children
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eTV8GKrQjqo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R4RPzy2GA_U

Podcast: Shades of Trauma Healing https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/shades-of-trauma-healing-childhood-trauma-trust/id1697943321
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/shades_of_trauma_healing/.
Email: support@shadesoftraumahealing.com

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In this episode, Sophia Mills and Rylie Heck speak with Julie McGue, an adult adoptee, identical twin, and author. At the age of 48, a breast biopsy brought to light the limitations of closed adoption, sparking a quest to uncover her birth circumstances, family medical history, and genealogy. Beyond her writing, Julie is a mother, grandmother, and an identical twin, embracing the myriad roles and experiences life has offered her. She has a lifelong passion for storytelling and has filled countless journals and binders with narratives and reflections from her experiences. She writes about finding out who you are, where you belong, and making sense of it.

Julie has published two award-winning books, Twice a Daughter is about the five year search for birth relatives. Belonging Matters is a collection of essays about adoption, family, and kinship. Her third book, a prequel to Twice a Daughter, comes out in Feb. 2025. Julie McGue takes us on a gripping exploration of her profound adoptee journey through a medical crisis within the confines of closed adoption, discovering personal identity and voice while weaving resilience and inspiration from every challenge faced.

GUEST INFORMATION/LINKS:
https://juliemcgueauthor.com
www.facebook.com/juliemcguewrites
www.twitter.com/juliermcgue
www.instagram.com/julieryanmcgue
www.Goodreads.com/julieryanmcgue
www.linkedin.com/in/julie-mcgue-a246b841

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In this episode, Sophia Mills speaks with Rebecca Korda, program manager for recruitment and training at the National Youth Advocate Program. Rebecca provides quality services to children and families within the dependency system here in southeast Florida.

Rebecca began her career as a case manager with ChildNet in 2012. She transitioned to working the last 8 years with foster parents and the youth they serve. First, as a treatment coordinator ensuring the children's appointments and needs were monitored. Then, as a licensing specialist monitoring foster parents were in compliance and good standing with DCF regulations. Currently, Rebecca works as a trainer and recruiter actively trying to dispel the myth that it takes "someone special" to be a foster parent. She has learned through professional and personal experience that being a foster parent simply means putting aside your own conveniences at times to ensure the children coming into your home feel welcomed and valued. Rebecca's expertise serves to educate and encourage anyone interested in becoming a foster parent. She also works with foster parents struggling because, per Rebecca's words, "being a foster parent isn't all sunshine and rainbows." There are struggles which require expert guidance. It is important to ensure foster parents and the children in their home are given necessary care and attention from the system of care responsible for their placement.

Rebecca offers personal experience. Many people work in the foster care system but not all of them are also licensed foster parents. Her ability to recruit and assist soon-to-be foster parents comes from a unique place; lived experience. Rebecca's lived experience as a foster parent has improved the way the state mandated curriculum is delivered to people attending foster parent training classes.

GUEST INFORMATION/LINKS:

NYAP.org
https://nfpaonline.org/
Maybe Days: A book for Children in Foster Care
EveryParent (Palm Beach parent app)
https://www.cscbroward.org/families/ (Children's Services Council)

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In this episode, Sophia Mills and Sofia Scher talk about the need and importance of PPEC with Thomas LoBianco, the vice president at Tender Care PPEC. Tender Care is a Prescribed Pediatric Extended Care Center (PPEC) which is basically a daycare for kids with special medical needs. They help birth to 21 and are staffed with nurses and therapists. They have six locations in Florida and are free with Medicaid.

UPCOMING EVENT: 2nd Annual Special Needs Resources Expo on Saturday, April 13 from 1-3 PM at Mall 2121 in St. Augustine, Florida.

For more information, check out this information: https://www.tcms.care/st-augustine-2024-expo/


GUEST INFORMATION:

Website: www.tcms.care
Facebook: Tender Care PPEC
Instagram: teamtendercareppec
TikTok: teamtendercare
YouTube: tendercareppec
LinkedIn: tendercareppec

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In this episode, co-Hosts Sophia Mills and Sofia Scher have a conversation with Debbie Reber, the parent of a 19 year old neurodivergent child and the founder and CEO of Tilt Parenting. Tilt Parenting was created in 2016 to support parents find more confidence and hope in raising their differently wired children.

GUEST INFORMATION

Debbie Reber is a parenting activist, bestselling author, podcast host, speaker, and the CEO and founder of Tilt Parenting. Tilt Parenting is working to change the way neurodifferences in children — ADHD, learning disabilities, autism, giftedness, processing challenges, twice-exceptionality, and more — are perceived and experienced so these children, and the parents raising them, can thrive in their schools, their families, and in their lives. She is the author of more than dozen books, including my most recent book "Differently Wired: Raising an Exceptional Child in a Conventional World." Before Debbie launched Tilt, she spent more than fifteen years writing inspiring books for women and teens, and frequently spoke about issues like media literacy, self-esteem, and confidence, and consulted for clients including the Girl Scouts, the Disney Channel, McGraw Hill, and Kaplan. In the earlier years of her career, Debbie worked in TV and video production, producing documentaries and PSAs for CARE and UNICEF, working on Blue’s Clues for Nickelodeon, and developing original series for Cartoon Network. Debbie currently lives in Brooklyn, New York.

Social Media:

https://facebook.com/tiltparenting
https://instagram.com/tiltparenting

Website Links:

https://tiltparenting.com/club
https://tiltparenting.com/podcast
https://tiltparenting.com/book