Ancestral Women - Living Arts Performances

Below is a flyer about a business initiative by way of one our community-based partners. Also, the Entrepreneur Fund (www.entrepreneurfund.org/) is offering grants to help cover the $100/month costs to join one of the Strategic Business Mastermind groups mentioned in the flyer.

Ancestral Women- performances can be discussed, contact through FB messenger, Christine Doud and/or Barbara Blackdeer Mackenzie ❤️

2023 Bear River Powwow - this weekend in Lac du Flambeau

Got my big nephew musical 🎵 socks to go with his Instruments.

Indigenous joy.
I saw this gorgeous photo that Twyla Baker posted from a collection at the Minnesota State Historical Society of Arikara/Mandan/Hidatsa girls laughing, it reminded me of this piece I wrote last year in my endeavors to gather old photos that embody Indigenous Joy:

Indigenous joy.The laughter emanating from these faces, the pleasure of the sounds of corn husks rustling as harvests roll in.The essence of pure joy on those faces is the embodied wellspring to which I make my daily offerings.

We are sowing seeds of Indigenous joy. When the days are long, when the row is long to hoe, when the smoke fills the sky and uncertainty creeps into the corners of my mind. I bring my embodied prayer back to this; that the fruits of our labor and also our creativity will continue to carve into being a world where it is safe and nourishing place for grandmas to teach their children the stories that are held inside the seed corn, that the deft hands of grandmothers conjure up magic in the simple beauty of knot being tied or the way a knife is handled.

Remember this. They want us to be defined by our intergenerational trauma. Yet the blood in our veins carries wild rushing rivers of intergenerational resilience, reverence, pleasure, joy and collective creative force and a spirit fire that could never be extinguished against all odds and acts of atrocities.

Let that be our North Star, our ancestral blood memory of beautiful resistance. Make yourself into a vessel where that song can be sung...

Don't despair.This resistance is intergenerational work and it is alive and sprouting. The seeds of hope of this movement have been planted a long time ago, by loving humans who cared so deeply that you might know no hunger. These prayers have been whispered around many fires, in birthing rooms, in final breaths, heaved towards horizons at first dawn light, to the winds, under rustling dry corn stalks during the harvests...

Don't despair.Those seeds of hope are sprouting. We can hear the seedsongs of generations in that reverent inhale.

Let us hold the vision of Indigenous joy as we move in community and tend the hearth of dignified resurgence.

These ancestors in sepia remind us.

Living Arts Performance at the WI Indian Education Association Conference, Madison April 20, 2023

Need to fill out a packet at LdF DNR or Deer Registration bldg.

2023 WIEA Conference, Madison, WI

Please check your emails.

Hamburger Goulash soup w/Grilled Cheeses!

Madison area Peeps

The public is invited to the 2023 Lac du Flambeau Ojibwe Winter Games at UW-Madison on Friday, February 3rd!

The event runs from 3pm to sundown, with an opening welcome in Dejope Hall. Donations go to the Lac du Flambeau Public School.

Dejope Residence Hall
640 Elm Dr, Madison

Nicolet College TEDx https://www.nicoletcollege.edu/tedx

Don’t miss this unique event on September 30th. TEDxNicoletCollege is back! This year’s theme is Origin Stories: Reflections from Our Northwoods Community. Together, these reflections will blend to create a kaleidoscope of our beautifully intertwined histories, backgrounds, experiences, identities, and more. Learn more here.

Ancestral Women have been invited to a performance this upcoming summer, in northern WI.

🚨 Pop Up Rummage at LDF Country Market until 2:00 pm TODAY, July 3rd! 🚨

Stop by and buy some beautiful artwork, books, small treasures, and collectibles! 🏺😍

Ancestral Women Exhibit, 17 July - 15 August 2021 - see flyer for details

March is Women's History Month!

All this month, the Wisconsin Historical Society is celebrating BIG moments in Wisconsin history and highlighting extraordinary Wisconsin women.

Betsy Thunder was born near Black River Falls in the 1850s, although her exact birth year is unknown. She was a member of the Ho-Chunk Nation, and was a descendant of the Decorah family, whose founding mother was Ho-Chunk chief Ho-poe-kaw (Glory of the Morning). Thunder married a medicine man who was much older than she was. He taught her how to collect, prepare, and administer traditional and ceremonial medicine, and hoped that she would pass the knowledge and skills on to the next generation after his death.

Thunder became well known in the area for her skill with medicine. She treated both Ho-Chunk and white patients, despite knowing little English. As was the custom for Ho-Chunk healers, Thunder received gifts of clothing, food, or blankets as payment for her work. One of her patients gave her lumber to build a small cabin in the town of Shamrock, and the people of the town built the cabin in appreciation. In the early 1900s, the U.S. government ordered Thunder’s tribe to be moved from Wisconsin to Nebraska, but she refused to leave her ancestral land. Thunder hid in the hills of Jackson County and remained in Wisconsin until her death.

📷: Betsy Thunder: WHI ID # 4492