Motherhood, mess, and honest laughter.
Family Looking Up is a motherhood-support show built around Beth, Andrea, and Camille trading family stories before turning to parenting conversations and guests. Its tone is warm, teasing, and self-aware, with room for kids, teens, vacations, holidays, autism support, and the exhaustion behind ordinary home life.
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Family Looking Up is a motherhood and family show shaped by conversation more than formal instruction. Beth, Andrea, and Camille appear as recurring voices with an easy, teasing rhythm. They talk like people who have built years of inside jokes, but the subjects stay grounded in recognizable home life. Valentine’s Day becomes less about grand romance and more about pancakes, kids, expectations, and deciding to make the day cheerful anyway. Vacation talk turns into a meditation on guilt. A girls trip sounds easier to justify when there is a race, a Costco run, or some practical excuse attached. That kind of emotional honesty is the show’s strongest gear. It lets a small domestic detail reveal the bigger pressure underneath. The show is funny, often in a messy and self-deprecating way. It is also interested in parenting tools. Episodes include conversations about supporting parents of kids with autism and helping teens build happiness and success. William Stixrud and Ned Johnson appear as former guests in one teen-focused conversation. Joya Van Der Laan is featured in an episode about parents of children with autism. The hosts’ intros often wander before the planned topic begins. Death, cremation, cartoons, recipes, old recordings, and failed edits can all become part of the ride. That looseness is part of the identity. Family Looking Up does not sound like a polished seminar or a lifestyle brand. It sounds like a table where motherhood is allowed to be tiring, funny, awkward, generous, and unfinished. The best fit is a parent who wants encouragement without being talked down to. The show’s final episodes also carry a bittersweet farewell energy, looking back on years of listener connection and friendship.
Made for: Family Looking Up suits moms and family-centered listeners who want parenting support delivered through candid friendship rather than polished instruction. It is especially fitting for parents navigating busy homes, kids, teens, holidays, travel, and the emotional weight of caregiving.
What sets it apart: The show’s signature is the contrast between loose, joke-filled banter and sincere parenting conversations with practical takeaways. It feels less like expert performance and more like friendship that can still make room for autism support, teen happiness, and hard family questions.
We're about all things family and home. If you're a mom, and on the verge of jumping off the dryer or overdosing on Diet Dr. Pepper, visit us weekly for some laughter and hope. Learn from our fails and the successes of others. Motherhood is the busiest, messiest, worst paying job that we love...most of the time. We want you to know you're doing better than you think. When life gets you down, know that your family is looking up!
Three friends turn manners, grief, and heart-shaped meatloaf into the mom chat you needed.
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Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
A warm, self-aware goodbye that turns the show's own running jokes into the last laugh.
The final Family Looking Up episode reads as a warm, self-aware goodbye from Beth, Andrea, and Camille. It returns to the joke that grew into the whole premise, and to the way listeners have mistaken Camille's low voice for sadness.
A funny, practical Valentines reset that favors family rituals over romantic pressure.
The episode turns Valentines Day into a small, familiar conversation about married life, kid-centered celebration, and how romance can give way to a more practical family ritual.
A vacation chat that treats leaving town like a valid reason to breathe.
Family Looking Up spends this episode on vacation ideas, and the appeal is in how ordinary the possibilities feel. Camille, Beth, and Andrea talk through race weekends, girls trips, hotel stays, shopping, and even a Costco run, turning leaving town into something that can be…
Parenthood and bodies, told one honest story at a time.
Three moms discuss helping children find happiness and share personal struggles, including a tangent about cremation.
Beth, Andrea, and Camille use the final Family Looking Up episode to revisit the first run-throughs, the first internet guest, and the panic of early recording.
Beth, Andrea, and Camille open with jokes about old intros, then pivot into Valentine's Day and the book Present over Perfect by Shauna Nyquist.
Beth, Camille, and Andrea use "girls trip," "couple's trip," and family travel to compare what different kinds of breaks actually do for relationships and stress.
Family Looking Up hosts Beth, Andrea, and Camille interview Jenedy Paige about motherhood, religious art, American Ninja Warrior, and grieving her deceased oldest son.
Family Looking Up hosts Andrea, Beth, and Camille interview Brooke Romney about teaching teenagers manners while preserving family relationships.
Family Looking Up Ep.
Linda McGurk, author of the new book "Open Air Life," returns to Family Looking Up to explain friluftsliv, which she says has no English equivalent and is defined by the Swedish government as time outside "without pressure to achieve or compete." She organizes the book around four elements: air (walks and sleeping on a back deck), earth (foraging, barefoot walking, potatoes in buckets), water (a communal lake sauna and cold swimming), and fire (campfire cooking and survival skills).
Dawn Madsen recommends boxing up toys outside four chosen categories before deciding what to donate.
Three moms discuss parenting challenges, offer support, and interview a guest with tips for parents of children with autism.
Three moms discuss parenting challenges and interview experts on helping children find happiness.