How I am Sometimes Delusional

April 5, 2008 at 6:09 pm (Uncategorized)

So last year I thought that one person could have four blogs and update them all.

Yeah I know, delusional! I came to my senses and I’ve been posting on only one blog. The subject matter varies but at least I can pay attention to it instead of feeling like a crazy woman. So I think I’ll move the posts from here to there, a little bit at a time. If anyone is even still reading, you can find me at

http://greenwoman.wordpress.com

I love this blog title, but I can’t keep up multiple blogs because I have a life! So if you’re looking for me, come visit me at the Greenwoman blog. I’ll keep this up until I get all my posts transferred. Thanks for reading!

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Why Am I *yawn* So Sleepy?

September 18, 2007 at 8:17 am (Musings)

I have a magical dreams themed goddess in the works right now, with wonderful home-spun yarn from Enchanted Knoll. Last night I gathered up the herbs I had dried for her and crumbled them together in a bowl, sniffing until I got the balance of fragrances right, then covered the bowl and set it aside for the night.

This morning I got up at my usual time, spent some time giving myself reiki, then picked up my knitting needles and my “Black Magic Woman” yarn and started. I stuff these ladies as I go, so when I got to the first stuffing point I uncovered my  herbs, tucked them in to the silk fabric, and stuffed them in the goddess, then continued knitting. Usually when I’m knitting–especially one of these goddesses–I’m so excited and charged with the magic of creating that I’m almost fluttery with the energy. But this morning I found myself getting sleepier . . . and sleepier . . . and my fingers were moving very sloooooowly. Why? What?

*sniff*

Um. Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that my lovely lady is stuffed with mugwort, LAVENDER, and HOPS?

I think in order to finish her I’ll have to sit in a cool room with lots of light, and perhaps some noise. And take lots of breaks that involve getting up and walking around.

I don’t think falling asleep and drooling all over the goddess would be good for the yarn.

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Miscellaneous Doings

September 9, 2007 at 4:11 pm (In the garden, Musings)

I love my herbs, and I love knitting, and it seemed for a long time that the two would never really overlap. That is, until I woke up two weeks ago with an idea in my head, for a lovely knitted goddess stuffed with the beautiful herbs from my garden. I made a prototype–not quite right! Then a second, which was better, and the third was perfect. I put her up on my Etsy shop and she sold. Then I got two orders. Then I made another one and IT sold. And I have three more orders. Wow–very exciting. So far I’ve used roses, lavender, mugwort, sage, and rosemary from my own garden, plus some things given to me by friends from THEIR gardens. What a wonderful way to use the bounty that I can’t turn in to medicine for my family–sharing it with someone else to bring them comfort and joy and beauty. I feel honored!

I’ve also been working with materials for my Green Witch correspondence course from Susun Weed, which has a nice mix of herbal projects and witchy projects. Very enjoyable so far!

Herbal activity has been pretty thin on the ground this week because Jeff and I are creating a cutting garden with flowering perennials given to us by a friend’s mother. We’re making great progress, but building raise beds is pretty labor intensive (we HAVE to be careful how we start beds here, because the morning glory delights in taking over any open ground). In the next week I’m hoping to make some rose petal vinegar, harvest more calendula flowers and some of the huge garden sage. September always feels sort of frenzied, between getting the kids back in to their school routine and the way everything is suddenly ready at once in the garden. We keep trying to plan but nature won’t be dictated to. This year I’m doing better at not stressing about it–the garden is supposed to be a joyful thing, not a burden. A lesson I’m constantly trying to learn is to focus on the joys around me rather than on my worries. I like to think I’m getting better at that. =)

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Blog Party: Preserving the Harvest

August 27, 2007 at 7:38 am (Uncategorized)

lovely rose

Oregon is definitely rose country. They grow abundantly here, without a lot of extra fussing. All right, I imagine my roses would be more attractive and bloom more if I gave them a little more TLC, but they produce abundant blossoms all summer even with my . . . ah . . . relaxed gardening methods. The above photo is the perfect, luminous blossom on a little rose in my front yard. The color is so splendid!

Of course you can dry rose petals for winter teas, and you can make many things with rose hips if you have a variety that produces those big, red hips.

But my favorite way of tasting the sweet, summery delight of roses is to make rose petal honey.

My stepdaughter and I made rose petal honey early this August. We collected roses from all different rose bushes in our yard. Any rose petals will work, so long as they are fresh and fragrant. Don’t buy rose petals from a florist for this; not only are they less fresh and usually less fragrant, but the roses in the flower shop are heavily sprayed with chemical pesticides and fertilizers and heaven knows what else. And many of the roses found in flower shops are flown in from South America–hardly a sustainable practice. Your regular garden variety roses are the way to go.

My method is messy but simple: collect fresh rose petals and make sure they aren’t wet. Remove the petals from the blossom, make sure there aren’t a bunch of little bugs clinging on, and fill a very clean, very dry mason jar right to the top. Then pour over raw, local honey until the jar is full. That sounds simple enough, but you will have to use a clean, dry stainless steel knife or a chopstick or the clean handle of a wooden spoon to push the flowers around and get the honey all worked in. Cover it lightly and walk away for a while–have a cup of rose petal tea, perhaps. Come back an hour later or so and make sure the roses are still covered in honey. They’ll have floated to the top, and that’s all right so long as there isn’t a big pile of petals on top of the honey. Top off if necessary, cap, and place somewhere cool and out of direct sunlight.

The roses will end up all floating on top of your honey. You might want to peek at your honey frequently for the first few days to make sure all the roses are in the honey. What I did, since my rose petals kept floating up, was turn the jar upside down every few days (make sure your jar doesn’t leak!!!). The flavor of the roses did end up all through the honey.

Let them sit for about six weeks, then strain through cheesecloth. You WILL get sticky doing this. It can’t be avoided. Just enjoy it, remember that when you’re all finished you can lick your hands. Mmmmmm . . . .

Here are some suggestions for using this honey.

-Add to a cup of warm milk to help you relax before bed.

-Use rose honey as a substitute for the sugar in vanilla or tapioca pudding.

-Roses and chocolate. In a small saucepan over medium heat, warm a mug’s worth of milk (about a cup, possibly a bit more). While the milk is heating, place 1 level tablespoon of good quality cocoa powder and 1 level tablespoon (or a goopy full teaspoon, depending) in the bottom of a mug. When the milk is steaming hot, ladle a few tablespoons worth in to the bottom of the cup and stir in to the honey and cocoa until you have a smooth paste. Then add the rest of the milk slowly, stirring constantly to incorporate all the cocoa. Drink while it’s hot!

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Becoming a Root Woman?

August 21, 2007 at 5:31 am (Dandelion, In the garden, Musings)

This week Jeff (my partner) and I were pulling weeds in the garden. (This is a rare happening. We are, as herbalist Heather Nic an Fhleisdeir put it at the NW Herb Fest, “catch and release gardeners”. This means we only pull weeds if they are threatening the well-being of something we planted on purpose. After all, most of the weeds are good medicine. [Except I have yet to find any good medicinal use for morning glory. Which we have in abundance. That doesn't mean there isn't a good use for it. It just means I don't know of one. So if any of y'all need some wild hedge bindweed, I'm your girl.] The word “weed” at my house is just defined as “plants I didn’t put in the ground”.)

Close to the bee balm (monarda didyma) I came across a luxurious dandelion leaf rosette (no blooms–our dandelions bloom most in February/March/April and spend the summer lying low), and so I thought I’d dig up the root for a mineral rich vinegar (Old Sourpuss Mineral mix from Susun Weed’s New Menopausal Years). As I started brushing aside the dirt, I was thrilled to discover a juicy, buttery-yellow root the size of a large carrot! I had to fetch the trowel to help me dig her up. Of course now I’m cursing myself for not getting a picture . . .

As I was digging–and I was digging for a while, due to the size of the root–I thought about the ways roots are good for us, besides the obvious medicinal uses we harvest them for. Think about it:

Root medicine makes us put our hands in the dirt. Putting our hands in the dirt reminds us of our connection to the planet and the flesh; it helps us be more grounded (rooted?). It is difficult to ignore mama earth when you have dirt all over your hands and under your nails.

Root medicine makes us work for our healing. Earning our medicine reminds us that ultimately, our health and healing is our responsibility–the plants will help us heal, but we must do the work. And all that digging is good exercise, too.

Root medicine makes us take our time and pay attention. If we dig too quickly, tug too hard, fail to pay attention, we break the root and lose some of the medicine. This reminds us that healing is a process that requires patience, because true deep healing takes time. And it requires attention, so that we do the right thing for ourselves, and get the full benefit of the healing partners that join us in our healing dance. Slow, focused medicine is powerful stuff. You can’t get it from popping a pill–nor can you , apparently, get it from visiting your doctor most of the time. I read in Dr. Duke’s Essential Herbs that former Surgeon General C. Evert Koop reports that “after asking a question, male physicians interrupt a patient’s answer in an average of 14 seconds. Female physicans are slightly more polite, interrupting rambling patients after about 40 seconds.” The way I see it, like effective root digging, effective medicine takes time. But it isn’t only doctors who think the best answer is the one that takes the least amount of time. It seems like this attitude has infected our entire culture–look at all the advertisements for pharmaceuticals offering a quick fix for whatever ails you so that you can get on with being productive. How did we get here? And how do we get out? Root medicine tells me not to panic–this is another healing that needs to take place, and we can’t rush these things.

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What Not to Do

August 19, 2007 at 12:27 pm (Musings, Rose)

Last night I learned a valuable lesson.

I learned that you should never put a pint of infusion in a pan on low to cook down for a decoction, then decide you MUST go see Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (for the third time) RIGHT NOW because it’s on at “the cheap theater”, and leave the house in a red hot rush, forgetting to turn off the stove. When you come back you will have a very hot pan and some very dry herb charcoal at the bottom. Thank the goddess I put it on super low …

I also learned that rose infusion always smells good, even when it’s been reduced to charcoal at the bottom of a pan because you left the stove on while you rushed off to watch Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix for the third time at “the cheap theater”.

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13 Moons with the Rose

August 16, 2007 at 12:01 pm (Musings, Rose)

Everything is coming up roses around here . . .

That is, there’s going to be a lot of information about rose on this blog for the next year. That’s because rose is going to be my “green ally” for the next 13 moons. Not that I won’t use any other herbs–I’d be lost without blackberry and elderberry/flower, and of course things like plantain will be the first pick for boo-boos.

There are several reasons for choosing one ally to work with extensively. My big two are:

1. I’m taking Susun Weed’s Green Witch Correspondence Course, and one of the projects is to ally with an herb for a time (1 year is suggested).

2. I’ve reached a point in my learning process where I’m ready to start going deeper. It seems like focusing on one plant at a time is the best way to do this–to form a relationship, learn about each part of the plant and how to use it, learn all I can about the best way to help the plant grow, really engage with the energy of the plant in every preparation, made from the plant dried or fresh, etc. So even before getting my correspondence course materials in the mail, I was thinking about doing this.

So, why rose? Well . . .

1. At last count there were just over 40 rose bushes growing on my property. That was a few years ago, and a few new roses have somehow appeared since then.

2. Have you ever smelled a rose? I mean!!!!

3. When I was at the NW Herb Fest in July, there were some people selling plants. During a break between sessions I was wandering the booths, not intending to buy anything. But a Rosa rugosa was just RADIATING green energy, waving around, pushing the other plants out of her way as if she was saying “look at me, look at me!!!!!”. She’s now growing in my garden.

4. It occurred to me a week or two ago that every time I do spirit healing work (or, healing at a spirtual/vibratory level with the help of . . . whatever seems right), rose is part of it. Sometimes rose is the only plant component. I don’t even usually think much about it, just sort of go by instinct. So maybe rose has been calling ME? (It’s flattering to think so).

5. Also out in the realm of airy fairy, rose is complemented by the stone I’m currently working with the most, which is rose quartz. A while back I had a body talk session, and my body “told” the practitioner I should carry rose quartz with me.

Roses have been around for ages–fossil records go back millions of years–and many cultures make use of roses, and believe roses to have deep spiritual and mythological significance. There will be so much to explore, a year may not be enough.

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A Blackberry Day

August 11, 2007 at 9:07 pm (Blackberry, Preparations)

After a lovely early afternoon chat in another good witch’s garden, I came home and fetched a couple of empty buckets for blackberry picking. We enjoyed blackberry cobbler yesterday, thanks to my stepdaughter and her friends, who picked just enough berries for my recipe (which is the one found in the good old reliable Better Homes and Gardens cookbook).

Today I was the one getting the scratches . . . I got some help from the girls, but mostly it was just me and the garden spiders out in the brambles. I’m not sure why those little brown and beige stripey spiders like the blackberry patch so much, but I never seem to go picking without having to dodge around their webs.

I was nearly done picking when I remembered that if I wanted to make cordial, I had to run to the liquor store for more brandy. Fortunately the liquor store isn’t far; I took my scratched and stained arms in to town and got a big bottle of brandy just before closing time.

Back home, I finished filling my second bucket, and took the berries in to the kitchen. I was gathering up my equipment to make cordial when I realized I was getting low on honey! AND I was hungry. Crap. So I started warming up some of the soup I made (this is GOOD soup y’all, yellow split peas, organic sage bulk sausage, carrots, onions, potatoes, celery, chicken broth, oregano, basil, salt and pepper . . . mmmmmmm). While the soup was heating I called our honey providers (they live just a couple of miles the road) and arranged to buy some honey from them. (I should take this opportunity to mention that I’m sort of the haphazard herbal student, and not an example to be followed very closely!)

After eating my soup, I had an hour until my appointed honey purchase time, so I decided to get started. My way of making blackberry cordial is adapted from Dian Dincin Buchman’s Herbal Medicine: the Natural Way to Get Well and Stay Well. The book (at least the edition I have) was published in 1979 (when I was in KINDERGARTEN! That’s ancient wisdom for you huh?). I actually haven’t read the whole book so I’m not sure how good it is, but she gave me proportions to start with and a basic method, which I sort of tweaked. So enough blathering, here’s my “recipe”, which you should feel free to play with and make your own.

5-6 cups blackberry juice

2-3 cups honey

2 teaspoons nutmeg

2 teaspoons cloves

1 1/2 cups 80 proof brandy (the cheap stuff really is fine).

I extracted the juice by first heating the berries until they were runny. Then I ladled them in to my old fashioned food mill type thingy (yes that IS a technical term) and squeezed out the juice. Anything that will get seeds and debris out will work fine, I just always use what I have on hand.

After getting the juice, I measured it (it was 5 1/2 cups), returned it to the stock pot, and brought it up to a boil. Just at the end I added the nutmeg and the cloves, then took it off the heat. While it was cooling a bit, I measured out my honey and my brandy, got my bottles ready and labeled, and found my funnel. Once I had finished all that, I added the honey and stirred until it was dissolved, then added the brandy and stirred a few more times. Poured it in to a big glass measuring cup and from that in to bottles with the help of one of humanity’s most ingenious inventions, the funnel.

Some notes: I don’t sterilize my bottles for this. The cordial is full of honey and brandy and I keep it in the fridge, so I’m not too worried about spoilage. If you want to keep it at room temperature, you should research the best method to make cordial with that in mind–I don’t know if this recipe would keep at room temperature for the whole winter. It WILL, however, keep in the fridge all winter. If I make another batch this year I will probably look in to ways to make sure it lasts longer, possibly using white sugar instead of honey, or upping the alcohol content, or some other method. If I do that research I’ll post my findings here. If YOU do that research and want to share, leave a comment! I’ve not had a real comment yet, it would be fun and exciting.

There was, of course, a little bit left for sampling, and whoa boy it’s tasty. But it packs a wallop! It’s a lovely bed time beverage.

My primary use for this, though, is medicinal. (No, really, it is!). It’s very nice when you have one of those tight coughs that keeps you awake–it helps loosen things up a bit, soothes the irritated throat, and the brandy helps you relax and get to sleep. It doesn’t take much, anywhere from two tablespoons to one of those small cordial cups. Blackberry is one of those gentle aids, supportive and soothing. At some point I’m sure I’ll post about all the folk uses of blackberry, but I’m exhausted and want to crawl in to bed with my sweetie and maybe fall asleep to The Lord of the Rings or Harry Potter on DVD.

Sweet dreams, y’all! And happy blackberry picking.

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One woman’s weed is another woman’s medicine

August 9, 2007 at 1:31 am (Dandelion, In the garden, Musings)

What makes a weed a weed? What makes an herb an herb? Who decides?

According to my (very old) copy of Webster’s New Collegiate Dictionary, a weed is “any plant growing in cultivated ground to the detriment of the crop or to the disfigurement of the place; an economically useless or unsightly plant, esp. of wild growth”, and an herb is a plant “mainly used for medicinal purposes, or for its sweet scent or flavor”.

Looked at in this manner, it seems to me that weeds are in the eyes of the beholder.

One woman’s weed is another woman’s medicine, no? One of the most amazing, magical, beautiful things about plant healing (and stone healing, energy healing, etc.) is that there are as many ways to heal an individual as there are individuals to be healed. If we can see healing as an interaction between person and plant, stone, universe, spirits, and of course other people, we can see that each person will have a very individual path to healing. My parents curse their dandelions as blemishes in a perfect lawn; I love them, love seeing their little bright sun-ray faces blooming, eating their leaves, and I welcome them. I wouldn’t care if they replaced the grass entirely. My mom’s bane is one of my best–free!!! abundant!!!!–sources of medicine, nourishment, beauty.

Weeds like dandelion, mugwort, plantain, chickweed urge us to question our assumptions and examine what we value. Any plant that grows abundantly in your habitat–or invasively–has something to offer you. Perhaps it is offering you medicine. Perhaps it is protecting you. Perhaps it is trying to heal the soil. Perhaps it is teaching you about holding on, being tenacious. Perhaps it is the universe’s way of making you get out in the garden and work up a sweat, instead of sitting on the couch watching television. Those weeds that make you crazy might be a glorious blessing from the universe, and you just need to get out there with them and try to understand what they’re telling you.

Weeds are like other parts of life that we often find unpleasant: lessons, blessings, paths to enlightenment. It’s just a matter of looking at them in the right way.

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Seeds and long life

July 28, 2006 at 11:35 pm (In the garden, Lore, Sage)

Today I spent some time in the garden cutting back my sage plants. One of them is still blossoming, but many of the first blooms have turned brown and put on seeds. Or should that be put on seeds and turned brown? In either case, I cut all most of the dried bracts and put them in a paper bag, so I can separate the seeds and share them. I had to go check in my herb growing book to make sure sage can be grown successfully from seed. It seems that it can.

I realize daily how little I know, how little I’ve learned in the past few years in spite of my efforts. But there’s comfort in the realization that this journey will be long, and slow; it will carry me through the rest of my life if I want it to.

In which case, it’s a good thing I’ve got all that sage growing in my garden. Not only is sage reputed to impart wisdom (of which I am in sore need), but there is, apparently, an old monk’s saying about sage: “Why should a man die whilst sage grows in his garden?”. And an old English rhyme: “He that would live for aye, must eat sage in May”. (Judith Berger’s Herbal Rituals, page 47.) Maybe with sage as an ally I’ll live long enough to gain some much needed wisdom? It’s worth a shot.

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