Our Daily Herbal Tea

For a few months now, we have each been drinking two cups of herbal tea a day. At this time, we are buying the herbs that we are using in our tea. We feel like this is a healthy addition to our diet. Here's why.

I start off with:

3 tbsp. dried dandelion root simmered in 2 quarts of water for 20 minutes. I start this time when the water is still cold. This makes a decoction.



The benefits of dandelion root include:

• liver detoxification/tonic
  
• promotes good digestion
• good for indigestion
• good for arthritis
• regular use helps reduce cholesterol
• gentle laxative
• good for psoriasis

After the roots have simmered, I turn off the fire and add:

1 tsp. celery seed & 1 tbsp. meadowsweet, which sits and steeps for 10 minutes. Seeds, leaves and flower parts are used to make an infusion, which is the steeping process. Since the roots of the dandelion are much harder and thicker, they need to simmer to release the desired properties.

The benefits of celery seed include:

• helps reduce high blood pressure
  
• good digestive; reduces muscle spasms in the muscles of the intestinal tract
• purifies the blood
• helps treat arthritis
• has anti-inflammatory properties
• stimulates thyroid & pituitary
• clears uric acid from painful joints
• acts on kidneys & is a mild diuretic

The benefits of meadowsweet include:

• antacid properties
• astringent
  
• anti-inflammatory
• contains salicylates like aspirin
• diuretic 
• calming for overactive digestive system
• helps acid stomach, heartburn, ulcers, hiatus hernia
• helpful for rheumatism & arthritis
• clears sandy deposits in urine

This information has been compiled from several of my herbal books. Not everyone agrees with the effectiveness of herbs upon the body. You will have to do your own research and decide for yourself what is right for you.

Last year we began harvesting and replanting dandelion seed in the herb bed, just for this tea. I know many people see them as the bane of a beautiful lawn. Every time I see them I think of the benefits they are providing our bodies. We will continue to harvest the seeds and spread them all over the herb bed. They are already up and blooming this year, so it won't be long before the seeds are ready. Now I need to learn how to harvest and dry the roots for our tea, as well as start incorporating some of the greens in our diet.

May 2014

I have one meadowsweet plant established (I think, I haven't seen it yet this spring) and need to add many more to provide the amount we are currently using. 

October 2014, over wintered and is coming back out now

Celery seed may be a whole new challenge. I think I will do some more research and see if I can dry the leaves and/or stalks to use in the tea. It would be much easier for us to produce the plants than the seeds. My other research will include celeriac to see if it contains the same beneficial constituents as celery.

The lemon balm is just starting to come out now.

June 2014

We have some other things growing in the herb bed that I will be adding to a tea blend of our own. These ingredients will be chosen for the beneficial characteristics they have, as well as compatibility with other herbs. Lemon balm and peppermint are on the list for now. If I can get a good crop of chamomile and echinacea, I will add them as well. We're trying to cut down on the amount of herbs we buy, because we would rather consume those we can grow and harvest 

Peppermint, May 2014

ourselves. I still have a lot of learning to do when it comes to growing herbs, harvesting them at the appropriate time, dehydrating to retain the most benefit, and usage. This is another dream come true. I have wanted to be able to grow and use herbs for many, many years. Now I am starting down that path, and it's wonderful.

This is just one more way Frank and I are trying to reclaim our bodies from the effects of the chemicals we are bombarded with everyday. I am grateful we still have the peace and freedom to do so. The more I can learn now, the better off we will be if it ever comes down to having to make do with what we know, have and can do. I pray it doesn't reach that point, but it sure looks that way more and more every day. Learn something important this week that will benefit your family should times get hard. It's critical.

Until next time - Fern

A Very Simple Lotion, Failures & Success

A day or so after we made our simple lip balm, I tried my hand at making a simple lotion. I got the recipe from Leigh over at 5 Acres & A Dream. It's in her latest ebooklet, How To Make An Herbal Salve, which is part of The Little Series of Homestead How-Tos, she's been writing. I wanted something very simple, with few ingredients, that I could make from things I normally keep on hand. Leigh's recipe fit the bill.

Trying to make a simple lotion is a continuation of our attempt to minimize the chemicals we ingest or absorb into our bodies. And, once again, I was amazed just how easy it is to make this lotion, even though it failed the second time I made it. But that's getting ahead of myself. I forgot to take any pictures while I made the first batch.

The recipe calls for one cup of herbal tea. I had recently read that lemon balm and peppermint are good for your skin, and I happened to have a few leaves here and there growing out in the herb bed, so I picked them to use in my tea. I brought the water to boiling, turned off the fire, added the herbs and let them steep for about five minutes.

Next, I took 3/4 cup of oil, I used olive oil, and melted 2 tbsp. of beeswax in it. After the tea was ready, I blended it into the oil, until it was well blended. Leigh uses a blender. I used a slotted spoon. I wasn't sure how long to stir it, and I knew I wouldn't get the same consistency as a blender, but I thought it worked out well.

Frank and I were pleased with the results. This lotion is definitely oilier than any over the counter lotion we have used. But, if you give it a few minutes it will soak in and works very well.

 
So, the other day I thought I would make another batch since we have already used up more than half of the first batch. I picked more lemon balm and peppermint, even though there wasn't much left out there. 

 






Made my tea, melted the beeswax and got ready to mix it together. 

This time I used the KitchenAid with the whip attachment to 'blend' the tea into the oil. After I thought it was well blended, it started to solidify on the sides of the bowl, I poured it into my half pint jars. 

 





Very quickly it started to separate. Tea on the bottom, olive oil and beeswax on the top. I scooped it out and remelted everything, stirred it with my slotted spoon, and poured it back into the jars. It separated again. I looked at the recipe over and over and tried to figure out what I had done differently to no avail. So, on the counter, taking up space, my failed lotion sat for almost a week. The other day Frank asked me if it had anywhere else it could be. But I told him for now, it was just sitting there until I could figure out what to do differently with it.

 Well, this morning it was time. I didn't have the time to go out searching for more lemon balm and peppermint, so I used some store bought chamomile and made up a cup of tea.

I scooped off the olive oil and beeswax from the failed batch, remelted it again, and poured out the old tea. This time I didn't bother with the Kitchen Aid. I figured if it didn't work, I would dump it all out and try again another time.

After I poured the tea into the oils, I stirred and stirred with my slotted spoon. The mixture looked exactly like the failed batch and I didn't think it would work. I have been researching a lot about making soap lately, reading and watching YouTubes. I have learned what getting your soap to trace means. It's when you have stirred it long enough for it to become a thick, pudding consistency that will hold it's shape when you run a spoon across the top. What does this have to do with making lotion? Well, as I stood there stirring and stirring, I wondered if I cooled the lotion down enough for the oils to start solidifying, would they begin to blend with the tea the way they were supposed to? So I put the pan into a sink of cold water to cool it down as I stirred and stirred. My arm was getting tired.

It worked. As the oils began to solidify, the tea started to blend into the mixture. I tried stirring with my left hand, but kept splashing droplets here and there on the counter. So, I stirred and stirred until it was time to stop.

There are still tiny, little pockets that look like moisture, but this time, the lotion actually looks rather creamy, like you would expect from a commercial lotion. I really couldn't care less if it looked like a commercial lotion, but since that is what I have used all my life, it is what I have come to expect a lotion to look like. The consistency of the first batch is more like a salve than a lotion, but this batch is creamier, even though the ingredients are the same. Interesting.

There are many things that I have long dreamed and thought of doing. Making lotion wasn't one of them. But, you know what? I think it is so neat, and fun, and healthier, and just really cool. I made a very simple lotion from ingredients I keep on hand, thanks to all the folks out there that share what they know and do, so I can do it too. What a great life!

Until next time - Fern

How Did It Work Out? Some Updates & Things

You know how it is when you read about someone trying something new, but never hear how it worked out? It can leave you wondering if it was a success or a flop. So I thought I would let you know about a few projects we've written about recently.

First up are the reusable food wraps. I love them. They work great on bowls of stuff. I have yet to try wrapping food in them without using a bowl, but my main goal was a way to cover bowls of things in the frig without using plastic wrap or a plastic lid. I've used them to cover fish, ground meat, coleslaw, onions, herb cheese, and I don't remember what else. The first time I put it over
a bowl of salmon I really wondered if the wrap would stink. Nope. It still smelled like beeswax. The next stinky test was the onion. I was glad to find out that the wrap will not absorb the odor of the food item it is covering. Clean up is an easy rinse with lukewarm water, dry thoroughly, fold up and store for next time. I'm glad I made the smaller wraps while I had the beeswax out making lip balm. I use these smaller wraps the most.

They do get creases where they are bent or folded, and I haven't done anything to cover them up yet. But, from what I have read, you can use hot water and your hands to smooth out the wax on either side of the crease and cover it back up. I am very happy to be using something besides plastic lids or plastic wrap. These appear to be very durable, are quick and easy to make, and are made with more natural products than plastic.

Next, are the reusable panty liners. I am still very pleased with the design I came up with. They are effective for my use, comfortable, easy to make and care for. I haven't made any more yet, we have been doing a major clean up and organizing task. But I will make about a dozen more before long, probably on one of the next cold, yucky winter days. If you have a sewing machine and a need, I would highly recommend making your own. If not, there are many vendors that make a good, quality products. It's an easy way to eliminate the many detrimental chemicals that are so easily absorbed by women's bodies.

The lip balm we made is great. We really like knowing exactly what we are using, and again, eliminating more chemicals from our daily routine. I have used Carmex, and Frank Chapstick, for many years. One thing I found out when I switched to our lip balm is that I seemed to have a kind of withdrawal. I know, withdrawal from Carmex? I never considered it before we switched to our lip balm. My lips got pretty chapped for about 10 days. During that time we had some really cold weather with strong north winds that may have contributed some, but I really think most of it had to do with a Carmex 'withdrawal' period. It didn't occur to me at first, but as time went by, I began to notice an improvement. So, at first, I used our lip balm many times a day to deal with the chapped lips. Now, I only use it a few times, similar to how I used the Carmex. We are both very pleased. I have infused some olive oil with lemon balm and peppermint that I picked from the herb bed for our next batch. We'll let you know how that goes.

One thing I have not written about, nor did I take any pictures of the process, was the simple lotion I made. It is only beeswax, olive oil and herbal tea made from some of the lemon balm and peppermint I picked. Very simple. The recipe called for mixing with a blender, which I do not have, so I used a slotted spoon. Obviously, the spoon did not do the mixing job a blender would do, and sometimes there is a couple of droplets of water on top of the lotion. But it doesn't bother us at all. We really like this lotion. I will take pictures and write about the next batch. I'm going to try using the KitchenAid with the whipping hook on it to see if it will mix it up better.

When I first started using the lotion, I only used it on my hands. My skin is very sensitive to a lot of things. For many, many years the only hand lotion I could use is the original, plain Vaseline Intensive Care. It's a good lotion and worked fine. I cannot use any soap or cleansers on my face at all. They break me out in fine little red bumps. So, I wash my face with water and use Eucerin lotion and nothing else. But, after I used our lotion on my hands and it didn't break them out, I tried it on my arms for a few days. That went okay, so after about a week I got brave and tried it on my face. No little red bumps. I was very happy. But the same kind of dried out reaction happened to my hands, arms and face that happened to my lips. I wondered if it was the quality of moisturizing components of our lotion compared to the chemicalized store bought version. You know, those chemicals we can't pronounce? Things like isopropyl myristate, PEG-40 sorbitan perolrate, glyceryl lanolate, sorbitol, propylene glycol, cetyl palmitate, stearic acid, magnesium sulfate, aluminum stearate, lanolin alcohol, BHT, methychloroisothiazolinone, and methylisothiazolinone. I have no idea what these ingredients are, or what they do to my body. But, you know what? I really think our bodies are so accustomed to, and almost addicted to, all of the chemicals we put on them every single day, that we have withdrawals. When I first thought of that, I thought it sounded kind of weird, but the longer I used our non-chemicalized products, the more I think it is true. I have long considered these two lotions to be good quality products, but until now, I have never read the ingredients. Or tried to, anyway.

Now, I know that the olive oil I have is processed. And the beeswax is processed. And the lard we bought to use in the lip balm has preservatives in it and the pigs it came from were fed highly chemicalized feed. But at least we were able to eliminate many of the man made chemicals that are the basic components of lip balm and lotion. That's one more small step we were able to make. We really hope in the near future we will be able to render our own lard and harvest our own beeswax. That will be wonderful.

One of the things we are excited about is making lye soap. We have researched and gathered the necessary ingredients for a basic lye soap. When time allows, and a few other projects are completed, we will give it a try and share the results. We haven't experimented with many projects that could be dangerous to our health, but making lye soap is one of them. Remember, safety first.

We will continue to learn and experiment with eliminating more chemicals from our lives. We really feel that the more naturally we can live now, before we have no choice, the better off we will be. If we can learn how to make our own natural care products with minimal, hopefully renewable ingredients for the most part, then when the stores are empty, we won't miss them as much. Don't slow down and let a life of learning pass you by. There is so much to learn and do, the journey is a never ending process. It will keep you young and ticking.

Until next time - Fern

Dream Big, Be Patient

As I brought some of our salsa, jalapenos and pears into the kitchen from the pantry this afternoon, I mentioned to Frank how great and unbelievable it is that we have finally reached this point in our lives. It is very humbling and brings great peace to our hearts to have some of our dreams come true. Let me explain.

This morning (Saturday) I made our usual homemade biscuits for breakfast. Then I fed the cats, opened up the chicken house and fed the chickens. This led me to the barn where I fed Pearl, our Pyrenees, milked One Stripe and fed the rest of the does. Enjoying the beautiful sunshine, I made my way back to the house and strained the milk. This time I didn't cool the milk because we needed to make yogurt. 

After the yogurt was started, it was time to make bread out of the sourdough sponge I had left out overnight to ferment. 

We had set out a bag of Cushaw squash to thaw for a pie a day or two ago, so it was time to get the pie going. This would also warm up the kitchen so the bread would rise more quickly.




By now it was time for lunch, which brings me back to the beginning of this post. It has taken many, many years of dreams, planning, postponing, and planning again to make it to this point. When we were newly married, our big date was to walk around downtown and window shop. We couldn't afford to buy anything. We just spent time together, walking, holding hands, and dreaming. Dreaming that someday we would live in the country and be as self reliant as possible. Now, thirty-something years later, we still have not achieved all of our dreams and goals, but many of them seem to be coming together.

Five years ago, we had not learned how to can vegetables. At that point the only thing we had canned was salmon when we lived in Alaska. 

Five years ago, we barely knew how to garden. We had a lot of book learning, but no practical experience. We grew one fairly successful garden about 20 years ago, then about five years ago we began to garden again.
  
 








Three years ago, I had never made cheese. 

Two years ago, I had never tried growing herbs.

A year and a half ago, we had just started to get into ham radio.

One year ago, I had not canned any fruit on my own. 

Six months ago, I had never used a dehydrator. 

  

Two months ago, I knew little to nothing about kefir and had never tried it. 

One month ago, I had never made sourdough bread. I have made a lot of bread, but now I have the self-sustaining means of continuing to do so indefinitely without yeast. As long as the wheat and flour hold out, that is. 

Two weeks ago, we had never tried any herbal, medicinal teas. Today we added some celery seed/chamomile tea to our daily repertoire.




And I almost forgot to mention.  234 days ago we had never had anything to do with a blog. We had been reading a few, but never written anything like this. And, believe it or not, we used to seldom take pictures of anything. Now somedays we are doing something and one of us will say, "Hmm, we should have taken some pictures for the blog." It is interesting how things turn out while you are pursuing your dreams.

You may not live on your own little piece of dirt yet. You may not have all of the livestock or garden space you want. You may not have the money to do some of the things you really feel are important to be prepared. But you do have the opportunity to learn all you can wherever you are. Dream big. Really big. Be patient and frugal and determined and diligent and vigilant. Then dream big again. When Frank and I first got married he had a saying that has been a motto of ours ever since. "Postpone gratification for long-term gains." Think about that. There are so many things we can do without. Sometimes there are things that are nice to have or that we just want. And sometimes it is really hard to put some things off. And then sometimes things happen that cause our goals and dreams to be postponed or changed. But that is not the end of them. Keep them close to your heart, discipline yourself that you might always keep them in focus, and don't allow yourself to be distracted by the things of the world.

Know that most dreams don't come true over night, at least not in my experience. And most days, I think that if they did come true overnight, I wouldn't appreciate them near as much. So, today, my heart is full of gratitude. Gratitude that God has seen fit to bless us with this little spot of land upon which we can achieve the things of our dreams by the sweat of our brow and the touch of His hand. Since we have been here, we have learned much, and I feel we have just begun. Hold fast to your dreams. They may come true in the most unexpected ways.


Until next time - Fern