Nurturing the Wild Heart

Back in January I came down with the flu and had a few bouts with kidney stones. Due to an unexpected series of events for our family, I didn't care for myself the way I normally would. I ended up in the hospital with no insurance and I want to finally share my experience. My family is not super well off in the ways of money. We never really have been. Insurance for my husband and I is a luxury. I know for some that sounds absolutely crazy. I was excited when Obama Care first came out. I wanted to believe that finally insurance would be affordable for us. It didn't work out that way. We are one of those middle cases. Somewhere in between poverty and middle ground. So just for me insurance would be over $400 a month. JUST FOR ME! This was the reason I became an herbalist in the first place. I knew we couldn't afford insurance but if I could keep us well and strong. If I could take care of the small things. Maybe the big things would be so few and far between that we c...

I took some time off from everything while we were in the big city. I felt oppressed and fearful there and it was hard to find inspiration and even a desire to come out of my hidy hole to play and chat with my plant family. Then we had an opportunity fall right in our laps which placed us right back in the mountains of NC that we LOVE so very much! We are laying down roots so we have called our new house Root House!  My youngest introducing Root House <3 I am still a bit overwhelmed with homeschooling our kids and trying to find time to dive head first into every topic that interests me (there are a lot of them), but I have been finding time where I can to go out and play. This weekend we went hiking and had so much fun creek stomping and digging roots!  I set out for the hike with the intention of finding Yellow Root ( Xanthorhiza simplicissima ) and Bloodroot ( Sanguinaria canadensis ). I had almost used up all my Yellow Root tincture I had made a few yea...

Gladiolas from the kids' garden Today was a beautiful solstice day! I love to roll with the seasons so I like to celebrate each of them in some way. So today we all started in the gardens! It has been unusually hot here for the month of June but some nice thunderstorms in the evenings lately have been helping to keep the plants happy! My youngest talking to the bees this morning on the Bee Balm  We had so much fun relaxing together! My husband and I drinking coffee, while laughing at one of our dogs, watching the birds, and doing a little pruning and harvesting. Harvest from the herb garden   The best part of the day was a short hike at Medoc Mountain. One of our favorite places to hike around here. It is always gorgeous out there! A brilliant blue dragonfly who wanted his picture taken!   My oldest, that was recently diagnosed with Crohn's disease, loves to hike but since her flare up she has been very fearful to attempt it. She did...

So much has been happening lately that I haven't found time to post. So I will give you a run down of all the excitement and hopefully be able to get back to a nice schedule from here on out! Florida Herbal Conference 2015   My Favorite Class Room The center of it all! At the end of February I was lucky to attend the  Florida Herbal Conference  thanks to some dear friends. I helped them run their booth, Earthen Moon , and they helped me get my ticket. It was a blast and a well needed break from the daily mom stuff. There were so many amazing classes it was hard to pick exactly which ones I wanted to attend. My favorites were To Hold Quiet with Kate Taluga, Iris Evaluation with Joanna Helms, Breaking Addictions with Leslie Williams, Inter-species Telepathic Communication with Ellen Kamhi, Planting Sacred Relationships with Willow LaMonte, and Scientific Validation of Botanical Medicine with Ellen Kamhi. Ok well that was all the classes I took and ...