Monthly Archives: September 2005

Chimney Swifts

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K and I went downtown tonight to watch the Chimney Swifts do their nightly plunge into one of the larger chimney’s in Asheville. I have lived here off and on since I was 12 and have never heard of this. Apparently, they all gather in one spot before taking their winter trip to Peru. So, for 3 days at sun rise and sun set you can see them swirling around the chimney over one of the downtown buildings. It was really amazing! It started off ~7 pm with 10-20 of them circling over the building. We went to lay in the grass with ~30 other people all there to wathc (some with wine and cheese:-). By the time the sun was setting, there were thousands of them in what looked like a funnel cloud just swirling around the chimney. Then they started to dive in. And over ~5 minutes, they were all gone. It was wild! While we were there, a reporter from the local paper came over to ask me a few questions. I said stuff like ‘yeah, it’s amazing that they don’t crash’ and ‘I wonder why they chose that chimney’ and stupid stuff like that (I’m glad she didn’t quote me when I joked about why no one was getting crapped on since we were all laying down directly under the birds). And then, K (who had been occupied with a cookie that someone gave her) decided to get up and do a “birdie dance”. It was awesome! She was flapping her arms and tweeting and zooming all around! She is such a nut! Too bad the reporter didn’t have a camera 🙂

I tried to get a good picture, but there was just no way with them all swooping all over the place. I did get a shot of the chimney that they all fly into though. If you look really close, you can see some dots in the sky that are the birds. (but don’t strain your eyes!)

Me… a professor… kind of…

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Well, after this weekend at the herb conference, so much has happened. First, I brought some of my products to one of the natural food stores here, Greenlife, and they are interested in some of my stuff. Yay! After my meeting at Greenlife, I went to another meeting with some other area herbalists. The North Carolina Chapter of the American Herbalist Guild has just been started here and I am now an official member. It’s very exciting! The conference this weekend really helped me see what an amazing area this is for herbalism. I am very lucky to be here in the middle of this ‘herbal revolution’! Then, just today, I got a call from the directer of the Southeast School for Herbal Healing and was asked to become a teacher with them!! I am extremely excited!!! Of course, being me, I am also very intimidated, it gives me heart palpitations 🙂 Well, my first classes will be on herb/drug interactions and running an herb business (this will be for the 2nd year students). Then in the spring, I will be teaching some basic courses (materia medica, medicine making…) to the first year students. Cool eh!! She (the director) and I met this weekend at the conference, but I am going out to the school next week for an official tour and stuff. AND, as if that weren’t enough. I just found out about this fantastic course (distance ed.) that Aviva Romm (very well known herbalist!) is teaching in which I could get certified as a Women’s Herbal Educator. I emailed her about it and she said I would “make a wonderful student”. So, I will probably start the course this fall (if I can find the funds!)! It will be a great refresher of basics, as well as lots of advanced herbalism that I need. The only thing that is lacking is actual clinical experience, which I hope to get with one of the local school this coming spring! WOW! I am feeling very blessed and a little overwhelmed. Now… when am I supposed to start homeschooling???

Toby’s Birthday Cake

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Here ya go, Gina!

Applesauce-Raisin Spice Cake with Maple Cream Frosting
CAKE
3/4 c butter
1 c Honey
2 eggs
2 c unsweetened applesauce
1 tsp. vanilla extract
1 1/2 c whole wheat pastry flour
1 1/2 c unbleaced white flour
1/2 cup rolled oats
1 Tbsp. baking soda
1 1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon
1 tsp. ground nutmeg
1/2 tsp. cardamom
1/4 tsp. ground cloves
3/4 c raisins

GLAZE
1 c maple syrup
1/2 c heavy cream
2 Tbsp. unbleached while flour

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Grease and flower two 9- or 10- inch cake pans.
For the cake, in a medium-size bowl, cream the butter with the honey until light and fluffy. Beat in the eggs, applesauce, and vanilla.
In another bowl, stir together the flours, oats, baking soda, cinnamon, nutmeg, cardamom and cloves.
Beat the dry ingredients into the wet and stir in the raisins.
Pour the batter into the prepared pans, and bake for 25 to 30 minutes, until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Place the cakes on cooling racks for 10 minutes, and then turn them out onto the racks.
To prepare the glaze, heat the maple syrup, cream, and flour in a saucepam over low heat, whisking until it begins to simmer and thickens slightly, about 5 mintues. Cool the glaze in the fridge until the cake is cool.
Place on of the cake layers on a serving plate and spread half the glaze on top. Add the second layer and spread the remaining glaze on top. Cut and serve.

Birthdays, celebrations and house crap

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Toby’s birthday is today, so K and I got up and made him some breakfast, and brought it to him in bed. Then, tonight we got some Thai food (one of his favorites) and I made an “applesauce raisin spice cake with maple cream icing” MMmmmmm.

We are also preparing for our equinox celebration. We made our indian corn necklaces today, and then wore them to the grocery store where we got lots of compliments. We also planned out our menu… I am making spiced apple bread, garlic mashed potatoes and gravy, swiss chard casserole and maybe some turkey. We are going to a friends house tomorrow for dinner (we are having our big celebration tomorrow ’cause Toby won’t be here on the equinox), and then to a huge bonfire on Sat. I am really enjoying having celebrations with the seasons! It just makes so much more sense to me.

OK, so the house crap. We sent a letter to the x-buyers letting them know that they had broken the lease and did owe us earnest money, since their reasons for breaking the lease weren’t legal as far as the contract goes. We just got a letter this morning from the x-buyers with the general tone of ‘you guys are idiots and will never win in court with your frivolous claims. We told you we can’t get financing and won’t be able to buy the house. we are right, you are wrong, Suck it!’ Well, had they actually told us that they couldn’t get financing, that would have been a whole different story! My feeling is that they went out and asked someone to deny them credit so that they could send the letter to us. Who knows. ‘Cause otherwise, why would you say “well, we just don’t want to have two mortgages and we may not get approval from the builder” and other crap like that. A simple “we can’t get a loan” would have ended it right there, no questions asked. Oh well, we are totally over it and don’t feel like pushing anything. If it was a missunderstanding, whatever… If they did get someone to give them a ‘no credit’ note after we sent them the letter asking for earnest money… well, Karma baby.

Lata!

SE

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I just spent the past three days at the first annual South East Women’s Herbal Conference and I had a blast!! There were classes Friday, Saturday and Sunday about anything you can think of related to herbs! It was held at Camp Merri-mac, which is a beautiful camp set in woods ~15 minutes from Asheville. Susun Weed was the Keynote speaker, but I wasn’t as impressed with her as I was some of the other herbalist/speakers. I mean, she is very vibrant and fun to watch, but I could see all these people just drinking in what she was saying without even questioning it, just because she is Susun Weed, Goddess Herbalist. Like, ok, she talked about being a Wise Woman herbalist, and claims to have ‘discovered’ this tradition. Um, no, there have been shaman and granny herbalists for thousands of years! I am truly happy that she is helping to give herbalists a name and all, but she is not the founder of the wise-woman tradition. She says that being a wise woman is all about being flexible, being able to adapt to the situation, use your intuition and that there is no set of hard and fast rules. Yet, then she totally contradicted herself by saying that flower essences and essential oils are crap and should never be used by a good herbalist. (wait… isn’t that a rule??) Anyway, her talk was enjoyable for the most part. She is known for being a very wise herbalist but also a hard ass, and I could see both of those as she spoke. But, I did enjoy the talk.

I also went to talks by a local herbalist friend of mine, Lauren Connell, about Flower Essences, and a local midwife who discussed homeopathics. Then I heard talks on Menopause, the Endocrine System, and Winter Immune Strenthening given by Kathleen Maier, who is a very knowledgable herbalist and fantastic speaker! The highlight of the weekend, though, had to be the talks given by Sheri Winston, a reknowned “Certified Pussy Professional” and “Pelvic Priestess”. I took the class on Vaginal Ecology and the one called “Maps of the Clitoris” and I have to say they were awesome! Not only is she a very vibrant speaker, but it was just in-your-face stuff that we all should have been taught about ourselves when we got our first periods!

The food was fabulous (I think I gained a few pounds!). Friday night, there was a girls band called the Buckarettes, and Sat. night was Baraka Mundi a belly dancing troupe. I camped out and spent the whole weekend there, which was wonderful! It was also very hard, cause I missed K a lot! But, she and Toby did just fine and had some good bonding time!

Our Trip to the Post Office

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while standing in line at the post office
“Mama, do they have a potty here”
“No K, there is no potty at the post office, do you have to go?”
“I have to go potty, mama”
“K, didn’t you just go potty at daddy’s office?”
loudly and emphatically“Mama, I have to go Poopy!”
move up to the counter, hear snickers from the people behind us and the postal workers
“Can you wait until we get home? We are going home after this”
“Mama, I just stand like this”crosses legs “and hold da poopy in so it doesn’t come out!”
more giggles

“Hey Mama! der’s a cock on de wall! A big round cock!”
strange looks from the audience!
“Yes, K, there is a clock on the wall! It is almost one o’clock”
I turn to the other customers and say “you didn’t know the post office had such wonderful things to look at did you?” and one of the customers replies “I have never had such entertainment at the post office!”

“Mama I’m still holdin’ in de poopy, kay?”
“Good job K, let’s get home so you can go potty”
“Mama, I already went. I run like dis to de car” jumping, skipping and waving her hands “and all the poopy goes boing boing boing on my butt!”
“Thank you K for the visual”
“welcome mama”

For those concerned citizens, K did not go in her ‘big girl panties” She waited until we got home!

Addendum: Oh, and I almost forgot about the part where K told me “mama, I don’t want to eat my poopy! It’s stinky! SHOOOWEEEE!” Ahh, my little girl!

Wild ride!

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I have to say, I am kind of glad that this weekend is almost over and maybe we can start fresh tomorrow. Aside from the house coming out of contract (they just decided they didn’t want it anymore!!) Toby started having trouble breathing and had to go to the ER. Turns out he has costochondritis, inflammation of the joints in between the ribs and the sternum. It’s usually caused by stressing that area too much. (We think this may have happened in the move). It’s like throwing out your back, except it’s your front. I’ve got him on all kinds of herbs for inflammation and pain, and he is taking prescriptions if needed. Poor thing! In the middle of it all, K and I are full of snot with a nice cool weather change cold. But, on the bright side of it all, K has decided (at barely 27 months of age) that she will no longer wear diapers. She has been in her “big girl panties” for the past week, including at night, and hasn’t had an accident! I am floored! I thought she would be at least 3 before this happened!! She’s so awesome! Today, when I was putting her to sleep she said “mama, K has a little butt, and mommy and daddy have big butts”. How true!

OK, I’m off to bed to recuperate!

Oh, here are a few pictures of our evening play. We are taking all the kernels off of the indian corn and are going to make them into necklaces in celebration of the equinox next week. You just soak them in water for a few hours and then thread a string through them. Then, when you have the right length necklace, you lay them out to dry. and Voila!



passwords!

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OK, I have now become one of those bloggers who needs to hide their posts from certain readers. If you are interested in reading my rantings, please email me (maria@fullcircleherbs.com) and I will send you the password. And don’t worry, if you know you have done nothing to incur my wrath, then it’s not you I’m ranting about 🙂

mama’s play time!

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Well, I just dropped K off at her first day of play school! I am still struggling with the “I can do everything and still get a nice dinner on the table” mama attitude, and have realized that in order to keep (or get back) my sanity, I need a break! So, I found this great place just down the street (literally 5 houses down) that has a Tuesday/Thursday play school from 8-11:30!! So, K gets some time to play with friends and learn more than just my 5 song repertoire, and I get time to work on Full Circle Herbs. I am still planning on home schooling, but I think this will be very good for both of us.

So, I am hoping to use some of this free time to start doing an “Herb of the Week” write up. I figure it will be a good way to refresh myself! I will post it on this site.

What else… Oh, we have a contract on the house in Chapel Hill!!! We never did have to put it on the market! And we should close by the end of this month!! So, we went to Chapel Hill again this weekend and did all the final touch ups and trash removal. We were also able to pack up the bees and bring them to Asheville. (At night, when they have gone into their hives, you put a piece of screen over the entrance and strap the hives together so nothing moves. Then put them on the truck and away you go) They are hanging out on my brother-in-laws property where he has a little more space than we do. I hope to get over there at least every other week to do a mite count. That is about all I do now for the bees. Toby does everything else. I am kind of freaked out about getting stung again. After the last sting (which I think was a yellow jacket, but still), my leg swelled up so big you could bounce a dime off of it. And it took a few weeks to resolve. SO, I figure, I should probably stay away from the bees just in case the stings keep getting worse.

Helping hurricane victims

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I am trying to pile together some things to take to the local shelter collecting items for the victims of Hurricane Katrina. Aside from canned goods, I am also putting together some herbal first aid kits (I hope they take them). I have some herbal betadine, herbal styptic and lots of soap. If you are trying to find a place to take donations just google your city’s name and ‘katrina’ and ‘donations’ and you will find something. I know that Red Cross, food banks, and many grocery stores are accepting donations. If you are feeling too poor, or don’t think just one person can make a difference, then just imagine you are a new mom sitting in a shelter with 45,ooo other people around you… you have no food for you or your child, no fresh clothes, no clean diapers, no medicine, basically none of the three necessities for life: food clothing and shelter, nothing, and it might be months before you can reliably count on any of these things to be there. Now, go donate!

Addendum: OK, so I just called the local donation place to ask about bringing my stuff and they said they don’t want it! I don’t have my soaps wrapped in any way, and I can totally understand that they may not want those right now, since they don’t know what they are getting, but with the styptics and betadine and other herbal medicines, they don’t want them because they feel people will be unfarmiliar with the items and not know what to do with them (they do have labels with directions!) and would rather me go out a buy things at the store to donate. Kind of frustrating…

Out for a drive

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I took a drive this morning to go look at some land that a friend has for sale. I puttered along in my biodiesel/vegetable oil car thinking how I have been paying $3-3.50/gallon of biodiesel for a year now (when we can’t make our own) and gas has finally reached the same price. I think everyone has felt that this was coming, no matter what the cause of price increase might be. I realize that most people in this country are totally dependant on gasoline to help run their daily lives (myself included), but I can’t say that I am not glad that the prices of gas are so high. Maybe it is just what this country needs to make a change for the better. We have traded in our souls for the ‘convenience’ of a system of travel that cannot go on indefinitely. And Biodiesel isn’t the answer either. We would just be putting a bandaid on the wound and not really dealing with the problem. I realize that I am preaching to the choir here, but I feel it must be said again… we have got to start supporting our communities!!! If we bought locally produced food and clothing, if we rode our bikes, walked, or car pooled, if we lived more sustainable lifestyles in harmony with earth and her cycles, if we were all a little more present, we wouldn’t be in this mess. Change must happen! So, here is the challenge:
1- grow just one plant your house that produced some food (think tomato, lemon, potato, herbs, banana, whatever!) and then share that food with your neighbors!
2 – If you are going to eat out, eat at the local mom and pop restaurants instead of the chains, and hound them to buy their food from local farmers (then, no trucks needing gas to haul our food from California).
3 – buy recycled clothing or make your own (there is nothing wrong with a thrift store special!)
4 – get out and walk or ride your bikes as much as possible. If this just can’t be done, than extend a hand to a neighbor and offer to carpool (to work, for errands…). Or try to get all your erands done in one outing instead of multiple trips.
I know there is so much more that can be listed here, but I think this is a good start!