Category Archives: Mothering

scrawny snoman

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We had our first snow of the year this past week and it stayed about 2 hours before melting.  Poor Kaia wanted to build a big snow man so badly.  We scraped the snow off of the car and built this sad little man.  He’s about 8 inches tall.  He was melted by the next morning and she was very sad.

I woke up this morning after another warm night without the stove lit, and thought about global warming… wondering if I need to start planting tropical fruits in the yard!  Then Toby told me that we are supposed to be getting a cold from this week.  It’s going from 55 degrees tomorrow to highs in the 30s, lows in the teems with a wind chill in the negatives!!!   No pineapples in my yard this year 🙂

More pictures

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Kaia is just getting to bed… she was out at the house helping us light our first fire in the new stove!

But first, some pictures!

The drywall is all up. They finished in a little over a day! New guys came out this morning to start the mudding! Unfortunately, the hangers left big piles of drywall everywhere. So, I’ve got a day of cleaning up scheduled for me on Wed.

Here’s the door to the master bedroom upstairs… it looks so different with the drywall up. I can’t wait to get some color on those walls!

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Here’s part of the kitchen. You can see a cordwood wall on the left. That is one of the ones that has the most work still to be done. We’ve put up plastic over all the holes and hooked up the stove today so we can try to keep the house warm… for the sake of the cordwood mortar and the drywallers.

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Here are the mudding guys. They were really fast! I love the stilts!! They both turned around and stopped working to pose for me when they saw I had a camera 🙂
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And here is our first fire in our new little stove! Woohoo!  It’s supposed to get into the teens tonight, and we are worried about the mortar.  It’s been a little over a week since we last laid cordwood, but still… we don’t want the walls falling apart because it didn’t set up right.  So, hopefully the stove will warm the place up enough.
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So, as far as getting in touch with the guy who was jumping on the trampoline when her leg broke, I’ve written a long letter, but I have decided not to send it. I really just needed to get some stuff off of my chest and I don’t think it will do any good to make them feel guilty about it. I do feel like he needs to know what happened, but I am letting it go. I have enough stress in my life right now without having to put more energy into this.

I know… I know…

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I said I’d post pictures a week ago… and here we are.

Well, in the past week all the dry wall has gone up.  I was waiting for them to mud it before I took pictures, but I may take some and post ’em anyway…  We also have a 165 foot trench going from our well to our house.  Toby and I laid the water pipe and electric wires in it today, before the rain started.  Tomorrow, we hope to hook up the stove so we can heat the house.  There are still large holes in the cordwood walls, but we will probably put up some plastic to try to keep the place warm so the walls will try properly.

Kaia got her cast off on Thursday.  Doc says her bones look great and she has no restrictions.  She’s walking with a limp while she works out the stiffness and gets more confident.  Occasionally her leg will hurt and then she gets scared again about using it.  You know, I’ve been trying to get in touch with the guy who was jumping on the trampoline with her and double bounced her when her leg broke.  I was kind of expecting to hear from him or his wife to ask how Kaia was doing, but it’s been a month since it happened and I haven’t heard a peep.  I didn’t know who he was so, I asked a friend who goes to a library story time with them to get their contact info.  Really, I just wanted to let them know what happened so he would stay off the kids equipment next time… Guess what… the wife refused to give out her contact info!  She knew Kaia broke her leg and hasn’t even told her husband!!  She didn’t want to upset him!!  Then she had the nerve to ask my friend if I wanted money!  Can you believe the nerve??!!  MY child has a broken leg and she doesn’t have the balls to say “I’m sorry” or to even tell her husband what the consequences of his actions were!!!  When I have the quiet of mind to be able to compose a letter, I’m going to have to put a few words to paper and let them know some of the hell that we’ve gone through in the past month because of their actions!

Thank you! THANK YOU!

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Thank you everyone for the support you have given our family since Kaia broke her leg!  Your kindness means the world to us!  We feel very blessed!

Kaia got her cast on this morning.  She is moving much more easily now and enjoying her new purple cast!  They took xrays and said her bone is healing very well.  She should only need to be in the cast for 16 days.  After that we’ll see if she needs any kind of support for a while as she gets use to walking again.  But, really, she is doing fantastic and may even get to go back to school on Thursday!

learning flexiblity

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Kaia is doing well! Thank you all for your well wishes and concern. The orthopedic doc wants her to keep her splint on until next Tuesday to be sure that any swelling is gone before they cast it. Then he thinks the cast will only be on for 2 or 2 1/2 weeks. So, not so bad. He said the break is a full break through the bone, but the bones didn’t move, so they didn’t have to set them, and the break is below the growth plate, so she shouldn’t have any problems there either. She’s been moving around (by crawling and scooting) with ease and throws herself onto the couch. She’s even been putting a little weight on it and doesn’t have any pain. Her main problem is that her heel itches like crazy when she is sleeping. I think her foot is going to sleep and she wakes up when it starts tingling.

We went to her Nana’s house for dinner last night… here she is (the little brain child) trying to figure out the game “Battleship” and ‘resting’ on the couch. She’s learning to be flexible about getting around, and we’re given another lesson flexibility in our lives…

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The insulation went in yesterday. Easy-peasy! They just spray it (icynene) into the walls in a very thin layer and it puffs up to fill the wall space. We would have loved to use something totally sustainable, but this was the closest we could get for what we needed. Icynene is a petroleum product, but it is supposed to be more air quality friendly and non toxic. It’s also more energy efficient.

See the thin, white spray on the upper left wall…

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Here’s what it puffs into:

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Cool, eh?

Feeling down

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Kaia broke her leg last night.  My poor little one!  She was at a birthday party where there was a trampoline and too many people were jumping at once.  She came down as the trampoline was bouncing up, and the impact was enough to break the top of her tibia!  She was in a lot of pain, but there was no swelling or color change.  So I was hoping it was just a sprain.  But, as the night wore on and the pain continued, we decided to take her to the ER.  So, now she is in a full leg splint, from hip to toes!  She was up until 5am in the ER, so I’ve got her on some pain killers now to help her get some sleep.  Tomorrow, we will go to an orthopedist to get a ‘permanent’ cast put on her leg.  It may be on a few weeks, it could be a month or more.  We’ll know on Monday.  Poor thing.  She can’t move.  The cast is almost half her weight… she can’t get up the stairs to her bedroom,  she can’t get in or out of her car seat,  she can’t get into her chair to eat a meal, she can’t go the bathroom by herself.  I know that this time will fly and kids bones heal fast, but I don’t care!  I wish it had been my leg!  I can’t stand to see her in pain!  This, on top of Suki’s surgery, not having insurance, and not having much money left to finish the house, and the whole family is feeling a bit low.

Animal News

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So, Suki is loving her raw food! She has so much more energy and really seems to be happier since we started her on her new diet. But that lump on her muzzle just won’t go away. A few years ago she got a swelling on the left side of her muzzle. We thought she was stung by a bee, but the swelling never went away. I took her to a vet who said it didn’t look like anything to be concerned about and that it may just be a fluid cyst. Well, it stayed the same size for the last 2 years and recently got larger. I looked in her mouth to see her gums were red and inflamed with some pustular drainage in her upper mouth. I took her to the vet again today (a different one) and they said that it could be an abscessed tooth, but because of where the drainage is located, they think it may be a foreign body lodged in her gums. The only way to tell is for us to take her to an animal hospital an hour away, have her be anesthetized and get a CT scan of her head! UGH! They did some blood work today. I’ll know tomorrow how that looks and when we can get in for the CT scan (and how much it will cost). I’ve had her on some herbs that have brought down the redness and swelling, and she is showing no signs of discomfort. But, there is still drainage.

Now, on a happier note… we are getting Max back!!! 2 years ago, my baby Max (a Devon Rex cat that I had had for 8 years) went to live with some friends of ours. It broke my heart to give him away, but he was very unhappy with our living situation (tiny apartment with no other animal friends) and needed more companionship. Well, last week, I got an email from my friend. She said Max was doing ok, but he was lonely. He is again an only cat since the two cats they had when they adopted Max had died. Plus, she started having allergy problems to him during her last pregnancy earlier this year. So, as soon as the big house is done, Max will be coming home!!! He is 10 years old, but going strong! I’m hoping to get another younger cat (hopefully another Devon) to be a companion! Yay!! I’ve missed him!

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AHG Symposium

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Things have been cruising along busily for the past few weeks.

I spent much of last week in Columbia, MD at the American Herbalist’s Guild Symposium, which was fantastic, as usual! I spent most of the time in Paul Bergner’s classes. He’s got a fantastic way of explaining things in a way I understand. First was a 6 hour intensive on Clinical Nutrition in the Herbal Paradigm. We talked about macro and micro nutrients in the prehistoric, agrarian, and modern diet, and how the deficiencies and imbalances that have come about since industrialization have led to modern diseases. After that we began to discuss patterns of imbalance that are seen in the modern day diet: 1) The SAD pattern
(Standard American Diet), 2) The Anorexia pattern, 3) The Junk-Food Vegetarian pattern, 4) The Stress-Carbohydrate pattern, 5) The Insulin Resistance pattern, and 6) the Food Allergy pattern. It was fantastic! I have such a hard time with my clients and being able to describe why food is so important to health. I think the research he presented will help me to educate my clients in a way they can understand.

The next day I went to a talk on HPV and the new Gardasil vaccine given by Mary Bove. I was enraged when I left the class! So far, here is what we know about the vaccine…
–In June of 2006 the FDA approved Gardasil to be used on females age 9 through 26.
–The vaccine trial for Gardasil was a 14 day trial on women averaging 23 years of age (there were no girls under 12 in the study, yet it is being recommended by the FDA for 9 year olds!). The 14 day trial showed protection against 4 types of HPV (Two of these types of HPV cause over 70% of the cervical cancers, but there are over 100 different types of HPV.) Gardasil was tested alone. It was not given with any other vaccinations (yet we often give vaccinations in groups, ex: MMR and DTaP)
–As of May, 2007 (one year after approval by the FDA) there have been 2227 adverse reactions reported to the CDC (and only ~10% of all adverse reactions are ever reported). The reactions included 13 cases of GBS (Group Beta Strep.), 239 cases of fainting with temporary loss of consciousness (some also with head injuries and fractures), and seven deaths reported after receiving Gardasil. There have also been respiratory and cardiac problems, neuromuscular and coordination problems, and convulsions.
–The vaccine does not contain mercury. As a substitute preservative, it has 225 mcg Aluminum. (so if girls get all three shots, they will be getting 675 mcg aluminum)
–The 3 series of shots cost $360 wholesale. So if states made it mandatory to get this vaccine, Merck (the only producer of Gardasil) stands to make $3 billion dollars a year!)
–There is no long term testing on this vaccination. We have no idea long term effect on women, fetuses, health… and how long it will remain effective.

So, what about education??? We will force our girls to get a vaccination against potential cervical cancer, but we won’t teach them safe sex practices?? And what about getting our girls to have PAP smears as a preventative for cervical cancer? Cervical cancer is a slow progressing cancer. If we get pap smears, we are much more likely to catch cervical changes before it progresses. And what about educating our girls about healthy nutrition and body care? With a strong immune system, about 80% of HPV infections will be cleared rapidly from the body.

There is so much we don’t know about this vaccine! I would encourage all of you to become educated so you can make the best decisions for your children!

Next I went to a class on Herbal Gastroenterology talk by David Winston. This was another fantastic talk on how the digestive system is key to good health!!

I spent the next day with Paul Bergner again hearing his talks on Patient Energetics. Herbalist and fellow blogger, Guido Mase, give a great description of the class on his blog.

Then, it was on to Tongue Diagnosis with Christopher Hobbs. Tongue diagnosis is something that has been skimmed over in all the herb schools I have been to. I realize that it is not really a diagnostic tool, but more of a way to confirm what you may be seeing in a client. I really enjoyed his class. He kept it pretty simple (what a hot or cold tongue looks like and where different regions of the body are reflected in the tongue). But, it definitely helped.

Next years symposium is supposed to be in Seattle!  I hope I can make it!  They can really add up in price, especially if you have to fly.  But, you really can’t put a price on knowledge, education, and feeling of community with fellow herbalists.

Happy Fall

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Tomorrow is the first day of Fall.  So, Kaia and I started celebrating by heading to the Annual Plow festival at Warren Wilson College.  Every year, tons of people come out with their old timey plows and draft horses and plow the fields for the college.  There was also fresh pressed apple juice, a black smithing demonstration, pie tasting, bbq, face painting, and wagon rides.

The house is moving along… we finished putting on all the layers of roof insulation, the plumbing passed inspection, and Toby built 3 pocket doors (one for Kaia’s room, for the master bedroom, and in the linen closet) to save space and ’cause they are cool!  Because of all the funky angles in a 16-sided house, we also have a secret room and a built in bookshelf in Kaia’s room, a secret cubby in the guest room, built-in shelves in the hall, a large pantry, and an office cubby under the stairs.  This house is going to ROCK!!

Beautiful mama

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This weekend I threw a Blessingway (kind of like a spiritual baby shower) for my good friend and business partner! She is 34 weeks pregnant with her first child. Her close friends came over and we had a circle to give her our blessings and love for her journey into motherhood. It was really beautiful. Then a friend of mine who is a henna tattoo artist came over to tattoo mama’s belly. Isn’t this beautiful??!!

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Then the ladies there had their hands done too. The henna paste comes off after ~a day and there is a stain from the henna that is left. The tattoos can last anywhere from 2-4 weeks, so now when we look at our hands we will stop for a second to send mama good birthing energy. Cool, eh?

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The cake of the century

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Kaia turned 4 last Sunday, but we are having her party tomorrow (we were out of town last weekend). Kaia asked Toby and I to make her birthday cake with her instead of buying one! She picked out all the stuff… the cake pan, the decorations, etc…

So, today, we set about on a cake baking expedition! Seeing as we had a 16″ diameter round cake pan that is 2″ thick, we had to quadruple the recipe!!! (Man, I hope lots of people show up at the party tomorrow, ’cause this thing isn’t gonna fit in our fridge!) Here’s Kaia mixing the ingredients in the biggest pot we have.

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As you can see, the batter turned out rather tasty! We made a Hummingbird cake (which is kind of like a carrot cake, but with pineapple, coconut, pecans, and bananas).

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Here we have our little cake cooling. I can’t believe it came out of the pan in one piece! (to give you some perspective as to how big this friggin’ thing is, that is a dime on the front corner of it!)
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Kaia really disliked the decorating process, as you can see. And, of course, she had not sampled any of the icing by this point!
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And here we have the final product! Ariel sitting on an island, while purple waves lap the shore. The sun shines brightly down on the fruit people who are dancing in the sky, on the island, and in the sea. Everything in and on the cake is edible and we used turmeric, annatto, cranberry, and blueberry for the colorings. Next time, I’ll get some chlorophil for some vibrant green. Now… how to get this too the party??? Hmmmm…
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Summer’s here!

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Happy (almost) first day of Summer everyone!! I always love the longest day of the year, but it also comes to me with some sadness. ‘Cause that means every day after it is getting shorter 🙁

Things are going well here at the homestead. The chickens are happy, Suki is enjoying time in the shade with her favorite bone. Unfortunately, our great friend and house-helper, Mattie, is moving back to Canada at the end of the month! He’s been an amazing help and support with the house so far and we will really miss him. Another friend may begin working for us in a few weeks. Plus, a few years ago, Toby helped install a veggie oil conversion kit in a school bus in Chapel Hill. Well, the woman who owns the school bus now lives near us and she wants to give a few days of work on our house to repay the favor!

Toby and I have started talking about whether or not we want to have another child. Part of me really wants to. I look at Kaia and I think “how could I not want another one. It’s so absolutely amazing to be a parent… to watch her grow and learn… the complete love I feel” and part of me is like “why would I ever want to put myself through that again?! The nausea of pregnancy, the immense weight gain, the pain and depression after the birth, the endless nights without sleep… ugh!!” So, you see, I am torn. Now that I finally have my energy and my sanity back (though unfortunately, I don’t think I’ll ever get my body back), it seems like having another child would be easy… ’cause I’m in a good place. But all that changes after not having slept in 2 years. Toby and I would both really like to adopt, but no one will approve us right now… you know – tiny cabin, out house, now shower, no money and all that. So, maybe in the future. Kaia is up for another child, without a doubt. She gives birth to some kind of pretend baby every day in preparation for the real thing 🙂

Baby or not, I’ve started trying to get a little more exercise. I’ve been getting up early to go out and hoop a little before Kaia wakes up. It’s been really nice hooping in the cool morning air. It puts me in a great mood for the rest of the day. I’ve also signed up for a workshop in July that I am really excited about. I hope it will get me into some sort of hooping routine! I continue to (slowly) get better, but I want more!! Here is a hooper doing some of the moves that we will be learning at the workshop.
Viriditas is going great! We are finally picking up! This week was booked. We have people from South Carolina, Eastern NC, and even a tourist from CT. coming in for the Maya Abdominal Massage. And Herb consultations have picked up too. Hopefully this is the start of something. Then maybe we can start paying off some business loans. Our Summer Newsletter is out if you want to see it.

Happy Solstice!

Day of Adventure

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Kaia and I and two of our friends met a bunch of other homeschoolers on a goat farm tour today.  We drove ~1 hour to the farm and planned on having the afternoon to play.  But, soon after getting there I started feeling light headed and had to sit down.  I broke into a cold sweat and the world around me started getting dark.  Some of the mamas, and the farm owner helped me inside to the couch and got me some cold rags.  I laid down, drank water, munched on some crackers and fruit and started feeling better.  So, after ~15 minutes I got back up to join the grew.  I hadn’t walked too far when it started again.  I was having trouble walking in a straight line.  So I went to lay down in their small shop store and the farm owner (who also happens to be an ICU nurse) took my BP (which was fine) and offered me some gateraide and ice cold cloths.  I felt totally fine when I was laying down… I’m not pregnant, I don’t have a virus, it wasn’t heat exhaustion, it wasn’t my blood sugar… the only thing I can think is that it was vertigo.  I never had any issues with vertigo until a month ago when I was at my Maya Abdominal Massage class and I started getting dizzy when I laid down.  Supposedly, there are particles moving around in my inner ear and they cause dizziness with a change of posture.  So, I wonder if with all the hills we went over and all the turning my head and neck to deal with the girls in the back of the car that maybe some of the particles moved and made the vertigo worse.  Either way, the girls had a blast milking the mama goats and feeding the babies, and my friend was nice enough to take pictures for me.  On the way back we ran into a tremendous rain/hail storm that was amazing.

here are some pics:

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make your own…

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Last week Kaia asked me why we didn’t chew gum. I told her it just wasn’t something we did. I was a huge gum addict when I was younger. I use to have a drawer in the fridge that I kept my gum in. My mom hated it! Mostly because it was chewed gum that I believed would regain it’s flavor if you cooled it down and then tried chewing it again. Anyway, at some point, I just stopped chewing gum. Now, with having Kaia, I think I didn’t want to get into it because I wasn’t ready to deal with gum in the hair, in the bed, stuck to furniture…

Anyway, last week when she went to play at her grandmother’s, Kaia came home with a pack of gum and she has been chomping on it for dear life. She loves it! Any chance she gets she asks me for another piece. And get this… She found a little corner in the fridge and stores it there… new and used gum! Now she wants to know how to blow bubbles (gum in the hair, here we come)!

So, looking at the ingredients in the gum (the pack she had was loaded with artificial sweeteners) I decided we were going to learn how to make our own and come up with our own special flavors. So, I ordered this and also got the ingredients to follow this recipe. We’ll see how they all turn out!  (Oh, by the way if you ever happen to get a wad of chewing gum stuck in your belly button, Q-tips work really well to get it out.  Just keep twisting it around and it will get it all out… 🙂
After looking up how to make gum, I got in the ‘makin’ mood. So, we decided to make some ice cream. Since we don’t have an ice cream maker, we followed both of these recipes for Pumpkin Ice Cream (also from the Leener’s site we got the gum recipe from… cool site!) and for Fruit Ice Cream (we used a frozen fruit mix at the end). They both turned out fantastic!!! Kaia is bouncing off the walls right now while Toby tries to get her into bed! (Mental note: no more ice cream right before bed!)

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Kaia, smiling like the nut she is, mixing the pumpkin ice cream.

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Here we are kneading the bags of fruit ice cream. Kaia has a cloth over hers to keep her hands from getting too cold. You can see the pink ice cream in the bag I am holding.

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Savoring the fruit ice cream. (No, she didn’t eat all of that! We put most of it back in the freezer.)

I think I am going to order her the “Play and Freeze” ice cream maker for her birthday.

When the cat’s away, the mouse will clean!

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Why is it that when Toby goes out of town I get things done?  Maybe it’s that I don’t expect to have help with anything, so I do what ever needs to be done.  Which, in this case was:

  • Get the car completely detailed as it hasn’t been washed in ~4 years
  • Wash the dishes
  • Deep clean the kitchen
  • Clean Kaia’s room
  • Put away Kaia’s winter clothes and tidy her clothing drawers
  • Tidy/organize the whole house!
  • Organize the front porch
  • Take everything out of the house downstairs, sweep and mop the floors
  • Bring all the food compost scraps covering the kitchen counter to the compost bin
  • Bring the dead snake (thanks Suki) and the bird carcass (again, thanks suki) to the compost bin
  • Take off all the recycling and trash
  • Strain the kefir
  • Spend the afternoon with Kaia at a school picnic
  • There’s more, but I can’t remember it all!

And that was just today!!!

Tomorrow, we have a birthday party, hiking, maybe we will start planting her flower garden…

If I just had a little help (to lift the big beams), I could have the new house done by the time he comes home! 🙂

Mark your calendars

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Would everyone please mark you calendars to email me next year to make sure I get my butt into the woods the first week in May.  The woods are bustin’ out!!

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Kaia and I went to the annual WNC Herb Festival  today and shopped for 4 hours!  I gave her 25 one-dollar bill in a little purse so that she could buy the herbs she wanted in her garden and keep track of her money.  She did a great job, and so many of the vendors thought that she was so cute with her little purse, that they cave her stuff for free.  For her garden she got: Sweet Annie, Lavender, Wood Betony, Dill, Fennel, a roma tomato, a bottle gourd, and sweet grass.  For my garden, I got:  Stevia, Wood Betony, Two Tomatoes, basil, Feverfew, Rue, Marigolds, Blue Vervain, Motherwort, … I think that is it…  Oh, I also got a hops vine… but that will go in near the house once it is done.
Sunday I leave for a week of studying with Rosita Arvigo so I can learn (professional) Maya Abdominal Massage.  It won’t be in belize, unfortunately.  It’s in NH, but that will give me a chance to see relatives that I haven’t seen in many years!

Prof. Maria

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Thanks everyone, for your concern about Kaia. She is totally fine! She was over and done with her fever within 24 hours and asking to go back to school! Her immune system is amazing! I’m really liking Boneset, by the way, for how quickly it seems to help with cold/flu-y symptoms.

House-wise, we have the new footings poured… 30 feet from the old one. We have all the concrete blocks ready to go (north side wall), but the ground has been frozen, so we are on hold until it warms up a little.

Hey, I’ve been asked to start teaching at the local community college! Well, I’m covering a class for another herbalist, but that’s a start right? Asheville-Buncombe Technical College has community classes about herbs, and will soon have Continuing Education classes for nurses (herb related). Right now, I’m going to do a 2 hour Materia Medica class covering Valerian, Ginger, and Saw Palmetto (3 of the top 10 selling herbs). And I am helping to set up the CE classes. Pay is nice too! 🙂

So, tomorrow is my birthday! Toby’s mom took Kaia to play for the weekend. So, tonight, Toby and I are heading to the local hot springs for a soak. Tomorrow, I get a day at the spa, followed by a nice diner and maybe a movie!!! Wooohoooo!

house woes

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I’ve spent a little time off the blog for fear of saying nasty words that should not be typed. But, now that I am feeling a little better, I shall vent.

Well, we finally got the soil engineer out there to take a look at the last footer that we needed to pour so that he could tell us to dig it a little wider so we could finish pouring. Well, he told up that we need to move the whole house!!!! Yep, that’s what he told us! The footer, it seems, is over old fill dirt that was never compacted correctly and we would have to build an enormous retaining wall if we wanted to keep the house in the same spot. It looks like it will be cheaper to just move the whole dang thing ~25 feet to the east. So, we keep going and will hopefully pour the footer (again) this week or next. Bye-bye bank account!
On another land front, I got a call from this guy who said he is under contract to buy 130 acres east and south of us and he plans on developing it. He wanted to know if we wanted to sell!! I have to say, I thought about it for a second, and then I remembered the promise that I made to this land to try to preserve it. So, I am trying to look on the bright side. Hopefully, he will build without tearing the mountains apart, we will get a good road to our house, and we will have some nice, new neighbors.

We all spent the night wide awake last night while kaia hallucinated through her high fever. She does that when she gets sick. She is totally fine one minute and then, BAM, she has a fever of 104! We put potato slices and some yarrow essential oil on her feet, which brought the fever down for a while. Then it went up again. I gave her some herbs and a tea, which brought it down for a while. Then it went up again. Finally, when she woke me up with her laughing at the “movie” (aka hallucination) she was watching on our window about a “tiny little flying black man who was stuck in glue and blueberry jelly”, I decided to pull out the motrin and knock it out for a few hours so she could get some sleep. She’s running around right now like nothing happened last night. Her immune system amazes me! Hopefully she is over the worst of it. I’m at the clinic right now getting some boneset and elder flower in case it happens again.

Back in the saddle again

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I’ve taken a little while to catch up after being gone last weekend! I spent 5 days in Boulder, CO at the American Herbalist’s Guild Symposium. It was fantastic!! My head was so full of information when I left that I had a hard time relaxing! The first day I went to an intensive with Rosita Arvigo and Shelley Torgove, about Maya abdominal massage for displaced uteri (is that the plural of uteruses?) Then I went to another intensive with Amanda McQuaid Crawford about Women’s Herbs. Both were outstanding, but Rosita’s left me wanting to get trained in Maya Abdominal Massage! (Uh oh, Toby… more schooling for me!)

For the next three days, I sat in talks with famous herbies like David Winston, Jonathan Treasure, Mary Bove, Aviva Romm, James Snow, Matthew Wood, Eric Yarnell, Leslie and Michael Tierra, Roy Upton, and many more. I felt like I was absorbing knowledge by just sitting there 🙂 I learned about Bringing Spiritual Practice into Clinical Practice, Pediatric Herbs, Eclectic Treatments for URI’s, and so much more! By the time the day was over, I wasn’t worth much and usually went back to the room to go to sleep. I did get out to see Boulder a little and enjoyed the city. It reminds me of Asheville, except it is much more brown (not a lot of lush green like I am use to).

There were 7 students from Aviva Romm’s Women’s Educator Course there. So we all got together for lunch on Sat. It was nice to finally meet Aviva in person and to meet some of the students behind the course.

On the shuttle from the hotel to the airport, I sat next to Mary Bove. We had a great time talking about cats, skiing, Eclectic herbalists, raising kids, and more. It was really neat to meet all of the people who wrote the books that I have learned a lot of my herbalism from, and whose books helped me through all of Kaia’s early illnesses.

At the airport I met up with Aviva and her family again. (Aviva’s husband, Tracy, and two of their daughters were also there. Really sweet family!) I have a great time talking with her. She is very easy-going, and she and her husband both have such warm, welcoming personalities. Oh, and they homeschooled all of their kids (they have 4), and are still alive and sane! So, I have hope 🙂

Speaking of Kaia, she is loving school. Sometime, I think too much! She goes there and learns how to behave like a ‘good girl’ then comes home and rebels. She is challenging my authority left and right! That perfect little angel who we have been able to take out to restaurants since the day she was born spit water on me the last time we went out for sushi!! She is also rebelling about the potty training thing. She concentrates so hard on what she is playing with that she refuses to stop and go potty. So, she ends up going in her pants way too often. We have finally resorted to the “sticker reward chart”. Everytime she tells us that she has to go to the bathroom and doesn’t go in her pants, she gets a sticker. After 10 (or what ever number we choose) stickers, she gets a treat (preferably not candy!). It’s working fairly well so far.

What else… no eggs from the chickens so far… they are 19 weeks old…

We turned our house plans into the county and they said we need to get them stamped by a structural engineer to prove they are sound. Toby is going to meet with one on Tuesday. If all that goes well, hopefully we will have ‘approval’ to start the building process.

The storage building is done and all of our stuff is moved in. I don’t have pictures yet, but it is really cute!

Girl time

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It’s been a fun filled few days! Toby is away at a wedding, so Kaia and I have taken the time alone to do anything but house projects! We have played, gone to the mall(!), snuggled up in bed and watched movies! It’s been really nice for both of us to have a little down time. I will be at the AHG symposium next week and I hope Toby takes the time for some down time too!

We did have a great find for the house though. Kaia and I visited a building that use to house a marble/granite cutting school. The school moved and left all of their granite… free for the taking. SO, we loaded up the Jetta with everything I could carry (probably enough to do a marble kitchen counter top and bathroom sink) and plan to head back there when Toby is in town so we can get the heavy stuff! There were some pieces that are 6ft by 9 ft in perfect condition! It’s just that it would take a crane to lift them and very strong truck to carry them. I can’t wait to see what this house looks like when it is done!

We tried to turn the house plans in for code approval on Thursday, but there was one paper we still needed to fill out. So, hopefully next week!

Today I attended a class on 5 phase theory and how to apply it to my clinical practice, as well as in my own life. For those of you that don’t know, 5 phase theory is Chinese based and stems from the belief that everything in this world is a part of the ‘one’. Broken into 5 non-stagnant phases there is Water, Wood, Fire, Earth, and Metal. They are all a part of us, and often times we may have imbalances in them. This class really helped me see how they all embody certain aspects of life and that they are in constant motion. Hard to explain in a blog, but really cool stuff!

Picture update

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9/15 – Here are a few pictures of our latest accomplishments.
We are doing lots of design work on the main house and hope to pour the foundation next month. In the mean time, we are trying to finish up on the siding for the little house. It’s been taking forever ’cause it is usually just one person at a time working on it. But, if we can get a team of three, it goes really fast. So, I have put together a “work/party day” for Toby’s birthday. What he really wants the most is to have some of these projects done. So, tomorrow we are going to try to finish up some of the siding, winterize the house, and cut up more wood for the cord wood walls in the main house.

Kaia starts at a Montessori school (3 days a week) next week and we are all very excited. She has really been getting the shaft with all of our work and no play. So, we think school will be really good for her and give her some time to be a kid. We still hope to home school, but it’s just not feasible right now.

9/17 – OK, so we didn’t finish up the siding, but we did put in the stove chimney and enlarge the chicken run area (to ~1600 sqft!!!. So they are pretty much free range now. Hey, how do you get them to stop sleeping/pooping in their laying boxes?? I put up netting and they tore it down.) We also put up a porch yesterday!!!! Wahoo!! A bunch of people showed up to Toby’s “workin’ birthday”, so they decided to throw up a porch in an afternoon! It looks great and makes this place feel so much more like a ‘home’. We spent this morning relaxing on the porch and even hung up the hammock.



Kaia’s friend came over yesterday, so she was occupied the whole day while the working was going on. At one point, they both came out of the camper with huge smiles on their faces and not a stitch of clothes on! They collectively decided that it was nudey time. 🙂 The place was completely trashed, with toys everywhere. But, they had a blast and kept themselves very busy.

Here’s a little fairy house that Kaia decided to make. She wanted to see if she could entice them with yogurt covered raisins and chocolate peppermint.

And look who can write her name!!!

Here is an ity bity mushroom I found. I can’t identify it except that it is a polypore and looks like a porcini. I will have to bring it to my mushroom friend and see if it is edible.

And life goes on…

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We had a little tragedy at our house yesterday. Suki killed Buffy, one of our Buff Orpingtons (and our favorite chicken who liked to sit on my lap, roost on my arm and climb on my shoulder!). I think she was near the fence sticking her head under for some food that rolled and Suki grabbed her out. When we screamed at Suki “NO!” she immediately dropped her, but by that time, Buffy’s neck was already broken. It was a good opportunity to talk with Kaia about the circle of life and death, but I was having a hard time not bawling! Kaia was consoling me! We had a little burial and said thanks to Buffy for the short time that she was with us. Now, we have to decide how to work this out with Suki. I am thinking that building her an enclosed space is the best option. No, that means she can’t have the run of the land, but will us wanting to have other folks up here who are also wanting to homestead, it’s probably a good idea for Suki to get use to having an enclosed space.

On a happier note, I have found a bunch of new herbs on the land… all volunteers in my garden!! I have found some Mullein, St. John’s Wort, what I think is a type of Lobelia, and a Reishi (Ganoderma Tsugai). Cool, eh?

The rain is also doing wonders for the garden and the shiitaki logs! This is a shot of a small shiitaki bloom. Right now, I have one log that has ~40 shiitaki growing!!!

And check out this Phallic tomato!

So far, I have put up only 4 quarts of tomato sauce, but I have many more quarts ahead of me!

My herbs are doing well too. I harvested some boneset to tincture and dry, as well as Holy Basil, Skullcap, and red clover. Doesn’t my herb corner look nice?

Things are also going well at my school. I have been asked to continue on as a core staff member and teach for the Level 2 herb students this winter!!

Yes, I’m still here!

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Hey there!! Long time no blog! I know, I know… I need to post more pictures! So, if any of you dedicated readers out there are are really that excited to see our progress, I invite you to come on out and set up some solar panels and a satellite system so that we can get internet out here! Otherwise… you’ll have to wait for the big installment. 🙂

Things are chugging right along here at Dandelion Homstead! We are finally starting to feel like we are home. We have a week of parties this week, so we have to get things in order… at least a little. Wed. night some friends are coming over for a little Summer Solstice celebration. Thursday night, I am having a bunch of herbies up there, including Matthew Wood (who is teaching a weekend class in Asheville this weekend! woohoo!) for a Solstice celebration. Then, Saturday, Kaia will be 3 and we are having our 3rd Annual Mid-Summer’s Day KaiaFest! The cool thing is that everyone knows we have no power, no water (our well pump died last Saturday), and just a bucket to poop in. So, I don’t feel like I have to host this huge shindig. All the parties will be laid back and go-with-the-flow.

We have put in a little kitchen and found a two-burner gas stove top that will fit perfectly in our small space. The closet has been built up stairs. We have decided to go with “pallet” shingles for the exterior siding. We’ve found lots of pallets (free) and are cutting up the wood to make shingles. Then we dip them in stain and put them up. It’s going to be SOOO CUTE!! I will post pictures once we get that started. We have also started (and will finish tomorrow) the ‘out house’ It is close to the compost pile so you don’t have to carry the buckets too far. (Yes, I will put a crescent moon on the door!)

The day old chicks are set to arrive on the 26th! I can’t wait to get them set up! I haven’t seen the coop we are getting yet (toby’s brother is giving us one) but I hear it is pretty swank 🙂 I got Juliete di Bairacli Levy’s book on herbal care of farm animals and it is fantastic! It has a section on Bee care and chickens (like how to use elder branches to splint a broken chicken leg!)

The bees are ok. One hive, the one with the laying worker, died. Toby added a new package of bees to the hive and they seem to be doing well. The other hive is without a queen (the one that hatched a queen with a missing wing). So, we got some brood from Toby’s Bro. and put it in the hive to give them a chance to grow another queen. So far, no dice… so we may need to buy a new queen for that hive.

Shesh, what else has been going on??? OH, we were out for a walk the other day and noticed all these squashed, red berries on the ground. They looked like cherries but I didn’t see a tree anywhere, until I looked up… way up!!! This cherry tree has to be at least 50 feet tall, and full of cherries!! Unfortunately, we can’t reach any of them! I may go throw some bed sheets out there and see if I can catch any! Oh, and we just began getting our first black raspberries from a little vine by the pond.

The garden is doing really well considering I have put absolutely no effort into it since I planted the seedlings. Our tomatos have blooms, the squash is growing, we are eating kale, chard, pea sprouts, lambs quarters, plantain, and other yummies almost daily. The strawberries are done for this season, but we got a ton out of them for their first year in the ground!

School is going great! Only 6 weeks left until I can officially call myself a “clinical herbalist”. I have started seeing clients at school and it feels really good. I am going to try to have my paper (on proving myself as an herbalist) published about the same time I graduate to see if I can drum up some new clients that way. I have also decided to use my tattoo design as my logo (tree of life with a moon behind it and a spirit in the tree). I think that goes well with the name “Sacred Forest Herbals”.