Hawthorn: The Heart Healer
Crataegus species, a.k.a. Mayhaw and Thornapple. Hawthorn loves the heart. It lowers high blood pressure and raises low blood pressure. Hawthorn, like other tonics, focuses on stabilizing the existing system to achieve a healthy balance. Happily, this tree grows all over Eurasia and the Americas and has hundreds of species adapted to their native climate. This […]
How to Sew a Catnip Mouse
Cats love catnip. It’s lots of fun to watch them play with catnip toys. This mouse pattern is simple to make with small scraps of sturdy fabric, cotton stuffing, dried catnip, and a piece of leftover ribbon. Sew away, then let your cat go crazy with the results. Making a Catnip Mouse Catnip mice are […]
How to make a Heat-infused Herbal Oil
An infused oil is an oil that has been infused with the properties of one or more herbs. Infused oils make great massage oils and are often used as the basis for healing salves. Some herbal infused oils can be used for cooking, too.
How to Make an Herbal Oil: Cold infused Botanical Oils
An infused oil is an oil that has been filled with the properties of one or more herbs. Infused oils make great massage oils and are often used as the basis for healing salves. Some herbal infused oils, like garlic or cayenne, can be used for cooking, too.
How to Make an Herbal Vinegar: Easy Herbal Home Medicine
An herbal vinegar is a vinegar that has been infused with one or more herbs. In my home, vinegars infused with berries, barks, and pretty much any other form of edible plants count as Herbal Vinegars.
How to Make a Tincture: Easy Herbal Home Medicine
An herbal tincture is an alcohol-based liquid into which the properties of one or more herbs have been infused. Tinctures (also called herbal extractions) are one of the most popular herbal preparations used by clinical herbalists in our modern culture. Tinctures can be taken on the tongue, just like a flower essence, or can be added to a cup of water or tea. I have made mouth tonics, which are a lot like a mouthwash, from mainly tinctures and I often use tinctures as part of my cough syrup formulas because of the preserving nature of the alcohol in the tinctures.
Yarrow: The Wound Healer
Achillea millefolium Yarrow is nature’s bandage. Since yarrow grows in every vacant lot, abandoned field and rocky wayside, it’s clear Nature must think herbalists need a lot of bandages. This scruffy little herb contains its own antiseptic and a soft calming scent that helps soothe gravity’s sniffling victims. Medicinal Properties of Yarrow Yarrow has a […]
How to Make Easy Herbal Tea: Herbal Infusions
An herbal infusion or herbal tea infusion is really just an herbal tea. By soaking dried herbs in hot water, you extract the herb’s properties, scent, flavor, and color into the water. Thus, the water is infused with the herb’s properties.
How to Make an Herbal Syrup: Easy Herbal Home Medicine
An herbal syrup is a combination of honey and herbal decoctions, herbal infusions, and herbal tinctures. During cold and flu season, I often make one or more batches of cough syrup for my family using this basic procedure. Honey has a wealth of healing properties all on its own, and when combined with the various […]
How to Make Cider Vinegar at Home
Vinegarizing cider is an annual fermentation project in our home, as is apple-pressing to produce that cider. Cider vinegar at the store, especially the kind that still contains all the wonderful nutrients and constituents the organic, mother-in, raw, unfiltered, unpasteurized cider vinegars contain, is expensive. In some areas, it can be hard to find. So, […]
How to Make a Salve or Balm: Easy Herbal Home Medicine
A salve is a combination of soft oils and a hardener, such as beeswax or petroleum jelly. The beeswax or hardener makes the oils more workable and less sloppy to apply. Most recipes for salves ask for 1 part beeswax per 3 parts oil. These are measured by weight not by volume. Adding more oil will make the salve thinner. Adding more beeswax, makes the salve thicker. Essential oils or vitamin E oils are added at the end of the process as a preservative. This is important since all oils can go rancid over time.
Apple: Nature’s Bandage
Malus domestica/sylvestrus a.k.a.: Fruit of the Gods, Fruit of the Underworld, The Silver Bough Although apple is familiar as food in our kitchens, an herbalist has to return to the old almanacs for reminders of its medicinal properties. It’s surprising that these simple and reliable remedies have fallen out of use since apple is so […]