Herbal Blog Party!

Spring is a great time of year to start planning or expanding your herb garden, and Corey at Aquarian Bath is having a party! An herbal blog party that is and has invited the following bloggers to share their ideas, and gardens.

Take a minute to visit:

Tina Sams of from the Essential Herbal gives us a tour of emerging Spring herbs in Pennsylvania. Her Anise Hyssop photo is featured in this blog post. ~Cindy Jones of Sage Script also shows us what herbs are coming up in Colorado, and discusses plans for herbal planting.~Sarah Head of Tales of a Kitchen Herbwife in England shares a richly descriptive post on the first medicines of spring.~Lady Barbara of Lady Barbara's Garden in Oregon takes us on an exuberant Alice in Wonderland stroll finishing up with a treasury of Violet Magic.~Beth Brynne of the Garden Meanderings blog in Western New York also discusses emerging Spring Plants. Visit Maggie McMillan's lovely farm. What beautiful animals she has. Maggie shares about making biiter Dandelion coffee and Dock syrup.~Yael Grauer of Dirt Time is also "Embracing the Bitter" this month. Check out her post on Horseradish. ~Karen Vaughan of Acupuncture Brooklyn discusses the challenges and opportunities of Spring Time Urban Gardening.~Here at Aquarian Bath, my contribution to the blog party is Shapshots from my Spring day in the Garden at Fair Share yesterday. You will definately want to check out the new and unique "US mint" bed we started yesterday.

Happy Gardening
Karen

Spring has Arrived in the Ozarks

Today it seems like everything decided it was time. Forsythia, Dutchman's Breeches, and Bloodroot all were blooming on the county roadside. Tomorrow I'll try to take some pictures.

Earth Hour

On Saturday, March 27, at 8:30 PM your local time, turn your lights off and unplug your appliances for an hour. You will be joining with millions of people and thousands of municipalities around the world in a dramatic demonstration of unified global cooperation for a sustainable environment. www.earthhour.org

Snowing hard now

It's snowing pretty hard now, a blizzard, even.

Kitchen Cosmetics Blog Party

As winter drags on in most parts of the country our skin is probably suffering from dryness. Here are a few links to blogs with simple recipes that you can try at home to help your skin get through winter.

Cindy Jones from Colorado Aromatics at Sagescript Institute posted a recipe for a yogurt facial that is easy and soothing. You will find several good options for herbs to add to this right on your spice shelf such as parsley, thyme, even turmeric. http://sagescript.blogspot.com/2010/01/kitchen-cosmetics-blog-party.html

Mountain Mary posted some recipes for salt scrubs. Exfoliating is a great way to get more moisture into the skin.
http://mountainmarys.blogspot.com/2010/01/kitchen-cosmetics-blog-party.html

Maryanne Kudera posted a few recipes here; one of which uses 'old champagne'. Personally, I would never leave champagne around long enough for it to get old but you might try it.
http://maryannkudera.blogspot.com/2010/01/kitchen-cosmetics.html

Maggie at Prairie Land Herbs posted a recipe for a lemon egg shampoo. Soon our chickens will be laying too many eggs for us to eat so I'll try it then.
http://prairielandherbs.blogspot.com/2010/01/first-up-obligatory-weather-related.html

Cory Trusty of Aquarian Bath posted instructions for making an herb infused vinegar and them some great recipes using it. http://aquarianbath.blogspot.com/2010/01/kitchen-cosmetics-do-it-yourself-body.htmlThis time of year winter makes itself known by giving us dry itchy skin. Besides the wonderful skin care products offered by Colorado Aromatics and other small independent companies, there is also alot that you can do for your skin from your kitchen using simple ingredients. My all time favorite is the yogurt facial.

Happy Father's Day ~

This weekend is Father's Day .. a day to celebrate and honor the men in our lives.
I was not fortunate in this lifetime to know my Dad ... however, my Grandpa and Uncles were very loving and positive roll models for me.

Some quotes for Father's Day:

'It is not flesh and blood ..
but the heart which makes us ..
fathers and sons. '
- - Johann Schiller

'Sherman made the terrible discovery that men make about their fathers sooner or later... that the man before him was not an aging father but a boy, a boy much like himself, a boy who grew up and had a child of his own and, as best he could, out of a sense of duty and, perhaps love, adopted a role called Being a Father so that his child would have something mythical and infinitely important: a Protector, who would keep a lid on all the chaotic and catastrophic possibilities of life. '
~ ~Tom Wolfe, The Bonfire of the Vanities

"My father didn't tell me how to live;
he lived, and let me watch him do it."
-- Clarence Budington Kelland

In honor of Father's Day ~

Blog Watcher's Special:
Free Shipping on all orders $50.00 or more
on UPS Ground in the continental USA.
This offer is valid thru June 22, 2009
Enter this in the 'comment section' when checking out.
We will only honor those that enter this code:
FD09 Free Ship

Our Father's Day Give A Way ~

1 - (4 / 5 oz bar) Working Man Hands Handmade Soap
1 - (4 / 5 oz bar) Scandanavian Woods Handmade Soap
1 - 4 oz Peppermint Hydrosol for a cooling after shave spray

Please be sure to put your name and email address so that we may contact you.
Pass this on to those that you think may enjoy our Give A Way.

- until next time,
Rosanne
www.sunrosearomatics.com

Roses are Blooming

I am very excited that the first roses started blooming This week. This is when I gather all my baskets to start picking roses and rose buds to dry and use later for Colorado Aromatics products and crafts I might do later. Some roses will be ground and used in bath salts and scrubs, some will be saved to use in potpourri. The buds will be saved for later use. One thing to do with buds is to string them like a necklace and put them on a lampshade. The warmth of the light will help release the scent. Later when more roses are blooming I'll harvest them for a small distillation run.
Cindy, Sagescript

It's almost February - where has the long dark winter gone?

I know that the northern readers are wanting to come down here and give me a talking to about my thinking that winter is almost over. My tongue is planted firmly in my cheek, because I know the worst is yet to come. I like to think about spring though. It makes winter more bearable.

To be honest, I'm not much of a seed starter. Lancaster County is awash with greenhouses, herb farms, and the month of May (and parts of April and June) is crammed with herb festivals and herb farm open houses. It is a gardener's dream, and when I read of the people in other parts of the country who have nothing much except a hardware store or big-box store selection, I appreciate it even more.

So mostly, that is how my garden comes to life. Mostly I transplant what others have started and nurtured to a point that it might actually survive me.
What manages to survive my forgetfulness usually falls victim to the roving gangs of bunnies or the insatiably gnawing hunger of the unstoppable groundhog. Then there are the giant deer hoof prints I find in the garden, and the birds that sit waiting for the berries to ripen. But never mind that. If I think about that too much I might give up - and gardeners NEVER give up. So where was I?Oh. Right. We were talking about seed starting. There are parts of the country (and thriftier people than I) where seeds are the way to begin the garden. Many people wouldn't think of purchasing adolescent plants, and if they are vigilant, seeds will pay them back many times over.

We were talking on the Yahoo Group for The Essential Herbal Magazine, and some of the favorite seed sources can be found below:

Fedco Seeds

Horizon Herbs

ArborDay.Org

The Rosemary House

Botanical Interests

Heirloom Seeds

Rare Seeds at Baker Creek

Seed Savers

Landis Valley Museum Heirloom Seed Project

Abundant Life Seeds

They all have lots of great information, and I could spend several days just visiting seed websites. I DO grow most of my vegetables from seed. Things like eggplant, where I only need one or two plants, and melon, which takes forever to grow, I will buy the plants. Everything else in the veggie garden is from seed. Come to think of it, this should be a post about PLANTS! Maybe later.

While you're thinking about gardening, consider our book, The Essential Herbal ~ Under the Sun. There are several articles on different types of gardens, how to create good soil, how to care for seedlings, and get rid of pests.
We also have the CobraHead tool available on our website. This is one tool you don't want to be without when you are out there doing battle with the dandelion, the sour dock, and the bladderwort. This baby is ergonomically designed to help you get more bang for your buck. Less wasted energy, more effect. And it is one of the few tools that can take me through season after season without rusting, bending, or breaking.

And before the season gets started and you need something for those tired muscles, head over and get your supply of Gardener's Soap, Arnica Rub and Gardener's Tub Tea from our sister site: The Sibling Group!

Credit for the pansy picture goes to Deborah Stiffler. Deborah, of Scent-sational submitted this photo for the cover of the May/June '07 issue of The Essential Herbal.

Operation World Smudge

Yesterday I received an invitation to join Operation World Smudge. Anyone can participate. Maybe you'll want to, too! Here's the info:

Smudge where you are! Participate from home!

Smudging is a Native American tradition that involves the burning of herbs such as: sage, sweet-grass, tobacco and cedar for the purpose of purification. Join in the WORLD SMUDGE event and smudge your home, office or land on Inauguration Day. Help clear out the old administration and prepare a clear space for change.

Creative Work Spaces

Okay the holidays are over, winter has decided to visit North Georgia, so there is not a lot to do outside. This years Burpee Catalog came in the mail yesterday, and I have plans with a hot cup of coffee and a recliner later this evening pouring over the tomatoe section. I will report on all the great new vegetables and flowers tomorrow on my gardenchick blog www.gardenchick.com/garden-blog

HOWEVER, today was the day to start crossing off the to-do-list, which is part of my 2009 goals. Today, clean and organize my office. I plan on making this years garden, and my Gardenchick business my priorities this year. I don't know about ya'll, but I can't think in clutter. I also have to have inspiration around me. Since I collect junk, what a great place to put it all together in my office downstairs. My son has almost finished painting (who would have known that the earlier green on the walls would have needed THREE coats of light yellow to cover it up.).

The computer hutch is filled with my gnomes, the 1950's pixies I just love, and old concrete dwarf I paid a whole dollar for at a flea market. On the top shelf you will see a picture of my mother and her sister in a cornfield (1930's). The red cabinet holds some 1950-1960 paint by number pictures, an old rose care kit, and other odds and ends.

But just in case you thought I had conquered the clutter I included a "left to do picture".

Karen

http://www.gardenchick.com/