NAHA | Herbal Salves for Aromatherapy

Crooked Bear Creek Organic Herbs's avatarCrooked Bear Creek Organic Herbs

Herbal Salves for Aromatherapy

By Anna Pageau, NAHA Certified Professional Aromatherapist®

What is a salve? A salve as defined by dictionary.com is “a medicinal ointment for healing or relieving wounds and sores.”1 Many over-the-counter remedies are salves such as Neosporin®. Lip balms are also a form of salve, so a salve doesnt have to be medicinal, just nourishing to the skin. Salves in general are a simple formula with just a few ingredients. They generally include an oil and a wax to create a semi-solid material. Today people use the terms lotion bars or balms to also describe salves.

These oil-rich salves are used to nourish and protect skin. They lock moisture in, keeping skin soft and smooth throughout the seasons. Salves can be made as thick as a bar of soap. A salve will remain in a solid state…

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Standing Stones at the Summer Solstice

Dana's avatarThe Druid's Garden

Ancient peoples set standing stones in various places in the world.  In places, such as in the British Isles or Iceland, you can still often find these standing stones, trilithons, stone circles or stacks of stones.  While their many uses are shrouded in antiquity and subject to some speculation, in the Druid Magic Handbook, John Michael Greer describes standing stones can channel the solar current into the earth, which offers blessing and healing to the land.  I think it’s likely that standing stones can do many other things (tell time, point to astronomical features, be places of worship and community). Today, new groups of people and individuals are choosing to set stones. For our purposes, today, setting stones for land blessing and healing is certainly a good thing to do to provide spiritual support for the land.

The Summer Solstice is a fantastic time to raise a standing stone–in…

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4 Fascinating Orange Mushrooms Worth Learning

Greetings,

Orange is not the first word that comes to mind when most people think about a hemlock forest.  Greens, grays, tans, and browns are instead the colors that typify these densely shaded areas — especially as the early days of summer approach.

With careful observation, however, and with a directed focus on the fungal world, any color can easily make itself known in a dark forest.

On a recent walk through one of these areas, the only mushrooms that I encountered were orange.  Of course, I thought nothing of it upon seeing the first orange species, and I wasn’t too surprised after finding a second orange mushroom either.

But then I found a third, and eventually a fourth.

And I inevitably thought to myself, “Someone should document this.”

Fortunately, I brought my camera along for the adventure and decided to film the orange mushrooms that were appearing in succession.  All four mushrooms are fascinating, though a few of them are often overlooked and underappreciated despite their brilliant coloration.

If you are interested in learning more about orange mushrooms that may be growing in a forest near you, check out the new video.

When I am not looking down at the forest floor for plants and mushrooms, I am looking up into the canopy for birds of all colors.  Fortunately, I live in a region characterized by its avian diversity, and if you are interested in seeing some of the birds that have recently posed for my camera, check out the Learn Your Land Instagram page.

Thanks for reading, and thanks for your continued support!

-Adam Haritan

NATIONAL HERBS AND SPICES DAY

Crooked Bear Creek Organic Herbs's avatarCrooked Bear Creek Organic Herbs

Celebrating flavor each year on June 10th, National Herbs and Spices Day recognizes the diversity and quality offered by using both fresh and dried herbs and spices in your cooking.

All year long, herbs and spices are essential to cooking. But as the summer heats up, developing a knack for cooking with fresh herbs will bring brightness and flavor to your grilling and your kitchen. They not only add flavor to your meals but herbs and spices also add color bringing a vibrancy that might otherwise be missed.

Raising your own herbs can be a form of relaxing therapy, too. Herbs and spices have been used for many hundreds of years, and besides making our food delicious, each has its specific health benefits. Growing your own herbs and spices is a great way to add fresh variety to your food. Herbs raised in your home add an aromatic and natural fragrance…

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Embrace the Shift

The Energies of June 2020

Crooked Bear Creek Organic Herbs's avatarGood Witches Homestead

The energies of June have a flow and depth to them that will take us deep inside ourselves to reflect, integrate and realign. This is powerful, highly transformational energy containing huge potential for positive change and spiritual upliftment.

By the third week in June we will have a total of six retrograde planets, including Mercury, all encouraging us to journey within from a variety of perspectives.  There are also threads in the energy stream that could provoke some uncomfortable emotional intensity, especially around any unresolved anger you might have.

This means that it will be particularly important to stay grounded and connected with yourself this month so that any emotional volatility can be recognized and dissipated with conscious intent.

Full Moon Lunar Eclipse

We have a full moon lunar eclipse on June 5th with the Sun in Gemini and the Moon in Sagittarius. This will be a particularly potent eclipse…

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CRYSTAL HEALING RITUAL FOR THE SAGITTARIUS FULL MOON ECLIPSE

Crystal Ritual for the Sagittarius Full Moon Solar Eclipse with Blue Kyanite: Deep Listening, Inner Activation, Truth, Understanding / www.krista-mitchell.com

Many people might expect awakening and evolution to be light-filled, radiant, even peaceful, but awakening is an act of creation and becoming, and the creative forces of this world are often also required to be those of destruction, unravelling, dismantling, or un-making (ie: fire, ice, death, water, the shedding of skins) in order to create.

Growth, healing, and change are often painful or creative/destructive/creative processes because they force us to let go of things: how (and with what) we identify, our beliefs, comfort zones, old wounds that have become companions, our gremlins, parts of our past, dreams of the future.

(Important note: I am talking about creative forces of destruction in nature and in the nature of healing, NOT destruction purely for the sake of causing pain, harm, or chaos. The former is in service to the cycle of life and the healing process, the latter I see in service to the dark spirits of this world).

These processes bring challenges because they trigger what needs to be seen, heard, faced, accepted, healed, resolved, and reintegrated.

In essence, we cannot evolve without facing our inner shadows. There is no awakening, growth, or positive change without facing the shadow.

It’s never easy or comfortable, or pretty. It’s badass territory, where angels fear to tread. And this is why so many people choose not to go there, choose complacency, apathy, even silence.

I had a teacher once who said “Tyranny reigns over silence.” The power of that statement has never left me. And I had another one who said “Sometimes you have to go to war.” That one’s never left me, either.

There’s great turmoil in the world right now – uprising, revolution, demands for justice, and they’re happening because this is part of the evolution. We can’t be awake while still being asleep to what’s happening around us, to social injustice, to systemic racism.

We also can’t be awake if we’re asleep to our own shadow selves.

I’ve been in deep listening this week, and I’ve also been unpacking and sorting through unconscious bias and conditioning in my own shadow. As a healer, and human, my inner work and outer work never ends. There’s always another layer of the onion, there’s always another shadow aspect to work through. And conditioning can run deep – through generations and lifetimes of ancestral and spiritual DNA, as well as what we’ve experienced in our own time.

This full moon solar eclipse in Sagittarius (exact on 6/5/20 at 3:12pm ET), while the sun remains in Gemini, is an opportunity for us to look within, to learn, to grow, and to face our inner duality.

Healing happens in the space between light and dark. Expansion of consciousness happens in the embrace of light and dark.

It’s important to sit with that for a bit.

Read original article at: Krista Mitchell ~ Crystal Healing Ritual for the Sagittarius Full Moon Eclipse

Honey Moon Eclipse Candle and Fire Ritual

Honey Moon Eclipse Candle and Fire Ritual

This Full Moon is known as the Honey Moon, the Strawberry Moon and the Rose Moon, but you might find very little is “sweet” about this Full Moon! We have been experiencing a lot of tension all week as many have watched or attended the protests and riots going on all over the country.

This is a Lunar Eclipse and it squares Mars which can create some tension while bringing out anger or causing emotional pain to surface.

This Full Moon is also squaring Neptune, the planet of illusion, causing a lot of people to feel vulnerable towards deception and confusion on how to act. This Full Moon will continue to open our eyes towards the injustices and deceptions going on in the world.

Pressures have been building throughout the year. 2020 is a very remarkable year and this full moon is stirring up some big changes.

This Eclipse takes place in the sign of Sagittarius. Sagittarius is usually an optimistic and sunny sign, but when squared with Mars and Neptune you might be feeling that emotional tension, a stir towards action, but frustrated that there is little you can do right now.

Read original post at: Spirit de la Lune ~ Honey Moon Eclipse Candle and Fire Ritual

Marchpane Cookies for the Rose Queens — Gather Victoria

Marchpane was one of the most popular Tudor confections – at least for those who could afford it. Created from costly ground almonds, sugar and rosewater, moulded into shapes and baked, decorated with coloured glazes, gilded fruit and “comfits”, then assembled into elaborate centrepieces, it was found only on the most aristocratic and royal tables. …

via Marchpane Cookies for the Rose Queens — Gather Victoria

Confidence vs Arrogance