Jean Rudd

I needed more comfrey salve because of an injury to a knee in my family.  So here is what I did.

I followed Rosemary Gladstar's book Medicinal Herbs which basically says to make a salve use 1/4 c beeswax to 1 c infused oil.

I'm going to show me making some more infused oil, but this time I want to try a solar 2-week infusion.  I had about 1/2 c left of my heat method infusion from an earlier bb for https://permies.com/wiki/164460/pep-natural-medicine/comfrey-leaf-infused-oil-PEP#2983329, so I'm using that to finish the salve today.

For the new solar infusion, I harvested and chopped more comfrey leaves.  Then put them in a glass jar and covered them with 1"+ of oiive oil.  The jar is labeled and sitting on a sunny window for 2 weeks until I strain it.

For this salve, I used the 1/2 c of infused comfrey oil from before and added 2 T beeswax pellets, then melted them on very low heat.  I took my chances and did not test the salve consistency but wildly poured it into a small glass jar with the confidence that Rosemary Galdstar gives you.  The texture is perfect.  I labeled the jar and will be delivering it tomorrow.

This was my first decoction.  Very exciting.

I cut the herb (thyme) and gently simmered it.  I tried to simmer in a double boiler at first because I was afraid of forgetting about it, but it didn't seem to do anything so I moved it to direct low heat.  That worked.  

It was very fragrant.  I had plans to just have a tablespoon at intervals, but I ended up drinking it all over an hour.

I made some comfrey poultices for the freezer because my comfrey plant is (once again) bountiful!  The plant itself flopped over.  I think I have to divide it to get it back in control.

I harvested the good looking leaves and collected the other leaves & stems to use as mulch in the garden.  

When I harvest comfrey, I try to make as many poultices as needed for the year and I store them in the freezer. 2 people in my household regularly use them to help long-term deep tissue injuries. So I'll do 2 or 3 choppings during the growing season. Once I have good looking leaves, I chop them smaller and then blend them with some other ingredients.  This time I had solomon's seal root, so I added a bit of that before blending with some water.  Then I flatten the paste like a thick pie crust and freeze it.  Once frozen, I'll break it into smaller pieces and return to the freezer until they are needed.

Congratulations!  I love my echinacea.  I started with 2 transplants and now I give away divisions every year after I find some good roots for the medicine.  It loves it here in Colorado.  I'm pretty sure my 2 patches are spreading from seeds that fall from the flower heads which I leave up all winter because the birds love them.  Last year I made the seeds into Fukuoka seed balls, but I haven't seen if they worked yet.  Enjoy your coneflowers!

Button Tin!  I've actually had a button tin for many years, then got rid of it for many years, and now it's back due to an inheritance of buttons.  So I thought I would look for some more matching buttons to add to the tin.  Found some on some scrap fabric (formerly a well-loved baby jumper worn to shreds!)

Collected the 4 remaining matching buttons (one was a replacement that did not match) and they are now happily in the button tin.

Time for a floor sweep!  And making the dog put his toy away.

I keep trying to get this badge bit done because I have a great stash of oregano in my herb garden and every year I dry it (mostly for culinary use, but this year I'm working on medicinal use).  Each year I forget to take full pictures of what I've done.  

So I finally have it in order.  Every summer, I have such abundant oregano that I do a "continuous harvest" of sorts.  I cut a bunch, strip off the bottom part if I need some oregano for the salad dressing, then tie up the remainder in an air dry bundle.  I fill up jars of dried oregano as the summer progresses until fall when I chop it all back and dry the remaining.

Well, it's only August, so I am showing the start of the dried jar from this year as well as a few years of past harvest jars.

Hi Kate,

I would love to be a tester!  I have edited courseware and written instructional design, so I think I can follow your recipes!  Currently this summer, I am learning to perfect sourdough whole grain breads.  I used to be good at making yeasted breads, but gave that up for gluten-free 15 years ago and recently (past few months) have been switching back to Weston Price and sourdoughs.  I think it isn't the modern wheat necessarily that is causing major problems, just contributing.  Pesticides and GMOs with poor soils are likely doing the bulk of it. Anyway, trying traditional methods with a host of other ways to get more nutrition and less bad stuff!

On my sourdough journey I have been using the "scrapings" method and I have a very active starter that I got from a friend.  I am now going through the Bittman Bread book and I'm getting so good.  Baking recipes twice really helps.  I made a Rye bread yesterday, and today was a Brioche sandwich loaf.  These are all whole wheat and I am finally getting the lift and crumb right!  I've made sourdough focaccia, pretzels -- tomorrow is a scallion pancake, and I think I'm prepping a cinnamon roll for the day after.

I totally would love to help test recipes.   Here's some of my recent pictures.

I use only whole grains and have access to einkorn, wheat, emmer, rye, buckwheat.  I could get spelt and probably whatever else whole grain.  I have a mill and hard red wheat berries.  I'm not sure what to do with whole einkorn, but I have some of that.  I thought someone said you have to de-hull it somehow before you grind it.  So I'm not sure how that works.  But it's always nice to learn something!

I don't have any of the other kinds of ovens, just a regular oven.  

Good luck with the book.  I'm excited for you and for more people learning this skill!  So thank you for writing this.

My teen chick ate my gold stud earring out of my ear.  Does that count?

Two of my growing chicks would sit on my shoulder, just trying to be close to me as I got their food, etc.  One day, one of them pecked my earring and it fell out into the coop.  I grabbed it quickly.  The next day, one of them pecked the earring and it was gone.  Completely eaten.  Do you think they will ever lay golden eggs?

They're hens now, and no longer sit on my shoulder.  And I don't wear earrings in the coop.

Hugo Morvan wrote: I've planted some  true garlic bulbils that are known to flower and seed .

A related topic: are you saying we shouldn't eat the delicious garlic scapes on hardneck garlic?  I'm not sure I can make that sacrifice :)  But again, I have a small yard!