Herbal Wisdom

The Thirteen Best Weeds to Have in Your Garden

I wrote this essay a few years ago.  I decided it was time to bring it back because I still love weeds and we still need to sing their songs….and they are coming forth in abundance this year with all the rain.  I added three more weeds to the list.  A couple of years ago, […]

Read More...

I am a Green Witch

I am a green witch. I have been initiated into this practice. My green witch name is Crow’s Daughter. This is a calling for me. It used to frighten me because of what people say about witches. Witches are evil. Witches worship the devil. When I was very young, I knew only love and goodness. […]

Read More...

The Old Way is the New Way

I have been thinking about medicine and what it really is. What is happening with the plants is very much beyond the most common definition of medicine…”science and art of diagnosing and treating disease.” There is another definition though…medicine can be “a ritual practice and or shamanic practice.” Both these definitions were in the dictionary. […]

Read More...

We are Wholeness~A Holographic Perspective and Nourishing the Nervous System

2020 Update: I wrote this essay a few years ago.  And during this time of the pandemic, I thought it would support people to explore this concept again and again…wholeness.  Peace and Green Blessings to you all, Julie   The perspective of the hologram is one of the wise woman ways that can gives us […]

Read More...

Stinging Nettle~Listening, Asking, Harvesting, Drying, Utilizing

Stinging Nettle is just coming up here at our farm. Its a bit later than usual this year.  When it is about six inche s tall, it looks to me like a purple-green dragon emerging from its cave of hibernation. I am thankful for the return of nettle to our Whidbey Island landscape. This plant […]

Read More...

Douglas Fir Vinegar-The Messy, Kitchen Table Method

I have been thinking a lot about the art of medicine making and how simple it is and how beautiful it is. To connect with the plants, to find out what they have for us, to gather the plants, to prepare the plants and to utilize the plants for healing. To be grateful. It is […]

Read More...

It Belongs to the Wind and the Rain

I wrote this essay almost two years ago.  I have come around the spiral again to this and thought it was a good one for our times.   “All changes, even the most longed for, have their melancholy, for what we leave behind us is a part of ourselves. We must die to one life […]

Read More...

Plant Cunning

Sometimes I find myself just looking at the plants in the garden.  I look up at the trees.  I notice a blade of grass, its shape, its sharpness and its bright green leaves.  I see and then I see more deeply.   When I first started studying herbalism, I would look at the plants to identify […]

Read More...

Vulnerability ~ A Path of Strength and Wildness

Almost one year ago, I signed up for a course to rebuild my website. With the help of Heather, my accountability partner and advocate, I am almost done. Through this process, I have returned to my current website and seen how beautiful it is in many ways. The colors, the leaves to signify the different […]

Read More...

I am a Wildcrafter

I am a Wildcrafter I began writing about wildcrafting yesterday and although I got a lot of my ideas into the writing, I felt like something was missing. Then an apprentice graduate of mine came to pick me up and she and I and two small children went out to harvest plantain from our church’s […]

Read More...