maximal juicing on a budget (guest post by jeff)

Today's post is a guest post by Jeff, sharing about affordable juicing. Truth be told, there was a time that I did not think it was wise to drink juices of any kind, believing that foods were healthiest in their whole form and that juices had too much concentrated sweetness without the fiber to help the body absorb it more slowly as it naturally would. Also, you could consume much more food than you regularly would in one sitting. The book 'Nourishing Traditions' helped shape some of my thoughts about that. I still don't think pasteurized juices of any kind are good- they're pure sugar and not nutritious in my opinion, but my thoughts about raw juices changed after reading 'Gut and Psychology Syndrome' by Natasha Campbell-McBride. After learning about how toxic people become when they have pathogenic bacteria in their guts (which is so prevalent today for so many reasons) and that juicing is a natural way to detoxify, I changed my stance. I still believe juice is best in small amounts and we mostly stick to vegetables, but I believe it can help people's bodies heal, get much needed nutrition when digestion is impaired, and provide the benefits of raw enzymes and life force.

 There's nothing better for you than Juicing good fresh organic fruits and veggies.

And there's ways to do it without spending a fortune on the veggies and fruits.

Summer's not a problem because we can grow and trade for most things...

But in Winter and Spring

we gotta get creative.

I try to make juice for my family almost every day..

It starts of course with a good juicer...

That is the biggest expense...

But last year it was our Christmas present to ourselves..

After a lot of research I chose the Omega.

It has a 10 year guarantee...

And easily does Greens,

which most other juicers have a problem with.

(it will also do incredible nut butters...

and ice cream made from frozen fruit).

Now that it's Springtime 

we are elated that our Nettle Patch is thriving. 

We planted it a few years back,

now it's taking over.

But that's OK,

 because there's nothing better for you than Nettle Juice.

So I got gloves,scissors and a big pan,

and bravely ventured into the Patch.

 PURE NUTRITION

 Nothing better steamed either.

And FREE..

Wheat Grass is another very Healthy Option

Bracken helps me plant it in pots we grow in the Living Room by the Window.

(although now that the Nettles are in I can Phase that out for a while). 

 The Nettles and Wheat Grass go in First..

Gotta wear the gloves or YIKES

those are some potent Nettles.

But have no fear, drinking the juice,

and cooking the greens

is pain free.

 Grind...Grind, Grind

The Omega slowly Grinds the juice out..

No heat involved like in the faster spinning ones.

We used to get our Juicers at the Thrift Store.

Had to buy a new one every year..

and a lot of juice was wasted.

This baby squeezes it all out.

Deep Green Health

(did you know chlorophyll is almost identical to human blood,

 so it's really good to fortify the blood.) 

It also binds to so many toxins, heavy metals etc.

and removes them from the body.

And in the world today,

this is a good thing. 

We buy Carrots in 15 pound Bags,

for 12 or 13 bucks...

Put in a Beet, some Apple,

Ginger when we have it,

a little lemon, celery...

And in the Summer,

Everything but the Kitchen sink.

You aren't supposed to put in a lot of fruit with the veggies,

Apple is really the only one recommended..

But we like the hint of lemon.. 

Grind all those goodies up

Bracken likes to "Help" me,

(Mostly he likes to take a bite out of every apple piece)

The Chickens Get the remnants...And LOVE it.

I have this on Good Authority

 AHHHHH

Give it a try...

You will feel so much better for it.

real food on a real budget

Tricia, of Farmish Momma blog, invited me to join her Real Food on a Real Budget series and asked if I'd like to contribute a guest post. (Whoops, I made a blooper on the series name when I asked Jeff to make the graphic above. And just realized that now. Oh well, you get the idea.) As soon as Tricia asked me I was really excited about the idea. I thought: 'Now, here's a topic I'm passionate about! Something near and dear to my heart. Something that we could all help each other with so much, by sharing what we've learned with one another.' Real food, as you know, is so important to our family. But how do you afford the healthy food you want to be eating, on a budget? I was eager to hear from others in the series about their discoveries (I have some catching up to do and can't wait to read all that's been shared so far. You can find the whole series here) and looked forward to sharing some things we've learned ourselves. If this is a topic that interests you too, you can read my guest post here. There was so much to say and I could have kept going, but it gives a good idea of different things our family does to save money when it comes to food. (And we still have much to learn, of course. We'd love to be eating more seafood and would like to learn how to do that affordably!) If you have some tips you'd like to share, please do so in the comments! I'd love to hear your ideas about real food on a real budget! (Thanks for inviting me over to your space Tricia, I had fun writing the post!)

one way to eat more liver

Breakfast I made last week. Grass-fed ground beef with liver, carrots, homemade sauerkraut, sprouts, fresh-pressed raw garlic, and garden chives. 

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We know how good liver from healthy, grass-fed animals is for us, but we were having a hard time incorporating it into our diet very much. I had a recipe I made a few times that was alright, but it didn't stick (plus we stopped eating grains and it was based on brown rice.) Jeff wasn't very fond of the texture of liver, even when it was in very small pieces. We got dessicated liver capsules, but Jeff can't stand swallowing pills and it's not my favorite thing either. Hmm... how to eat more liver? We were buying grass-fed ground beef from Long's Meat Market and one day I had an inspiration. What if they could grind a little bit of grass-fed liver in with our ground meat? I asked them and they could! It was very affordable and a great way to get the incredible nutrition of liver into our diets. Also, we experimented with different amounts until we settled on an amount that's been working for us. When we buy 10 pounds of ground beef at a time, we get a discount. So we tried 10 pounds of ground beef mixed with 2 pounds of liver. I liked it, but that amount of liver was a little too strong for Jeff. Then we went to 10 pounds of ground beef with 1 pound of liver mixed in (which they put in one pound packages for us.) That's the ratio we've happily settled on. I hardly notice a liver taste at all, Jeff does more than I do. (Occasionally when they have grass-fed lamb heart available we'll add a pound of that as well, it's mild in flavor.) We've been doing this for quite some time and it's really been working for us. You can mix in herbs and garlic to make the liver flavor even less noticeable, for those who are sensitive to the taste.

We're really happy to be eating more organ meats now! It's been a goal of mine for a long time and I feel like it's such a good thing for our family to be eating. It's a start. I still don't feel like we're getting as much liver in our diets as I would like us to, or other organ meats for that matter, but we're on the right track! I wanted to share about this with you in case you've been wanting to get more liver and organ meats in your diet too. Perhaps your local butcher shop could help you out like they've been helping us?

If you feel like sharing your favorite ways to eat liver or organ meats, I'd love to hear!

how to render lard (guest post by jeff)

(Today's post is a guest post by Jeff. When I was growing up, I never would have imagined eating lard. It was like a naughty word in the general populace. An old fashioned food that people ate before they "knew any better." Later, after getting my information from other sources and learning about lard's incredible health benefits and high levels of Vitamin D (one of the few food sources of it), I was interested. I discovered our friend Lara rendered her own lard and I was amazed, thinking she was like a pioneer. I thought it sounded so hard to do- rendering your own lard! When I found out how easy it was I laughed. Today Jeff shares his favorite way to render lard, in case you're interested too. Some people have been shocked to discover that our family's diet is full of animal fats. Luckily, information about the health benefits of animals fats (from healthy, pastured animals, of course) is becoming more mainstream all the time. For further reading: two good books, for starters: GAPS & Nourishing Traditions. And two good articles: here and here. )
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How to Make your Own Liquid Sunshine (Home Rendered Lard)
And a bit of a Rant

Today I want to talk about how to create your own home rendered lard. A healthy alternative to the Vegetable Oils that are so bad for you. There has been a lot of Bad Information based on Poor science fed to the population during the last few decades about the dangers of Animal Fats in the diet.  Most of this information came from a single poorly done study which was bolstered by Corporations that had toxic Bi-products that they wanted to Sell to the general population. TA DUH.... Margarine and vegetable oils.  This study observed that folks who died of heart disease had cholesterol plaque encrusted on their arteries and so surmised that the dietary intake of high cholesterol substances was at the heart of Heart Disease.  BAD SCIENCE! (Did you know that most folks who die, of almost all diseases...Have Hair on their heads.....OMG, better get bald!!)

But all those corporate owned government entities with all those various initials like the FDA, USDA, AMA, WHO, CDC etc, financed by the same corporations (in a round about way) jumped on the band wagon, and all came to the corporations aid and began to sell us this erroneous and deadly idea.  The fact is that the most healthy humans on the planet tend to ingest the most natural animal fats, AND until the last century when humans began ingesting large amounts of vegetable fats and fake food, heart disease was virtually unknown.  The actual Truth is that Plaque forms from Cholesterol to protect the body.  The reason humans get hardening of the arteries is that they have systemic inflammation caused by the intake of substances human bodies were not meant to ingest, or breathe, or put on their bodies. Hardening of the arteries is the bodies natural defense against this inflammation, and reducing the dietary intake of cholesterol, rather than having any positive impact on the body, is very dangerous.  But with a gazillion dollars at stake in the Pharmaceutical industry (hello Statin Drugs) and Junk foods industries, there's not much chance you will hear about this from your doctors whose coursework was mostly financed by these same companies.  But the information is out there, the studies overwhelming as to the actual truth of the matter.  So Have no Fear, healthy organic animal fats are a boon to health.  OH, just a side note here. If you are interested in optimal health and longevity, listen very closely to those corporate owned government entities mentioned above, LISTEN VERY CAREFULLY to the FDA, USDA, AMA, WHO, and the CDC..... Then DO THE OPPOSITE.

Rant done for now...
OK, now we come to how to make your own liquid Sunshine.  I call it this because it's chock full of good Vitamin D, which most humans are very deficient in. (you want to look for a good cause of disease, here it is.)
First off you need to get good organic GRASS FED pork fat, the Kidney Fat supposedly is best.  It's very important that you get organic and grass fed, otherwise you will have a deadly GMO fed, and antibiotic Laden toxic non edible foodstuff.  The fat tends to load up on these horrible things that will cause your health to decline, rather than grow... HELLO MRSA, thank you antibiotic laden factory farmed meats for that.... More people dying in hospitals from that than the conditions they go in for...OOPS, more ranting..... Anyway,
So you get your hands on some REAL Pork Fat, from some good local farmer whose operation isn't owned by some big corporation....good ol Ma and Pa Kettle down the road, who actually care for the animals, the environment and their fellow humans,  like our friends at Deck Family Farm where we get ours.
Take a big ol pile of this fat and put it in a big pan with a lid on it.
Then put it in the oven on really low. I've found 150 degrees gives us the most amazing GOLDEN beautiful liquid that hardens snow white.  But the truth is around this household, as soon as Bracken gets a whiff of that fat cookin, he's begging for some. (It's one of the foods he'll eat and eat...that and salmon...and blueberries...)  so I generally have to turn it up a bit to speed up the process....because once it's done you are left with liquid sunshine....and Cracklings, which Bracken eats hand over fist, and we put into our dozen or so egg yolks at dinner time (with some onions, celery, turmeric, garlic and salt). We sometimes joke that our favorite food is Fat Fried in Fat with a little fried fat on the side.

So anyway you put it in overnight or so, for a long time, check it in the morning...then pour off the liquid sunshine, cut up with some scissors or a knife what's left in the pan if it's still pretty fatty looking, then put it back in for a few hours. You don't want to cook it totally to death if you want to feast on the cracklings, because the Leaf Lard (as they call the kidney fat) will practically totally disappear into the liquid gold.  So quit when you have some nice brown crackling there in the pan. Pour off the rest of the Lard...And now you have the best thing to be cooking your eggs and other fried goods in. The beauty of the animal fats is they can remain stable under high heat..(unlike vegetable fats which become carcinogenic when they get too hot)...so now you have one of the best Oils you can ever get, health giving, REAL food that the human body was meant to ingest. (Although since most humans have been ingesting non-food chemical laden substances that they have been told are safe, their gut has been virtually destroyed and fats have become harder to digest) so start off not eating pounds of the cracklngs like we do...when we started on our REAL FOOD gut healing diet a few years ago, I couldn't eat hardly any fat without major problems...now, if you knew how much we eat every day you probably wouldn't believe it. But my lack of arthritis and lifelong terrible heartburn and GERD...thanks me.      ...OH, and if you live nearby and want some of this Lard, give us a Jingle.... we like those cracklings so much that we just keep making it, and have a freezer full of the lard.

sprouts made easy

Breakfast one morning with a heaping handful of fresh sprouts on top and some basil leaves.

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Since I've know Jeff, he's been excited about sprouts. His enthusiasm is contagious and it rubbed off on me.  Now I'm pretty excited about sprouts too. If you've visited us at market lately and asked us 'what's new?', I may have told you Sprouts!
I'll back up. We've made sprouts near our sink in glass jars here and there. We'd be excited, but doing it on a regular basis never stuck. We'd forget to rinse them often enough or sometimes we'd be running errands and come home to find them dried out. For one reason or another- it just didn't really work out. Jeff told me (many times over the years) that he wanted to eat a bowl full of sprouts a day. He also told me he wanted to build a sprouting machine that would automatically water sprouts for us. I had never heard of such a thing and honestly, it sounded complicated to me. I thought: 'Why do we need a sprouting machine? All we need is a glass jar.' But like I said, that didn't happen as much as we would have liked and certainly not enough to provide a bowl a day!


Why Sprouts?

What is so great about sprouts? Enzymes. Mega Nutrients. Life Force. To name just a few things. I remember reading about the importance of raw foods in 'Nourishing Traditions', including fermented foods and sprouts. A few quotes about sprouts from the book:

"The process of germination not only produces vitamin C but also changes the composition of grains and seeds in numerous beneficial ways. Sprouting increases vitamin C content, especially B2, B5, and B6. Carotene increases dramatically- sometimes eightfold. 
 ...sprouting also neutralizes the enzyme inhibitors present in all seeds."

"The sprouting of seeds is one of the most fascinating natural phenomena. From this minuscule appendage, tiny part of a seed even tinier, is born the plant. That this sprout has exceptional nutritional value is not surprising. But even more remarkable is the ability of this sprout to produce a whole range of substances- principally vitamins and enzymes- that are completely absent, or present only in extremely small amounts, in the unsprouted seed. The seed becomes hardly recognizable and transforms itself into something new, which is less energetic but richer in nutrients." -Claude Aubert 

Recently, while reading 'Fresh Food From Small Spaces', my interest in sprouts was renewed. That book inspired me in quite a few ways, but one of the major inspirations I came away with was to get into sprouts again. If you want to produce more of your own food with limited space, sprouts are the way to go!
Here are some quotes about sprouts from the book:

"Quite simply, it allows me to produce armloads of fresh food every week, from pennies' worth of seed, using just one or two square feet of space that does not need to be well lighted. No other food production system can claim this."

"Sprouts retain the nutrition from their seeds and create much more. Radish sprouts contain 29 times more vitamin C than milk, 10 times more calcium than a potato, and more vitamin C than a pineapple."

"Broccoli contains a substance that may be thousands of times more powerful than antioxidants in fighting heart disease. However, according to a University of Saskatchewan study, it would be nearly impossible for most people to eat enough broccoli per day to give them a substantial benefit. Broccoli sprouts, on the other hand, contain 20 to 50 times more of this substance than the mature plant, meaning that a handful or two per day may allow your body to "correct major cardiovascular dysfunctions such as hypertension and stroke" according to the study's leading author."

"Home sprouting in your own controlled environment allows you to avoid contamination risks associated with comercially-grown sprouts."
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Okay, we know sprouts are awesome, now....

Why a Sprouting Machine?

In 'Fresh Food From Small Spaces', the author recommended that if you were going to get serious about sprouting to invest in a sprouting device. It takes only minutes each day to fill the water and you can produce a lot at a time. 

Here are some thoughts from the book:

 "The use of automatic sprouters may raise some ethical questions for sustainable gardeners. Are these hydroponic systems? If they use energy and water to get the job done, how sustainable are they? First, they do qualify as hydroponic systems, but none of them uses lights, so their energy consumption is very low compared to the wasteful systems we associate with the word "hydroponic." The Freshlife, for example, turns on for only a few minutes each hour and it uses just 8 watts of energy, which is much less than a lightbulb. These systems' water use is also quite reasonable. The Easy Green, which is the larger of the two, can produce up to 6 pounds of fresh sprouts each week with only half a gallon of water per day. These systems are far more productive than any hydroponic garden, at a tiny fraction of the energy and water consumption. In fact, with the incredible amounts of water and energy required to farm and transport vegetables and meat, it is very wasteful not to have an automatic sprouting system at home that produces your own fresh veggies and protein.          ...With no energy available, an automatic sprouter would make a very effective manual sprouter and would simply require occasional rinsing."

After talking with Jeff, we decided to research some different sprouting machines. Jeff still wanted to build his own, but decided realistically that it wasn't something that would happen anytime soon. We decided to purchase The Easy Green Sprouter. It was the best quality sprouting machine that we found (and also happened to cost the most.) We found a refurbished machine for sale on the website, which helped us afford it. Spending that much money, on our humble income, was a big investment for us. Adding more raw food to our diet and eating nutritious sprouts was a big priority for us though. When we got it in the mail, we were ecstatic. Jeff got it all set up right away. It wasn't long before we were enjoying fresh sprouts with all our meals. I wanted to share about it here, but wanted to wait a little while until we had enough time to see how we really liked it. 

One thing I was hesitant about was that The Easy Green takes up a 18" by 24" space. We need all the counter top space in our kitchen that we can get, so I wondered how that would work out. It's a little more cramped, but not that big of a deal (and so worth it.) We only have to fill up the water in the machine about once every 24 hours. The machine automatically mists the sprouts regularly. Occasionally, we take a break from sprouting to sanitize the machine with hydrogen peroxide. 

We are producing so much fresh food right on our kitchen counter top and it's awesome! Soon, during the winter, when we no longer have fresh greens from our garden in abundance, we will still have fresh food growing in our very own kitchen.

Our favorite sprouts are: clover and radish (the easiest and the radish has a delicious spice.) We also like: kale, mustard, sunflowers, chinese cabbage, and broccoli. We sprout each kind of seed separately because they have different germination times. 

We like to eat our fresh sprouts with a little bit of raw apple cider vinegar on top, yum. 

Jeff saves many seeds from our garden and many seeds are reserved for sprouting. Growing our own sprouting seeds saves us a lot of money.

After some time, Jeff and I would both agree that buying a sprouting machine was a great investment for us. (Even though Jeff knows he could make one of higher quality and perhaps he will at some point.) I wanted to share about all of this with you because maybe you've had a similar experience as us, that sprouting in glass jars just didn't stick, and you'd like sprouts made easy. If that's the case, perhaps a sprouting machine will work wonders for you too.

And yes, most days Jeff is eating his bowl full of sprouts. 

You can imagine how he feels about that.

natasha's top ten influences which boost immunity

{Homegrown Garlic. Picture originally from this post.}

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Naturally, while I've been recovering from the flu this week, my thoughts have turned to boosting immunity. It's still so early in the season for getting sick (I know you can get sick anytime of year, but I always associate the flu with winter) and I want to boost our family's immune system in preparation for the colder season (and for always.) I turned open the page in Natasha Campbell-McBride's book, GAPS, about immunity and felt like sharing it here. You'll notice some of her ideas on this list (and many in her book) are not mainstream (though I hope someday they will be.) Mainstream would say to avoid animal fats, cholesterol and the sun (as a few examples), but she thoughtfully explains why our bodies need those things. I highly recommend reading her book if you would like to learn more. Within this post I won't be getting into explanations behind her ideas, but I'll be touching on how we incorporate these immune boosting things in our life.

Top Ten Influences which Boost Immunity

1) Fresh animal fats (from meats and dairy) and cholesterol-rich foods (particularly raw egg yolk.)

2) Cold-pressed oils: olive oil, fish oils, nut and seed oils.

3) Onions and garlic.

4) Freshly pressed vegetable and fruit juices.

5) Regular consumption of greens: parsley, dill, coriander, spring onion and garlic, etc.

6) Probiotic supplementation and fermented foods.

7) Contact with animals: horses, dogs, etc. Having a pet in the family can do a lot for children's immune status.

8) Swimming in unpolluted natural waters: lakes, rivers and sea.

9) Physical activity in the fresh air.

10) Exposure to sunlight and sensible sunbathing.

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Here are some of my comments about her list.

1) The main animal fat we eat is lard that we render from local, pastured pork. We cook everything in it (ground beef, vegetables, scrambled eggs, etc.) It makes everything taste incredible. I'm looking forward to eating more eggs as our chickens lay more. We eat beef and chicken regularly, so that's another source of animal fats for us. I'd love to find a good, local source for duck fat

Years ago, I used to put some raw yolks in our smoothies, but I haven't done that in a very long time.

2) The most important oil for our family is cod liver oil. My sister is just the sweetest thing and when she found out we ran out of cod liver oil last week, she surprised us and sent some. She sent my favorite kind, that we've only bought a few times because it's pricey. The best quality cod liver oil that I've found is the fermented cod liver oil from Green Pastures. Taking cod liver oil regularly helps our immunity and improves mood. It also greatly reduced my cramps during my moon time. I've written more about cod liver oil in this post.

We love olive oil and have it on our salads. We use it sparingly because it's spendy. 

3) It's a good thing that onions and garlic are so tasty because it makes for a very enjoyable way to boost immunity! We would happily consume sauteed onions with every single meal, but usually eat onions a few times a week. Jeff recently told me about this article by Dr. Mercola, talking about garlic needing to be consumed raw to have the benefits. We like to use our garlic press and squeeze one to two cloves on top of our meals. We usually do that for breakfast and sometimes for dinner as well. We love the taste so we enjoy adding it that way.
I should mention that my body used to have a hard time with garlic, but over time that has changed. Now a few cloves at a time is a good amount for me.

4) Jeff makes raw vegetable juices here and there. We love them. (I should mention that Natasha does not advocate the consumption of pasteurized juice at all, only fresh raw juices.) We love juice with nettles, cucumber, parsley, ginger, celery, apple, mint, lemon, beets etc. We use whatever is in the garden at the time.

5) The greens we eat the most are kale and chard. We also love nettles, collards and add green herbs to our meals here and there. Lately our greens have been slowing down in the garden and I need to increase our greens consumption again. We were eating greens every day and I want to keep that going.

6) We eat something fermented with every meal. Sauerkraut is the fermented food that we eat most often. Lately we've been eating raw, fermented pickles as well.
The best probiotics I've found are Bio-Kult. If we could afford it, I'd like our family to take them regularly.

7) Do our chickens help boost our immunity? If so, yet another wonderful benefit of having chickens!

8) Well, we went swimming once this summer. I'd like to make that a more regular occurrence.

9) My favorite physical activity in the fresh air is gardening, walking, and yard work. Walking along the ocean is wonderful. It's been super rainy and my visits to the garden lately have been brief, so I have not been getting as much physical activity and need more.

10) We soaked up all the sun we could during the summer. Now, in the midst of storms, our sunny season seems like a distant dream. Winters in the Pacific Northwest don't have ample opportunities for soaking up the sun. We take cod liver oil for the Vitamin D (and eat Vitamin D rich foods), which is especially important for us in the wintertime.

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We do the best we can within our budget. There's always room for improvement. I'd like to add another thing we do for our immune systems: we buy powdered elderberries from Mountain Rose Herbs and make tea with it regularly. I'd like to learn more about medicinal mushrooms that boost immunity and would like to consume echinacea more.

{Just a note: the power just went out, then came back on. We're having storms here. If Gratitude Sunday is a little delayed in the morning, know it's because our electricity went out.}

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How about you? 

What do you do to boost your immune system?

Do share!

miracle cleansing bentonite clay

 Today's guest post is brought to you by Jeff (aka Clay Man.) Today he shares about the benefits of taking bentonite clay internally. And also shares about a yearly annoyance that he attempted to take care of with conventional medicine and then finally discovered the miracles of clay.
I'll let him take it from here.


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Bentonite clay is a Miracle Cleansing Food.

You can buy in the store in a small bottle called, “Detox” and pay a lot of money for it, OR you can follow the instructions below to make your own Miracle Cleansing Food.

First let me tell you what it's good for.

Taken Internally it draws out:

 

-Toxins

-Pathogens, like Giardia and Cryptosporidium etc. 

(In a study from Arizona State University, bentonite clay was found to be highly effective at killing MRSA (those nasty antibiotic resistant bacteria that make every procedure done in hospitals these days, life threatening) as well as taking care of Salmonella, E.Coli etc. )

-Viruses

-Herbicides

-Heavy Metals

-Radioactive substances

It also gets extra Oxygen to the cells and pulls out excess Hydrogen.

It has an alkalizing effect and helps maintain beneficial gut flora.

It's also chock full of good minerals for the body.

Pretty amazing, and it doesn't mess you up in the long run like the things the Doctor will give you to deal with these little nasties.

You can also smear it on your skin and it does the same thing, pulling out toxins.

Taryn probably has a link to show you that, we're about due for our annual “Clay Day”.

It's great for stings and blemishes etc.

Part of how it does all this is basically magnetically.

It has a strong Negative charge...and all those nasty things have a positive charge, so it literally sucks em in and because it has a very porous structure it holds on to em, and carries em out of your body.

I'll tell you a little personal story. Almost every year for more than 20 years now I get an annual visit from the Screaming Meanies. Some kind of Pathogen . This cleans me out and allows me to spend way too much time in the bathroom. I've been tested for parasites etc and more often than not they don't see anything so I once had to go to California, where they saw Cryptosporidian that the local folks didn't see. In fact locally they never saw anything but I told them to humor me and give me anti Cryptosporidian medicine, which always cured it in a couple days...otherwise it could last a month or more... Bummer.

But the problem with that medicine was that it killed all the good gut flora. Just perpetuating the problem, and many others. And these days with all of the stuff in water, food and antibiotics etc. most folks have a messed up gut environment with too may pathogenic bacteria, fungi etc.. and a major lack of the good stuff which is the center for a persons health.... In fact this messed up gut environment is at the center of Autism spectrum disorders and Heart Disease and arthritis...(actually most of the inflammatory diseases.) Taryn may have a link to where she has spoken about this and the GAPS diet which is designed to return the gut to a healthy state, and cures Autism spectrum disorders and all the other stuff I mentioned.

So I looked for a healthy alternative to the gut flora destroying stuff the Pharmaceutical Sales Representatives in White Coats (Doctors) will always prescribe, that wouldn't have negative repercussions in the long run.

And discovered Bentonite clay.

It usually works in a couple of days.

The Indians and indigenous folks figured it out by observing sick animals that would drink from pools of water in clay deposits.

I read somewhere that some Indigenous folks would carry clay pellets with them just in case they might need the benefits of the clay at some point.

The old Diarrhea standby, Kaopectate, was made from Kaolin clay and Pectin.

To work it has to be soaked in water for awhile, you can't just eat the powder and dissolving it in water imbues the water with it's negatively charged properties.

But here's the thing, you can't just stir some clay into a cup of water...NOPE, all you'll get is a big gross glob of clay that's no fun to ingest.

So what you have to do is fill a blender or really fast food processor with some preferably filtered or distilled water, then turn it on and scoop in some spoons of the clay. It greatly expands so take it slowly. Now what you are looking for is for it to still be liquid, just right before it becomes kinda like a thick jello. You want to be able to pour it easily, otherwise you get that blob problem.

Then put it in a little jar and keep it in the refrigerator.

Then when you want to take some you mix a teaspoon or two into a tall glass of water. Stir it up really good and let it sit a bit if you can, this expands the electrical charge into the water .

And drink er down.

Yummy....

Don't do massive amounts, after all it's clay and my first introduction to it was when I worked at a mill and the large Mill Pond up the mountain where we got our water from just kept draining out a hole and going who knows where. It was very strange, just like someone pulled the plug on a bath tub. I tried dumping loads of rock and dirt in there but it didn't do a thing. Finally we got a truckload of Bentonite and dumped it in the hole, it went down in a greatly expanded and was pretty much water impermeable.

That solved the problem.... but we don't want to do that to our intestines. A large teaspoon in a tall glass of water....maybe a tad more will do the trick. You can take it every day and it won't hurt you, you'll get good minerals and your guts cleaned out...

You can get the powdered clay really cheap at Mountain Rose Herbs, Taryn has a link on the right side of her blog that'll take you there.

Happy Cleansing

Sharing more of our healing journey

Recently I was asked by Starlene, who blogs over at GAPS Diet Journey, if she could interview me about our experience on the GAPS diet on her internet radio show. I said yes and was excited for the opportunity to share more about our experience, since it has been so life changing for us in so many ways. Truth be told, it's much easier for me to express myself through writing and I knew expressing myself vocally would be a little more challenging (especially on a topic where I have so much to say!) I'm glad I stepped out of my comfort zone to do the interview. We had some funny bloopers, but Starlene worked her editing magic and pieced it all together wonderfully. 

So, if you'd like to hear more about our family's journey on the GAPS diet, 

I invite you to listen to the show here. 

I share about what really spurred us into action to make some major changes in our diet, about the food allergies we were experiencing, and tips we've discovered along the way. I share about the changes we've experienced after being on the diet for almost 2 years.

 I said a lot and yet there is so much more I'd like to say, because there is so much to say. (My passion is evident, isn't it?) Food is a topic I deeply care about. And the GAPS diet has brought not just physical changes (which have been major), but feeling... spiritually uplifted. Our hearts guided us to this diet and the results have been miraculous to us. It's hard to put into words, since we feel it on so many levels. 

If you listen to the interview, I hope it will inspire you to love and care for your body and to follow your heart on your own unique path to healing.

How to Make Mullein Garlic Ear Oil

 Every year we have mullein that pops up wild in our garden. Years past, I didn't pay much attention to it, just noticed it was an interesting looking plant. As I learned more about herbs, though, I became more interested in mullein. Over the winter I found a recipe to make herbal ear oil with the mullein flowers. So, when the seasons shifted and the garden started to grow, I waited for a mullein plant to pop up. I knew one would pop up somewhere, and it did. It grew and grew until it was towering above our heads. Then, starting in August, as the little yellow flowers came, we gently harvested them and spread them on screens to dry. Then I saved the dried flowers in a jar.

I took these pictures throughout the summer and fall, to share with you.

Harvest after harvest we brought in to dry. At first I harvested some mullein flowers every day. Then slowly harvested less often, until finally being finished harvesting for the season. The flowers are quite small when they are fresh, but when they dry they shrink into tiny little things. My jar full of dried mullein flowers was not filling up very fast. But I knew a little could go a long way.

Making mullein garlic ear oil is incredibly simple.

 In 'Rosemary Gladstar's Herbal Recipes for Vibrant Health.' she writes about garlic-mullein flower oil:

"This is a wonderful remedy for ear infections; it relieves the pain and helps eliminate the infection. The flowers of mullein are often difficult to purchase, so gather some in the summer and fall. You can also buy this oil ready-made in most natural food stores."

Garlic Mullein Ear Oil

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A few tablespoons fresh-pressed garlic

A few tablespoons dried mullein flowers

Extra virgin olive oil, enough to cover herbs

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.

You can heat the blend gently on the stovetop or let them infuse in a jar in a warm place for awhile. 

I strained them through fabric (t-shirt-turned-rag) and squeezed the oil out. 

I placed the oil in a glass jar with a dropper. 

It will keep in the fridge for a long time.

To use, take out of fridge and let warm to room temperature (you want to use it warm.)

It smells so good and feels delightful and soothing in the ears (in my opinion.) 

Drop a few drops of oil in your ear, when needed.

We put cotton balls in our ears for awhile afterward to soak up the extra oil that comes out.

.

.

That's it!

Easy!

We've used it when our ears just felt like they needed some "soothing." We haven't needed it for ear infections, but it is a wonderful remedy to have on hand. (Side-note: the best explanation I've ever found on ear infections is in the book 'Gut and Psychology Syndrome' by Natasha Campbell-McBride.) This oil feels good when ears are somewhat itchy and uncomfortable from allergies. If you don't have mullein growing in your area or any mullein plants to harvest from, you can purchase mullein flowers from Mountain Rose Herbs (though they are often "out of stock.") Oh yes, one more thing: Jeff and I created that top picture especially with Pinterest in mind, so you can pin it to easily find it later.

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Here's to Happy Ears!

Wild Spring Greens and Garden Gifts

On Sunday....

I harvested nettles from our patch.

{bowl by Amy the Potter}

While I was harvesting nettles...

Jeff was planting seeds.

And Bracken took a little nap on his back.

When Bracken woke up, he played with his garden tools next to me while I harvested chives. Jeff kept planting in the greenhouse.

We chose chive plants to harvest and left others to go to seed.

The plant we wondered what it was and left it over winter out of curiosity turned out to be purple cauliflower. 

We harvested some watercress (that grows wild around the garden) for salads and some parsley for salads too. The cauliflower was sauteed with eggs for dinner.

Handfuls of fresh nettles went in our homemade chicken soup with chicken broth, chicken, celery, carrots, parsley, and onions. 

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 On Monday......

We went to our neighbors' place and harvested nettles in their meadow surrounded by woodlands. They didn't want anything to do with nettles and thought it was quite funny that we would eat them.

Our timing was perfect. The nettles were vibrant with spring potency and there was a break in the rain for harvesting. Harvesting nettles is one of my favorite spring rituals. I love nettles, they are truly one of my favorite plants.

Ladybug on a nettle leaf.

We loved coming across surprises of color in the woods, like Salmonberry.

Bracken had a break from being in the pack on my back and rolled in the grass with Jeff 

(far from the nettles.)

Our baskets filled up quickly.

We were surrounded in green goodness. The meadow was quiet and peaceful and we listened to the river flowing nearby.

There was a wet area with skunk cabbages where the nettles were thick. There's Jeff in the thick of it (with gloves and long pants to protect from stings, though we both did get light stings even being covered.)

The skunk cabbage was so beautiful. 

(Our friend wrote a post about them called Ode to the Skunk Cabbage.)

We collected some fiddleheads to identify when we got home and see if they were the edible kind. (They weren't the best variety of fern for eating.)

Jeff started manicuring them, cutting all the leaves off the stems. 

Every year we like to harvest nettles to eat fresh all throughout the spring and dry enough to have nettles in soups and teas until the following year when we can harvest again. This year we had more ambitious plans, we wanted to harvest enough to share some dried nettles with all of you, in our shop and market booth. When we got home we filled two dehydrators with nettles, many screens drying by the woodstove, the whole refrigerator full for fresh eating, more in a pot of soup, and Jeff even put some in our juicer and we drank fresh, raw nettle juice. We're so grateful for these sacred greens, so rich in nutrients and bursting with green life force. And soon, they'll be available in the shop for all of you to enjoy too (along with some dried chives!)