Rose Cottage

 One of my Reset tasks this weekend has been cleaning the fridge! I moved into Rose Cottage 10 months ago, and have done spot cleans - one shelf or drawer at a time as I emptied a container or cleaned out the veggie drawer, but it was time for a thorough go!  Tuesday - before You know the drill - turn it off, empty the contents (into a cooler, if it's going to take awhile! ), wash drawers and any organizers, wipe down shelves, walls and gasket! I did the main shelves Saturday, and saved the door for today.   I have a random selection of clear shelf organizers, so put them in the dish pan and gave them a good wash.  Compost went into my under sink container, then out to out bin.   ' After ' Don't you love a clean and reorganized fridge?!! The oddest one I ever saw was in the home of a friend's aunt - one lazy Susan on each shelf, and all items on one of those lazy Susan's! Way to OCD for me - but necessary for her!  Natural cleaning products I lo...

 Recently, I used my little Cherokee Syllabary dictionary to record plant names in my garden journal, I needed to look up one of the wild greens, Sochani, and was delighted to find this article !  This winter, I'd ordered 'Golden glow' (Rudbeckia lanciniata) seed from Everwild, having read the greens were a favorite food of the Cherokee. Sochan seed packe t In an article on his blog in 2019, edimental proponent Stephen Barstow wrote that Rudbeckia lanciniata "is documented as probably the most important spring vegetable of the Cherokee in the Southern Appalachians in Moerman’s Native American Ethnobotany, which is probably where I first noted its edibility.  "It’s missed in Cornucopia II. The Cherokee ate the tender young leaves and stems cooked alone or with other greens such as poke (Phytolacca americana), Ramps (Allium tricoccum), Rumex spp. (docks) and eggs. They were also fried with fat, were dried for later use and also eaten as a cooked spring salad or as c...

 Last Saturday, our Edible Landscapes of Yamhill  group met to discuss tending our  28 garden boxes this year! It was fun to see each other and meet the newest volunteers at Mac Market - I brought my own mug for a cuppa, and got a Mexican Mocha. Edible landscaping volunteers Last year, our group officially 'adopted' the 8 block stretch  of Alpine Avenue, and this year we've received a grant to expand the garden box project to several other areas.  The board members scheduled the quarterly clean up for after our meeting, and the city of McMinnville provides kits (vests, rubber gloves, grippers, signs and garbage bags) which make it easy for groups to tend the roadsides!  Clean up crew It felt so rewarding to gather those bags of litter along Alpine - and what a great reminder to attend to the areas near and around our garden boxes!  This is the second year I'll be tending the Tea Garden which I dearly love! It is ironic that the picnic tables (one nea...

 Gong Xi Fa Cai! Blessings this year of the Dragon If you've followed my blogs for long, you'll know I love holidays, ceremony rituals! Am annual favorite for over a decade is cleaning and preparing for the Asian of lunar new year. My friend Gwynne is a Feng Shui practioner, and has lovely tips on her  blog  for celebrating Chinese New Year, including:  'Roll 88 cases, or 88, or 8 single oranges one by one through your front door (& every exterior door that enters your home) and across your threshold, as well as real coins, ingots, gold chocolate coins into your home & business to symbolize filling them with abundance of good luck & prosperity. Then share the fruit with friends & neighbors.' Rolling oranges and coins Here's a citrus 'money tree' from a decade ago in the Galloway House -  there's an old Chinese legend of a tree with branches of coins & gold, - when you shake it, the gold falls like rain from heaven! This year I have a ...

 One of my favorite protects is to create Cosmic Smashbooks and Juju Journals!  When she was in her color of Woman teacher training, our Red Thread SiStar  Catt Geller  wanted an option suitable for low-income participants. She thought of using simple composition books - and  Cosmic Smashbooks  were born!  After my own graduation from Color of Woman Teacher training in 2015, I corresponded with Catt, and was granted permission to teach local classes for several years, before she began her certification program.  I offer a simple journal process in my Reiki 2 classes, inviting students to document their Reiki experiences. In these Good Medicine journals, we used Apothecary vessels to transform old stories into remedies .  Reiki 2 Good Medicine journals Composition books are readily available, and provide a good foundation for Journaling, using word and image. Many of us covered notebooks with brown paper - that's a great beginning. ...