The Moon is calling, the herbs are singing, we're sharing our dream!

I feel grateful and awe-struck to be able to put this work out into the world and to invite so many beautiful and clever souls into a circle of learning and magick! I have designed the course that I was looking for years ago - a place to dig deep into the world of herbology, revel in mystery, take delight in our ability to heal, and embrace the enchantment of our lives and worlds.

The circle is forming, the web is singing, and the Moon is calling our names...

I hope to see you at the Lunar Apothecary!

P. S. Keep reading for a special Early Moon discount! 

The Lunar Apothecary is for the brave, the odd, the curious, the moongazers, and midnight gardeners. Come if you are ready to experience a world of Moon medicine and magick, where we seek to know “As Above, So Below” in our herbal practice. If you are drawn to live your life by the pace of Lunar tide, recognizing your inner changes with the changing face of the moon – come meet us in the garden at midnight. If you want to learn to make herbal remedies and formulations both medicinal and magickal – join our circle. If you are intrigued by the world of medicinal astrology and its important legacy in Western Herbalism – sit down for a cup of moon-blessed tea with us.

We have space for you, clever friend, if you’re ready to answer the call.

Expect to work with lunar plants in new ways, incorporating the written and spoken word to better understand the influence of the Moon in your life, herbal practice, and medicine-making.

Expect to learn in a way that recognizes enchantment as a tool of healing. Whether crafting charms or brewing tinctures, both are given equal reverence and attention.

Expect to change and shift, opening yourself up to the cleansing and compassionate power of lunar herbology.

Expect to embrace all that is dark and beautiful, night-filled and starry, to fully experience the rich spectrum of a life lived not just for the bright expanse of day, but the healing mantle of night.

The Moon is rising – are you ready to join our circle?

◇ ☾ ◇ ☾ ◇ ☾ ◇ DETAILS ◇ ☾ ◇ ☾ ◇ ☾ ◇

The Lunar Apothecary is a twelve week ecourse for ☾ women ☾ composed of weekly newsletters, pdf books, hand-drawn goodies, and guided meditations. You’ll be invited to join an exclusive online circle with your fellow Lunar apothecarians and I’ll be present to answer questions and offer weekly guidance.

Weekly:

• Moonwise: The Lunar Apothecary Newsletter
  • Full of Lunar inspiration for the coming week and guidance about the current moon phase
• Guided Journal Exercises
• The Mansions of the Moon Guide
  • Exploring the ancient Lunar Zodiac
• The Celestial Wheel : The Moon + The Zodiac
  • Exploring the twelve signs of the Solar Zodiac and Lunar Herbology

Monthly:

• The Lunar Compass : Nightly, Weekly, + Monthly Calendar
• Herbal Moon Ritual / Amulet / Charm
• Medicine-Making Tutorials (Twice Monthly!)
  • Teas
  • Extracts
  • Flower, Gem, + Moon Essences
  • Lunar Dreaming
  • Basic Lunar Aromatherapy
  • The Basics of Formulation

BONUSES!

• o Guided Moon Meditations
  • Five 30 minute audio recordings of guided meditations including building your own sacred lunar space + meeting your lunar plant ally
• eBooks:
  • Moonrite: Creating Nightly, Weekly, and Monthly Lunar Rituals + Celebrations
    • Developing a Lunar spiritual practice for yourself and your community, including a guide for hosting Moon Tent Revivals full of herbal magick + medicine!
  • Moonlight: Using Moon Signs to Guide Medicine-Making + Healing
• Growing + Harvesting Plants by the Moon Illustrated Chart
• An annotated bibliography for further reading and explorations
• All the materials from the Lunar Apothecary are yours to keep and use and learn from and love forever.

Start Date: May 1. Space and sliding admissions will be limited, so to secure your seat at the circle sign up early!

Early Moon Special : ENROLL by Monday, April 8 and receive 15% off with the coupon code "EARLYWORTMOON" 

Apothecary Holiday Plans

Now that the Apothecary is closed for the holidays (we'll be back around December 28) we finally have some time for some of the items on our winter respite to-adventure list.  Since it often involves brewing up new goodies for the Apothecary, we thought we would give you a peek into our winter workshop.

Just what are we doing these wintery days and nights?

Working on my Swedish Chai recipe. A lot of my remedy ideas come from dreams.  So it was that one night I dreamt of DeLoreans and the idea of making a chai recipe that incorporates classic Swedish herbal elements.  I already have an idea of what herbs I am going to use, now it is just experimenting with the proportions.  I’ll share the recipe once I’m done!

Reading. I am never far from a book and I have a couple of books I have been carrying around but have yet to read that I look forward to tucking into during these long nights.  One of these books is Culpeper's Medicine: A Practice Of Western Holistic Medicine by Graeme Tobyn, which explores the work of Nicholas Culpeper’s herbal practice and especially his use of medical astrology.

Catching up on my writing. Journaling, writing up new blogs for the Apothecary, such as plant profiles, and other freelance writing work fill up lots of my time when I am not making medicines (or walking dogs or making tea).  Between Samhain and Yule I write down my goals and dreams for the year which build upon the work of the previous year, arching towards my long-term visions.  It is a season, in other words, of making bridges out of lists.

Making lots and lots of sweet herbal goodies. This is the time of year that I fill up friends and family with adaptogenic, bliss-filled herbs in the guise of holiday sweets.  I love Kate Magic’s wonderments, My New Roots, and Earthsprout are some of my current sources of my recipe inspiration.

Sending out handmade postcards like a boss. I guess I am a boss of myself so I would therefore be the type of boss to make and send out handmade postcards.  If you get a lot of boxes this holiday season that you don’t have much use for, cut them up to postcard size, decorate them with some glitter, and make the folks who get them in the mail really happy.

Working on a new adventurous offering from the Apothecary! We'll be offering a brand new something in the next few months that we've never done before in the Apothecary.  I'm in the phase of charming dreams into the waking world...  There will be a tiny preview - just a hint - of what we'll be offering on the Winter Solstice.  Keep your eyes on the skies...

So, my clever friends, this winter dark may you...

☆ Find the festiveness of quiet moments + simple retreats. ☆

☆ Delight in the delicious company of loved ones. ☆

☆ Love + nurture the tangled roots of all your dreams. ☆

Good Morning Mischief!

Morning Mischief: Enchanted Herbal Recipes for Delicious Awakenings + Resolute Magnificence has arrived!

Create mornings of mischief with our new fully enchanted, full-color ebook! Morning Mischief is full of herbal recipes - 25 in all! - but so much more, including:

☆ A workbook to getting your morning groove back!

☆ Inspirational mini-poster printouts (feat. unicorns + rocks +  sunlight)!

☆ A guide to Tissue States - Western Herbal Energetics!

☆ Plant profiles for herbs to start your day with!

☆ Planetary recipes for aligning your stars!

☆ A guide to creating your own foundations for herbal yum!

More than just a recipe book, Morning Mischief is a ❤ HEART❤ book for plant folks, apothecarians, urban homesteaders, rural wonderkin, + those looking to infuse their world with the magick of herbal medicine + mystery!

Let's Begin At the Beginning: 10 Seeds to Start Your Herbal Studies

1. Sit with trees.

Just be still and listen to them - what can be learned in those moments of tree conversing is limitless.

As a child I could often be found up in a tree or a fort at tree level.  That is how I came to know the Pepper Tree Schinus molle that grew over the fence of our yard from our neighbor's backyard.  I would sit in my fort with my plastic play buckets full of water and carefully remove the outer pink skin of the Pepper Tree's berries, crushing the papery skin between my fingers and mixing it into my water buckets, discarding the hard inside berry back over the fence.  I would let it brew overnight, sometimes days, and convince the other kids in the neighborhood that they were magickal brews.  I loved how the water would change colors with the berry-skin infusion and I truly believed that magick was at work.  I still know that magick was at work then and years later I learned that I was unknowingly mimicking the medicinal preparation of the Pepper Tree by earlier peoples, such as the Incas.

2. Grow something.

It can be a herb, a succulant, zuchinnis, flowers, moss, or something else but it is important to grow!  Buy seeds, find seedlings in the farmer's market or maybe take a cutting with permission from a neighbor's yard.  Begin to speak the unique root-clicking, multifloral, seed-spreading  languages of plants.  Find out the best growing conditions for your plant friend, water it when needed, and talk to it all the time.  For those who say they have no green thumb I would say that it is more about having a green heart.  To grow a plant we must grow ourselves and that requires building relationships, all which go through cycles of sprouting, fruitfulness, death, and decomposition.

pepper tree schinus molle

3. Talk to plant folk, herbalists, and the guy down the street who knows how to prepare nopalitos.

You are surrounded by folks who know about plant medicine - really, you are!  Whether your Aunt who uses Tumeric on her skin to maintain her glowing complexion or your high school science teacher who keeps a beautiful potted garden, there are real live humyn creatures who could tell you a thing or two about plant medicine.

4. Read good books.  

There are lots of wonderful herb books to inspire you on your journey.  My growing list of books for beginners can be found over at LibraryThing, but I'll recommend a few here, too. Rosemary Gladstar's Herbal Recipes for Vibrant Health is a great place to start - colorful, easy to follow, and diverse in its coverage, Gladstar's book is a valuable assest to any aspiring (and practicing) herbologist.  I am also a fan of James Wong's book Grow Your Own Drugswhich is not only beautiful to look through but full of simple, effective herbal recipes (I also recommend watching Wong's show of the same name).  Check out our LibraryThing "Books for Beginners" list for more inspiration!

5. Start with one herb.

We are surrounded by growing plants on an ocean planet.  Beginning to study plant medicines can seem overwhelming with the quantity of material to learn.  Find one plant and work with that one plant for a year - write about it, taste it, smell it, grow it, make medicines with it.  You can work with other plants, certainly, but commit to working with this one green ally for a full turning of the seasonal wheel.  It is incredible the complexities and nuances of use and potential found in one plant - very much like each of us.  I'll write more about building relationships with a green ally over the course of a year in future posts.

yum, thai basil!

6. Invite your green allies in to your home.

Drink tea, cook with spices, and clean your counters with essential oil concoctions.  Plants are everywhere!  Invite them to participate in your life, be conscious of the ways they are already in your life, and experience the green world pulling back its layers a bit more, inviting you back into their homes.

7. Make your own drugs.

There are so many ways to prepare herbal medicines.  Oils!  Teas!  Syrups!  Salves!  Tinctures!  Powders!  Essences!  And more!  Learn how to make medicines, make mistakes (brews gone wrong, cayenne in the eyes, exploding fermentations), and make even better medicines.  Herbal medicine-making is a nuanced art - we make remedies for individuals, not miracles for the masses (though I'll not pass on a global miraculous healing were it to come our way).  Medicine-making is another way of building relationships with the plant world, one that changes the material of the maker as much as the plant.

8. Laugh a lot.

Need I say more?

9. Trust yourself.

You will not know everything that ever was and was-not.  You will still be able to be a good herbologist, a healer, and green ally.  One day you might even teach others.  Trust yourself to know thyself.  To know that you are capable of learning more every day, of owning up to your shortcomings, and celebrating your powerful gifts.  Trust yourself to receive what is given and give in return.

10. Expect the mysterious and indulge in it.

We live in a enchanted world - one that continues to grow stranger and more unusual by the minute.  And we are truly strange creatures in it bumbling and dancing on our green, ocean rock of celestial matter hurtling swinging round space.  What an adventure!  You have the opportunity to engage in inter-species communication as a herbologists, to recognize plants as clever, funny, and deeply wise.  The green path is full of mystery and every time we reach the edge of what-we-know to find there is much more to learn, take time to indulge in the fragrance of complexity ever-guided by the certainty of our own desires to live enchantedly.

I hope you've enjoyed our little guide to starting your herbal studies. For more herbal wisdom, exclusive coupons to our Apothecary, and plant medicine goodness, subscribe to our infrequent, but inspired newsletter.

::right now::

Right now, I am...

:: welcoming in the spring by opening all the windows and doors.

:: thinking over the recent housing mess and knowing that we won't be renters forever.

:: wearing a floral thrift store skirt and two headscarves.  Fancy!

:: considering new semi-regular blog post topics that will combine my love of radical feminist history and tea.

:: hoping that the whether will remain nice and cool for a little while longer.

:: loving the smell of orange blossoms outside our front and back door.

:: singing songs of spring! For She will bring the buds in the spring and laugh amidst the flowers...

:: laughing at the inexhaustible presence of joy in our lives if we just take part in its effervescent laughter!

:: enjoying quite hours in a quiet house.

:: smiling at my puppy who is covered in bits of flowers and leaves after time spent dutifully exploring what the winds have stirred up in our backyard adventure park.

:: deciding what recipes to invest more time in next - Chai blends?  Cacao creations?  Special oils blends for wellness?

:: feeling excited by the arrival of family later this week and going to the RV show!

:: readying myself for that same RV show and the strong urge to get on the road now.

:: brewing teas for fertility and to support all different sorts of reproductive bits.

:: considering the all important question of what color to paint my nails - and then back to the issue of neighborhood peace, city peace, state peace, country peace, and eventually, of course, world peace.  But first, the nails.

:: working on that same Materia Medica for Borage (Borago officinalis).

:: reading new herb books that I got for my birthday (and have been checking out of the library for years):  A City Herbal by Maida Silverman, Encyclopedia of Herbal Medicine by Andrew Chevallier, and The Book of Herbal Wisdom by Matthew Wood.

:: listening to my birthday mix still.  Birthday month dance party!

:: grateful for the incredible support of folks who are experiencing similar struggle as us and yet, without hesitation, offer more than we could ever ask for.

:: remembering that the promise of spring is a gift freely given and one that should be freely received.

:: feeling all sorts of good stretch and soreness by a regular yoga practice made possible by an early birthday gift.

:: wanting to say thanks for the ever-growing support of our quirky Apothecary.

:: wishing everyone a moment today to know balance as we step firmly into spring.