The Most Important Things A Gardener Can Grow

Admin-013 on April 18, 2019

In my humble little opinion the most important things a gardener can cultivate are: curiosity; patience; acceptance & hard work. Oh, and a sense of humor. That comes in really handy. I drafted this list on the spot after hearing someone describe gardening as too overwhelming and scary to know where to begin. It probably isn’t for everyone. I’m not really sure where my obsession with plants comes from, but they are my friends. And flowers are people, too.

I’ve been gardening for going on 20 years now and I learn something new every season, usually the hard way. Less stubborn souls may have given up by now, but not if they’re as enchanted with horticulture as I have become. Gardening has probably saved my sanity at least twice in my life, of this I am certain. There few other distractions that prove to be as fruitful, nor addictions that could ever be so wholesome. A seed catalog in January is exactly the promise of hope my winter weary soul relies upon each year.


To be a gardener is to look at the world through a very primal lens. The agrarian model offers such an elegant philosophy to apply to ones own personal cultivation, in addition to their garden plot. I am, no doubt, more fully alive in a tech saturated world that I willingly (and enthusiastically) subscribe to because I care to set the rhythm of my life to that of the seasons. We have much to gain by remembering the ancient ways of our ancestors and embracing a more harmonious lifestyle. It benefits not only Mother Earth, but her children, as well. My garden taught me all of this and more.

Each spring I can scarcely believe that the delicate seeds I plant will actually grow and they do. I am always giddy at the first sights of green shoots. I hope I never lose that sense of awe. And every Autumn when the harvest is finally in and Jack Frost is playing chicken with what’s left of my plants I am always sad to see the season end. I hope I never lose that sense of reverence. To become a really good gardener is a lifelong pursuit and while I’ve learned a thing or two, I await the lessons yet to come with the same dreamy anticipation I reserve for mid-winter seed catalog browsing!

An Invincible Summer Within… After All

Admin-013 on April 18, 2019

Seed catalogues are a wonderful diversion for me in the cold grip of a northern winter. Flipping through the pages, I fan my tiny flame of hope that spring will indeed arrive. Usually by the beginning of March I have to sit on my hands to keep from starting plants too early for this Montana climate. When our last frost date rolls around by mid May (MAY!) the cloched landscape of my garden betrays my eagerness to get growing. I fall asleep scheming my garden plan, while visions of pickled beets dance in my head.  
 

I’ve been gardening for a couple of decades now and each year I learn something new on a fundamental level that absolutely blows my mind. Sometimes it’s related to the plants themselves, but more often than not it is the life lessons that keep me coming back to work the plot. This year I had zero of that anticipatory buildup to planting. I planned not. If I’m being really honest, I wasn’t even sure I was going to plant a garden come May. The spark just wasn’t there, but there is something to be said for going through the motions. Bit by bit the garden got planted and in perfect alignment with favorable aspects to the moon, no less! I think that might be what’s called, perfect timing. 

Gardening all these years has paid dividends in the knowledge department, as well. Some years are busier than others and this year we decided that if the garden was going in at all it had to be easy. So, we let it be easy. We finally know how to work smarter, not harder. In the end, as cliché as it truly sounds, the work was it’s own reward. Gardening has a funny way of being like that.

After two consecutive warrior weekends everything is in the ground and growing like gangbusters. Conditions were perfect the first few days after transplanting, cooler with periodic rain. Then just like clockwork, an unseasonably warm spell kicked everything up several notches in the germination department. I’ve almost never seen sprouting rates like I have the past two weeks. Let us hope this is an omen of good fertility for the season ahead!

 Writing about gardening and gardening, itself are two very different pursuits! My creaky bones and weary muscles are welcoming a little break in the desk chair after working so hard outdoors the past couple of weeks. I am getting reacquainted with muscles I forgot I had (and making pledges to myself about ways to improve my strength and up my gardening game)! I can hardly come up with a more holistic pursuit than growing one’s own food as a way to nourish body, mind and spirit. I am so glad I pushed on, stretching past my limits, honoring the power of ritual because just like a seed the smallest intention can sprout into being with a little love and care each day.
 

Wishing all my readers a bumper crop this year, whatever it is you are growing!

Wash, Rinse, Repeat :: Sage & Aloe Soap

Admin-013 on April 18, 2019

Sturdy sage plants renew themselves in my zone four garden each spring. I study their resilience and ability to survive the grueling Montana winter where we frequently spend days, if not weeks, frozen in sub-zero temperatures. I want to be more like these plants, to endure bitter cold and still thrive. I make medicine from them and use them to cook with understanding that if I ask with a pure heart, the sage will impart it’s wisdom to me. It tells me to let go of what no longer serves me so that I can focus on my roots. If I do that, I too will be renewed in spring.

Soothing aloe vera heals and nourishes my skin, but it also serves to protect in a magical sense. Applying it to a fresh wound reminds me of a mother’s kiss attempting to take pain away from my ‘boo boo.’ My mother is gone now and I’m left to nurture and protect myself. Little acts of self care everyday remind me that it’s vital to my whole being to look after myself with maternal devotion. When the children were small my daily care was enfolded into theirs, but when they left home rigorous schedules weren’t the only thing that slipped. Self care fell to the bottom of my list, first in the name of freedom, but eventually it just became the standard. Treating myself with the plant medicine I grow is an affirmation of how I’m returning to better routines and deeper attention to my health.

The cleansing power of sage combined with the protective and healing properties of aloe vera blend together to create a powerfully natural antiseptic soap. Lovingly tended in my garden, the sage was intentionally harvested on Lughnasadh. Prolific pots of aloe vera scattered throughout my home offered up their juiciest leaves on a waxing Gemini moon in March. Biodynamic gardening is a way of life for me. The relationship I have with my plants and the earth goes far beyond organic methods. Every action I take or refrain from in the garden is dictated by the moon. Layering intention and magic into planting and reaping is just one of the ways I express my devotion to our mother earth, Pachamama.

My sage and aloe soap was formulated with superfatted coconut oil and blended on a Monday to harness the watery energy of the moon. This hand soap is perfect for cleaning up after any mundane chore, but also excellent for use after doing body or energy work for the metaphysical cleansing and protecting properties of the plant constituents. Earth medicine practitioners know the importance of Cleaning, Clearing and Cleansing. This soap is an excellent tool to assist anyone in that process.

History of a Home Cook Part 1

Admin-013 on April 17, 2019

“Learn the rules like a pro, so you can break them like an artist.” ― Pablo Picasso

​Food is integral to our lives, it is necessary for survival, both a blessing and a bane. I was raised by two wonderful cooks, who associated with other wonderful cooks and therefore my culinary experience growing up was rather extraordinary. I admit that as an adult I often still wish I could be the recipient of all of that wonderful cuisine, instead of being responsible for producing it. While I did spend some time in the kitchen in my youth the majority of hours were logged in the pursuit of baking cookies and cakes. I didn’t learn to properly cook until I was married with a family of my own. Even then, it wasn’t until I had tired of skillet dishes and goulash that I knew I was going to have to get serious about figuring out ‘this cooking business.’

I married young and along with my dashing husband I opened my heart and my home to his two small children. Fortunately, I can say with all honesty that in our 16 years of married life there are only a few meals that go down in history as entirely inedible. The first one was an eggplant lasagna and another particularly horrible incident was a salmon noodle casserole. It is clear with regard to these atrocious dishes, I was working with a stacked deck to begin with. In each case I took one bite, narrowly avoided getting ill, and declared dinner a disaster. It was a bit of a bumpy road out of goulash town.

As will happen when one enthusiastically takes up a new hobby or sets out to learn a new skill, my motivation tended to blind my sense of practicality. I recall an especially unimportant Wednesday evening that I chose to make a multi-course Chinese dinner. Not a quick stir fry, but a feast fit for Lunar New Year. Homemade egg rolls, salads, sweet and sour soup, fried rice AND an elaborate stir fry topped off with homemade mooncakes. Sauces, techniques and ingredients as foreign as could be to me. Somehow we managed to eat before midnight. If anyone said anything to me about my over-the-top menus, I didn’t listen. Over the next year I hosted my own mock UN around our dining room table several times a week. I owe it all to the Sundays at Moosewood Cookbook. To this day it’s an all time favorite. The cover is burned, torn, stained and splattered. It has never let me down.

Looking back now I laugh more than I cringe, which is a relief because frankly the newlywed period can be rather awkward. In our case, integrating a freshly formed family into everyone’s life certainly didn’t diminish the challenge. All of the nights spent earning grease stains on my Sunday at Moosewood really paid off. Adding Julia Child’s The way to Cook to my repertoire rounded out my education. We came to refer to that cookbook as, The Bible. That first year of our marriage I learned how to cook and my family ate incredibly well. But what is more, I eventually found a level of commitment to the process that I could sustain. Elaborate meals every night of the week will burn out even the most devoted student, as an eager young bride, I was certainly no exception!

​The concept of ‘meat two veg’ radicalized my kitchen routine. This was especially important when the children were in school and I had also returned to University. One ‘veg’ was always salad and that left only two relatively easy choices to make. Meal planning and shopping were streamlined into militaristic precision. Stocking up on whatever the butcher was offering on sale week to week and putting the freezer into heavy rotation mode made life easy… and predictable… and a little boring. However, once I knew the rules, I could break them. Enter the elaborate Sunday Dinner scheme. Throw one wild card night in the mix and a happy balance between interesting food and eating dinner on time was finally achieved.