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12/21/2015

Elderberry Bellinis and Winter Solstice Celebrations

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Midwifing the Sun Back into Being

One way we can honor the Winter Solstice is by creating a releasing ritual at home or in circle with family or others in order to release what is out of date, outmoded and no longer serves you and therefore the greater whole. Winter Solstice is the shortest day, and longest, darkest night of the year. It holds the promise of the Light, just on the other side of it, beginning to return. We help birth the Sun back into being just by simply releasing what is no longer needed. We are deepest and longest, on this very day, with the Divine Feminine within her dance with the Divine Masculine, which peaks on the Summer Solstice. This ancient practice honors the dance, the medicine generated from their dance, and helps us open to healing. We need only to make ourselves available through simple, intimate acts with our Divine. Creating an altar, making releasing bundles, time together, and sparkling celebratory drinks are our way on the Winter Solstice. My third son was born today and this deepens the already special night that it is for our family. He always tells me he's from the Sun. I believe him. 
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Being an herbalist means I deeply desire to fill your belly with something nourishing, especially when we work deep in the darkest time of year. My celebratory contribution this year to my tribe includes Elderberry Bellinis and Elderberry Sparkling Water. I share in the hope that you'll fill your belly with the goodness of Elder. xo-jen


Elderberry Bellini & Elderberry Sparkling Water

Elderberry Bellini
1-2 tablespoons Elderberry syrup
Prosecco
Lime wedge

Mix gently in a beautiful glass and enjoy!

Elderberry Sparkling Water
(The Non-alcoholic Bellini)

Yes! Simply use sparkling water with your syrup. Children rave over this and delight in having beautful drinks in elegant glasses with their favorite grownups. As I'm writing this, I'm sipping this one... it's in the pics and so good! The Prosecco is in the frig for tonight.

Our immune systems often get taxed this time of year, right? Elderberry provides. Elder shores up the boundaries in all directions to the possiblity of passing colds and flus around as we celebrate through the holidays. This is such a delicious, gorgeous, and easy way to celebrate. Who said medicine usually tastes awful? Never with Elder!

– Quick & Easy Elderberry Syrup Recipe–
1 cup fresh (or 1/2 cup dried will do) Elderberries
1 1/2 cup water
1 cup raw wildflower honey 
½ tsp fresh chopped ginger root
1 tablespoon fresh lime juice
½ tsp Cinnamon powder

  • Slow simmer berries, ginger, and cinnamon in water for 30 minutes. Mash the berries a bit during this simmer with the back of a fork or potato masher. Cool a bit and then strain, mashing the berries to get all the goodness. Compost the solids.
  • I pour this infused juice into a large measuring cup and add 1 cup raw wild flower honey and the 1 tablespoon of fresh lime juice for every cup of infused elderberry juice. Stir, bottle and label. This is fine out of the refrigerator for one day or store in the refrigerator and use up within 1 week. 
  • Add by the tablespoon to warm water, seltzer, or into cocktails described above.
  • ENJOY!
  • You can also take by the tablespoonful every few hours when exposed to viruses or have active flu symptoms.

Making Winter Solstice Releasing Bundles

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​This is another way to honor the releasing season we are in. As we reflect on the year passing and what worked, what bloomed, what was a complete bomb, and how we may have tripped ourselves up, making bundles to burn today solidifies our accepting of our part in it all. It's a simple act with deep rippling effects on so many levels.
​
Here's what you'll need to gather to make your releasing bundle:
  • A 6x6" square of repurposed cloth/cotton/hemp and any natural fabric. You can certainly make it larger if you’re feeling that. Any color will do although black is traditionally called upon.
  • Offerings of dried plants of loose tobacco, mugwort, or lavender. What do you have and feel you want to call upon? That’s perfect. I use small pinches of any or all of these and always white sage to shake up and make space around that which we want to move.
  • Small slips of paper to write your releasing wishes on.
  • A natural fiber cord, thread or string to tie it up with.
  • I also have cornmeal, natural material beads, and other tiny natural items like pine needles, tiny pine cones, seeds and pods, strips of bark, or tiny feathers


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Assembly:
  • I begin with a bed of crumbled sage and add on the square of fabric. I choose tattered, repurposed fabrics to represent the imperfect beings we are and also the shadowy aspects we must learn to work with and integrate to be well.
  • Sit with what you are releasing. What is it? What are you shifting? What will you be burning up and away? See if you can distill it down to the actual essence of what has bound you and write this on the slips of paper. Roll or crumple them up tiny before you add them to the pile.
  • Now I offer more plants with prayers of gratitude for the support in letting these things go as they no longer serve me or the world. A pinch of cornmeal for the mother who recycles all of this is my final addition.
  • Gather the corners up and tie loosely with hemp twine, thread, or string so the contents stay bundled inside. You can smudge this and keep it safe on an altar or in sacred space until the Winter Solstice.
  • Tonight, the eve of Winter Solstice, set aside some time and build a fire. If you do not have access to an outdoor fire pit, or barbecue pit, you can burn it outside, in an open space, in an earthenware bowl, abalone shell, or a dug out area of earth or sand. DO BE CAREFUL and do not burn this inside. The smoke must rise outside and the ash must go to the Mother, the Earth.
  • If you have no burning options then bury your bundle in a forested area, loosely tie to a shell or stone and toss off the jetty to the ocean, or drop from a mountain cliff. These are all fine but fire is the first choice for quick deconstruction of the heavy tattered aspects we are letting go of. Know that it all makes it to the Mother no matter what route you must choose.
  • This practice is supported strongly through the next few days so no worries if today is full for you. Try tomorrow or the next. xo-Jen

What if, in this release, the inspiration and energy comes forth to fund your forward motion towards a dream for yourself? What if your dream-made-reality is actually connected to the whole as your gift to making this world a better place? Would you choose to step forward through the simple act of letting go? I pray you do. xo-Jen


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Want to study deeper with the plants? Check in with the 2016 classes.
MoonLodge Bootcamp for Women - Synchronizing with the Moon

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9/25/2014

Root Beer Syrup For Your Autumn Tune-up

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So here are a few visuals of the northeastern lovelies you will need to find either in the woods if you are lucky enough for that (!) or at you local herb supplier store. Sassafras has been getting a bad rap from the USDA for years. They say that the active component of sassafras, safrole, is a “known carcinogen.” Why? Well, the scientists gave quantities of pure safrole (that do not exist in nature in such quantities) to rats and the rats got cancer. Later researchers noted that safrole seems to cause cancer in rats, but not people. Many people still think that sipping sassafras tea will ensure you end up with an oncologist. Just know that there are many times more known carcinogens in a bottle of beer than there are in any homemade sassafras-based root beer product you might make. It has been calculated that you would need to drink at least 24 gallons of sassafras root beer a day for an extended time to get the amount of safrole fed to those rats. Close to impossible. 
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Sassafras - Sassafras albidum
With the shift in seasons comes that deep inner knowing in your body that it too, must shift to prepare for change.  This can be more drastic for some depending on where you live. The truth is, we all need a little help and looking to your local plants is the best place to start. Here in the northeastern US, we have such a massive variety of options second only to tropical regions. I bring in a few tropical plants for flavor but rely on our trees mostly for the traditional rooty-earthy flavor and tonifying effects. Remember days are shortening, nights are lengthening and our need to keep warm, quiet down, slow down, sleep more, and go within is increasing. Even our blood draws deeper into the body as surface capillary beds contract to conserve heat. Resisting the natural cycle of things will make you feel out of sorts. Some herbalists will not use their home heat here in NY until after mid-November as a way to honor and encourage this process of shifting that is happening at the cellular level. 

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Wintergreen - Gaultheria procumbens
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Black Birch - Betula nigra
Harvest the leaves of Wintergreen. If you are not sure if it's the right plant, use your nose! Break a leaf and inhale. It smells like....wintergreen!
Shave the Birch bark so you have that inner green fragrant inner bark layer. That's the alive part of the tree! Smell it too - it smells like.... Birch.
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Whittled Black Birch Bark
If you are lucky enough or skilled enough to find Black Birch, just shave the bark off of the small branches you harvested with your excellent pocket knife you carry for just such occasions. Yes, normally we harvest in the spring for this bark. But I need a little now to finish my syrup just right so I snipped some lower small twigs with much gratitude and wandered home to start working on the bark whittling. Never substitute mints for the birch/wintergreen component. Yuck is all I can say as the mints do not hold their taste with the long simmering. Go the length and get the traditional ingredients, especially for your first time through.
Please read through before starting so you get the idea first. Remember you are medicine making.. This is a divine art as well as a science. Multi-tasking makes room for error. Stay focused, put on some music you love, and a little dancing and singing in the kitchen always makes things come out better. Give all of you to this process. My grandmother agreed that it is how you stir, not just what you use!
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Root Beer Syrup - Ingredients

6 cups cold water
4 oz Sassafras root dried (double if you have fresh)
2 oz Sarsaparilla root dried (double if you have fresh)
1oz Burdock root dried (double if you have fresh)
2 Tlb minced fresh ginger root (highly sprayed so find it unsprayed!)
Black Birch Bark shavings - 1 handful; OR 4-6 fresh Wintergreen leaves; OR Wintergreen Extract 1/8-1/4 tsp
2-3 whole cloves
1 tsp Coriander Seed
1/4 cup Molasses
1/4 Maple Syrup -(Real .... from the Maple Tree please; high minerals and goodness!)
Organic Sugar or Maple Syrup to equal your amount of strained final decoction.

PART I:
Place all herbs EXCEPT Black Birch Bark or Wintergreen, into a pot and pour cold water over and bring to a simmer.
Simmer covered loosely for 20-25 minutes.
Add Molasses, stir, replace lid, simmer another 5 minutes
Let sit until cool or overnight. This allows all the nutritive mineral to move into your brew. 
Strain through cheese cloth or fine mesh fabric.
Congratulations!! This is your root decoction! Taste it. It should be good like this so add a little to some warm water and sip.
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Cooking the root decoction and adding birch bark.
PART II:
Now we will work on giving it a shelf life. Place your measured root decoction in a pot and use a chop stick to measure the level up the chopstick. Bring to a gentle simmer and  reduce by 1/3 to 1/2 - this concentrates the flavor and helps preserve. Use the measure on the chopstick to estimate the level as it goes down. Remove from heat and NOW add Birch Bark or Wintergreen and recover for 10 minutes. Now strain and measure this amount in a measuring cup and return to the pot and add an equal amount of organic sugar or maple syrup and warm to mix. So if you have 3 cups, use 3 cups sweetener. Yes, it sounds like too much but it preserves it and tastes good. Chemistry is chemistry. Mess with it and you will have a jar of mold. Remember, you take 1 Tlb at a time when done because you concentrated it. 

Now.... Taste it! See below for ideas on how to use.
Pour in clean labeled jars and keep in the refrigerator (up to 6 months). Some process in mason jars and store in the dark until needed.

TO USE
1tsp-1 Tlb over ice with seltzer and sip.
1tsp-1 TLB stirred into warm water and sipped. 
A therapeutic seasonal autumn tonic dose is 2-3 Tlb/ day diluted as mentioned and drink throughout your day. Use each day until your batch is gone. It is absolutely delicious with a fresh squeeze of lime.
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Bottle, label with date, keep refrigerated, Enjoy!

Enjoy!

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    Jennifer Costa, Herbalist, Teacher, BS, RN, CST, and Founder of ElderMoon School of Herbs & Earth Medicine

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  • ABOUT
    • MISSION & BIO
    • Crystal Clear HEALTH DISCLAIMER
    • Crystal Clear - WHO WE SUPPORT
  • PATREON + CONTACT
  • APOTHECARY
    • PDF - TINCTURE LIST
    • 8 Immortals Sichuan Chili Oil
  • LEARN
    • FAQ + FREE MEDICNE MAKING Course
    • 8 Mushroom Journeys 2023
    • MONTHLY HERBAL COUNCILs
    • Mirco-Dose Self-Initiation PLANT DIETING >
      • 2023 Micro-Dose Plant Diets
      • LIBRARY: Micro-Dose Plant Diet Self Initiation
    • Birthing an Herbalist in 13 Moons On-line Plant Medicine Apprentice Journey >
      • Course Details for Birthing an Herbalist in 13 Moons
      • Course Outline
    • Private Herbal Classes
    • KIND WORDS
  • HEALTH SERVICES
    • FREE Health Clinic
    • Ask An Herbalist RN Questions
    • Herbal Consultations
    • Earth Medicine Craniosacral Therapy Sessions
    • Long Distance Earth Medicine Healing Sessions
  • BLOG
  • Apothecary Time w/Jen
  • LIBRARY
  • PHOTOS