Sunday 13 June 2010

D's Bees

Exciting News

Dieter finished off his 'Top Bar Hives’ and put them out in the fields last weekend with a little lemongrass essential oil in dropped around the entrance, apparently this mimics a scent given off by the bees own homing signal.

Anyhow we have a swarm -it has made itself at home and is happily making comb -we went down yesterday to move it into the bigger hive.

I am getting excited now as to how I am gonna process the wax n propolis etc...

Monday 7 June 2010

Tonsillitus

Elektra was up all night running a fever –pyrexia in medical speak, from the Greek pyretos meaning fire

I have never really used thermometers before but Dieter checked her and she was 38.8 she felt so hot. I gave her some yarrow and elderflower,. Specially to help bring down the fever a bit and help her to sleep. I know the fever is a good thing to burn the infection away – it is a sign the bodies own immune system is working well. But as a mum I needed to help make her feel more comfortable and I also needed some sleep!

She complained of a ' hurting tummy' so I also administered strong chamomile tea.

But this morning it became apparent she had very swollen tonsils - Harry my boy had it last week.

The tonsils are lymph nodes in the back of the mouth and top of the throat. They normally help to filter out bacteria and other microorganisms to prevent infection in the body. A particularly virulent bacterial or viral infection causes them to swell and become inflamed, this is called tonsillitis.

So today I have been brewing elderflowers, sage blossoms and leaf, flowering thyme, lemon balm, marjoram and bay teas straight outta da garden with lots of lemons and honey.

She has also been using the Tonsil Tickler throat spray regularly...

There are lots of aromatic (full of antiseptic oils) herbs to help fight off the infection. Powerful lymphatic herbs encourage the immune system by helping to remove the infection from the area so that it can be safely excreted from the body.

It contains: elderberry syrup, tinctures of ginger, sage, rosemary, thyme, oregano.

Poor little mite

Wednesday 2 June 2010

Sunny Dayz

Well I definitely enjoyed today’s weather loads more than the wet yesterday - we were out at the Celtic Harmony Camp Brickendon - www.celticharmony.org -which is a lovely place for kids and had a great day despite the rain, hearing tales of Finn MacCoul and the Giant's Causeway, all very interesting!! Harry made me a leather and grass bracelet and Elektra ground grains and made some bread on a fire in a round house.

Today has been a harvesting and production day in the garden with my little girl Elektra -she helped me to cut the delicate Ladies Mantle blooms and the fragrant Sage flowers for drying and also to make a Motherwort tincture. It has been blissful.

We then went around smelling the various fragrancies on all our flowers hehehe

The Motherwort (Leonurus cardiaca) has grown enormous nearly 1.7m high now, it will flower really soon so I have only taken about half of the leafy stems out. It is my favourite relaxant herb during and just before my period really helping me to properly chill out and alleviate the heavy womb feeling.

Dieter has put his newly built Beehives out into the fields anointed with Lemongrass Essential Oil to attract a swarm -the oil is similar to the bees own homing signal scent.

This evening was spent watching Britains got Talent whilst taking my dried Hawthorn blossoms off spiky branches and into jars.....