Today I took part in a winter remedy workshop with Naturally Untamed.
I have been very interested in one day becoming a herbalist and needed to start somewhere. there's only so much you can do, without actually doing. And there's no doing without the knowing.
I got in touch with Zoe and told her about my community space and she decided to host her very first workshop with us.
Zoe talked us through her journey and got us to talk about any herbal remedies we used at home.
Through conversation, we spoke about how we can incorporate 'herbal medicine' into every day life. Herbs can be made into balms, used in baths, teas and in food. Learning about the plant benefits is the hard part, but that's something to learn with time. The actual process of using herbs to make into medicine is not that hard and very enjoyable.
We tasted tea and thought about where in the body we felt it. We wrote down what we smelt and what we tasted. I enjoyed doing this as it's something that I never really sit and do. We went through different ingredients, including, marshmellow root, yarrow and elderberry. We then made our own tea blend, after it was explained to us what each ingredient did and its benefits. I chose Yarrow, Marshmellow and Thyme. I chose these ingredients based on what they do, I wonder how the tea will taste! If it's not nice, i'll throw it into a foot bath.
We made a chest rub from infused sunflower oil. We added essential oils to the infused oil after the oil was melted with wax. The oil was already infused which you can infuse with anything you want to. (deffo need to experiment with that one). I'm actually looking forward to when I can use this. Chest rubs definitely give me that nostalgic feeling of being cared for as a child.
To end, we made a fire cider. This included lots of different ingredients such as ginger, orange, lemon, onion, thyme etc. This has to be left for 4 weeks until it is ready. I'm looking forward to trying this as i've never used apple cider vinegar which i have been told by many people is good for you.