After Five Months

 Tulsi transplant  // Newly potted Jiaogulan // Selecting Black Fitsu to save seed from

 

     Now that the weather is consistently warming up time has sped up. I can still get away with weeding my lettuce/roots/bean bed once a week but my small herb garden space will be requiring two or three weedings a week to keep the sprouts down around the direct-seeded valerian and Californian poppies, and to continuously battle the morning glory vines with their hydra tenacity. Continually experimenting and learning-- right now the lesson is patience and accepting painfully repetitious work.

Hand watering lettuces before work

     While my little farm is mostly growing in a very literal sense, my plans for it are growing and branching out seemingly without end. While I still have a large end-goal of growing and crafting herbal tea blends, the legal aspects of this are proving to be beyond what I can do at this point-- not only do you need to have a commercial kitchen (this I was expecting), labels need to be approved and the product needs to be tested for safety. Essentially I need product ready to go just to begin the steps of having it approved to sell. I don't have the funds for this so I've found branching out in other creative ways helpful to pass the time and keep expanding my shop lines. This has been the first month selling my salves, lip balms and now produce at the Bainbridge Island Farmers Market.

First market on Bainbridge Island

 

     With my regular job repairing fly rods is about to shift into over time (oh the pain but also oh the savings) I do expect progress to be slow. My spare time is spent looking for wild plants to harvest, begging my direst-seeded herbs to germinate already come-on-its-been-three-weeks-where-are-you, formulating blends for yummy salves and lip balms and trying to find connections. It is a lot of work but I have herbs on my side (huge shout out to gotu kola and nettles!) and passion tempered by knowledge of my physical limits (huger shout out to college!).

 

 

Heath flowers for a personal elixir // Flower essence in the Pinot Noir //  Wonderful nettle blend

 

     Oh if I only had a way to share this formula with others. Inspired by the abundance of strength-building stinging nettles that grow like a mad biting jungle with a heart of gold; the sweet essence of elderflowers that stand in testament to the vitality they protect; and the ability of tigers eye to maintain a strong sense of Self amidst the seas of work and Calling I crafted two bottles sweetened with North Kitsap honey for a myself and a dear friend who is very involved with the Seattle food system to build strength and pervert burnout. They taste like Green and Growing and leave a warm energetic lively buzz in my heart-center.
     Last summer through a workshop with Sylvia Linsteadt I was introduced to, and fell madly in love with flower and plant essences. Their subtle but profound effect has moved me this last year and helped give a large area of focus I want to have Sun & Bee to have that fits in beautifully with my Long Term Goals. This past fall I felt called to work with stones-- to move beyond just collecting and to collaborate with them for healing. The formula I described was the result of a winter of extensive study and my first experiment combining herb, flower and stone medicines. As someone who has always balanced adoration for fact-based sciences and emotion fueled arts, this kind of work is incredibly satisfying and grounding for me, a way of bringing all these different aspects of myself together to Create and Heal.

All that remains of the cane burning

       Cane Burning // Traditionally in the early spring all of the vineyard canes that have been pruned from their trunks are gathered together and burned in a ritual to let go of the old year and welcome the new growing season. Standing with my heart to the blaze I realeased my fears and quiet-spoken doubts that tell me "You will fail" I poured all my anger and frustrations from the last year into a single grape cane and threw it onto the pile to be destroyed in a magical community event at the farm I am lucky enough to both live and work on. Fifty or sixty others did the same and the event was joyous. All that remains are the ashes, and eventually they will be plowed and tilled into the rich soil to grow a future harvest.

From Shine Tidelands // Saw my first orca

 



snowy chandelier and

forests of fern cradle

a wren's ocean serenade 

-Shine Tidelands, 5/29
 

 Your farmer//resident weed-witch, Sabrina
Sun & Bee Farm
 

     Fun Finds

• This nature journal made during a trek in the Sierra Nevada
• "Method" a poem by Tess Taylor
• "Landspeak" by Robert McFarlane in Orion Magazine