Natural Living Monday

Welcome to Natural Living Monday where we share all our natural living tips, tricks, and fun ideas.

Natural Living Mamma

Thank you for joining us on Natural Living Monday!  We are excited to see the great things you have been doing to live a more natural, whole, holistic life.

Your Hosts:

Amanda from Natural Living Mamma

Katie from Nourishing Simplicity

Angela from Mama Rosemary

Last weeks most popular posts were:

 

 

Congratulations on being featured! These amazing posts (and a few others) will be tweeted, shared on my Facebook page and pinned on my Pinterest boards!

Are you ready to link up?

From this week forward the list is in random order!

Here are the rules: Your blog article must fit these categories: sustainable living, homesteading, DIY, herbs, home-made body and skin care, real food (no processed ingredients, Weston A. Price Foundation guidelines are a good place to start to define “real food”), and all things “natural“.

Link back to this week’s blog hop post so that everyone can see the other amazing posts. It is just basic common courtesy.

Show some love! Go check out and see what others have posted. Share the hop and the posts you love!

Not required but I would love it if you would grab the button and share share share!

What are your best natural living posts this week?

Please Note:  To add a post and see all the wonderful posts linked up this week, please hit "Click here" below!  

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Natural Living Monday ~ Helpful Elder

Have you heard of elder? Of the tasty flu fighting syrup made from its purple blue berries?

Of the fever healing properties from its lovely lacy cream colored flowers?

If you haven't you are in for a treat!

Ripe berries on Sambucus Ebulus (Dwarf Elder) ...

Elder Flower 'n' Berry

Sambucus nigra

The usefulness of elder as a source of medicine is amazing.  Every part of the plant has medicinal actions with the flowers and berries being the most gentle and useful.  Tea made from elder flower drunk hot helps to alleviate anxiety and restless at the onset of colds and flu while also helping the body to sweat and resolve the illness.  It is specific for flu and upper respiratory issues as elder flowers assist the body in healing and relaxes spasms (coughs) in the lungs as well as assisting in removal of mucus.  Studies have found elder berries to protect against the flu virus.  We use elder berry syrup every year as a preventative.  Elderberry also helps ease coughs and colds.  Drinking elder berry tea is another delicious way to experience the benefits of this amazing plant.

Some cautions with elder: the seeds can irritate the digestive tract in some people.  Only the blue elder berries (Sambucus nigra) should be used as the red ones are toxic.  Elderberries are generally considered to be quite safe though they can be drying and irritating for folks suffering from migraines.  The bark and roots are an emetic and therefore cause vomiting.   If you have a reaction, stop taking it immediately.

Find this and more information about other amazing herbs in my Materia Medica section.

More ~ 

Elder Berry Syrup

Elderberry Day ~ Herbs for Kids ~

Sources ~

Elder by Brigitte Mars

And now for the hop...

Welcome to Natural Living Monday where we share all our natural living tips, tricks, and fun ideas.

Natural Living Mamma

Thank you for joining us on Natural Living Monday!  We are excited to see the great things you have been doing to live a more natural, whole, holistic life.

Your Hosts:

Amanda from Natural Living Mamma

Katie from Nourishing Simplicity

Angela from Mama Rosemary.

Last weeks most popular posts were:

Congratulations on being featured! These amazing posts (and a few others) will be tweeted, shared on my Facebook page and pinned on my Pinterest boards!

Are you ready to link up?

From this week forward the list is in random order!

Here are the rules: Your blog article must fit these categories: sustainable living, homesteading, DIY, herbs, home-made body and skin care, real food (no processed ingredients, Weston A. Price Foundation guidelines are a good place to start to define “real food”), and all things “natural“.

Link back to this week’s blog hop post so that everyone can see the other amazing posts. It is just basic common courtesy.

Show some love! Go check out and see what others have posted. Share the hop and the posts you love!

Not required but I would love it if you would grab the button and share share share!

What are your best natural living posts this week?

Please Note:  

To add a post and see all the wonderful posts linked up this week, please hit Click here below!  

Thank you!

Powered by Linky Tools

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Natural Living Monday ~ Spicy Warm Cuppa Ginger Tea

On a cold, windy day there is nothing better than a nice hot cup of ginger tea, in fact this is one of my favorite ways to enjoy this amazing herb.  So to start this week’s wonderful blog hop I want to share one of my simplest favorite herbal remedies!

Here is how I make the perfect cup of ginger tea, it is so simple!

  • Slice 1" of fresh ginger rhizome into thin pieces.  Use more or less depending on your taste.
  • Place in a pan with 2 cups of water. 
  • Lightly simmer for about 15 minutes.
  • Pour it all into a cup (including the ginger slices) and serve with honey or maple syrup if you feel so inclined.
  • Drink hot and munch on the spicy ginger pieces if desired.

This a great beverage for relieving chills, headaches and soothing cold/flu symptoms.  Stimulating circulation, ginger tea warms you from the inside!

Latina: Zingiber officinale. Русский: Имбирь.

Ginger

Zingiber officinale

Ginger is one of my all time favorite plants.  It is useful for many different things and tastes great too so it is easy to give to my kids, as long as I don’t make it too spicy. Ginger assists the immune system through stimulation of circulation and digestion. This warms the body and improving nutrient absorption thereby increasing overall health.  It is excellent as a preventative or at the beginning of an illness.  Ginger helps to alleviate cramping and so can help a gassy stomach, menstrual cramps and headaches. I use ginger very effectively as a migraine preventative.  As soon as I feel a migraine starting or see visual disturbances, I make a hot cup of ginger tea, even using ground ginger in hot water if that is all I have on hand.  I sip this and also drink two packages of Emergen-C.  This and a bit of yoga, for me, typically stops a migraine in its tracks.  It is great for motion sickness. Ginger increases the effectiveness of other herbs in combination.

Ways to use ginger:

  • Use in syrup making
  • Drink on it's own as a as tea or in combinations like chai
  • Use in foot and body baths
  • Add to food when cooking or candy it to eat as a treat  which is yummy in baked goods!  (I sneak crystalized ginger into my older daughter's lunch box when I think she needs a bit of a boost at school).

More please....

Ginger Day ~ Herbs for Kids ~

After School Teas

Elder Berry Day  ~ Herbs for Kids ~ 

Find this and more information about other amazing herbs in my Materia Medica section.

And now...

Welcome to Natural Living Monday where we share all our natural living tips, tricks, and fun ideas.

Natural Living Mamma

Thank you for joining us on Natural Living Monday!  I am excited to see the great things you have been doing to live a more natural, whole, holistic life.

Your Hosts:

Amanda from Natural Living Mamma

Katie from Nourishing Simplicity

Angela from Mama Rosemary

Last weeks most popular posts were:

 

 

Congratulations on being featured! These amazing posts (and a few others) will be tweeted, shared on my Facebook page and pinned on my Pinterest boards!

Are you ready to link up?

From this week forward the list is in random order!

Here are the rules: Your blog article must fit these categories: sustainable living, homesteading, DIY, herbs, home-made body and skin care, real food (no processed ingredients, Weston A. Price Foundation guidelines are a good place to start to define “real food”), and all things “natural“.

Link back to this week’s blog hop post so that everyone can see the other amazing posts!

Show some love! Go check out and see what others have posted. Share the hop and the posts you love!

Not required but I would love it if you would grab the button and share share share!

What are your best natural living posts this week?

To see all the wonderful posts this week and link up

please use “Click Here” below.  Thanks!

Powered by Linky Tools

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Natural Living Monday ~ Stop And Smell The Roses

I admit it, I have roses on my mind.  It is almost Valentine's Day!  I adore roses, fresh or dried.  I delight in making tea with rose petals and hips; crafting with sweet little baby buds of rose; and making body care products with anything rose ~ rose water, rose petals and rose essential oil.  With all this rosiness on my mind I wanted to start this week's wonderful blog hop with a little informative herbal tidbit about roses.  Of course Summer is a wonderful time to collect and use fresh rose petals yet even during the cold of Winter we can enjoy the bounty of roses by using dried petals and fruits (hips).  Roses are helpful for supporting immunity and lung health.  They bring a ray of happiness to folks feeling sad in the during gloomy months of late Winter.  Plus they are great for crafting with especially with kids who really love the little dried baby rose buds.

Rose Petals and Hips

Rosa spp.

Roses, in their beauty, open the heart and speak of love.  Yet they offer so much more than meets the eye.  The petals are edible and are lovely added to salads, desserts and even made into rose butter.  They also make a tasty tea (use fresh or dried) that I have found to be quite popular with children.  All that deliciousness brings with it immune enhancing properties as well as soothing coolness for the urinary system, nervous system and heart.  The petals ease cold/flu symptoms and lung congestion increasing lung strength and vitality.  Roses are also helpful in cases of PMS and fullness in the pelvis.  Emotionally roses sooth broken hearts and aggravated nervous systems.  Rose hips, the fruit of a rose, are very high in Vitamin C.  They make a tasty sweet sour addition to teas and foods helping to prevent infections.  I love to soak the hips in apple juice until they are soft and use them as jam on my kids' PB & J.

Roses are often heavily sprayed so be sure to use organic roses.

More please....

Valentine's Day Crafts:

Using Roses With Kids:

Find this and more information about other amazing herbs in my Materia Medica section.

And now....

Welcome to Natural Living Monday where we share all our natural living tips, tricks, and fun ideas.

Thank you for joining us on Natural Living Monday!  I am excited to see the great things you have been doing to live a more natural, whole, holistic life.

Your Hosts:

Amanda from Natural Living Mamma

Katie from Nourishing Simplicity

Angela from Mama Rosemary.

Last weeks most popular posts were:

9 Ways to Waste Less and Save More by A Proverbs 31 Wife

Congratulations on being featured! These amazing posts (and a few others) will be tweeted, shared on my Facebook page and pinned on my Pinterest boards!

Are you ready to link up?

From this week forward the list is in random order!

Here are the rules:Your blog article must fit these categories: sustainable living, homesteading, DIY, herbs, home-made body and skin care, real food (no processed ingredients, Weston A. Price Foundation guidelines are a good place to start to define “real food”), and all things “natural“.

Link back to this week’s blog hop post so that everyone can see the other amazing posts. It is just basic common courtesy.

Show some love! Go check out and see what others have posted. Share the hop and the posts you love!

Not required but I would love it if you would grab the button and share share share!

What are your best natural living posts this week?

To see all the wonderful posts this week and link up

please use “Click Here” below.  Thanks!

Powered by Linky Tools

Click hereto enter your link and view this Linky Tools list...

Natural Living Mamma

Ginger Day ~ Herbs for Kids ~

Ginger Day ~ Herbs for Kids ~

Not long before holiday break we had a lovely day playing with ginger and doing one of the kids' favorite activities, foot soaks!  This is a great way to spend a cold winter day especially if little ones are passing any sort of cold around as it stimulates the immune system and helps kids relax.

Read More

Preschool Teachers' Tricks For Staying Health During Cold And Flu Season

Imagine that you are surrounded day in and day out by little kids.  These little kids don't know how to blow their own nose, they may not even know they have a nose much less that it needs blowing.  They are learning to cover their coughs and sneezes but often forget.  And sometimes their fingers wonder to germy places like the inside of their nose and then they pick up a toy to share with a friend.  Needless to say, illness can spread fast in a school.  So, what is a preschool teacher to do to stay healthy?  I asked my fellow teachers what they do to keep illness at bay.  I am excited to share their tricks of the trade!

Each teacher had a different protocol they follow.  These are some great, straight forward easy to use remedies.  All of these wonderful women have very healthy diets and unquestionably  that is a big part of staying healthy.  Also, we all are sure to wash our hands any time something questionably germy comes in contact with them at school.  This, of course, is huge!

Here are the results ~

Teacher #1

This lovely lady takes Echinacea (2 or 3, 400 mg pills)at the first hint of illness or if she been exposed to a bunch of sick kids!  She also takes vitamin D everyday.

echinacea in bloom

Teacher #2

Kick Ass Immune Activator by WishGarden Herbs is teacher #2's go to.  When she feels anything coming on she starts taking this remedy with frequent doses.  She is also great at keeping her energy straight and doesn't get freaked out when exposed to illness (law of attraction baby!).

I love WishGarden Herbs.  They are local to us here is Colorado and have simply wonderful formulas with great quality.  They also carry a Kick-It Immune For Kids that is wonderful.

Teacher #3

Teacher #3 told me she does something strange.  Well, I have research a bit about what she takes and it sounds interesting.  She takes Miracle Mineral Solution (MMS) which is a solution of 28% sodium chlorite in water.  This solution works to kill pathogens in the body:

"Kills all pathogens - viruses, disease causing bacteria, parasites, molds, fungi and even oxidizes heavy metals from drinking water. Won't hurt pipes or plumbing inside the body or out if used as directed! Won't taint the taste of your food storage or other products with that nasty chlorine taste."  Source: Discover MMS

I have not tried this at all and know only what I am telling you here including that this particular teacher finds MMS to be very effective at keeping her healthy.

Here are some more sources for your own research should you be interested:

Teacher #4 (Me!)

I have a bunch of tricks up my sleeve.  I take vitamin D everyday as well as multivitamins and fish oils.  This post "A Sniffle and a Sneeze" that I wrote last year has my protocol plus what I do for myself and my kids if they seem to be coming down with something.

Here are a couple of other tricks I use for when I start to feel sick or have been exposed, though I don't use all of them at once, I try to keep them on hand for when I need them:

  • Place one drop of high quality peppermint essential oil in a full glass of water and drink it down.
  • If my nose is runny, I take Bi Yan Pian.
  • For general sick/off feeling I take Yin Chiao then if that doesn't work I take Gan Mao Ling.
  • Also my acupuncturist just gave me some Cold Quell by Blue Poppy.  She said to take it at the first sign of illness.  Luckily I haven't had a chance to try this out yet!

flowering peppermint

How do you stay healthy during cold and flu season?  

Shared On: The Kid's Co-op, Natural Living Link Up, The Sunday Parenting Party

Natural Living Monday #14 ~ A Gift Of Health

The perfect gift of knowledge and beauty for anyone interested in herbal knowledge and healthy living!

Have you heard of Rosemary Gladstar?  Read any of her books?  She is an absolutely amazing herbalist, simply inspiring in a nourishing love filled kinda way.  Her books are infused with a plethora of knowledge that is easy to understand and relate too.  Her beautiful book, Family Herbal, A Guide to Living Life With Energy, Health and Vitality is no exception.  Filled with lovely pictures, stories and herbal tips this book is a great introduction to the world of herbs while also being a valuable resource for those more experienced with plant medicine.  Broken down into chapters for every member of the family this book has wonderful ideas for addressing everyone's needs.  There are also sections brimming with ideas for healthy eating, help with stress, body care recipes and remedies for times when we need a bit of herbal help such as during a cold or flu.

 

Rosemary also includes a materia medica section complete with many favorite and useful plants as well as a section on making herbal medicines.  Through out the book you will find beloved wonderful recipes from Rosemary to try in your own home like:

  • Rosemary's Perfect Cream
  • Longevity Tonic and Chai
  • Chamomile Tisane
  • Energy Balls

Her recipes are easy to follow and produce wonderful medicines.  She often provides the reader with special little tips for medicine making success.

This is truly one of my favorite books.  Full of inspiration and wisdom, it is a delight to read and use.

And now....

Welcome to Natural Living Monday here we share all our natural living tips, tricks, and fun ideas.

Natural Living Mamma

Thank you for joining us on Natural Living Monday! I am excited to see the great things you have been doing to live a more natural, whole, holistic life.

Your Hosts:

Amanda from Natural Living Mamma

Katie from Mexican Wild Flower

Angela from Mama Rosemary.

Last weeks most popular posts were:

Image Via Mountain Rose Herbs

Congratulations on being featured! These amazing posts (and a few others) will be tweeted, shared on my Facebook page and pinned on my Pintrest boards! From this week forward the list is in random order! I am hoping this will get the late linkers more views! Here are the rules: Your blog article must fit these categories: sustainable living, homesteading, DIY, herbs, home-made body and skin care, real food (no processed ingredients, Weston A. Price Foundation guidelines are a good place to start to define “real food”), and all things “natural“. Link back to this week’s blog hop post so that everyone can see the other amazing posts. It is just basic common courtesy. Show some love! Go check out and see what others have posted. Share the hop and the posts you love! Not required but I would love it if you would grab the button and share share share!

What are your best natural living posts this week?

To see all the wonderful posts this week and link up

please use “Click Here” below.  Thanks!

Powered by Linky Tools

Click here to enter your link and view this Linky Tools list...

Elderberry Day ~ Herbs For Kids ~

Elderberry Day ~ Herbs For Kids ~

As a preschool teacher and a parent, I am always on the look out for ways to help kids learn about staying healthy during cold and flu season.  So every year, just like I do at home, I make elderberry syrup with the kids at preschool.

Read More

After School Teas

After School Teas

Yesterday... Outside a light drizzling haze of rain has begun which promises to give way soon into a steady downpour.  Walking home from the bus will likely be a wet adventure in worm hunting with rain drip dropping on each of our umbrellas.  When my kids get off the bus they are worn out, ready to relax and let down their guard.  Ready to be home.  I love to support and help them relax with nourishing snacks and a hug.

Read More