Every year Ohlone Herbal Center goes to the desert. This year we experienced every micro climate the desert has to offer. From dry hot arid to lush green oasis.
We visited a few amazing petroglyphs from ancient yoni rocks traced by the native americans to a rock calendar over looking the southern hemisphere. So much reverence for this land, its plants and the people who live there.

The OHC students discovered a  profound connection to beautiful plants and healing waters. Spending an incredible week in warmth and lavishly soaking in hot springs during the cool desert evenings.

_I love eating flowers, plus the aromatic seduction of roses make them my top favorite flowers to eat.

And today you lucky darlings I'm gonna tell you how to make an easy 1, 2, 3 rose cordial. All made with LOVE of course.

Yes, nice and simple:

What you will need are a bunch or fragrant roses, be it red or lavender they must be fragrant or your cordial will fall flat. The magic is in the aromatic rose, because first you will smell your cordial. A good, no better - a GREAT cordial caresses all the senses. Plus you want non-sprayed, organic roses. You're about to eat these flowers, you do not want any chemicals on, in, near your roses or you - for that matter.

_Second you will need honey. Choose a local raw honey so you can benefit from the amazing healing qualities honey has to offer. Also choose a honey that doesn't have to strong of a flavor, because you want your roses to be the star.

Next you will need Brandy. I really like Slivovitz, plum brandy. It doesn't have to be brandy, by the way. You could use another alcohol that's at least 80 proof. The brandy (alcohol) is needed to preserve the cordial.
[ It is possible to use a lot of sugar or honey to preserve this cordial, but I'm only gonna talk about an alcohol based cordial, sweet and simple. (comment or email me if you want to discuss non alcoholic versions). ]

What you will need:
1) a bunch of Roses
2) a lot of Honey
3) a bottle of brandy
See, easy as 1, 2, 3!

Pluck the roses at the peak of their fragrance. Some roses love to express their scent during morning hours, like lavender roses. Other roses, like red roses like a mid day sun. Pick the roses during the optimal fragrant hour, for the most optimal fragrant cordial. Gather the rose tops and lay out a clean cloth on your kitchen table and lay the roses face down, let them sit for a while. This let's the critters free and dehydrates the roses a bit, releasing the excess water. Now you don't want a dried out rose, you still want a fresh and fragrant rose.

After a while, you pluck each petal off (no stems or stamen) and place it into a wide mouth canning jar. Yes, only the petals. Cover the petals with honey leaving about an inch above the petals.

Now you need patience. Leave the honey and petals for a good long while at least a month. Shake the canning jar every once in a while to make sure your roses are submerged and why not add some loving thoughts into your rose infused honey, while you're at it. What happens is the honey absorbs the fragrance of the roses and the honey candies the roses.

After the long while has passed I pour brandy onto the honey rose mixture. How much brandy depends on how alcoholic/sweet I want the cordial. Honey will preserve the roses but adding brandy will preserve the roses and honey longer. Because after a while the honey will start to crystallize changing the flavor and texture of the rose honey. By adding an alcohol, like brandy you turn your infused rose honey into an alcoholic cordial.

Simple.

This cordial is sure to open your heart, lift your mood and transform your day for the better. Enjoy in a cordial glass with your loved ones.

♡

i heard it.

i woke up the day i choose to turn and face all the things i thought were holding me back.

in facing these fears i woke up. i let go, i stood up, climbed my ladder and held myself accountable. when i heard myself saying the same old things i would stop and replay that tape and consciously listen.

i heard my repetitive points and thought of solutions. and i took a step into what seemed like the hard and vulnerable. i revealed authenticity to the people i feared/loved the most. attempted the scariest things. pushed through my own sticky loop thoughts.

and my fear thinned. i saw through it.

of course i still have an ego and am part shadow and light. but the difference is i'm not afraid of myself. 

and most of the time i feel pretty damn good, even on my not so good days. even through frustration i can still see opportunity.

eating well is a key. a major key. i have so much more room in my head with out all that inflammation. i feel so clear, really it is amazing.

what i pray is that everyone around me is choosing to pick up the call too.

My mind has been extraordinarily clear. Due, in part, to my latest 3 month (I'm about a month in) experiment - the paleolithic diet. Well, first I was inspired by this amazing dinner I ate. Not only was it super delicious but it was all local, dairy and grain free.

Truthfully eating dairy has never been a feel good thing for me. It harkens back to earaches as a kid. Those earaches turned out to be my one and only surgery - tubes in my ear. Later as an adult on my journey of being a health care practitioner, I learned about milk allergies causing inflammation. This inflammation showed up in kids as earaches! Holy cow, no literally wholly cow allergy (and really not only cow - any dairy, even goat).
What happens in the body is the inflammation of mast cells. These mast cells can be found lining the ear, nose and throat (ENT). If the ENT is inflamed a series of bodily upsets can be found. Things like asthma, chronic ear infections, nasal drip, higher sensitivity to well - pretty much anything.

As for grain... If you look closely you can find grain in everything. Unless you cook your own whole foods. Prepackaged/precooked/prepared foods are the worst culprits! And if you like to go out to eat, try and look for a meal that isn't accompanied by some form of grain. It's on every menu - a taco, sushi, nan and curry, injera, hell - a regular old burger.
Just the other day I went out with my dearest friend Kasey, a nutrition chef and recipe author (check out her blog), to the eat real festival in oakland and everything had grain. So, we ate around it - even the Mexican/Indian burrito, with chopsticks no less (hey, we were at a festival).
In fact she gave me the terminology paleolithic diet. She explained it as eating as our ancestors did. At first I was like - hold on! I'm super multi-racial, how am I gonna pin down which culture in my myriad of ancestors to eat after? Then she explained further - really it's about eating as a hunter and gatherer. Oh, hunt and gather...well, if you stop and think about it - if I was to hunt I probably would only be eating meat occasionally (and more often it would be fish). And hell, how many ears of corn or grains of rice can I realistically gather? not much, right?

As for allergies and leaky gut syndrome or whatever else people are getting diagnosed with could it be a bombardment of to much of the same grain in our bodies? Could it be corn cups, corn oil (+biofuel), corn syrup, popcorn, corn tortillas, corn in everything be too much? Not to mention soy, wheat and rice too. We drink, eat, drive, utilize the hell out these grains. We've all heard the saying, "too much of anything is a bad thing."

Hence, my paleolithic diet experiment. And as I was saying it feels great. My overall inflammation has reduced by leaps and bounds. Not only in my ENT but in my gut too! Plus i can feel my body more. Who knew inflammation would deaden body sensation? Oh yeah, damn near every health practitioner. There are books out there ranting and raving about how inflammation is a major cause of disease across the board. Why not look to the cause of this inflammation and transform our diets.

Eating simply, never felt so good.

When my Grandmother was diagnosed with cancer 2 years ago, it hit the family hard.

She pushed through chemo in the hopes to see a cure to a progressive rapid growing cancer, before she died July 15, 2011 at 6:20pm.  When the Dr.'s quoted us 6 month's [for her to live] back in December of 2008 our hearts broke. However we joined together to celebrate her, when she survived past the 6 month mark into another year, as a hopeful cancer survivor.

Being able to treasure more time with her has been a godsend. My dearest Grandmother has taught me so many amazing things about how to live and be in this world. In the final moments of her life we had some of  the most potent and frank dialogs. She let me in, in a way that showed me her vulnerability, her strength and the fragile majesty of death. How sacred this life is and how temporary our time is on this planet.

Being with her every month and then every day, it was in those moments that something awoke in me. Something that had been in deep slumber. She said, "Tatiana, you are stronger then you think you are!" Mostly she lipped it, because her voice was gone, but I could certainly hear her. Those words strung together, as a necklace of pearls, pearls of wisdom. Now when I look in the mirror, to look for the part of me that is her, I find my self lip syncing those exact words to myself and now to you dear reader.

She gave me an incredible gift, because of her pearls of wisdom I am able to push through the grief and hold up high her standard of being inclusive to a family being tested, by their loss of a great Matriarch. I listen more keenly. I am fierce with my love, but unconditional - every member in my family knows I LOVE them, each and everyone of them.

Too keep this a useful Florentina Craft (Craft being my Matriarical family name, from my Grandmother who just passed) I will share with you a few herbs that helped with the grief and loss of my Grandmother.

During Hospice, I lived with my Grandmother, it was a 24/7 ordeal. In order to sleep I made a sleep formula, for her caregivers and myself.

• Vervain [Verbena officinalis], a strong bitter nervine that quiets an anxious over active mind.
  
• Chamomile [Matricaria recutita], a gentle bitter nervine that gently smooths a worried mind and upset stomach.
  
• Milky Oats [Avena sativa], a nutritive nervine that helps rebuild the myelin sheath of an over stressed nervous system.
  

30 to 60 drops taken while in bed, the point just before head hits the pillow.

My dear friends the Community Cup, a group of herbalist got together with me a day after her passing. We hiked up into the Bay Area wilderness, sat and honored my Grandmothers passing. Marina Storm put together a grief herbal smoke blend, to honor the release of my Grandmother:

• Rabbit Tobacco [Gnaphalium species], to release shaken energy.
• Juniper [Juniperus species] for protection.
  
• Sage Brush [Artemesia tridentata], to release electric energy.
  
• Traditional Tobacco, that had been prayed over by a Native Elders [Nicotiana species], to connect with the ancestors
• White Sage [Salvia Apiana] to cleanse the energy.
  

We rolled up these herbs, smoked them and talked about my Grandmother (Please contact Marina Storm to find more information about the above smoke blend).

Marina and Robin of the Village Farm offered a bushel of Rabbit Tobacco for me to take home. So, I have been sleeping with and smoking this herb often. This lovely plant has been a great companion during my release, through my grieving process. I couldn't have asked for a better plant ally

A death of a loved one is a deep experience, so many layers are still being uncovered. Thank you for sharing in this experience with me.

about a year ago i stopped washing my hair with traditional shampoo and conditioner. i read/watched several articles about toxins and hair stripping.

so, i made a choice. i stopped using shampoo and conditioner.

first, i tried just water - i found my hair full of build up and a grey gunk that turned out to be my own hair oils and whatever else my hair picked up in the urban city i live in...

what to do, i wondered.

after an astounding amount of research and hours of personal experimenting i found a natural way of cleansing my hair, without toxins.

i use a few simple ingredients:

• local eggs (for vegans substitute egg for flax seed blended with distilled water or herbal tea)
  
• vinegar (home brewed apple cider vinegar, made from local apples)

fyi
my hair is curly and tends to be dry, or at least it used to be dry. ever since i stopped stripping my hair with over the counter shampoo my hair is a lot healthier from root to tip.

egg whites are an amazing source of protein for the hair. so potent too much egg white can thicken the hair and cause it to become too heavy; causing the new hair to break at the shaft. at first i washed my hair with egg several times a week. until my hair started to feel crunchy the first signs of too much egg white. i tried only egg yolk, finding my hair to feel heavy and thin. after trial and error i found washing my hair with one whole egg every week and a half to be perfect for my hair.

i used to beat the egg then apply it in the shower to wet hair. then i tried experimenting with making a hole in the egg shell only letting egg white out gently massaging whites into my wet scalp. this technique thickens my new hair growth. then i break the shell open and massage the egg yolk into the ends of my hair. the fat in the yolk is a great conditioner. (remembering to wash in warm to tepid water, too hot and i could end up with scrambled eggs in my hair, again...)

after the egg wash, i rinse with apple cider vinegar. the first time i used vinegar on my head i poured it straight out of the bottle. it stung and i smelled like a salad. after months of trial and error i found infusing apple cider vinegar with a few herbs and diluting didn't sting. my favorite is rosemary infused vinegar. it improves my scalp circulation and imparts a nice rosemary fragrance.

to make a diluted vinegar hair rinse i measure a spoonful of infused vinegar to a cup of distilled water (or herbal tea). generally i leave the vinegar rinse in my hair for a few minutes. the vinegar softens my hair and helps soften dead skin cells from my scalp. letting the vinegar set on my hair a while  makes it easier to massage unwanted impurities out of my hair.

i cleanse my hair with vinegar more frequently then i do with egg. i also use a homemade hair balm to shape my curls or style my hair into loose waves. the no shampoo experiment has been a success for me, i don't think i will ever go back to commercially made shampoo.

+
for folks with oily hair try a spoonful of baking soda (aluminum free) in a cup of distilled water (or herbal tea) instead of an egg.

The Ohlone Herbal Center goes to the DESERT.
A magical time full of flowers, animals, spirits and adventure.

Join Tatiana Almendral and Jim Hall for a spring wild flower trip
to Anza Borrego Park in Southern California.
We discussed the medicinal properties of desert
plants and flower/environment/gem essences.

March 15 – 20, 2011

May day is well known for a spring celebration, called Beltane. where traditionally druids celebrate the season of life. and today many people dance around a pole colorful ribbons in hand embodying the spirit of pan, horns and all. choosing a May queen, and hanging May baskets on doorknobs. many fruitful women get pregnant on this warm spring day, humping somewhere in a meadow, birds and bees buzzing.

it was traditional to light a fire to honor the sun and the longer days the spring season is famous for. an honored bow to the flora and fauna of nature celebrating the fertility and abundance of spring.

during the up rise of peoples rights in the mid 1800's; may day evolved to include celebrating workers rights. humanitarians all over the world fought to have a celebrated day off.

Siquijor is known as the Brujah (witch/shaman) Island of the Philippines. When the Spaniards came they called it the "Island of Fire."

there are stories of the aswang (inherently evil vampire-like creatures);
who are said to dwell on this island.
a reminder, this undeveloped island is protected.

the only way to get here is by ferry at night.

      it is a magical place thick with lore protected by fierce untamed energy.

a brave magical journey into the deep heart of the forest where fallen stars, caves, waterfalls and an amazing connection to the spirit of the Philippines is found.

we surrender our fears and cleanse ourselves on the white sands of destiny
as we watch the dawn break our day into night.

this place forever taking residence in our hearts,
a place where brave souls go
to be quenched and rejuvenate their fire within.