2nd Sunday Classes - September

We've got another incredible day of herbal goodness planned on September 13th.

We will begin with a short weed walk and discuss different methods of preserving herbs over tea and a snack. After discussing various herbs that are traditionally used for unwinding and relaxation, we will be blending a relaxing tea. Each participant will make their own blend and take it along. Next, the bounty of elderberries in the backyard beckons, and we'll be making elderberry syrup to help ward off colds and flu this coming winter. We will also mix up eye pillows, and a lotion, the details of which we will probably come up with during the class - depending on what you all want to make. We'll end the day with an herbal supper.
Supper will come from the garden, and will most certainly include the scrumptious tomatoes and basil that are growing so well there. Maybe some wild roots? We'll see :-).
Participants will leave with some of the tea blend, the syrup, an eye pillow, and a bottle of lotion, as well as a booklet that will include instructions and recipes from everything we've done that day. 11:30 to 6:30.

The whole day is only $75!

Come sign up today - space is limited.

Wondiferous Weed Walk

Tina & I have known Fred and Barb Will for quite some time through the old PA Herb Business Association and we see them every spring at the Landis Valley Herb & Garden Faire where we are "next door neighbors". It seems every year, we (actually Tina) mention some plant or other that we have been looking for and, oddly enough, the Wills have it growing on their property and Fred brings us a big shovelfull or two to plant in our own woods.
Last spring we were talking about what a treasure trove of plants they must have and how much fun it would be to take a long weed walk with Fred through his woods and see all these plants in their "home." Thus hatched the plan for "The Wondiferous Weed Walk."

We traveled out to Somerset, PA on Friday for the event. We got there Friday afternoon and wandered around finding vista after vista of beautiful wildflowers and herbs. This is just a quick example of a hillside of ironweed and Queen Anne's lace. I can't do them justice because everywhere we looked was some new plant, another stunning combination of colors... it was amazing.

That evening, we met up with our hosts, Fred & Barb as well as a few of the other folks who had gotten in the night before the event for dinner. It was delicious and I wish I had taken a picture of the "skillet cookie" we had for desert. Three of us shared it and there was enough left over for another person!
After a night at the campground - which I promise to not whine about except to say I'm just too old to go camping again, even in a "bunkhouse," we made our way to the Wills' home.

The main event of the day was Fred leading us on THE Wondiferous Weed Walk! Here are just a few of the sights we saw:

Shagbark Hickory. I even found some nuts, still in their green coating.

Devil's Walking Stick. As Fred said, so full of jaggers even the Devil doesn't want to touch it.

Wild Yam. For some reason, I always thought it was a tropical plant, but I guess I was wrong! Here, it is wound around this maple sapling.

Just a quick shot of Tina in her element... foraging with a basket in hand.

And finally, the bath house at the campground. On the right are the toilet stalls and on the left are the showers. The glass block windows and the interesting paneling on the doors lead me to believe the camp ground was built in the 50's or so.

Family Pictures

I was playing with old photographs yesterday and dug out some family shots that have been loved and pawed over for many, many years. There were 5 kids in our family and I have to say there are very few of all five of us together. Often I was the photographer and so there are some of the other 4, but all 5 is something unusual. This was one of the few I found.I'm the oldest one up there at the top and beside me is John. Tina is right in front of me and beside her is Tom. Mark is the baby, of course, and we have never been able to figure out what he was doing in this picture. I think supposedly there was a cookie involved, but I'm not sure. There are a couple of pictures of Mark with his eyes crossed and he tells us that it was because he always wondered what he looked like with his eyes crossed.... but, you know, how many times did he have to see?

The reason I was looking through the pictures was the occasion of our 35th wedding anniversary. I posted a few pictures on facebook, but there are a couple more I've always liked.

This was taken on our honeymoon in Acapulco, on a boat tour of the harbor:Apparently we were boarded by pirates who then posed with us for pictures! You can't tell that by this time, Montezuma's Revenge had hit me and I was constantly scanning for the nearest bathroom! I think that drink in my hand had calmed things for the cruise so I was a bit more relaxed. I had been so careful about everything I put in my mouth while Bob, on the other hand, had been cruising all the little taco stands down the alleys.

A few years later, we went to Jamaica. Not one of my favorite trips, but Dunn's Falls was beautiful:Yes, I am wearing clothes. It's just a weird angle. Back then, the tour took you to the bottom of the falls and you climbed up. It was really nice and peaceful and a lot of fun.
Nowadays, the parking is at the top and you come down steps. After climbing to the top, there is a gauntlet of shops one must run before reaching the safety of their tour bus. I found out about this change when I took my mom on a tour from a cruise we went on together. It really changes the feeling about the place.

Finally, after Rob came along, we didn't travel much until he hit about 4 and we went to Bermuda with Tina and her then-husband John. This is us at dinner one evening:Notice the parade of dinosaurs on the table in front of "Bobby". Our waiter, Manuel, told him that at night, the dinosaurs will come to life and grow. I can't tell you how thrilled we were with that! Luckily Rob didn't believe him.

It came from the kiln

I know, I know - Time to update the website.... Well, I've been working on getting a nicer variety to put up there. I'm getting there.

First a vessel in Copper Green/Pale emerald with a salmon frit swirl. I love this combo and have done it a couple of times before. I'll continue doing it until I wind up with one left in my hot little hands that has not sold!
Another vessel made of a pastel slate blue that I think is one of the Vetrofond colors that they did once and may never make again.. I love it, but I might as well use it. The vine is goldstone and the flowers are "magic" - a reactive color that just does downright magical things!
A water goddess or os she a mermaid? Hmmmm

And finally, my fire goddess! I tried this a couple of times and wasn't satisfied with the results. This gal, I like with her little wisps of flames licking around the edges...

More Tute Results

These were done some time ago - when I was on my wild tutorial binge. I love the results though and have been wearing them a lot. I have to make some more because I think other people will like them too.

These were from Ann Rickett's Tutorial, She gives you a good starting point - and one of the bracelet beads is an exact copy, but then, using the techniques, I branched off and created my own.

First the bracelet:
I strung it with leather spacers and ivory colored beads. The counter-weight bead is a topaz tiger bead.

More recently, I sat down and made this focal. I wired it up and wear it on a ball chain.

I think the bottom part of this bead reminds me of Monarch butterfly wings, so there's another direction to take it!

Second Sundays - Herbal Adventures with the Twisted Sisters

We've been talking about it for a long time, and now we're ready to do it... classes here on the farm, Frog Hollow Evergreens, in Manheim, PA.

Second Sundays with The Twisted Sisters

Each Herbal Adventure day will begin at 11:30 AM and will include:

~ A short weed walk where we will identify the plants of the season.
~ An herbal craft or two
~ A culinary creation
~ A medicinal preparation
~ A talk/discussion of a pertinent herbal subject
~ A light herbal supper
We will finish up around 6:30 PM and participants will leave with samples of everything we've made and a booklet put together specifically for that day with recipes and instructions to make it easier to continue at home.

Beginning with the August 9, 2009 Adventure:
Limit 8 fellow adventurers.
Cost $75
pre-registration and payment required. Click here to register and pay.

We'll start the day around 11:30 AM, with a short weed walk,
and then return to discuss what we found and talk about foraging while having a snack and tea (most likely the tea will be from the walk).

We will be making herbal vinegars,
distill some mint,
create some neck coolers, and then finally make up some passionflower tincture
before sitting and relaxing together over a light herbal supper. Tomatoes and basil are expected to star in that menu!

Around 6:30 PM, you will leave with a bottle of herb vinegar, some passion flower tincture, a neck cooler and a booklet with instructions and recipes for everything we did today.

After the winter holidays here at Frog Hollow Christmas Tree Farm we'll switch to Second Saturdays, but until then it is Second Sundays. Join us!

You an see all our Second Sunday plans and keep up with all the latest announcements on our new blog Twisted Sisters Herbs

Market on the 4th

It was July 4th at Mount Joy Farmers Market. Flags lined the streets of our small town, and at Market, one of our vendors set up a little vignette to celebrate!There were even red, white and blue potato varieties. Supposedly they hold their color and it was very tempting to try making potato salad with them, but knowing our family we stuck to the tried and true!I walked around market part of the way through the day and when I got home and downloaded the pictures I took, I was thrilled and amazed by the beauty that surrounds us every week.

You can tell the pride that goes into growing or producing the products by the way they are displayed.

CORN - Seems a little early for local, but....

Wonderfully displayed root veggies

And more

Tomatoes - again, very early this year. All the rain really slowed the crop.
More and more variety every week.

Not local, but... yum! Melons

And some of the delicious baked goods offerred.

Some of the herb and flower plants you can find every week!

And, of course, a sunflower to finish off the day!

What a week...

Until I started downloading my pictures from the past week, I didn't realize just how much we managed to pack into it.

I'll start on Saturday, the 20th. We were to be speakers at a family reunion in Shippensburg. The theme was colonial times, when the family had settled in the area and we were to tell them about the way the mother of the house would use herbs in her daily life.

If the weather had been more pleasant, it would have been a nice ride and a quick little gig. Unfortunately, it was raining and so, not very nice. It gave us some insight into how it must have felt to have been a pioneer woman out in the godforsaken wilderness. We entertained ourselves taking pathetic self-portraits!

The rest of the weeks seemed to be a celebration of lavender! We spent a few quiet evenings in the beginning of the week on Tina's deck making lavender wands.

On Wednesday evening, we headed down to Pottstown to visit with Sue Hess at Farm at Coventry, where we did a lavender distillation and made some lavender wands - also called lavender bottles and lavender baskets.

Sue's place is lovely and I took many pictures of the farm, from the welcoming vignette on the front porch (shown here) to the cats, the chickens and the gardens.

I can't post them all, but wanted to show the lavender treats we enjoyed on her always-beautiful table as a snack.

My son and I decided we needed to get moving and started walking each morning at our nearby community park. We discovered that the edges of the new park have been planted in wildflower seeds and I took a picture of the drift of wildflowers along the side of the trail.And one particular hill covered in many colors of yarrow with the large golden variety at the very top, reaching for the sun!The vistas are just beautiful!

We wound it up on Saturday at market with yet another lavender event. We had attempted to coordinate a mini lavender festival for market mid week, but had apparently waited too long!

But, on our own, we set up a lavender distillation (how essential oils and hydrosols are made) which seemed to fascinate patrons and other vendors alike. Here's Tina explaining the process to our market neighbor, Mary Prescott of Prescott's Patch (organic vegetables).

Tina had also baked some gluten-free lavender shortbread for everyone to try and we had piles of lavender so anyone who wanted to make one could try their hand at a lavender wand.
Somewhere along the line, I also managed to get orders out and make some flag beads so I will have earrings and necklaces for the 4th next week at market!

And more goddesses (goddessi)?

I was anxious to get the photos of these latest goddesses. I'm not even sure if I like them as much as the first ones, although I guess they just aren't as "new", so not as exciting to me. I still like them a lot:

Topaz Goddess

Star Goddess

Mermaid Goddess

Cocoa Goddess

Mossy Goddess

And this is when I ran out of propane. I was almost finished with the goddess on this vessel and realized the flame was getting smaller and smaller, so I worked feverishly to get her head on! No lip to the vessel, but I think I'll finish this up somehow by electroforming a strap around the whole thing. It could turnout to be a serendipitous catastrophy!

New Goddess Beads

My goddess beads in the past have been quite anatomically correct and actually, some folks have been upset with me for showing them (the children, you know - who will probably not be allowed to visit an art museum until after marriage!)

Although I can't claim what follows as an original idea, I have to say that I saw some similar beads online and sort of took it to another place. The original idea was posted on Lampwork, etc. by LouiseI. Her Etsy name is Fireseed.

This is my first try at this particular goddess bead. She's very similar to the first one I saw. So, she's okay, but not something I can really claim as my own. She does look very fertile though (as they all do!)

My second try was the one to the right, an attempt at some color. This was more original and I like it pretty much. She's a little fire goddess.

I should probably keep her as my own since I am a fire child.

As I started my third attempt, I thought of Tina and her affinity for green - leaves in particular.

This gal could be surrounded by jade and would blend in beautifully. I kinda like her as the star of the show though.

Finally, I got really brave and started playing with enamels in a bigger way. This is what resulted:

I really like the way she turned out and will be doing more like her - in new and exciting colors!

I suspect these will be for sale soon at Radiance in Lancaster.