Wednesday 22 April 2009

Living without pain (and showing off doing head stands)!

This post is stretching the bounds of Apotheblogary a bit... but I never expected to see my dad on YouTube so I just had to include this clip of him talking about the positive results of alternative treatment - called "Proprioception" - he's recently received from Simon King, author of Live Without Pain:



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Monday 13 April 2009

Digging at Springfield Sanctuary

On Saturday I paid my first visit to Springfield Sanctuary. It's a beautiful place with natural springs and herbs a-plenty! This wasn't one of Sarah's workshops - although I hope to return there for one later in the year - but rather a day for digging and doing some spring clearing along with a few other people. Here is the new herb bed (she says proudly ;-)

I brought back some herbs to go in my back garden as well: angelica, lady's mantle, motherwort, feverfew, lemon balm and mint. A few familiar faces there, and a good chance to learn about some new herbs that I'm less familiar with (and which I'll blog about soon).

It also got me to thinking that I'd like to formulate a herb gardeners hand cream - any suggestions from my fellow herbal bloggers for ingredients would be most welcome! :)

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Kiwi and Papaya face mask

A couple of days ago I made the Kiwi and Papaya face mask that was featured on BBC's Grow Your Own Drugs recently. The only thing I changed is that instead of using vegetable gelatine such as you might find in a supermarket, I used xantham gum which I had in the cupboard (I have THAT kind of cupboard!).

It's a bit of a faff to make (papaya flying everywhere - I ended up blending it before trying to strain it through the sieve), but it smells lovely, and of course you get to eat the leftovers. :-) It made about enough for 4 face masks, so I've used one portion and frozen the rest in an ice cube tray to use later.

How is it supposed to work? Papaya contains proteolytic plant enzymes which help to remove dead skin cells. Apparently these are most potent when the fruit is green and unripe which, as you can see from the picture, isn't what I used! Kiwi is also supposed to be full of good things such as vitamins and organic acids to nourish and cleanse the skin

I only occasionally do a face mask and it always feels like a treat, especially if its homemade. The kiwi and papaya mask was pleasant and refreshing, but I didn't feel it had any particularly marked effect. I'll enjoy using up the batch that I've made, but won't be making it again (mostly because of mentioned faffy-ness).

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Friday 10 April 2009

Apotheblogary Slideshow!

I've just been uploading Apotheblogary pictures to Slideshare, here's the slideshow (including the scary white coat ;-) 


I'll keep adding new pictures to Flickr so the slideshow will grow over time!

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Wednesday 8 April 2009

US regulation HR875 and how it will impact farmers markets, CSAs and local food

I just came across this story about the proposed US regulation 875 on Alchemille's blog:

Alchemille's Secret Garden: Please Read This...

An excerpt from one of the articles: 
"Rather, than promoting true accountability and proper farming techniques that minimize the risk of introducing pathogens into the food supply, it simply will create greater barriers for our already struggling small farms and farmers markets. HR 875. mandates that anyone who produces food of any kind - meat, milk, fruit, vegetables et cetera - and transports that food for sale be subject to warrantless government inspections of their farms and food production records. These random inspections can be conducted at the whim of federal agents without regard to farmers rights or property rights. Further, the law would allow federal agents to confiscate records, product as they see fit as part of the inspection process... The penalty for denying federal agents unlimited, random access to a farm’s fields, properties, products and records is up to $1,000,000. The penalty for not registering is up to$1,000,000.... Remember, this law would affect every farmer or food producer who must transport his goods to sell them - in effect, every single farmer. That means that an orchard that sells fresh fruit at a roadside stand would be affected; a farmer who delivers CSA boxes would be affected, even a home gardener who brings excess harvest to a farmers market’s community booth would have to register or be subject to $1,000,000 fines and that garden plot would be subject to inspection by federal agents. Ridiculous, isn’t it? But it’s true."

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