Backyard magic
You can make medicine from what's growing in your backyard
I remember making pretend potions in my backyard as a kid. I would gather plants and make concoctions and dare my friends to try them. It’s in our nature as children to collect plants and herbs and make things.
Nature connection as a child is amazingly formative. I spent close to a decade playing soccer as a kid. I started on a rec team and then made the cut for a selective team, which was mostly exciting because the jerseys were fancier. But in all those years of spending time in fields, what I remember most is starring at the ground looking for four leaf clovers while the coaches were endlessly explaining something.
This all came back to me this week as I taught my daughter about four leaf clovers. That’s the wild part of having kids.
Now I get to watch my daughter get her harvest basket and explore around the yard. She picks daisies endlessly. She snacks on miner’s lettuce. She screams, “GRAPE HYACINTH!” when we see the purple flowers around the neighborhood.
If it’s not obvious by now, I love making things out of plants. Salves, tinctures, bitters, cookies, cakes, teas…there is nothing more fun than playing with plants and getting to know them along the way. Well I guess what’s more fun than doing it alone is doing it with my daughter, who has a deep love of all things flowers, fairies, and magic and an incredible thirst for learning and partaking in fun projects.
Recently, we picked some flowers and made something I’ve never made before. It was so awesome I decided to make more to gift to my daughter’s teachers. It’s incredibly useful and beautiful — the best kind of present!
