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(612)910-9756

ADDRESS:
456 Old E East, Hudson, WI 54016

We are located 45 minutes from Minneapolis/St. Paul,
5 miles east of Stillwater, MN and 10 minutes north of Hudson, WI.

Our Herbal Apothecary Farm Stand is open daily until dusk.
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Cultivating Connection with Nature

First week of Earth Warriors Spring Session, after

First week of Earth Warriors Spring Session, after our 2 week break. 💚

A beautiful day, happy to welcome all these bright spirits again and fill the gazebo with their joyful chatter.

#earthwarriors #natureclub #naturecamp #gazebo #outdoorclassroom

The first thunderstorm of the season! Those beau

The first thunderstorm of the season!

Those beautiful wind chimes you can hear were a birthday gift this week from an Earth Warrior. 💛

#electricalstorm #thunderstorm #midwest

Squee! The first plant babies are up! 😍 I kno

Squee! The first plant babies are up! 😍

I know this is what happens when you plant seeds, but every year I feel absolutely giddy when they actually germinate and poke through to the light.

If all goes well, we will be having our Annual Medicinal Plant Sale again the Memorial Day weekend. So SAVE THE DATE for May 24/25, two days this year!

More details coming soon…

#plantbabies #plantbaby #seedlings #medicinalplants #medicinalherbs #plantsale #plantlove #germination #plantingseeds

Scarlet texted me “the sunset is absolutely gorg

Scarlet texted me “the sunset is absolutely gorgeous” so of course I ran out to check it out. Then I heard the Northern Lights were out tonight so I ran out again. Too much cloud cover to see them, but wow! Look at that sky!

With the lack of snow for this Winter Session, I t

With the lack of snow for this Winter Session, I took matters into my own hands and decided to try an ice rink.

There was considerable trial and error, with the big tarp I bought not actually being water proof. And just running the hose on the rink doesn’t work, because the warmer water and friction of the flow actually melts the previous layers of ice.

But the sprinkler worked! And filling 55 gallon drums and dumping them all at once. Over and over again. Dragging the hoses down from the house every time it was single digits, and then dragging them back up into our laundry room every night so they wouldn’t freeze solid.

But as you can see it was totally worth it! The kids decided to make hockey sticks out of buckthorn and a puck out of a chunk of wood wrapped in a bandana. And they played for hours!

#winter #icerink #icehockey #natureclub #naturecamp

Gutters and windows and pavers, oh my! The gazebo

Gutters and windows and pavers, oh my! The gazebo is still transforming, becoming more and more of my vision for this outdoor classroom.

Maya and I finished the gutters in the freezing cold back in December, but I was so thankful during the recent snow thaw to have that water flow managed.

The windows were a whole other adventure! They are salvaged patio sliding glass doors that we’ve had stashed in the bushes for years. We had to remove the old rotting frames and build new ones. Many thanks to Josef for his problem solving and skillful carpentry making all of them!

The kids loved washing the windows and we definitely loved having that wind protection to keep us warm around the fire on those coldest days.

And I decided to dive in and start the paver project, since the dirt floor has proven to turn into a cloud of dust when the kids run through. They had a blast pickaxing, pretending they were miners digging for gems. We got it almost ready to lay the pavers, but alas…the ground froze so we had to pause.

But soon, when the ground thaws a bit more, we’ll be able to start that up again.

All in all, it continues to come together, thanks to so many of you!

#gazebo #gazeboclassroom #outdoorclassroom #natureclub #naturecamp

Winter Session of Earth Warriors wrapped up a coup

Winter Session of Earth Warriors wrapped up a couple weeks ago, but I’m behind on sharing the fun…

Our Nature Club shifts with the seasons, and Elderberry Syrup was the perfect warm project for the start of winter.

The kids plucked the elderberries off their stems and added them to the pot. They each took turns, adding the cinnamon and other spices, and squishing it all with the potato masher.

We don’t follow a strict recipe, the kids use their intuition to choose and add the ingredients.

Then we mixed the potent elderberry infusion with last year’s honey, a 1:1 ratio, and stirred the warm and beautiful mixture until fully combined.

Yum!! Such a good herbal remedy for the cold season, supporting your immune system to fight off the inevitable viruses.

#elderberry #elderberrysyrup #elderberries #herbalsyrup #herbalism #earthwarriors #natureclub #naturecamp

Did anyone else notice the bluebirds never left th

Did anyone else notice the bluebirds never left this winter?

These photos were taken on Christmas Day, captured by my daughter Scarlet through our kitchen window.

They seem to love the berries on our bittersweet vine that grows up our garden fence.

And they were here all winter!

#bluebird #bluebirds #birdwatching #birds

We packed up our Herbal Apothecary late last night

We packed up our Herbal Apothecary late last night and are excited to be all set up at the Midtown Global Market in Minneapolis today!

The No Coast Craft-O-Rama is from 10-4 today (Saturday, Dec 7th) and we’d love to see you! There are over 60 vendors here with all sorts of beautiful things!

@midtownglobalmarket @nocoastcraft #holidayfair #holidaygifts #apothecary #minneapolis #mpls #mn #herbalapothecary #herbalism #herbs #medicinalherbs #plantmedicine #craftfair

A Beeswax Rendering Day! My friend Phyllis of @sa

A Beeswax Rendering Day!

My friend Phyllis of @sacred_ibis_botanicals generously brought over more than a dozen 5 gallon buckets of beeswax cappings last weekend and we spent ALL DAY boiling it down in water and pouring it through high quality milk filters.

Look at all that gorgeous yellow beeswax we were left with!

The cappings are full of honey, propolis, dead bees, larvae and more. It’s what is left over after extracting your honey harvest. Rendering it involves the long process of putting it all in a big pot with a few inches of water and bringing it to a very low boil. (Believe me, letting it boil over creates an absolute disaster to clean up!)

Once it’s melted you can strain out the bigger clumps of gunk. We have several fine mesh strainers that are only used for beeswax now, as they are almost impossible to clean enough to recover for regular use again.

Then we pour the mixture through the high quality filters into a 5 gallon bucket and let it cool.

The beautiful beeswax rises to the top and cools to form a hard yellow puck. Underneath is all the watered down honey mixture. When the puck is cool enough, we crack them open and gather all the chunks of that good beeswax. And then we pour the honey water into the garden.

I’ll melt down the beeswax again in a double boiler, for one last filtering so it’s ready for use in our salves and for our hand-dipped candles.

It’s a long and sticky process but so worth it for the precious end result!

#beeswax #beeswaxrendering #wax #beeswaxcappings #honeycomb #honeybees #honey #rendering #homesteadkitchen #homestead #candles #candlemaking #candledipping

Well, it’s been frigid suddenly but Maya and I w

Well, it’s been frigid suddenly but Maya and I were able to bundle up and hang the sliding barn door yesterday as the sun was setting. It arrived broken so I got a full refund but was able to repair it enough to make it work. So win/win?

Also, the roof is officially BLUE! Doesn’t it look pretty in the glowing Golden Hour?! We made a final push last weekend to finish the cupola and blue metal trim, before I had to shift gears to cleaning my house for Thanksgiving. A huge thank you to Tony for helping finish it with me!

I still need to get the gutters hung, so the melting snow doesn’t drip all over our dry firewood. As you can see they are in process, halfway done. Just waiting for a little warmer weather this week…

#gazebo #diy #barndoor #octagon #octagongazebo #outdoorclassroom #metalroof #metalroofing

Look at all the wonderful people in the gazebo tod

Look at all the wonderful people in the gazebo today! Stone Soup, Closing Circle with the Earth Warriors families, all gathered around the fire.

This is what makes all the hard work worth it. ❤️

Also, check out the skylights I decided to add, to bring a little more light into the space. Super easy, just with the ProSky panels that perfectly line up with the blue metal roofing. But many thanks to Buck for cutting it just right, after I messed the first one up. 🙄

Now that the earthbag wall is plastered and painte

Now that the earthbag wall is plastered and painted, we can finally stack all our split firewood back there! So the kids made a “bucket brigade” and filled up one whole bay! Everything is more fun with friends.

#firewood #dryfirewood #woodstorage #earthwarriors #natureclub #naturecamp #kidsandnature #winterprep

With the temperatures dropping, I made a desperate

With the temperatures dropping, I made a desperate attempt to finish the earthbag wall in time. So I called my daughter and begged her to drive home from college to help, and along with two other teenage helpers, they finished all the plastering in one morning!

Then I took a photo to Home Depot with me to pick out a paint color that matches the belly of a bluebird.

And here it was halfway painted on Sunday, before I went back for a second gallon. Note the sweet handprints of many of the kids who helped.

I was desperate to finish this space because we plan to stack our dry firewood as high as possible in this protected alleyway. All in preparation for the coming winter!

#earthbag #earthbagwall #retainingwall #plaster #erosioncontrol

Whew! I’ve been using every possible moment to w

Whew! I’ve been using every possible moment to work on the gazebo roof and it is coming along! Many thanks to all the folks who’ve been helping me the past few weeks!

There’s Jackson up there helping install the “ridge cap” trim to every small peak of the octagon, tied to a rope for safety. Note my not OSHA approved method of tying that safety rope to a rafter through the chimney opening, on a ladder over the fire pit.

So the roof was looking very blue, but yesterday it turned white, thankfully just briefly. I just need a few more nice days…

Anyways, I got it all tidied up yesterday for our final week of Fall Earth Warriors. And today we all made Stone Soup together and shared it with their families for Closing Circle. When I stood outside looking in on all the people chatting and laughing, my heart was so happy. 💚

#earthwarriors #natureclub #naturecamp #gazebo #outdoorclassroom #stonesoup

A little snippet from the top of the gazebo… I

A little snippet from the top of the gazebo…

I was able to sneak up there with one of my helpers briefly this afternoon to finish the insulation and drip edge, while the Earth Warriors stoked the fire and finished their game of Capture the Flag.

I’m using every available minute to get a little further along with the roofing, before the weather inevitably takes a turn.

You can see the two openings in the roof now. I decided to add two small sections with clear roof panels, like a skylight, to shed some light down inside. I think it’s going to be lovely on those cold winter days!

#earthwarriors #natureclub #naturecamp #gazebo #outdoorclassroom #classroom #diy #roofing #metalroof #octagon

Progress! A huge thank you to Buck and Jooniper fo

Progress! A huge thank you to Buck and Jooniper for their help the past couple days getting the insulation on the roof and the first blue panels!

These shorter days are a challenge (can we get rid of Daylight Savings yet?!) but I’m very thankful for this nicer weather to keep moving forward.

With the funds from our Fall Harvest Fundraiser a couple weeks ago, I tallied every last penny and then spent a ridiculous amount of time measuring every inch of the gazebo roof and my pile of leftover metal from building our house. I had a stack of the copper colored ProRib from our house roof and thought I’d use that. But in tallying it all up I realized I had a bit more leftover blue, and just enough funds to buy the rest I’d need. So blue it is.

Jooniper said today that it perfectly matches the sky so that makes me very happy. I always wanted this structure to look like it was growing out of the hillside, like it belongs right here.

I’ll be using every day that it’s not raining to keep plugging away, so we will see if we can get all the metal on before snowfall!

#gazebo #outdoorclassroom #metalroof #diy #earthwarriors #natureclub

Our new little tree arrived last week! Many than

Our new little tree arrived last week!

Many thanks to @willow_river_company for gifting us this several year old sugar maple, and for planting it so expertly into its forever home.

I asked the Earth Warriors if they could help welcome it, so they decorated these bits of fabric with all sorts of blessings, while we chatted about how perhaps their kids and grandkids might enjoy the shade of this sweet tree when it is fully grown.

“A society grows great when old men plant trees in whose shade they shall never sit.” — Greek Proverb

#sugarmaple #maple #babytree #treeplanting #earthwarriors #natureclub #naturecamp

Remember that Earth Warrior with such a skillful e

Remember that Earth Warrior with such a skillful eye for photography? He made this drone video for me!

I love seeing this different perspective of the land! You can see our curved house, the terraced medicinal gardens, our little greenhouse, the game circle in the pasture, the gazebo classroom with its tarped roof waiting for the metal roofing I ordered…

And he captured the beautiful colors in all directions from our place! I’m so thankful for his gift!

#drone #dronevideo #dronephotography #earthwarriors #natureclub #naturephotography #hudsonwi #hudsonwisconsin #homestead #home

A closer look at our Herbal Apothecary Farm Stand…fully stocked and currently open all day every day.

The Ashwagandha Cacao blend is packaged and ready for you. Our Sumac Honey has been poured into its sweet little bottles. A dreamy remedy to soothe a sore throat.

Tinctures, bitters, teas and salve. Books and prints and catnip toys.

All the plant medicine is grown in our south-facing terraced garden beds.

Feel free to message me with questions.

#plantmedicine #plantmagic #hudsonwi #hudsonwisconsin #herbalapothecary #apothecary #farmstand #farmstands #medicinalherbs #tea #teas #tincture #tinctures #bitters #salve #salves #herbalsalve

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