How I spent my summer (and a flower essence story)

Off the internet, that's how I spent it!

And wow .. I highly recommend it. But more on that later.

First, a nifty, and just a little spooky, story about a flower ...



We were on the hunt for wild blueberries on the island one evening a few weeks ago. It's a really dry summer (odd after 100 yr floods in the spring, eh? Global weirding strikes again!) and although we found some, they weren't great. Surprisingly plentiful, but dry, alas, at least in that one area. I (ever the optimist) thought we might find some juicier berries on another part of the island, closer to the river.

So off we went.

Not a single blueberry to be had. But we were in what I know to be prime wintergreen territory, and I'd had this hankering to make some wintergreen flower essence for the few days previous (don't ask me why, I just did), so I headed for the patch and wow, just WOW, so many flowers! Wintergreen is a lovely little plant, low to the ground, shiny green leathery leaves, and friendly, too. It's one of those plants that you almost feel guilty harvesting even a few leaves because they just look so darn pretty where they are, but they seem to say "take me! take me!" as though it would be their very great pleasure to come home with you. And the flowers are delightful, tiny white bells, you could almost swear you can hear them ring, like fairy bells.

And they taste amazing, like wintergreen (of course) with a crunch to them. Yum!

I only needed a few for my flower essence - that's one of the nice things about flower essences, a few blossoms go a very long way - and they're so tiny I wasn't sure how to get them home safely. So instead of plucking the little bells, I picked a few stems, with a couple leaves and a few flowers each, popping them carefully into the small paper bag I always, always carry in my back pocket or purse when leaving the house. (Because you never know.)

I got them home and put the little stems in a small glass of water for the night to make the flower essence the next morning. Which leads me to another thing I've learned about flower essences. Sure, the "authoritative" voices say you must place the blossoms in the bowl of water in the sun immediately upon picking them, without delay .. yeah, well that's nice and all, but it's not absolutely necessary. If you find your flowers by chance out there in the world, they'll wait til next day for you to make the essence. They're patient.

That evening, because I was a little vague about exactly what wintergreen flower essence is used for, I checked my sources. The flower essence site (here) I most often refer to says:

 "Seeing and accepting ourselves for who we are, cleansing ourselves of the expectations of others and giving ourselves the ability to strive for a positive expression of our true inner being is the power of this essence. Wintergreen brings healing from the hurt of relationships gone wrong."

(These flower essence people tend to be a bit .. err .. flowery (sorry!) in their descriptions, don't they?)

Then I had a look at a couple of my field guides which reminded me of something that I knew, but hadn't twigged on (oh I did it again, I'm sorry!) as I picked them, and that is

wintergreen flowers in the spring.

not August.

And yet there was a veritable carpet of them, just when I had a yen to make wintergreen flower essence!

I made the essence the next morning. Now in case you don't know, the process is (briefly) this: float a few flowers on the surface of a tiny (preferably pretty, just 'cause it's nicer that way) bowl of water in a sunny spot outside. After a few hours, strain this into a small jar, and top it up with enough vodka to preserve it. Shake. That's the "mother" essence. Then, using a tincture dropper, take 6 DROPS of the mother, and put those in another little bottle. Mostly fill that with water, then enough vodka to preserve it. Shake. That's the "stock". Then take 6 DROPS of the stock and put them in a tincture bottle, fill it with water and enough vodka to preserve it. That's your flower essence. So .. that's highly diluted by the time you're done, yes?

So how on earth is it that my wintergreen flower essence tastes like wintergreen??

It's actually not possible. The "mother" doesn't taste like wintergreen, but the finished essences does.

Paul (my husband, co-conspirator and all around good guy who wouldn't kid me about this) tried it, and without me mentioning the taste he said "wow, that really tastes like wintergreen."

I tell you, these flower essences are very interesting ...

Not having the heart to throw away the sprigs of wintergreen that the flowers came from, I've still got them in their little glass of water on the windowsill, and I check on them once in a while to see if (oh wouldn't it be wonderful) they're rooting. They're not rooting .. but they're producing more flowers. How cool is that?

Pretty darn cool.

I have another wintergreen post, from wayyy back, here.

Now, as mentioned above, I've been off the interwebz for quite a while, and loving it. I'd like to spend far less time here from now on, so I'm trying something new. No comments on the blog any more (not that people were commenting much any way) and I have new contact info above. Please check it out.

See ya!