Flashback - The Great Mud Sauna Adventure

This was from the day before I came to NB, the day before my mom had her stroke and went into the hospital. Who knew the following day I would be living in NB and on a completely new adventure. But the day before my journey took me to an incredible sauna.. with everyone covered in black mud, getting grounded with crystals and candles and essential oils and all sorts of wonderful high vibe earthly and unearthly things. massages, laughter, Bliss.. black mud!!

We brushed our skin and steamed and showered and steamed and got our pores opened and covered ourselves with essential oil doused deep dark living black mud and sat in a candle and crystal filled steam room, house powered completely down..

We drank gnome water (from up north, property close to David Wolfes land, with incredible magical gnome spring water) sat and sweated with a few of my favorite people.. what a way to leave Toronto. Who knew that the next day - actually this was a Sunday and I left on Tuesday, but close enough.. who knew that very soon I would leave Toronto.. and I still havent been back! All my things, including my boyfriend and cat, followed me out here & here we still are!  Live can be interesting - Expect the unexpected!! ; )

Mud steams are usually followed by feasts of the best food ever!!

Sprouts and probiotic hummus and garlic/herb marinated heirloom tomatoes, wild leek spread, jerusalem artickoke antipasto, Earth bread (the best raw bread ever!!) ..lots of sprouts!!

We made open face sandwiches..

Chaga and other medicinal mushrooms..

more sandwiches.. freshly grated organic turmeric on top..

and crystal goblets of keffir coconut water - thank you, thank you, Thank you!!! xox

What a beautiful send off, love u very much! big hugs and smiles : ) xo!

Strawberry Day

It's strawberry season and yesterday we bought 5 flats (60 quarts) of strawberries. They are so beautiful and so delicious - local and unsprayed (although not organic, which are hard to find around here and very expensive) but unsprayed works for me.

Fresh produce always looks so great. You always feel good buying it in the store and bringing it home. Colourful and beautiful. 

& everything strawberry is beautiful!

We set up production. Washing, hulling, setting trays of them in the sun to dry and bagging most of them for the freezer. ..for when strawberry season is over. 

After sitting in the sun they tasted even sweeter, almost like strawberry jam.

Our back porch with strawberry plants, tomato plants and solar water.

It seemed sad to put them into bags, but we'll appreciate them later. Enjoy strawberries now!!

Yoga and Foraging at the Cemetary

ok, this may sound weird.. but one of our main hang outs lately is the cemetery. I've just realized/worked out that Mom used to take Buddy often to the cemetery for walks. My dad is buried here, and my grandparents and other relatives.. and in the back section its cleared and kept landscaped and mowed, but only has a dirt road to drive on and not many people are buried here yet. ..and in back there's an area they are just clearing, which is almost always just empty, there's never anyone there - the dog can go free and we can pick wild strawberries and forage for greens for our smoothies.

Most of the cemetery has plaques on the ground, but some areas have tombstones, sculptures and landscaped park areas. Along the edge of the cemetery on each side it wanders off into wooded area, on one side you have to cross water.. which Buddy loves to get into. 

It was finally hot here today. Its been a very cold, wet, rainy spring and is just starting to warm up.. I'm loving it!!. But I really enjoyed a shady area we found and doing yoga there. I've missed doing yoga very much during the past 2 years.. and am really enjoying getting back into it!! : )

ps. The best thing about the cemetery is that Mom is always so happy going there. ..and the curvy fun road that you drive getting there.. its hard not to speed a bit here on these roads, they make driving fun. & the speed limits higher out here! 

Happy Ivan Kupala Day!!

On Ivan Kupala day, children are engaged in water fights and perform pranks mostly involving pouring water over someone. Many of the rites related to this holiday are connected with the role of water in fertility and ritual purification.  Youths would jump over the flames of bonfires. Girls would float wreaths of flowers often lit with candles on rivers and would attempt to gain foresight into their relationship fortunes from the flow patterns of the flowers on the river. Men may attempt to capture the wreaths, in the hope of capturing the interest of the woman who floated the wreath.

There is an ancient Kupula belief, that the eve of Ivan Kupala is the only time of the year when ferns bloom. Prosperity, luck, discernment and power would befall on whoever finds a fern flower. Therefore, on that night, village folks would roam through the forests in search of magical herbs and especially the elusive fern flower Chervona Ruta. 

Traditionally, unmarried women, signified by their garlands on their hair, would be the first to enter the forests. They are followed by young men. Therefore, consequent to the quest in finding herbs and the fern flower may be the blooming of relationships between pairs of men and women within the forest.

It is to be noted that biologists have held the persistent scientific fact that ferns have never and will never bloom.

The Russian name of this holiday combines "Ivan", Russian for the name John (the Baptist), and Kupala which is related to a word derived from the Slavic word for bathing, which is cognate. The latter is reinterpreted as John's baptizing people through full immersion in water (therefore his biblical title of the Baptist). However, the tradition of Kupula predates Christianity

Images from fiski.net and google images
Info from wikipedia

Whats going on in the Kitchen?

Pizza Crusts just coming out of the dehydrator - 2 square, 2 round. I'm going to spread a square one now with cashew cheese and marinara and toppings and put the rest in the fridge, so they are ready to create a quick meal. (I have extra cashew cheese, marinara and pesto made from the lasagna I recently made ;)

The herbal tea brew.. I always feel extra witch-like when I make special blends of herbal teas.. even the hands taking a picture, dont they look witch-like?? ; ) 

wow, this is bad, you know what? I dont even remember! ..probably crackers. I have been looking for and creating ways to use up the pulp from the almond milk - one of the ways was crackers, and it gave them a really great texture. 

Mom's homework (a small part of it) - her words of the week are: Joan, walk and smoothie. I have to try to get her to say them as often as possible. Her therapy and this process we are going through is really interesting. Mom is great at responding 'off the cuff' or 'spur of the moment' and is getting better and better all the time.. but the problem with aphasia is that the connection gets lost when you think something and then have to voice the idea.. if you have aphasia the more you think about it the harder it is. So you can sometimes get the right responses by surprising it out ..which leads to some interesting homework sessions. Not to mention Mom has a great sense of humor (which I have only really discovered since coming home in April, and it is amazing to see this side of her that I missed before) We get so silly sometimes, its kind of ridiculous - For 3 nights in a row I was laughing so hard I was literally crying.. just really crazy.  Now, dont get me wrong.. its crazy and bizarre and fun sometimes.. but its also hard, for both Mom and I - There are periods when its really frustrating for her not to be able to convey her thoughts ..and periods for me when I feel very inept. I know I'm most likely the best person for the job.. but sometimes I feel so clued out. Most of the time I think I am fairly good at translating or deciphering what she is getting at.. but sometimes, its like shes talking Japanese.. and I'll go get James and he'll figure it out ..and I'll wonder what I am doing here?? But, I know that really, I'm just too close to her and miss things because of that sometimes. Sometimes a really simple idea will take a half hour, even longer to figure out.. we have all these different strategies we can try to figure it out. A few nights ago after trying and trying.. finally I said 'can you show me?" (one of my favorite lines now) and outside we go running in the rain to get the 2 bananas we left in the backseat of the car. I thought that was hilarious. Its really kind of bizarre around here sometimes - Mom has a new name she creates for herself regularly (it changes each time) and often when I dont know what she wants I just ask if shes suggesting ice cream, or buying me something interesting or going to some fanciful place.. I have my ways to make her smile ..and turn it all around to the most important things in life - Having Fun!!

Last 2 Cinnamon Rolls, with a squeeze bottle of Macadamia Caramel Frosting (from Sweet Gratitude ; ) Yumm!!