As a busy mom, you’d love to just cuddle your coughing child until they feel better, but the world keeps moving and you’ve got to keep up. Those days were and are awful, and they weighed heavily on my mind as I chose herbs for a supportive tincture. 

As a perimenopausal woman, you may be considering exploring certain herbs and botanicals to help manage the symptoms and challenges accompanying this natural life transition. Herbal medicine and women's wisdom are intertwined and rooted in nature and ancestral ways. 

In this blog, I'd like to share with you some of the most well-known and loved herbs for perimenopausal women.

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The kids are going back to school just as the flu season kicks off. Now that all the kids are in close quarters, that slight cough or cold becomes harder for little bodies to defend against because they are so exhausted and stressed - illness is never preferable, and it always seems to hit at the worst times. Who wants to miss the big field trip or stay home sniffling when their friends are back at school playing with each other? As parents of more than one child, you know that means the sickness will make the rounds to the entire family.

Thankfully, we have lots of healthy herbs to build and strengthen our kids' immune systems as they go back to school so they can stay as healthy as possible even if they've been exposed to bacteria and viruses.

In some ways, breastfeeding is an instinctual art, but in other ways, it is a learned skill that takes time and space to master. Have you ever looked in a breastfeeding book and the images looked blissful? Well those women have mastered breastfeeding. It takes time and lots of practice to master something. Let me give you an example of what I mean. Have you ever looked at a yoga book and thought that the poses looked easy? What happened when you tried the poses for the first time? Did you wobble and topple over? Right! We all do. The woman doing yoga has mastered the poses. She practiced and practiced for months and maybe years before she got the confidence up to have someone photograph her for the book.

It’s the same with breastfeeding. It looks natural and easy, but it is a learned skill that requires perfect practice to master. This type of mastery requires patience and persistence.

When the inevitable happens and a summer day ends with sunkissed cheeks – or, worse, uncomfortable sunburns, have a remedy on hand! Gels, salves, and sprays can all be soothing. You want a good sunburn remedy to sooth the pain, reduce inflammation, and moisten skin that will eventually dry out and peel.

Oh, sweet summertime! How I love you! The sun rises early and sets late. I get to spend more time in the garden and on long mountain hikes. Honestly, though, summertime in Arkansas is both beautiful and brutal! We have so many bugs, ticks, mosquitos, and chiggers. Fortunately, we also have fireflies! No seriously, during the summer, my whole family is riddled with itchy bug bites and insect stings for months.  

Today I'm going to share one of my favorite summertime herbs with you. Plantain is one of the best natural anti-itch bug bite relief remedy known to humankind! Stick around if you can relate to loving summer and needing relief from all the itchy bug bites.  

I'm not one to advocate a large stash of gadgets and products for babies. Instead, keep a few multi-purpose must-have items on hand. That way, you are not overly cluttered with duplicate items in your house. 

Having said that, these are the four herbal products for babies that I consider necessary items.

To truly honor the Summer Solstice, we need to reflect on who we were during the Winter Solstice. At that time, we planted seeds of who we are becoming. In December, we honored our ancestors and went into the dark foreboding places of our lives. We explored the cold darkness- the extreme Yin. In the deep dark places, we found beauty. We found the lost parts of ourselves, our forgotten talents and abilities. We found our inner light and shared it with the world.

Now during the Summer Solstice, the time of fire, heat, and bright light- the time of extreme yang. The sun is so bright it catches us and exposes us, like a deer caught in the headlights. Or like a bright spotlight revealing our vulnerabilities and our shadows. The stark truths about the hidden parts of ourselves are revealed. They become so clear and evident that they can no longer be ignored.