Scottish Harvest

We have had an adventure up to the Boarders of Scotland last week when we visited Traquair Festival. Fi and Lily Driving all the way from Dorset, Dieter and Harry took the truck and Elektra and I the train. On arrival in Edinburgh we decided to climb the 257 steps of Scott’s memorial to get superb views of the city sky line.
Sir Walter Scott, 1st Baronet born 1771 was a prolific Scottish historical novelist and poet, popular throughout Europe during his time, the first English-language author to have a truly international career in his lifetime. His works are classics and included Ivanhoe n Rob Roy which I have to confess I have never read or even seen the films! To do list……
I had never been to Edinburgh and was very impressed I would like to go back and spend more time there definitely. The people were so kind, warm and friendly and the general vibe, building and green spaces are great.
Traquair is the oldest inhabited house in Scotland and with its grand avenue, amazing Yew tree, confusing maze, hospitably host Catherine Maxwell Stuart and noisy peacock it’s a truly special place to see. The Fair when well and we met loads of lovely folk a lot of whom had come down from Edinburgh but some as far a field as Dresden in Germany!
After the fair we when on a heather hunt an what a joy to see purple covered hills both little Lily and Elektra helped us to collect our harvest the sweet smelling delicate flowered heather is seldom seen in herbal commercial preparations and is lacking from most Materia Medicas. It is a valuable urinary antiseptic with both kidney and liver actions and a needed ingredient of our Piss Ease Tea used for Cystitis symptoms a strong infusion of heather tea can alleviate burning sensations almost immediately.
It is also the other ingredient of our Clear Vision Drops -
Action not Reaction

Heather is all about patience and imparts her wisdom gently. As a herb of the liver and urinary system she helps us to truly understand the self and our part within our community and relationships traditionally used for purification and stimulation.

Bilberry is renowned for its affinity with the blood vessels especially of the eyes, giving us the ability to see clearly. The circulatory aspects push ideas and concepts that may have reached stagnation. It is nourishing and nutritive, as with all of the berries.
Meadowsweet is another prolific herb on the Scottish Boarders everywhere lining the wayside are creamy white, candy floss, almond scented heads of flowering Filipendula when you take some of the tiny individual flowers that make up the heads to taste they are drying and one can make out the aspirin connection clearly.
With very long history of herbal use, it was one of the three most sacred herbs of the Druids. Unlike the extracted aspirin, which can cause gastric ulceration at high doses, the combination of constituents in meadowsweet act to protect the inner lining of the stomach and intestines whilst still providing the anti-inflammatory benefits of aspirin. It is going to go in our Joint Juice Tea and also our Liver Cleanse Digestive Delight mix.

Meadowsweet is a herb of Jupiter and I have used it to help folk recognise the good in themselves. In particular with one gentleman who was very hard on himself and had a distorted sense of self I made him a little amulet of meadowsweet to keep under his pillow with a few words of affirmation it helps to break down rigid barriers and soften tensions.