Herbs for Children’s Health: How to Make and Use Gentle Herbal Remedies for Soothing Common Ailments. A Storey BASICS® Title PDF
Preview Herbs for Children’s Health: How to Make and Use Gentle Herbal Remedies for Soothing Common Ailments. A Storey BASICS® Title
Contents Dedication Preface Chapter One: Herbal Medicine for Children Chapter Two: The Best Herbs for Children Chapter Three: Treating Common Childhood Ailments Chapter Four: How to Make Herbal Remedies Recommended Reading Resources Index Other Books by Rosemary Gladstar The Storey Basics Series Share Your Experience! Copyright To all of the earth’s children, small and large, young and old. May we steward the plants and the earth they grow upon in such a way that they remain in sweet abundance for future generations of plant lovers, so that when you walk upon the land with your grandchild’s hand in yours, you can show them the same sweet medicines of the earth. Preface As I was finishing the last pages of the first edition of this book, my young nieces Samantha (then age 10) and Lindsey (age 6) were coming over to spend a night with their “Aunt Rosie” so we could share a day of herbal delights. “I’ve been planning for the last few days the things I wish to do with them,” I wrote. “There’s so much that’s green and beautiful and so many wonderful things to do with plants. We’ll make my famous herbal face cream, make lip balms, and maybe do herbal steams and facials.” These young girls are fully grown now, and they both still have that deep love of the earth and its natural gifts that was nurtured in their childhood. My granddaughter Lily is next in line to come to Grammy’s “School of Herbal Healing.” Lily, already eight years old, has grown up on an herb farm and knows her herbs quite well. Recently she invited her entire class on a field trip to her family farm, Zack Woods Herb Farm. Though her parents were there to help, it was Lily who took her fellow students on an herb walk, proudly pointing out the wild plants and the rows of neatly growing medicinal herbs. She had fun instructing her friends how to use them in salves, in teas, and as poultices, and judging by their enthusiasm and excitement, the kids were all interested. We’ll be taking Lily camping in a few days, and just like when her older cousins came to visit, I have planned an assortment of activities that are plant-related. We will make plant presses to press some of the common wildflowers and leaves for her first herbarium. I’ll remind Lily why we don’t pick some of the woodland plants growing around our campsite — either because they are rare, so we want to help protect them, or else because some plants, like poison oak, protect themselves with toxic oils that cause a painful rash to those who are foolish enough to grab them. We’ll also make a special campers’ flower essence to remind us of our trip together. And maybe on one of the warm summer evenings we’ll stop to watch the fireflies and tell the stories that the trees are whispering to us. . . . It is at times like these that I am reminded most of my own early encounters with plants. I am forever thankful for the lessons my grandmother taught me as a child in her gardens. Though I have gone on to study plants with great teachers and have traveled around the world to learn ever more about them, it is still those teachings that I learned at the feet of my grandmother that were planted the deepest and have stayed with me the longest. No matter how little you think you may know about the plants — or how much — that knowledge is a gift to pass on. And it’s especially important today to pass those little seeds of wisdom and knowledge along to children. What we learn to love as children, we will love, respect, and protect as adults. It is these children and this generation that will be the future caretakers of our herbal traditions and the stewards of healing plants. Let’s teach them well. C H A P T E R O N E Herbal Medicine for Children
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