Loving Lemon Balm, Part 2

Lemon Balm has so many great benefits, I had to write two blogs about it!

• Lemon balm also has anti-viral properties. It can be used topically and internally for viruses like herpes and shingles. It mixes well with another anti-viral herb, licorice. A suggested formula would be 3 parts lemon balm to 1 part licorice as a tea or tincture.

• Lemon Balm is good for your heart. It helps to lower blood pressure and can be mixed with motherwort to strengthen the heart.

• Lemon Balm is helpful for colds and flu. Drink hot lemon balm tea to help with the aches and pains that accompany fever. It can also help to induce sweating to break a fever.

• Lemon Balm also can lower the thyroid and is useful in hyperthyroidism. However, it is good to avoid too much use of lemon balm is you have a hypothyroid.

Lemon Balm essential oil has also been studied to be helpful with calming the agitated state of Alzheimer’s. To order the best, high quality organic lemon balm (melissa) essential oil, visit the Floracopeia website.

Herbal Medicine Making: Tinctures, the Folk Method

by Atava Garcia Swiecicki, Herbalist and Medicine Maker in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Fresh scullcap, ready to tincture

There are many ways to prepare and preserve herbs for daily use. One way is to make an extraction in alcohol, or a tincture. Alcohol extracts and concentrates many of the plant constituents and is also a great preservative.

The folk method for making tinctures is simple. Just buy some of your favorite hard alcohol (about 80 proof) like vodka, brandy or tequilla. Put your herbs in a glass mason jar and leave some room on the top. Cover the herbs with enough alcohol so that there is about 1 inch above the herb.

Now, place your herbs in a cool dark place and let them sit for one month. It is nice to give your herbs a shake every now and then to keep things well mixed.

The alcohol-herb mixture is called an herbal maceration. In one month, you can strain out the liquid by using cheese cloth or muslin. Now you can store the liquid tincture in the right sized amber glass jar.

The leftover herbs from the tincture making process is called the marc. I like to give my marc to my garden or guardian tree in the yard.

Full Moon Herbal Medicine Making

San Francisco Bay Area, California, USA

On the full moon on August 5, 2009 I received my order of fresh, organic passiflora (passionflower) and scutellaria barbata(scullcap barbata) from Sonoma County Herb Exchange. I prepared the herbs outside by the light of the full moon. Both tinctures sat all night out in the moonlight by the Buddha. Full moon medicine making adds extra strength and magic to the final product.

I added a big piece of rose quartz to the passionflower maceration and a piece of clear quartz to the scullcap. In this way, the healing properties of these gemstones also becomes a part of the medicine.