Waxing Crescent Moon in Sagittarius | Harvest Rituals; Making Use Of The Season's Bounty

At the dinner table last night, I shared that I feel a strong responsibility to gather up as much of the abundance that we have here, this time of year. So much labor over the past few months has gone into planting, weeding, fertilizing, watering, and tending to the garden and the green house and the orchard. So, I feel the need to honor the work, by working further, to harvest, and dry, and can, and pickle, and put in the freezer, until the frost takes all the life and puts it back into the soil.

This time of year, I feel my energy begin to slow down. The heat and dryness of summer has worn out its welcome, I am ready for the days to shorten and for the quiet that autumn brings.

I am more motivated this year to provide hearty greens through the winter. This past week I cleared out the green house and planted snow peas, scallions, and broccoli raab, in one wide bed. In the other beds I planted kale, tatsoi, radishes, radicchio, and in a bed of its own a special garlic variety called Chemyan.

I gather up seed from bolted lettuces, chard, and spinach. Seed heads from the few radishes I left in the soil since spring, will gift me with enough seed to continue the cycle. The garden looks wild this time of year, with most of the plants going to seed. Can I encourage all of you to become seed collectors?

There are a few dozen jars in the pantry filled with dried herbs. The perennial herbs in my garden are a great pleasure to me. They all are great pollinator plants for the many kinds of bees in our area. They are a lovely fresh component to all of my cooking in the warm seasons, and they are a much appreciated commodity when dried and used in the winter. Herbal infused honey, herb infused vinegars, herb infused oils, are all ways I use to capture the magic of nature.

Working so closely with nature is an exhausting pleasure. I am looking for a few of you who would like to come and experience being nurtured and nourished while I fill your imaginations with endless ways to use the bounty of nature in your kitchens, in your first-aid kits, in your skin care routines, in your arts, in your desserts… See you at Hunter Moon Homestead in 2024.