A Rocky Mountain Plant Worth Protecting

When the long mountain winter begins to loosen its grip and the snow slowly melts back from the forest floor, the bears wake. After months of hibernation their bodies are stiff, their digestive fire is low, and their immune systems vulnerable. The early spring landscape does not yet offer berries, lush greens, or abundant forage. A deep intelligence guides the bears to seek out powerful medicine rooted in the mountain soil.

To balance Kapha is to invite lightness, movement, and renewal into the body and spirit.

Handmade paper with wildflower seeds that you can plant right in the earth.

A fleeting sense of balance in the wheel of the year. Night and day are of equal length and polarities are in equilibrium - dark and light, masculine and feminine, inner and outer.

A Ritual for Honoring Thresholds

Ghee is the most revered and auspicious substance of Ayurvedic medicine. Here are just a few of the reasons why it is so good for our bodies and why you might want to start adding a daily dose to your diet.

A Sap moon marks the transition from winter to spring and the spring equinox. Mother Earth fluctuates between warm thawing temperatures during the day and freezing temperatures at night. Life begins to wake up flow again, slowly at first.

Nettle packs a big nutritional punch with its vitamin, mineral and antioxidant content. This herb is often used as a tonic, meaning it supports, strengthens and tones.

Spring equinox ritual and silliness.

Some part of me tracks them even when I am asleep. I’m awake now, but before I open my eyes, I reach for them with my senses. Sight isn’t very useful at this time. I know the state of them mostly by smell. For now, they smell earthy and a little sweet; no sourness or sharp pungency to send alarm bells racing through my blood.

The Kapha time is when the heavy, cloudy and earthy tendencies dominate our bodies and minds. It is the beginning years of life, the spring time of the year and the morning time from 6-10am.

She is a great mother. Her fire is the fierce protection of life. When threatened, she rises like a mountain of earth—vast, immovable. Her power pours outward as love, a river forever flowing. Despite her great size, she moves with the swiftness of wind when she must. Within her lives the potency of emptiness, and she is strengthened by the nourishment of all the elements.

Transformation happens long before it is visible.

Brigid, a cloaked embodiment of Mother Nature, traveled by foot from village to village with her companions. Where she walked the earth, tiny sparks awakened in her footsteps. She held an oak staff in hand and a golden cloak wrapped around her shoulders.

Ghee is one of Ayurveda’s most treasured winter medicines because it is, quite literally, liquid sunlight transformed through plants and animals. Grass absorbs the summer rays and is eaten by the cow, who turns it into milk. Humans separate the milk into butter, and finally clarify it into a refined, golden nourishment. In the dark season, eating ghee is a way of feeding our inner radiance and weaving a thread through the seasons of Mother Nature.

Winter is a discerning ruler of life and death with a surprising alchemy. It sends us on a journey which belies refinement and valor when we travel the path wisely. The dark and cold are a sharp knife that prunes and consolidates the life-force. This may feel harsh but it can clarify what is of essence and awaken our dreams. In winter, the element of fire stoked in the hearth, kindled in our bellies, and nested in starlight becomes central and sacred.  If we weather winter well, we emerge more rooted, more resilient and more awake than when we began. 

Watching the local birds outside our window is a favorite late winter family activity. Treating the birds connects us to the wildlife that is still thriving even in the stillness of deep winter.

The deepest dark of the year on earth, shines the brightest of heavenly lights in the night sky.

When people come to Mother Mountain to make wreaths, I hope they learn a craft—but also something deeper. My current curiosity is how humans stay well through ritual, culture, and connection to the natural world. Wreath making is a perfect place to explore this intersection: where physiology meets psychology, where spiritual practice meets daily habit, where ancient traditions meet modern science.