THE JOY OF VISITING NORTHERN MINNESOTA & GOOD FRIENDS

 Spent a day visiting a dear friend in northern Minnesota a week ago. My friend lives completely off-grid on over 80 acres of land in the middle of the forest surrounded by the most diverse wildlife (plants and animals) you will find in the state of MN. It truly is a little piece of heaven at his place. It was a great place to escape to for the day.

Here is my daughter and my friend checking out a wolf den.

We found some bobcat scat.

My friend showed us how to identify wild ginger by sight and taste.

We explored around all the beautiful trees growing on his property; sugar maples, aspen, cedar, white pine...

My favorite part was walking for hours in the woods taking in the awesome autumn smell in the air and learning about our surroundings.

Thank you, Barry. 

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2016 EARLY SUMMER PLANT WALK

This past weekend my oldest daughter and I attended another herbal workshop.  This time the location was a beautiful farm in North Central, MN and it was the perfect spot since there was a great variety of wild edibles and medicinals spread over the property, even this beauty… truly growing wild, there were just two plants on the 38 acres.

I think my daughter had the most fun hanging out with the chickens 

While I was busy eating wild foods

We talked about many plants including the a variety of uses for Solomon's Seal

and Black Medick

There wasn't a boring minute while Lise Wolff talked

I really can never get enough of these plant walks.  Lise Wolff is like an herbal encyclopedia that I wish I could just put on a shelf and open when needed.  How she mentally files away so much detail about medicinal and edible plants I will never know.

It truly was a great day!

For anyone who lives in MN and may be interested in these workshops, here is a link to Lise Wolff's website .  Her classes are not always posted on her site but if you sign up for emails she'll definitely send you one when a workshop or class is scheduled.

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STRAWBERRIES!!! TIME TO GET PICKING!

It is that time of year again, when the kids think they get to sleep in for the first time since the school year ended but instead I am dragging them out of bed at 6 am to go berry picking.

We headed out to our favorite farm yesterday, Sam Kedem's Nursery in Hastings. It was a perfect day; sun was shining and temps were decent.  When we arrived, there were more pickers than I am use to so we got busy before all of the berries were gone.  We ended up with 16 lbs worth of juicy organic strawberries and rushed home to make jam.  

As usual, what was suppose to be a family affair turned into my oldest daughter cutting up all of the strawberries and me finishing the rest on my own. LOL! That's ok, I enjoy it. 

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IT'S THAT TIME OF YEAR AGAIN

And yes, in case you are wondering (because I get asked this a lot), I think getting a real tree is better for the environment then getting an artificial tree (and supports the local economy) and this is why:

Earth 911
Living Green

Organic Gardening
Mother Jones

The absolute best live tree you can get to minimize impact to the environment is one that is grown on an organic tree farm or one that remains in a pot so it can be planted after the holidays (if you are in a location where you can keep the tree alive for replanting when the time comes - Minnesota not included).

The absolute best environmental choice of Christmas tree is no tree at all.

(oh, and the above is referring to tree farms and not just running out into the wilds on land you don't own and chopping down a tree, that would hardly be a good eco choice).

What do we do with our tree after Christmas? We put our tree outside in its stand and hang seed ornaments on it for the birds and we don't remove it until the tree is completely dead (brown and dry). Once the tree is obviously dead, which oddly isn't until the end of summer usually (balsams tend to be hardly little suckers after they are cut), we chop it up and use it in our fire place or we'll do something even more cool which I'll share in my next blog post so stay tuned.

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BUTTERFLIES, BUTTERFLIES, BUTTERFLIES

Yesterday we went to the Minnesota Science Museum to check out the Monarch exhibit.  If it wasn't for a time constraint I could have stayed in the butterfly house all day, as it was we had to bribe Aiyana with better things to come just to get her to leave.  

Who knew insects could be so fascinating but I'm finding myself more and more interested in learning about them, and not just the pretty ones either.

Mating pair.

Apparently I am the only one who thought this was fascinating. Mating butterflies. Maya kept telling me to stop taking pictures but I thought it was cool to see.

Monarch (male) - the swollen pouches (circles/balls) along the veins near the ends of it wings tells you it is a male.

Painted Lady Butterfly hitching a ride on Aiyana's head.

Maya and Monarch posing for the camera.

Painted Lady Butterfly

Monarch (female) having a conversation with my husband.  I think she had a crush on him :P

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FUN IN THE BOUNDARY WATERS

I meant to post this much earlier but I didn't get around to uploading all of my BWCA pictures to the computer until now.

In early July our family took a trip up to the BWCA (Boundary Waters Canoe Area), one of our most favorite places to visit in the U.S.  We spent 4 days canoeing, hiking, fishing, camping in addition to looking for bears and wolves.  Unfortunately we didn't find any wolves or bears :( but maybe next time.

It was a great trip (aside from the whole "losing my dog" situation).  Our guide Kate was absolutely amazing!  We met Kate back in winter 2011 when we were up in Ely for a Wintergreen dogsledding adventure but we didn't have the pleasure of her guiding us on any sort of trip until this year.  She's fantastic with kids and overall just wonderful with families.  Our daughter Middy is tough to please but Kate kept her busy, didn't take no for an answer, and in the end Middy really enjoyed being in the BWCA again and having Kate as a mentor.  Middy learned to bait a hook with leeches, remove her fish from the line, build and start a campfire, prepare and cook camp food, identify wild plants, etc...  Some of the valuable things that not many kids get to learn today.

I really liked that the trip our guide Kate and the owner Jason from Ely Outfitting Company planned for our family was perfect for the energy and enthusiasm level of our kids.  We stayed at one camp site this year, were able to visit several different areas in the BWCA, divide equal time between hiking around and canoeing and we also had some fun fishing and the kids were able to squeeze in some swimming.  Kate is such an awesome guide that when we had one day of solid rain she still managed to keep the entire family entertained by playing cards and other games.  

I recommend Ely Outfitting Company and any one of Jason's guides to anybody interested in visiting the BWCA and not wanting to think about possibly getting lost because you have no idea how to read a topography map or a compass (like me) or if you don't want to go through all the work of packing enough food, finding and transporting a canoe and other equipment.  With Ely Outfitting Company it is all done for you and worth every penny spent.  

Here are some of our pix from this years visit to the BWCA:

Gypsy resting in the canoe.

Pure and beautiful BWCA water (courtesy of Kate Ford).   

Aiyana releasing her floating art (courtesy of Kate Ford).  Kate had the kids create art from pieces of nature and when they released their floating art into the lake they were to make a wish.

Sunset in the BWCA (courtesy of Kate Ford).  Kate got up really early to take some fantastic shots of the BWCA.

Early morning in the BWCA (courtesy of Kate Ford).

Middy with one of the fish she caught (courtesy of Kate Ford).  This little baby was returned to the lake.

Me showing Aiyana how to bait a hook with a worm (courtesy of Kate Ford)
This was actually a good lesson for Yana.  She learned a bit about the process of fishing and what it all entails in addition to seeing a living thing going from nature to her plate.  She decided that keeping fish and eating it wasn't for her (she liked catch and release much better), she also decided on this trip that she'd much rather use fake bait over live bait.

Kate and Middy sunk the canoe and played around in the water with it (courtesy of Kate Ford)

Kate making us dinner.

Pictographs (If I remember correctly these were done by the Ojibwe).

Kate, Maya, Gypsy,  Middy, Ulises, Me, Aiyana

Our little crew in the BWCA

Maya Fishing.

Tea made from nature (I forget the name of the plant)

Scenery from above our campsite.

Wintergreen.

Ulises and I.

Our state bird: the loon.

Kate teaching Middy to put a leech on a hook (you have to look closely to see the leech on Kate's boot)

Aiyana waiting for a big fish.

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