We hope the tea drinkers out there will enjoy this list.
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We all know you can drink tea, and I’m sure many of us know one or two other things a person can do with a tea bag, but take a look at this list of 15 things you might not have thought of:

1. Put some tea bags in your drawers for a fresh scent on your clothes or linens.

2. Stain fabric with tea to make it appear aged.

3. A wet tea bag is soothing on shaving cuts and burns.

4. Seed your lawn! Sow grass seed in small bare spots with a used tea bag. Make sure the bag is moist and place it in the dirt where you want the grass. Sprinkle it with seed. The bag will hold moisture and gradually decompose.
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It doesn’t take a health nut to know that herbal teas are all the rage. They are healthy, tasty, varied, and a great substitute to your morning cup of coffee. But, surprisingly, they are also quite easy to make.

One of the great things about easy to make herbal teas is the control: you can include or omit the herbs you want. If you are hoping to stimulate your mind, you can include vanilla. If you are hoping to fight off a cold, you can include sage. If you are hoping to soothe an upset stomach, you can include lemongrass. Basically, if you have an ailment, you can find a herb to assist you in beating it.
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From old fashioned blueberries to the fad of the acai berry, berries, when it comes to health, have us surrounded. While this is true, not all berries are as well known as the strawberry or the raspberry. Take, for instance, the cedar berry. Chances are, you don’t know a lot about this berry and the benefits you are missing out on.

Cedar berries are a berry of many aliases. They sometimes go by one-seed juniper, cherrystone juniper, New Mexico Cedar, West Texas Juniper, or their scientific name, Juniperus monospermous. Whatever you want to call them, cedar berries hail from the cedar berry tree, a tree with a long history in Native American medicine.

The cedar berry tree is great at flourishing in places of poor soil and can often thrive where other trees suffer. In many instances, the cedar berry tree reaches heights of twenty five feet.

The cedar berry tree is found in the Southwestern US, including New Mexico, Texas, and Colorado. In the former, New Mexico, these trees run rampant and cover nearly seventy five percent of the state.

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I don’t know about you but the winter is an awful time for me in regards to skin care. Much like so many others, I suffer from dry skin and cracks in skin because of the dry air and cold winds. As it gets colder, dryer and windier, it’s critical to protect your skin from the elements.

It becomes very important to take proper care of your skin in the winter. One way to make sure your skin stays healthy and beautiful is by using essential oil blends. Essential oils will ensure you and your skin will look dazzling and attractive.

Essential oils have many wonderful uses. You’ll find many of these oils found in aromatherapy products, perfumes, creams, lotions, and bath products. They are used to promote mental health and relaxation along with physical health. Plus, the aroma they give off is absolutely splendid.

Did you know that essential oils are a great therapy for achieving better skin? It’s true. Essential oil blends hold many vitamins which strengthen and rejuvenate your skin. Normally only a few drops are essential oils needed.

Here are a few easy skin care tips you can do in your own home using essential oil blends:

• Try adding eight to ten drops of essential oils into your next bath. There is nothing more relaxing than sitting in a hot bath filled with hot water and essential oils. Another option is to use cool water and essential oil blends to calm an inflammation.
• Try massaging parts of your body with an essential oil. About twenty to twenty-five drops of essential oil with two ounces of canola or any other vegetable oil works great.
• Essential oils are great for facial compresses. Put two to five drops of essential oil in a basin filled with water, stir, and soak it all up with a clean washcloth. Squeeze out any excess water and apply the washcloth to your face. Sit back and relax.
• Use essential oils along with moisturizing products. Ten to twenty drops for every two ounces works best.

I recommend using all of these beauty tips. These are so many different uses for essential oil blends that it would fill up this entire blog! Try some this winter. Your dry skin will thank you for it.

Like its Korean counterpart (to which it has no relation), ashwaganda is classified as an “adaptogen.” In herbal therapy, this means that it aids in resistance to the effects of:

• stress
• trauma
• anxiety
• fatigue

Overall, an adaptogen strengthens immune function and physiological defenses against any kind of stressor, whether it is a physical injury, a chemical toxin or a biological pathogen, thus normalizing bodily functions and maintaining a state of homeostasis, or stable and healthy condition.

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Dried kelp comes from seaweed, under the Latin botanical name of Ascophyllum nodosum. It also goes by the common names of egg wrack, knotted wrack or knotted kelp. It is found in the northern Atlantic Ocean, the northwest coast of Europe and East Greenland. It is thought that there are several dried kelp benefits that may come from the use of this interesting sea vegetable.

Kelp flourishes in sheltered estuaries. Plants of this seaweed have been shown to live for ten or even fifteen years. The plants will live longer the fewer stresses are placed on them in terms of temperature changes and exposure to waves, as well as the salinity of the water.

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Can artichoke extracts be used for cholesterol control? A research study published in a 1998 edition of the Journal of Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics described experiments in which extracts made from artichoke leaf was shown to lower levels of LDL cholesterol in laboratory rats.

What About People?

Does this work in humans? Scientists in Germany believed there were some benefits. That same year, the country’s Commission E (somewhat analogous to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, which until a few years ago regulated the use of therapeutic herbs in that country) approved the use of artichoke leaf for the treatment of certain digestive problems, though not specifically for lowering cholesterol.

In 2008, a the results of a study on adult human subjects was published in the journal Phytomedicine showed similar benefits in lowering cholesterol levels with the use of artichoke leaf extract has had been achieved in laboratory rats ten years earlier.

The Mechanism

Artichoke leaf appears to work by preventing the digestive system from absorbing cholesterol into the blood system. The way this works is by stimulating the production of bile in the liver. Bile, as you may remember, is a substance that is excreted from the liver and enters the digestive tract through the gall bladder. It acts as a sort of surfactant, or “wetting agent” (like dish soap), which aids in the emulsion of fats and enabling these to be absorbed in the small intestine. Somehow, the action of biochemical agent cyanin within artichoke leaf causes the low-density cholesterol (LDLs) to pass through without being absorbed.

A Supplement, Not a Cure

It should be noted that therapy with artichoke leaf extract is most effective with combined with proper diet and exercise. In particular, persons using artichoke leaf extract should eat a diet that is high in soluble fiber (such as whole oats and other unprocessed grains) and substitute saturated fats (such as lard or butter) with unsaturated fats like olive oil. A minimum of 30 minutes of aerobic exercise daily is also recommended.

Sources:

Curries are traditionally spicy vegetable dishes found in many regions in Asia and India, although some dishes may also include tofu or meats. The word “curry” can also refer to a sauce that is used to spice up vegetable or meat dishes. Curry spices are a spice blend that varies a bit by region, but often includes a base of fenugreek, turmeric, cumin and coriander, and may also include ginger, black pepper, garlic, red pepper, fennel seed, nutmeg, cinnamon, mace, clove, cardamom, mustard seed and clove. You can purchase premixed curry spice blends, or you can buy individual spices and mix your own custom blends.

How to Make your own Biryani:
One dish that features curry Indian spices is called biryani. It features vegetables and rice in a wonderful spicy sauce, and chicken can be added to it if you wish. After placing some butter in a saucepan, you can add some Indian spices such as turmeric, cumin, coriander, cardamom and cinnamon to the pan over low heat and toast the spices for a couple of minutes, being careful not to let the pan get too hot because they can burn easily. After, stir in the rice and toast it for a minute, then add water and boil, cooking the seasoned rice. As the rice cooks, in another skillet melt butter, and saute onion, garlic and ginger, to which you will add raisins, almonds, and more coriander, cumin and cardamom, all the while stirring. To this mixture, add your vegetables. You can include your favorites, but some that work well in this dish are new potatoes, green beans, carrots and cauliflower or broccoli. Add a bit of water to the vegetables, raise the heat and cook them with the lid on the pot and then removing the lid to reduce the water, until the vegetables are tender. To finish, simply add the seasoned rice to the seasoned vegetables and mix together.

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Many people are concerned about the number and kinds of chemicals used in ordinary, everyday products that you use on your body on a regular basis. Synthetic chemicals can be found in toothpastes, shampoos and body lotions. If you are one of those people who have allergies to certain chemicals, it can be challenging finding personal care products such as body lotion that can work well for you and not cause itching or rashes on your skin. It is fairly easy to create your own organic body lotion, however. When you make personal care products for your own use, you know exactly what the ingredients are, and can avoid those to which you are allergic. Even if you do not have allergies, it is a healthier choice to avoid chemicals and use natural and organic products that, after being applied to the skin, will sink in and enter your body.

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Many of our readers enjoyed the article on using soapnut berries as an eco laundry substitute.

We wanted to pass along some other great ideas from our friend’s at Herbal Recipe Journal. Enjoy these All Natural Cleaners for the Home and Recipes for Natural Cleaning products. Now you can replace those chemicals!

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