How to make a Skin-Healing Salve from "Weeds," Part 1 (video)

I love learning about how to use plants, both as food, and as medicine. I'm certainly a beginner when it comes to making my own treatments, but I'm so happy to share what I learn, as I learn. It pains me to think about all the knowledge that has been lost, and so I'm tramping my own little way to chase after the past however I can, and maybe glean some little bits of wisdom so that I can better care for my family.

Of course, I goes without saying to use discretion when testing out homemade formulas. So rather than starting with the really potent herbs, I'm slowly building up my knowledge with plants that are as innocuous as they are helpful. That's the wonderfully kind thing about working with many plants: all they really can do is either help heal and nourish, and even if they don't seem to resolve the problem, I like knowing that they haven't hurt the situation either. And I've never experienced any of the awful side-effects that I've had with OTC drugs. So, for example, if the ginger-mint tea doesn't settle my upset stomach, at least it didn't also make me lightheaded to add insult to injury.

I know the FDA and Big Pharma certainly don't support the idea of food as medicine or of people self-treating before turning to their products (how would they make their billions??). And while I believe there's an appropriate time for certain medications (like an epi-pen, for example), I'm chagrined by how thoughtlessly we, as a society, just pop a pill, not knowing its contents, when we have the slightest discomfort. In our family, we'd rather have the first line of defense be rest, nutritious food, and natural treatments. About 99% of the time, those have resolved our ailments, and taught us something along the way.

So, in this video, we share our first attempt at making a healing salve from scratch. If all goes well, this should be good for bites, minor burns, stings, and scrapes. We've used this formula for making a soothing lavender and rose hip lotion (I used it on our son when he was an infant for diaper rash, and it worked beautifully!), but I've never attempted harvesting my own plants and extracting their active compounds. THIS IS EXCITING.

The main ingredient of this salve will be the humble Broadleaf plantain and English Plantain.

We'll also be mixing in red clover blossoms...

...And the promisingly-named Self-Heal, or Heal-All.

In this first part, I'm just going to be going out, collecting, and drying the herbs. The actual salve-making will come in part two! As I mention in the video, I love how all three of these known healing plants are common lawn "weeds." They're all SUPER common, literally forcing themselves to grow in nooks, crannies, and cracks in the sidewalk. How graciously they've been provided! And the best part about plants like this is that they are all edible as well (the red clover is particularly delicious).

Knowing that my skin will absorb what I put on it, I hope to never slather a medicine on my skin that I wouldn't be willing to eat (doesn't that cause some sobering realizations!).

I hope this piques your interest in getting to know the plants in your lawn a little better. They may very well have an edible and medicinal application that could be far more beneficial than a plain lawn of boring ol' grass!