Yerba Mansa.

 

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brought in the copper pot and scrubbed it from a winter over with walnut.  When i picked it up Out Side the handle broke off.  Bummer.

 

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dried Yerba Mansa leaves.  

Last summer,  late,  not long before her father died,  Fermin Chavez,  Fermin phonetically most like Fairmean,  took us at my request to all the places he knew that Yerba Mansa grows.  And he knew everyplace. His family here for generations.   The road his house is on,  the place where Thelma grew up is named after him.  There is a street sign..Fermin Chavez.   We harvested some plants and i brought a few home here and planted.  Tay,  that year was new and un~planted them,  trailing them wildly around in her mouth,  their roots flying.  But i think one Took.  We'll see.  Mike and Thelma planted many and with their Drip System, yesterday there was a space of about 6ftx8ft with runners all over.  So we harvested some…not the runners,  but the leaves and stems.   

i think about 3 years ago i dyed cloth with dry Yerba Mansa and it was the most elegant amber color.  I don't know what this pot will give…it's a different time of year,  the plant material is Spent.  But it's on the wood stove for Maybe.

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8 responses to “again”

  1. jude Avatar

    maybe is in between . i like it.

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  2. Michelle in NYC Avatar

    I don’t see any google reference to it as a dye but if you used it, it’s probably useful. Most plants are dye material under certain circumstances. It DOES have medicinal value though http://www.yerbamansa.org/YM-benefits.html, so I hope one of your roots took despite dear Tay. The pot is gorgeous.

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  3. grace Avatar

    i do too. Even just this way. Dry in the pot. Loved
    looking at it. Dry in the pot. and now, Wet in the pot.
    Becoming a soup. a piece of cloth in it. I like this too.
    Really, i think it’s just quite very much satisfying…if
    it’s just This. Putting dry leaves in a pot, adding water,
    a piece of cloth. These things….a Good Feeling, no matter.

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  4. grace Avatar

    i would so much love to know more about medicinals but maybe
    that’s another LifeTime. I WILL go to where he showed me
    and bring home more plants this year. Will be able to care for
    them better and Tay understands more and won’t pull them up.

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  5. Marti Avatar
    Marti

    Oh this made me so happy this morning, your beautiful glowing copper pot filled with Yerba Mansa and cloth. Positively inspired me to go out and retrieve one of my copper pots. My fingers felt like that old photo of a kid sticking his tongue on a metal flag pole in winter, fused to the pot as I keep my dye pots outside and it is 23 outside, light snow is coming later and maybe will turn to rain. None of that matters however because when nspiration hits and the urge to dye comes, who cares about the weather so off I went. Don’t have any Yerba but picked up a lot of dried leaves that we have in the compost piles, a bit of Spanish broom green stems and cheated by adding a T of chai tea…cut up a white cloth grocery bag as I’m out of cloth until I go to the thrift stores plus recycled some softly dyed old desert bloom cloths that only had a smattering of soft blue and voila, I have my own soup cooking on the stove and the house smells like a wet forest and it is good…

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  6. grace Avatar

    what could be better than Wet Forest….ahhhhhh.
    When we do the whirlwind shopping trip in the
    next couple weeks, we will find cloth for you.

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  7. ² Avatar
    ²

    that’s nice , make me smile at this early morning

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  8. dee Avatar

    thanks for telling how to say Fermin… I would’ve gotten it so wrong.

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