Last week our whole household was sick. I hate being sick. On top of it my husband was out of town. He only leaves home once a year for work and we seem always get sick while he is gone. The struggle become real when I found out we were out of cold medicine too. It meant that I would have to got to town. Did I tell you I hate being sick. Even a small cold can make me want to crawl in bed and die. I am glad I don’t get sick very often but when I do the house usually fall apart around me. That another story all of it’s own. It was just too much. I decided I was not going to go town, we were going to go old school. Years ago, one of my goals on the homestead was to leave modern medicine behind as much as I could. Why didn’t I stick with it? I don’t know. The world makes thing just to darn easy for us leave our old traditions behind, I guess.

So I went deep and I mean deep into the back of my book case to find all my old remedies. I have to stop here to tell you I am not a doctor and what I chose to use for my family may be right for me and not for you. Only you can decide.

The first remedies I found was lemon oil. Lemon oil is squeezed from the rind of a lemon. It can be used for many things like heartburn, stress, concentration, and emotional balance. It’s true I was feeling stressed and very emotionally unbalanced. Lemon oil can also help with congestion and mucus if rubbed on the chest or defused in a diffuser. For a runny nose, like I had, it is best applied to the bridge of your nose or on the inner wrist. I keep a small cash of oils in my medicine cabinet. I order all my oils from Doterra Oil Company. It worked wonders. I did have to reapply it to my wrists every hour but I could live with that. The next remedies was Eucalyptus oil to help with my congestion and sinus pressure. I put it on my wrist and the bottom of my feet to help me sleep at night. Fun fact. Did you know that Eucalyptus oil was widely used during WWI to control infection and influenza?

The third remedy was good food! Food you say, how can food be medicine. Good nutritious food has been should be our first defense against sickness.

“Let food be thy medicine and medicine be thy food” Hippocrates

I used my shredded chicken meat and bone broth, I pressure canned from our chickens this Summer, to make some rich Chicken Noodle Soup. It hit the spot. I loved how easy is was. I needed something easy and nutritious. I just had to open the jars, cut up some organic veggies, and throw it all into a large pot and let it simmer. I ate it for days.

My boys decided after the second day they wanted something different. They bounced back quicker then I do. They made some Chili and cornbread. My oldest son just had to brown some burger and pour in our pressure canned Chili Beans. I didn’t even have to leave the couch. My middle boys seems to bake something every day. I wasn’t hard for him to whip up a batch of cornbread. In fact I think he made two batches. One batch for dinner and the other to spread our home canned grape jelly all over.

YYMMMM!!!!!

Speaking of grapes, we also drank lots of water and our home canned grape juice. It was a great replacement to store bought Orange Juice that I usually drink when I am sick. Plus I made it low sugar! Don’t tell my boys, but extra sugar is not something a healing body needs.   

One good thing about last week was the beautiful weather. I think most of the days reached above 50F. The sun felt great. It made the chore easier to handle alone. The warmer temperatures also brought in a little extra milk from Amber. So it was a win, win. Tell next time.

Don’t let the world hold you back. Pray, Just Plant!