Wednesday, July 23, 2008

miracle rub

I’ve been seriously interested in herbal remedies
ever since Josiah was about 4 months old.
I’d read an article with a recipe for a sleep tincture
and decided I’d give it a whirl.
What did I have to lose ~ we were already not sleeping.
So I followed the recipe.
Exactly.
Well, not exactly exactly
but close.
I followed the procedure exactly.
To my delight
the tincture worked!
It didn’t help Josiah as much as I’d hoped
but it worked wonders with Jeremiah!
And I’ve been hooked on natural remedies ever since
(prior to that, we were pretty much no-remedy,
so while the kids aren’t always thrilled with my potions,
they are glad to have some relief from their ailments.)
~
I bought my first two herb books
The ABC Herbal and The How To Herb Book.
First time I read ‘em
they confused the fire out of me,
especially the How to Herb one.
But the more familiar I became with all these ‘new’ words and ideas
the more sense I could make of it all.
Using some of the info I gathered from The ABC herbal
and a No Greater Joy article about I-can’t-remember-what
I created my own Miracle Rub
when I had a cold with a sore throat
(I couldn’t use my kiddos as guinea pigs…)
And the stuff worked!
We have since come up with lots of uses for Miracle Rub
(thus the name.
Tyler questioned the use of ‘miracle’
but I assured him, all the ingredients were from God,
so it was a worthy name.
And
the stuff does work miracles!)
~
We use Miracle Rub for the following:

Sore throats ~ even Strep
Simply rub a bit all over your neck
and lymph nodes anytime you feel pain
~
Earaches & infections
Put a bit of warm oil on q-tip & rub gently in ear
Rub some around the ear, too
Repeat a few times a day till pain is gone
* the oil must be warmed, cold oil could cause additional pain*
~
Congestion
Rub on back & chest (and neck & nose…..)
* use caution if you do this right after a warm bath
while pores are all open ~ it may feel a bit ‘hotter’*
~
Prevention
Rub on soles of feet any time you’ve been exposed to illness,
think you have been exposed, are feeling sick in any way
or just want to smell like Christmas.
When I remember,
I put in on everyone’s feet morning and night
all during cold & flu season
~
Warts
Needs lots of repeated treatments
~
You could use it for tooth pain
But a dot of straight clove oil would probably be better,
Although I do rub some around the jaw and ears
when someone is teething, for additional comfort
~
and now
the recipe
~
Miracle Rub
Crush a couple cloves of garlic and put in a tiny bowl
Cover with a olive oil
no more than a TBS or you’ll end up with a ton of this stuff
(which is okay, you can just store in the fridge and use later….)
Heat in microwave
(or set bowl in a shallow pan of water on stove)
for just a minute or so.
We’re getting the oil really warm, but not cooking the garlic.
Cover warm oil and garlic and leave it on the counter
anywhere from 5 minutes to a couple hours.
Strain out garlic, keeping the oil.
To the garlic oil extract you just made
add clove essential oil
until it ‘smells like Christmas’.
(you can also add lemon, orange & cinnamon essential oils;
they all add their own helpful properties,
but just clove oil works great,)
Next
note how much oil you have
and add 4 to 5 times that in olive oil
(if you have a TBS of garlic/clove oil combined,
add about ¼ cup olive oil)
This step is so important because some essential oils are very strong
and would ‘burn’ the skin
if you didn’t add more olive oil as a ‘carrier oil’
If a little one cries right after application on tender skin,
you probably need to add a bit more olive oil to the mix.
~
Its best to store this in a dark bottle, but any jar will do.
I like to keep an ounce or so out
and the rest in the fridge till we need it.
~
Keep in mind,
I’m not a herbalist or an apothecaries
just a momma who found something that
Works For Me!


1 comment:

  1. We love to use garlic oil. We use it as ear drops when the kids get an earache - I don't know for SURE that it works, but we have 7 children and have NEVER had antibiotics for ear infections!

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