Spring and Peach blossom bath oil

Wednesday, 23 September 2015

Spring and Peach blossom bath oil

Spring is in full swing and it's been a couple of weeks now that my almost 40-year old peach tree has been blossoming and this year I decided to make some Peach Blossom bath oil! I was afraid we might get a cold spell (not that it can't still happen!) and that her buds would be killed.

Did you know that peach blossoms are edible? The flavour isn’t very strong; the petals are sweet, and taste like nectar. The flavour has been likened to almonds.

Peach blossoms are used for adding colour and flavour to dishes. Scatter pink peach blossoms onto a salad or soup or use as a garnish for a dessert. Peach blossoms can also add colour to drinks or punches. Pluck the petals from the base of the flower because the rest of the flower can be rather tough.

Peach Blossom bath oil

This time of the year is when I make my own bath oils with whatever is available in the garden. Using an essential base oil like Almond oil, I pour it into a clean Nescafé instant coffee bottle (because it has a wide mouth), add a couple of handfuls of peach blossom petals, screw the lid on tightly and leave it for about a week. I then pour it carefully into a pretty bottle (I have a great collection of those!), careful not to disturb the peach blossoms as they tend to break up and make the oil look murky. Once in the new bottle, just for good measure and for prettiness, I add a couple of fresh petals and voila! your own peach blossom bath oil!

Some interesting facts on peach trees :

- The blossoms of the Peach tree are pale to dark pink in color and have five petals.

- The Peach blossom appears before the Peach leaves.

- The delicate pink Peach blossoms may be large and showy, but sometimes are quite small.

- Peach trees (Prunus persica) grow 15-25 feet high. Their slender leaves have toothed edges.

- Peach trees start to bear fruit at 3 to 4 years old, reaching a peak at about 12 years.

- Peach trees are native to China and have been cultivated there for over 2500 years.

- Peach blossoms are in the same genus as plums, cherries, apricots and almonds.

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The Mystical world of trees

Many primitive people of noble highly developed civilisations treated trees, flowers and plants with great respect. Often trees were associated with having supernatural powers, being gods, ancestors and associated with different forms of worship, whilst flowers and plants were viewed too as also having medicinal applications and miraculous healing qualities.

The Druids, particularly, believed that trees possessed great mysterious powers especially the rowan and the oak. It is currently believed by some that the power and strength represented sybolically by the tree trunk could be the reason why standing stones were erected to reflect the respect bestowed upon nature. Since ancient times man has been influenced by trees throughout Europe, whilst we can see such images reflected in Mexican sculpture and carving, and also in Ancient Indian artefacts where sacred trees have played a central role in the belief systems. The Ancient Greeks too are known to have highly respected the power and nobility of trees as paintings and pottery indicate images of reverence and gratification.

Perhaps today the idea of touching wood, to ward off evil and encourage good luck, is a living remnant of our ancestor's spiritual practice, as in ancient times touching wood indicated respect of the tree and the mysterious powers of the spirit gods that inhabited the trees and woodlands. Currently, it is thought that to grow chives around the bottom of an apple tree will improve the general health of the tree. Perhaps learning more about the interdependency of flowers, herbs, plants and trees may lead us to a further understanding of how to improve our local environments? Browse through the associated sections on this site to know how this may be possible.

The Mystical world of spiders

‘If you wish to live and thrive, let the spider run alive’.

This may be a familiar saying and in the Middle Ages spiders were highly prized. It was considered the height of good breeding and sanitation to have spiders in the house as they served the useful purpose of getting rid of any flies which carried many dreaded diseases.

If you were lucky enough to see a spider spinning a web then it was considered a sure sign that within a short amount of time you would receive new clothes. Webs have long been said to have the power to stop bleeding from a wound if laid over it. It is thought that this belief stems from the Bible and how the baby Jesus was hidden from Herod’s soldiers in such a way.

In fact many of us today are still drawn by one of the most common of all beliefs in the ‘money spider’ - to find one dangling from your clothes or person was thought to be a sure sign of imminent prosperity in a venture.

The appearance of a web that was broken or was very small and unevenly made was thought to indicate that a terrible storm was about to arrive according to medieval weather lore.

When Robert the Bruce, King of Scotland (UK) 1306-29, was a fugitive it is said that he waited in a room, for his pursuers believing that the fight to save Scotland was at an end. He was ill, ready to accept defeat. Dangling from one of the roof beams was a spider spinning a web and attempting to secure it between seven beams. The spider struggled for some time with the seventh strand. Bruce watched closely and felt his strength return and his faith grow when the spider finally attached the web. This he took to be an omen that perhaps through hard toil success will be the outcome. It certainly affected Bruce as he came out from hiding and went on to ensure a separate identity for Scotland.

The Mystical world of Earth

This is the theory that planet Earth is a self-regulating organism, it was put forward by the British biologist James E. Lovelock in the early 1970's. Lovelock accepts that he was not the first to come up with this theory as in 1958 Alfred Redfield also offered the idea of the planet controlling a homeostasis. His main hypothesis was that the whole planet is biologically controlled by self regulation of all living things on planet Earth.

The belief is that humans along with all other life forms contribute too and are affected by all other life forms, this in turn creates a homeostasis. Those that do not support this theory believe instead that the Earth was created and is maintained by serendipity ? (happy coincidence), it is for the Gaia theory that our Ecology section is put under this heading along with recommended sites. The whole team at Mystical World Wide Web support any organisation that is attempting to correct some of the destructive nature of "Man and Commerce".

"This we know, all things are connected,
like the blood that unites one family.
All things are connected,
whatever befalls the Earth,
befalls the sons of the Earth.
Man did not weave the web of life he is merely a strand,
what ever he does to the Web he does to himself.
This we know.”

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Wednesday, 23 September 2015

Spring and Peach blossom bath oil

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