A Poison Ivy Remedy

This is Jewel Weed, which will cure an outbreak of poison ivy rash. Unfortunately, it is seasonal while poison ivy is not. The cure is in the stems, which when broken or crushed exudes a juicy substance that spread on the poison ivy rash will dry it up and it will go away. My husband has tried this on himself; he has a lifetime allergy to poison ivy and will break out just getting close to it. We have tried freezing the stems, freezing just the juice in order to keep it for year-round use and have been unsuccessful. Also, the stems do not get liquified if there is a drought, although the plant comes up and blooms. We have all orange blooms, but we have seen it blooming yellow in other places.

MimiRock at Castle Yonder

Visitors From Ohio

I was so happy to see my niece, Rosalie, and her husband, Leslie, last weekend for a very short visit. Here's a photo of the two of them with our beagle, Louie. Leslie spent the two days getting the paranoid beagle to make up with him, as you can see here.

MimiRock at Castle Yonder

Look What Crossed Our Path!

Earlier this summer our neighbors cut down a huge dying tree that had partially fallen across our road. Its base, this stump, was left standing up a slight hill to the right. This week it evidently loosened its grip on the earth in the monsoon-type rains we've been having and rolled down the hill and crossed our road. It stopped just a few feet before the hill drops off sharply to a creek at the bottom. That would be to the left on this picture. The photos show different angles of this tremendously huge tree that was probably way over 100 years old. We're not quite sure what we're going to do with it now. Options are to have our neighbor drag it off with his tractor, or push it on over into the creek, or leave it where it's at--it makes for a good conversation starter when we have visitors.

MimiRock at Castle Yonder