Head’s up, y’all. Rob’s giving away one of his beautiful keepsake boxes.
Sign up for the Wild Ozark Woodworking announcement list to enter. The contest is open only for shipping to U.S addresses.
The winner will be selected on October 1, and we’ll send the announcement out to the list! List members will get announcements with photos whenever a new woodworking creation is underway.
This Woodworking email list is not the same as the one I send out with lots of rambling. That’s the Wild Ozark Musings newsletter. This one is strictly to let folks know when Rob has a new creation to sell. If you love hand-crafted woodworking items, you’ll want to see the things he makes.
Join using the form below the announcement.
About the voice behind this blog, Madison Woods
I'm a creative old soul living way off the beaten path with my husband in the wild Ozark Mountains. Besides homesteading, growing plants & making crafty things and newsletters, I write books and stories. My rural fantasy fiction, written under the pen name, Ima Erthwitch, usually takes place in a much altered Ozarks.
Ways You Can Support Wild Ozark
Spread the Word
Share this post or tell a friend about my website. "From little acorns do mighty oaks grow." A little thing like sharing could start momentum! This is a free and tremendously powerful way to help.
Unique gifts, books, and information for the nature lovers in your life. Adding more items as time allows: Wild Ozark Nature Boutique.
Become a Patron
A small monthly stipend of even $1 from enough supporters will help me continue the educational outreach and construction of habitat gardens. More information here: https://www.patreon.com/wildozark
We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program; an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites.
Thank you for reading and/or participating in this Wild Ozark community! ~ Madison Woods
Have you found a wonderfully delicious way to use our syrup? If so, post your recipe in the comments and share it with the world! Need to order a bottle? There’s a link to it in our online shop at the bottom of this page.
Here’s our favorite way to use it.
Cornbread and Ice Cream
Bake a pan of fresh cornbread. I make mine from scratch using a recipe my mawmaw gave me. She didn’t have it written down, so I just had to watch and I wrote down what she did.
Let me know if you need a recipe and I’ll share mine.
You can use whatever kind of cornbread you like. My favorite is a little on the sweet side and large crumbed.
The delicious parts.
Add a scoop of vanilla ice cream on top of a buttered slice of that cornbread.
Drizzle on the Shagbark Hickory Syrup
Top with chopped pecans (pan roast these in butter for extra yummy)
Voila! The most delicious thing we’ve ever tasted. We only buy very small portions of ice cream so we don’t eat it too often.
The delicious whole.
Submit your ideas, too!
Need your own bottle?
https://www.wildozark.com/shop/product_cat/syrup/
About the voice behind this blog, Madison Woods
I'm a creative old soul living way off the beaten path with my husband in the wild Ozark Mountains. Besides homesteading, growing plants & making crafty things and newsletters, I write books and stories. My rural fantasy fiction, written under the pen name, Ima Erthwitch, usually takes place in a much altered Ozarks.
Ways You Can Support Wild Ozark
Spread the Word
Share this post or tell a friend about my website. "From little acorns do mighty oaks grow." A little thing like sharing could start momentum! This is a free and tremendously powerful way to help.
Unique gifts, books, and information for the nature lovers in your life. Adding more items as time allows: Wild Ozark Nature Boutique.
Become a Patron
A small monthly stipend of even $1 from enough supporters will help me continue the educational outreach and construction of habitat gardens. More information here: https://www.patreon.com/wildozark
We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program; an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites.
Thank you for reading and/or participating in this Wild Ozark community! ~ Madison Woods
Our shagbark hickory syrup is available from our booth at the Downtown Rogers Farmer’s market. Sign up below if you want to be notified when it’s ready to ship. We’re pursuing certification and getting legal issues in place now:
Recipes and Feedback
Once you taste the flavor of this incredibly unique syrup, the wheels in your head will start turning. There are so many ways this syrup could be used!
Go to our recipe page to find out how others are using and get our “favorite way to use it” idea.
Taking pre-orders now. Click to pic to order. Or sign up for the announcement list to keep up with our progress of production. We’ll let you know when it’s ready to buy and ship! Sign up below. Click here for recipes and ideas or to share yours!
The Story of Our Shagbark Hickory Syrup
Ever heard of shagbark hickory syrup? I know you’ve heard of maple syrup, made from the sap of a maple tree.
Shagbark hickory also goes by the name of Scalybark Hickory, but they’re both the same tree. The latin binomial name is Carya ovata.
Well the shagbark syrup is different than maple syrup. Although the tree can be tapped, for this one, it’s the bark that is used.
My husband comes up with some tasty ideas for things to make here on the Wild Ozark homestead. Last time it was home roasted coffee. That was so successful it’s now one of our homestead standards.
This time his idea was shagbark hickory syrup.
Freshly gathered hickory nuts. Hard to beat the squirrels to the good ones!
Skeptical? I was too. This is how the bark of a shagbark hickory looks.
Time Tested
Apparently, this kind of syrup is an old-timey thing. There are lots of variations on the recipe online. Rob was looking up recipes for hickory pie (like pecan pie but using hickories instead) and he stumbled on a post about the syrup and his creative wheels started turning.
We gathered nuts the in fall with plans to make things from them when the weather turned.
We gathered bark, too, because the idea of making syrup from it sure did intrigue.
On a Friday eve that fall, Rob made the syrup. And, like the coffee, it was so delicious it’s going to become another must-have in our cupboard!
A basic recipe for Shagbark Hickory Syrup
Rob modified the original recipe some to make it taste more like we like and you can do the same to suit your own tastes. Here’s a rough outline of how it’s done:
Gather bark from the tree
Clean bark by washing and scrubbing
Break bark into smaller pieces
Roast bark in the oven
Add bark to a pot and cover by several inches with water
Decoct the bark by cooking on very low heat (no boiling, no bubbles breaking)
Remove bark from water, strain liquid, return to pot
Decoct to concentrate to nice dark color
Add a little cream of tartar to keep it from crystallizing
For each cup of liquid add 2 cups sugar
Cook until sugar is completely dissolved
Pour into jars
Enjoy!
Scaling Up
We’re now cooking large batches at the Food Innovation Kitchen in Fayetteville Arkansas. Soon we’ll be able to sell wholesale and retail nationwide!
If you know of any good chefs who might like to try our product in their kitchens, let me know. Or let them know! I’ll send samples to anyone interested in wholesale purchase.
We’ll sell them retail at $10/bottle, wholesale at a discount according to volume ordered.
Want to Stay Informed?
Taking pre-orders now!
https://www.wildozark.com/shop/product_cat/syrup/
Shagbark hickory syrup and some of the bark.
About the voice behind this blog, Madison Woods
I'm a creative old soul living way off the beaten path with my husband in the wild Ozark Mountains. Besides homesteading, growing plants & making crafty things and newsletters, I write books and stories. My rural fantasy fiction, written under the pen name, Ima Erthwitch, usually takes place in a much altered Ozarks.
Ways You Can Support Wild Ozark
Spread the Word
Share this post or tell a friend about my website. "From little acorns do mighty oaks grow." A little thing like sharing could start momentum! This is a free and tremendously powerful way to help.
Unique gifts, books, and information for the nature lovers in your life. Adding more items as time allows: Wild Ozark Nature Boutique.
Become a Patron
A small monthly stipend of even $1 from enough supporters will help me continue the educational outreach and construction of habitat gardens. More information here: https://www.patreon.com/wildozark
We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program; an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites.
Thank you for reading and/or participating in this Wild Ozark community! ~ Madison Woods
I’ll be in Jasper, for a change of venue. I’ll have a couple of older ginseng plants (2 yr and 3 yr plants), ginseng seedlings, ginseng jams, books, and nature art and cards. If it’s very windy, I’ll keep the ginseng inside the high-walled tote, so ask if you don’t see them if you come by. Also, if you want fresh-roasted coffee beans, I’ll have that with me too. Oh – and an item I keep forgetting to bring but is wonderful: Amazing Sting Oil! This stuff works to keep poison ivy from itching so badly, will bring down the pain and sting and swelling of wasps and hornets, too. I made some up by dissolving frankincense tears in fractionated coconut oil after my daughter told me how good it worked for her when a hornet stung her on the lip.
5/23/17 – Tuesday
Cancelled due to rain, even though now it seems as if it might not rain very much after all. I can’t pack the night before if rain chances are high because too many of my items will be ruined if it gets damp. This morning, it was raining a little, so I cancelled out.
5/16/17 – Tuesday
I’ll be in Huntsville at the Farmer’s market from 7-12. This week I’ll have a couple of older ginseng plants (2 yr and 3 yr plants), ginseng seedlings, and possibly some Heritage red raspberries if they’re ready after transplanting to the pots. Also will have ginseng jams, books, and nature art and cards. If it’s very windy, I’ll keep the ginseng inside the high-walled tote, so ask if you don’t see them if you come by.
5/2/17 – Tuesday
I won’t be there this week. The recent weather made crossing the creek to get to the nursery too difficult and it’s been far too windy to pot up more tender seedlings. As of right now, I do plan to be there next week on the 9th, but check back in case more weather or unexpected circumstances happen!
5/6/17- Pot 5 Get 1
The recent flooding has made our driveway nearly impassable except for trucks. If you plan to come to the Pot 5 Get 1 event this weekend, be sure to let me know! If no one RSVP’s, then I may not be out there if someone unexpected shows up. The nursery isn’t near the house, so unless I know someone is coming, I won’t be down there the whole time.
General Info
The Farmers Market in Huntsville (AR) will open on Tuesday, April 11. It’s early this year! Many of the vendors must already have crops ready to sell. I am going to be fairly bare-boothed for a few more weeks.
I won’t have ginseng so early, though. It’ll be May before I start bringing the plants to market. We’ll be there every Tuesday. Once the ginseng is ready, we’ll be there some Saturday’s also.
However, I will have other items. When I see what sells best, I’ll adjust what I bring more of accordingly. Art generally does not seem to sell so much at farmers market venues, but I’m experimenting with a couple of different forms of it to see if that makes a difference.
Nature Art Cards
I’ve searched high and low to source the materials for my cards from companies in the US. These are 100% Made in the USA cards. The paper, ink, and art was all created right here in the United States. The cards are fine art paper and are blank inside with a drawing assemblage on the front made from one of my original works of art mounted on kraft paper.
Available directly from me, and coming soon to the Westwood Garden Nursery stores in northwest Arkansas.
Nature Art Prints
Tree Priestess
I’ll have a few of the 5 x 7 or 4 x 6 prints of the Tree Priestess, and Slug on Poison Ivy. I’ll have others when my printing supplies come in. The paper I usually order is out of stock and other than that one favorite brand and type, I’m not sure what else to use. It’s too expensive to try and have it fail in the printer to just pick another. So more research is in order for that if my trusted supplier doesn’t restock.
Jams
While supplies last, which I suspect won’t be long, I’ll have some of the ginseng jams left. I will have other jams and jellies as I get them made, including red onion marmalade, wild plum jelly, and blackberry if it’s good seasons for the wild fruits this year.
Fairy Gardens
I’ll have a couple of the fairy gardens, but again, I’m out of the globes for them and need to order more. Basically, I need to make some money before I can order all the things I’m short on, so hopefully the opening day will bring cash flow, too.
Books
I’ll have some of the ginseng look-alikes guide, at least, on opening day. The book order with the rest of my books won’t be here until the following week, though.
What Else?
That’s about it for my lineup. I’m not sure what everyone else is bringing, but it should be a good variety of things this year. The Huntsville Farmers Market has grown to more than 10 vendors, from what I hear, so it will be fun! Come out to see what else is there, and say hello to me while you’re at it.
About the voice behind this blog, Madison Woods
I'm a creative old soul living way off the beaten path with my husband in the wild Ozark Mountains. Besides homesteading, growing plants & making crafty things and newsletters, I write books and stories. My rural fantasy fiction, written under the pen name, Ima Erthwitch, usually takes place in a much altered Ozarks.
Ways You Can Support Wild Ozark
Spread the Word
Share this post or tell a friend about my website. "From little acorns do mighty oaks grow." A little thing like sharing could start momentum! This is a free and tremendously powerful way to help.
Unique gifts, books, and information for the nature lovers in your life. Adding more items as time allows: Wild Ozark Nature Boutique.
Become a Patron
A small monthly stipend of even $1 from enough supporters will help me continue the educational outreach and construction of habitat gardens. More information here: https://www.patreon.com/wildozark
We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program; an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites.
Thank you for reading and/or participating in this Wild Ozark community! ~ Madison Woods
I’m just going to update and repost this same market page each Monday night before market.
Tomorrow I’ll have ginseng seedlings, a couple of older ginseng plants, and various companion plants including blue cohosh, doll’s eyes, bloodroot, and maidenhair fern.
Ginseng Companion Plants ready for market day. Pic may be sideways because it’s from my phone and I can’t figure out how to make it stay upright in WordPress, lol.
I’ll also have the books, art, and ginseng jams.
Hope to see you there!
April 11, 2017
The Huntsville (Arkansas) Farmers Market 2017 season is set to begin. Tomorrow (Tuesday, April 11) is the first market day this year.
Wild Ozark will be there, but it’s too early for plants. Tomorrow we’ll have ginseng jam, winter crud/cough syrup (jam), books, and nature art cards and drawings. If I can find a way to pack it in the car, I might bring my herb hanger.
Next week I should have some plants ready to go, including ginseng seedlings.
If you’re in the area stop in and say hello!
I might not have the banner hanging until I get more grommets, but look for the tan top and green curtains 🙂 About the voice behind this blog, Madison Woods
I'm a creative old soul living way off the beaten path with my husband in the wild Ozark Mountains. Besides homesteading, growing plants & making crafty things and newsletters, I write books and stories. My rural fantasy fiction, written under the pen name, Ima Erthwitch, usually takes place in a much altered Ozarks.
Ways You Can Support Wild Ozark
Spread the Word
Share this post or tell a friend about my website. "From little acorns do mighty oaks grow." A little thing like sharing could start momentum! This is a free and tremendously powerful way to help.
Unique gifts, books, and information for the nature lovers in your life. Adding more items as time allows: Wild Ozark Nature Boutique.
Become a Patron
A small monthly stipend of even $1 from enough supporters will help me continue the educational outreach and construction of habitat gardens. More information here: https://www.patreon.com/wildozark
We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program; an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites.
Thank you for reading and/or participating in this Wild Ozark community! ~ Madison Woods
I’ll be in the Kingston square with the Wild Ozark booth on Saturday selling ginseng jams, nature art, and fairy gardens.
The premier ginseng jam, golden in color and sweet, mild flavor. Great on toast or crackers to start your day.
Chilly Day
For weeks it’s been warmer than usual and so I decided I’d set up the Wild Ozark booth on the Kingston square this weekend to take advantage of some of that nice weather.
So of course now it’s going to be ordinary for February weather. Tomorrow’s high is supposed to be around 45*F, which I suppose is still fairly warm for a winter day.
But it’s not the balmy 70 we’ve been seeing.
Bringing out the Ginseng Jams
Anyway, I’m going to take the booth out there anyway. I’ll have ginseng jams, nature art cards, nature drawing prints, a couple of Wild Ozark Fairy Garden terrariums, and a few books.
Rural Fantasy Fiction
One of my books that I won’t have with me is going to be free at Amazon this weekend. It’s First Hunt, the complete first book of the Bounty Hunter series. The title at Amazon, as of the time I’m making this post, still says “Part One” on it, but that will hopefully update soon. It’s saved to Amazon, but they haven’t changed it yet.
I’d first released it in parts, but revised the Amazon listing to only list this one instead. If you do get the download while it’s free, please let me know if it still ends at “part one”. When I use the “Look Inside” feature, it shows me the whole book. But when I order the free sample, it still only shows me part one.
At first I thought doing it in 25,000 word parts would be a good idea. But then when it came time to figure out what to do with all the parts once the novel was published, I decided I won’t be doing it that way anymore.
First Hunt takes the reader from Treya’s beginnings with ARSA and follows through the first kill on her first assignment. I’m working on the second book now, tentatively titled “Twice Dead”.
There will be a third kill, but I won’t call the last one “Third Dead”, lol. I think it’ll be called “Grub Stage” instead. The concept of the series is that the ARSA bounty hunters kill their targets three times to force them into lower incarnations. Grub Stage is the lowest and is reserved for the worst criminals.
About the voice behind this blog, Madison Woods
I'm a creative old soul living way off the beaten path with my husband in the wild Ozark Mountains. Besides homesteading, growing plants & making crafty things and newsletters, I write books and stories. My rural fantasy fiction, written under the pen name, Ima Erthwitch, usually takes place in a much altered Ozarks.
Ways You Can Support Wild Ozark
Spread the Word
Share this post or tell a friend about my website. "From little acorns do mighty oaks grow." A little thing like sharing could start momentum! This is a free and tremendously powerful way to help.
Unique gifts, books, and information for the nature lovers in your life. Adding more items as time allows: Wild Ozark Nature Boutique.
Become a Patron
A small monthly stipend of even $1 from enough supporters will help me continue the educational outreach and construction of habitat gardens. More information here: https://www.patreon.com/wildozark
We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program; an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites.
Thank you for reading and/or participating in this Wild Ozark community! ~ Madison Woods
Here’s my recipe for an herbal remedy I use every year to combat what we’ve come to call “Winter Crud”. We also take it at the first sign of anything that feels like trouble coming on. This year’s formula uses mullein, echinacea, ginseng, and beebalm. I’ll update and repost this every year to tell you which herb’s I’m using and whether I’ve changed anything about how I’m making it.
click to enlarge or print
Ugh. Winter Crud
I’m sure there’s a real name for it, but I don’t know what it is. We just call it the “winter crud” or “creeping crud” or “that *bleeping* cough that lingers forever”. I don’t usually go to the doctor because I’m worried that there might be even more serious ailments lurking inside the office waiting room than the one currently plaguing me. So I generally rely on my trusty herbal allies unless it’s acute or serious.
The symptoms are always the same: deep congestion that’s hard to cough up, sometimes a low fever for a day or two at the beginning, and a few weeks of long-lingering congested cough.
Inevitably someone in the family gets it. Usually the whole household gets it. And so I like to have it ready to go. Most years I make extra for Christmas gifts, but this year I procrastinated too long.
My reservations
Generally I don’t blog much about my herbal remedies because it feels like slippery ground when it comes to sharing that information outside my own little network of like-minded family and friends. But I’ve really had great results with this one and thought I’d share.
Please make sure you research these herbs to find out if they’re suitable for you and your conditions. Just the sugar alone is enough to send a diabetic into crisis.
I am not a doctor and am not prescribing or advising you to try this remedy. I’m just sharing how I make it and what I use it for. If you want me to make some for you, though, I will do that. See the link at the bottom of this post.
Took the photo before adding the ginseng. Dried mullein and echinacea root getting ready to decoct.
The Ingredients
The precise list of ingredients I use for anything at all changes according to what I managed to gather the summer and fall before.
Today’s ingredient list for this year’s Winter Crud syrup features wild American ginseng root (Panax quinquefolius), mullein leaves (Verbascum thapsus), beebalm flower, stem, and leaf (Monarda fistulosa), and echinacea root, leaf stem, and flower (Echinacea purpurea).
Wildcrafting
All of the herbs except the cinnamon were responsibly foraged from right here at Wild Ozark. I never take more than a small percentage of ginseng (or any other roots) from a colony. When taking flowers, I always leave half behind for the pollinators. There is no shortage of mullein anywhere so I am less concerned with conservation of that herb.
I had blackberry syrup on hand from a failed batch of jelly this past summer, so I’m using it for the sugar content and for flavor. You can skip that ingredient and add back a cup of sugar to the recipe.
The Most Important Ingredient
The syrup must have mullein for it to be useful for this remedy at all, and thankfully mullein is easily found almost all year long here. I think the beebalm and ginseng also add a lot to the effectiveness. But if all I had was mullein, I’d go with it. And if sugar is an issue for you, it works just as well as a decoction alone. You’ll have to use it within a few days because the sugar is a preservative. It just won’t taste as good, but it’s a tolerable flavor.
I give instructions on how to make a decoction in my book 10 Common Plants Worth Knowing, but that one is for witch hazel tonic. Here’s a procedure for the mullein decoction recipe you can download. It’s in PDF format. Just save it to your hard-drive or print it out.
I’d love it if you’d “pin” it to Pinterest for me:
Mullein needs to be strained more thoroughly than most other herbs because of the hairs on the leaves. Make the decoction with the mullein, ginseng, and echinacea roots. Then add the leafy parts of herbs in the last phase of making the decoction, just before the final reduction.
DIY?
You could make it yourself and it’s a great project to do so. If you try it and need to ask questions just email me. If you don’t have the ingredients or don’t want to spend a day stirring the cauldron, you can buy a pint from me.
I'm a creative old soul living way off the beaten path with my husband in the wild Ozark Mountains. Besides homesteading, growing plants & making crafty things and newsletters, I write books and stories. My rural fantasy fiction, written under the pen name, Ima Erthwitch, usually takes place in a much altered Ozarks.
Ways You Can Support Wild Ozark
Spread the Word
Share this post or tell a friend about my website. "From little acorns do mighty oaks grow." A little thing like sharing could start momentum! This is a free and tremendously powerful way to help.
Unique gifts, books, and information for the nature lovers in your life. Adding more items as time allows: Wild Ozark Nature Boutique.
Become a Patron
A small monthly stipend of even $1 from enough supporters will help me continue the educational outreach and construction of habitat gardens. More information here: https://www.patreon.com/wildozark
We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program; an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites.
Thank you for reading and/or participating in this Wild Ozark community! ~ Madison Woods
I’ve been working on a few new Wild Ozark creations lately. This creative streak seems to have no end in sight, either, because ideas just keep coming and I keep feeling compelled to follow them through.
Slugs
This is the latest drawing I’ve done. The digital and print rights (for business branding, not art prints) and print #1/100 have been sold already, but there are still 99 prints available. I had so much fun doing this drawing, because it made me see poison ivy and slugs in an entirely new light. Whoever knew the two of them could be beautiful together?
Slug on Poison Ivy
Dragons
I’ve been photographing a particular green dragon (Arisaema dracontium) over the past few years, trying to get good photos of all the various phases. A couple of years ago, I even had seeds that I’d gathered from it sprout.
So I was finally able to complete a creative thing that’s been waiting a long time – The Dragon Life Storyboard:
A poster showing the growth phases of a green dragon plant.
You can read more about Green Dragons on one of my earlier posts.
Ginseng
So then I thought, “Well, I can’t have a dragon storyboard without a ginseng one too!”
Story of Ginseng
Pressed Leaves
And for ginseng I also have been making pressed leaves. Some of them are laminated so they’re durable enough to take to the woods. Some I’ll mount on fine art paper for framing. Only the laminated ones are posted to the shop so far. They’re $10.
Fiction
I’ve been working on my novel and am getting excited by how it’s going. Here’s the story line for that:
Bounty Hunter is a rural adventure fantasy set in post-collapse northwest Arkansas. There’s a rift in the Universal fabric that the Feds aren’t telling anyone about, but it’s the main reason martial law is still in effect. Treya is training to be an assassin for ARSA, a covert government agency headquartered in Bentonville. Punishment isn’t that the criminals are put to death. It’s that they’re killed three times to force them into successively lower incarnations. Treya has to learn how to use her innate gifts that enable her to track a person throughout their incarnations, whether they’re human or not.
Your Turn!
So tell me what projects you’ve been working on? Send links if you have posts about them or Etsy listings or whatever and I’ll link to them. My email address is [email protected]
About the voice behind this blog, Madison Woods
I'm a creative old soul living way off the beaten path with my husband in the wild Ozark Mountains. Besides homesteading, growing plants & making crafty things and newsletters, I write books and stories. My rural fantasy fiction, written under the pen name, Ima Erthwitch, usually takes place in a much altered Ozarks.
Ways You Can Support Wild Ozark
Spread the Word
Share this post or tell a friend about my website. "From little acorns do mighty oaks grow." A little thing like sharing could start momentum! This is a free and tremendously powerful way to help.
Unique gifts, books, and information for the nature lovers in your life. Adding more items as time allows: Wild Ozark Nature Boutique.
Become a Patron
A small monthly stipend of even $1 from enough supporters will help me continue the educational outreach and construction of habitat gardens. More information here: https://www.patreon.com/wildozark
We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program; an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites.
Thank you for reading and/or participating in this Wild Ozark community! ~ Madison Woods
Note: an edited and better composed version of this is posted over at Medium.
I’ve been in a crafty mood lately. It’s probably safe to say I’m always in a crafty mood. I think I’ve finally figured out why.
I like balanced asymmetry and order in chaos. Noticing when these states occur and capturing them in art or photography, or creating things bring order to chaos in a satisfying way.
I Like Seeing Results
That’s the thing about crafting – results. I love seeing order brought from chaos, order within chaos, and balanced asymmetry.
It started recently with the rocked in culvert. Well, it started long ago, probably when I was born. But the most recent bout of craftiness urges started with this culvert.
I like to see the results of my work. Work that never comes to fruition, or never ends with a sense of balance is frustrating. Housekeeping is that sort of work. The house is rarely clean and orderly long enough to see the end result for more than a few minutes. And as soon as I glance another direction, I see the same job waiting again!
I would be a very bad production worker because of this unless I got to put on the finishing pieces. I have worked these sorts of jobs before, so I know that I don’t like it and when it comes right down to it, the lack of “finished result” satisfaction is why.
In those positions when I worked on specific projects (like the 245 Startup at Honeywell in 2002), I did get a sense of completion when we brought the unit online, even if I was only a small part of that project. My work contributed to a finished product that I was able to witness. I liked that.
Balanced Asymmetry
I like symmetry, but I like balanced asymmetry more. Symmetry by itself does nothing to spark my sense of wonder. Asymmetrical things without a balance to them just look chaotic and are unsatisfying.
Everything I really enjoying seeing in nature, like sunsets, moonrises, forest paths, etc. are all asymmetrical studies. The clouds that frame the moon look best when they’re asymmetrical. Sunbeams filtering down between limbs of a tree on an early morning are not equally distributed across the entire scene. If fact, the very non-uniformity in where and how they appear is what makes them so breathtaking.
Building a rock wall using native stone is an exercise in learning to balance in an asymmetrical way.
The whole is balanced. This is not one of my rock walls, by the way. This is an old one that’s been here on this earth for possibly longer than me.
This rock wall is a perfect example of balanced asymmetry and organized chaos.
The parts are not.
The rock pile for culvert retaining wall.
Order to Chaos
There are some who say it is not possible to have chaos and order at the same time.
I say you can. Sometimes.
A pile of rocks is a static sort of chaotic thing.
A pile of asymmetrical rocks even more so.
But when the chaotic tumble of asymmetrical rocks are stacked, sometimes an organized balance can be achieved. That is an example of bringing order to chaos.
Orderly Chaos
Orderly chaos is a different thing. Orderly chaos is a lot like asymmetrical balance. I also think whether something is chaotic or orderly depends on the viewer’s perspective.
To the person who just bumped into the hornet’s nest, the swarm of hornets attacking feels pretty chaotic.
But that swarm is actually very orderly, a whole chaotic mess of stinging insects all bent on achieving the same goal: to kill or run off an intruder.
I see order and chaos side-by-side and even occupying the same spaces all the time. A glance at the news is full of speculation fodder for this topic.
What seems like a chaotic world right now probably has a lot of order to it if we can back off far enough to view it from a distant perspective, both literally and figuratively.
Balanced asymmetry and orderly chaos in Crafty things
It’s pretty asymmetrical too, but is also balanced. The weaving is probably still chaotic in appearance to some, but there’s order in there now, in spite of the chaos that ensued before I was done with it.
It’s definitely asymmetrical. But the whole thing is balanced in spite of that.
Balanced Asymmetry.
Same deal with a website I’m creating. To someone viewing only the parts of this creation, it might seem terribly chaotic. It seems that way to me, too, sometimes.
But eventually all the parts start working together and it becomes yet another example of balanced asymmetry. And of order in chaos.
Things that are both Symmetrical and Asymmetrical at the Same Time
A lot of things probably fall into this category, but the one I see most often and notice happens with plants. Ginseng is a good example.
This goldenseal plant is balanced even though it is very asymmetrical.
Signed & Numbered prints are available now!
On the vertical plane, it’s asymmetrical. However, if sliced horizontally, it is symmetrical.
Your Thoughts?
Have you noticed yourself attracted to more symmetrical things and only clear-cut order, or are you like me and fascinated with the balance between asymmetrical and ordered chaos?
About the voice behind this blog, Madison Woods
I'm a creative old soul living way off the beaten path with my husband in the wild Ozark Mountains. Besides homesteading, growing plants & making crafty things and newsletters, I write books and stories. My rural fantasy fiction, written under the pen name, Ima Erthwitch, usually takes place in a much altered Ozarks.
Ways You Can Support Wild Ozark
Spread the Word
Share this post or tell a friend about my website. "From little acorns do mighty oaks grow." A little thing like sharing could start momentum! This is a free and tremendously powerful way to help.
Unique gifts, books, and information for the nature lovers in your life. Adding more items as time allows: Wild Ozark Nature Boutique.
Become a Patron
A small monthly stipend of even $1 from enough supporters will help me continue the educational outreach and construction of habitat gardens. More information here: https://www.patreon.com/wildozark
We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program; an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites.
Thank you for reading and/or participating in this Wild Ozark community! ~ Madison Woods
Oh yeah 🙂 I’m getting ready this morning for a full day of aromatic and sumptuous coffee roasting. Mmmmmm-Mmmmmmmm all the locals will soon get to try some of our delicious Wild Roast.
We’ll have these Wild Roasts on Saturday:
Peru Aprocassi
Congo Kivu
Guatemala Ceylan
Tanzania Peaberry
You can get whole bean or ground, with and without ginseng leaf added at the Kingston Fair on the Square! It won’t be “ready to drink” but I’ll have samples of the grinds there to smell-taste.
Organic and/or Fair Trade
With the exception of the Tanzania Peaberry, all of our coffee is either organic or Fair Trade and most of the time both. Some, like the Guatemala Ceylon, is also Rainforest Alliance Certified as well.
Add a Little Pep
We love ginseng leaf in our morning brew. The leaf has all the same properties as ginseng root (American) but the harvest doesn’t kill the plant. That’s why I like using leaf more than root whenever possible. There will be ginseng & coffee blend available on Saturday.
The stimulating, balancing & restorative ginsenosides in ginseng are a great complement to the energizing caffeine in coffee, but ginseng is a medicinal herb and you should ask your doctor or do some research to make sure it’s safe for you.
Just the Coffee Please
We’ll have blends available with ginseng leaf and plenty of Wild Roast without it for those who just want the coffee.
Save a Buck
Bring in your Wild Roast coupon and get your Mom some delicious coffee roasted right here at Wild Ozark. Print-n-Clip or save the coupon to your iPhone and bring it by to get a dollar off of any of the coffees:
Clip or save to your phone! About the voice behind this blog, Madison Woods
I'm a creative old soul living way off the beaten path with my husband in the wild Ozark Mountains. Besides homesteading, growing plants & making crafty things and newsletters, I write books and stories. My rural fantasy fiction, written under the pen name, Ima Erthwitch, usually takes place in a much altered Ozarks.
Ways You Can Support Wild Ozark
Spread the Word
Share this post or tell a friend about my website. "From little acorns do mighty oaks grow." A little thing like sharing could start momentum! This is a free and tremendously powerful way to help.
Unique gifts, books, and information for the nature lovers in your life. Adding more items as time allows: Wild Ozark Nature Boutique.
Become a Patron
A small monthly stipend of even $1 from enough supporters will help me continue the educational outreach and construction of habitat gardens. More information here: https://www.patreon.com/wildozark
We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program; an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites.
Thank you for reading and/or participating in this Wild Ozark community! ~ Madison Woods
