Join lara pacheco of Seed and Thistle Apothecary and Atabey Medicine to meet a few common herbal allies that a person can easily find in most outdoor spaces and/or cultivate in your yard.
The workshop will be a demo of how to make herbal salves and some herbal styptics and poultices. lara will show some of the growing habitats of these plants in between the process and will also share a native PNW plant that may be used as a herbal bath for bacterial infection.
Date & Time: August 31, 2020 from 10am to 11:30am on Zoom.
This session will be downloadable for those who can’t make it live.
See below for information on registration, sliding scale, and the video medium.
Join Larkin for a fun class where you can learn how to make cordage (natural rope!) from nettle stalks.
This class is BYON – bring your own nettle stalks. You’ll receive an email four weeks in advance of class with instructions on how you can go about finding and harvesting your own materials to work with in this live virtual class. We’ll talk about what cordage can be used for and other materials we can use to make it as well.
Date & time: Saturday, September 12, 1-2pm PDT
This video will be recorded for download for all participants, including those who can’t make it live.
See below for information on the sliding scale and video format.
This is a guide to keeping well and staying healthy, with the help of herbal allies and personal rhythms. In this time of COVID-19 spread, it is ever more vital to practice embodied relationship to our own well-being.
It is downloadable as a .PDF file for free or by donation: choose your price at checkout, based on your needs in the current moment. Feel free to share widely!
This guide is for us to use in times of wellness as preventive care – not during illness – to keep our immune health strong and to deepen our connection to our bodies and the more-than-human world.
To help support my community during social distancing of COVID-19, I am offering virtual hide tanning consultation at a pay-what-you-can basis. Simply choose your price at checkout.
A Virtual Hide Tanning Consultations is a 1:1 conversation on everything you are wondering about hide tanning. Whether you’re jumping into a new skill on your own or need help troubleshooting a pesky problem, the floor is yours to ask questions and delve deep into the craft with me.
Sessions are 75 minutes long via a phone call or Zoom video. Sit back, sip some tea, and let’s talk hide tanning.
Each session comes with a package of class notes on the four fundamentals of natural tanning (barktanning, smoketanning, fur-on, and mineral tanning) as well as an invitation to a Crowsnest Wildcraft alumni Facebook group, for continued community support.
This video download is an introduction to hide tanning, with an overview of history, natural methodologies, and cultural relevance of this ancient craft. Mara covers the deep time roots of tanning’s ancient origins and weaves a narrative of co-evolution by people, plant, and animal through the ages.
Smoke-tanning (brain-tanning), mineral tanning, and bark tanning are all covered, with examples of hand-tanned products for all. Downloading this course comes with free class notes to each method for re-creation of DIY home tanning projects.
Cost:
The sliding scale cost is $0-$60. Indigenous people are welcome to download for free. At checkout, you will “name your price” and then you’re good to go.
See below for notes on interpreting a sliding scale for your own needs.
We will spend a morning virtually to explore some Qigong movements and theory while inviting in the medicine of two plants at separate times.
Led by lara pacheco of Seed & Thistle Apothecary and Atabey Medicine Apprenticeship, we’ll begin with some gentle meditation and one plant ally, then step into some Qigong.
It will be important to have two tea preparations made for the morning medicine. This along with the Zoom meeting link will be shared upon registration.
See below for information on the sliding scale prices.
*Registration opens August 8, 2020* Please check back here then.
June Pardue, Alutiiq and Inupiaq Elder, is teaching a fish-leather and deer-hide/moose-hide slipper making class – trimmed with fur!
Learn to cut fish skins, deer or moose hide and fur during the class with patterns to follow from June’s family repertoire. Materials arrive in the mail prior to class and you follow along with June’s on-screen instructions.
Each student must register by August 31st, 2020 to receive June’s family pattern and materials by mail in time.
Dates: Saturday, September 12th and Sunday, September 13th, 2020
This tool-kit has all the essentials you need to get started hide tanning!
Scraper: for fleshing and wet scraping all hides in the first steps to prep for tanning. Fits nicely in the hand and its stainless steel blade resists rust and keeps its edge. Custom design by Mara; hand-made by Nathan at Zilka Forgewerks.
Apron: for many stages of tanning, an absolute essential. This ankle-length apron is waterproof and durable.
Awl: for framing hides to prepare for softening. This graduated awl is perfect for any size hide and fits in the palm of the hand.
Pumice: for a finishing touch to buckskins and sheepskins to add sheen and polished look. Wildcrafted with permission on Lil’wat and Shasta Nations territories.
These tools are hand-forged by Zilka Forgewerks, an artisan blacksmith based in Portland. Use these for fleshing, graining, and membraning hides. Stainless steel and designed for easy maintenance, they have a bevelled edge on each side for comfortable handling.
To order: buy here and you will receive a confirmation email to ask if you are getting shipping or will pick up. Pick-up is in Aldergrove, BC. Shipping is $20 CAD extra within Canada.
*Class is currently full and there is a waitlist. We will likely hold another class as there has been so much interest! Please email to get on the waitlist. Some spots may open in this class plus you will ensure you are first to know about the next class.
This is a private class taking place on Galiano Island. If you wish to register for this class and don’t know the password, email crowsnest.wildcraft@gmail.com.
We will be tanning with the smoketan (braintan) method to make buckskin, an ancient textile in resurgence. Along the way we will learn the history of hide tanning and explore the cultural and modern contexts of this craft.
The hides provided are wild deer skins salvaged during the 2019 hunting season. I skin and salvage these hides from animals whose hunters want only the meat. I use the tanner’s pull method to ensure the highest quality of intact hides.
Each participant works with their own deer skin from start to finish, and you take home your own creation at the end. We also help each other out and lean on each other through the tough work.
Join Larkin for an exploration of what it means to practice landbased skills while experiencing chronic pain or disability. Many of us learn these skills because they’re healing & connecting. Grief can arise when we want to access land in changing or disabled bodies.
How can we start bridging our way to justice and wholeness by challenging capitalism in land-based community that supports and accepts all bodies?
This is a workshop for those experiencing chronic pain and disability, and those wanting to cultivate ways community can support. We will have time for group discussions, exercises, inspiration, and thinking about tangible ways we can bring this work out into the world.
This workshop is 2 hours long and will be recorded for participants, wether folks can attend live or not. Please be in touch ahead of time about access needs.
Date & time: Sunday July 19, 1-3pm PDT.
See below for more information on the video format and Limina series.
Join CZarina Den Ouden Lobo on a textile journey through the alchemy of natural dyeing.
Hapazome is the art of transferring leaf and flower prints by gently hammering them onto paper or cloth. Bundle dyes are an artform of transferring leaf and flower colours and prints onto cloth or paper. The material is decorated with the plant material and then wrapped around a stick and steamed.
Czarina will lead people through the process from her own home to yours. You may collect your own dye materials or order a Bundle Kit from CZarina in advance.
Czarina’s Bundle Kit includes:
An organic cotton bandana
4 card size pieces of 140lb water colour paper
1 teaspoon of Alum
A piece of unbleached cotton – to use for Hapazome with fresh materials (list will be included)
Logwood bark
Osage bark
Marigolds
Cochineal bugs
Onion peels
To order a Bundle Kit, purchase your spot in the class and then email czarinal@yahoo.com. You will be sent an email reminder upon registration. Note: the deadline for ordering a kit is June 25.
This session is kid friendly! It is geared towards families, whether homeschoolers or DIY crafters.
Date & time: Friday July 24th; 2-3.30pm PDT.
This video will be recorded for download for all participants, including those who can’t make it live.
See below for information on the sliding scale and video format.
Create your own useful small basket, using Jute twine and yarn. In this live interactive video, you will weave a basket to be a cozy for a pint-sized mason jar.
You don’t need any experience, just a curiosity to make your own functional craft. You will learn how to use materials you have in the kitchen cupboard or garden, including plant fibres you can forage. You will also be shown how to scale the the basket for bigger projects of your own.
Date & time: Saturday, August 8, 10am-12pm PDT.
Czarina will lead people through the process from her own home to yours. You may collect your baskets materials or mail-order a Basket Kit ($15) from CZarina in advance.
To order a Basket Kit, purchase your spot in the class and then email czarinal@yahoo.com. You will be sent an email reminder upon registration. Note: the deadline for ordering a kit is June 25.
This session will be recorded for all participants, including those who cannot make it live.
See below for more details on the sliding scale and video format.
Join CZarina Den Ouden Lobo on a textile journey through the alchemy of natural dyeing.
Bundle dyes are an artform of transferring leaf and flower colours and prints onto cloth or paper. The material is decorated with the plant material and then wrapped around a stick and steamed. Hapazome is the art of transferring leaf and flower prints by gently hammering them onto paper or cloth.
Czarina will lead people through the process from her own home to yours. You may watch and learn for DIY re-creation later, or you can follow along with your own prepared materials. CZarina will send out all information and at-home kits by mail prior to the video session.
Date & time: Saturday June 27th, 10-11:30am PDT.
Czarina will lead people through the process from her own home to yours. You may collect your own dye materials or order a Bundle Kit from CZarina in advance.
Czarina’s Bundle Kit includes:
An organic cotton bandana
4 card size pieces of 140lb water colour paper
1 teaspoon of Alum
A piece of unbleached cotton – to use for Hapazome with fresh materials (list will be included)
Logwood bark
Osage bark
Marigolds
Cochineal bugs
Onion peels
To order a Bundle Kit, purchase your spot in the class and then email czarinal@yahoo.com. You will be sent an email reminder upon registration. Note: the deadline for ordering a kit is June 25.
This video will be recorded for download for all participants, including those who can’t make it live.
See below for information on the sliding scale and video format.
Learn to make your own delicious and effervescent wild herbal sodas! You’ll learn how to make your soda starter called a ginger bug, and how to use that to make a variety of yummy sodas from the wild and cultivated plants around you have growing around you. This will be a demonstration with supplies and recipes that will be sent to class participants.
Janey Chang will be leading this fun and interactive video session with an emphasis on experimentation and creativity using your own surrounding environment as muse.
Date & time: Wednesday, June 24 from 7-8:30pm PDT.
See below for information on the sliding scale and video format.
Join Larkin of Forest Heart Botanicals for a 3-hour class on growing and using medicinal plants. We’ll look together at ways to unlearn exploitative relationships with the land. We’ll talk about the ethics of growing a medicine garden. We’ll cover how to grow, when to harvest, how to use and what types of medicine can be made from each plant.
Plants that may be covered and are growing in Larkin’s medicine gardens include: skullcap, motherwort, valerian, chamomile, yellow dock, blue vervain, elder, angelica, lemon balm, wood betony, arnica, peppermint, oats, plantain, calendula, marshmallow, echinacea, passionflower, black cohosh & ashwagandha.
The class will be hosted live with recorded segments embedded within it, and there will be lots of time for Q&A. A download version of the session will be available for all participants, including those who can’t make it live. Registration will close 30 minutes prior to the class.
Join lara pacheco of Seed and Thistle Apothecary and Atabey Medicine as we work with a few plant allies that play unique roles in guiding our connections to our well intended ancestors.
Our time together will weave in plant meditations, and sharing of our experiences as we navigate tapping into these relationships during these challenging times. Colonization has not only removed us from a connected relationship to the land, but also from ancestral connection and honouring traditions.
This workshop will be a gentle introduction to creating ritual and connection.
To arrive prepared for this workshop, please have with you a bowl of water and a candle. If possible, also have nearby one or all of the following plants: yarrow, mugwort, sage and/or calendula. These can fresh or dried plants or as extracts in salve or tea. You will be sent out an email reminder a day in advance.
Date & time: June 13, 2020 from 10am to 12pm PDT on Zoom.
See below for details on registration and the video platform.
The making of fish skin leather is an almost forgotten ancient skill that was once common among ocean and freshwater communities in the Northern Hemisphere in places such as Japan, China, Norway, Sweden, Alaska and the Pacific Coast. It is a beautiful textile that can be tanned in different ways to create a strong leather for clothing, pouches, wallets, footwear and art.
In this two part class we will explore oil-tanning and will use everyday materials you will likely find in your own home. In Part 1 we will prepare our fish skins for tanning and create a tannin liquor. In Part 2 we will soften and finish our skins into a beautiful leather. By the end, you will know all you need to know to have your own simple home fish tannery!
This class is offered by Janey Chang, ancestral skills practitioner and fishskin leather revivalist.
Date & time: Wednesday, June 10 & Wednesday, June 17, from 7-9pm PDT
These video sessions must be attended live; no recording will be available for download.
See below for details on registration, the sliding scale, and more.
Birds are around us all the time…in forests, yards, parks, and city streets. Learning to pay attention to and understand birds fills our lives, nourishes our spirits, expands our sphere of awareness as we move through the world.
This 2 hour video course sets the foundation for understanding what birds are saying. We will learn whom to give our attention, how to tune in, and the basics of Sit Spot meditation. We will practices connection and honouring, 5 Voices theory, patterns of alarm, and deep sensory awareness.
No prior knowledge of birds is needed.
This video session will be recorded for all participants, including those who cannot make it live.
Date & time: Thursday June 11, 7:15pm to 9:15pm PDT
*Registration opens August 8, 2020* Please check back here then.
June Pardue, Alutiiq and Inupiaq Elder, is teaching a fish-leather and deer-hide/moose-hide slipper making class – trimmed with fur!
Learn to cut fish skins, deer or moose hide and fur during the class with patterns to follow from June’s family repertoire. Materials arrive in the mail prior to class and you follow along with June’s on-screen instructions.
Each student must register by August 31st, 2020 to receive June’s family pattern and materials by mail in time.
Dates: Saturday, September 12th and Sunday, September 13th, 2020
These tools are hand-forged by Zilka Forgewerks, an artisan blacksmith based in Portland. Use these for fleshing, graining, and membraning hides. Stainless steel and designed for easy maintenance, they have a bevelled edge on each side for comfortable handling.
To order: buy here and you will receive a confirmation email to ask if you are getting shipping or will pick up. Pick-up is in Aldergrove, BC. Shipping is $20 CAD extra within Canada.
This tool-kit has all the essentials you need to get started hide tanning!
Scraper: for fleshing and wet scraping all hides in the first steps to prep for tanning. Fits nicely in the hand and its stainless steel blade resists rust and keeps its edge. Custom design by Mara; hand-made by Nathan at Zilka Forgewerks.
Apron: for many stages of tanning, an absolute essential. This ankle-length apron is waterproof and durable.
Awl: for framing hides to prepare for softening. This graduated awl is perfect for any size hide and fits in the palm of the hand.
Pumice: for a finishing touch to buckskins and sheepskins to add sheen and polished look. Wildcrafted with permission on Lil’wat and Shasta Nations territories.
Join lara pacheco of Seed and Thistle Apothecary and Atabey Medicine as we work with a few plant allies that play unique roles in guiding our connections to our well intended ancestors.
Our time together will weave in plant meditations, and sharing of our experiences as we navigate tapping into these relationships during these challenging times. Colonization has not only removed us from a connected relationship to the land, but also from ancestral connection and honouring traditions.
This workshop will be a gentle introduction to creating ritual and connection.
To arrive prepared for this workshop, please have with you a bowl of water and a candle. If possible, also have nearby one or all of the following plants: yarrow, mugwort, sage and/or calendula. These can fresh or dried plants or as extracts in salve or tea. You will be sent out an email reminder a day in advance.
Date & time: June 13, 2020 from 10am to 12pm PDT on Zoom.
See below for details on registration and the video platform.
Join CZarina Den Ouden Lobo on a textile journey through the alchemy of natural dyeing.
Hapazome is the art of transferring leaf and flower prints by gently hammering them onto paper or cloth. Bundle dyes are an artform of transferring leaf and flower colours and prints onto cloth or paper. The material is decorated with the plant material and then wrapped around a stick and steamed.
Czarina will lead people through the process from her own home to yours. You may collect your own dye materials or order a Bundle Kit from CZarina in advance.
Czarina’s Bundle Kit includes:
An organic cotton bandana
4 card size pieces of 140lb water colour paper
1 teaspoon of Alum
A piece of unbleached cotton – to use for Hapazome with fresh materials (list will be included)
Logwood bark
Osage bark
Marigolds
Cochineal bugs
Onion peels
To order a Bundle Kit, purchase your spot in the class and then email czarinal@yahoo.com. You will be sent an email reminder upon registration. Note: the deadline for ordering a kit is June 25.
This session is kid friendly! It is geared towards families, whether homeschoolers or DIY crafters.
Date & time: Friday July 24th; 2-3.30pm PDT.
This video will be recorded for download for all participants, including those who can’t make it live.
See below for information on the sliding scale and video format.
Join CZarina Den Ouden Lobo on a textile journey through the alchemy of natural dyeing.
Bundle dyes are an artform of transferring leaf and flower colours and prints onto cloth or paper. The material is decorated with the plant material and then wrapped around a stick and steamed. Hapazome is the art of transferring leaf and flower prints by gently hammering them onto paper or cloth.
Czarina will lead people through the process from her own home to yours. You may watch and learn for DIY re-creation later, or you can follow along with your own prepared materials. CZarina will send out all information and at-home kits by mail prior to the video session.
Date & time: Saturday June 27th, 10-11:30am PDT.
Czarina will lead people through the process from her own home to yours. You may collect your own dye materials or order a Bundle Kit from CZarina in advance.
Czarina’s Bundle Kit includes:
An organic cotton bandana
4 card size pieces of 140lb water colour paper
1 teaspoon of Alum
A piece of unbleached cotton – to use for Hapazome with fresh materials (list will be included)
Logwood bark
Osage bark
Marigolds
Cochineal bugs
Onion peels
To order a Bundle Kit, purchase your spot in the class and then email czarinal@yahoo.com. You will be sent an email reminder upon registration. Note: the deadline for ordering a kit is June 25.
This video will be recorded for download for all participants, including those who can’t make it live.
See below for information on the sliding scale and video format.
Join lara pacheco of Seed and Thistle Apothecary and Atabey Medicine to meet a few common herbal allies that a person can easily find in most outdoor spaces and/or cultivate in your yard.
The workshop will be a demo of how to make herbal salves and some herbal styptics and poultices. lara will show some of the growing habitats of these plants in between the process and will also share a native PNW plant that may be used as a herbal bath for bacterial infection.
Date & Time: August 31, 2020 from 10am to 11:30am on Zoom.
This session will be downloadable for those who can’t make it live.
See below for information on registration, sliding scale, and the video medium.
Create your own useful small basket, using Jute twine and yarn. In this live interactive video, you will weave a basket to be a cozy for a pint-sized mason jar.
You don’t need any experience, just a curiosity to make your own functional craft. You will learn how to use materials you have in the kitchen cupboard or garden, including plant fibres you can forage. You will also be shown how to scale the the basket for bigger projects of your own.
Date & time: Saturday, August 8, 10am-12pm PDT.
Czarina will lead people through the process from her own home to yours. You may collect your baskets materials or mail-order a Basket Kit ($15) from CZarina in advance.
To order a Basket Kit, purchase your spot in the class and then email czarinal@yahoo.com. You will be sent an email reminder upon registration. Note: the deadline for ordering a kit is June 25.
This session will be recorded for all participants, including those who cannot make it live.
See below for more details on the sliding scale and video format.
Join Larkin for an exploration of what it means to practice landbased skills while experiencing chronic pain or disability. Many of us learn these skills because they’re healing & connecting. Grief can arise when we want to access land in changing or disabled bodies.
How can we start bridging our way to justice and wholeness by challenging capitalism in land-based community that supports and accepts all bodies?
This is a workshop for those experiencing chronic pain and disability, and those wanting to cultivate ways community can support. We will have time for group discussions, exercises, inspiration, and thinking about tangible ways we can bring this work out into the world.
This workshop is 2 hours long and will be recorded for participants, wether folks can attend live or not. Please be in touch ahead of time about access needs.
Date & time: Sunday July 19, 1-3pm PDT.
See below for more information on the video format and Limina series.
Join Larkin of Forest Heart Botanicals for a 3-hour class on growing and using medicinal plants. We’ll look together at ways to unlearn exploitative relationships with the land. We’ll talk about the ethics of growing a medicine garden. We’ll cover how to grow, when to harvest, how to use and what types of medicine can be made from each plant.
Plants that may be covered and are growing in Larkin’s medicine gardens include: skullcap, motherwort, valerian, chamomile, yellow dock, blue vervain, elder, angelica, lemon balm, wood betony, arnica, peppermint, oats, plantain, calendula, marshmallow, echinacea, passionflower, black cohosh & ashwagandha.
The class will be hosted live with recorded segments embedded within it, and there will be lots of time for Q&A. A download version of the session will be available for all participants, including those who can’t make it live. Registration will close 30 minutes prior to the class.
Join Larkin for a fun class where you can learn how to make cordage (natural rope!) from nettle stalks.
This class is BYON – bring your own nettle stalks. You’ll receive an email four weeks in advance of class with instructions on how you can go about finding and harvesting your own materials to work with in this live virtual class. We’ll talk about what cordage can be used for and other materials we can use to make it as well.
Date & time: Saturday, September 12, 1-2pm PDT
This video will be recorded for download for all participants, including those who can’t make it live.
See below for information on the sliding scale and video format.
The making of fish skin leather is an almost forgotten ancient skill that was once common among ocean and freshwater communities in the Northern Hemisphere in places such as Japan, China, Norway, Sweden, Alaska and the Pacific Coast. It is a beautiful textile that can be tanned in different ways to create a strong leather for clothing, pouches, wallets, footwear and art.
In this two part class we will explore oil-tanning and will use everyday materials you will likely find in your own home. In Part 1 we will prepare our fish skins for tanning and create a tannin liquor. In Part 2 we will soften and finish our skins into a beautiful leather. By the end, you will know all you need to know to have your own simple home fish tannery!
This class is offered by Janey Chang, ancestral skills practitioner and fishskin leather revivalist.
Date & time: Wednesday, June 10 & Wednesday, June 17, from 7-9pm PDT
These video sessions must be attended live; no recording will be available for download.
See below for details on registration, the sliding scale, and more.
Birds are around us all the time…in forests, yards, parks, and city streets. Learning to pay attention to and understand birds fills our lives, nourishes our spirits, expands our sphere of awareness as we move through the world.
This 2 hour video course sets the foundation for understanding what birds are saying. We will learn whom to give our attention, how to tune in, and the basics of Sit Spot meditation. We will practices connection and honouring, 5 Voices theory, patterns of alarm, and deep sensory awareness.
No prior knowledge of birds is needed.
This video session will be recorded for all participants, including those who cannot make it live.
Date & time: Thursday June 11, 7:15pm to 9:15pm PDT
Learn to make your own delicious and effervescent wild herbal sodas! You’ll learn how to make your soda starter called a ginger bug, and how to use that to make a variety of yummy sodas from the wild and cultivated plants around you have growing around you. This will be a demonstration with supplies and recipes that will be sent to class participants.
Janey Chang will be leading this fun and interactive video session with an emphasis on experimentation and creativity using your own surrounding environment as muse.
Date & time: Wednesday, June 24 from 7-8:30pm PDT.
See below for information on the sliding scale and video format.
This is a guide to keeping well and staying healthy, with the help of herbal allies and personal rhythms. In this time of COVID-19 spread, it is ever more vital to practice embodied relationship to our own well-being.
It is downloadable as a .PDF file for free or by donation: choose your price at checkout, based on your needs in the current moment. Feel free to share widely!
This guide is for us to use in times of wellness as preventive care – not during illness – to keep our immune health strong and to deepen our connection to our bodies and the more-than-human world.
We will spend a morning virtually to explore some Qigong movements and theory while inviting in the medicine of two plants at separate times.
Led by lara pacheco of Seed & Thistle Apothecary and Atabey Medicine Apprenticeship, we’ll begin with some gentle meditation and one plant ally, then step into some Qigong.
It will be important to have two tea preparations made for the morning medicine. This along with the Zoom meeting link will be shared upon registration.
See below for information on the sliding scale prices.
