Grown Lady Grows

Remembering the divinity of plants.

Honouring the people who kept this practice alive.

Allowing herbal medicine to move us.

🌀🌀🌀🌀

Some thoughts of mine lately as I increasingly see misinformation about herbs, fear about herbal practices, and knowing that trendy posts are part of the reason why disconnection with plants exist. Of course we want to share the AMAZING & INTERESTING things we learn about plants ~ absolutely! This knowledge needs to be passed on and kept alive, but not like this.

Herbal work, land tending work, gardening with intention — always. always. always.

No more overconsuming to help us get ahead. Let’s not dishonour the long-standing work done by those who have kept this tradition alive.

✨✨✨

If you are here to genuinely learn and connect with herbal kin, thank you. I see you. I’m not trying to divide or shame with this post — We’re all trying to navigate this interweb world and it’s ever evolving state. But if this stuck for you and made you think, it may just be time to come back to herbal practices in a sacred and intentional way.

🌿🌿🌿

How did this move you or speak to you? 💕

All my love,
Alley

Our April theme for our GATHERING TIDES women’s circle: L I N E A G E. 🌹✨

When my chronic pain and anxiety rose loudly to the surface five years ago, ancestral healing found me. I began understanding that many of the stories and patterns I held since I was young, weren’t just mine. They stemmed from my mother, and my mother’s mother, and my father’s stories, and beyond. And although they are mine to hold in this moment in time, I don’t have to walk them alone.

There is a quiet power that comes from connecting to this thread of our lineages past, present, and future. It slowly begins to unravel the confusing knots of our lives and bring oxygen back into the parts of ourselves we may have long left in the dark.

In this month’s circle we’ll begin to softly untangle these together, holding each other’s patterns through sharing and silence, witnessing our truth come online again.

✨ This can feel very tender or edgy if you’ve never explored ancestral work before. To this I want to say: come as you are. You can share as much or as little as you’d like, go inward with meditation and journaling, lean into the herbal practices for deeper work at home, or joyfully share stories of your ancestral connection.

All of you is welcome here 🌊

~~

Registration link can be found below or DM us for more information & connection. https://www.theshalawindsor.com/workshops

Thank you for bravely exploring this circle with me,
Alley ✨💕

The complexity of showing up when you don’t feel like showing up. Of abandoning yourself to the wide open world of the web when you just want to crawl back into your own body and cocoon there for a while.

It’s easier to share when things feel clear and purposeful.

These days, everything feels uncertain. The weight of the world is heavy; it feels impossible to feel light in a time of so much darkness. And yet. And yet that is the sweetest rebellion when everything works to keep you pressed down. To find joy amidst the unimaginable. To stay connected to self, to purpose, to each other.

These days all I want to do is knit, connect with my hands in the soil, go for long walks with the trees. I practice Qigong and I cook. I find these moments of humanity and as simple as it all is, I need to continuously remind myself of how deeply important it is. In the age of AI and warfare and disconnection and isolation and overstimulation, all of these basic human acts are in fact bold. Boredom is sacred. Cooking from scratch is an act of magic. Gathering with community in person is more important than ever. To be together and remember our purpose and what is real and tangible. To break from doomscrolling and hug a new friend. To feel safe in your own embrace. To remember that we aren’t holding these weights alone, or we don’t have to.

Repeating, we don’t have to 💕💕💕

~~
Windsor friends, come and be seen & held in community. Those from afar, find your communities. ✨

Sat. April 18 / GATHERING TIDES WOMEN’S CIRCLE

Sun. May 3 / ALIVENESS BELTANE CELEBRATION

Both at 💛💛💛 https://www.theshalawindsor.com/workshops

& For Ontario friends, there are under 40 tickets left for ~ come and be held in this sisterhood for the weekend and experience a homecoming like no other. https://thesacredvillage.ca/festival-schedule

Hugging you from my corner of the internet (or in person soon),

Alley ✨💛🌸

Walking through a bare forest with the earliest buds is such a homecoming. What a joy to be greeted by poplar buds & flowering maples, seeing the ground littered with acorns and walnuts. 🍁 mm, after months in peak summer, it feels so right.

Dane and I got home a few days ago and haven’t missed a day spent in the trees yet. It’s been the best way to adjust to the change in weather, although we’re surprised how much our bodies have softened since landing back into early spring. How much our souls have yearned for cold cheeks and steamy breath. How much our bodies remember exactly where they should be.

🍃🍂

We have spent these days collecting natural elements for our seasonal altar and for our spring equinox event happening on Friday. We only take what is freely given, gifts from the earth to bless the season ahead. We always return these gifts back to the lands where we found them when the season ends.

We love bringing these elements into our home to ground us into the given season. It brings so much meaning to the changing days & reminds us to honour the shifts within the season and to notice the subtle changes within ourselves as well.

We can’t wait to share all that we’ve intentionally collected with you all who are coming to RISING SPRING on March 20 at ~ to create a seasonal altar together, to seed our dreams in a seeding ceremony, to sip on Cacao and hear what our bodies are calling for in this season, to move and to journal and finally to name the actions needed for change and witness each other as we notice these subtle shifts.

It feels so right to be back in this season with you all, and we can’t wait to celebrate another turning of the wheel as we welcome in Ostara. Spring. 🌸🪺

More information about the event can be found here: https://www.theshalawindsor.com/workshops

Spring blessings, everyone!
Alley