Make a natural medicine reference journal - PEP BB medicine.sand.journal

Question: in the Journal we're supposed to make a tab 'Infusions' and another tab 'Teas'. Why is that? Isn't a 'tea' an infusion in hot water?

When I ask my mother, she says that tea is only tea if it comes from the tea plant (Camellia sinensis). When another herb or mixture of herbs is used, it's an infusion.

In that case we can't make real tea here, because the Camellia sinensis only grows in Asian countries like India.

Hi Inge, this seems like a good question worthy of addressing.

I'm not knowledgeable enough to answer you; but let me see if I can find someone who is.

Hi guys, I've used Trello for my journal/organising system, hope that's ok? I've posted 2 shots of the Trello board that have the columns labelled with the categories, so essentially my index. As you can see I've started adding in a few entries - I can also add photos and also reminders - might be handy for harvesting or if I'm running out of something. For example, I made some bizarrely tasty garlic honey from a recipe that I've used over the cold season and it's now pretty depleted, so I could put in a reminder there to make some more :) Anyway, the 3rd shot is of the 'open' journal, in the sense of showing one of the entries that is open. I guess this could be used out in the field if you have a Trello app on your phone. Hope this works - I find it really user friendly. Cheers!

Yay for trello!

brad millar wrote:I use a recipe app for cooking. I thought it would work well for the natural medicine journal. I like the fact that I can add pictures of the herb I’m harvesting and I can add tag words that are searchable for later reference. The apps name is “OrganizEat.” ...

Thanks, Brad!  I was dreading the idea of more paper to keep track of and have hated "recipe books" for years.  I opened OrganizEat and was quickly able to add my index to the list of folders that come standard - and in settings, I can manually sort them and delete ones that aren't relevant to my herbs or "regular" recipes I might want to add.

I was able to add tags to the recipes and choose or change the emblem that goes on the folder index page.  I am really liking this!

Here are my photos for this badge bit:

For my Natural Medicine Journal, I am using "Option 4: Create a box or file cabinet with folders for the information."
My files are a hybrid of (low-tech) index cards and (high-tech) computer documents and spreadsheets. The basic structure is based on David Allen's Getting Things Done planning system
https://gettingthingsdone.com/2009/07/paper-is-king-for-some/,
as implemented by Merlin Mann's "Hipster PDA"
http://www.43folders.com/2004/09/03/introducing-the-hipster-pda.
The first two images, below, show my index-card filing system with sections for herbs in my garden or kitchen, for remedies by symptom, and for preparations by type. Two additional images show my basic gtd index-card working file and an archive file for ongoing herb-related projects.
One screenshot from my pc shows an example of an archived file for Lemon Balm Medicinal Uses. Another screenshot shows a spreadsheet section for information on sowing to harvesting for medicinal herbs I've grown from seed. Other herb-related tracking spreadsheets not shown include propagation by cuttings, costs of production for remedies, etc.
The index-card system is highly portable - not dependent on electricity or Internet access. I can binder-clip a group of cards together to take out to the garden or on the road and can easily reorganize the cards later for reference. I don't have to protect my cards from moisture like I would have to protect my cell phone, and I don't have to keep them charged, so they can go with me wherever I want to go.
I use plain 3" x 5" cards in a "portrait" orientation. My archive file boxes are magazine files and housewares boxes from the Dollar Tree. I make my dividers from 8.5" x 11" card stock cut into six sections of roughly 2.75" x 5.5" each. The computer files and spreadsheets are organized to complement the index-card system.

Here is a picture of my Natural Medicine Journal in OneNote, showing the first section Herbs.

Here is my BB attempt!

I used a recipe/cue card box:



Below is an example of an entry. The main label will be in Ink. Each section will be a different colour. The rest will be in pencil so I can make changes/updates/notes. If I don't have enough space on one card I'll have the number of cards written in the bottom right corner to indicate multiple cards.

Front


Back

i normally keep most of my stuff online, but lately i've just wanted to share it with friends, and folks when I do some teaching, so I started printing it out, and put it all in this binder. I don't have a nice pretty cover page yet, I just have it colour so I can quickly ID it with my silly title. I also think as I add more and more to this book, I will need to change the labeling system but as for now, it completely use able by me, I can find thing quickly.  I think I might take a page from the 1800 medical home books, and build this guide into sections even though they repeat themselves a lot. More info is never a bad things. I'm so glad I started this BB it's getting me inspired to do more this winter once I'm inside and not working on  the many project on the farmlab.

Here is my fledgling journal:

I stuck with writing out a basic recipe for each type of remedy (poultice, infusion, etc.) and started compiling a list of what the herbs I currently have in my yard can be used for. The individual herb pages have more directions for creating the remedies if the basic recipe is not sufficient. (Example shown on the Juniper page for infusions)

So, I hope this is okay for the badge criteria. I have the basic recipes in the front and tabs to organize my herbs A-Z in the back.

brad millar wrote:I thought it would work well for the natural medicine journal.

I thought this was genius as well. It has a phone and web app so I can quickly add info from the web and pics from my phone. Very clever, Brad! Happy to finally have an easy way to access a bunch of the info I have on my computer when I'm on the go.