 Horehound (Marrubium vulgare) is a robust, hardy herb that has carved a niche for itself in both historical and modern medicinal practices. With its downy leaves and white flowers, this unassuming plant carries a wealth of healing properties and a rich history that dates back to ancient times.
A Glimpse into Horehound’s History Horehound has been revered for centuries as a medicinal powerhouse. Its use can be traced back to ancient Egypt, where it was considered sacred and used in a variety of healing practices. The Greeks and Romans also embraced this herb, particularly for its ability to soothe respiratory ailments. During the Middle Ages, horehound was a staple in herbal medicine, often used in cough syrups and lozenges. It was a common remedy for colds, coughs, and other respiratory issues, and its popularity spread across Europe and eventually to North America with early settlers. Medicinal Uses of Horehound Horehound’s primary claim to fame lies in its medicinal properties, particularly in treating respiratory conditions. The herb is rich in marrubiin, a bitter compound that acts as an expectorant, making it easier to expel mucus from the lungs. This makes horehound an effective natural remedy for bronchitis, asthma, and coughs. Here are some of the medicinal benefits of horehound: 1. Respiratory Relief: Horehound is most commonly used to alleviate coughs and colds. It can help soothe a sore throat, reduce phlegm, and clear congestion. Many traditional cough syrups and lozenges contain horehound for this reason. 2. Digestive Aid: The bitter properties of horehound stimulate digestion and can help with issues like indigestion, bloating, and loss of appetite. It promotes the secretion of digestive juices and bile, aiding in the overall digestive process. 3. Anti-inflammatory and Antioxidant: Horehound has anti-inflammatory properties, which can help reduce inflammation in the body, particularly in the respiratory and digestive systems. It also contains antioxidants that help protect the body from oxidative stress. 4. Wound Healing: Horehound can be applied topically to help heal wounds and cuts. Its antiseptic and anti-inflammatory properties make it a useful herb for promoting skin healing. Ways to Use Horehound Horehound Candy/Cough Drops: Traditionally, horehound was used to make a bitter candy that was not only a treat but also served as a remedy for sore throats and coughs. The candy is still enjoyed by those who appreciate its distinctive flavor. Tea: Horehound tea is another common way to consume the herb. It’s often sweetened with honey to counteract the bitterness and can be sipped to relieve respiratory or digestive discomfort. Infusions and Tinctures: Horehound can be made into infusions or tinctures for internal use, providing a more concentrated form of the herb's medicinal properties. Horehound is a part of the mint family and is relatively easy to grow and if left unattended while planted in the ground, will spread easily. But is manageable in a container! If you are interested in growing herbs for medicinal uses, this is a great one to have growing! Horehound is also found growing wild and a great resource for all wild growing herbs in Texas is Foraging Texas If you are interested in learning to make herbal tinctures, Mountain Rose Herbs is one of many great sources for guidance.
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My favorite herbal tea blend is cooling and hydrating Don't feel like you need to stick exactly to the recipe. Make adjustments to your body's needs and your tastes. Also adjust to what you have! I don't always have everything because I use herbs in my soap and skincare products, so sometimes I'm out until I can restock. HOWEVER, if you can use Hibiscus and Peppermint or Spearmint, you will have a refreshing tea that is cooling and hydrating to your body. Perfect for summer. Hibiscus, Peppermint, Spearmint, Chamomile is available at most grocery stores in the form of tea bags. Start where you can!  Want to know what is so great about each herb?Here are all the reasons you may want to try my Summer Herbal Tea Blend: HIBISCUS
COMBINED BENEFITS
Do you have any favorite tea blends? I'd love to know about them!  Here's a few reasons we love goat milk in our body soap!!  Goat milk has been treasured for centuries as a natural beauty elixir, and its use in body soap brings a host of benefits for the skin.
One of the most significant advantages of goat milk soap is its remarkable moisturizing properties. Unlike many commercial soaps that strip the skin of its natural oils, goat milk soap contains fatty acids and triglycerides that help maintain the skin's moisture barrier. This makes it especially beneficial for those with dry or sensitive skin, as it provides gentle hydration without causing irritation. The creamy lather produced by goat milk soap not only feels luxurious but also leaves the skin feeling soft, supple, and nourished. Another key benefit of goat milk in body soap is its rich content of vitamins and minerals, particularly Vitamin A, which is known for its ability to promote healthy skin cell turnover. This can lead to a smoother, more even complexion over time. Additionally, goat milk contains lactic acid, a natural exfoliant that helps to gently slough away dead skin cells, revealing fresh, radiant skin underneath. This gentle exfoliation can also aid in reducing the appearance of fine lines and wrinkles, making goat milk soap a popular choice for those seeking a more youthful glow. With its natural, skin-loving properties, goat milk soap offers a perfect blend of gentle care and effective cleansing, making it an ideal choice for daily skincare routines. Have you noticed a difference between soap with and without goat milk?  I get asked about the ingredients in the herbal healing balm that I make and what their purpose is within the balm, so I'm going to give that information here! It took me forever to write it all down, but I did it in a way that you can scroll through without heavy reading. So it's more like a reference. ALL VARIETIES OF HEALING BALM (BABY, TALLOW & ORIGINAL) HAVE THESE HERBS INFUSED IN ORGANIC OLIVE OIL. ORIGINAL HEALING BALM is made with Organic Coconut Oil and Infused Organic Olive Oil TALLOW HEALING BALM is made with Tallow and infused Organic Olive Oil BABY HEALING BALM is made with Tallow and infused Organic Olive Oil Ingredients:
COMFREY LEAF I love a good comfrey leaf balm! So simple. So healing. I think every human should grow comfrey leaf! Here's why: PROPERTIES:
Read more about it here! LEMON BALM LEAF This is another one I think we should all grow! It's part of the mint family and grows very easily and can really help you make most days better in some way! PROPERTIES:
Read more about Lemon Balm here. CALENDULA FLOWER This flower is so well known as a skin healer! Almost everyone has heard of it and it has a long history of ways it helps benefit the skin! PROPERTIES
This is such a huge player in the healing balm that I make and I bet you can see why! It has so many more uses, but I only listed the skin benefits. You can check out the extensive list here. HELICHRYSUM (IMMORTELLE) FLOWER This flower is really amazing. This is why people say using the balm has reversed the age of the skin on their hands or wrinkles on their necks. But it's also healing. It's primarily used as an essential oil, but it's really expensive. PROPERTIES
Known for it's anti-inflammatory and regenerative properties, this flower, generally used as an essential oil, is for infection, arthritis, muscle pain and to reduce the signs of aging due to regenerative properties! Read more here. CHAMOMILE FLOWER This is a good one! SO MANY helps in a tiny flower! Even small grocery stores generally carry a chamomile tea... so that's pretty easy to get your hands on. PROPERTIES
TEA TREE ESSENTIAL There are a good number of studies about tea tree oil and that's always exciting to see the results of what kind of funky stuff tea tree oil can zap! Acne is probably the number one thing you'll see if you do a search on the benefits of tea tree oil. It should be diluted so using the healing balm with an extra drop may really give some relief to the redness and swelling of acne. I know it works well on cystic acne because of all the reviews I get! Here's a basic rundown:
LAVENDER ESSENTIAL OIL Lavender is another keep on hand favorite of mine! It's amazing for emergencies or quick needs! It's easy to stick a bottle of it in my pocket for bites or stings, cuts and to stop bleeding. It definitely has a place in the healing balm!! PROPERTIES
The healing balm that I make for you is the same stuff I make for myself and my family. It meets so many needs while being convenient. It also doesn't hurt when applied. No stinging. But it is soothing. Some common uses, besides cuts, wounds, burns, insect bites are cold sores, chapped lips, diaper rash, other rashes, whatever skin stuff you might be dealing with, try it and tell me how it works so I can share that with others. It helps calm down cystic acne, soothes cracked heels, prevents dry winter skin cracking, helps with wrinkles, arthritis, dry skin... the list just goes on and on. It's such a simple but valuable balm. A little goes a long ways, so unless you're eating it, it should last awhile. You can safely eat it, but shouldn't. It's safe to use on your critters also! If they lick it, no worries! Testers are available at any events that I'm at and usually at any of the store locations that carry any of the healing balms. See STOCKISTS in the menu. Baby Healing Balm
$16.00
Nurture your little one's delicate skin with our Baby Healing Balm. Specially formulated with gentle, natural ingredients, this soothing balm helps calm irritation, reduce redness, and promote a soft, healthy complexion. Perfect for everyday use, its mild, nurturing formula is designed to protect and heal sensitive baby skin, ensuring comfort and care in every application. Completely non-toxic just in case it's eaten! (it happens!) Convenient packaging to go into bags to have at the ready, or in car consoles! Also safe to use on your pets or livestock. Tallow Healing Balm
$16.00
Just like our Original, but made with beef tallow instead of Coconut Oil. A trusted remedy born from the everyday needs of a busy family. Developed when quick, soothing solutions were essential for little cuts, scrapes, bites, stings, rashes, and burns, this balm has been a household staple ever since. Its gentle, soothing formula not only eases minor injuries but also works wonders on cracked and dry skin. A little goes a long way, making it perfect for tender hands and feet before bedtime. Enjoy the comforting, familiar relief that makes healing a little easier for everyone in the family, including pets and livestock. Original Healing Balm
$16.00
Introducing our Original Healing Balm—a trusted remedy born from the everyday needs of a busy family. Developed when quick, soothing solutions were essential for little cuts, scrapes, bites, stings, rashes, and burns, this balm has been a household staple ever since. Its gentle, soothing formula not only eases minor injuries but also works wonders on cracked and dry skin. A little goes a long way, making it perfect for tender hands and feet before bedtime. Enjoy the comforting, familiar relief that makes healing a little easier for everyone in the family.  Let's Build a Worm Bin!I’ve always been fascinated by the unsung heroes of composting: worms, specifically Eisenia fetida (commonly known as red wigglers, brandling, or manure worms) and Lumbricus rubellus (another manure worm). These species are the powerhouses of vermicomposting, efficiently breaking down organic waste into nutrient-rich vermicompost that’s a gardener’s gold. Avoid nightcrawlers for composting bins, as they require deep soil to burrow and have different feeding habits. For a thriving worm bin, you want fast-working, surface-dwelling worms like red wigglers that devour food scraps with gusto. After neglecting my own worm bin for nearly a year, I finally set up a compact, indoor bin in my laundry room, which has been a game-changer. You can easily create a small bin to tuck under a kitchen sink or place on a porch, tailored to your space. My larger bin, safely housed in the barn with fencing to keep curious chickens at bay, continues to churn out compost for my garden. With a little care, these wriggly workers can transform your kitchen scraps into eco-friendly fertilizer in no time. Here’s a picture of it. It’s nothing exciting, but I have a ton of worms! I’m gonna show you how I made my newest worm bin from a couple buckets that I had on hand. First, you will need a dog and 2 buckets!  It’s super simple to add a faucet to a bucket and it is super handy later, as a lot of draining happens and you’ll want to use that liquid on a plant or two. You sure don’t have to have a faucet though. 
I found an old window screen in my barn and cut a circle out for the INSIDE BOTTOM of the bucket with the holes.  Now the fun stuff! Use some newspaper, paper shreddings, for putting in next, on top of the screen. I used a paper feed sack and tore it into pieces. It’s fun that you really can use things that you have on hand!  If your worms and the 'stuff' in the bin isn’t very wet, add some water to the paper and get it a bit wet, not soggy. My worms and their dirt was pretty wet, so I added them on top of the dry paper. There is just really nothing horrible going to happen either way, but just remember that your worm habitat needs to be like a squeezed out sponge. A bit more than damp.  Above is TOO WET. You can see the puddling of water. It's SO IMPORTANT to provide drain holes so this will never happen. Next, I add some used hay, so it’s almost chopped looking, but only a handful. I don’t want to create a hot environment by adding too much green matter. But I want them to always have a way to be happy and never soaking wet.  If you have heard about compost getting hot and stuff like that, it’s very true. So we want the worms to break things down and if it gets hot in there, they’ll die. I have caught some outdoor compost piles on fire by accident of course, but it burnt an entire wall of a barn…but that’s a story for another day. If it can burn a building down, obviously the worms are going to die. NOT the goal! Next, you can add some food for them. They love coffee grounds and at my house, they get a lot of those! Also vegetable trimmings, fruit scraps. Molded, uncooked produce is one of their favs! No fats, meats, citrus. And egg shells don’t break down well, but it aerates things, so adding a few is nice, but really, it's a pain later when you want to use the vermicompost.  Coffee filters, fermented cherry pits and skins, coffee… As I add food for them, I add a bit more paper to the top. Kind of layering, but there really isn’t hard rules here. But just try to keep a balance going.  You will then sit the bucket with the holes, screen and all the worms inside the bucket with the faucet.
That’s it! Super simple! Do you have worm bins? I’m excited to know who else raises worms! If you are somewhat local to me and want to get some worms, just reach out! I generally have extras. |
AuthorEvelyn Jane here... the blog started as a way to have some recipes always available for my children when they left home and wanted to cook some of their favs. Then I added some farm topics, then I started selling soap to stores and wanted a way for them to have all the information they wanted plus printable graphics. So now, it's a pretty diverse space of topics, but it's also 100% me. I am a soap maker, but also a small farmer of goats and chickens, a gardener, a cook, baker, sewist, crafter, reader, a business owner, naturalist, herbalist... I happily wear a lot of hats! Archives
July 2025
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