"Gimme a Mason Jar!"

A couple days ago on October 27th, I finally cleaned, de-seeded (tedious as picking cat hairs off a blanket with tweezers!), and placed into maceration by vodka the rosehips and hawthorn berries I'd collected on Lopez during my trip. Careful cleaning and inspection is more necessary for rosehips than hawthorn, I found, because a certain little worm --- likely the young of an insect --- likes to take up reaidence in the rich centre of the rosehip as a source of food. After a thorough wash, especially of the hawthorn berries, I placed both in the jar along with the vodka. The result is this beautiful, nutrient-rich, heart-empowering, red tincture in the making!

It was critical I finally make medicine from the fruits, because after a, ahem, few days in yoghurt containers, they were starting to go bad and mold! I ended up using, rather than juice bottles, a mason jar I'd borrowed from Kathleen, with whom I'm staying. Both for simplicity and due to the fact I had only one ready mason jar, I combined both types of berry into a single remedy. A couple weeks of daily shaking, and a new potion will be ready for winter imbibing.

This mason jar issue is one of amusement, especially now that I'm living with another, rather bawdy-humored witch and we can share laughs. These memes illustrate this well! The above, for example, resulted in me laughing my effing arse off.

Privately, I also think that if anyone should dare give Professor Snape a gift, the safest item would be either a rare ingredient, an exotic Dark Arts object, or, well, an empty vitreous vessel.

Hallowe'en is coming! Time to harvest, cook, party, bake pumpkin seeds, cackle, and brew our frizzy (or greasy) heads off!