October Water Ceremony News

WATER CEREMONY

October 26, 2011 – 6 p.m.
Hospitality House, 705 B Street, Minong, WI
Sponsored by Sisterhood of the Planetary Water Rites

Storm looms in west as Minong is bathed in golden light
Storm looms in west as Minong is bathed in golden light

 Open to women who feel called to honor and respect water. Purpose: Support water issues that need our attention. To change negative impact on the world’s fresh drinking water supply for all living species all over the world. Turning our hearts and prayers toward positive energy and vibrations to heal water world wide.

Water Blessing Event
October 28 – 1 p.m. – 4 p.m.
Sponsored by the Sisterhood of the Planetary Water Rites
and Grandmother Tonya Whitedeer. May we all stand together with a single intention for water matter where we are on the Earth at this time.

Water Sister Worth Cooley-Prost sent the following Messsage:

Dear Ones!  At long last, the convergence of time, energy  and Heart allows for this long-overdue message.

[A new friend and I] talked about indigenous understandings of Now, and how I can’t imagine how I’d be able to look around in these times if I hadn’t heard Don Alejandro speak 11 years ago, how the Mayan calendar isn’t about the “end of the world,” rather about the accelerating unfolding of a whole new Time that’s very different from all that’s unraveling now. (I really like Tom Kenyon’s metaphor about 2012 or whenever — he says when his odometer turns over 100,000 miles, he doesn’t expect his car to disappear!) I think our unexpected hour together was a Gift to both of us, and recalled again the Hathors advice about the difficulties of chaotic nodes: “be curious and expect miracles.”

Turtle Women Rising 2011 was in Olympia WA this year, from sunrise on October 7 through the afternoon of October 10. I have the bowl that held the Water on the altar at TWR 2008 and 2010, both here in DC. It’s lovely bowl, about 16″
across and a graceful low, open shape in that hint-of-palest-green often seen in thick handmade glass, with a swirl of slightly darker pale green. It was in one of Coldwater Creek’s crazy online sales about 2002, marked down from probably $125 (never could’ve afforded that) to about $35. I loved it (and had a lot more money back then!), and ordered it thinking it would be beautiful on our diningroom table with fruit or flowers or just air. When it came, I realized that our diningroom table was
neither big enough nor clear enough for the bowl, so for about 6 years it sat up on top of a bookshelf in the diningroom. Then in one of the final planning conference calls for the first TWR, Eli said they needed a bowl to hold the Water in the
altar tipi, and I said, “Eli, I have the bowl.” Near the end of the final day of TWR that year, I’d left the circle to smoke a cigarette and just put my chair at the edge of things when I came back in. I remember sitting there watching
everybody singing and dancing, and thinking, “I can’t sing and I can’t dance, but I can bring the bowl that holds the Water.” We used it again in 2010.

So last Friday, Willy put two chairs and a little round table that came from the side of the road several years ago in a special, leafy grove part of the yard before he went to work, and later my friend Margaret came over with her drum. The several pieces of cloth covering the table were made by Mayan hands, African hands, and Indonesian hands, and though I’m sure the the bright red fleece with Native American designs was made in China, it came to me from Council on Indian Nations a couple of years ago. The bowl took up most of the table. The things around it included several stones, a tiny bottle of rose
quartz chips, a little basket with Haiti beads, some lavender, a Fourth Wise Man figure, and seems like a couple of other things I can’t remember at the moment. (I’d meant to take a picture but forgot; it must not have wanted me
to.) After smudging us and everything else, we filled the bowl with Water from the house and opened the space with prayers to connect with TWR and with all healing Waters around the world. I asked especially that the spirits of all the men, women,
children and horses of the civil war be honored for their courage and sacrifice, calling them back from their journeys and the traumas endured, so they can heal and return Home… and that Mother Earth be healed in all the places that have
held their pain and fear and anger for all these 150 years, and that all the Waters that touch that land — rivers, rain, dew, fog, snow, tears past and future — carry that great healing also.

Margaret brought a really beautiful drum, and I used my Ocean drum for the first time. I’ve always wanted to be where drumming is — Native American, Haitian, African, and those astonishing sideways Japanese drums — but somehow never really felt called to drum myself. Then last summer I ordered myself an Ocean drum for my birthday — synthetic covering on one side, clear mylar on the other, and filled with steel shot. I’d experimented with it a little a couple of times since… tilting it from side to side makes sounds of waves and surf… but this was the first time I really used it. Amazing! Each of the
times between opening the space Friday and closing it Monday afternoon — and the next night when Moon was full somewhere behind thick clouds — it’s given me something new. The first day, when I opened my eyes after a few minutes, the
sky and trees were in my lap! (The clear mylar side is like a mirror.) Also, the steel beads often make a yin-yang pattern. The next day I also used the beater that came with it, and after a little while realized there were subtle musical tones at the edges; they’ve been clearer each time. Another time when I looked down, I saw the ripple patterns around my thumbs holding the
edges. Looks like I have my drum — who knew?!!

When we came back to the house on Friday, the mail had come, bringing the sage you sent, Mary Ellen… so that’s been part of each visit since. When I went back to the space the second day, there was a line of sand or fine dirt around the whole front edge of the table. (Another time I’ll tell you the story of the six deer who came in January after I’d asked my grandmothers for guidance and protection and that I be able to see them and hear them clearly.) We took everything back in but the cloth and bowl when we closed the space on Monday. I’ve left the bowl there for the three days of rain we’ve had, and tomorrow will give the Water to the Earth there and it will go back on the high shelf until whenever its next time is.

Margaret is coming again for Water Prayers at 1:00 on October 28, so we will be among you all around the world. These are some fancy, fancy times, aren’t they? I’m so grateful to be here, so grateful to both of you that you’re in my life and in my heart. I do want to be a Water Sister, please!

Abundant love and blessings,
Worth

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Sisterhood of Planetary Water Rites September 2011 Newsletter

Greetings from the Sisterhood of the Planetary Water Rites. Grandmother Tonya Whitedeer assembles all the Water Circle news from Water Sisters and it is posted at this link at http://www.waterblessings.org/newsletters/newsletter2011-09.pdf

Beauty is etheral
Beauty is etheral

I have excerpted Grandmother Tonya Whitedeer’s message. She says, “Dear Ones,  It seems as though I am repeating myself; however the message is not being heard within the hearts of many. To those that read this message please take this to  heart….and know that they are real and will affect the entire World. To those that hold the words deep within their hearts, know that you will receive more personal messages that are in tune with you and your loved ones needs. It is a matter of  knowing how to prepare for the great changes that will come down upon us.

There is no need to live in fear for when you know the prophecies you will trust the truth of the teachings as compassionate lessons given through love for every living thing upon this Earth. We all have a great responsibility to be caretakers of certain areas, the plants, animals, children, food supplies, housing, land provisions, and so much more. Your path should be clear by now, if not, they say “You have not done your homework!”

Most of this information has been given to all peoples for around 40 years!. The time is now to make our choices….either go with the material or step into the 5 th dimension and raise your spiritual consciousness into that higher realm of light energies.  We must keep united and form more circles of like-minded and spirited people. Staying strong with our prayers and eremonies that honor our Ancestors that are coming forward to give us the help and information that is needed. We are living within the times of a most Divine Purification and should not question for we, within our hearts already know the answers. We must be seed-savers for the future! With  the light comes the darkness, there are entities that do not want the Light Bearers to be able to go through to the next dimension for it would mean the salvation of a renewed Earth. They are trying to  block our work, separate people from their beliefs so that there we be no survival of the goodness of humanity living in harmony with the Earth. Stand Strong! Stand Tall! Stand Together!
AHO…Grandmother Whitedeer

Importance of water stressed – MiningJournal.net | News, Sports, Jobs, Marquette Information | The Mining Journal

As many of you may have heard by now, I walked with the copper pail with water from the Gulf of Mexico last Saturday when Sandy Stein and I caught up with the Mother Earth Water Walkers between Old Post and Reserve at LCO.  Anna Merritt and I are going to Bad River Reservation tomorrow, June 10. Follow-up on this day afterwards.

Please take the time to read about the important issue of protecting water for all species and for generations to come. Water is a gift and not a resource to be plundered, contaminated, bought and sold.

Importance of water stressed – MiningJournal.net | News, Sports, Jobs, Marquette Information | The Mining Journal.

Today when you take that sip water, be sure to thank the water. She has been taken for granted and disrespected for far too long. In ancient times and with many tribal cultures of today, people remember to thank the water and honor her for the gift of life she brings.

Happy Tonics on the move

posted by Mary Ellen Ryall

March 2, I did a radio interview with Jim Dick, Managing Director, Discover Wisconsin. The topic was Earth Day and why it is important.  The broadcast is scheduled to air on radio stations across the state on March 10. As many of you may realize, Happy Tonics sponsors the Washburn County Earth Day Event in Shell Lake. This year’s event is on April 23. See event details at www.happytonics.org

 March 11, Happy Tonics and invited guests will attend the Discover Wisconsin Premiere & Gala in Spooner, WI, 6 p.m. at the Palace Theatre ; 7 p.m. Gala at Northwest Sports Complex Ballroom. The syndicated television network broadcast will air on Saturday, March 12. The Washburn County TV program includes the Monarch Butterfly Habitat, Shell Lake, Woodcarving Museum, Shell Lake and others. Michelle Voight, Executive Director of Washburn County Tourism Association (WCTA), was instrumental in getting Washburn County promoted as a Tourist and Vacation Destination. Washburn County WCTA members that include businesses and nonprofit organizations are featured in this TV program.

Stations and Times: Local access channels: WDEE TV 4, Deerfield; WSCS TV 8, Sheboygan; Channel 12, Cottage Grove; New London, Cable 6; City Channel 25, West Allis; JATV 12, Janesville; PEG Station Channel 6, Mauston; W43BR Baraboo; FSN North and FSN Wisconsin, All stations air on Saturday, 10 am; WQOW, Eau Claire, Sun. 5 p.m.; WKOW, Madison, Sat. 6:30 p.m.; WFRV Green Bay, Sat. 5 p.m.; WJMN, Marquette, Sat. 6:30 p.m., WAOW, Wausau, Sat. 6 p.m.; WXOW, La Crosse, Sun. 5 p.m.; WYOW, Eagle River, Sat., 6:30 p.m., WIFR, Rockford, IL, Sat., 6:30 p.m., KFXA, Cedar Rapids, Dubuque, IA; WDIO, Superior/Duluth, Sun. 5:30 p.m., WIRT, Hibbing, MN, Sun. 5:30 p.m.; WITI, Milwauke3, Sunday, 9 a.m.;   

 March 16 – Environmental Film Feast at Lac Courte Oreilles Ojibwa Community College (LCOOCC) will feature speaker Kevin Schoessow, Agricultural Agent, Spooner Agriculture Research Station. Subject: Composting. One can’t have a soil enriched garden without composting.  A rare film, “Life in the Soil” will be shown. Food prices may continue to rise to offset rising fuel cost at the pump. One way to be sustainable is to plant a vegetable garden. Soil is just as important as seed. Many seed companies are charging more for garden seed this year.  Join us at LCOOCC on March 16, 12 Noon to 2:30 p.m. 13644 Trepania Road, Hayward, WI.

 We are pleased to announce that Pat Shields, Happy Tonics Board Member and Faculty at LCOOCC, recently received an International Faculty Award to attend the seminar on sustainability in Costa Rica and Nicaragua this summer. The National Science Foundation is a co-grantor.  Shields will be submitting the college’s 3 year grant with the Center for Traditional Medicine in Esteli, Nicaragua, on March 16th and leaves for Nicaragua on March 17th. 

 March 19 – Happy Tonics will be exhibiting at the 11th Annual New Ventures Garden Seminar, Northwest School, Hwy. 53, Minong, WI. We will promote Earth Day Event and Monarch Butterfly Habitat in Shell Lake. Cassie Thompson, young environmental advocate will assist us. She lives in Minong and is an inspiration for youth across the Nation to get involved in Volunteerism.

Happy Tonics September News

Ryall, M. E. (2010, October 6). Happy Tonics September News. Washburn County Register, p. 10

Alex paying attention to learning to identify leaves
Alex paying attention to learning to identify leaves

 There was a Fall Youth Plant Science event at the Spooner Ag Research Station on Saturday October 2, 2010. Area 4-H youth and other youth were invited to attend the event. Happy Tonics is proud to announce that the Pines and Lake Girl Scout Troop of Shell Lake attended. The Girl Scout Troop had a container garden at Friendship Commons this past summer. Offering youth gardening opportunities is one way to jumpstart their interest in gardening. 

Emily experiences pure joy as she catches a falling leaf
Emily experiences pure joy as she catches a falling leaf

Kevin Schoessow, UW-Extension Spooner Area Agriculture Agent and UW-Extension Master Gardener Volunteers lead discussions and demonstrations on making compost, planting garlic, pruning grapes and raspberries and putting the garden to bed. There was a tour of the Spooner Ag Research Station Display gardens were youth learned about the “off the grid” drip irrigation system, powered by an airlift tech pump and windmill and the newly constructed hoop house for season extension. The girls learned something about seed saving and enjoyed tasting fresh fruit, vegetables and berries right from the garden.

Kevin showing a button bottom and a peanut shaped squash
Kevin showing a button bottom and a peanut shaped squash

Happy Tonics exhibited at the Lac Courte Oreilles Convention Center as part of the Wellness Fair and Farmers Market on September 30, 2010. The nonprofit organization is a member of the Green Team at the LCO Tribal College which sponsored the event.  A pumpkin and squash display was on Exhibit. The plants are native to the Americas. A Three Sisters Garden (Corn, beans and squash) was grown in the habitat to teach visitors how heirloom organic crops may have been grown by Native Americans in the prairie of long ago. WOJB did a live interview of the Three Sisters Garden with Mary Ellen Ryall.   Happy Tonics volunteer staff shucked Hidatsa beans and packaged organic herb tea and organic culinary herbs for their online Store at http://stores.ebay.com/HAPPY-TONICS

Happy Tonics received a Matching Gift from Hachette Book Group from Park Avenue, New York, as a match to the donation made by Erica Hohos of Worcester, Massachusetts. The donation will allow us to implement memory pavers around the large wild black cherry tree in the Memory Tree Grove. We will honor Happy Tonics members who have passed on with pavers. The nonprofit organization will invite the public to participate in this upcoming fundraiser. Citizens will be able to purchase an engraved paver in memory of their loved ones including family, friends and pets.

Event: Environmental Film Festival at Lac Courte Oreilles Ojibwe Community College March 11

Join us for the March Environemental Film Fest
LCOOCC, 13466 Trepania, Hayward, Wisconsin

LCOOCC James “Pipe” Mustache Auditorium
Thursday, March 11th, 2010
Lunch Available on Site @ 11:30am for $5 – Provided by LCO Elders Association
12:00pm  Speaker:  Dr. Damian Vraniak
12:30pm Film: “America’s Lost Landscape: The Tall Grass”
1:30pm Community Discussion – Advocacy to Action

Common Sunflower
Common Sunflower at Damian Vraniak's Prairie in Springbrook, WI.

Prior to Euro American settlement in the 1820s, one of the major landscape features of North America was 240 million acres of tall grass prairie, but between 1830 and 1900 the prairie was steadily transformed to farmland.  This change brought about an enormous social change for Native Americans.  The film creates a powerful and moving viewing experience about the natural and cultural history of America.  Loss of prairie and fragmentation is a loss of many species, plant, animal, and human. (57 minutes) 

Save the Dates for Upcoming Environmental Films and Sustainable Living Education!Thursdays –April 22nd and May 6th

For More Information Contact:  Amber Marlow – GIS Lab/ Rm 508 or @ 634-4790 ext 156

 

Day Nine – Teaching Importance of Native Crops through Brighter Planet Grant Proposal

A special thank you to Tim Reedy, State Farm Insurance, of Spooner, WI, for voting for our cause.  To the countless anonymous voters, we are grateful that you are supporting our grant proposal.  

Happy Tonics collaborates with Lac Courte Oreilles Ojibwe Community College to teach that we need to grow local and native crops to support biodiversity of plants and pollinators during climate change.  Please Sign up and VOTE for Climate Change Native Habitat and Community Gardens Shell Lake grant proposal at Brighter Planet at http://brighterplanet.com/project_fund_projects/100  Your votes may help decide if we are able to secure funding for the Morph Your Mind Environmental Education Program that reaches far and wide to bring Indigenous wisdom of sustainability to the public.  

Beautiful corn silks that add flavoring and nutrients to soup.

The Lac Courte Oreilles OJibwe Community College (LCOOCC) Sustainable Living Institute in partnership with the LCO Green Team, Happy Tonics Butterfly Sanctuary, and LCOOCC Library are bringing an Environmental Film Festival to LCO! 

 February 18th Event in the Auditorium includes: 

 Luncheon: Prepared by LCO Elders Association, Student Center $5 – serving starts at 11:30 a.m.
Noon:  Speaker:  Mary Ellen Ryall, Happy Tonics Butterfly Sanctuary Executive Director.
Topic: Role of biodiversity of native corn and reasons why native crops best survive climate change.
12:15pm Film:  “King Corn”
1:45pm Community Discussion:  Advocacy to Action! 

Native dent, flour, flint, popcorn and sweet corn

 Almost everything Americans eat contains corn: high fructose corn syrup, corn-fed meat, and corn-based processed foods are the staples of the modern diet.  Ready for an adventure and alarmed by signs of their generation’s bulging waistlines, college friends Ian Cheney and Curt Ellis know where to go investigate.

Eighty years ago, Ian and Curt’s great-grandfathers lived just a few miles apart, in the same rural county in northern Iowa.  Now their great-grandsons are returning with a mission:  they will plant an acre of corn, follow their harvest into the world, and attempt to understand what they—and all of us—are really made of.  Visit the movie link to learn more at http://www.kingcorn.net/ 

Good night dear voters where ever you are.

LCO Tribal College to Host Environmental Film Series

LCOOCC James “Pipe” Mustache Auditorium, Thursday, January 28, 2010

Free event—public welcome!

Lake Superior
Lake Superior

Pre-Activity; LCOOCC Ice Fishing Event, Friday, Jan 22, 9:00 a.m., Grindstone—South Landing

12:00 p.m. Potluck (remember to bring your plate!)

12:30 p.m. Speaker: Gladyce Nahbenayash

1:00 p.m. Film: Flow

Irena Salina’s award-winning documentary investigation into what experts label the most important political and environmental issue of the 21st century—The World Water Crisis. Salina builds a case against the growing privatization of the world’s dwingling fresh water supply with an unflinching focus on politics, pollution, human rights, and the emergence of a domineering world water cartel. (64 minutes)

Save the dates for Upcoming Environmental Films and Sustainable Living Education!

Thursdays—February 18, March 11, April 22, and May 6. For more information, contact Amber Marlow, GIS Lab/Rm 508 or #534-4790, ext 156.

Irena Salina’s award-winning documentary investigation into what experts label the most important political and environmental issue of the 21st century—The World Water Crisis. Salina builds a case against the growing privatization of the world’s dwingling fresh water supply with an unflinching focus on politics, pollution, human rights, and the emergence of a domineering world water cartel. (64 minutes)

Save the dates for Upcoming Environmental Films and Sustainable Living Education!

Thursdays—February 18, March 11, April 22, and May 6. For more information, contact Amber Marlow, GIS Lab/Rm 508 or #534-4790, ext 156.


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Lakeland Manor Hosts 1st Environmental Film of 2010

Happy Tonics, Inc. is sponsoring the II Annual Winter Environmental Film Festival in Washburn and Sawyer County, Wisconsin. USA.

Viewing insect world
Life is a mystery in the understory.

The first host site was Lakeland Manor.  The senior housing residence showed MicroCosmos a film produced in France.  The movie shows the little seen world of insects in the USA and the rain forests of Latin America.  Beautiful closeup photography.  Event took place on 15 January 2010.

St. Richelle, guests and Gretal
Darling Gretal goes to the movies

We had a good turn out of residents and guests.  Oh yes, our little pets enjoy being with us during film viewings especially when cookies are served.

I want some cookies
Buddy was more interested in the cookies that were served.Little Gretal goes to the movie

EVENTS – II Annual Winter Environmental Film Festival January 2010

II Annual Winter Environmental Film Festival – JANUARY 2010

January 28 – Lac Courte Oreilles Ojibwe Community College, 13346 Trepania Road, Hayward.  Local fresh caught fish to be served at NOON day meal.  Speaker from Red Cliff Reservation will share update on toxic waste dumping in Lake Superior at 12:10 p.m.  Gladyce Nahbenayash speaks at 12:30 and film at 1 p.m.   Environmental film Flow to be shown. Film addresses global Indigenous water rights, water purity, privatization and pollution.  College students plan to go ice fishing on January 22 to catch the main course.  American Indian Science and Engineering Society (AISES) will cook the fish for the pot luck meal.  Guest speaker Gladyce Nahbenayash will speak on the sacredness of water.   FREE.   Open to the public.

Silver Lake
Silver Lake