WCSHome   Register   Schedule   News   Camping/Facilities   What to Bring   Workshops   Directions   Merchants   Local Accommodations   Info/Policies   Volunteer   Food  Contact Cindy Parker is a community herbalist who lives on 30 beautiful acres in southeastern Ohio which also serves as home to her business, Healing Heart Herbals.  Here she offers educational classes, retreats, consultations, and tea parties while also renting the space to others for their own business and personal get aways, gatherings, and events.   Cindy has been a community herbalist of the wise woman tradition since completing her studies at the California School of Herbal Studies in 1979.  She then became a certified childbirth educator in 1982 and was actively involved in the Ohio midwifery movement.  She home birthed and home schooled four children while sharing her knowledge of herbs with others.   More recently she received her Master's degree in Family Studies with minors in Women's Studies and Communication.  She is a part time professor at Ohio University and substitute teaches in her local public school district of Meigs County.    Her passion is sharing her love of plants and people and home and family with those who also respect caretaking as a valuable and integral aspect of human development and survival.  She is committed to elevating the status of women's work and the domestic arts through sustainable practices and by keeping the folkloric tradition of herbalism and home management alive and in the hands of the people.     Cornstalk Festival This session conducted by Cindy Parker focuses on the historical uses of plant medicines and how they may be utilized as valuable resources today.  Much of this information is the result of oral tradition kept alive by the strong and resilient people of the foothills of Appalachia.  Despite their geographical isolation and poverty, their sense of self sufficiency, modesty, and faith have created a connection with the earth that embodies herbalism as a precious way of life.