A shipment of six dwarf fruit trees arrived on Friday: Asian and Bartlett pears, Bing and Black Tartarian sweet cherries, Elberta peach, and Methley plum. I turned a lovely sunny spot of the yard, next to the vegetable garden and driveway, into a fruit orchard.
Inga's placenta has been lurking in the depths of our freezer, and it was time to plant her tree of life.I'd like to say there was some deep symbolism behind which fruit tree the placenta went underneath. But honestly, I decided that I really liked dark sweet cherries and so under the Black Tartarian it went!
Zari helped me dig the holes. She wanted to touch the (still frozen) placenta and umbilical cord before the burial.
Zari's placenta went underneath a climbing rose. Dio's went under a rose tree. Now that I've branched out to fruit trees, I wonder what type of plant the next placenta will nourish.
Do you still have a placenta in your freezer? What are your plans for it?
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That's funny - both our daughter's placentas (placentae?) are buried under cherry trees - because that's the fruit my partner and I prefer!
ReplyDeleteI do have a placenta in the freezer... we had our last 2 kids really close together, and I hurried and planted my older daughter's placenta under a new pear tree, because I thought it would be weird to have to label the placentas in my freezer to tell them apart. My baby's placenta will be planted under a cherry tree that I plan to plant in the spring. If all goes well :)
ReplyDeleteI'm bummed that I didn't even get to see my first placenta. The plan was for it to go into the freezer and then under a tree.
ReplyDeleteThe placenta I'm working with right now will probably end up encapsulated, so it'll bypass the freezer altogether. :)
I have one 2-year old placenta in my freezer still. I'd like to plant it someday, but we live in a city with no green space of our own, so I guess it will have to keep waiting.
ReplyDeleteI'll probably encapsulate the one I'm currently working on, but we'll see...
I haven't ever kept mine. All 6, just tossed. Now I feel kinda bad. ~T~
ReplyDeleteSo funny! Our youngest daughter turned two today, and until yesterday, her placenta was lurking in our freezer. We had good intentions of getting it buried in the yard, but life just happened and the task never got checked off. Yesterday, a share of organic beef came to our house, and we needed the freezer space, so the placenta finally found a home in the yard. :)
ReplyDeleteI have 2 placentas in my freezer still. We're waiting until we have a house... which will be about 7 more years.
ReplyDeleteI made prints of my placenta about 6 months after my daughter was born, but I do still have the placenta in the deep freeze. She'll be 4 in less than a month. I'm planning to keep it until I can show it to her and she'll be old enough to understand what it's all about. I won't be producing any other placentas, so I'm going to put the one I've got to maximum use! It'll be a few years yet before I dig it out to show her, so I don't have to make any decisions about its final destination. Maybe she'll have her own plans for it.
ReplyDeleteMy last three placentas are all buried with my son's tree (maple). He passed away when he was only two so we planted a tree in his honor in the park near our house where he loved to play. I love the symbolism of nourishing that tree and it directing our vision heavenward.
ReplyDeleteI DO still have a placenta in my freezer, and I don't know what I am going to plant it under yet.
ReplyDeleteI have some fears:
what I plant will die.
My dogs will dig up and eat the placenta and terrify neighbor children.
or we will move and I'll be so, so sad.
I am saving it to plant when we wean to comfort my sorrows over that stage ending. so I have some more time.
My first two placentas are both buried in different places. I'm not so attached to my placenta that I get weepy over that fact :)
ReplyDeleteDo I ever! The original plan was to encapsulate it, but first time parents plus we moved a week after she was born. That did NOT happen.
ReplyDeleteNow I'd love to make prints with it so I have something to show my daughter when she's older.
Hopefully it will make it to a final resting place below the earth. :)
I thought Id plant my sons placenta, but then i learned about encapsulation and not feel confident thats going to be the way to go for us with each babe! i LOVED taking it, it really helped balance my hormones. i bet it is amazing nourishment for the trees though :)
ReplyDeleteWe planted my son's placenta under a Redhaven peach tree. The peaches we got from it were perfect!
ReplyDeleteNow we have a new placenta in the freezer. I think we'll be replacing our ailing pear tree, so the placenta will go under the new one.
It doesn't just take placenta, I get weepy over where I've lived easily. I told my husband as soon as we planned our homebirth - I said you know I'll never want to move now. silly I know LOL
ReplyDeleteWe still have both the boys' placentas in the freezer...in a new house, even (which reminds me, I must send you my new address, Rixa!). I think maybe one of these days I'll get around to planting them, since we have a nice yard now...nothing specific in mind yet, though.
ReplyDeleteMy sons placenta first ended up in my parents freezer then when my parents left for the winter, it was transitioned to my sisters freezer since my husband and I are temporarily relocated.
ReplyDeleteI hope to plant it in the spring. We haven't decided the type of tree yet, we'd like a shade tree to replace the 100 year old pear that is dying out.
A word of caution: If you do freeze your placenta, while an ice cream container is a wonderful shape that my midwife prefers and didn't leak at all - placentas should always be CLEARLY LABELED. We had planned on waiting for my son's 1st birthday and find a suitable blossoming almond tree to bestow it upon.... but when our fridge freezer died, while we were away for a couple of days... suffice it to say, opening a container which you thought contained melted ice cream and it did NOT was a slight shock. The poor placenta got buried quite unceremoniously in the forest behind the house. (Not many people out there can laugh at this! Glad to finally have someone to tell the story to! =0)
ReplyDeleteJust to clarify, I am a doula, and I love placentas. Adore them. Think they're wonderful. But the one in my story had ceased to be lovely in any way. Sorry.
ReplyDeleteHa! That's a great story. It reminds me of a story I read where a midwife's husband accidentally cooked a foil-wrapped placenta, thinking it was a pizza :)
ReplyDeleteEach of my boys has a tree, with their placenta buried underneath it. But we no longer live at that house... it was a sad part of moving, but I took pictures and also some dirt from each tree. I plan to put in new plants and use some of that dirt at our new house. :)
ReplyDeleteMy daughter's placenta went under a Rosemary bush at my Dad's house because we do not have a house yet. Rosemary is the herb that symbolizes remembrance. The bush is crazy thriving because of all the nutrients, added bonus is that I use the Rosemary for birth control (it has scientifically proven anti-implantation effects).
ReplyDelete