A friend came for a visit recently. While she was here, she brought her new foster child with her during the visit. This little girl is about one year old and seems rather curious about everything. I noticed she was enjoying listening to the sound of a small indoor wind chime with bells when my friend rang it for her.
I had just bought a second Halo Plus Stainless Steel handpan in D# Minor Arboreal to go with my C# Celtic Minor, so I thought about playing for her. (Yes, you can play the two scales together at the same in a very free flowing manner. Even if they are only 1 step apart.) I thought it might please her to hear the handpans because at one year old, I knew she had never heard THAT sound before.
Imagine my surprise and delight while I was playing when she didn’t make a single peep …so focused was she on the music. The instance I stopped playing, she giggled and threw her arms wide reaching to me to be in my arms. I didn’t take her from my friends arms but she still giggled a few more times and reached for me again. She had been interested in me earlier but hadn’t given any indication she wanted to be in my arms. Her pure joy and delight in the music was definitely one of my moments of joy this week. These handpans bring that kinda of joy. They are just that pretty and relaxing of a sound. These two handpans are the 6th and 7th handpans that I have owned. I was never fully happy with any of the others for one reason or another even though I did like several of them and kept them for years.
The C# Celtic Minor was love at first touch. I knew within 5 minutes or less of first touching it that it was the handpan for me. I have played that handpan nearly exclusively for 3 years and nearly every day. I have enjoyed it so thoroughly, that I sold all of my other handpans. Granted, it did take me 7 years before I could let my F Pentatonic by Isthmus Instruments go. It found a happy home with another local Handpan player. I may even be able to see her play it now and again.
Music is medicine. It is healing. And it creates joy. Another moment of joy related to this has been Morag, my 9 year old Border Collie. She has always enjoyed music but her reactions to this C# Celtic Halo + have been remarkable. Now combined with the D# Arboreal, she seems even more in love with them. She sits and asks me to play every single day. It has become an every morning ritual that she waits for.
A couple of days ago, she came into the bedroom while I was making my bed. She looked at the two handpans than at me than back at the handpans with a very pointed look. She wanted me to play for her. So of course when your Border Collie asks that nicely, you play the handpans! Right? I had to chuckle because as I was playing she was scrubbing her body against the back of my legs, knocking me and almost took me off my feet once. She does that. Scrubs across a box of fleece or fiber because she loves the smell. Bumps me to show her appreciation.
Morag isn’t the only one that loves handpan music. The goats like it when I play handpans for them. You can see them HERE IN THIS VIDEO. This was a D Minor made by Veritas that I had a few years ago. Silly dogs and silly goats. Animals are drawn to music as well as people. Their joy in the music is pure and full of innocence just like the little girl that was overjoyed to hear the handpans. HERE IS A VIDEO OF THE C# CELTIC and you can see Morag in this video putting herself right under the Handpan while I was playing. She had never done that with the previous 5 Handpans. This is where she started to show her love of Handpan music with the C#.
Do you want to hear the handpans and the crystal singing bowls? I am offering in person sessions now. Single sessions, double person sessions, and small group Sound Healing sessions again. Open air or in the tent are sessions I only do in warm session months. It is lovely being outside in the Secret Garden or in one of the Stone Circles. They are added back into THE APPOINTMENT APP so you can easily book your private session or for your group at whatever date is convenient. Now is the time to see the spring flowers and the lavender as they start to green up. Fruit trees are in bloom and everything is waking up.
I burst out laughing the other day because Morag stood up at the baby gate leading into the bathroom. She jumped up and down in place in anticipation asking me for lavender infused herbal oil. I was putting some on myself and the only reason she wasn’t scrubbing all over me was because that gate was closed. She loves Lavender Infused Herbal Oil.
Have you tried it yet? Or tried the hydrosols that I distill in small batch Artisanal Copper Still right here at Alba Ranch? Many of the hydrosols and oils are half off right now. Now is the time to snatch them up if there is a scent you wanted to try. You can get the Hydrosols and Herbal Infused Oils Here In The Shop Online. Click and shop online.
This Border Collie likes her handpans and her lavender herbal oil. Specifically Pink Hidcote, Melissa, and Ms Katherine. The three sweet PINK WHITE lavenders that I grow, handcraft infused oils and distill into hydrosols here at Alba Ranch in Michigan. Our Lavender flowers are starting to bloom with later varieties just making their buds. This year with a proper winter and cooler spring, the lavender plants are flowering at different rates and stages as they are supposed to. Last year everything bloomed all at once and early in June. Distillation will begin soon for the 2025 season.
