Herbalist · Historian · Seamstress · Theology writer
Carolyn Smith-Kizer
The Little Old Lady Who Could, and Did, and Does.
An American expat restoring a stone house in a small village in the Creuse, France, and writing about the plants, history and faith that have shaped my life.
I have always been interested in plants
As a baby, I was told I could look at the Muscari, the grape hyacinths in my grandmother’s new front yard in Idaho, and I could smell them. I could not pick them. So there I am on my hands and knees with my nose in the flowers. Nobody guessed that baby would grow up to be a plant lady.
The plants kept finding me. As an adult I foraged spruce tips in Michigan for jelly and spruce tip beer. On Adak Island in the Aleutians, I looked down one day and found tiny daisies growing in the grass. The 140 mph winds could not blow them away, and Pliny the Elder had written about them back in 70 CE.
My story
I was born in Murray, Kentucky, in 1949, to a Southern father and an Idaho-born mother, and I grew up in Idaho from the time I was 13 months old. As a young woman at Ambassador College, I was told women were there to earn an “MRS degree.” I told the student body president that God gave me this brain, and I would answer to Him if I didn’t use it well. I have been using it ever since.
For more than twenty years I was a French Colonial historical reenactor at Fort de Chartres, Fort Niagara and across the Pays des Illinois. While translating 18th-century French cookbooks, I kept running into herbs and the ways people used them. What started as curiosity became my life’s work. I trained in Western traditional herbalism and studied archaeology and anthropology along the way.
The Carolingian tradition
My name, Carolyn, is the feminine of Charles. I like to think I carry on the Carolingian herbal tradition, which is why my herbal writing now lives at At Charlemagne’s Behest.
Homer Kizer’s work
I am the widow and literary steward of theologian Homer Kizer, and I continue to publish his work alongside my own biblical scholarship at cskizer.com.
Starting over in France at 74
At 74, I moved from Idaho to Clugnat, a village in the Creuse, and began restoring a stone house built in the mid-1800s. When I arrived it had no electricity and no internet. I started a YouTube channel to share the restoration, the history around me, my garden and my kitchen. Weeks later I accidentally deleted that channel, nearly monetized, while cleaning up old email accounts. I started again, and the new channel was monetized within weeks.
About my logo
The tree in my logo is the tree of life from Revelation 22:2:
In the midst of the street of it, and on either side of the river, was there the tree of life, which bare twelve manner of fruits, and yielded her fruit every month: and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.
Revelation 22:2 (KJV)
Plants, scripture and history have always belonged together for me. The tree says that better than I can.
As featured in
French Connections HCB
“Why this American Lady moved to France at 74 | Life After Starting Over”
May 2025 · over 1.1 million views
A 35-minute conversation about why I chose France, my first night here, living without electricity or internet, restoring the house, and starting my channel. Watch part two of my story.
Ty Myers
“The Remarkable 76-Year-Old Who’s Out-Working 99% of YouTubers”
June 2025
YouTube coach Ty Myers told his community of midlife creators the story of my deleted channel and my comeback. He said I was doing it in a way that was “humble and poetic.”
Earlier press
shroomer · Needle Arts · Metro Active: Dining · chow · Paper Chef · The Boston Globe
Where to find my work
YouTube
The Little Old Lady Who Could. Life in Clugnat, The Slow Renovation, History Detective, and live conversations.
The Little Old Lady blog
Simple living, French kitchen habits and village life.
At Charlemagne’s Behest
Carolingian and Galenic herbalism, plant monographs, and the Capitulare de Villis garden.
Training and memberships
- Herbal Academy, 500-hour training
- School of Evolutionary Herbalism (Sajah Popham), certificate
- American Herbalists Guild, associate member
- Classes with herbalist Thomas Easley
Herbal content I share is educational and historical. I do not offer consultations.
Years of studying herbs taught me the same thing the garden did: the line between “us” and “the natural world” is a modern invention. A tree’s rings and a human fingerprint both record a life lived in time. My work with plants, food and the seasons starts from that continuity.
And yes, I am a raving football fan
Boise State is my alma mater. I attended when it was Boise State College, before it became a university, and I am still proud of the Broncos’ Cinderella story. There is nothing wrong with a little old lady being a raving fan of Boise State football.
“To love is to act.” Victor Hugo
If this work is useful to you, you can buy me a coffee: buymeacoffee.com/cskizer