Love, Joy and Peas: herb garden

Showing posts with label herb garden. Show all posts

Friday, July 15, 2016

Lavender Wreath Making at Willow Oak Flower and Herb Farm

Happy floral Friday! Last Saturday my friend Sandy and I enjoyed a lavender class at Willow Oak Flower and Herb Farm. We had a great time and she kindly agreed to model with the wreath she made in our class (thank you, Sandy!).

We also made some new friends, including Barb, who kindly modeled the pre-made wreath form provided to us for making our lavender wreaths (thank you, Barb!). If I heard correctly, the wreath bases were made from organic thornless rose bushes grown on Willow Oak Flower and Herb Farm.

The instructor (whose name I didn't hear, but who was super nice) demonstrated each step.

These are some of the materials used to make our wreaths. We harvested our own lavender flowers from Willow Oak's flower and herb gardens. We each cut 36 stems from their lavender plants, lined them up (using the bottom of the flower heads as the alignment point), trimmed the whole group of stems to about three inches each, then separated them into six piles of six stems each for making the wreaths. As you can imagine, the wreath making area smelled great.

Willow Oak also provided previously dried statice and tiny white flowers as accents and a piece of lavender ribbon to finish off the wreath. The lavender class was a fun experience, made even nicer for having been shared with friends.

What is your favorite herb? If you have any wreath making tips, I'd love to hear them!

Thank you for visiting! May God bless my kindhearted models and may He bless you too!

Related posts:
My lavender: http://lovejoyandpeas.blogspot.com/2016/07/lavender-spirea-double-day-lily-mexican.html
My Spanish lavender: http://lovejoyandpeas.blogspot.com/2016/05/funky-lavender-thyme-allium-marigold.html
DIY sleep tea with lavender: http://lovejoyandpeas.blogspot.com/2013/08/diy-sleepy-time-tea-recipe.html

Note/disclaimer: I wasn't asked or paid to write this post. All opinions are my own.

Thursday, June 12, 2014

Missy's Marvelous Gardens

My dear friend Missy graciously opened her home and garden to me (and my camera) yesterday. We had a great visit and I enjoyed touring her marvelous gardens. Above is one of her front yard garden beds, a delightful mix of flowers, herbs and foliage plants.

Here's a close up of her patriotic porch display with beautifully flowering strawberry plants in wooden boxes. Missy's clever ideas make her garden a beautiful, fun and unique place to visit!

She has some of the best window boxes I've ever seen lining her deck.

Her chervil must be eight feet tall! She had to bend a branch to get it into the photo. You can see a bit of her back yard behind her.

Here's a landscape view of her back yard. I like how she made the bed curve and lined it with large stones.

Hearty thanks to Missy for sharing her beautiful gardens and modeling for my blog! Come back Saturday for another blog post featuring some of Missy's prettiest flowers up close (tomorrow, as usual, I'll be posting flowers from my own garden). May God bless Missy and may He bless you too!

Related posts:
Missy's fall flowers: http://lovejoyandpeas.blogspot.com/2012/10/chrysanthemum-rose-and-butterfly-plant.html
Egan's back yard retreat: http://lovejoyandpeas.blogspot.com/2013/09/egans-backyard-retreat.html
Mary's amazing garden: http://lovejoyandpeas.blogspot.com/2013/05/marys-amazing-garden-retreat.html

Wednesday, May 16, 2012

Herb Day At US Botanic Garden

After enjoying Garden Fest at the Smithsonian Castle we walked up to the US Botanic Gardens and were thrilled to find their Herb Day celebration. What a blessing to encounter two great events in one day! As you can see from the sign above there was a lot going on but there were even more activities than what was listed on the sign. There was also herbal tea making, herbal greeting card crafts, herbal fairy dust making (in the children's garden), interactive educational displays throughout the gardens and more.

Here's a rabbit (sculpture) hiding in a bed of lamb's ears.

A brightly colored bird house in the Children's Garden.

I loved this herb garden poster.

And this herb poster caught my eye too. The US Botanic Garden is free (although donations are accepted) and has many different sections with an amazing variety of plants.

It was fun to celebrate herbs at the US Botanic Garden. At home, we grow a variety of herbs (not nearly as many as the US Botanic Garden though) and it's nice to just snip off the amount you need for dinner right before cooking. Do you grow or use herbs?

May God bless you!