Crafting with Herbs

 

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I vowed not to take multi-day classes until I retired, there just isn't enough time. But retirement has been pushed out and I couldn’t wait. Understanding how to grow and use herbs has been one of my top interests. When I learned about Herbal Academy it didn’t take more than a day for me to abandon my vow and decide to enroll in the introductory herb class.

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With plenty of borage outside my door, the first herbal recipe I tried was fresh borage leaf tea. The taste is mild and not unpleasant, quite like a weak green tea. Learning that it helps with stress and insomnia makes it a winner for me. Borage self-sows and I have it all around the yard from spring to fall.
 

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July also meant another trip to my local nursery where I picked up more herbs for my new herb spiral garden. My purchases included the bee-friendly plants bee balm, hyssop, and lavender that are now blossoming. These plants can also be used for herbal teas, tinctures, and salves. I'm eager to make a rosemary-lavender hand salve.

After the flowering plants have lost their blooms I’ll be saving the seeds to start next year’s plants. The sunny side of the backyard will become a bee haven!

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Throughout the summer, bees swarm the chive, oregano, rosemary, thyme, and savory blossoms. I’ve often wished I could get the herbal honey they are making. Then, this week in my herb class, I learned how to make herbal honey with dried herbs and I can’t wait to try this. My herbal class has introduced me to excellent sources of dried herbs for those that won't grow in my climate.

The next step in my herbal crafting journey will be stovetop hydrosols. Perhaps if my new peppermint and spearmint plants are bountiful I can create a refreshing mint hydrosol before summer is over.

I'm very happy I decided to take this course as I can now use the information before retirement to get a head start on experimenting with cultivating herbs and putting them to various uses. In fact, I'm so happy with my decision that I've already enrolled in a month-long class during September. Life long learning is the true goal after all, so why wait?

 

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All Wound up with Herbs

 

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Hours after pulling out several feet of the "weed" above I learned it is one of the medicinal plants I should be harvesting--purple dead nettle. Argh! Fortunately, there are a few plants I missed so those will come back in abundance next year.

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Another "weed" I will be planting is heal-all or self-heal. Both self-heal and purple dead nettle can be used in salads and teas, the latter is my goal. Both have been used for centuries by indigenous peoples.

 

 

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While studying herbs and watching videos on their use, I came across spiral herb gardens. You can guess what happened next. 😀 But first, I'll share more about spiral herb gardens, as shown in the following photos. 

 

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One advantage of a spiral herb garden is that it lets you grow a lot of herbs in a small space--six feet in diameter with three tiers. The taller plants in the center should be those that love heat, such as the Mediterranean herbs rosemary, thyme, and oregano. The lower tiers get more drainage and shade from the taller plants, and this is ideal for dill, cilantro, and sage.

Another advantage for me is that it clears space in one of my planter boxes in the front yard for more vegetables. The backyard space I've already cleared has sufficient sunlight for herbs.

Clearing space in the backyard went quickly, and building materials for the spiral herb garden have come from reclaimed sources already on hand--plenty of forest duff for fill and rocks pulled out of the ground for the spiral walls. Here's what we've accomplished in an afternoon's work. Not bad for the first day!

Ready soon for plants!

 

 

Anticipatory Joy

 

Lupine at my favorite local nursery

I recently attended a lecture given by a nurse at our local teaching hospital. If anyone is qualified to talk about stress and tips for coping, it's healthcare staff. She told us that anticipatory joy is what gets her through long, emotionally difficult shifts. 

Anticipatory joy is defined in the linked article as "the in-the-moment pleasure experienced when imagining a future event". Through anticipatory joy "We can find joy in the present through luscious ruminations over wonderful things to come. Anticipatory joy can bring light to the dreary present."

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In Seattle, our first week of May saw more rain than we normally get in a month. My husband joked that we'd need a boating license to get to the post office. It was wet and so very dreary. Every soggy day I looked forward to that first trip of the year to my favorite nursery. 

Photo by Oriol Portell on Unsplash

On the long-awaited day the skies even cleared as I searched for herb and vegetable starts on the list I'd curated over the winter. It's still too cold to plant the honeydew melons that I most anticipate, but I've got them started indoors and have pored over tips to help me have a successful crop.
 

Another joy awaiting me this month is an online class "Tending Your Medicinal Garden". While I'm wildly successful with the many herbs I grow, I'm eager to learn about the healing benefits of native plants and which ones I might add to the garden. Or maybe I can seek them out in the yard, thinking once that they were only weeds.

 

The heavy clouds that are soaking us this month have one silver lining-- the mountain snowpack has raised from 80% of normal to 126%. I expect a hot summer if climate change continues our dry spells and will be grateful for the snow and rains. Soon, I look forward to a few days off to spend in the yard and garden. Until then, like the wild bunny in our backyard, I eagerly await the first fruit of the season, strawberries.

 

 

The Blessed Bee

 

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Now that my apples, plums, raspberries, blueberries, and strawberries are in bloom, it's time to focus on the all-important bee. One third of the planet's food relies on these tiny tireless creatures. Pollinators in my area include the honey bee, bumble bee, mason bee, and leaf-cutter bee. (Fig trees are actually pollinated by fig wasps.)

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Flying from blossom to blossom makes a bee thirsty! My husband has been making bee watering stations that attach to either a standard soda bottle or quart-sized Mason jar. Do the bees like them? One beekeeper gave us proof! My husband started making the larger size for beekeepers so they wouldn't need to refill them more than once daily.

Photo from Prairie Homestead

 Bees are more than just pollinators--they also give us delicious honey and beeswax. Speaking of beeswax, the creative buzz followed us into the kitchen where my husband recently tried his hand at beeswax candles. We've learned a lot in just one trial!

 

 

Wick type and size, preparation of the wick, candle size, temperature of the wax and jar, all make a big difference in a successful outcome.

While perusing one of my old books on candle making, we found the origins of some old sayings. Beeswax was mixed with a lead compound and used as a base makeup by wealthy women to enhance their beauty. This white paste was kept dry in the summer months by shielding the face from the sun with a fan. This way, the ladies could 'save face'. They were also careful never to express mirth so they wouldn't 'crack a smile'.* 

My appreciation of bees extends to card making, and we can't talk about bees without mentioning the birds, too. We have a bird feeder in one window and it's popular with our feathered friends.

 

However, the feeder leads to some bird injuries. Using more of my card making supplies, these holographic bees keep birds from flying into our windows. I've put half a dozen in the busiest windows to keep the birds safe.

 

 *Source: The Candlemaker’s Companion, Storey Communications, Inc. 1997, Betty Oppenheimer

 

Spring is in the Garden!

 

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It's every gardener's eagerly awaited time of year--spring planting. Despite the bit of snow and frost we had a few weeks ago here in the Pacific Northwet, I've already put in asparagus, a few potatoes, new blueberry plants, and a three-way grafted pear tree. The pear tree replaced a plum tree whose fruits were the size of large olives and not our favorite, but we love pears.

It's every gardener's eagerly awaited time of year--spring planting. Despite the bit of snow and frost we had a few weeks ago here in the Pacific Northwet, I've already put in asparagus, a few potatoes, new blueberry plants, and a three-way grafted pear tree. The pear tree replaced a plum tree whose fruits were the size of large olives and not our favorite, but we love pears. 

Asparagus, less than a week after planting.

Beautiful ruby rhubarb shoots are also peeking out.

 

 

This year will see big changes to our front garden where we get the most sun. A new 4'x8' raised bed will be added along with an herb tower. The old 4'x4' raised bed will see its herbs moved to the tower with space for 15 varieties. In place of the herbs in the raised bed, I'll be planting honeydew melons and peas.

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I've found a new plant to try, Oca, or Oxalis tuberosa. Oca can be eaten raw, baked, fried, roasted, and boiled. The taste is said to be similar to potatoes that already have sour cream, with a slightly acidic flavor. It's a perennial, so should come back year after year.

While waiting for warmer weather, I've given hydroponics a try and am very happy with the results. Hydroponics entails growing plants in water with liquid nutrients. Many commercial varieties of produce are grown this way, and I've had great success with the consumer unit I purchased. 

In just three weeks we were enjoying fresh salads with lettuce and mesclun from our countertop. Two months later we're still eating salads from the original seeds. The best part? No worries of E. coli on our greens!

Having enjoyed abundant salads, I'm now trying a dwarf tomato, dwarf hot pepper, and some spinach in the hydroponics unit. Branching out hasn't been as successful and it's a learning process, but the pepper is coming along great. I'll keep trying different seeds to find those that do best, and if nothing else, we'll now have salads all year round!