What I Do With My Lavender Harvest

Lavender is a beautiful and fashionable flowering herb. The lavender I develop in my backyard is Lavandula angustifolia, also called English Lavender. The range I’ve known as Hidcote, which is a comparatively compact lavender with deep purple flowers. Versatile and simple to develop, this lavender is a helpful wildlife attractant on the sunny fringe of my forest backyard.

August is the time of yr when, with the crops in full bloom, I flip my consideration to harvesting it. Slicing lavender blooms is one thing you possibly can and will do commonly over the summer time months. Not solely will they be helpful for a variety of tasks in your house, however harvesting may even encourage new flowers to emerge.

Listed below are a few of the methods I take advantage of my lavender harvest.

Harvesting Lavender for Culinary Use

One motive to reap lavender is to be used in edible recipes and drinks. Nevertheless, I need to confess that I discover lavender a bit an excessive amount of usually, and when it’s used, it’s best utilized in moderation.

A method that I’ve loved lavender is in a honey-lavender French dressing for late summer time salads. You can even add it to sugar to make a lavender sugar that can be utilized in a variety of confectionary or pair its floral scent and style with a variety of summer time fruits.

However keep in mind, on the subject of utilizing lavender, usually much less is extra. So do not overdo it and keep in mind that you’ll often use most of your crop, as I do, for different issues.

Harvesting Lavender for Dwelling Decor

Most of my lavender finally ends up not in recipes however in vases or different shows inside my residence. I usually merely carry lavender inside after which organize it in vases in my residence. This serves a number of functions—it appears and smells nice, enhances my residing areas, and permits the lavender to dry so it may be put to different makes use of.

I additionally like to rearrange my lavender in different methods. For instance, I take the bottom for my Christmas wreath (which is comprised of a number of twisted ash branches) and place lavender stems, usually alongside rosemary, in bunches round it, securing these to the wreath with my do-it-yourself nettle twine. That is one other good method to dry lavender to prepared it for different makes use of.

For those who, as many do, accumulate lavender blossoms to place into drawer sachets or to make use of in potpourri, do not throw the stems away.

A method I’ve discovered to make use of stems is to craft bunches into little baskets or bowls. The bunches of lavender stems will be moistened and coiled round, stitched right into a bowl form with a pure twine. Little baskets like this could additionally look pretty as residence décor.

Harvesting Lavender for Magnificence & Private Care

I take advantage of lavender (and rosemary) to make my very own hair rinses, just by steeping the recent or dried herbs in boiling water, straining, after which utilizing them once I wash my hair. After all, lavender may also be utilized in a variety of different methods to make quite a lot of cleansing and sweetness merchandise.

Within the subsequent week or two, I additionally plan to make use of a few of my lavender in an infused oil (with a candy almond oil base), which I take advantage of inside a beeswax honey balm that’s nice for chapped lips in winter, and likewise, I discover, good for dry fingers through the coldest a part of the yr.

After all, lavender may also be utilized in a variety of various soaps. And the vary of how wherein you should utilize it are additional elevated in case you distill your lavender to acquire a correct important oil.

There are many methods to make use of lavender, and you’ll actually discover that it is a versatile harvest. Regardless of how a lot lavender you could have rising in your backyard, you’ll find loads of methods to make use of that which you carry into your own home.