LAVENDER
Wild Word Friday!
In spring 2010 I gathered my courage and bought a LAVENDER plant for my garden. The reason that the purchase was brave (Or maybe foolish – have you noticed that sometimes bravery and foolhardiness are mistaken for one another?) was because I live in a Zone 3 to 4 area for plants and LAVENDER is a 5 and sometimes a 6. I had noticed, however, that my Zone 4 plants thrived since we moved here by the water and even most Zone 5 plants survived our terrible winters. So I bought LAVENDER, and it flowered and was lovely.
In the fall I covered it with a good bed of leaves and winter came – without snow. Folks ten miles away from us had lots of snow. Not us. The temperatures dropped to way below zero (and that’s Fahrenheit), twenty below, thirty below. Our snow eventually came, but we had much less (about 90 inches less!) than normal. In the spring my LAVENDER was a mass of winter-killed gray. I almost pulled it out, but I’m an optimist. I left it. In June I noticed I bit of green among the gray. And a week later more green, and then more and finally the whole plant filled out. By August my LAVENDER plant even pushed up a few brave flowers. What a tough little guy! (Or girl – how do you tell?)
Nobody really knows where the word LAVENDER came from. Maybe from the Latin lavare to wash. LAVENDER is, after all, a lovely bath perfume. It also may have come from the Latin livere, which means to have a bluish hue. Either way, I’m happy that a little LAVENDER plant has come to live in my garden.
Do you have a garden? Have you ever grown LAVENDER?
Blessings!
Sue
I do have a garden, two years running! I planted lavender this year but unfortunately we experienced three weeks of over 100 degree temperatures! Kind of killed everything but the potatoes. I did once visit a lavender farm (if that is the correct term) located on the San Juan Islands. Absolutely gorgeous! Blooming lavender stretched for miles, and the smell was incredible! I say keep trying!
Lavender always looks great in garden but I dont have it in mine as it gives me headache’s (migraines) but I do have something similar with silver leaves which is a native plant. I will send it across to you Sue when my other’s plants bloom for you to view.
I do have a garden, I am more into growing herbs, fruit and vegetables then flowers, I do love lavender tho and have been growing it for years now.
Such an amazing smell. I pick the stems with the flowers on it and hang them upside down in the toilets and bathrooms.
my sister in law makes her own candles and put some lavender in some, looks and smells great.