The Urban Lavender Farm

When we moved into our home on Halloween 2013 we brought 10 lavender plants with us in their pots. Spring of 2014 they were planted and 2 new,tiny plants were added to the collection. They bloomed profusely and were harvested, dried and stored away.

2015 rolled around and I decided it was time to step up so I bought 26 additional  English Lavender plants got busy putting them into the ground. At last, on May 26 2015 they are all in the ground.

As often happens, I tend to get things a bit backwards. As I was working on planting an idea hatched in my ferbile brain. Why not find some lovely, high quality fabric and use our blossoms to make "Comfort Pillows", sachets and eventually to distill the oil for our products and hydrosol to sell? Let's make this tiny farm a paying endeavor. Where else can you get home grown Lavender?

The search was on and the result of the first step is below.  
 

1920 Singer sewing machine and first Lavender Comfort Bag.

         
Less than a week later plans have come to fruition. As they say on the A Team, " I love it when a plan come together." and it certainly has. We have presold a couple of pillows and are taking orders. This Saturday May 30th we will have the sachets and pillows at our booth at the Battle Ground Outdoor Market. The other items are in the timeline and guess what? We are Washington State's only urban lavender farm!

See you on Saturday!

                                                                                       

Six Reasons for using cast iron pans

1. Longevity These pans will last for multiple generation
2. Even heat Don't get in a hurry. Slow heating will give consistent results
3. Flexibility: This pan will work with any heat source.
4. Easy to clean: Do not wash with soap and water. Wipe with paper towel or scrub with coarse salt and recondition. Please refer to our blog post of October 15, 2013 “Cast Iron Love Affair” 
5. When properly conditioned the pans become non stick..
6. Cost effective: You can find cast iron pans at thrift stores as well as new. If properly cared for you will be able to hand down to your descendants 

These pans are part of our cast iron collection. Yes, that is our "new to us stove". It a Westinghouse built in 1949, Some of the pans are heirlooms, others we have found at thrift stores and on Craigslist.