A Lavender Experiment

I planted and now I am (impatiently) waiting for things to come up. The temperature inside the greenhouse is holding steady at a balmy 80-ish degrees so it shouldn’t be long.

When I finished yesterday morning, I had half a tray of nine-packs full of dirt and nothing left to plant in them. I decided to try an experiment. I went out to the garden and scooped up a handful of lavender seeds:

I’ve never grown lavender from seed, at least not intentionally. My plants are so prolific that I have seedlings popping up everywhere. Lavender plants that began as seedlings in my garden are scattered from one end of Mountain Brook to the other because I gave them to anyone who wanted some. Propagating from cuttings or digging up random seedlings is easier than growing from seed. Lavender seeds need to be stratified—left in the freezer for a few weeks—and they can take up to a month to germinate. These seeds were stratified for me by Mother Nature, and if they take a month to germinate, that’s okay. This is an experiment. If they don’t germinate, I haven’t lost anything. If they do, I may have 36 lavender seedlings for the plant sale.

I took a good look at the garden yesterday and said to the husband that if he wants to take the track loader out there and do some leveling work, I would be most appreciative. The west side of the garden is not as level as the east side. There are also a couple of rotting stumps on the edge that could be pulled out.

I am going to sprinkle some lettuce seeds into the raised beds in the herb garden where we had lettuce last year. I found a few survivors that must have been insulated by the snow:

I’m always amazed at what comes up or survives even when it’s still cold out.

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The project for the boys is done. I am going to start working on my mother’s robe next week. I’ll be teaching for most of the rest of this week. And next week is April already. 🤯

Today is supposed to be stelllar—a high of 64F and sunny. We won’t know what to do with ourselves. I’m going to have to put away the sweater knits soon and take out the bin of woven fabrics to make some spring and summer tops.