Cherry Point Lavender Festival

This first picture is an aerial view of Cherry Points Farm's Lavender Labyrinth which surrounds a wonderful, huge herb garden.

The entire labyrinth and structures were all created with lots of meaning behind them.

To walk the labyrinth would take hours.

The lavender was at its peak, it smelled wonderful.

There were many free classes through out the day, this first class we studied how to propagate plant cutting and were able to take clippings off some of the herbs, dip them in root tone and plant them in a cup of soil to take home. The root tone helps the roots on plant cuttings to develop.

All the herb gardens were planted in different sections. This one is their Dye garden, some of the plants in it are St. John Wort, bietermeister sage ( a wonderful big soft leaved sage, I have a clipping of this).

Golden Marguerite (anthemis tinctoria ) any plant with a Latin name of tinctoria in it is a great dye plant. I have a starter plant of this, hopefully in the next couple of  years I'll have enough to use.

Lovely tansy which I still need to add to my dye garden.
Their were many more plants including yarrow.

They had many different herb beds a few were the Biblical:herbs from the bible.

Herbs from Shakespeare.

Medicinal

Herbs used in Vinegar.

This is Rue (not a common herb) the leaves are so cute. I think this herb was used in old Europe. 

There were free craft classes all day making lavender wands and small wreaths.

My favorite teacher Marsha gave 3 different classes this one is her cooking with lavender. Oh my gosh she cooked a whole meal from appetizer to chicken dinner for us to sample. Too wonderful!
There are many different varieties of lavender the culinary types are munsted and hidcote.
This is a annual event so keep that in mind for next July!
This farm also has berries, apples, cherry's, their own bakery and all summer long have a fish boil on Saturday nights. What a beautiful place in such a small little town.

So my treasure today, I was running errands for my mom down a road I don't normally travel and there in this front yard was this old rusty iron gate for sale! I was so excited I've been looking for one. This one is from 1929 the year the house was built, they had a stone fence around part of the house and this was one of the gates. (He's looking for the other one for me).

I wish it was a little more ornate because I plan on rust dyeing it on white wool blanket, then I thought it would be cute to applique wool flowers and vines climbing up the rusted gate design. How fun will that be? A few bugs, maybe a bird sitting on top of the fence. Or a Autumn fence with pumpkin vines and sunflowers! The ideas go on and on.

Dyeing with Flowers

I wasn't planning of dyeing with these  gaillardia flowers yet but when my grandson went out to get the mail he came back in with his shirt filled with them, (picking them from around our mailbox). He was very proud of himself.

So, that night we laid out some wet wool cloth (pre mordanted with alum), placed the flowers on, rolled it up tightly and steamed it for a good hour. I left them in a zip lock bag with a heavy book on top of it for about 3 days.  

 I now have a new scarf for winter to wear with my wool jacket.

The flower print is a beautiful blue purple.

This year with all our rain and sunny weather all my flowers are doing wonderfully, my lavender plants are full and ready to be picked.

To all my local friends Saturday is a big Lavender festival at Cherry Point Farms in Shelby Mi. To find out more check out their web site or call me. See you there!

My Fourth of July

We had  a wonderful week camping, no one wanted to come home.
My husband and son fishing while our son's girlfriend and I relax in the front of the boat and soak up some of the Sun's rays.

The grand kids fished and fished,

when they weren't fishing they played in the water,

caught turtles and critters,

and when I had a free minute I sat here and quilted, all the while enjoying the "nature" around me,

beautiful water lily's,

wild roses blooming all around the lake,

and my most favorite of all, loons with their haunting call.

One of my most favorite "wilderness" sounds.

I finished quilting my mullein block,

the design came from this plant.

I completed a cosmos flower block.

Our Fourth of July table with my "family jean" table cloth (I made it in the 80's with my husband, our kids and my jeans and more recently sewed on my grand kids jean pockets).
I picked a bouquet of flowers from home and put them in my dads old minnow bucket from the 50's. 

We grilled hamburgers and slow cooked a roast.

Nothing better than corn on the grill.

While the kids went to town for the fireworks, my husband and I watched our own from the boat.

Back home to my rose dyeing. I started with deep red petals, simmered them in water and added the fabric.

This wool was pre mordanted in alum than I soaked it in vinegar. It turned out dull and boring.
I think the pre alum mordant wasn't a good idea.

Next I tried wrapping the petals in the fabric and steaming them. The fabric on the left was pre soaked only in vinegar, the fabric on the right was premordanted in alum. Vinegar is the way to go with roses. Now the real test is how they will age, will they turn brown? We'll see.

Happy 4th of July

My dad is recuperating from his broken hip at our local nursing home. Upon finding out they had so many WWII vets there they had a special ceremony for them.

As a child I wore and played in my dads old Navy uniforms not thinking what they represented. Now that I'm older I thank him and all our Veterans for all their Service to our Country in keeping our Freedoms.

We've been camping up North this past week (I came in for the ceremony). My mind and body needed to be camping, lately there's been too many hospitals/emergency rooms, surgeries and work. So, until next week this is where I'll be, on a little dock right outside our camper. There is no place I love better to be quilting than outside. And even better all our kids and grand kids are camping with us.

And this is where the grand kids are when their not out in the boat fishing with grandpa.


Next week I'll show you the results of my rose petal dyeing (don't get excited).

And yes Deb C. I have dyed with avocado pits and they give a beautiful soft pink. the post on them is somewhere back in my past posts:)