Herb Conference

Last weekend I attended the Michigan Herb Conference, this "Bee" display greeted you when you came in and lets you know "Springs on the way".

They have lots of wonderful educational displays.

A large one on the importance of milk weed.

This was an interesting fact.

I don't know if this is good, it would take a lot of seeds to using as stuffing. How would the plants reproduce without them and then what would the monarch butterflies live on???

The "Herb of the year is Savory". They used the plants for center pieces on the banquet tables.
There are two types of savory, winter and summer. This is the summer variety, it is the most popular.

Little place markers made from old wooden thread spools, vintage lace and a button.
Love these.
 

A few health benefits from savory besides the wonderful flavor it imparts to food.

More medicinal benefits.

Winter savory is much more bush like, more like rosemary.

One of our speakers talked about gardening and crafting ideas. This is a good one. She purchased two containers from the dollar store, a plastic basket that will fit inside a plastic pot.

Take them out to harvest your vegetables in the garden, then you can rinse them off outside and just bring in the basket.

Our speaker does a lot of crafts and every year comes to the conference with wonderful "flower" purses and accessories. This was one of her apron ideas.
To make a no sew garden apron, cut up a pair of jeans only leaving the waist band and back pockets with a little leg fabric left. To use, button the waist band in back and the pockets go in front for garden tools, seeds etc.

This was her Hosta purse for this year.

Made from green polar fleece.

Last year was this wool poppy purse.

Another year was wool roses and a necklace to match.

A rose purse.

A needle felted and felt wool purse.

Necklace to match.

Knitted then felted wool purse.

Her accessory for the second day of the conference, hand made jean and fabric flowers.

Besides savory I bought a new variety of scented geranium called Sweet Mimosa. The flowers are suppose to be bright red and suitable to pick for a bouquet. We'll see this summer.

Here is a recipe to make your own Herbes de Provence made from dried herbs for cooking.