Not all lavender flowers are equally attractive to bees As I noticed when I visited Cambridge University Botanic Garden in July. The gardens are curated by lavender expert Dr Tim Upson (his PhD is in lavender!), and I was fascinated by his extensive collection there. Surprisingly, not all lavenders seemed equally attractive to bees, with…
Tag: traditional craft
My dried flower diaries July 2012
My dried flower garden in July Since my last monthly diary post, we actually had some hot weather – hooray! I have spent lots of time in the garden, but most of it soaking up sunshine rather than doing anything useful. Experimenting with dried flowers from my garden I was trained as a scientist, so…
Fragrant leaf potpourri recipe
Potpourri recipe with scented leaves In my last two posts I have been drying leaves from my garden for use in potpourri and then adding essential oils to the potpourri for added fragrance. Here is the finished potpourri recipe. Choosing the leaves for this potpourri recipe This dried leaf potpourri is not as pretty as…
Fragrancing my dried leaf potpourri
Using essential oils to fragrance potpourri Last week I made some potpourri using dried leaves from my garden. This week I am boosting the fragrance of the potpourri by adding essential oils. I had hoped that my combination of lemon balm leaves, peppermint and scented leaf pelargoniums might have enough scent to fragrance my sitting…
Dried leaves for use in potpourri
Dried scented leaves make great homemade potpourri A couple of weeks ago I took my trusty basket into the garden and collected some scented leaves that I thought may be useful in potpourri making. Picking scented leaves for drying I found scented leaf pelargoniums, lemon balm and peppermint. Drying the leaves I put the basket…