Ria and her husband came into my shop today. I've known them for years since Lavender Wind Farm was so small we just went to a few farmers markets and didn't have anyone coming onto the farm. Her husband has gone downhill significantly due to progressive Parkinson's Disease. However, today they were excited to tell me that they had read that lavender tea made a big difference to the problem of sweating that he had been experiencing. They said each night she padded the bed with several towels over and under him and in the morning all the towels and bedding were soaking wet. Sometimes, she'd have to get him up in the middle of the night to replace his wet clothing and towels.

So, about week ago, after reading about lavender helping with sweating associated with Parkinson's Disease, they came to the farm to get some lavender to test this theory. They report that on the first night after sipping a couple of cups of lavender tea during the day he had dramatically reduced sweating, and the second night the bed was dry. Ria said it made a difference in his energy level, too, because his body doesn't have to cope with the loss of the fluids from the extreme sweating he had been suffering.

Some aromatherapy and herbalists say that lavender, taken internally as tea, can stimulate the flow of bile, be mildly sedating, and can help with headaches.

I'm not able to find scientific studies that prove or even test that lavender helps with sweating symptoms of Parkinson's disease. So, this is definitely an anecdotal testimonial. However, you wouldn't have dared suggest there'd been a mistake to this relieved couple that have enough on their plate in dealing with the ravages of Parkinson's Disease.

Tires smelling like lavender? You've got to be kidding, right?

Not at all. Apparently, Kumho Tires has come out with a lavender tire that can be smelled inside and out of the car. They've found a way to imbed the rubber with heat resistant scented oils - this can't be REAL essential oils.... I've been seeing mentions about this product for over a year, but it hasn't seemed to take hold of the public's imagination or desire as far as I can tell. But, I'm not in the tire business so I really don't know.

Here's the article on it in the online Arizona Daily Star

Kumho Tires ECSTA DX tire is described on the company's site. It's amusing, really, the company's site is done with typically male design - hard edges, lots of black, and tons of description about the performance of the tire. It just doesn't go with an aromatherapy product... I have to wonder who they are marketing to? It can't be women - not that we don't like solid facts about tires, but if you're trying to add a floral aspect to a product wouldn't you put a picture of flowers somewhere in there?

What do you think? I'm really curious about how this will play out.

WIND - it's in our name and this weekend we saw why. All of the Puget Sound region had wind from a fierce storm that barreled in from the Pacific. Our farm saw winds that reached 70 mph at 7:30 on Monday morning. That's high, but we can expect to see that probably three or four more times this winter. It's scary here when that happens, the windows bend in, the gutters rattle, and the exhaust fan from the stove makes the most horrible clattering noise. The nursery pots get overturned, and two lavender plants got blown out of their pots completely.

I like to think our plants are very strong by the time they are purchased for people's gardens! They've had to go through a lot to survive, no pampered greenhouse plants here, that's for sure.

The harvest season is winding down. We still have some Super lavender left, it's not done blooming. The sunflowers are going nuts, though! We planted three acres of them to hold the dirt down in our new field.

It looks like I'll be getting a life back so I can write in the blog. This farming life is very intensive, but I've never been happier. We are a small lavender farm with a BIG view and some great gardens - this all takes a huge amount of work. We are also intimately tied into our community, which involves volunteering with various organizations including the uniquely Whidbey sort of thing - Lighthouse Environmental Programs. Then, last January, I went and said yes to being the president of the Central Whidbey Chamber of Commerce. It's a real stretch for a farming type to be president of such an organization, especially when anything at all is expected during harvest season, which for lavender lasts three months. What was I thinking?

It looks like we'll be getting our jams and jellies into a relatively small grocery chain. I'm really excited about that - it's a large step for our product line to grow beyond the farm.

The distilling with the copper still has been, simply, just fabulous. It helps people see how essential oils are made, and I get to create some fine hand-crafted oils that smell amazingly good right away. Our farm is still small enough that we can distill with 100% copper and that makes a huge difference. The quantity is small, so we sell it mostly to our own customers and use it in our own products and can't consider wholesaling much of it.





Our new gardens with pond and gazebo have been a hit this year. Though the pond has evaporated much more than I had planned. We are looking forward to the rainy season so it can fill up again. We created it to catch the rain water that falls on our roofs and driveway in order to use the water for watering our nursery stock. It has been a lesson in more forces of nature while we watch first the wind and then the sun suck up the water. We expect the pond to fill this winter. It didn't last year due to last construction. Even though this summer was wetter than normal, the water still left us. We do have lots of fish (goldfish and coy), though, that have grown and now we are seeing tiny new ones, so they are doing very well.

In addition to the fabulous changes in our landscape we also are working on our essential oils.

Right now we are now bottling up our own essential oil that was distilled last year. We take truck loads of flowers over to a neighbor's still and I work like a mad-scientist to get it distilled. It's fun, smells wonderful, and then we bottle it up and store it for a year to age - like fine wine. Now it's ready to bottle and we have a limited amount (remember we are a very small lavender farm). We have it in 10 ml. bottles for $6.75. If you want it in bigger bottles, watch our site for availability.

To let you know what's coming soon: This year we got our own fairly small Alembric Hand Hammered Copper Still and have been practicing on some left over dried lavender. Oh, my gosh! This is wonderful oil and fresh hydrosol that is really different than any oil distilled in bigger, non-copper stills. We are not yet bottling it up, it doesn't have to age as much, but we want to be sure of what we're doing with this new version our our oil

This is the season for plant jitters. Most people are getting a whiff of spring in the air and starting to think about planting in the garden. For us nursery types, it's a different story - we've been thinking about your planting for a long time, and hoping that our customers will want what we've grown. This time of year I get jittery.....

Maybe, I ordered too many lavenders! And other plants! We have a TON of little plants some of which have been transplanted and the others are waiting to be done. We have very little room left to put them. Fortunately, we have so much planting to be done to recover from the pond construction that many of the plants will be absorbed into the property. But the pond itself now has plants lining the shelves that have water on them.

We're so used to dealing with drought-tolerant plants that having bog plants is like being on a different planet. I don't know how to deal with plants that like wet feet. I'm sure I'll learn, though, and I'm looking forward to it.

Meanwhile, to put my jitters to rest I want to tell you, that if you're around Whidbey Island and looking for lavenders and herbs, then we're the place for you. Check out the varieties we've got!

Was Baskin Robbins peaking into our freezer? Last year we had several flavors of ice cream for sale at our shop - Vanilla lavender, blackberry lavender, and caramel cheesecake lavender. Folks loved 'em - came way out here just for an ice cream fix.

I just found out that Baskin Robbins has come out with a blueberry, lavender, and chocolate ice cream. It sounds DIVINE! Unfortunately, they don't have any stores less than 1 1/2 hours away - so... anyone out there that tries it, will you let me know what it's like?

Meanwhile, stayed tuned to our shop - more flavors are planned for this year. We're not Baskin Robbins, it's hard to get out here but worth it.

I'm in one of the hottest art capitals in the country - Chicago. The art community here is very strong, galleries everywhere. And for me, a friend who I've known since I was 11 years of age who teaches are at a local university.

Do you know how many products are packaged nicely and labeled "lavender" in downtown Chicago (or any other city) that don't have a drop of real lavender essential oil? No? Neither do I. However the fragrance industry is awash with mixtures of artificial scents combined with natural ones. There probably isn't enough lavender essential oil in the world to provide all the producers with enough to go around, so I guess we shouldn't complain. I wonder if people who have allergy problems to scents are reacting more to artificial oils or to true essential oils. Anyone know?

Did you know that lavender oil is an ingredient in varnishes that artists use on their paintings?

"It can be used as a medium to give body to the color as well as a certain amount of bite, which improves adhesion to the lower layers. It can have the effect of either increasing or decreasing dry time, depending upon the other ingredients it is mixed with. If pure, it also works as a diluent, and was widely used in the middle ages. It Dries more slowly than Turpentine, allowing the artist to work wet in wet."

People use lavender oil in overglazing when making painted ceramic tiles. It seems to be used as a drying retardant.

SIGNS! On Monday the Island County Commissioners voted to approve a signage program much needed in our area. In Washington we have a state Highway Motorists Information Signage Program wherein businesses and recreation/tourist places can apply for signs to be placed on those signboard that have "Gas" or "Food" or "Tourist" kinds of things. It's not easy to qualify, but once a business does a sign gets put up. Well, it does IF the business is right on the road that is off the highway. Any more turns and "follow through signage" is needed.

In Island County we now have a provision to apply for that follow through signage. Yahoo! That means that Agritourism oriented farms can now be found. That means that other small home-based businesses that qualify for the state sign system can be found. In a rural area, where even knowing an address doesn't mean that a place can be found because the roads wind around and are sometimes not well marked.

Over the last two years we've been putting up sandwich board signs at the intersections and they do make a difference - the only trouble is that they are illegal. So, we don't do that anymore. If counties want to help small farms survive and if we realize that part of small farms (that are near urban areas) need to rely on agritourism signage is a key component.

Do farmers blog less than others? I'm looking at my series of blog entries and realize they are very intermittent. I have a cousin who writes in her blog at least once a day. When I get up the first thing I do is look out the window to see what the weather is doing and decide what I can do outside. In the winter, it's often inside work because we don't work out in the field when it's too wet or snowy. On Whidbey Island we don't have much snow, but every once in a while we do and this year has had quite a lot (for us). Coming from southern New England and having lived in Denver for many years, it doesn't compare. This is a banana belt compared to those places.

Even when I'm inside, though, I'm consumed with the tasks I've put off in order to do the work outside. So, there is precious little time to write in a blog, much less think of something remotely interesting to write about.

Today will be different, though, because I'm visiting my son who lives in a city far away and I have the luxury to kick back, gaze out the window and think up something that might be interesting.

The weather! It's January and constantly like this - windy, spotty rain or more, chilly.... It's hard to get out to finish the pruning. Here in the Pacific Northwest, we can also transplant. It's actually a good time to do it, as long as the weather is above freezing. The ground is very juicy and the temperatures are cool enough that the plants are dormant. The only problem is getting up the gumption to go out and do it.

Lt Rain 37°F (3°C) Humidity: 82 % Wind Speed: ESE 21 G 26 MPH Barometer: 30.31 in (1026.70 mb) Dewpoint: 32°F (0°C) Wind Chill: 26°F (-3°C) Visibility: 0.00 Miles

I just hired another Coupeville teen - now we have two 14 year olds working here. I like to think of kids as my "other" crop. This last summer we graduated three that had been with me for several years - one had been here since she was 14. It was a proud moment as well as being rather poignant - to go to their graduation and cheer them on their way to college. Meanwhile, Spencer, the new kid at the farm, has been doing very well. Yesterday he dug out the dirt and grass from the fence around the vegetable garden so we can replace the fencing. It's old enough now that the voles and rabbits can just chew through it and get into the garden to eat OUR food. Spencer said he didn't mind it at all, was listening to music as he worked. I think iPods and other portable players are such a gift - it makes working so much more pleasant!

Each year we have a holiday party and the three new college kids (who have left Lavender Wind Farm to go on with their lives) came, one with her boyfriend, and they were happy. Each one was growing in her own direction, and because they are still freshmen, that direction is still rather fuzzy.

This year we got our first company sweat shirts.


This year we have lots of new stuff planned for the upcoming season. And this winter we are taking care of lots of background paperwork. This is usually a chore I avoid, but to avoid being outside in this weather.....

Building a pond and terraced gardens is taking up most of our time and energy these days. Owen's Raco Construction here on Whidbey Island is doing the work - it's amazing to watch good masons create these beautiful walls. But, the mud has been awful. Sometimes I wonder if the place will ever recover!

The pond has to have a liner because the glacial till that underlies our fabulous sandy loam topsoil is porous. The pond is being built to collect rain from the building roofs and the driveway. It is very deep to reduce loss from evaporation. But, we're not completely sensible because we also are creating a stream bed that will circulate water from the main pond to a small holding pond above and back down. It's going to be fabulous - once the pond fills up. I figure it will take all winter and spring to fill the pond. The snow we had just after Thanksgiving weekend put a stop to the project for a week.

High school football isn't something we talk much about at the lavender farm. But, this year Oak Harbor High School's team won the state championship and the town is all a-flutter about it. The Wildcats haven't had their own stadium since 2002 and have been playing great ball in spite of that. I have to wonder if they are like lavender plants, they thrive when stressed a bit. Lavender produces better oil under a bit of stress, and the Oak Harbor High's team is playing great football. Congratulations to the team and the coaches - Go Cats!

Lavender and Tee Tree Oil are getting some impressive press because of research that indicates they are linked to breast enlargement in boys age 10 or younger. Research by Clifford Bloch of the University of Colorado School of Medicine seems to say that these two oils both mimic estrogen and suppress androgen. He collaborated with researchers at the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences in North Carolina who found that breast cells grown in test tubes exposed to these oils reacted in the same way as cells exposed to estrogen. Dr. Bloch reminds us, though, that growing cells in test tubes is different from what happens in a live human body - the research remains hypothetical at this point.

But, it brings up a very important point. In our ordinary daily lives there are many ways that we can be exposed to endocrine-disrupters such as phytoestrogens. My mother took DES when pregnant with me in the early 1950's. For many girls born from mothers who took this drug serious health consequences has been their fate. DES was used in animal feed for a couple of decades and continues to be sold in developing countries. This is just one example - others are soy, a chemical used in making plastics, and room fresheners. Phytoestrogens can have both positive and negative effects. This is not a simple, straightforward issue. We need far more research done on the effects of natural compounds such as essential oils in and of themselves and we need research of natural compounds vs artificial ones such as artificial scents.

As a lavender grower the link of lavender essential oil to endocrine disruption is, at first, worrisome. It's important to remember a few things, though. The original correlative research was done on 10 year old boys who are at a vulnerable point in their hormonal development. It is not reasonable to believe that the effects reported happen to people of other ages, and it isn't clear how girls react. It is important to remember that we need to be aware of endocrine disruption in general and phytoestrogens in particular because there are health concerns, but keep your head and don't be swayed by hot-press items until they have been proved several times over that they are true. (Proving is not the same as copying and forwarding information on the internet, proving requires separate scientific studies.)

On a philosophical note - I have to ask, why the over-kill on press for Dr. Bloch's findings? While I think we need to pay attention by following the research his work will spark, there are far more damaging endocrine disrupters out there. I think there is a bit of hysteria about two things - first we seem to be defending our chemically-based products, and second we are worried about being "girly." I don't mean to minimize the problems of having one's body develop the other gender's characteristics - that condition needs to be cured so that child doesn't have to suffer the consequences. However, lavender oil has been known, over the centuries it has been produced, to create a relaxing effect. Could that be because of the estrogen-mimic they are now speculating about? Could it be that we need a bit more relaxation in our lives - to reduce a tendency to be too combative? What about the other qualities of lavender oil that people talk about, such as anti-microbial effects? We'll be looking more into lavender oil, its effects, and research.

Here is a little article that makes sense to me: Scented oils report needs clarification

I was faced with a huge bag of kale to cook for dinner. For those of you who don't usually cook with kale it's sort of like a tough spinach. It has LOTS of great vitamins and mineral, so it's good for what ails ya, but it doesn't lend itself to easy, fast meals. Except last night I created a great pasta sauce out of it - here's the recipe.

3 or 4 tablespoons olive oil
1/2 large yellow onion chopped up
3 large cloves of garlic chopped up
1 stalk of celery chopped up

Saute those in the olive oil in a large skillet. While sauteing add

1 1/2 tsp Herbs de Provence
1 tsp ground Lavender

While the onions brown up a little bit chop up the kale, stirring the onions from time to time.

1 produce bag of kale leaves (you know, the plastic ones in the produce section, stuff it with kale leaves and that should be enough)

The kale reduces in size like spinach does, so just heap it into the pan and turn it in the pan, like a stir fry.

After the kale has sagged a bit, add

1/3 Cup of Knorr Alfredo Pasta Sauce Mix (I got it at Costco, but it may be available at regular stores)
2 cups of milk (maybe a bit more if you like thinner pasta sauces)

Cover and let it cook for about 5 or 10 minutes. The Alfredo Sauce should provide all the salt you need.

When it's done put it over your favorite pasta (that you have already cooked) and enjoy!

Sunshine feels like a blessing in April when it seems as if the cold rains and winds of winter won't release their hold. This is the first Saturday that we've had a pleasant calm day. Gini came to take the market van to our local farmers market in Coupeville. We loaded her up with tables, a canopy, products, lots of plants, and enthusiasm. On Whidbey Island we have five (5) farmers markets! That's a lot for a long skinny island of about 75,000 people. Lavender Wind Farm used to go to three a week, Thursday evening, Saturday, and Sunday. As things got busier on the farm we reduced the numbers and now just go to the one Saturday market.

I was on the board of the Coupeville Farmers Market for several years and learned a lot about running markets. In Washington we have the Washington State Farmers Market Association. It has rules and standards for markets as well as resources such as insurance and networking. Vendors at markets are an interesting, free-spirited lot. They pride themselves on their individual ways of doing things and their own products as well they should. But, sometimes it's hard to get that level of individually focused people to band together or agree on a course of action. The underlying agreement, though, is to provide the best possible for their customers and to get customers to come to the markets. In cities, it's less difficult to find people, but out here in the rural areas where the population of the town is not yet 2,000 folks critical mass can be a problem. Nevertheless, the people on this island value homegrown food and local crafts, so the market is growing every year.

Gotta go, the sun is shining and the weeds are growing.

April in the Pacific Northwest rain shadow region means that the rains are starting to diminish. At last. At Lavender Wind Farm we are waiting to hear about our application for a Water Right to collect rain from the roofs to put into a holding pond which we can then use to water things like plants in pots. We don't irrigate here at all because we don't have irrigation rights with our land.

Western water rights are a complex set of laws(WSU's Water site). We live on an island which is a "sole source" aquifer. Our source of drinking water comes from one source, the aquifer under our feet that is recharged by rain. We don't have rivers running through our island that we can take water from, so we are completely dependent on the health of the aquifer below us for drinking water. The problem is that there are many places on this island that are threatened with salt water intrusion. Our health department monitors the water situation and the level of rainfall is important in recharging the aquifer.


Lavender, coming from the dry summers and wet winters of the Mediterranean region is well suited to grow without irrigation in our Mediterranean climate. Our summers aren't as warm as those in southern France, but our lavenders grow very well anyway. The plants that are more exposed to the harshest of our winds - the west wind - are having a harder time. They are smaller and less prolific than the others in the deeper soils and more protected areas of our other fields. Even so, we don't irrigate. The native lavenders of France are stubby little plants in hard-scrabble dirt. These are the early colonizers of the lavendula family and it's impressive to see them struggle for existenced in their natural way. They only have the water that comes from the rains and they bake in the hot summer sun - a real testament to survival with style. They smell so good!

It's 4 am and there is a slight line of light in the eastern sky. Spring has passed, but the weather is not yet dependably nice. But, the light in the sky this early in the morning means that the warmer season of light is just around the corner. It's a relief to have more and more light, but it also means more and more weeds and work.

Our new gift shop is having it's opening today. After lots of work and worry it's done.


In these days tiny (micro) farms, like mine, who are in tourist locations without a huge population base nearby to feed may need to have places to visit and things to do in order to survive. It's taking the idea of multiple streams of income seriously. Here, on Lavender Wind Farm, we also take the concept of Triple Bottom Line very seriously. When we do things we want to be sure of three things
1) It helps the financial health of the farm
2) It is sustainable and good for the earth (at least not causing it harm)
3) It is good for our people who live here, work here, or visit and for our community.
The gift shop is subtle, you don't notice it from the outside, it's just a room in the garage. It's also part of the operation because lavender drying wires are strung across the ceiling there, as well as throughout the garage. In harvest season we are scrambling to get the lavender dried and then put away for use during the year. There is an attic in the garage where the ceiling rafters are, at their highest point, 5 feet high. Even I, at 5'3" bonk my head - frequently. But it's a great place to dry lavender - warm, dry, and, because of the fan, moving air. You can see the empty wires across the ceiling in the new gift shop, waiting for June when the first part of the harvest starts.

My computer died while Kathy was using it. It was easy for me to see it wasn't her fault, but she felt awful. I think the power supply went out, but I still don't know because we are in a rural area and Macintosh techs are few and far between. It brings to mind the ridiculousness of the PC/Mac competition. Technology is getting to the point in which the platform the programs are run on and the actual hardware that is used should be irrelevant to the actual functioning of the software. The increasing use of online programs and java-based applications would seem to reduce the incompatibillity problems.

Here on Whidbey Island we have a fabulous library system - a necessity for farming folks who want access to information and just plain old good reading. It is a dual-county system (SnoIsle Library System) and we can order books and get them in from anywhere in the system. I listen to a lot of books-on-tape, they make weeding much more fun. As I'm out there in the fields pulling weeds I can be entertained at the same time. I confess there are times that I turn it off and just listen to the sounds of the birds and the waves on the shore - sometimes I can even hear the sea lions barking from their perches on the buoys off-shore. But, the other day I found out that the library has e-books that can be downloaded and put on an mp3 player. Then I found out that Microsoft has orchestrated the system so that it is stopped from being able to be used by macintosh computers even if I have an ordinary mp3 player that can take the downloads to be played (out in the fields, of course). The two providers of this servie to the library are: OverDrive Audio Books and Recorded Books. I have a macintosh along with quite a bit of expensive software and years of mac experience. I'm not about to change my whole system and spend thousands of dollars coverting software just for a few e-books.

Irritated by this? You bet I am. E-books are far superior to books-on-tape because they don't break, I can have a whole book on the player without having to carry around 15 to 20 tapes with me, and the sound is much better. How do I know this? My son gave me a year's subscription to Audible.com. That was a great year! And I learned how wonderful e-books can be. So, why does a public institution, such as a library, sign up to a service that doesn't let a significant number of it's patrons use?

It's back to this attempt to smash the "other guy". In the lavender business there are hundreds of lavender farms trying to survive by growing lavender and then just plain selling it or trying a combination of selling the raw crop and making finished goods out of it. The crop is too small for significant local coops to have been formed, with the exception of Sequim, WA. But growers in Sequim produce only a small percentage of the lavender grown on the west coast - between some of the huge farms in California and the newer ones in Oregon, and all those of us in the rest of the state of Washington a lot of lavender is grown and sold that isn't included in the Sequim Lavender Coop. I think banding together as the Sequim growers have done is a wonderful thing, don't get me wrong, but it isn't necessary to try to squash the rest of the lavender growers. In fact, I've found that when there are many people working in the same area a wonderful creative energy develops. In the area of lavender, ideas for great products, new uses for lavender, and subtle shifts towards better production and products takes place.

In the same way, software companies rely on each other for ideas, breakthrough methods, and generating a big enough market to make any of it work in the first place. But, in our culture of "smash the other guy" it's never recognized. Apple gave Microsoft the idea for Windows. Microsoft gave Apple a workhorse application in Office. There is a back and forth, even between giants, that helps us all. However, the cut-throat mentality, the one that made the company that serves up e-books for our library system, is not serving us all. It's hurting the very idea that libraries are based - free access to information for all.

Join me in lobbying our libraries and these companies to stop this nonsense and to allow all platforms to be able to use their service. Audible.com proves this is not that hard!

The wind is blowing into the 30 mph range this morning. It's coming from the southeast which is where the storms come from in the Puget Sound trough. This farm is on the east end of the Strait of Juan de Fuca which means when there's a west wind it barrels down the strait and hits us full force. We don't have hurricanes, but from November through March we'll have hefty wind storms when it blows more than 70 mph.

It's depressing. The wind batters the sides of the house as well as my mind. It is unrelentingly pushy. The Beaufort Wind Scale has the various kinds of winds classified - right now it's blowing a "Near Gale". I watch the shipping go by in this wind as the ships and tugs and barges go out the strait or up and down to the Strait of Georgia on the inside edge of Vancouver Island. The waves break over the bows as they plow their way through the violent water.

Kari, my new weeder, is coming to work today. I hate to have the weeders working in the fields when it's like this. It sucks all the warmth out of the body, it blows into our ears and makes them hurt. The ground is wet enough that at least the dirt doesn't blow up into our eyes.

Life is not genteel and tranquil all the time on a lavender farm.