Green Thumb Sunday - tender lavender blooming in the window

Gardeners, Plant and Nature Lovers can join in every Sunday, visit As the Garden Grows .

The first time I participated in a volunteer project at Crossroads Village with the Genesee County Herb Society, a pleasant, knowledgeable woman gave me a fragrant tussie mussie of fresh herbs she had just made as a demonstration for the visitors. I knew then these were the kind of people I wanted to be around. Milli is still one of our stalwart members, and I'm getting to be an old hand.

I took the little bouquet home and took it apart - and rooted the tender lavender in a small pot. That little variegated feather lavender (I know, common names drive me crazy too but I'm not looking it up) grew for me for years until I let it get root- bound and baked one summer on the patio.

My take home point here, however, is that tender lavenders in pots are some of the easiest and most rewarding herbs to grow. They grow easily from cuttings in plain old potting mix, and will grow without artificial light if you can put them in a south window, and remember to water before the tips droop too awfully much.

The felty gray-leaved variety here has been neglected in this pot for years, and the small blooming stems are a reminder that I should do something for goodness sake. This year, little lavender, I promise some fresh soil, but let's wait until spring...


You can see in this third photo, how I'm doubling up my indoors-square-foot gardening-in-front-of-the-window scheme by stacking the smaller Dutch lavender on top of the soil in the French lavender's pot,in a space left bare by some heavy pruning back done last year on the French lavender. A curry plant is also having a good winter right there in its front row seat.
Waiting for spring...