Lavender Harvest...


It's that time again.
The first big lavender harvest.


Every year, a lot of you email me asking how to know when the lavender is ready for picking.
If you want to dry lavender for gifts, cooking or sachets...it must pick it at the perfect time.
When the flower heads are big and
before the small flowers have opened.
To make this easy to understand, I give you this...


Why I haven't made this very easy visual for you before is beyond me.
Bunch them together and hang upside down to dry.

Lessons In My Garden...



Last night, I discovered strawberries in the new patch we planted this year.
This lead me to take a closer look at the rest of the 'food' section in our yard..


 it's the very first cauliflower I have ever grown!
Isn't it lovely.


I found out I had carrots ready..


the beets are coming along - there are only three of them, but they are looking well.
I fail too.


Yellow cheery zucchini are making me smile...


and the apples are very pretty.
We are shooting my garden and studio for Canadian Living in a week, 
so I've been working extra hard on it this year.
Aside from the beet debacle, I'd say it's looking great!


It's been a week of bugs here at the farm.
I could photograph bees all day.
But I wanted to share two things.
One I learnt years ago, and one I learnt last night.


Years ago, I learnt that this is a ladybug before she transforms into the charming storybook version.
It's like a nasty spider gone wrong.
But they eat aphids and soon will become ladies.


This is a box of 5000 aphid eating bugs whose name I couldn't type or pronounce.
You release them at dusk - which I did in our blueberry patch last night.
If you ever decide to do this, here are some helpful tips:
1  hold your breath
2 plug your nose
3  lift lid and run really fast
I didn't follow any of these steps and I'm pretty sure we only have 4000 in the field - not 5000.
I swallowed about 600 and another 400 are trapped in my hair.

Easy Breezy...



I'm looking forward to this summer.


At this point, there are no giant projects to get through.
Just a few fun magazine shoots with my friends and happy getaways.


We're shooting my vegetable garden and art studio for Canadian Living in a few weeks.
The veggies are looking fabulous!


We put in two new strawberry beds this year.
They are finally starting to take off.


I've got more lettuce than I know what to do with.
Smoothies?  Would that be weird? 


A welcome stranger to our garden this year.
The foxglove.


Almost time to harvest the first wave of lavender for the jam..


The blueberries are beautiful...


...and the easy breezy summer has begun.

In One Hour...


...walking around my yard tonight, this is what I saw.