Are You Digging Your Garlic and Other Herbal Harvesting Going On!

Garlic Dug My Way!

We have this discussion every year.  The Herbal Husband tends not to remember the outcome unless it is in his favor.  For garlic to have any chance to overwinter or be stored long term, it needs a nicely formed wrapper.  As you may be able to see this garlic has both brown and green leaves, this is when I like to dig them.  Even at this stage the wrapper had some splits in it.  The Herbal Husband, however, likes big bulbs of garlic and thinks if he leaves them in the ground until the leaves all turn brown, the bulbs will be bigger.  It is just not the case and I can't convince him otherwise.  A postscript to this post:  Here is a link to a post from my gardening friend, Jessica Walliser's blog, Savvy Gardening called A Few Garlic-Harvesting Tips.  Maybe it will be some good additional information.

The other issue for me is that if it continues to rain, and we don't get a dry digging day soon, the garlic bulbs will come out split and the wrappers will start to degrade and will have to be used more quickly.  So stay tuned as the garlic turns in the ground! :)  Postscript to this story.  It isn't getting run over by the car, but the rest of the garlic was dug yesterday (July 29th)!

The Rest of the Garlic Was Dug Yesterday!  Yippee!

I got some interesting new canning supplies from Ball.  They are individual herb jars so I decided to see how they worked.  I had dried eight or so stems of spearmint.  Took the leaves off the stems and then used my herb mill to finely grind the leaves.  They all fit in a 4 oz. jar.  I think it is a very cute idea for a Xmas present.

Spearmint Dried for Tea or Potpourri!

Cute Little Shaker and Pour Spout on the Jar!

Also Found a Scary Amount of Herbal Vinegars That Needed to be Decanted!

I Made This Potpourri Last Year!

I Found These Vintage Green Ball Canning Jars to Display the Potpourri!

I wrote about the scented geranium potpourri in Mother Earth Living last year.  The recipe can be found in my post called Aromatherapy Crafts for the Holidays, Part 2.  I'm trying to work inside during rainy days or the ickies and stickies days which we are having at the moment!  Hopefully the cold front will come through soon and cool us down and dry us out!  So I haven't been sitting on my herbal butt not doing something!  Can't believe it is almost the end of July!  Hope you are having a great day!  Talk to you later!