Amber Royer
Garden Railroading
Gardeners are all about the time and nurture it takes to bring beauty and a sense of order to a natural landscape. Read More
What is an Herbarium?
Have you ever wondered what an herbarium is? (Hint: it's not a style of herb garden.) Read More
What to Do With All That . . . Cilantro
Cilantro may be an annual, but it is one of those herbs that self-sows, which means that if you plant it in one spot in the fall, it could pop wherever the wind has blown the seeds the next spring. Read More
Making a Terrarium Pendant
After all the hard work we put into our gardens, most gardeners love a chance to show off the results. Read More
Figs, Glorious Figs
One of my earliest memories of childhood is hiding under my grandmother's fig tree, while playing hide and seek. It was an enormous tree, with branches that spread to cover much of the side yard. And every year, my grandmother would go out with a bucket and pick the figs to put up preserves. My brother and I used to get smaller bowls, and we would help pick. Read More
What do I do With All That . . . Rosemary
Let's tackle another prolific grower: rosemary. The upright kind gets leggy and looks scraggly if you don't trim it back occasionally. Give it a sunny spot, and your prostrate rosemary will creep out of its bed and half way across your yard if you let it. Read More
What do I do With All That . . . Mint
I just had a gardener give me some very healthy mint plants today. She said she used her mint for making tea, but didn't know quite what else to do with it. "There's just so much of it," she lamented. Sound familiar? Read More
Why Build a Bat House
Many gardens use birdhouses to attract spectacular creatures that add color and movement to the landscape. But have you ever considered adding a bat house? Bats can actually be quite beneficial to your neighborhood. They help solve one of my gardening pet peeves (though this may not be as much of a problem for you as it is for me here in Texas). When the day finally cools off, which should be prime gardening time, that's when the mosquitos show up. In droves. But one bat can eat 10,000 mosquitos a night.* Read More
Making Your Own Screen Printed Tea Towel
Do you want to bring your garden into your home in an elegant, permanent way? Consider making a screen printed botanical tea towel based on a photograph of one of your favorite plants. Tea towels can make decorative hangings (or be draped through the handle of your oven door), or simply be used for drying cleaned dishes or covering a tea pot or tea tray. Read More
Make Your Own Scented Sugar
You can often find scented sugar (sometimes called flavored sugar) at a gourmet shop. But it is such a simple process to scent sucrose, why not add a personal touch-while saving some cash and make your own? Scented sugar is a simple way to dress up any occasion, and jars with the flavoring agents still in them make quite attractive gifts. Read More
Baking Herb Breads
There is nothing like the fragrance of hot, homemade bread wafting out of the oven. And that fragrance is even richer and more interesting when there are herbs in the bread. Artisan style breads are easy to make (the long prep time you see in bread recipes is mostly the time it spends rising all on its own, while you can be doing other things). Read More
What to Do With All That . . . Dill
Dill is a favorite food of the black swallowtail butterfly. So, when you plant dill, it is a good idea to add a few extra plants for the caterpillars to snack on. But the plants can bounce back after the caterpillars make their chrysalises, or the caterpillars may not show up in your yard at all. This can leave you with a lot of dill when the plants get ready to bolt and go to seed, or with a large number of volunteer sprouts the next spring. It also leaves you with the question: What to do with all that . . . dill? Read More
Make Your Own Lavender Dryer Sachets
When I found out that a large percentage of commercial dryer sheets contain formaldehyde (along with a host of other toxic chemicals) I stopped using them. But I missed having a soft, fresh scent that told the olfactory part of my brain that the clothes were clean. So I started using dryer sachets, which make my brain even happier, because the clothes never have a "fake" scent. It's easy to make lavender dryer sachets. Read More
20 Ways to Soup Up Your Soup
It's finally gotten cold outside (winter seems to come to Texas later every year), so my thoughts have turned to soup. These warm, easy to eat concoctions are the very definition of comfort food. But what can you do to turn a basic recipe into a showstopper? Or maybe you just want to make canned soup more palatable. Here are twenty ways to soup up your soup. Read More
Eating from the Lipstick Tree
Have you ever eaten from the "Lipstick Tree?" Chances are, you have. If you see E160b on a food label, that means you are eating a red dye made from seed coat of annatto (the seeds of the achiote, or lipstick tree). It is used in prepared foods, and to make cheese orange. It is also commonly used to dye margarine and butter yellow.* But why is achiote known as the lipstick tree? And how can you use the seeds in your own cooking? Read More
Herbal Cake Pops
Lately, I have become fascinated with cake pops. The first time I made them (using packaged frosting and candy melts, as so many tutorials directed) they were way too sweet and lacked depth of flavor. So ditched the candy melts in favor of real chocolate and turned to the herb garden for inspiration, designing a rose, cardamom and pistachio cake pop; a basil and strawberry cake pop; and a lemon thyme and lavender cake pop. Read More
Eating Cactus
Cactus has long been an important vegetable in Mexican and southwestern cooking. It has a flavor that is reminiscent of a bell pepper with the undertones of a green bean. The prickly pear (the variety most often eaten) grows despite even the harshest conditions, making it a popular choice for wild harvesting. Cactus is becoming more popular as a vegetable in other parts of the world. Would you like to give it a try? Read More
What to Do WIth All Those . . . Chives
Many people consider chives the easiest herb to grow. This may be because they start so easily from seed, and grow into dense grass-like clumps. A little bit of the herb goes a long way, so even a small chives bed can feel like more chives than you will ever be able to use. What can you do to make the most of all those chives? Read More
What to do with all that . . . oregano
Oregano is one of those herbs that tends to grow prolifically. This can be a good thing. After all, it is a member of the mint family. It makes a sort of tall carpet, and it covered with tiny blossoms in the spring. But it can easily grow out of its intended bed. If yours gets out of hand, the only thing left to do is start cooking with it. Read More
What to do with all that thyme
It's hard to have too much time in a day. But it's easy to have more thyme than you can use in your garden. The plants spread horizontally, forming an attractive carpet. But sometimes you still wind up having to trim it back, and it would be a shame to waste the clippings. Thyme is such an intensely flavored herb, and it is an essential ingredient in so many traditional spice mixtures. Read More
