Blog @ Purple Haze Lavender Ltd.

OK, we’ve got some good news and we’ve got some bad news. First, the bad news; we have purchased the house across the street from the farm and will be moving into it soon. After 12 years in our beautiful little farmhouse, we will miss it terribly but both Rosalind and I want a new start in our marriage and will take up housekeeping just a hundred yards or so from the farm.

Now, the good news; we will be offering the farmhouse as a vacation rental starting around the third week in November. We still have a lot to do to get it ready but things are progressing as planned and we should be moved in about a month or so. We have installed a hot tub on our back deck, and that, with all the other amenities, should assure that the house will be rented regularly. It already has a steamroom, wireless internet, satellite t.v.,large gas barbeque, and is three bedrooms and two bathrooms so would be a neat “family getaway” for the holidays and throughout the summer months. We will be adding “rental”pages to our website in the near future, but for the time being if someone is interested in renting the farmhouse, they should email us with questions or inquiries at info@purplehazelavender.com . We feel it will fill up quite quickly so plan way ahead and contact us soon if interested

We’ve marked all of our lavender plants down by 25% and they are going fast at the farm. We do this every year as we don’t want to keep them through the winter in the greenhouse. So come on down and get some plants to put in the ground. With this cool, wet summer we are experiencing they should thrive when transplanted.

I finished my last distillation of Helichrysum yesterday and will start on the various lavenders today. We will distill until everything is done which should take us a couple of weeks so visit and we’ll show you the process.

We also had a unique group visit us yesterday. It was the Olympic Peninsula Chapter of Combat Vets Association. A bunch of really nice guys on motorcycles. They shopped for awhile and we visited over the distiller.

FINALLY we were able to finish distilling the Helichrysum yesterday and now will start on the fields of Grosso lavender. This process will take a couple of weeks working about 8-10 hours a day. It’s really kind of fun as the visitors to the farm get a chance to see where the essential oil comes from and the process it takes to get it. Typically, we will get about 40-60 pounds of lavender oil but this year it may be less as we took out some mature plants this past spring and replaced them with new, smaller ones.

After getting married last Friday, Rosalind and I took our new camper to a remote section of Eastern Washington for a two day honeymoon. The weather was wonderful and we had a little lake all to ourselves. We’ll be able to travel more this fall when all the distilling is finished.

My friend,Dennice, provided the photo on today’s blog…pretty gorgeous pic of the farm, huh?

Everyday now is spent harvesting helichrysum and distilling it. The yellow streaks of it in the fields are disappearing as Jose and his crew take the sickles to it. I love the earthy fragrance of it almost as much as the scent of lavender essential oil.

Yesterday we were visited by accomplished pastel artist Dorisjean Colvin of Olympia, Washington and her good friend, Marsha Lippert of Shoreline. They spent the day creating some fantastic artwork of our fields. We would like to have them back more often.

The visitors continue to come to the farm to pick their own lavender, wander through the gift shop, eat lavender ice cream, or to just generally take it easy. All the varieties of lavender are now in full bloom or past it and we are harvesting constantly, filling all of our drying barns.

Today is a very special day for me as I will be marrying the love of my life, Rosalind. We are so very happy together and anticipate the future.