We tend to adopt “neighbor grandmas” wherever we live, and our time in New Mexico was no exception. We stood in line next to Miss Norma at a garden tour in Albuquerque, and after chatting for a bit discovered she lived right down the road from us. We invited her over for tea and very quickly formed a sweet friendship. When her lavender was in bloom she called us down to pick fresh stems from her front yard and taught us how to make lavender wands. She showed us a few wands she had made years before and they still smelled good. We were so excited to learn this beautiful new craft!
I've always been smitten by lavender and Albuquerque's high-desert climate was the perfect environment for growing this fragrant herb. Our local organic farm, Los Poblanos, was famous for their gorgeous lavender fields and had this to say about their lavender crops: “Lavender is a low water use plant that thrives in our arid environment, and our fields have grown to hold thousands of plants after years of hand propagating the original lavender plants in our historic greenhouse.” I planted dozens of lavender plants around my property and was excited to make lavender wands every fall with our own crops.
How to make lavender wands:
Gather 15 freshly picked stems of lavender and about 50 inches of narrow ribbon.
Remove all the leaves from the stems.
Line up the bottom of the flower heads and tie them together.
Turn the bundle upside down.
Gently bend each stem down around the blossom heads.
Start to weave the ribbon under and over the stems.
Continue weaving until you have covered all the flowers. Wrap the ribbon around the neck of the wand and tie it off.
Miss Norma had wands from years ago, and to release more scent she simply rubbed the wand in her hands. We still have ours that we made with her that day and they still smell so lovely. I hope you will invite your neighbors over for a lovely time of crafting lavender wands. Xo
* We have since moved away to Tennessee, but Miss Norma packaged up her fresh lavender and sent it to us so we could make this project again.