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To my girls:
Alyssa, Hayley and Courtney
Growing up, you came through the door after school to smell… not the baking of cookies or other edible confections, but a new herbal concoction of some kind. Thank you for being willing testers of my recipes – accepting them with all the pungent failures and fragrant successes.
I am grateful for all the years you let me chase this gardening passion. I am truly blessed.
■ TABLE OF CONTENTS ■
SPA: A LITTLE HISTORY AND LORE
SURROUND The garden as sanctuary and spa retreat ■ Creating serene spa surroundings in your home
■ INTRODUCTION ■
I am an herb lover, but I am also a spa lover.
When you put the two together, you have the start of
a journey of delight.
“SPA” CONJURES UP SPECIFIC IMAGES FOR ME. A destination resort with fluffy white towels, relaxing massage, luxurious skin treatments and maybe even a fun drink with an umbrella in it. Search online for the word spa and you’ll likely find an alluring image of a well-stacked pile of polished black stones next to a candle and a woman with an exotic flower in her hair. Pretty much as expected. But, as I got deeper into writing this book, I become highly aware (with maybe too much sensitivity) of how the word spa is being used for a variety of other commercial purposes – a hot tub company, a pedicure salon, and much more. Recently, I was at a hotel and on the bathroom counter was a row of tiny bottles, each one labeled as a “spa” shampoo, soap, conditioner, bath gel – each one containing a white, silky liquid with no color, no texture. I wondered if it was all the same stuff. I took a picture of the items in the dish and started writing a paragraph in my head with the notion that I needed to debunk this idea of a spa. How dare they? I thought, climbing on my high horse. Of course, I didn’t actually use the picture because have no wish to defame the company that packaged them as “spa” products. But it served as a reminder to me of how generic the word has become.
What is your image of a spa? In the sense of this book, I would like you to visualize the word as a way to nurture and heal. Think of it as a mindset of wellness.
It is all about relaxation in your own surroundings and using herbs from your garden to create a pleasurable, deeply beneficia experience. (Note to those of us who have been treated to a day spa: Creating the spa experience in your own home brings a speda degree of relaxation because you don’t have to get in the car after your spa day and then drive home afterward. You simply relax, go to bed, meditate or spend moments with renewed energy in your own space. What could be better than that?)
LESSONS FROM MY GARDEN
My herbal journey began many years ago,
not as a book, but as
lessons from the garden.
Much of my garden learning was in a high mountain desert garden in Idaho. It was in zone 4, and I couldn’t grow every herb I wanted to; but oh how I tried! In between killing frosts (usually June and early September) I would grow, gather and preserve as much as possible. In that challenging gardening climate, I used to say if I couldn’t make something from the plants, I wouldn’t spend my time planting it! I experimented and made many things from the garden; it wasn’t always about food, it was also about fragrance and healing.
As a garden designer, knowing plants and gardening is what drives my work. I do know that not every plant can be harvested to make something; when I first moved to Washington State, I used to joke about what the heck I can do with a Rhododendron. My work is creating beauty with ornamental plants, but my personal garden passion is all about what the garden gives back.
As a garden speaker, many of my talks are about encouraging people to make discoveries in their own gardens. In recent years, my most requested lectures are about herbs. People are captivated by their fragrance and flavor and all the ways to use them. In 1997, I taught a popular class at the local community college called “Herbal Lotions and Potions.” The topic has evolved over time, in both seminar form and as a hands-on workshop – all about growing herbs and using them for skin care.
Then came a discussion with Paul Kelly of St. Lynn’s Press and all those lessons, workshops and herbal experiments became the findings for a spa book for herb lovers. During the creation of the book there was an oversized piece of paper posted on the wall of my workspace. In big, black marker I had written the words that I wanted to keep in my thoughts every day:
I knew the herbs and recipes by heart, but I wanted to express more, beyond simply making sure you have all the information needed – from the measurement of ingredients to the basics of mixing and blending. I wanted to always find descriptive ways to invite your senses into this herbal journey so you could feel the words, smell the aromas of fresh cut herbs,
