herbs to grow in family herb garden

I have taught the class 10 herbs to grow for the family medicinal herbal garden a few times these past couple years, and I’m gearing up to teach it again this year at the Mother Earth News Fair. I love to teach this class simply because I love growing easily accessible medicinal herbs. Even before fully embracing the title of herbalist, my garden was full of herbs because they simply just brought me joy. Most of these herbs I purchased form local greenhouses, procured seedlings from friends, or just tossed down seeds and wished for the best.

Like I mentioned in my last post, my chickens wrecked havoc on my garden bed. Using my yarrow as a dustbath and nesting in my mugwort and so on and so forth. So this year ill be starting from scratch with quite a few herbs. My apothecary supply has dwindled significantly and I am looking forward to increasing supplies. This will require a lot of drying and storing of the herbs as well.

Thyme

I was taught that unless collecting the flowers of a plant for use, you should harvest it before it puts it all its energy towards flowering, but by jove the smell of flowering thyme is absolutely heavenly. Once the thyme and oregano are flowering in my garden beds I feel like a bee constantly flitting down to catch a whiff. But I digress, harvest pre-flowering thyme for all its culinary and herbal remedy goodness. It will always go in my cold and flu remedies or cleaning concoctions because its a good antimicrobial.

Lavender

I try each year to grow lavender because I want oodles of it everywhere, last year was the first time I had a successful flowering crop. I want to continue that energy and plant more.

Rosemary

My sons name is also Rosemary, he’s named for my Aunt Rosie, a powerhouse of a woman. I adore rosemary, I want it in every garden bed. Not only for its affinity for cognition, but also its an antimicrobial, its good for your hair, and of course as a culinary herb.

Mullein

Mullein is a beautiful plant to look at. I love a good mullein leaf tea for lung health, but it also is a good anti inflammatory remedy for zits and what not. The flowers go in ear health blends as well.

Yarrow

Yarrow has a special place in my heart. I never want to be without it. I had a dream one time that a friend’s husband of mine needed yarrow for a wound, and then she mentioned in the group chat that he had scraped his arm pretty badly. He needed yarrow, after a poultice of the fresh herb, he was right as rain in a few days.

Mints

Chocolate mint, pineapple mint, mountain mint, apple mint. Pop these babies in a pot so they dont ever take your garden and dry them or make a fresh iced tea with them.