January 2026 – Nine by Eighteen

Ordering Seeds

SabineJanuary 25, 2026Leave a Reply

This afternoon, while the biggest snow storm in four years was howling outside, I cozied up inside with tea and seed catalogs and made plans for the upcoming gardening season. I ordered seeds for disease-resistant tomato varieties from both Territorial Seeds (Galahad and Purple Zebra) and High Mowing (Marmalade, Caiman, and Mountain Sunrise), and shallot sets from Fedco (Roderique). I still need to place my order for herbs, flowers and some vegetable seeds with Sand Hill Preservation Center, which needs to happen soon, as in mid-February, I will need to start my first seedlings. Dreaming of spring 🙂

PS. The Baker Creek catalog is a piece of art. Such a pleasure to browse.

Update: On January 28, I placed my Sand Hill Preservation Center order via snail mail. I ordered Tuscan kale, Altaglobe radishes, herbs (sage, thyme, lemon basil), and flowers (Petite Mix marigolds, snapdragons mix, Alaska mix nasturtium, Iceland mix poppies plus Polar Bear and Oriole zinnias).

Calendula Salve Part 3 – The Salve

SabineJanuary 5, 20262 Replies

It was time to make the calendula salve. I gathered the ingredients – homemade calendula oil, beeswax, unrefined shea butter, and essential lavender oil. I also needed a water bath, a spatula and tins for the finished product.

I started by weighing out the beeswax and the shea butter. The recipe calls for 1 oz. beeswax and 0.5 oz. of shea butter for every 8 oz. of oil. I had 12 oz. of oil and adjusted the amounts of the other ingredients accordingly. I melted the beeswax and the shea butter in a water bath and then added the calendula oil.

Once it was all melted – taking care not to heat the oil too much so it would retain its medicinal qualities – I added a few drops (around 8) of lavender oil for fragrance and filled four 4 oz. tins.

I left the tins undisturbed for the salve to harden and settle and added labels.

Voila! My first-ever batch of calendula salve.

Calendula Salve Part 2 – Calendula Oil

SabineJanuary 2, 20262 Replies

The next step in my calendula salve project was to make the calendula oil. I needed dried calendula flowers, a carrier oil (I used 500 ml of sweet almond oil) and glass jars. It is a simple process: Fill the glass jars with the flowers (about 2/3 to 3/4 full) and top them with the oil. There should not be much room between the oil surface and the lid as contact with air can make the oil rancid.

I initially used non-standard jars that held a bit more than a cup each. But I miscalculated the volume and ended up having to switch to smaller jars half-way in the process to make the oil fill all the way to the top (to minimize exposure to air). As I had already covered the flowers in the initial jars with oil, in the end, my jars held more flowers than intended. This will make the oil more potent, but also potentially will yield less oil as some of it will be absorbed by the flowers.

*November 17, the day I made the calendula oil*

I let the oil infuse for about 6 weeks in a warm, dark place (under a cardboard box next to the radiator in my dining room), turning the jars every couple of days.

After those six weeks, I strained the oil using a sieve lined with one layer of cheese cloth. I tried to squeeze out as much of the flowers as I could.

In total, infusing the flowers with just under 16 oz. of almond oil yielded 12 oz. of calendula oil. As expected, some of the oil (a surprising amount, actually) had been absorbed by the flower petals and the cheese cloth. I then stored the oil in a dark bottle in a dark corner of my cool bedroom for a few days. The oil can be stored this way until the original expiration date of the carrier oil. Onto the next step: calendula salve.