I like the smell of lavender, but dried lavender is very fragile and tends to shed the wilted flowers and other bits as it dries. A common solution is to create a small sachet and sew the lavender inside, a less common (but more fun) solution is to make a lavender wand.

Start with fresh lavender. You want to select long stems with flowering ends. Depending on the thickness of the stems gather 7-21, it just has to be an odd number.

Take a foot or so of ribbon, and tie the heads together in a bunch.

Then turn upside down, and carefully bend the stems back over the flowers. Try not to bend them too sharply, and ease them into position.

Use the backward bent stems to create a cage with the flowers inside.

Carefully start to weave the ribbon over and then under each stem. As long as an odd number of stems are used, each round should be offset by one, making a basket weave pattern.

Continue to weave until the head of the wand is completed, and the flowers are encased. Then wrap the remaining ribbon around the stems to make the handle of the wand and tie off.

And hocus pocus, a la shazam, you have your very own wand, suitable for banishing stale drawer smells and for use as a ward against the anti kitsch.

Hand crafted items have a special kind of magic all their own, especially when made with love by someone you know. The time, effort and care that is put into a homemade gift adds something that just can’t be replaced by sweatshop mass production.

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