Did you know bay leaves, sage and cloves are all natural insect repellents? It’s true. You can crush them up and use them by themselves or crush them up and use them together. Put them in bowls and place around your barbecue and picnic to keep the bugs at bay, or burn as a potpourri. You can even put wrap them in a bit a gauze and wear them on your person to deter insects from biting.

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I have my own herb garden, that I started years ago.  Some years it looked really, really good and other years it went to heck and looked horrendous.  It all depended on how much time I had available to work in and around the garden.  Big vacation years, or when my kids were young and needed a lot of watching in the pool were the bad years.  My kids are older teens and I now have a lot more time to spend in the garden, plus sometimes they help out.  Raised beds make it easier to grow and control my herbs and keep the weeds and grass at bay.

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  Last fall, we decided to plant some winter crops and see what would happen.  We weren’t dedicated or organized enough.  We had raised beds, but didn’t cover them.  We did mound up our leaves and grass around the outside of the bed to help keep it warm, but I think we needed the cover.  The only things that survived the winter were the spinach and the garlic.  The spinach languished in the bed.  Never growing a huge amount, just staying a small plant.  At the end of March, the beginning of April - Spring sprung and so did the spinach.

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