Yesterday, my husband, youngest granddaughter, and I attended the annual Lavender Festival held at the Denver Botanic Gardens extension at Chatfield Farms, located at 8500 W Deer Creek Canyon Road in Littleton, Colorado. Chatfield farms is a 700-acre native plant refuge and working farm located along the banks of Deer Creek with facilities that include a visitor center, the historical Hildebrand Ranch, a restored 1918 dairy barn and silo, an 1874 Deer Creek Schoolhouse, and miles of nature trails and numerous wildflower gardens. We love to visit the area as it is a short drive from our home!
More than 2,000 lavender plants of all kinds have been planted in a section of the garden and every summer a two-day Lavender Festival takes place. We last attended in 2018--you can see that post on this link--so we were excited to return for a day of enjoyment. There were garden tours, free entertainment in the amphitheater, barrel rides for the children (and adults!), demonstrations, a variety of food, dessert, and drink vendors, a farmer's market for fresh produce from some of the partners of our Community Supported Agriculture program, Lavender products made by local growers and artisans available for purchase and paintings and pottery available for purchase from local artists.
There are many varieties of lavender planted at Chatfield Farms that can thrive in Colorado's climate and you can see PDF descriptions of them at this link.
Chatfield Farms is full of other beautiful gardens full of flowers!
I was fascinated by the many colorful displays of coleus.
Chatfield Farms is also the location of an original farmhouse that is on the National Register of Historic Places. In 1866, the Hildebrand family bought the log cabin and the surrounding land. In these dry grasslands nestled against the foothills, they turned a small cabin and vegetable garden into a thriving farm and ranch with 600 head of Hereford cattle. Over time the family extended the cabin and added clapboard to the exterior. The site also includes a schoolhouse (built in 1874); granary; icehouse; wood and blacksmith sheds. Recently renovated, the blacksmith shop is fully functional.
Now there is a Community Supported Agriculture program (CSA) located at Chatfield Farms, growing seven acres of vegetables, flowers, and fruit for subscribers (shareholders) and farm stands.
Now there is a Community Supported Agriculture program (CSA) located at Chatfield Farms, growing seven acres of vegetables, flowers, and fruit for subscribers (shareholders) and farm stands.
Our granddaughter enjoyed the Lavender Festival and had fun exploring the labyrinth, the gardens, the willow sculpture art installation, and the farmhouse very much. I hope the day will always be a fun memory for her and instill a love for lavender in her life forever!
Do you love lavender?
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29 comments:
Hello Pat,
I do love lavender, I have sachets in my dresser drawers.
The Lavender festival looks fun, beautiful views and lovely flowers.
The lavender loaf cake sounds yummy. Looks like a fun day with your granddaughter. Take care, enjoy your day and have a happy new week!
I do love lavender! I would have loved to have gone to that Festival. The artist that created the stick structure recently did one here at our botanical gardens.
I bet that smells absolutely heavenly!
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How can anyone not love lavendar! I'd enjoy the festival, as well as seeing those antiques in the home...and a working blacksmith shop too! Stay cool!
...Pat, this post is jam packed with beautiful images! The blue sky and puffy clouds set them off.
Lavender field are always beautiful but the other gardens are also gorgeous
...Pat, this post is jam packed with gorgeous colors and the blue skies and puffy clouds are the frosty on the cake.
Oh that looks like so much fun. I know Lavender smells really good, but unfortunately cannot smell it or any other scent anymore.
I had lavendine, a variety of lavender for lower altitudes, in my old yard. Would harvest the seeds for use around the house. Lovely photos.
I do enjoy lavender and we have about 6 full plants right now. I just cut some to bring in. Your trip looked fun and I love the collages!
Beautiful!!
I do love lavender and am lucky that there are lavender farms not too far away. At this time of the year they look beautiful with their blue and purple fields. I liked the photos of the coleus which seems to have gone out of favour here as I haven't seem much of it at all lately.
I would go crazy! I love lavender, love it. And can't grow it to save my soul. The fragrance had to be heavenly. What a wonderful day!
Beautiful shots.
I do love it Pat, for all the reasons you cite, except that I've never tried the culinary variety. Another wonderful experience with your grand-daughter and I know she'll remember it always!
A few years ago we attended a lavender festival here in Lane County (up the McKenzie River a couple of hours away). We enjoyed it -- it was wonderful, but had not nearly as much as yours did -- ours was *all* lavender -- just what you could pick and the products the farm made, soap and such. No food. Now I'm wondering (and will research) whether what's grown here is different and can't be used for cooking. ... There is always something new to learn -- how lucky we are these days to have the whole world of knowledge right here at our fingertips!! ...
Lovely images! Yes, l like lavender.
Of course I love lavender :) and my dream is to experience the large fields of lavender flowers in long rows in Provence in the south of France. Think the scent ... I love the scent of lavender!
I love the fragrance of lavender. It is a beautiful farm with rows of lavender plants. Beautiful photos with the blue sky and white fluffy clouds. So many colourful flowers and plants. Would love to check out the interesting original farmhouse.
Oh, my goodness!! It all looks so beautiful (and fragrant). Looks like it was a wonderful event.
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www.scribblingboomer.com
Beautiful blooms and scenery.
You're always visiting fun and interesting places! I love seeing photos of lavendar. They photograph beautifully!
I've never seen Lavender fields before. Great capture.
Yep, I love lavender, both the color and the smell. Chatfield Farms looks like my kind of place.
That sounds like such a fun day out! Thank you so much for sharing with us.
How wonderful! Lavender is awesome!! Beautiful collection!
that was an awesome outing. I love lavender.
I absolutely love lavender and so did my mother and sister. They swore by a few drops on the pillow at night gave them a good night’s sleep. I keep the dried flowers in my drawer. Wonderful photos and I could walk around here for hours.
Such stunning images and yes, I am a huge, huge fan of lavender. Though they don't grow a lot in our part of the world, except the high mountains.
Thanks for sharing these awe-inspiring shots. I was also ogling at the sky and the wispy clouds, Pat.
And I can't wait to check your lavender cake recipe. :)
https://natashamusing.com/2022/07/6-months-of-balanced-flow-word-of-the-year-2022/
Oh I love lavender…..I can smell it from here…so relaxing..Michelle
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