Billowing hillocks of mauve-colored blooms invite meandering at Prayer Lavender Garden in Rockwall. Tera and Kyle Griffin bought the land, 3 acres abutting a creek on Prayer Circle, in 2016. Then they added 2,000 lavender plants (Phenomenal, Grosso, and Hidcote varieties), beehives, pygmy goats (Willie, Waylon, and Hank) and babydoll sheep. The couple had flipped several houses, doing all the work themselves. For their first farm, they wanted a heat- and drought-tolerant plant with a plethora of uses.
A dream of bucolic life drew them. “We were living in Dallas at the time, and I wanted to move further out of the city,” Kyle says. His wife’s brother lived in Rockwall with two kids who were the same age as their own son, Dean. “My wife’s cousin lives in Seattle,” he says. “So we’d been to some lavender farms out there.” They appreciated the bloom’s uses, from the aromatherapeutic to the culinary. The garden opened to the public in June 2018, and they do everything themselves, from the lavender-infused ice cream and popsicles to the décor.
In a barn shop, they sell slices of Tera’s lavender-honey-blueberry pie, quiche, blueberry-lavender lemonade, and biscuits.
Beeswax goes into handmade candles. Goat’s goes milk into soaps, lotions, bath salts, and exfoliating sea salt scrubs. You can get a lavender aromatherapy massage and learn to make lavender wreaths. Occasional shindigs involve lavender prosecco punch and strolls through the garden’s well-kept lavender aisles.
“My wife is the visionary,” Kyle says. “I always joke: I’m just the farmhand.” Farmhand, beekeeper, miniature golf course-maker. His brother Lance (whom you may see on weekends at the Dallas Farmers Market), is roasting coffee they scent with lavender. It’s a very DIY family.
Open April through December.
