I just planted three types of creeping thyme around my new raised herb garden. I used half sand and half top soil with a little compost thrown in, and they're growing very well so far. 'Highland Cream' is a neat variegated cultivar you can check out, and 'Elfin' stays amazingly short...1" or less. I found mine at the Duke Gardens plant sale a few weeks ago, but you can get these from Bluestone online as well if you can't find them locally (they're a little bit more, but Bluestone is reputable). They have 13 varieties to choose from.

I bought three of each but left plenty of room to fill in between them. They're fairly carefree from everything I've heard, which is good because I plan to ignore them. =)

Here is a link that might be useful: Bluestone Thyme

In my experience, a small pot of ordinary thyme spreads about 2 feet wide in one year. I like the Bonnie's herbs in the bio-degradable pots that you can find locally at a lot of nurseries and big box stores.

Lemon thyme spreads slower than the ordinary thyme in my garden. It's a lovely thyme, though.

I've had bad luck with the red/rose bloom thyme not standing up to the intense full sun in my south-facing garden. That surprised me!

You can mow over the thyme as long as your stepping stones are low enough to not be hit by the mower (raise the blade).

Cameron

I just bought my Creeping Thyme from the Farmers Market in Raleigh. I can't remember exactly which vendor I bought it from but they had a couple of "steppables". Several vendors had different varieties. I love the Lemon Thyme. It smells so good when I have to clip it back. Dirtrx

Thanks everyone so much for the suggestions and information. You've inspired me to get on the plant exchange, search out my yard for perennials to share, and think about what plants will accompany my hosta bed in the back yard!

Seems gardeners are good people.

I have used Bluestone, appreciate their customer service and guarantee, and found that plants arrived in good condition. Had no idea they sold so many varieties of thyme. I'll look for steppables at the local nurseries, and if I don't find enough varieties of thyme in stock, order from Bluestone.

Happy gardening! You've inspired a newbie. :)

I have a ton of common thyme I grew and I swear the more you abuse it the better it does. I have found it rather easy to grow from seed as well. This type seems to fill in the quickest, be more dense, and is more forgiving than other types I have had.

Out of all the varieties I have purchased, right now I have a yellow margin variegated type and silver thyme left. They have not only spread fairly quick but you can cut off small bunches, pull off the bottom leaves and put them in moist soil in the shade and they root really easily. And those rooted pieces become bigger plants rather quickly.

FYI, Bluestone is having its half-price sale and many of these creeping thyme are on it. Good till 5/31.

The Thyme Garden Herb Company offers Organic Mixed Creeping Thyme Seed, which might interest you. Their website also has detailed instructions on selecting, germinating, and planting various thymes. (Even so, I may out and buy plants.) An invaluable tool when ordering online is Dave's Garden website. DG's Garden Watchdog Directory dishes the good, the bad and the ugly on 7,870 online nurseries - including the total positive, neutral and negative customer reviews for each. Rather than navigating the DG's massive website, I google the name of the nursery followed by the word "reviews" -- ie Thyme Garden Herb Company reviews. If Dave's Garden has reviewed it, your search will bring up The Scoop on (name of nursery) -- Dave's Garden." Interestingly, the Thyme Garden Herb Company has 10 positives two neutrals, and three negatives (from the comments, it appears that unhappy customers bought live plants rather than seeds). One more thing, the Mother of all online nurseries has to be Annie's Annuals and Perennials. If you can handle massive Plant Lust, check it out

I get Annie's catalog every year. Seems like everything is $5 bucks for any amount of seed, one seed or 10 seeds. You never get a lot of seeds, and everything in there looks surreal. Most of it only grows in zones 9-11, but there are a few in zone 6. Her stuff is expensive, and beautiful. It's her trip, I'm not judging, it just seems out of touch with reality. I can get thousands of seeds way cheaper. She just seems to find really hard to find plants and sell them at a high price. We grow hard to find plants and sell them at a cheap price. Not knocking it, she just has a better selection. Her prices are high bc of her overhead. We don't use expensive heaters and grow what we can by natural selection and for zone 6 and up. I just don't really want to pay the electric company to grow what Mother Nature can grow if you just pay some attention to it, so somebody's gotta pay for that electric bill, and the hoop houses. I still can't understand why they need to be so high when most people who shop are women and under 5'7". They don't need to be 20' high. Hot air rises, seems silly. Check out Elliot Coleman who grows in Vermont with no lights, no heat, and sells to high-end restaurants in the middle of winter. It's more impressive.

I grew both mother of thyme and creeping thyme. mother of thyme tends to stand up as it grows and spreads well; creeping thyme has tinier leaves and seems to grow flat in a mat kind of way. I can see where people would choose that in rock gardens because it is flat and grows up and over rocks or wherever you put it. I'm partial to mother of thyme which i had in pots growing next to the creeping thyme i grew and the bees turned all my mother of thyme pink which was the same color the creeping thyme was. i thought it was funny. i don't think you can drive over it and that's my issue - my brick pathway gets driven over partway when our soil is delivered each year, so its going to look weird to have thyme growing all the way down the brick pathway except there where its mashed down. a landscaper told me to put a piece of plywood down and it would stop them from crushing my bricks - so it may work on the thyme also - i don't know, it's a dilemma of sorts.