Shady Oaks Garden Club members participated in a holiday fundraiser making arrangements for Dr. Marty Olsen’s staff at the ETSU Medical school. We are a busy and industrious group and we really enjoyed providing special holiday cheer for folks at ETSU.
Shady Oaks own Sara Bowers led our January design workshop. Club members learned how to make a Cascade design. A Cascade design has an emphasis on downward movement . The downward lines may be curved, straight, zigzag or a combination. The design is supported by a container or other device. A minimum of components may extend upward. Thank you Sara! Everyone had a great time and the designs were very impressive.
The members of Shady Oaks Garden Club had a busy summer and fall! Just a few highlights: In July, club member Katya Kaverina led us on a most delightful mushroom stroll on her property. In September, Brandon Lark Roberts hosted us at his enchanting garden. Brandon is a local garden celebrity and is passionate about topiaries. Our club also worked hard arranging flowers at the Salvation Army as part of our Flowers of Hope project.
In honor of National Garden Week, several of our members will be hosting informal “open garden” visits. Just drop in, take a stroll or sit a spell 5-7pm on the following days. Monday June 7 @ May Votaw’s, Tuesday June 8 @ Mickey Grossman’s and Thursday June 10 @ Heather Jacob’s. Several members attended the city commission meeting to receive an official proclamation from our mayor celebrating National Garden Week.
In other news, Flowers of Hope is up and running again. We are now in our new work space at the Salvation Army. On Friday’s from 1-3pm we will be making bouquets and arrangements for nursing homes, community organizations and others who might just need a floral pick-me-up. Please sign up to volunteer if you are available. It is a lot of fun and a great opportunity to visit with your fellow club members.
The Shady Ladies are back! After many months of Zoom meetings, we are now meeting in person again. Our May meeting was fantastic. Club member Natalie Olsen was a most gracious hostess. Her 1920s Tudor residence in the historic Gump neighborhood was a warm and welcoming meeting location and her property boasts more than forty different species of trees and shrubs. It was a wonderful reunion after so many months apart and there were plenty of hugs and smiles all around. We were also delighted to welcome several potential new members. Members submitted an array of stunning horticulture entries for the May meeting as well as some top notch designs. (The chosen design for May was “Together Again” Standard Grouped Mass Design.)
Dr. Marty Olsen gave an informative presentation about his award winning bluebird trail. Dr. Olsen was inspired to create his bluebird trail after success with a single nesting box. He also hoped to enhance the songbird habitat for native songbird species while introducing others to the principles of conservation. He now maintains 5 boxes on a 1.2 mile loop in his neighborhood. He has even designed and built some of his own bluebird nesting boxes! Dr. Olsen explained how he monitors and maintains the boxes, some of which have multiple broods in a season. After his presentation, he led a walking tour to visit some of his nesting boxes. It really was a great way to start the new club year. Hope to see you in June!
Flower Show School Students and Garden Guild Garden Club held an NGC Standard Flower Show entitled ‘A Walk in the Garden’ at Racheff Gardens in Knoxville on Friday, September 25, 2020. Because of rainy weather, designs were staged indoors while horticulture was exhibited in the tool shed. Social Distancing and Face Masks were required. Sara, Cindy, and Natalie were exhibitors. Of the five design classes, Shady Oaks members took home blue ribbons in three. Sara won a blue ribbon for her parallel design in a section for accredited flower show judges only. Cindy was also an exhibitor in this class. Natalie entered a line design and a tubular design. Her tubular design featuring hydrangeas twisting around an old animal yoke won a ‘best of show’ ribbon. Featured horticulture included perennials grown for bloom, cut herbs, container-grown succulents, cut specimens of plants grown for foliage, and container-grown plants grown for foliage. Shady Oaks brought home a number of blue ribbons here as well.
The suggested horticultural specimen for September was Zinnia. And it is a staple in any summer cutting garden. But this year a new (to me) addition has stolen the stage. I have grown cosmos for years. More out of habit than anything else. I am a creature of habit. I don’t like change. Every year I curse the tall stalks that end up bending over. I am too lazy to keep them deadheaded to promote more flowers. I keep growing them though because they are a nice addition to a vase of mixed flowers. This year I ordered a (new to me) cultivar: Gloria. This girl has really impressed me! Her flowers are large and lovely and she is absolutely radiant. Yes the stalks are tall and on this September Sunday many are bent over in my late summer neglected garden. But she has given me such joy and makes for a wild and dramatic addition to large table vases! Green Envy Zinnia are a nice companion if you veer towards the preppy end of the spectrum! (I ordered seeds from Swallowtail Seeds. I had excellent germination directly sown into the ground!)
I also want to give a shout out to my favorite Austin rose, Sharifa Asma. She gave me a few luscious, fragrant late season blooms!
We are now more than five months into the pandemic. All of us are probably weary. Those of us who live alone or work entirely from home may be struggling with the isolation and disconnection from our fellow gardeners. Yes, we are lucky to all share a passion for digging in the dirt or arranging flowers and tending to our little plots of earth has been a saving grace. But it is hard to not be able to sit and visit with one another. Fortunately we are finding ways to stay connected and our first ever virtual garden club meeting was a great opportunity to see one another and to check in with our fellow Shady Ladies (and gents.)
Luke Carter of the Northeast TN Chapter of Citizens’ Climate Lobby gave a great presentation about climate change and inspired us all to step up, get involved and do our part to help. After his presentation we had a very fun show and tell with horticulture and design. Our first virtual meeting had a few (very entertaining) technological hiccups but by next month we will all be experts! Thank you Katya for hosting us on Zoom.
If you missed the meeting we really hope you will join us at the next one in October.
Sara Bowers is keeping us all on our toes with the challenge to create weekly designs from things in our own garden. (Or those of friends near by.) Thank you Sara!
Members of the Shady Oaks Garden Club recently celebrated the announcement by National Garden Clubs that the club is the First Place National Overall Winner of an award for their promotion of National Garden Week. To promote National Garden Week the club organized a tour of gardens in Johnson City that included a plant sale that featured member’s grown non-invasive, native and hard to find plants. Members provided education material for each plant. The tour included private home gardens as well as gardens in public places and highlighted innovative gardening solutions such as water management.
You can read the full story here: Shady Oaks Garden Club Award