Steady Traffic

The plant sale started today for Friends members and volunteers and we had fairly steady traffic throughout the day. We had plenty of volunteer help this morning to get everything organized for maximum efficiency. The forecast for the weekend looks better with almost no chance of rain now and we hope for a super turnout tomorrow. The first Saturday is typically our busiest day and we hope that trend will continue. The Garden Festival is also tomorrow (11am-4pm) and there should be a "crossover of crowds" that will go to both events. Our mum supply is currently holding (see below) but will be decimated tomorrow. Marianne and I were mentioning how we'll have to put in another 120 hours at this sale and sure hope we get the crowds we need to make this a successful fundraiser.

Life in the gardens doesn't stop for these plant sales so we were fortunate to have our Friday team out there as there will be plenty of visitors this weekend (we start a free admission week) and three weddings to boot! Little Jerry and Dr. Gredler took care of the riding mower work and Jerry had time to work in the Japanese garden as well. Janice helped prep for the Garden Festival but also put out labels, watered and pushmowed. Terry also mowed and worked on many tasks that included moving sprinklers around all day. Marv helped in the plant sale this morning getting things arranged and ran lots of irrigation and sprinklers around the gardens. I'm sure I'll miss some of the names but special thanks to our Friday volunteers of John, Becky, Gene, Elaine, Judy, Joanne, Mike, Joe, Jonas, Bonnie, Shirley, Ron, Lynda, Kristine (to the left cutting up pepper), Jumbo Jim, Bev, Julie, the RECAPPERS, Laurie and everyone else I forgot. This is such a great time of year in the gardens and despite all the prep work involved with our plant sale and the Garden Festival, it always ends up being worth it and we're glad to provide these events and activities for the community. At the bottom is just one of the beans ('Speckled Cranberry') that will be featured at the Garden Festival tomorrow. This variety also has neat seeds that are white with that same color pink as splotches. A true "ornamental edible"!