Shady Oaks Garden Club

 

 

The Shady Oaks Garden Club held a holiday luncheon at the Blackthorne Club on December 6th. Carol Tyree and Amy Reutlinger were hostesses.   There were 17 in attendance.  Our president, Sara Bowers, welcomed our District IV Director, Connie Wallace, and the TFGC state president, Cindy Hintz.  A visitor, Peggy True, was introduced and Associate members Lee Ward and Phyllis Stamm were also welcomed. Nancy Fischman provided some inspirational thoughts for the season. Club members attending donated $190 for the NGC Disaster Relief Fund which will go to the Deep South Region.

Janet Powell presented TFGC President Cindy Hintz with a certificate indicating the club was purchasing  a Penny Pines tree to be planted in the Gatlinburg area in honor of her presidency. This has been a secret collection among members since April.  Sara Bowers presented Loretta Arbogast with a Life Membership from the SOGC in recognition of her many hours of service to the club.  Illuminary floral designs titled, The Winter Aurora Borealis, and  provided by members were discussed. Amy Reutlinger, a co-chairman for Flowers of Hope Committee, presented the monthly report.  To date this year, Shady Oaks Garden Club members have spent a total of 574 hours volunteering by making bouquets at the Salvation Army to be distributed throughout the community.  At the end of November, members made 2,188 arrangements, donated 414 vase and made 1,380 deliveries of flowers.  What an impressive achievement!   A fun time was had by all.    

Seven members of SOGC attended the annual November Winter Greens Workshop at the home of Loretta Arbogast.  Each attendee brought greenery and floral supplies to create a holiday design.  Several of the designs were used to decorate the historic Carter Mansion in Elizabethton as well as the entrance of the Sycamore State Park’s History Museum.  Members learned about the history of orange pomander balls and made several for the Carter Mansion. Delicious homemade soups were provided by our hostess, Loretta. 

A note from our club president Sara Bowers:

This year Shady Oaks Garden Club is honored to have one of our members, Cindy Hintz, serving as president of the Tennessee Federation of Garden Clubs. Cindy  joined a garden club shortly after moving to Johnson City from Wisconsin at the invitation of a neighbor. She quickly became involved and served as President of Shady Oaks Garden Club from 1993-1996. She became an NGC Accredited Flower Show Judge when one of our club members decided to attend the Flower Show Schools and Cindy went along to keep her company. Now she is  a TFGC Life member, an NGC Master Flower Show Judge and a Landscape Consultant. She has worked tirelessly in District IV, and served as the District IV Director for 2001-2003, as well as serving as the editor of The Volunteer Gardener. Cindy, who feels that the mission of a garden club is “for nurturing plants and nurturing people,” is an inspiration to all of us. So this year our club will be celebrating her first year in office by planting our area with seeds of kindness as well as native plants.  Congratulations, Cindy, from all of your friends in Shady Oaks Garden Club.

 

The Shady Ladies have been very busy. We had a very successful garden tour. There were seven wonderful gardens on this year’s tour. Thank you to all the volunteers, garden owners and members who helped make it a success and thank you to all our visitors. 

 

Thanks to Shady Oaks president Sara Bower’s for contributing this post!

Frances Lambert from Ardinna Woods in Jonesborough generously offered to give SOGC  a large number of coneflowers for our upcoming plant sale which will be held at Loretta’s as part of our June 10th Garden Tour. Frances dug up about 75 plants for us and we organized an impromptu potting party. The weather was most cooperative. A big thanks to SOGC participants, Cindy, Loretta, Heather, Lydia, May and our honorary member for a day, Norman Jacob whose help was much appreciated. We transported the pots to May’s home where they will receive tender loving care until the sale.

 

  

In a few short weeks, the Shady Ladies will travel to Gatlinburg for our state convention. “Springtime in the Smokies” is this year’s theme and the convention will feature lectures and workshops from experts in floral design and horticulture. This is a very special convention for Shady Oaks because our own Cindy Hintz is the president-elect for the Tennessee Federation of Garden Clubs! She will be installed as the new president at the convention. To celebrate, our club will be hosting a special dessert reception for her and we are donating centerpiece arrangements for the tables which will be sold as a fundraiser. The Shady Ladies have been working on these for months. Loretta and Anne unearthed granite remnants in the hot summer sun and today Nancy opened up her warehouse to host an assembly workshop. You can see a sneak preview in the photos.