WHAT A WEEKEND!

This was the weekend when our orchid society had two events going on, and though there are maybe forty or so members (down from seventy a couple of yrs. ago) there are only about ten to twelve who actually do the work, and one who wants to run everything.

On Friday we had to set up our vendor site at the Master Gardeners Garden Sale. Five of us did that, and this is how it looked.




The sale was open for two hours that evening for Master Gardener members, but we knew that storms were predicted for that night, so all plants had to be carried to a building for the night and pulled out again the next morning. In addition, we had orchid culture sheets for the various genera we had for sale, membership in the society sign up sheets, and registration sheets for an orchid workshop in June. I did think ahead on the last part and took out a big plastic tote so that the paper goods could be stored under the table until Sun. when the sale ended. I helped with the set-up but didn't stay through the sale that evening. And sure enough the storms came that night. In fact, there was another about 7:30 a.m. the next morning.

And the next morning I was loading my car with the five plants I entered in the table top show downtown, my electric casserole which had the corn pudding ready to be baked, and my running shoes for the monthly judging for which I work as a volunteer clerk. This was going to be a day alone for me; usually there are two of us to handle the job.

Only twelve people entered plants for the show this year; two of them were from Tyler where we entered their show last month. Naturally we had far fewer plants on the tables this year. Maybe that's why I wound up with another First and Best Flower awards. (Remember you can click on the picture to enlarge it.) Sorry that those windows make it difficult to see the plant.


This is Paph. Lebaudyanum.



Here are a couple of shots of the show:



I call this shot, "Not a Crowd." However, those who showed up bought plants, and that was good.



And this picture is labeled," Plants the visitor blocked in the previous picture".

My job as clerk requires me to register all the plants to be judged (not all the plants in the show); there were sixteen. Then I had to take them into the room where the judging teams (2 this month) look at them, and then return them to the appropriate show table. I arrived at the downtown show at 8:20 a.m. and back home about 5:00 p.m. My feet were throbbing; I was walking into door frames; was totally wiped out. Fortunately, I was able to make a salad and heat up some pizza I'd spiced up earlier in the week. The wine was already chilled. Slept like there was no tomorrow.


But there was a tomorrow as I had signed up to help at the last two hours of the sale, and take down of the Master Gardeners sale. Fortunately, there had been no more threatening weather, but there were places in the lawn with serious mud issues. Here's a happy shopper:



As you can see the area where they hold the sale is quite nice, and I love being outdoors there. It's absolutely wonderful, and I much prefer it to being indoors, and very much superior to the Mother's Day sale in a mall next month.

Anyway, I survived the hectic pace and am now trying to do a few of the many neglected things at home. Will I ever catch up? Probably not!

Happy Spring, Ya'll!