March 2023
Get ready for the March meeting – next Tuesday, March 14th at 6 pm in the meeting room at TCAT. The add-a-dish meal begins at 6 pm, followed by a business meeting and a 5/15, then our speaker will have the floor from 7 pm.
This month we will be learning about food preservation, storage, and home canning from Denise Schaeffer of Humphrey’s County UT Extension. If you are planning your spring garden and have questions about what stores well and the best methods, Denise is the person to ask.
Our meal theme is Inflation Fighters: Recipes for budget-friendly meals.
Don’t forget your Help Center Food Donations! Members and Guests are welcome.
Email gpdc471@gmail.com with any questions.
February 2023
January 2023
Tuesday, January 10th at 6 pm will be our first meeting of the new year. We will be meeting at TCAT as usual. (If anyone arrives late and cannot get in the door, please text me at 615-668-1971).
Add-a-dish meal at 6 pm followed by a short business meeting and then our program begins at 7 pm.
Please remember your Help Center Donation – canned or shelf-stable foods that are unopened and not expired are very much needed.
Our meal theme this month: “The Secret Ingredient is…”
Our speaker this month is Susan Lyell from Restoration Rose. She is an enthusiastic and popular speaker and we are very pleased to have her.
She will be bringing a selection of merchandise for sale – she accepts Venmo, Paypal, cash, or check. A special offer on soaps is available for $10 each.
A bio from her website https://restorationrose.com/
As a trained soap maker and expert rose gardener, Susan Lyell infuses her oils, soaps and plant-based beauty products with rose petals right from her organic sustainable farm. The goal of Restoration Rose is to share her rose petals and knowledge to benefit your emotional and physical well being through self care and clean beauty.
Susan realized the sense of well being scent provided and has spent most of her life creating mood altering essential oil blends for friends and family.
Antique and heirloom roses provide a charm and fragrance that are far superior to most modern roses. They were mostly bred to be grown as garden shrubs rather than the Hybrid Tea grown for the show table. As a result, they are vigorous and healthy.
Susan set out to create a collection for her urban garden that has grown to more than 700 varieties.
A firm believer that the “scent of the rose remains, too, in the hand of the giver” Susan shares her passion for roses through her soap and skin care in the hopes that others will experience the serenity roses have given her.
“If everyone just nurtured one scented rose bush, the world would be a more peaceful place.”
December 2022
November 2022
Monthly meeting at TCAT Dickson 740 Hwy 46S (across from Lowe’s): Add-a-dish meal at 6 pm. Business meeting at 6:30. Program begins at 7 pm. Members, former members, and adult guests are always welcome, so come see what we have going on!
Hannah Hollowell, Forest Health Program Specialist is our guest speaker this month.
Bernie Harris will also be presenting a short (15 minutes) feature on Lasagna Pots.
We will have a selection of perennials to give as prizes this month so pay attention to the dinner slideshow. (last month, it was mums – this month will remain a mystery until Tuesday!)
We have several pieces of new business to discuss as well as planning our Christmas party for next month, so don’t miss this meeting!
My name is Hannah Hollowell and I work for the TN Department of Agriculture, Division of Forestry as the Forest Health Program Specialist. I help coordinate how we monitor and manage many of the pests and pathogens that threaten our forests here in Tennessee. I’m originally from northeast TN and enjoyed growing up in a beautiful area of the state with lots of forests and farms. I joined TDF this past fall as the forest health specialist, and have also gotten opportunities to share with others how important forestry and related natural resource management is. I love learning about the insects and other organisms present in our forests, and I enjoy getting to play a role in how we specifically manage insects or diseases that are threatening our forests. I also love sharing about these forest health threats with others to educate how we can all play a part in helping keep our Tennessee forests healthy, and how we can manage our forests for long-term sustainability.
From our featured speaker: Hannah Hollowell
October 2022
This month our meeting will be held at TCAT (across from Lowe’s) on Tuesday, October 11th beginning at 6 pm.
Our meal theme is Something about Pumpkins…or maybe Squash? (we didn’t really nail that down at the board meeting)
Stephanie Tidwell will be sharing her thoughts in a short presentation: Observations from My Garden
Remember to bring your donations for the Help Center – this time of year is especially important – food resources are strained already and the holidays approach.
Please see the agenda.
As always, all adult guests are welcome to attend.
Our guest speaker is Deborah Rosenthal. She recently presented a program at a Wild Ones meeting and Susan was able to book her for this month. This will be a great presentation that you won’t want to miss. Hope to see you all there!
Restorations Gone Wild!
Deborah Rosenthal is a retired Appellate Court Attorney from Los Angeles. She and her husband moved to White Bluff, Tennessee, in 2017 and quickly embraced the privilege of being land stewards. They started with 30 acres of mostly forest, and now manage 73 acres of forest, woodland and prairies.
Deborah will talk about the four native plant restoration projects she has been involved with on her property in Dickson County. And, there’s a video! Deborah supplied a drone video of her first restoration that has recently become the most watched video on the chapter YouTube channel.
August 2022
All members and adult guests are welcome to attend. TCAT Dickson 740 Hwy 46S (across from Lowe’s). Add-a-dish meal begins at 6 pm followed by a short business meeting.
Our meal theme is “Farmers Market Festival of Comestibles”. We have several farmer’s markets in the area and all of them have wonderful fresh produces, breads, desserts, eggs, meats, and many other items all produced locally. As always – our meal theme is optional and we recognize that not everyone always has time to whip up a dish.
We will begin collecting donations for the Help Center again this month.
Clean out your pantries and look for non-perishable and unexpired items to bring. Expired food is discarded and ends up costing time and money to dispose of, so be kind and please check those dates. Food collected stays in Dickson County to help local residents in need.
Our speaker this month:
Clean Genes Farm: “Introduction to Profitable Market Farming” Sara & Jason Kleinhans
A small-scale family farm that grows organic produce in McEwen, TN… lettuces, microgreens, vegetables, & herbs year-round. Our practices are no-till and regenerative; we boost soil health with probiotics, fermentations, and Mother Earth’s goodness.
See them on Facebook and here: https://cleangenesfarm.com/
July 2022
Tuesday, July 2022
Monthly meeting of Gardening Partners begins with an add-a-dish meal, followed by a short business meeting and a guest lecture. TCAT Dickson 740 Hwy 46S (across from Lowe’s). Add-a-dish meal begins at 6 pm followed by a short business meeting. All members and adult guests are encouraged to attend.
Guest speaker: Rosemary Chamberlain presenting ‘Gardening for Monarchs’. Rosemary is a long-time Gardening Partners member as well as a Retired RN, Certified Tennessee Naturalist for 8 years, Member of the Tennessee Naturalist Program, Board member Tennessee Bluebird Society, Member North American Bluebird Society and Member North American Butterfly Association
She and her husband put up 30 bluebird boxes out at Montgomery Bell State Park 8 years ago and monitor them during nesting season. There are 13 bluebird boxes and 3 Monarch Waystations on their property in Dickson.
She participates with Monarch Watch in butterfly counting, raising, and tagging monarchs for the last 6 years and has given several bluebird and monarch presentations to various garden and bird clubs and churches.
June 2022
Tuesday, June 14th
All members and adult guests are welcome to attend. TCAT Dickson 740 Hwy 46S (across from Lowe’s). Add-a-dish meal begins at 6 pm followed by a short business meeting. June program is a presentation on Old Wives Gardening by Bernie Harris and Seeds: Part 1 by Linda Al-Sangar. Contact GP at gpdc471@gmail.com with any questions.
May 2022
We made it through the plant sale! In the past, we have scheduled a picnic for the month after the sale and this year we are reviving that tradition. We will be at Holland Park in lovely downtown Dickson on Tuesday, May 10th at 6 pm. Bring your folding chairs or a blanket to enjoy some nice spring weather and the company of your fellow Gardening Partners. We can talk about our plans for future meetings and all the great gardening ideas we all have. GP will provide fried chicken and members are asked to bring a dish of their choice. Anything appropriate for a picnic gathering will be much appreciated, so break out those summer recipes! All current and former members as well as adult guests and family members are welcome to attend. If you are not a member but would like to attend, please contact us at gpdc471@gmail.com or 615-375-6675. This is a perfect opportunity to enjoy Holland Park and maybe even wander around downtown a bit afterward.
Drone video by Brent Wright (Nashville, TN) of Deborah Rosenthal’s new prairie installed with the help of Robert Hoffman and his colleagues at Roundstone Native Seed, LLC. This installation is almost one year old at the time of the video.
Gardening Partners 