Gardening Partners

of Dickson County

Category Archives: Uncategorized


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April 2023 Meeting

Happy Spring Gardening Partners!

April’s meeting is at TCAT on Tuesday the 11th at 6 pm. Our meal theme this month is “A Taste of Asia”. We love to see what our members come up with when we choose a meal theme, so let’s get something going on the stove! 

This month, we will be talking about our Plant Sale – plans are going well. This is something we look forward to every year; meeting new people, helping with plant choices and garden questions, and spending time with other Gardening Partners. We’re keeping our fingers crossed for good weather on Saturday, April 22nd (and no wind!). 

Andy Dennis will be presenting our 5/15 on Fermentation.

Chelsea & Anthony Vargas from Dickson Bee Club will present “Plantings to Attract Pollinators to Your Garden”. We have hosted this couple before and the talk was much enjoyed by everyone.

Jan Williams is looking for a Dappled or Variegated Willow to take cuttings from if anyone knows where one might be available.

Check the GP calendar for upcoming events and plant sales around the Middle Tennessee area. And remember to share or like our posts on Facebook – some of our members are really doing a great job – every click helps our organization be noticed online. We hope everyone is benefiting from the content shared on our page.

Don’t forget your donations for the Help Center, those are always appreciated. 

april-agendaDownload


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February Meeting 2023

Our meeting this month will be Tuesday the 14th at 6 pm. We meet at TCAT 740 Hwy 46S for an add-a-dish meal at 6 pm, followed by a business meeting and a program. Our meal theme this month is “Your Heart’s Desire” and our program will be a video presentation if technology agrees to indulge us. If you have questions, don’t hesitate to email at gpdc471@gmail.com.

Members are encouraged to attend as we will be discussing resuming certification of members.

Guests are welcome to join us.


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January 2023

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.”


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Elven Treats Christmas Party

Gardening Partners & Guests

Get ready for some holiday fun on Tuesday, December 13th at 6 pm when our Elven Treats Christmas Party kicks off. We will be in the meeting room at TCAT 740 Hwy 46S (across from Lowe’s).

Attendees are encouraged to bring small bites/cocktail-type elf-sized foods to be enjoyed as we socialize (meal themes are always optional – regular human-sized foods can also be cut up into bite-sized servings). A google search for recipes suitable for an elven banquet may turn up some interesting results. Any elves who make it to the party will be welcome, but reindeer will need to remain in the parking lot area.

Although there is no program or speaker, we will have Christmas trivia on screen and Bernie may have some entertainment up his sleeve, so don’t miss out. 

If you haven’t been to a meeting lately (or ever), this is the perfect occasion to stop by, greet old friends, and make some new ones so get your jingle bells on and come party with the fun garden people. 

Please remember your donations to the Help Center – they are a blessing to our community. 

Merry Christmas to all!


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November Meeting 2022

Tuesday, November 8th, 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.

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

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)

We have some gorgeous perennials to give away this month – probably around 12 (there may be more) in quart or gallon size and one in 2-gallon size. This week is the time to plant – we are expecting more winter-like weather starting on Friday.

This is open to all attendees, but you must be present for the whole program to win.

Plant list:

Japanese Holly Fern 3x

Loropetalum 3x

Elderberry Black Beauty 2 gal 1x

Indian Hawthorne 2x

Azalea Encore 1 gal 3x

Hope to see you all there and good luck!

Guests are welcome but remember our meetings are adults only. Questions? Contact us at gpdc471@gmail.com

Members: Don’t forget your Help Center Donation and the meal theme this month: Wraps and Rolls

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!


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October 2022 Meeting

This month our meeting will be held at TCAT (across from Lowe’s) on Tuesday, October 11th  beginning at 6 pm.  We start with an Add-a-Dish meal followed by a short business meeting and then a guest lecture.

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.

As always, adult guests are welcome to attend.

Our guest speaker is Deborah Rosenthal. This will be a great presentation that you won’t want to miss. Hope to see you all there!

Restorations Gone Wild!

How I Went from a Small Butterfly Garden
to 22 Acres of Restoration in Three Years

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.

Deborah 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.

Watch this short video clip for a drone view:

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.


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2nd Annual Plant Swap

Sponsored by Gardening Partners of Dickson County

Lakeview Park

October 8, 2022 10 am to 2 pm

Everyone is invited to the plant swap – you do not have to be a member of Gardening Partners to participate. You don’t even have to live in Dickson County.

Please keep an eye on your children, many plants are toxic and may have sharp leaves or thorns.

There are restrooms available at the pavilion and plenty of free parking

Gardening Partners will provide light refreshments.

Bring plants seeds, bulbs, divisions, cuttings, etc. Any garden-related items that are in good condition. All plant material must be properly labeled. All items are to be swapped – no sales are allowed.

Do not bring any diseased or insect-infested plants – you will be asked to remove any such plants.

The pavilion has tables available, but you can also bring your own tables to set up. There is plenty of space under the pavilion, on the parking lot, or on the grassy area behind the pavilion.

Cuttings: wait until the morning of the swap and immediately put them in water or wrap them in moist paper towels. Cuttings should have at least two nodes and please mark which end is the stem end.

Bulbs: should be cleaned and stored in paper bags with a label and the number enclosed

Seeds: should be dried and stored in labeled envelopes.

Potted plants: should be healthy, well-rooted, and labeled.

Keep plants or items you have swapped for under or behind your table or take them to your vehicle. Parking is close by, and this will keep your swaps safe.

Pre-swaps: A pre-swap is a plant swap made online (Facebook) before the scheduled plant swap date that will be picked up at the swap. You can also post your plant list so that others can request a pre-swap. Pre-swaps are especially handy if you are looking for a particular plant. Please keep your pre-swaps away from your other plants and make sure they are clearly marked with the person’s name. It may be a good idea to arrange a deadline for pickups so that you can swap any plants that are not picked up.

If you have leftover plants, you can donate them to other swappers or Gardening Partners by leaving them on the donate table.

Bring your questions – Gardening Partners will be on hand to help if we can.

Open the camera on your smartphone and point it at the image below:

This QR code will take you to our Facebook page.

Or use this link: https://www.facebook.com/groups/764570721453807/

The Facebook page for Gardening Partners Plant Swap will allow you to post questions, post the plants you have to trade, post your list of plants you are looking for, and get to know your fellow plant swappers!


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New Book Has 101 Great Ideas For Small Space Gardens

The Geriatric Gardener

If you’re a senior gardener who’s agonizing over whether to downsize or stay put, a new book has been published just for you. The title, The Urban Garden, is really somewhat misleading. You don’t have to live in the city to adapt the ideas to your garden. They’re just as applicable in the burbs or even the boondocks.

In my garden club presentations, I stress that small space gardens can bring out creativity you never knew you had. That’s because you spent so much time toiling in your big garden just to keep up with the maintenance that you had little time to just sit and enjoy it. Tending a small garden leaves you with plenty of time to think creatively.

Authors Kathy Jentz and Teri Speight mention that more time for creativity is one of the benefits of a small space garden but it’s also an underlying theme of…

View original post 356 more words


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World Cleanup Day a success in Dickson, TN

Early in the morning on Saturday, September 17th, we took up trash grabbers, traffic vests, and garbage bags and cleaned up around Suzanne Drive and Alexander Drive. The weather was great, the snacks were tasty, and the company was the best. Gardening Partners and Tree Board Members volunteered in service to our community. Public Works was very helpful in loaning us the tools and for picking up the larger items along with our trash bags and recyclables.

Thanks to everyone who showed up and grabbed some trash!


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July 2022 Meeting

Tuesday, July 12th at 6 pm.

Location: Tennessee College of Applied Technology 740 Hwy 46S (across from Lowe’s)

Monthly meeting of Gardening Partners begins with an add-a-dish meal, followed by a short business meeting and a guest lecture. 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.


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May Meeting *IMPORTANT* Change of location

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 Lakeview Park in 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.

 


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April Meeting

April Meeting – Tuesday, April 12th at 6 pm – Restoration Church 503 Henslee Drive.
Social from 6 to 6:30 with an add-a-dish meal, followed by a short business meeting.
7 pm – Guest speakers: Anthony and Chelsea Vargas will talk about the different bees we find in our gardens, and keeping honeybees and non-honey bees.
Adult guests are welcome to attend.