Good morning ladies. Many people ask me how I got into my hobby of perennials. So today I’m going to take you to where that love began. I’m going to take you to the first perennial gardens as I saw them. They were God’s garden. Some of you will be able to relate. For those of you who never experienced the sights we’re going to see, I want you to join me as a child and we’ll begin.

It’s spring – a day full of sun, white cottony clouds and blue-blue sky. I want you to visualize a beautiful meadow. It’s filled with flowers. You can see the yellow buttercups and you pick one and hold it under your chin and your chin turns yellow. You put it under your nose, take a sniff and the tip of your nose is covered with yellow pollen. As you walk, skip, or jump, you land in a patch of white daisies. You pick one and pull out a petal at a time saying “he loves me”, “he loves me not” until nothing is left but the yellow center. You pinch the center until all of the seedlings fall into your hand. Throw them up in the air, flip your hand over and count how many you caught. This is how many children you’ll have. Growing with the daisies are some brilliant red Indian paint brushes and black-eyed susans. They’re covered with butterflies. Push the weeds aside and you’ll see strawberry blossoms. In a few days you’ll be back with your berry pail.

As you pass through the meadow you approach a patch of woods. The temperature changes – it’s a little cooler and everything looks lush. The ferns are airy and a beautiful green, a natural foil for the red and white trilliums. And that strange looking thing with no flower at all is a jack-in the pulpit. A solitary pink lady’s slipper nods hello. The mayapples look like a perfect umbrella and you pick one and hold it over your head. Purple violets are growing near a decaying tree stump and you start a bouquet. You notice toadstools and the Indian puff ball. You jump on the puff ball and it releases its “smoke”.

You see some big rocks and as you sit next to them you notice they too are covered with growth. It’s green moss…. and you run your hand over the tickley moss hardly believing that it really and truly is growing out of a rock. The birds are singing and you hear the magical sound of….. a bubbling creek. The music draws you like a magnet and you’re off. The bank is covered with blue forget-me-nots. You step to the creek’s edge and look at the posies you’ve gathered. Some of the little heads are droopy and wilted so you very carefully lay them down in the creek to get a drink. You plunge your little hands in the creek and pull out…..some….beautiful stones. One is gray and very flat and as you inspect it you can see the shape of a leave and the shape of a fern imbedded into it. Some stones are small and pearly white and some have a green, slimy coating called algae, a form of aquatic plant life. You fill your pockets with stones and gather up your bouquet. You’ve got to get across the creek and you see a perfect bridge of rock. Oh so cautiously you go step by step to the other side to pick the gorgeous blue and pink Virginia Bluebells. Suddenly you smell spearmint candy and as you investigate you see spearmint leaves hugging the ground. You walk on them and the fragrance clings to your heels.

There’s a fence ahead and you know what’s on the other side – the most deliciously smelling flower of all – the pink trailing arbutus. Can’t pick them – just smell. Well maybe you can pick just one but be very careful not to disturb the roots because it is an endangered species.

You’re home now and as you run through the yard you see the huge lilac bush, the iris and the peonies. Something has happened to the lawn – it’s full of golden flowers – they’re everywhere you look. Dandelions! You don’t want them for your bouquet. Tomorrow you’ll pick some, and snap their heads off. You’ll slip your tongue down the hollow stems and they’ll split and make perfect curls that you’ll pin in your hair. The stems will also make wonderful chains that transform into necklaces, bracelets and even belts. You’ll pick the dandelion that’s gone to seed --- blow it and millions of seedlings will float through the air and you’ll make a million wishes and they’ll all come true.

I hope you saw Mother Nature’s garden – it’s perennial and it’s there every year.

We’ll put the lights back on.

My mother told me that when she was little my grandmother took her to the creek on Good Friday to wash because the water was holy. At that time of year the meadow we visited earlier was filled with blue and white hepaticas and the pussy willows were blooming in the hedgerow. Late spring would bring the strawberries, then blackberries and blueberries, golden rod, and asters ---- and even a little later elderberry, milkweed pods, acorns, brightly colored leaves, apples, chestnuts and beechnuts. And still later we would gather up the creeping pine and finally thee Christmas tree.

Perhaps I’ve gotten some of this vegetation

I wanted to surround myself with that kind of permanent beauty the rest of my life. Little by little it came together. By 1975 my garden was attracting many visitors. In 1981 Gibbs Orchard became Gibbs Orchard and Perennial Gardens – I got bottom billing.

My garden blooms from spring to fall. It comes up every year with bigger plants and more plants than the year before.