25th Anniversary Garden Party

2019 Garden Party

The standing room only event featured Nancy Leson, award-winning food writer, radio personality, cooking instructor and Edmonds resident, on The Romance vs. The Reality of Gardening.

Participants  at the August 7 program celebrated gardens and gardeners, met the Garden Hosts from this year’s Tour and enjoyed a show featuring highlights from the Tour and Edmonds in Bloom activities this past year. Visit our Home Page and click on the video to enjoy the aerial photography, garden photos and highlights of Edmonds in Bloom’s year. 

Thank you to PCC Community Markets, Sprouts Farmers Markets-Lynnwood, and Edmonds QFC for their support of the event. And to Sky Nursery, Lesley Bell and IMA Studio for Door Prizes. 

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.Check out this video shown at 2019 Garden Party!

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2018 Garden Party

Edmonds in Bloom hosted a Garden Party! event on Wednesday, August 1 at 7pm at the Edmonds Center for the Arts. The program honored and thanked volunteers and celebrated floral activities that beautify our community.

Landscape designer Karen Chapman of Le Jardinet was the featured speaker. Chapman is a noted plant specialist, garden designer and author.  Her topic was “Foliage and Focal Points: Ideas for Gardens and Budgets of All Sizes.” She is the co-author of two books: Gardening with Foliage First and Fine Foliage.

The Garden Delights raffle drawing took place at the event. The raffle included an array of garden-themed prizes, including private garden tours, garden gear and décor, and Edmonds entertainment and dining. Raffle proceeds provide funds to support Edmonds in Bloom projects that beautify our community.

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2017 Garden Party

More than 100 guests celebrated a year of beautification projects at the Edmonds in Bloom Garden Party, August 2.  The event focused on volunteers, Garden Tour hosts, donors and supporters.

Richie Steffen, Director/Curator of the Elisabeth C. Miller Botanical Garden was the featured speaker. He talked about the value to the community of gardens, for example, neighbors talking with each other, residents taking delight in the plantings in their community. “There is an amazing impact in the way a neighborhood feels about itself – it creates a community,” he said. He complimented Edmonds in Bloom for doing a huge service for the community in supporting the downtown corners and baskets, and other projects.

President Kathy Ludgate noted that this year’s Edmonds in Bloom flags were placed in more than 100 front gardens and business displays, bringing recognition to local gardeners who provide beauty though their efforts.

Steffen said he “loves meeting gardeners and also relishes the solitude of my garden. My favorite thing about gardening is creative expression – it’s part of what happens.”

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2016 Awards Reception

The popular Annual Awards Reception and Volunteer Recognition event welcomed 125 guests and featured renowned garden writer Valerie Easton.

The event, held August 3 at the Edmonds Center for the Arts, honored the Garden Competition winners and Business Recognition entries, applauded the Garden Tour hosts, and thanked volunteers for their work on Kids Plant for Mom’s Day and other activities.

It was an evening to celebrate the beauty of gardens as Edmonds in Bloom announced the winners of this year’s garden competition and recognized participating local businesses at a gala reception in the Edmonds Center for the Arts lobby.

Noted author, 25-year Pacific Magazine columnist, and avid gardener Valerie Easton gave an engaging keynote address on the joys and obsessions of gardening.

“Let me tell you, plant lust is real and it has serious repercussions,” she quipped. “Symptoms are serious overplanting, and ultimately creating a garden that outstrips your ability to maintain it, ending up giving more stress than peace. This is not the way it should be!”

Easton went on to provide common-sense tips on how to have a garden that brings maximum enjoyment and happiness. This includes choosing the right plants — the kind that require only easy care — and tolerating imperfections.

“Gardens are always changing — embrace and enjoy this,” she advised. “The whole point is to get outdoors and participate in the natural creativity of growing things.”

The club also introduced its new graphic artist, 2012 Edmonds-Woodway High School graduate Megan Lees. Lees graduated this year from Western Washington University with a degree in graphic design, and returned to Edmonds to work with Edmonds in Bloom.

But it wasn’t all gardens, as the club also announced that 2016 Mountlake Terrace High School graduate Bonnie Winters had been selected as the recipient of the club’s $1,000 scholarship. Winters, a recent award winner at the Washington State Science and Engineering Fair for her project demonstrating how lead-contaminated soils can be detoxified by growing certain plants, will begin her studies in paleobotany at Humboldt State University this fall. “I’m so thrilled,” she said. “This scholarship has made it possible for me to follow my passion and pursue this course of study.”

Here are the winners of the 2016 Edmonds in Bloom Garden Competition and Business Recognition awards:

Multi-family Category: Renee Reed (Honorable Mention: Ai Ho; Michelle and Mile Martin; Tisci Pasquale; Diana Van Loveren, Woodscreek Place; Emerald Hills Homeowners Association)

Single Family Category: Al and Toni Young; Marjorie Yalowicki; Barry Tharp; Gretchen Stewart; Carol and Doug Sheldon; Connie Pierce; Kirsten Paust; Linda and Gene Nicholson; Karen Neumeister; Patrice Kettner and Bruce Ballard; Rani Kettel; Patty Jayner; Don Hall; Kathleen and Tony Griffin; Kim Collier; Kayla Clark; Sam Christensen and Paul Kandel; Deborah Binder and Gaetan Veilleux; Susan Anderson. (Honorable Mention: Skip DeHennis, Kara Heck, Shelly Hutton, Rita Miller, Myung Ju)

Youth Award: Girl Scout Troop 41425 for planting and maintaining the corner gardens at the Perrinville post office.

Special Award: North Sound Church for years of maintaining beautiful flower gardens at the historic 1909 First Baptist Church at 4th and Bell and in recognition of the Church’s recent addition to the Edmonds Register of Historic Places.

Business Recognition Entrants: Art Spot, Chanterelle, Christopher Framing and Gallery, City Kitty, Cline Jewelers, Coldwell Banker Bain, Comstock Jewelers, Edmonds Automotive, Edmonds Barber Shop, Edmonds Frame Design and Atelier, Edmonds Law Center, Edward Jones, Fifth Avenue Animal Hospital, Five Corners Styling, Gallery North, Garden Gear, Ideal Salon, Infinity Mortgage, Ivar’s Seafood Bar, Dr. Howard Jue, Louvre Coffee Shop, McDonald-McGarry Insurance, Mosaic Group Salon, Pena Salon, Rusty Pelican, J. Rankin Jewelers, Teri’s Toybox, Wishing Stone.

— Story and photos by Larry Vogel. My Edmonds News, August 4th 2016

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2015 20th Anniversary Reception

Edmonds in Bloom celebrated its 20th anniversary with a reception at Art Works (201 2nd Ave. S, Edmonds) on Sunday, March 1 from 2-4 pm. Since 1995, Edmonds in Bloom, a non-profit 501c3 organization, has hosted several events that have become annual traditions in Edmonds: Kids Plant for Mom’s Day, the Garden Tour and Garden Competition. Its volunteers have worked with the City of Edmonds, its residents and businesses to create an awareness and appreciation of the wonderful floral beauty for which the City is now famous.

The afternoon was a delightful trip down memory lane, filled with nostalgia, a slide show of past garden tours, volunteer projects, garden competitions, and kids plant days. Door prizes, refreshments and special guests rounded out the day. A special proclamation was presented to highlight the day, declaring it “Edmonds in Bloom Day” by Mayor Earling. Edmonds in Bloom is very proud of its accomplishments over the past twenty years and hopes you can join them to celebrate this momentous occasion!

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2014 Awards Reception

The Edmonds Center for the Arts was the venue for this year’s Awards Reception on August 6, chaired by Kathy Ludgate, Vice President of Edmonds in Bloom.  Master of Ceremonies was Wayne Purser and Rich Lindsay from the City of Edmonds was the guest speaker.  The Garden Competition awards and Garden Tour slide show were the highlights of the evening.