Iris, a Flower For all  Time

The plans for our Fort Gardens 25th Anniversary celebration are again underway.   June 2006 should be an exciting month for the Missoula Iris Society, because not only do we have special events planned, but we will also coordinate some things with the National Garden Club Convention to be held in Missoula during the weekend of June 10, 2005.  The theme for our two week anniversary celebration will be:  "Iris, a Flower For All Time"

According to Jim Sadler, who is coordinating the National Garden Club Convention and also serving on our committee for the 25th, the theme for the garden club convention will center around iris.  Imagine that!  Therefore, we'll have a lot of out-of-area garden advocates attending our 2006 iris  show at the mall on Saturday, June 10th.  In conjunction with that, we  plan a short iris presentation at the mall that Saturday from about 2:00 to 3:00 p.m.  and our guest visitors will be invited.  The seminar will be coordinated and presented by our local judges and of course will be good for credit toward judges training.   Because we had an out-of-state judge last year, we will not have one this year.  Instead, we'll depend on our local judges and apprentice judges.

Now comes some really good fun-fun to make up for the work-work.   Saturday evening on June 10th we'll have a classy get-together at the Fort Gardens for a re-dedication and 25th anniversary celebration.  This will happen about 5:00 p.m. until 8:00 p.m. when we normally take a banquet break from the show.   It will be limited to members and special guests only. We're thinking about a really nice catered affair at the gardens that evening, complete with a big top tent and seated round tables with white tablecloths.  We may have to settle for a buffet type dinner at $10-$12 per person, rather than a sit-down dinner which could cost upwards of $20 per person.  We'll see how the costs go on that one.  This dinner will also be a chance for all of us to see the nice benches to be donated by the Friends of the Fort and perhaps some nice rustic arbors that are still in the talking stage.

We'll also publish a display garden history booklet, which will make a nice memorabilia for everyone.  We'll pass the  history booklets out to all attendees of the  Saturday evening dinner.  Anyone not attending our dinner may wish to purchase the history booklet, anyway, for a nominal fee to cover printing.  Along the publicity line, we hope to run ads using corporate sponsors such as nurseries, etc.  This could help pay for the history booklet as well as newspaper ads promoting our events.