Welcome Ryan Seely! This week, for our final show of the season, we want to welcome Ryan to the Garden Time crew. We’re introducing him early because we need to let viewers and advertisers get familiar with him. Of course, those in the nursery industry have known Ryan for many years. Both as a retail nursery manager and a wholesale grower. He is joining us at a time when the weather is starting to turn cold! We will be taking him out and shooting stories in the next few weeks so we can have fresh stuff on our website. We hope he isn’t scared away by the conditions! We’re pretty sure he will survive, that’s what a sixth generation Oregonian does!

This week as we wrap up our 14th season we share some great stories including visits to the Oregon Garden and the Village Green in Cottage Grove, to see their great Christmas displays, but also to Portland Nursery and Timber Press for some holiday gift ideas.

We want to thank you all for joining us this season and through all the recent changes. Not to worry! We will be back on March 7th of 2020 for our 15th season. You can always find out what’s going on during the winter by going to our website or our Facebook page!

This week we featured...

OSP Healing Garden

We had a chance to head down to Salem and the Oregon State Penitentiary recently. We were there to see the culmination of a project that we heard about a couple years ago, the new Japanese Healing Garden. We have done many stories featuring the healing Japanese Gardens of designer Hoichi Kurisu and his firm Kurisu International. This one was special though! We met with inmates Johnny Michael Cofer and Toshio Takanobu who were the driving forces in getting this garden built. Because this garden is built on the grounds of the Oregon State Penitentiary, Oregon’s only maximum security prison, there were lots of barriers and challenges. In fact there were 5 ‘final’ plans before they were able to put a shovel in the ground. There was a group of determined individuals that represented a broad range of inmates who made it happen and it has turned out beautiful. The garden was built through the efforts of over 180 inmates and the talented crew at Kurisu International and surrounds the Vietnam Veterans Memorial on the grounds. Even though this garden cannot be seen by the general public it will provide a serene and quiet place for inmates and staff. As Superintendent Brandon Kelly told us, it was inspirational to watch these men and see what they accomplished.

Village Green Christmas Market

The holidays are officially here and that means holiday decorations. I have great memories of when I was growing up and visiting wonderful holiday displays with hundreds of lights around the Salem area. It seems like they seemed to get smaller and fewer over the last few years. There are a couple of places in the Willamette Valley where you can see wonderful displays and create some incredible memories too. One that most people know of is the Christmas in the Garden event at the Oregon Garden in Silverton. With over a million lights, this one has quickly become a ‘must see’ for people near Portland and Salem. This one is huge, offering snowless sledding and ice skating. We now know of another great display of lights further south in Cottage Grove near Eugene. The Village Green resort, a sister property of the Oregon Garden, now offers a big display of their own. We were able to preview the opening and saw an incredible display of over a half million lights! Their ‘Village Green Christmas Market’ is a blast and another ‘must see’ in the Valley. We met with Karalyn from Moonstone Hotel Properties (the parent company) to talk about everything that is happening at this event. She told us about the artisan market with over a dozen unique local vendors. You can come and enjoy the lights, and get your holiday shopping done at the same time! We also learned about the live reindeer that will be there on the 6-8 of December. On the big market nights you can enjoy live music and visit with Santa! Plus on the 21st of December you can listen to The Chris Booher Family.

Of course, if you want to enjoy the whole evening of either event, both the Village Green (800-942-2491) and the Oregon Garden (503-874-8100) resorts are offering special overnight packages, but call early to book a room, they go fast. So this Christmas season, get the family in the car and visit either Moonstone property (or both!) and create some wonderful holiday memories!

Portland Nursery Holiday Open House

The holiday season is more than a bunch of gifts under the tree (most kids would disagree), but also about creating an atmosphere of warmth and friendliness. We stopped by Portland Nursery (503-231-5050) on Stark and chatted with Sara about how you can create that atmosphere with a wreath, kissing ball or swag. At either location of Portland Nursery you can find the greens, ribbons and other materials to create any of these seasonal delights. If you need help you can sign up for a class or bring some friends and book a class just for you and your friends!

Don’t forget about the plants too. There are a bunch of plants that can bring color and texture to your home and make the holidays brighter. We saw bulbs like paperwhites and amaryllis ready to bloom, cyclamen and hellebores already in bloom and even the containers to hold them all. Plus, many of these plants can go out into your garden once the holidays are long gone.

Your chance to see them all is this weekend during their annual open house. Sara said that the holidays are a perfect time to accomplish a couple of things. One is to get the perfect gift for your favorite gardener, and two, you can support a bunch of wonderful local businesses too. Stop by and find a favorite flower or wreath to brighten your holiday décor.

Tool Shed - Muck Boots

The one gift that would make any gardener (or outdoorsman) happy is a great pair of boots and the best of the bunch are Muck Boots. Every one of the Garden Time crew has a pair and we love them. The styles available are fashionable and functional. They are trendy colors and patterns so you can wear them in the garden or even running errands around town. The Muck Boot is durable too. Producer Jeff has a pair that are nearly 20 years old and still going strong! They stand the test of time because they’re built to last. Strong construction, and 100 percent waterproof, they even have an interior material that wicks the moisture away from your feet so you stay warm and dry.

Treat your gardener to a gift that they will love for years and years; Muck Boots. You can find a retail locator on their website or you can order them direct from the company on that same site.

Timber Press Holiday Books

If you are a gardener the winter months are tough. You can’t get outside to work in your garden and it seems like rain never ends. Time to curl up with a good book! We stopped by Timber Press to see what they have to offer for those long cold days. Tom joined us again with a huge pile of great books to share. We started with ‘Planting the Natural Garden’ by Piet Oudolf and Henk Gerritsen. If you love natural, billowy, and colorful landscapes this is the book for you. This is a new edition of the original book that kicked off the new perennial phase of gardening about 20 years ago. The next book was from Marta McDowell. We have seen some of her other books about famous people and their gardens, and they were wonderful. This one doesn’t disappoint either. This new book is about ‘Emily Dickinson’s Gardening Life’. It talks about the inspiration she derived from her garden and how she captured that in her written works. The third book was ‘Orchid Modern’ by Marc Hachadourian. Marc is an orchid guru and this book not only tells you about orchids and how to grow them, it also has a list of which ones are the easiest to grow. It also contains some great projects you can tackle to show off those orchids in different settings. If you were ever afraid of growing orchids, this book will take that fear away! The next book was ‘A Garden Miscellany’ by Suzanne Staubach. This book talks about the elements in the garden, like structures and formations, but instead of pictures, it contains drawings of those landscapes and the elements in them. It contains a lot of useful information, but the drawings really steal the show! It’s just a beautiful book to look at. We then moved to ‘Nature into Art’ by Thomas Christopher. This book is about the gardens at Wave Hill in the Bronx. It is one of the best public gardens in our country. It is often overlooked because of the proximity to New York, but this garden has been built into a wonderful display garden over decades! It has so many different areas featuring different plants and garden styles, all captured in remarkable pictures. The next book is one we have featured in a past episode on Garden Time, The Tree Book by Michael Dirr and Keith Warren. Keith was a long time breeder of trees at J. Frank Schmidt, a wholesale grower outside of Sandy Oregon, and Michael Dirr is an educator at the University of Georgia and a woody plant guru. This book is the best reference guide to trees in the U.S. If you are looking for a tree, or want details on a tree, this is the book to have! It is full of great information and pictures of every tree you can imagine. The final book was more about fun than about plants. The book ‘Animals Reviewed’ is a spoof of a ratings book on different animals. You will find tongue and cheek ratings on a bunch of different exotic animals. A list of stars and a ‘review’ from satisfied customers will have you chuckling with every page.

Not only are these great books for the winter, they also make great gifts too. To get copies of any of these books, or any other great Timber Press books, you can go to the Timber Press website!