Moriarty Garden Club looks to 2022
In December, the Moriarty Garden club Christmas party was held in the home of long-time member, Marge Shanfeldt. The previous year’s projects and accomplishments were reviewed in an attempt to see if we made progress in our goal to grow the club and to become more active in the community. Our primary goal was to increase membership, which did happen, as we have three new members. We have also increased participation by existing members by having programs and guest speakers.
One of the outreach programs that we had was a display at the Torrance County Fair incorporating scrapbooks that had been passed down through the years from one generation to the next. One of the most beautiful was a scrapbook made in the very early 1950s by one of the members that had an artistic flair!
That box of scrapbooks, newspaper clippings and pictures did a lot to let the current members know what our Garden Club could look like. It has inspired us to grow and improve our group. With that in mind, we have started having a more defined program on different topics ranging from how to grow iris, to drying flowers, to making holiday decorations.
There is no January meeting, but we will start a new year at the February meeting which will be Feb. 15. We are currently meeting at the Church of Christ building located behind the Lotaburger in Moriarty at 1:30 p.m. Visitors are welcome without any prior notice. Please stop in! The program for the February meeting will be about Bee Keeping Beginnings. It will be presented by one of our new members, Jessica Roderick, who has had bees in the East Mountain area for about 10 years. Many of us are interested in supporting the bee population, both for honey production and for improved pollination of our fruit and vegetable gardens.
We have had one small hive of honeybees show up at our farm. I’m hoping to find out if they are wild bees or just some that left another hive. Other possible offerings include growing a butterfly garden, using drip irrigation for vegetable gardens or the landscape, how to sharpen pruning shears, and seed starting. We are always open for new ideas.
Our other goal of trying to be more active in the community has been a little more difficult to accomplish. Since public anything has been pretty much shut down, most of our ideas could not come to fruition last year. We aren’t giving up however. We want to find a project that can be a teaching opportunity, or a place that needs a little extra brightness from plants. We'd love to hear your ideas.