Seed Exchange Success

We'll be doing a re-cap story in the magazine and I wanted to take a few sentences here to say the first annual Washington Seed Exchange held last weekend at the U.S. National Arboretum was a roaring success for us. We got some great publicity out of it with mentions on various radio shows, in local newspapers, and a few TV programs. Not only did we have a solid attendance, but most all left saying they were enthusiastically looking forward to next year's event and we also discussed a "harvest" picnic for the end of the summer to show off what everyone had grown from their seeds. The weather was picture-perfect and our speakers were spot-on. A big THANK YOU once again to our goody bag and door prize sponsors as well as to all of the volunteers and the USNA staff, we could not have it without you!

Judy Tiger of GROW (http://www.growdc.org/) was terrific at corralling the crowd. Kevin Munroe of the NoVA Audubon Society (http://www.fairfaxaudubon.org/) had answers for everyone at the "Native" table. And our staff photographer, Drena, did an especially great job covering it all and acting as "Vanna White" for our door prize drawing. I've posted one of her pics here and more will be in the March/April 2006 issue.

Speaking of TV, I've just got my second booking on our local CBS affiliate, Channel 9, for this Sunday, Feb. 5 at 8-9 am -- I'll be on around 8:45 to the end of the show. Not sure yet on the exact topics, but think I'll discuss and show our "glove wardrobe" article from our current issue as wearing garden gloves was a point of debate at my last appearance. The weatherman, Howard, said "real men" don't wear them!

Now our attention turns to: making our first anniversary issue - March/April 2006 - as good as it can possibly be; getting out our renewals to the charter subscribers; and prepping for our booth at the Washington Home & Garden Show from Feb. 9-12.