June 10 Column: Spokane in Bloom Preview

Spokane in Bloom tour

Spokane in Bloom tourI hereby declare garden tour season open! It officially begins with the Spokane in Bloom garden tour, which is hosted by the Inland Empire Gardeners, and takes place this Saturday, June 16, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Here is a link to my column, which is a preview of the tour: Spokane in Bloom tour features north side gardens.

There will be seven lovely gardens featured in the Nine Mile Falls area. Here is the list of addresses:

13315 W. Meadowview Lane
6178 Moriah Dr.
17310 N. West Shore Rd.
17420 N. West Shore Rd.
12405 N. Nine Mile Rd.
12205 N. Nine Mile Rd.
8625 N. Seigle Ct.

You can find ticket-purchasing information at the end of my column.

Spokane in Bloom, Anita SkinnerI had the pleasure of visiting with Anita Skinner (pictured to the right), whose beautiful garden is located at 13315 W. Meadowview Lane. She is a delightful lady who lives with her husband, Gary, on three acres perched above Lake Spokane. Anita told me ahead of time that she has created a garden on “only” one of those acres!

Visitors will enjoy the wonderful plants she has collected over the years. I was especially taken with every plant that had chartreuse leaves. What a pop of color that is in the garden! I kept telling her that I obviously needed to add more chartreuse to my garden, and that’s a fact. In my column, I listed a few of the shrubs she is growing, just to give you some ideas.

Tickets can be purchased for $10 at any of the gardens above on the day of the tour, or ahead of time on The Inland Empire Gardeners’ website at tieg.org, or at the following Spokane nurseries:

  • Blue Moon Garden & Nursery, 1732 S. Inland Empire Way
  • Gibson’s Nursery, 1401 S. Pines Rd
  • Judy’s Enchanted Garden, 2628 W. Northwest Blvd.
  • Northwest Seed & Pet, 7302 N. Division St. and 2422 E. Sprague Ave.
  • Tower Perennial Gardens, 4010 E. Jamieson Rd.

I also took a different approach to this week’s “Everyone Can Grow a Garden” video by using it to answer some the questions I’ve been getting from readers and followers lately.

Before I add in the video below, I wanted to tell you my tale of woe! I was about 70 percent finished with shooting the video and, all of a sudden, the audio stopped working. Argh! My husband and I tried everything we could to get it working again but apparently the fitting where my microphone’s receiver plugs into the video camera has failed. And it would cost more than the cost of my camera to repair… of course.

So, I was able to finish the video by standing next to the camera and speaking into the built-in mike (not a great solution because it picks up more background noise than I’d like but better than nothing, right?) and I’ve had to order a new camera. Sigh. Hopefully I’ll be back in business next week!

OK, so here is the video, with apologies for the audio near the end: