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I was leaving for a multi-day trip
at sunrise with my 3 flowered shirts. |
I named my latest 11-week book tour (Sept. 1 to Nov. 10) the #FloweredShirtTour. My third book, "
The Art of Maintaining a Florida Native Landscape," was published by University Press of Florida in September. Back in May I was a speaker at the
Florida Native Plant Society (FNPS) conference and at the end of my talk, I held up my calendar and asked the audience to fill up my dance card. Did they ever!
I sent emails to the contacts on all the chapters' websites and had also arranged to hold an all-day workshop of the chapters on outreach in September. In addition I'd contacted other groups that hold events in the fall and asked to be on their programs. All in all, I ended up with 35 events in 11 weeks. I've documented most of the events on my
Appearances Page.
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| October was Florida's Native Plant Month, which featured proclamations from state, county, and local officials. My snarky guess is that many of the people reading the proclamations had never put the words "native" and "plant" in the same sentence before. |
It was a bit of serendipity when The Society worked on an initiative to declare October Florida's Native Plant Month. Some of the chapters created special events or they redesigned already scheduled events to celebrate the month. I was honored to be part of many of these special events. I love working with FNPS members
—some of the smartest and most dedicated people working on behalf of Florida and her natural areas.
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| A poster for a 3-hour Martin County workshop. | A poster for 3 events in SW Florida. |
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| Organizers for my events created some great posters. | Off to a local farmers market. |
I've already written about a couple of the events:
2015 Master Gardener Conference;
Florida Local Food Summit; and part of my
Autumnal equinox post included details on my Wakulla County event.
A montage of some of the many flowered shirts I wore during the tour...
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| Some of the many different flowered shirts... |
This was also a tour of Florida
I roamed along many backroads on my way to various events. This is "The Real Florida." Sometimes, if there was time and a safe place to pull off the road, I stopped to take photos, but other times I appreciated the view as I drove by. What a great state we live in.
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| Swamp sunflowers dazzled along the roadsides for a few weeks during my tour. |
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| In Lake County, I stopped between venues to capture these reflections of Florida's mountains in one of her many lakes. |
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| A foggy sunrise at Wekiva State Park. |
I wish to thank all the organizers of the events and am pleased to have met so many people in my adventures. Thanks to everyone who bought books from me or one of the book sellers. And a special thanks to my hosts for overnight stays: Loret, Gail, Rose, and Marlene.
So off to work on the next book projects and many other items on my ever-expanding to-do list...
Green Gardening Matters,Ginny Stibolt
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