Solstice Gathering - ONE WEEK EARLY

 Our annual Solstice Gathering is fun and friendly.  Please come and enjoy the plants and plant-loving people!

      Our annual Seed Exchange is part of the festivities. A list of seeds we already have is included with the December mailing. Please get in touch with Rosemarie Parker at info@flnps.org if you have seeds of native plants to offer, and want a photo included on our board.  Remember, you can take seeds to plant, whether or not you bring any. Even if you have no more room in your garden, the Gathering is the perfect time to decide what you want to grow for FLNPS to sell at the Spring Plant Sale — many species require a cold, moist, stratification period before they will germinate.

     The plants we use to decorate the room for the Gathering give us materials for an Identify-the-Decorations “Quiz.” This is always fun, as well as educational, and we expect people to collaborate. You don't need to get any of the answers right to qualify for the Door Prize Drawing. It's always fun to have some new and different species for the quiz. 

     Every year, Door Prizes are donated by members.  If you would like to contribute in this way, again, please tell me early, so we know how many to expect.  We may save some for the January Members’ Night!

     To keep up our energy during all these activities, we ask everybody to bring some Food With a Native Element, and a prize is awarded to the creators of foods voted as favorites by the most participants. We’ll have two prizes again this year, one for sweet and one for savory dishes. You can think “outside the box” here. Besides the all-time popular blueberry, cranberry and apple dishes, there are many possible ingredients, from native plants like Black Walnuts, Butternuts, maple syrup, Elderberries, Wild Rice, mushrooms, quinoa, squash, peppers, corn, and potatoes (a Meso-American origin is okay). Creativity and truly local ingredients are appreciated.   

     Finally, we always need help with Set Up and Clean Up, and Rosemarie is the person to contact if you want to volunteer for either.