Holiday Luncheon December 2007

Our annual Christmas luncheon was held December 5, 2007. Over 70 club members and Garden Club dignitaries attended the festive celebration. Entertainment was provided by the San Clemente High School Chorale/Madrigals. Toys brought by club members were donated to FAM, our local charity.

(Double click photos to enlarge them)

Hospitality chair, Erika Wehrle worked tirelessly at the luncheon.
Ever faithful, Jim Higgins, delivering the delicious luncheons.California Garden Clubs president, Robin Pokorski and SCGC club President Homer Wishek exchange compliments. Homer presented a club donation to Robin's Presidents Project.

Photo op with Homer Wishek, SCGC President; Robin Pokorski,CGCI President; Launa Gould, past club president; Nancy Lee Loesch, State awards chair and Carole Lung, Orange County district director.

Civic Beautification

The Rose Garden at San Clemente City Hall has been maintained for years by our club. This is where we hold our annual "hands on" rose pruning seminar in January.

Doing monthly maintenance in November 07 were;

Jim Higgins, Homer Wishek and Launa Gould.

Bertie Lloyd, our historian stopped by to take photos and pick a rose.

Thanks Bertie. Your photo albums of our club are awesome!

Homer, the garden expert, hard at work.
Launa, hands in the dirt gal, enjoys working in the rose garden.
Jim, a faithful club member for over 30 years, works gardens until he stuffs his bucket full.

Casa Romantica Garden

Our club received a $500 Jubilee Grant from our parent club, California Garden Clubs,Inc. We planted the parking lot of the Casa on Earth Day, 2006.


Club members show up monthly to maintain the garden.

Launa Gould, past president and civic beautification chair.

Homer Wishek, Club President.

Esther Harris, Casa chair.

Jim Higgins, 1st Vice Pres.

All working at the Casa in November.

Esther really was working hard but paused for a pretty picture.
View of one of the planted circles

The November 7, 2007 meeting of the club. (Click on photos to enlarge them.)

Club President, Homer Wishek leading the meeting.

We were entertained by Cliff Meng, President of the OC Cactus and Succulent Society. He showed us how to "raise the root" of a plant and pot it for a striking design element in the garden.

Cliff doing a show and tell with each plant.

Cliff brought many of his ribbon winning plants.

Club members donate a floral design for the cookie table each month. This was created by new member, Myra Camilo. Thanks Myra.

We donated the arangement to the RIO Adult Day Care Center after the meeting. We do our monthly Garden Therapy at the RIO and they are so appreciative!

Pumpkin day at Rio Adult Day Care

The Rio Adult Day Care Center is where we offer our Garden Therapy projects.

Emilie Matthews and Ginnie Churchill are coordinators of the monthly programs.

Every year club member Tom Benton donates pumpkins for the clients at the Adult Day Care center. Our club organizes pumpkin decorating supplies and invite members to join the fun. We help these excited people decorate their very own pumpkin to take home. Tom brought 60 pumpkins and went home with one - the one Wilma decorated as a demonstration. This is one of the highlights of the year for these folks.

Ginnie, Wilma, (demonstrating) Ann, day care director, and Emilie

Tom operating the glue gun while clients wait for club members to bring their pumpkins to him.

Emilie and Launa working hard to glue the 'hair' on the pumpkins.

Clients working on their pumpkins.

Look what I did!

Fall Plant Sale

Setting up for the popular fall plant sale.

Propagation Workshop

Propagation workshop on September 8, 2007

Don Burkhart setting up for the prop workshop at the Cogswell's home.

Homer Wishek (our president) and George MacKelvey ready to transplant plants with that special potting soil in the wheelbarrow that Launa Gould mixed up. Potting soil recipe was from the speaker at our last meeting. It was a lot of work to hand mix all the ingredients! Hint: buy premixed.

Ron Lissner, Ces Smith, Wilma Cogswell, Diane O'ffill and Tanya Johnson among the members that participated in the workshop.

Club trips

Club field trip September 19, 2007 to Sherman Gardens including lunch and a tour of the gardens. The succulent garden was the hit for the majority of visitors.

Wilma Cogswell, Robin Pokorski, CGCI president, Bette Langford and Launa Gould

We met at Soka University on September 17, 2007 for presentation of a landscape award by California Garden Club president, Robin Pokorski.

We were treated to a tour of the beautiful campus.

Character Counts! Jamboree

Mike Gould helping soccer girls plant a flower.

A proud boy leaves with his plant.

Mike, Tanya Johnson and Bette Langford working the booth.

Launa Gould helping her excited granddaughter plant a flower.

Jim Higgins and Killeen Anderson (wearing hats) teaching children how to plant a flower.

Character Counts! Jamboree

“My plant from last year is still alive!” a 10 year old boy proudly shared with us.

The San Clemente Garden Club participated for the third year in the Character Counts! Jamboree on Saturday, September 29, 2007. The national organization of Character Counts! Coalition teaches the Six Pillars of Character: trustworthiness, respect, responsibility, fairness, caring and citizenship. http://www.charactercounts.org/.

Over 65 booths along with the Sheriff’s Dept, Fire Authority, USMC and Navy were represented. This year’s theme was “Protect Our Environment.” Our garden club chose ‘responsibility’ as the character we represented.

Our booth consisted of a table, two posters, a tub of potting soil, 8 flats of flowers and 300 plastic cups. The cups had a label with our club name and website.

We assisted 300 excited children, in planting a flower to take home. Their ‘responsibility’ was to water it regularly and plant it in a pot or their garden.
This is the most popular booth at the event and it is so fun to see everyone walking around carrying their flowers. Club members always come home with a high after working with the children.

Launa Gould