Opening Day.

Our weather yesterday was glorious! Cool and cloudy weather in the morning changed to clear and sunny by lunch time. It was perfect to tour the garden, and made nice working conditions for my volunteers.

Speaking of volunteers, there was no way I could have pulled this off without them. The day ran perfectly, our customers were very well cared for, and I wasn’t a frazzled mess at the end of it all. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

We met the kindest, loveliest people yesterday. Some came by because they had been following our house renovation in the newpaper articles over the years. Others came specifically for the roses and gardens, having seen notice of our opening online or in newspaper ads. Still more came, late in the afternoon, wandering over from the wine festival next door. Almost everyone left carrying pots of baby roses to add to their gardens.

Many people came with a list in hand. Some had printed my availability list from the web site … others had hand-written lists. Everyone asked lots of questions.

We sold out of more roses than I expected … and some of them surprised me. Francois Juranville, a lovely, lanky, pink rambler, was one of the first to go. Others, like Paul Neyron, Swan Lake, and Grandmother’s Hat, are particularly lovely and very hard to resist. At the end of the day, Steve updated the Roses for Sale list on the web site to show the ones that we no longer have … in fact, he will be completely redesigning that page in the next week or so.

I was so tired at the end of the day … but it was a good kind of tired. I’m really surprised how good it felt to share my roses like this. We had a wonderful day, and I’m excited to see what next Saturday will bring.