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Garden club hosts holiday celebration

Submitted photo Members of the Emma Scott Garden Club gather to celebrate the holiday season and review accomplishments of 2017. Pictured sitting in front is President Patricia Mayes with members holding donations purchased for the West Virginia Department of Health and Human Resources, Bureau for Children and Families, Region III and food items donated to students of the Elkins Mountain Schools. Front row, from left, are Marian Hanscom, B.J. McKenzie, Jane Hoxmeier and Bobbi Trimboli: back row, Judy Guye-Swanson, Nayoka Guthrie, Christina Sanders, Barbara Heasley, Ken Hanscom, Joann Gabel, Coco McDaniel and Sara Phares.

ELKINS — The holiday season is a time for celebration with friends, a time to reflect on a past year of accomplishment and also a time to look forward to a brand new productive year.

Members of the Emma Scott Garden Club upheld their tradition of fellowship as members attended a holiday gathering at the home of B.J. McKenzie this past month.

President Patricia Mayes welcomed the group, thanking McKenzie for her years of hosting the holiday event and offered the first gift to the group, as the festive evening got underway.

“My gift to you is no business meeting,” Mayes began. “What I do want to do is celebrate the club and its good works.”

Mayes outlined the club’s 2017 accomplishments, which included community projects such as the maintenance of seven public gardens and three Blue Star memorials. She thanked club members for participating in projects with other community organizations, such as helping with the creation of quilt squares and Christmas baskets with Elkins Main Street, and the creation of wreaths for the Elkins-Randolph County Library.

She commended the members for their unending work with the Elkins Mountain Schools projects and all the Yard of the Month recognitions.

The 51-member club also won several awards in 2017.

“We received three awards at this year’s State Convention: one for the Publicity press book, one for starting a Youth Club and a gold medal for the best Mini-Standard Flower Show,” Mayes said. “The Emma Scott Garden Club also sponsored poetry contest submissions to the State Convention that brought home three contest winners: Toby Wagoner, first grade; Alexandria Barrickman, fifth grade; and Isabelle Willkie, third grade, who was also the winner of the South Atlantic Region category of the National Garden Club.”

The Elkins club also won the Tygart Valley District Evergreen Youth Award for the third year in a row for its work with the Elkins Mountain Schools’ horticultural projects.

Looking toward the new year, Mayes outlined to the group major projects club members can look forward to including their main fundraiser, Food, Floral & Fun held in May, plus various luncheon and tour dates, as well at the announcement of the State Convention in April and National Garden Club Week in June.

Previous to the gathering, members were encouraged to donate items to help foster families meet West Virginia Department of Health and Human Resources requirements of home safety, especially for younger fostered children.

According to a letter sent by Regina White, DHHR Region III home finding specialist, to project coordinator Judy Guye-Swanson, families participating in the program do not always have the resources to purchase items required to become a certified foster care home.

“The clear majority of our foster care homes are relatives who may have one smoke detector, but nothing else,” White wrote.

Items needed for these foster homes included ABC certified fire extinguishers, smoke detectors, carbon monoxide detectors, emergency exit ladders for second-story homes, child gates, child safety locks cabinets, door knob safety locks and electric covers for outlets.

Emma Scott Garden Club members voted to donate items to the Region III Bureau for Children and Families and brought them to the December event.

Guye-Swanson noted that the club was able to assemble the following items: two packages of Safety Essentials Kits (outlet covers and safety latches); two carbon monoxide and smoke alarms; two packages of door latches, seven outlet cover packages; one basic fire extinguisher and two Home Pro fire extinguishers and five child gates.

“We are happy to provide these much-needed items to the DHHR,” Guye-Swanson said. “It will make a few children’s new year a bit happier.”

The club also donated to the students of the Elkins Mountain Schools nearly 15 dozen cookies and three bags of halos.

The Emma Scott Garden Club is a member of the West Virginia Garden Club Inc. (www.wvgardenclub.com) and meets monthly. For Emma Scott Garden Club membership information, anyone interested can contact B.J. McKenzie at 304-614-3079.

The next meeting, the Jack Frost Luncheon, is scheduled for Jan. 20.

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