June 4-6 were the dates of the 2015 Garden Bloggers Fling, held in Toronto, Canada. That’s the official group photo above, pretty snazzy with the Toronto skyline in the background – don’t you think? This was the 8th annual event, last year, 2014, a group of Portland bloggers played host to 80 bloggers from around the world. Plant lust was a sponsor of that event, supplying the swag bags which other sponsors filled with fabulous freebies for the attendees.
Because I was so busy trying to make sure that event went off without a hitch, it didn’t occur to me to take a photo of the happy bloggers with their swag, what was I thinking!? As luck would have it several people brought their totes along to this year’s event…
That’s Gail Eichelberger, who blogs at clay and limestone…
And Vicki Blachman, aka Playin’ Outside
Another bag, who could that be?…
Why none other than a fellow Portlander, Jane Finch-Howell (Mulchmaid). Just to the right of Jane is Susan Harris, who blogs for Garden Rant. Susan did a wonderful re-cap of our Saturday night event with Gayla Trail, one of the very first garden blogger’s at You Grow Girl (started in 2000!).
If you’re curious click on over there, Susan’s post is a great read. It talks about Gayla’s thoughts on staying true to yourself as a blogger, where garden blogging is headed (a specialty niche if ever there was one), and thoughts about how we garden bloggers find each other, among other things. The world of garden blogging can be huge, if you’re trying to find others with a like-mind and don’t know where to start (here’s a new directory, still under construction). Or very small, as I discovered later that weekend…
What’s that? Cistus!? A favorite Portland nursery on a t-shirt in Toronto? Why yes. That’s Michelle Chapman (Veg Plotting) who was in Portland for last year’s Fling and snagged a t-shirt. Evidently she’s still enamored with Cistus. The girl’s got taste!
I’ll wrap up this post with a few images showing just how garden crazy Toronto can be…wouldn’t you like to live on Garden Ave?
Or maybe in the Garden District?
Or on Horticultural Ave? (note the sign I managed to cut off on the bottom left…no parking/snow route! Yikes).
Next year’s event will be held in Minneapolis–Saint Paul. If you’re a garden blogger think about attending, fun will be had by all! Finally a few of the plants we saw in Toronto…