The Garden Club of Newtown announces its Holiday Greens Sale is being planned for Saturday, December 4, from 9 am until noon.

The sale, which for more than 30 years has featured uniquely crafted holiday items handmade by members, had to be canceled in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

This year, the club membership is planning to host the sale at a new venue: the gymnasium of Edmond Town Hall, 45 Main Street. Although the meeting house at the flagpole served for years as the perfect site for the sale, health protocols for social distancing have required additional space. In addition, there is a full parking lot behind the town hall with direct access into the gymnasium.

Moving the sale to the town hall gym will allow displays to be laid out on tables spread far apart. There are also four entrances and exits, to ensure safe distancing.

The traditional wreaths, swags, boxwood trees, and centerpieces will be available, as well as one-of-a-kind items and cookies and ornaments.

This year, the ability to preorder items will be made possible using the QR Code or URL app on one’s phone or the Mail Order Form in The Newtown Bee advertisement. The sale has been the chief fundraiser for the club for many years, allowing the membership to donate proceeds to a variety of local causes.

Members of the club will be busy during the coming weeks creating individual items with native materials such as pinecones, acorns, tree branches, and other flora from Newtown’s abundant woodlands. The club welcomes all to a Holiday Greens Sale that celebrates the season.

Townsend & Zierzow Honored

During a Greens Sale work session on November 2, two of the club’s members were celebrated.

Nearly a week earlier, The Federated Garden Clubs of Connecticut, Inc — of which The Garden Club of Newtown is a member — hosted its 92nd Annual Awards meeting. For the second consecutive year the event was presented online as a webinar.

Awards were announced in multiple categories for clubs and gardeners across the state. Among those were Peggy Townsend and Louise Zierzow, who each received a Civic Development Certificate of Individual Achievement.

While the room at Vicki Boccuzzi’s home where club members gathered that Tuesday afternoon was filled with work and conversation for a few hours, the noise quieted when club President Peggy Jepsen announced the honors. Saying she was very proud of the honors, she presented the certificates to the two women while fellow club members offered a round of applause.

The honor was presented, according to the certificates, for “the extraordinary work organizing members and evaluating crops in the Fairfield Hills Victory Garden” Townsend and Zierzow coordinated. Produce grown by the garden club, and others, is delivered to FAITH Food Pantry and Nunnawauk Meadows.

Townsend and Zierzow were two of four gardeners recognized this year with Certificates of Individual Achievement by The Federated Garden Clubs of Connecticut. Jeanne Futter, of The Garden Club of Brookfield, and Mystic Garden Club member Paul Coutu were also celebrated for projects they did for their respective clubs.