I work really hard on my garden. I work really hard on my gardening group. I share what I learn , and I always love to learn more. But I will never understand why my garden is never good enough for blue ribbons or even garden tours.

Yes I am indeed sulking. I put a lot of effort into entering the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society home gardening contest. And even though I do not garden specifically for blue ribbons, I am really disappointed that I didn’t win anything. I was a “Proud Participant.” I’m really disappointed that they didn’t think my garden was good enough. It stings.

I literally tick all of the boxes of their criteria. I’m not sure about completely ticking off the whole social connections to family/neighborhood/community because I don’t live in an urban environment. But I even occasionally host open garden days throughout the gardening season, except for this year because of COVID19.

It’s really crazy how you look forward to something and you daydream about what it would be like if you won a pretty ribbon for your garden. And then you don’t. Blah. ☹️

But it’s kind of like the people who come through my garden to preview it for potential inclusion on garden tours. They walk it and they tell me they love it (supposedly) and they evaporate….My garden is never chosen.

Most gardeners love to share their gardens, and I am no different. But it’s also hard to open up your garden and yourself and put yourself and your garden out there. I don’t know if I’m going to enter anything again. Or offer up my garden for a tour again. I’m only human and there’s only so much disappointment I can take, and it goes deeper than that it feels almost like a rejection of my garden.

So I will just continue to share my garden through my garden blog here and with fellow gardeners in my gardening group and my friends and family.

Keep on gardening!