The Portland Show

Today I got up at the ungodly hour of 4:00 AM and headed up to north to the Portland Dahlia Society Annual Show. This year, the show date and location was new. The show was moved up one week earlier from past years and the location was moved from Canby Oregon to Portland Oregon. The actual show site was Oaks Park in the Sellwood district of Portland. This lovely park is located right along the bank of the Willamette river. There are great views north to OHSU up on the hill and toward downtown Portland in the distance.

It was a gorgeous day and the river was busy with sailboats, crew teams, and kayaks.

I had an amazingly successful show. For the first time in 2 years I made it back onto the Head Table. I had three entries on the Head Table which is a record for me and I had my very first Best in Show in Portland!

My Best in Show flower was this single bloom entry of "Hollyhill Jitterbug". It was judged Best BB-sized bloom in show and then went on to win Best 1-Bloom Fully Double In Show. This is a new-to-me variety and I only have one plant of it in the garden. It just began its first flush. The ironic thing is this is the very last bloom that I picked for the show. And I only picked it becasue my sister talked me into taking one more walk around the garden Friday evening. Then I didn't have any vases for it so we carried it back to the house out of water!

But you can't keep a good bloom down apparently! I was really excited about this win. It was completely unexpected. I know the bloom looked good, but I thought it would be seen as a bit undersized and the stem was a bit too long for the bloom, proportionally. But the judges saw otherwise!

I also won best 1-Bloom Pom in Show with this perfect "Willo Violet".

I thought I might have a chance at this award but I certainly wouldn't have been able to pick the variety. I entered 10 single pom entries and I thought many of them looked really good. But it was still a thrill to see one of my Poms on the Head Table.

My third Head Table winner was this 1-Bloom entry of the Orchette "Fancy Pants". Again I didn't have super high hopes for this bloom but I did think it would compete. After two days of 95 degree weather, I was certain that good, open centered dahlia blooms would be few and far between and I was right. All in all is was a great weekend for me and my blooms and a wonderful way to kick-off the dahlia show season.