I have been gardening since my dad gave me a peace of his garden to plant, at age 12. I had some bird feed and some strawberry cuttings. The crop was not great, but I was intrigued that different seeds grew so many different plants.

I quickly moved on to flowers, and dad and I spent time talking about them. When I married, I spent many hours outdoors, growing flowers and enjoying them.

After I moved to Canada there was a 2-year period when I did not have a garden but then we moved to a townhouse and I took up gardening on the Canadian prairies.

At this time, I was given my first lily, a tiger lily. I found a new way of propagating plants through the small bulbs that grew on the tiger lily’s stem. When dropped on the ground and not disturbed, new lilies would grow.

Then I discovered that there were many more lilies, Asiatic lilies, daylilies, lilies of the valley. And then the education started when I met someone who was a member of our local lily society. She pointed out that although some plants like daylilies have the name “lily”, they are not true lilies. True lilies belong to the genus Lilium.

I began collecting true lilies and even began hybridizing them, something that was totally new to me, but I had a great mentor and today you can see some of my seedlings posted as my art.

My search for knowledge led me to take over the online version of the RHS Lily Register a few years ago and I also added the Lily Discussions and Information Sharing forum.

In 2007, three of my lilies won awards in the annual North American Lily Society show which attracts people from all over the world.