We attended the Garden Writers Association 61st Annual Symposium in Raleigh , North Carolina, last week. It was CobraHead's 6th GWA, and our fifth as an exhibitor.

Here's Anneliese putting the final touches on our booth. The symposium includes a trade show, seminars, speakers, tours, dinners, and awards. It is held in a different city every year, and tours of both public and private local gardens are a big part of the trip

Pictures from the Sarah P. Duke Gardens at Duke University. A truly outstanding public garden and arboretum.

These are from Montrose , a former estate of a governor of North Carolina, William Alexander Graham, now a foundation maintained by Nancy and Craufurd Goodwin.

S.E.E.D.S. , is a community garden project in inner city Durham that teaches people to grow food and care for the earth. The young people are paid interns and the food grown is sold at the facility. They were harvesting sweet potatoes while we were there. The second shot is of a green roof project constructed on the site.

On Sunday our tour had a mis-adventure as our bus slid off a driveway and got hung up.

Touring the Wal-Mart garden center in Mt. Olive was not on the agenda, but here's the group at the big box waiting for a replacement bus. The bus mishap put a damper on the last day's fun as we missed several of the scheduled stops, but overall, the trip and trade show were excellent.

Next year the symposium is in Dallas and the organizers promise another excellent show. GWA is as close to a vacation as Judy and I get since we started CobraHead. So we are looking forward to the gardens of the big D.

Judy and I returned to the Kickapoo Country Fair in La Farge, Wisconsin for another show Saturday and yesterday. We did our first show there, last year, which you can read about here. The fair is about farming and smaller organic family farms, versus the corporate factory farms that now dominate world agriculture.

The show was noticeably bigger this year than last. More exhibits, more workshops, more vendors and bigger crowds. I think, if they stay on track, Kickapoo will become a major event for promoting the ideals of organic farming and sustainable living. A large field of sunflowers greeted us when we entered the grounds of Organic Valley Headquarters. The sunflowers are part of an experiment in bio-diesel fuel.

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This weekend Judy and I were CobraHead Exhibitors at the Midwest Renewable Energy Association's 20th annual energy fair in Custer, Wisconsin. It is the largest show of this type in the U.S. This was our third year at the show. We sell lots of garden tools. In fact it is a way better show for sales than almost any garden or flower show we do.

The reason is the audience. MREA attracts people with interest in sustainable energy. They have a very high awareness of what is really "green". Thus there are lots of gardeners and small farmers. Overall, the people are way hipper than the average show crowd when it comes to environmental issues and a knowledge of food and gardening.

All aspects of renewable energy and sustainability are represented in vendor exhibits, workshops, and talks and keynote addresses. The three day show also has some excellent food vendors including the Wisconsin staple - beer - by a great and "green" local brewery, Central Waters Brewing Company, and good entertainment. Saturday night we saw Michelle Shocked and I immediately became a fan.

Here's Judy trying to make a sale.

Solar is cool! Pictured are a vendor of panels, a huge solar cooker designed for villages where there is no firewood, and a solar powered water heater.

Wind power for home, farm, commercial, and community was represented.

This experimental house features locally produced inputs and is super energy efficient.

The big boys like Toyota attend the show and don't pass up an opportunity to show off their energy efficient vehicles.

But the home enthusiast modified Mercedes that runs on vegetable oil is in many ways more interesting.

My favorite vehicle – an Allis-Chalmers "G" tractor modified to be solar powered. No gas fumes in this farmer's organic veggies.

This weekend saw three-fourths of the CobraHead Team working the Madison Garden Expo in our home city. The event is sponsored by Wisconsin Public Television and I can say with certainty, as we've now got over two hundred trade shows behind us, this is one of the better garden shows in the United States.

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I'm excited about the coming months for many reasons. We have a busy schedule exhibiting at garden shows and Green Festivals, and it's always fun to travel and meet new people (and say hi to the folks you haven't seen since last year). I'm excited for spring to arrive. Which it will. Eventually. I hope.

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In an effort to keep up with the times, CobraHead has set up a Twitter account. The rest of the CobraHead team has appointed me the designated Twitterer, and I've already started posting updates.

Feel free to follow us at http://twitter.com/CobraHead. I will post occasional tweets about gardening, events we're attending, and the occasional link or story that I think others might be interested in. I promise not to inundate you with lots of random or pointless updates.

The past two weeks have been quite hectic for me and Geoff. We exhibited at Green Festivals two weekends in a row, and they were on opposite coasts. It's a tiring schedule, to be sure, but we like being busy like that. The Green Festivals are always interesting and a lot of fun. At each festival we end up making new friends, and we often see a lot of old friends, too.

Two weeks ago the Green Festival was in Washington DC. A number of folks from the gardening world were on hand to promote better gardening practices. Some very nice folks from Purple Mountain Organics were there selling books and gear to help with organic growing, Kathy Jentz had a booth with Washington Gardener Magazine, Susan Harris from Garden Rant stopped by (see her picture of Geoff at the booth here ), as did Viveka Neveln from The American Gardener Magazine. My friend Martha Stauss of Green and Sticky, Inc. also came to the festival with her son Forrest, and our friend Joe Lamp'l gave a talk on greener gardening practices. He was kind enough to give us each a "Growing a Greener World" wristband. I was happy to wear it for the rest of the festival, but I have to admit that I'm not much of wristband wearer. The wristband is now serving a far more useful and visible purpose as a travel mug grip band. It makes my stainless steel tea mug easier to grab, and it helps to keep the slippery container from sliding out of my backpack water bottle pouch. Joe seemed to like the idea, and he even posted a picture that I sent him on his blog. Maybe I've started a trend!

We were only home two days before we left again for the San Francisco Green Festival. There weren't as many gardening exhibits this time (with the exception of our friends at Rain Reserve), but there were still a lot of people interested in gardening and food growing. We were very fortunate to meet some really wonderful folks. Across the aisle from us was Anne Thibeau from The Old Fashioned Milk Paint Co.. They make no VOC paints using old fashioned methods. Next door was our new very cool friend Jenny. Jenny makes aromatherapy sprays for stress, relaxation and revitalization. I was also lucky enough to be visited by my friend Brad, who I know from back in my drum and bugle corps days. Brad and his girlfriend Jennifer are expecting their first child, and they were glad to learn about the dangers of Bisphenol-A and other potentially toxic compounds in baby bottles and other baby items. They were able to pick up a few safe baby items from a company called ZoLi while visiting the Green Festival.

Geoff and I are now decompressing back in our respective home states. Traveling can be fun, but it's always nice to come home. Starting in early 2009, we'll be back on the road again for garden show season. Watch for us at a garden show near you!

That's Irene Bender, the event coordinator for the Minnesota Garlic Festival , held last Saturday at the Wright County Fairgrounds in Howard Lake, Minnesota. Nice Hat!

The garlic festival is a little show featuring about a dozen small farmers offering over 100 varieties of garlic. Garlic was for sale, but so were other homegrown foods and locally produced goods. Garlic flavored food was in abundance including garlic brats, garlic potatoes, pickled garlic, and more, with garlic flavoring many of the food items for sale. There was even garlic ice cream and garlic chocolate chip cookies for desert.

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In our ongoing quest to make the CobraHead Weeder famous, we occasionally try new trade show venues. Since I thought there had to be a connection between farming and gardening, we exhibited at a show in Minnesota this week called Farmfest.

The show organizers had invited us out as a "green" vendor and we were in a tent with others promoting such things as organic farming, sustainable agriculture, energy issues and land conservation.

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This weekend, Judy and I were vendors at the Kickapoo Country Fair in La Farge, Wisconsin: Kickapoo Country Fair. The fair is in its fifth year and is hosted on the grounds of Organic Valley's headquarters. Organic Valley is the farmer's cooperative that has been at the forefront of the organic movement in the United States.

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Hello all! Just wanted to write a quick post to remind everyone that the Chicago Green Festival is this weekend at Navy Pier. CobraHead will be exhibiting in booth 1621.

The Green Festivals are organized by Co-op America and Global Exchange. They emphasize not just "green" trends, but also social and economic justice and fairly traded goods. The Green Fest will feature live music, renowned speakers, green films, a kid zone, organic food (and beer and wine!), and, of course, a variety of innovative green products (like the CobraHead!).

Bring the whole family, and join us for a fun-filled weekend!