Ann King tries her hand at making boxwood Christmas trees with the Arbutus Garden Club at St. Andrew’s Lutheran Church in Charlestown as the 60-year-old club plants seeds for its Holiday Idea Show.

THE PROVIDENCE JOURNAL / John Freidah

Nancy Lee McLaughlin, left, King and Ann Doran collaborate on preparations for this year’s holiday show which is set for Saturday at the former Quonochontaug Grange Hall on Route 1, Charlestown. Arbutus club members have been cultivating their creations for this year’s show since 2004.

THE PROVIDENCE JOURNAL / John Freidah

It’s easy not to notice, because their plantings around South County have become such a part of the landscape.

More than a dozen locations throughout southern Rhode Island sprout with the work of the almost-60-year-old Arbutus Garden Club.

Flowering trees along Carolina’s Main Street, plantings at the Charlestown Post Office, the Neighborhood Guild in Peace Dale and the Hope Valley School each originated with Arbutus Garden Club members. So concerned is this club about beautifying the world that members take not one, but two years to prepare for their Holiday Idea Show, an event first held in 1961. This year, it will be held on Saturday.

“People have been following this show for years,” said club president Diane Giard, of Charlestown, as she explained their creative philosophy: “We try to keep things as natural as we can.”

“Everything is made by hand using natural materials,” and members promise that much of what they gather artfully will last indefinitely. They call the show a “holiday idea” because members produce items for a variety of holidays – even ones that are months away.

Since the fall of 2004, when they held their last show, 75 club members have been growing, harvesting and drying flowers and plants in their own South County yards.

Hydrangeas hang from garage rafters, flowers sit waiting to be pressed upon candles and cards, and cone flower pods are snipped and gathered for bouquets “because they have a really great shape to them,” said Giard.

Giard produces an arrangement of bittersweet, sea grass and cone flowers – all from her backyard. The items, she said, “will last all winter and I didn’t do anything special.”

She said she once made 75 pine cone wreaths, and produces one from her front door made 20 years ago.

“The whole idea to see what people can do with their gardens, and to have a good time,” she said.

“Ninety-percent of what we use is either fresh or dried,” said Alice Greene, a member since 1970, who has held offices several different times.

“I have let some people use some silk, but we want to try to keep things natural. We’re a horticultural club.”

Saturday’s event will be held at the former Quonochontaug Grange Hall on Route 1, Charlestown, from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. All proceeds go to the club’s scholarship fund. Each year scholarships are awarded to students pursuing botanically linked studies. The $1 cost of admission will also go to the scholarship fund.

The event will feature a bake sale and a table offering recycled garden items.

In addition to the sale of more than 200 items made from natural materials, the event will feature several demonstrations, including how to make Advent wreaths, and topiary trees from boxwoods.

“What we are trying to do is more of a community service than a bazaar,” said Greene. “We want to give people ideas. That’s one of our goals.”

When the biannual show concludes, members will get started on their 2008 event, carrying on the legacy started in 1947 at the home of Agnes Smith, of Carolina, when 13 women gathered at her home to organize the garden club.

Greene said she thinks the club has lasted so long “because we are community oriented and we have these different functions to give back in the two good-size scholarships every year. We try to keep that in mind.”

“We’re a little bit smaller this year, but we’re going after quality, not quantity.”