Renee at the White House

Renee's Garden was part of the Congressional Club's annual First Lady's Luncheon honoring Michelle Obama at the Washington Hilton last month.

This gala annual event, attended by Congressional, Supreme Court and Administration spouses as well as guests from around the country had a theme of "Forever Green", and event co-chair, Betty Ann Tanner, wife of the congressman from Tennessee, invited me to contribute our seeds for attendees. Individual packets of our Farmers Market lettuce and Pesto Basil were part of the beautiful gift bags given every attendee.
Best of all, I was invited to the VIP reception before the affair and had the thrill and honor of meeting Michelle Obama in person. I was also able to make a personal selection of our seeds to give to Michelle for the White House Garden. Michelle was everything I expected -- vibrant, graceful, clearly engaged and enjoying what she is doing. When you speak with her, you have her full attention and feel like you are the only person in the room. The luncheon itself was really fabulous. I was seated at a table quite close to the First Lady and other honorees, so I got to watch her "up close and personal" as she gave a very insightful speech on community service.

The First Lady also recently hosted a harvest party in the White House kitchen garden with the students from Bancroft Elementary to celebrate their hard work. Click here to read the blog post about it on the White House website. The kids harvested lettuce and sugar snap peas and then cooked a lunch from their harvest. More than 90 pounds of produce has been harvested so far from the White House kitchen garden.