Secret Garden Tour gives visitors a peek into area retreats

Robin Anlian's garden surrounding her Helena Valley home has been 30 years in the making. When she and her husband purchased the property the first holes dug in the ground were for a few trees, some lilac and caragana bushes.

Today, the acre-and-a-third, boasts glorious roses, deep colored irises, a spectrum of impressive columbine, and interesting garden art in every bed.

Anlian's garden was one of six preselected private home gardens featured in this year's Secret Garden Tour, put on by the Original Governor's Mansion.

Jack Slevin, Anlian's husband, says he's not a flower kind of guy.

"I couldn't tell a flower from a good grade of honey," he said with a chuckle.

Slevin, a retired state employee, does however, do the mowing and handwork around the grounds.

Anlian's credits her mother and grandmother for her love for flowers and green thumb. She can remember from an early age helping her mother, Gwen, now 80, in the garden. Gwen lives in New Mexico, and comes to Helena for occasional visits and the mother-daughter team make it a practice to visit all the local nurseries and select a few new plants.

"It just must run in the family," she assumes is the reason behind her love for gardening.

She says gardening is relaxing and really doesn't have one particular favorite flower, although she is partial to irises, sweet peas and lilacs. Hybrid tea roses pose the biggest challenge for her because they don't winter well.

Anlian recently retired after 30 years with the Department of Administration and hopes that her free-from-work days will allow her to lie around more and look at the flowers.

"I won't have to cram everything into the weekends," she said.

It was easy to see that those who walked through Anlian's garden were impressed by the care behind the beauty.

Garden tour visitor Sally Beall told Anlian, as she strolled through her yard, "You must feel like you are in your own piece of heaven."

This was the second year friends, Carol Kirkland, Brenda Kienlen and Kate Lamping, all of Helena, enjoyed the tour with the hope of finding tips on how to have a bountiful garden.

"I'm a gardener wannabe," Lamping said.

Kienlen brought along her camera gathering snapshots of ideas to hand off to her husband who somewhat reluctantly obliges her.

Another garden in the tour, owned by Paul and Helen Edwards, boasted a rainbow of colorful blooms and a relaxing backyard retreat.

Helen says when the couple moved into the home about five years ago the backyard was just a flat piece of grass. Now the serene site is the home of 10 raised beds, rocks, art, antiques and a water fountain.

"When I first started I just wanted to have beds for vegetables," says Helen. "Of course, it didn't stop me from planting flowers. When the vegetables were gone, I though, ah, this is nice."

The garden tour is one of two annual fundraisers that support restoration of the OGM like work the current work on the balustrade on the second story or the recently completed refurbishment of the leather walls in the dining room. The event offered free tours of the OGM with nearly 20 vendors displaying their merchandise on Ewing Street.