Finally getting around to finishing off GSBF Convention stuff before they get too old. Saturday Night dinner award was chalked full of people. Most of them are listed and a great write up can be seen on the GSBF website. I'm just going to hightlight just one of them that is a bit closer to home. Frank Nagata was posthumously awarded "The Most Prestigious Circle of Sensei Award" Yes, thats correct the founder of our club Nagata-san himself. He brought bonsai into the main str

Finally letting the cat out of the bag. GSBF posted yet another great write up about these winners and I'm going to steal its formatting because its done exactly how I would have done it! Every year Golden State Bonsai Federation (GSBF) Golden Statements (GS) Magazine hosts the best club website and club newsletter contests. It is an opportunity to judge club websites and newsletters for their quality, communications of club activities and information, and creativity of the w

The one area that I didn't visit for an extended period of time was the judged section. Trees were displayed as individual tokonomas in this section. The names were all flipped over for most of the displaying at GSBF so I could not ID people tree's so here they are in random order. I'm going to try to match up the winners with their trees. If I need a correction please email or facebook me and I'll make the changes. Best In Conifer: June Nguy - Juniper ABS Native Species: Jun

I have to admit, I was abit awestruck when I first saw Bjorn walk by me on Friday afternoon. I have been following Bjorn on his Youtube channel Bjorvala Bonsai Studio: The Art of Bonsai in Japan for the past 4 years. I have to say he is very down to Earth in real life and has the same personality as on his Youtube channel. Some background on Bjorn. He is originally from Tennesse. Bjorn spent nearly six years working at Mr. Keiichi Fujikawa's nursery, Kouka-en in Ikeda City. I

Many call me cheap, some call me crazy, others call me a shopaholic. I never go crazy at conventions shopping. But, its the thrill of the hunt is what I enjoy the most. For that you need to be the first or the last shopper at the convention to get those type of deals. At this convention, I was either. I tried to make it down on Thursday afternoon, but the traffic on my Iphone said, "No". I wasn't even the first shopper on Friday, because of work. At that point all the deals t

I did not sign up for any particular workshop at this convention. I was interested in the tamarix dig but, I had a busy week and could not get that Wednesday off. The only course that was semi interesting for my personal learning was the shohin trident maple by Peter Macasieb on Thursday afternoon. I did hear the suiseki hunt excursion had a blast, they were able to get into several areas before the end of the session. Saturday was a different story. I had a chance to walk in

I had the opportunity to visit and volunteer at the exhibit hall during the convention. I did have the pleasure of meeting some familar faces. The format was informal with pedestal in the middle of the room. Photo by Colin Fraser A panoramic photo of the bonsai exhibit hall. Brazilian Pepper - Steve Valentine Totally unique tree. I have never seen any type of pepper tree in a show before. The tree is powerful and has a ton of movement. The compound leave structure causes some