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ATTLEBORO -- It was the Attleboro Garden Club's third annual "Garden Stroll" held in the backyard of Kathi and Rick Gariepy.

The event, said club member Deborah Leach, is unusual in that garden clubs historically go on a hiatus from meetings during the summer because, well, members are busy working in their gardens.

But the city club is branching out.

The club, which traditionally has held day meetings, has within the past year introduced an evening series to expand membership. The first one drew more than 30 non-members.

This year's 'stroll' was a chance for members, new and old, to get together, chat, sip some icy lemonade and nibble on fruits and Gariepy's homemade morsels on what turned out to be a sultry summer evening. And, of course, it was also an opportunity to admire the blooms and inhale the scents of Gariepy's gardens at the rear of her home on Pleasant Street where several old apple trees dot the lawn, holdovers from the property's past as an orchard, field and farm land. A master gardener who was the most recent president of the garden club and the Massachusetts Horticultural Society's Master Gardeners, Gariepy declared that the event was held at her home "not necessarily because my garden is spectacular. It's just a chance for garden club members to gather and hopefully new ones come along too."

Gariepy is in charge of organizing the evening sessions now and has assumed new roles, including heading up the gardening study school for New England and her involvement in the Garden Club Federation of Massachusetts.

"The yard, as always, is in transition," she said, in preface to the event. Yet her beds were beautiful, nonetheless.

Gariepy took a reporter and photographer, and later others, for a tour, showing some of her most recent acquisitions - like a "beauty berry," which she described as having "insignificant purple flowers now, but in the fall produces lavender berries," - as well as time-honored yellow 'Hyperion' day lilies.

Her husband Rick also has his hand in things, having completed a white wood arbor for the Concord grapes which the couple plans for the first time this year to harvest for use in jam and possibly to produce wine.

He also tends to the lawn and the vegetable and fruits, growing watermelon and tomatoes - as well as pruning the apple trees; an old McIntosh, a Cortland, and an early McIntosh which he described as having "very sweet" fruit.

Conversation floats on the air as more take the tour. Gariepy is showing off some blooms to Joyce and Roger Jenks. Next year's stroll will be held in their yard.

"It gets people talking about their gardens," Rick Gariepy says before he excuses himself to talk to some folks who are headed to his garden domain. "After all, everyone likes to talk about their gardens."

Susan LaHoud can be reached at 508-236-0398 or slahoud@thesunchronicle.com.