Take the time to stop and smell the roses along U.S. 93

Gardeners of the Flathead offer a floral feast for residents and visitors alike during the summertime. A recent letter to the Inter Lake gives the credit due one resident who goes the extra mile cultivating her garden along U.S. 93.

At the highway's intersection with Indian Trail Road just south of Flathead Valley Community College lies a bank of such profuse flora and abundant color that, for most of us, even a daily commute doesn't steal the pleasure of soaking in the luscious view.

"To fully enjoy and appreciate this beautiful garden, one needs to walk, rather than drive by," Poul Houlberg writes. Houlberg, who lives in a nearby neighborhood, says he frequently includes the garden on his extensive walks. "The lady that manicures this flower garden should be commended by our city government for helping beautify Kalispell," he adds.

The credit goes to Linda Spangle who, with help from her husband, Chuck, has been building those terraced beds for more than 15 years. Spangle says her insatiable appetite for flowers has kept her busy perusing nurseries, greenhouses and garden centers across the years.

Lavender, larkspur and lilies, daisies, delphinium and daffodils and hundreds of other perennials and annuals have caught Spangle's eye, and her passion has spilled over into the community. When asked to name her favorite, Spangle says, "I love them all."

Spangle says she frequently is visited by passers-by who say they feel compelled to stop and "smell the roses." Once, in Arizona, she bumped into a Kalispell resident who immediately knew exactly where Spangle lived when she mentioned the blooming terraced beds along the highway.

She's kept her husband busy with her project, too, hauling rocks to secure the beds and pave the paths - an unending process that gives her pause when she considers the accumulative payload of all the huge rocks they've loaded from as far away as eastern Montana and Washington.

Not content with just a bevy of blooms, Spangle also has several berry patches, apple and pear trees, and even a lily-padded pond complete with frogs, Japanese koi and goldfish.

Born and raised in Glasgow, Spangle figures her green thumb comes from two family members - her grandmother, whose stories of her gardening prowess have been passed down, and from her father.

"Dad was strictly an edible food gardener," she chuckles. "He always said, 'You can't eat flowers.'"

The extensive gardens are fertilized almost exclusively by a carefully managed compost pile and "good ol' cow manure," Spangle says.

"I don't like to throw any dirt away," she says. "I know how valuable it is." When she is not working the terraced beds, the only beholders who see the beauty of her garden are traveling the highway because it can't be seen from her house.

When asked why she does all that work in a place that she can't see, Spangle says simply, "The Lord and I garden together. I plant it, and He makes it grow - and that blesses everyone."