Cress Creek Garden Club of Naperville, Inc.
Community Engagement
Paw Paw Garden
Naper Settlement
​Since 1979 our club has been planning, planting, and maintaining the perennial and vegetable gardens surrounding the Paw commitment House in the Naper Settlement. The Paw Paw House is one of the several landmark buildings that have been preserved and restored as part of the Naper Settlement, which is a depiction of a typical Northern Illinois town of the 1831 - 1885 era.
In 2009 Cress Creek Garden Club was inducted into the "Naperville Heritage Hall of Honor" by the Naperville Heritage Society in recognition of more than 30 years of service to the Paw Paw House Gardens. In 2015 the club also received the Presidential Service Award, as a result of our sustained commitment to volunteer service. CCGC has also received certificates from the Garden Clubs of Ilinois for over 40 years of volunteering.
In the spring of 2019, a tree was planted in memory of Tulita Wynne who passed in 2016. Tulita was a charter club member who helped care for the Paw Paw Garden since 1978.
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Trinity House
Trinity Community House in Cress Creek Commons is a residence for adult men with developmental disabilities. Residents share household duties to the extent possible and appropriate. All the activities are part of a learning environment that encourages the individual with disabilities to become as capable and independent as possible. In 2016 the club created a landscape update plan which was implemented with the help of a local Boy Scout troop. Front and back yard improvements were made, a vegetable garden was added, and annuals and perennials planted. The club will continue to do plantings.The club is working on developing an overall landscape and curb appeal improvement plan that Trinity Services can implement on their own over the following three to five years.
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The National Garden Clubs organization, one of the nation’s most-recognized nonprofits and largest volunteer gardening organization in the world, named The Cress Creek Garden Club the 2016 overall winner for Horticulture Therapy Garden Projects.
Plants are furnished and planted and maintained at the Naperville Veterans Memorial Park by members of Cress Creek Garden Club. A variety of red, white and blue annuals and perennials enhance the beauty and serenity of the park. Just north of the of the Memorial Wall is a Hobson Burr Oak sapling propagated by the Morton Arboretum. Surrounding the sapling are native plants known to attract butterflies and other polinators.
Veterans Park
DuPage Children's Museum
The entry bed, butterfly garden and the six large planters in the parking lot of the DuPage Children's Museum are planted by members of Cress Creek Garden Cub.