On what felt like the first sunny Saturday of spring, hundreds showed up to the annual Garden Club of Buzzards Bay plant sale at St. Mary’s Church on Dartmouth Street.

Club volunteers wearing straw boaters adorned with sprigs of flowers helped customers choose between a wide variety of annuals, perennials, and decorative houseplants.

Board member Kathe Parker said that this year’s sale was going “extremely well.”

With a packed house and popular plants like geraniums nearly selling out just an hour after the sale started, Parker said, this year’s event was even better than the year before.

Professional gardener Crystal Brinson said that she was excited about the sale. “They really grow really good quality [plants],” she said, adding that it was her second time coming out for the event.

Proceeds of the sale go towards scholarships and grants for various community projects in the areas of conservation, sustainable agriculture, horticulture, and civic beautification.

They award money to all types of organizations across the south coast region, including schools, land trusts, museums, libraries, the zoological society and the YMCA.

The Gardening Club has awarded around $40,000 to these projects since 2003.

Club President Ruth Jolliffe said that this year they are also gathering funds to re-do their greenhouse, located at the Rotch-Jones-Duff House in New Bedford.

“We grow almost all the plants ourselves, from cuttings,” she said.

“It’s fantastic, I love it,” said first-time customer Doreen Leite, who was buying for her home garden as well as house plants. She’s been gardening for twenty-five years.

“They just told me that the record [sale] was $204,” she said with a laugh. “I might reach that or beat it...it’s like a little kid in a toy store!”