"She was David in a Goliath story" is how Kathryn Fairchild described Elda Behm, a friend and a stand-in-grandmother to her, during a memorial service for Behm on July 19.

Behm, "Paradise Garden" creator, died July 13. Behm created the garden at her SeaTac home. When the Port of Seattle bought her property for the third runway at Sea-Tac International Airport, her garden was moved to the Highline SeaTac Botanical Garden in SeaTac.

Dozens of friends, family and those in the community who just respected her passion and determination gathered on the turf of the botanical garden's Rose Garden to celebrate and share stories of the life of this grand lady with a green thumb.

They stood in the sun between the stone colonnade, her children, in-laws, fellow gardeners and one by one and cheerfully told tales of how this amazing nurturer, changed their lives. The sun seemed to brighten as they each spoke of her "eyes" which even at the age of 90 plus years hinted of the fire/passion inside of her.

They all spoke about how grateful she was to live so long with her family and garden and to watch them bloom and spread to be both a benefit to themselves and our community.

There were at least three generations of family present that she had seeded, gathered from California to Colorado to Michigan there and countless germination of plants she raised from seeds quietly observing the joyful celebration.

Elda Behm was a small woman born on a humble farm in Spokane. "the little David" fought to raises a close decent loving family, remake Burien swamps, and in the end she took on the Port of Seattle to save her "paradise garden,"

It is for this last act that she may be best known by us for how she "motivated" volunteers like former Burien City Councilman Stephen Lamphear to come to her aid how she deftly demonstrated the value of her garden by making it a destination for the state horticulturalist and busloads of Japanese gardeners.

She inspired a community to share her love of all things growing enough to use her "paradise garden" as a keystone for the botanical garden.

The speakers shared clues to the origin of this inner spirit as they recounted her determination to pass the Washington State Council exam in Landscape Design, and Flower Arranging in her forties, the stories of her high competitiveness evidenced by the endless blue ribbons she won through the years, and the tales of how a family of all ages that was happy to share floor space during Christmas and holidays in her modest home because of the values she grew in them.

Her granddaughter told of how this strength and reserve not only shown through to all that knew her here, but as they both traveled India to explore new growing worlds how Behm, because of her "wisdom with plants and age," was often greeted with traditional Indian praises and kisses and asked "to give blessings" those who came to see her."

The most moving parts of the ceremony was when those who knew her best stood and shared the to the wonderful seeds she had left behind in them just by being Elda.

Wendy Morgan, now the president of the garden board, cheerfully recalled how her life changed one day while visiting Paradise Garden the she casually mentioned, "I write public grants."

Behm's son-in-law and, John Woodbury stood on the lawn and admitted that her "gentle Christian faith" challenged his "hostile atheist convictions" as a young man when they first met and how proud he was able to comfort/reinforce/replant her faith near the end with his because of the fertile ground she prepared earlier in his life and in his soul.