SUMMER WEEK 6
BOUQUET INGREDIENTS
zinnias, cosmos, celosia, amaranth
+bonus eucalyptus bunch
One of my favorite things about being in the business of growing cut flowers is having these natural benchmarks for the passing of time. I notice the changing of the seasons based on what tasks I am doing at the farm; I remember when I've received certain phone calls based on which crops I was harvesting when I received them; and I've started to view my life in terms of "seasons" rather than "years."
This week, while harvesting the amaranth and the eucalyptus, I was reminded of how, when I was harvesting these same crops at this time last year, we were preparing to move into our new home. It gave me a moment to reflect on the ways this home has served us well this year both in our lives and in our business, though not exactly as I had planned when we moved in. In a newsletter I wrote last September, I shared my plan to use our spare bedroom as a seed-starting room and floral studio. Well, the room turned out to be too hot for starting seeds and too out of the way for arranging flowers (I could not be bothered to haul bucket after bucket up the stairs). So our seed starting got moved to the basement, and I make our bouquets on our kitchen table.
There's a lesson for me: worried as I was about fitting the farm routines into this new space, sometimes you don't need a plan for every detail. Some things will reveal themselves as you go! And despite the space not being used as I'd planned before I'd even spent any time here, I'm really pleased with the weekly flow of flower buckets that has worn a path through our home this year.
Last September, I also hadn't yet decided to leave my job to work full-time growing flowers. That feels like a lifetime ago, but again, the rhythms of this work remind me how much can change in a year. I feel so proud of the work I've done this year -- work I wasn't sure, at the outset, that I would actually be able to do -- and grateful that I took a chance on myself to do it. I spent many months at the beginning of this year worrying that the risk wouldn't pay off. But then we surpassed last year's sales around Mother's Day, and we're on track to reach our ambitious goal for this year (still safely within five figures -- this is, after all, farming).
Maybe you have similar routines in your job or daily life, but if not, I hope you, too, will take a moment to reflect on the past season of your life. What have you learned? What do you still have to learn?
All of this to say -- as this season winds down, I’m feeling especially grateful for the chance to grow flowers for you this year. Thank you for being part of this little farm.
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