Monthly Musings - March 2024

April 16, 2024

March is when the farm starts to wake up. I start to see small buds appearing on trees, the carpet of snowdrops are very present on our morning dog walks.

The month started with my annual dahlia tuber sale. As I mentioned last month, there is so much behind the scenes work that happens to make this sale possible. I have to admit that the morning of the sale before it goes “live” I am very nervous. I worry that maybe nobody will want to buy my tubers as there are a lot of tubers sales to choose from. Then of course I worry that maybe my website platform will crash. Of course none of this happened. It was a hugely successful sale selling so many tubers. If you purchased any of my tubers, thank you so much for your support

Yelno Harmony displayed in a jug created by Cactus & Clay Ceramics

In March seed planting also kicks into high gear. All the sweet peas which were growing nicly were moved outside into the “cage” that was constructed for them. They can withstand low nighttime temperatures and I also needed room in the greenhouse for all the seeds I was about to plant.

Many days were happily spent in the greenhouse planting seeds. Everything that is planted is placed on a heatmat until at least 50% of the seed tray is germinated. Then it is moved off onto shelves in the greenhouse. It is a big shuffling act. At this time of year I love coming into the greenhouse each morning and peering under the dome lids of the seed trays to see what has germinated since I last looked, and to be honest with you it is something that now needs my reading glasses with me to spot a tiny little green speck just making its way through the soil up towards the light.

***Seed babies happily growing in the greenhouse***

hosted some workshops on the farm in March. The first workshops were my dahlia tuber dividing classes. I try to take the mystery out of dahlia tuber diving. It can be a little intimidating when you are faced with an almighty clump of tubers. To know where to start and what a dahlia tuber eye actually looks like. I hope that the attendees leave the class feeling a little more confident when they leave the class and that they can tackle their own dahlia tubers at home.

I also hosted an everlasting wreath workshop. Attendees were able to go into my drying room and choose from any of my dried flowers. It was a lovely few hours spent being creative together, the chatter from the outside world being shut out.

***An Everlasting Wreath created by one of my workshop attendees***

The first narcissus daffodils started to bloom, such a welcome sign. I love their beautiful fluffy trumpets. I am not sure if it is their gorgeous scent or the fact that when they appear, it means that winter is almost over.

Also with narcissus marking the end of winter of course comes chicks. If you follow me on social media you will know that my chickens are free range. However, this has come at a price. Predators ~ we have a lot of them around here. I lost 16 chickens this year. Bald Eagles are the main culprits but we have also have more than our fair share of coyotes and raccoons. I am down to one loney chicken, so in March it was time to give her some companions. I have started with 4 chicks. I am hoping to get some Lavender Orphingtons later in April and in June I will adopt some of my friend Jess’s chickens as sadly she is moving back to the East coast and can’t take her chickens with her. They won’t have as much free range as they used to - I can’t bare loosing so many again and honestly my girls used to go trotting off down the lane so a little less freedom will not be such a bad thing. I have a plan…as always, I just have to get the head of maintenance on board (my husband!)

As I write this months musings I am on a plane heading back from Los Angeles, after spending Easter weekend with my boys - who are actually young men. I am so proud of the young men they have grown into. I am in a different season of parenting now…and it just involves spending good quality time with them, laughing and chatting, drinking a glass of wine and talking about wedding plans for my oldest son and my youngest son has just been accepted into the University of Southern California to work on his Masters program. So proud of him and also happy he will be staying on the west coast for a couple more years.

That’s it for now. I hope that life is treating you well and that you are spending it with people that fill your cup.

Much Love,

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Monthly Musings - February 2024

March 22, 2024

Good morning friends, well February went by in a blink of any eye. To be honest with you it might have been that I was in Sweden for 10 days, more on that later.

The first thing on the agenda for February was sowing sweet pea seeds. I was not only sowing seeds for my sweet pea patch but also I sell sweet pea starts which was incredibly successful. People love sweet peas, I can’t tell you how many people say that they remind them of their grandma or their father and how they used to grow them. That being said my greenhouse is full to the brim with sweet peas which are all growing very nicely. Most of them are ready to be moved outside in the next week or so. They are best grown slow and cold - you want to create rugby players and not athletes. If you grow them too warm they with bolt and become long, skinny athletes.

In previous years I have had terribly problems with birds nibbling on them when they have been put outside and I have had to jerry-rig bird netting over them. This year my husband is constructing a “tunnel” with EMT conduit covered in heavy duty bird netting. This tunnel will have shelves placed in it and a door so I can walk into it…..I will show you pictures next month, but needless to say I am very excited about this and very grateful that my husband is willing to build this for me.

***Sweet peas growing nicely in the greenhouse.***

I was also able to take a little time to be creative, which was one of my goals for 2024. I spent some time creating a couple of everlasting wreaths. I love using dried flowers from my field and being able be able to get lost in the creative process, blocking out all distracting chatter of the outside world.

***Everlasting wreath created with flowers from my field***

February also included a wonderful trip to Sweden. My friend’s daughter is working in Northern Sweden for a few months so we decided to go and visit her. We started in Stockholm which is such a beautiful city. We then headed north to a town called Arvidsjaur. It is a very small town up near the arctic circle. It was minus 27f when we arrived - the hairs in your nostrils froze! Dressed in many layers we explored the area and fell in love with it. The main industry there is tourism in the form ofGerman men coming and driving fast cars on frozen lakes -who knew that was a thing but it keeps the town going in the long dark winter days. We even went dog sledding which was so fun. I truly fell in love with Sweden and of course would like to go back. For now I am happy to be home. My husband asked me if I wanted to join him when he goes to England this summer - I have decided that two trips to Europe already this year is enough for me and we are heading home for Christmas. I just need to stay on the farm for a while!

The first seeds have been sown in the greenhouse, they are the ones that can survive cold temperatures - it is too cold in the Pacific Northwest to start all your heat loving flowers - hold off on those for several weeks. I have sown several different varieties of violas this year. They are so versatile, they are pretty dotted around your garden, but you can also include them in a salad or add them to a cocktail.

The remainder of February was spent preparing for my dahlia tuber sale. So much work goes into the tuber sale. Obviously the physical side of digging and dividing etc., but there is also inventory, the photography of all the dahlias and then the website work which also includes all the descriptions. Many, many hours on the lap top, but it was completed in time and I am happy to report it was a very successful sale - if you purchased some dahlia tubers from me, I do appreciate it so much.

***Slow mornings with coffee in Arvidsjaur, Sweden***

March will be a busy month, seed sowing will really kick into gear, all the dahlia tubers that I have sold will need to be packaged up ready to be shipped out and I am also hosting a couple of workshops on the farm. Welcoming people from the community onto my farm and sharing with them the things I love to do is one of my favorite parts of my job. I continue to dream up more ideas of how I can share this love as I think people now what experiences more that they want “things”. If you have any requests of an event you might like me to host on the farm do let me know.

Let’s hope that spring is just around the corner. Longer days are slowly edging their way in, now I just need to feel the warmth of the sun on my face as I look upwards.

Stay happy and safe, until next month.

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Monthly Musings - January 2024

February 4, 2024

Good morning friends, we have all survived January.

I returned from Europe refreshed and ready to go. It was fun trip with my 87 year old “Uncle”, he did not miss a beat & walked almost 6 miles through central London on the first day, taking in all of the Christmas lights and of course some champagne at the Champagne Bar in Harrods! We were in 4 countries in as many days - in fact we popped over to Sweden for lunch - love traveling in Europe! ~ I know he had a few stories to tell at the retirement home he lives in!

Minster Lovell, Cotswolds - England

I hit the ground running on my return. January is all about planning for the up coming season. An inventory of sweet peas seeds was the first thing on my list and then a field plan. I saved sweet peas seeds for the first time this year which was a wonderful feeling. I can’t wait to see what the sweet pea patch is going to look like this year.

Castlewellan Sweet Pea

I mentioned in one of my previous musings that I have decided to scale back my growing space this season so that I can have more of a balance in my life. I am going from two fields down to one. That being said, when it came to plan the new area where I am going to grow my annual flowers it was so difficult to plan because of course I want to grow all the flowers in all the colors! I did stay strong and have come up with a good field plan that I feel is balanced with everything that I will need for this season. I feel so fortunate that Erin from Floret Flowers sent me packets of her “Floret Original” seeds. These seeds are about to be released into the world on Tuesday. They are seeds that she has bred and developed herself over the past seven years - so they are so special. I am so excited for the zinnias seeds I have received from her that I have the opportunity now to grow them this year. I promise I will share the results this year with you.

The big project of the month was dividing dahlia tubers. Shannon, Penny and I sit down in the basement with hot mugs of tea and listen to BBC radio ~ we can tell you what is happening on the M25 around London - but no clue of what is happening here. We sit there and divide thousands of dahlia tubers. It used to be a project that I dreaded but honestly we have come to enjoy it. We have become fast and efficient and good at it so in actual fact it is quite fun now and there is much laughter amongst us. We are so close to the finish line which will be a major accomplishment. Once we have completed the dividing I will work on my field plan for the dahlias and then finally update my website so they will be ready to sell at the beginning of March - and as you are my email subscriber you will get first chance to buy the tubers.

The January weather in the Pacific Northwest has been all over the place. We had over a week of VERY cold weather - down to 12F at night…this is not normal for this area. I tucked all my plant babies up in frost cloth and hoped for the best. I am very happy to say everything survived well. By the end of January the temperatures were in the mid 60’s F - farming is not for the faint of heart for sure.

***January Sunrise on Willow & Mabel Garden Co.***

Soooooo….I know that I have only been back on the farm for a few weeks…but I am off again on Thursday. In December my friend asked me if I wanted to join her on a trip to Sweden to visit her daughter who is working there at the moment. You know I love to travel, there are so many places to go and experience different cultures, to open your mind to different ways of living and I think it makes you grow as a person. Off to Sweden I go. We are going to Stockholm and then we head north to a very small town called Arvidsjaur close to the Arctic Circle. Dog Sledding and the Northern Lights are on the itinerary!! If you follow me on Instagram you will be able to follow along with my adventures on my IG Stories.

Thank you as always for reading my musings, I know that your inbox is so very full with so many other emails, it means the world to me that you chose to read mine.

Much Love,

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Monthly Musings - December 2023

January 12, 2024

It is hard to believe that the year is just a hair’s breath away from the end.

December was all about the wreaths. The month started off harvesting mountains of greens for our Christmas Wreath workshops. I have to admit that this is one of my favorite projects, especially when it is not raining! We are lucky as we have access to some private woods that used to be a Christmas Tree Farm. It is over 100 acres, and it is so peaceful and the air so clear and fresh. After the constant hustle of the year I feel that going to this farm clears my head and helps me reset and gives me the energy to finish off the year.

I also create 100% sustainable wreaths for custom orders and my CSA subscribers. These are created using both local evergreens and dried flowers from my field. I love having the artistic freedom to create something a little bit different from your average wreath.

The first two weekends in December are always taken up by our wreath workshops. Kelly from Ciderpress Lane Lane and I started these wreath workshops in 2016 in a cold, damp barn. That year we sold about 30 tickets in total. After that bone chilling weekend my husband offered up his workshop for us to use. This event has now become an annual holiday tradition for so many people in the area, it now feels like we are welcoming back old friends into our space. This year we sold 250 tickets, and it make us so happy that we have created a wonderful space that our community continues to return to each year.

Closing out the year creating table arrangements, again I use the everlasting flowers that I have dried from the summer. We live in a part of the world where we don’t have any flowers at this time of year so rather that using imported flowers I like to use the flowers that are from my field but have been carefully dried. I feel that they are equally as beautiful now in their dried form as they are fresh in the field, you just have to open your mind to the difference.

Every year I say to the ladies that work with me, “I am not going to be putting my cold hardy annuals into the ground in December”. What do I do each year - put those annuals into the ground in less than pleasant weather conditions. These annuals can survive the cold weather and thus they have a jump start on the spring planted annual flowers. We managed to get all of these little fellas into the ground along with all the ranunculus that had been pre sprouted in my greenhouse. I have to say I was so glad to reach the finish line of this season. I am really hoping with the changes that I have in mind for next season that it won’t be such a marathon for me. I know that I will always be busy but I am hoping not the kind that feels like it is getting slightly out of control.

To add a little interest to our lives we took care of my son’s 6 month old English Lab called Jurgen for the past 6 weeks. He is from the same breeder as our Ruby Crumble. A very sweet pup but oh my goodness into everything. I think he has loved his 6 weeks here becoming a farm dog and it will be a shock to his little system going back to LA and our house is going to seem oddly quiet without him.

By the time you read this I will be in Copenhagen to celebrate the New Year with my sister and her family followed by a short visit with the rest of my family in England.

Thank you so much for all of your support this year and I am so amazed by the positive feedback from my little monthly musings, I promise to keep them up for 2024.

Stay safe & surround yourself with people you love.

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Monthly Musings - November 2023

January 12, 2024

I am sitting here in front of our lovely log fire, with our half decorated Christmas tree in the corner twinkling in the corner, with the gentle snoring of the dogs.
At the beginning of November I finished tucking away all of the dahlia tubers and I was very grateful that I was able to complete this whilst the sun was still shining and it was not too cold, believe me this is a miserable job in the cold and rain.
My bulbs finally arrived from the wholesaler - they arrived several weeks late and then they send me another batch in error - I started to panic when the second lot arrived as I wondered what on earth I had been thinking back in May when I had ordered them. Thankfully for once, it was not my error. I plant my bulbs in crates….I started doing this a few years ago and it has been one of my best discoveries yet. No digging trenches to plant the bulbs in and the crates can be moved around as necessary. My ranunculus have been “pre sprouting” in the greenhouse and on Monday they will be planted out.

We created the florals for our last wedding of the year. The wedding was over in Seattle which always makes me a little nervous with the transportation of so many flowers. Sadly these days our ferry system is not what it used to be so I never rely on them to get to Seattle when I need to be somewhere at a certain time, I make the drive South and then head north on I5 to Seattle and pray for light traffic - is there such a thing these days? I am glad to say that everything went smoothly and the flowers looked beautiful.
After I had finished setting up the wedding I headed to another special event. An engagement dinner celebration for my eldest son Will & his how fiancé Sam. I am so excited for them - they have been together for 10 years now - they won’t be getting married for a couple of years as Sam is finishing her Phd. at USC. No prizes for guessing where her wedding flowers will be coming from!

My biggest event of the year is the Christmas Wreath workshop which I collaborate with Kelly Welk from Ciderpress Lane A lot of planning goes into these workshops. I harvest all of the greens locally for this event with my trusty sidekicks Penny & Shannon. I am lucky to have access to a property that used to be a Christmas Tree Farm as well as several properties that surround my farm. I love my job in all of the seasons and even though it can be wet and cold, there is nothing better than being out in the middle of nowhere with no noise and the beautiful smell of evergreens.
In November I also start creating my special order wreaths. I try to make them a little different from your average wreath and include lots of dried elements into the evergreens. Along with the wreaths I have been working on my Christmas Baubles and mini wreaths. People often say to me “this must be a slow time of year for you”. Not a chance…but some slower times are ahead but for the moment I am enjoying this wonderful season that is currently upon me.

I still pinch myself that we are at the end of another year - and it is nothing short of a Christmas Miracle that I have kept up my Monthly Musings for a whole year, and I am actually enjoying writing them - it does not feel like a chore and it gives me chance to reflect on what I have achieved in the past month. Thank you for joining me for the ride, it means a lot to me.
Many of you know that I also try to make a trip home to England at the end of the year. Christmas is going to be spent here in our farmhouse, bustling with dogs, my sons and their girlfriends - which is pretty much perfect. I will then head off to London and Copenhagen for New Years - with my 87 year old English “Uncle” - he has never seen the Christmas lights in London so I am taking him to see those and then we will meet my sister and her family in Copenhagen to see in the New Year. We will of course spend time visiting family too.
I hope you have a wonderful Christmas in which ever way you choose to celebrate.
Much love and sparkles,

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Monthly Musings - October 2023

November 19, 2023

After the frantic month of September, October started with a more rhythmic pace. The dahlia field was still producing an abundance of flowers but with the cooling weather there was a noticeable change in colors - some varieties of dahlias have a definite color change as the season progresses. The annuals field was starting to look a little bit ropey…..(This a great English expression that means inferior or inadequate for those of your reading this side of the pond).

Each autumn I choose a date that my flower season will end. A lot of farmers use the first frost date as the end of the season. However, as the weather seems to be becoming more unpredictable I always decide on a date ahead of time that I will “pull the plug” so to speak. Because I have a very busy Christmas period I don’t want to be digging dahlia tubers at the end of November and go straight into harvesting greens for our Christmas wreath workshops.

I cut down my dahlias on the weekend of October 14th, they then cured in the field for a week. The big dig began, it took us 5 full days of digging to get all 2,400 tubers out of the field and washed. This year I used weed barrier in the dahlia field. This is going to stay down all year, so we carefully had to pull up the fabric, dig up the tubers and then lay & pin it back down again. Even though it was extra work at the beginning and end of the season it was 100% worth it. I was looking back at photos from last year and how bad the weeds were, I think I had forgotten how bad they were, all the extra effort was defiantly worth it. As I write this letter the last few varieties are drying off in the basement and by the weekend they will all be tucked away for a few months rest….that is also what I am hoping for!!

I have been doing a lot of soul searching over the past few months and have been thinking about what direction I want to take my business. I have just completed my ninth season in flower farming, each year I have grown and expanded because really that is what you are supposed to do with a business right? Well, with that growth has come longer hours and so much more work. I have hired staff but honestly the profit margins are so small in farming - all types of farming - that it is not always possible to hire as many people as you need, so you end up doing more yourself. This past couple of seasons I have felt like I have been running around with my hair on fire most of the time, working long hours from March until December. With that being said I made a big decision this month - don’t worry I am not throwing the towel in, but I am going to reduce back down to one flower field again. I have made the decision to no longer provide wholesale mixed bouquets to the local grocery store. I will still be supplying them with sweet peas and dahlias. In my one field I will be growing dahlias - but probably down to 1,700 plants - which is plenty. I will also be growing some annual flowers but not to the extent that I have done in the past. I am going to focus on growing flowers for my weddings, flowers for drying, CSA shares and then possibly some mixed bouquets that will be available directly to the public from my farm. I have more flower related ideas swirling around my head which I hope that this reduction in workload will let me execute, and I want to focus and have more time to be creative with my dried flowers. I am hoping to get a little bit more of a balance in my life from now on, and honestly I am not getting any younger and this farming malarky is defiantly hard on your body. The moral of this story is, that bigger is not always better, I can still be a small but very productive little flower farm and I am excited for the next season, which is how it should be.

November will be spent tucking up the rest of the farm for winter and then preparing for our Christmas Wreath workshops that we host here. Along with that, I will be able to spend some time in The Potting Shed getting creative making all sorts of goodies for Christmas with my dried flowers.

Thank you again for taking the time to read my monthly musings, I do appreciate it.

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Monthly Musings - September 2023

October 24, 2023

September - wow September….this truly was my busiest month since I started my business over nine years ago. It was all about weddings and events and so many flowers.

Shannon (my wedding flower side kick) and I produced flowers for 7 weddings in September. I usually like to do one wedding every other weekend so how I got to seven I really don’t know, but with a lot of hard work and organization we completed them. All the weddings were using flowers from my field, I am loving it that people are choosing seasonal flowers. One of the weddings that was closest to my heart was for Marissa & Dan, those of you close to me will know why. The sneak peak at their photos made me so happy.

September was also full of visitors. My parent’s from England, both of my boys came to visit at different times and my “uncle Bob” - not a true uncle but he went to school with my dad - probably about 100 years ago, so he is like family came to stay too. We celebrated my parents 60th wedding anniversary, which is quite the milestone. The house was full and so was my heart - I was probably not the best host during the crazy busy month but it was still a lovely time.

The dahlia field continued to produce so many beautiful blooms, all the hard work in the spring definitely paid off, this has been my most successful dahlia season to date. I hosted my very first U-pick dahlia evening which was definitely a success and I will continue to host this evening in future years. So many people taking photos in the fields and going home with buckets full of blooms.

Jess Vallance and I started September by documenting with photography some more dahlias in the field. It was one of those perfect evenings that you want to bottle and save for the winter months. Beautiful warm sunlight, the dogs and her baby behaving whilst we chatted and took photographs. It was probably one of my favorite evenings from this summer.

Towards the end of September I hosted an intimate everlasting wreath workshop at the farm. A small group of ladies created a half moon wreath with flowers that I have dried from my farm. I love working with dried flowers and it was so lovely to see other people finding the joy in this too.

The evenings are getting darker and cooler and the season is drawing to an end, even though the flowers will be finished there is still plenty of work to do preparing for winter, so there is no rest in sight for a while yet, but in the meantime I am enjoying the glorious fall weather that we receiving in the Pacific Northwest.

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Monthly Musings - August 2023

September 3, 2023

August marks the heady days of summer. The grass around our farmhouse is so dry and the only thing that has survived is the dandelions.

The month started off with a beautiful wedding at Kiana Lodge, this was my only wedding of the month. Usually August is back to back weddings however this year it is all about September weddings. This has actually given me a little hiatus and enabled me to somewhat keep on top of the farming tasks that are always calling at this time of year.

I always host a workshop at my farm in August where you can come and cut flowers from me field and I give a hands on demonstration on how to create a beautiful floral arrangement. In years gone by this has been held during the day, but with our summers becoming hotter and the flowers and myself start to wilt during the heat of the day I decided to change things up and host what I decided to call The Golden Hour workshop. It was held when the sun was starting set on the field and it becomes magical out there and the flowers take on a beautiful hue. It was such a success and I will continue to host The Golden Hour in future years.

When I last wrote my monthly musings I was patiently or maybe not so patiently waiting for my dahlia field to burst into life. Oh my goodness, it was worth the wait. She has not disappointed. The dahlia field is everything I had hoped for and more. All the hard work that we put in at the beginning of the season has paid off. The landscape fabric has kept the weeds under control and all of the plants are looking so healthy.

Any free evening I now have is spent out in the dahlia field documenting all of the varieties. I had my lovely friend Beth from Cactus & Clay Ceramics create a custom pitcher or jug - depending on what side of the pond you are from, so that I can photograph all my dahlias in it. It is perfect for the job. It is a race against time as I have around 140 varieties to photograph and some of them start to change color as the season progresses and the weather cools down.

The month was finished off providing flowers for the Freedom dinner at Ciderpress Lane Such a beautiful event raising money and awareness for a very meaningful cause. If you have never been to a Freedom Dinner you need to make space on your calendar, they are such wonderful events. I feel privileged to be a small part of them by providing flowers from my field.

September brings so many weddings and a field packed with dahlias, it is going to be a beautiful month.

Until October, stay healthy & safe.

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Monthly Musings - May 2023

August 4, 2023

May, well May flew by in a blink of an eye. I am happy to report that is was a month full of sunshine and productivity.

The beginning of May started with unusually hot temperatures, in the heat of the day we started planting the annuals out into the field. Slowly the field started to fill up and the greenhouse emptied out. It felt so good to start getting these babies into the ground.

The main item of the agenda for May was the dahlia field. Last year the weed situation in the dahlia field was soul destroying, I am not ashamed to admit that last summer I cried a couple of times out there whilst fighting the loosing battle with weeds. This year I have decided to try something different. I am using weed barrier (landscape fabric), I have always been hesitant to use it for dahlias but with the guidance of another local farmer who uses it for her dahlia field I decided to make the leap. Before anything could be planted we had to cut 2,500 large X’s into the landscape fabric so the dahlia tubers could be planted into them. My husband helped me with this lovely little project, creating a job template so everything was spaced correctly - I am sure that was love in his eyes that I could see when was doing this project with me - well I am going to pretend that is was! If you ever meet him, just don’t bring up the subject for your own safety! Anyway, we persevered and got the job done. Compost, irrigation and said landscape fabric was laid out in the field.

Next came the planting of the dahlia tubers. Field plan in hand, well on my phone we got to it….amongst all this my brother came over to stay with me from England….you never come over to our farm for a true holiday…less than 24 hours after arriving he was planting dahlia tubers! We took a four day break in the tuber planting frenzy to fly to LA for my youngest son’s graduation from University - it was hotter in Washington than LA…strange times! I am very happy to say that all the dahlia tubers are now planted and some are already appearing up through the landscape fabric. I will admit that with the stop, starting of planting some of my rainbow plan of planting dahlia tubers went awry..a few of my pinks did not go into the correct place, but as I learnt last month there are way worse things that can happen in life than some pinks being in the wrong place!

Mother’s Day weekend saw Kelly from Ciderpress Lane & myself host a Spring Tea and Market. Again another glorious weekend weather wise and the event was a huge success with so many people from the local community and further afield stopping by the farm. We are both so grateful for the continued support we receive for our events that we host.

Everything is starting to bloom. Beautiful peonies and David Austin Roses are in full swing at the moment. The scent from lilacs has been replaced in the orchard by the sweet smell of honeysuckle bursting through. The first of my cold hardy annuals are now flowering. So much to look forward to this summer.

If you have got this far in reading my monthly musings, thank you so much for taking an interest in my flower farm, it means the world to me.

I hope that you are starting to enjoy your gardens this summer, whether it be in some container pots on the deck or a large piece of land you tend to, I hope you gain much enjoyment from them.

Until next month.

With much love,

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Monthly Musings - July 2023

August 4, 2023

Each month when I sit down and start writing I have to look through my photos on my phone to jog my memory and remind myself what was happening on the farm.

July was all about the sweet peas, which I am not sad about! I just love them, I have grown them for about 20 years now - way before I was a flower farmer. Despite the heat that has been relentless around here, the sweet peas have coped remarkably well. As I write this letter they are still blooming and are at least 7 feet tall in some varieties. I have all but stopped harvesting them - apart from the occasional bunch for my bedroom. Now I will let them set seed and over the next few weeks harvest the seeds and store them for next year. Sweet pea seeds are hard to come by in the United States - I grow mainly the Spencer variety, making sure they have long stems and are heavily scented - what is a sweet pea without that delicious scent? In years gone by I was easily able to have them shipped from England but that has been changed due to the hoops with customs that the growers have to jump through so I have decided that I am going to save my own seed this year and just possible introduce one or two new varieties.

The annuals field is now in full swing which means creating bouquets twice a week for Town & Country Markets, it is always a race in the early mornings to beat the heat at the moment. I am loving the beauty that comes out of this field, and sometimes I have to stop and remember that each one of those plants we started by seed and then hand planted into the ground.

My new Drying Room has almost been completed, a few pieces will make it complete but I have already started to hang so many bunches of flowers up to dry. One of my new favorites that I have grown this year is Helipterum also known as Paper Daisy. They are a dainty little flower of pinks and whites and as their name would lead you to believe they have a papery texture which makes them a perfect flower to dry. I am also growing some beautiful shades of statice this year - this is another flower that I did not particularly care for years ago but now seeing the different shades of color, it is a must have for my fresh flower bouquets and drying room. Of course there are strawflowers and this year and I have so many more colors - last year I overdid it a little with the vintage white!

The dahlia field….it is looking great but it seems to be taking FOREVER to bloom. I have spoken to many of my flower farming friends in this area and everyone is in the same boat. They took off well but then the growing slowed right down, due to the continued heat. Every time I go to the field I see more blooms appearing and there are plenty of buds, so very soon it should be a field of color. The other thing that is appearing in my dahlia field is deer…..by the looks of it they are not even using the path way but going down the middle of the rows, so I another job on the endless list is to also the corral the ends of each row so they can’t walk down there. Deer typically don’t eat dahlias, and I am hoping it stays that way.

That’s it for now. Enjoy your August and whatever you have planned.

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Monthly Musings - June 2023

August 4, 2023

Here I am again sitting with my laptop on my knee in The Potting Shed with Charlie the dog sleeping under my desk gently snoring away, yet again I can not believe that I am about to turn over another page on the calendar.

June is what is often called “the maintenance month” - that is actually another word for weeding! Almost everything has been planted in the field and I am really trying to keep on top of the weeding. Even though I use weed barrier in my fields it seems that weeds can find their way through the tiniest of holes. Last year was a terrible year for weeds for me so I am determined to keep on top of it this year so it has meant day after day of being on my hands and knees pulling weeds.

The weather has been very warm with no rain in the Pacific Northwest which has been encouraging everything to flower prematurely. With the hot weather comes the constant dance of keeping everything irrigated. It is a constant rotation that can not be forgotten, because of a couple of days of missed watering can have dire consequences.

The sweet peas have been blooming for a few weeks now but the plants are a lot shorter that they usually are, but they are starting to catch up and the stem length is still good, which is important when I am selling them and of course they are so fragrant. As I walk past my sweet pea patch I catch the fragrant scent hanging in the air. I always get asked which is my favorite flower and it defiantly has to be the sweet pea.

June also ushers in all the beautiful roses. I grow roses just for my personal enjoyment. I find that David Austin garden roses, which are the ones that I grow, don’t have a very long vase life so I tend not to include them in market bouquets, but they are so beautiful to have in the house for a fleeting few days.

This month I also did something that I don’t typically do. I took a week off and went to Italy! I have decided that life is too short not to do the things you love to do, you just never know what is around the corner. As my husband is a teacher we have opposite seasons as far our down time goes, but I decided to be daring and we went to Rome for a week. It truly was the best time. All the amazing architecture and history, add in all the great food and wine, I did not regret going for one second and we certainly embraced the Mediterranean way of life by having a siesta every day…..with the heat that we are having here I think I need to incorporate that into my day!

July starts with a beautiful wedding using all locally grown flowers. I am so proud to say that all the weddings that I create the florals for are using my flowers or flowers from local farms. Nothing is imported or treated with chemicals and it makes me so happy that brides are now aware of the importance of locally grown.

Enjoy the summer months, and I hope you are able to find a lovely space in your garden to enjoy a warm evening with friends with a cool drink of some sort.

With much love,

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Monthly Musings - March 2023

May 4, 2023

It's April already! Honestly, the month of March went by so quickly. Before I sat down to write about the goings on at the farm I actually had to pull out my planner and look at what I actually have been doing! I know I have been really busy but with what!

Once I looked at my planner I realized why I have been so busy. The month started with my dahlia tuber sale. The preparation for that is enormous. Not only do we spend several weeks dividing the dahlia tubers but then there is the preparation of the website, making sure that you have good photographs and descriptions to include with each variety and as I had 117 varieties for sale this year that is another time consuming project. I am so happy the way the dahlia tuber sale went. No problems with the website crashing or any scary disasters like that and the majority of the tuber varieties sold out, so I consider that a big success.

All of my sweet peas are now in the ground surrounded by fencing this year to protect them from the bunny parties that seem to go on after dark on our property. Never have we experienced bunnies before. The dogs love to chase them so this is a highly encouraged activity for them!

Seed sowing kicked up into high gear this month. I start everything from seed in my greenhouse, nothing is directly sown into the field as the weed pressure is too high. The greenhouse is now full to bursting with little seedlings growing away nicely. It is a big shuffling act. I only have room for so many tables with heat mats, so as soon as a tray of seeds has germinated the tray needs to be taken off the heat mat and onto a shelf and another tray of seeds goes onto the heat mats. One of my favorite times of day is to go to the greenhouse for morning watering to see what has germinated in the past 24 hours. I never fail to get excited when I see little specks of green peaking through the soil, and I am now of an age where reading glasses are a must for such inspection!

It is good to have some creativity each month to keep a nice balance. I learnt from Bex from Botanical Tales how to make a “Living Wreath”. Using moss, exquisite violas and grape hyacinths with some foliage and dried seed heads. I was so happy with the results. Learning new skills all the time is important for personal growth, no matter what your field of joy or your age.

Looking into April, we have the packaging and shipping of all our dahlia tubers in the first week - yes, I have said it before and I will say it again, they are a labor of love!! Then the field prep will begin, I still can not believe that the season is really under way. By the time I write to you next month if the weather continues to cooperate I will have the first flowers in the ground.

Enjoy the spring, step outside and take deep breaths wherever you may be and above all else keep moving forward.

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Monthly Musings - February 2023

March 6, 2023

I sit here curled up by our glorious fire, which makes winters definitely more bearable thinking about February. It is always a hard month. The fun of the holidays is way behind us and we are now in a holding pattern, desperate for some warmer weather to arrive.

A large part of February was spent underground like a little mole. We started the mammoth task of dividing dahlia tubers. I now have 150 different varieties of dahlia tubers. Each one stored in its own container - so as you can imagine our basement where they are tucked away each winter is getting pretty full. My intrepid crew sat with me each day with mugs full of tea and BBC radio playing in the background for almost three weeks dividing dahlia tubers. Honestly, we actually quite enjoy it now. Lots of chat and laughter made the days go quickly and we were finished a week ahead of schedule which was a huge bonus.

Then came the next mammoth task - honestly any project that involves dahlias is not small. They are definitely a labor of love! Deciding which dahlia tubers I am going to sell, which will go back into the field and then finally updating my website - farming is the easy part for me, dealing with websites is a whole other beast but job complete, and by the time you read this musing the tuber sale will be in full swing with hopefully no technical glitches!

Above ground in the greenhouse the sweet peas are growing nicely, they will be put outside hopefully in the next couple of weeks...I want the weather to be a tad warmer at night than it is at the moment. I also have to build some sort of structure to protect them from the birds which like to nibble on them, so another job on the never ending list.

We also started the first batch of seeds - these are for the more hardy plants. They are on heat mats in the greenhouse with dome lids on them plus at night I have to literally tuck them in for the night as it is so cold. I have long lengths of bubble wrap that I put over them at night to keep in the heat as the greenhouse is unheated. Quite the palaver but worth the effort.

Amongst all these other projects this month I have received several custom dried wreath orders. This is part of my business that I am trying to expand so it makes me really happy that orders are starting to come for some custom wreaths. It makes a lovely change to be creative like this especially in the depth of winter.

The new drying room progress is creeping along. I do my very best to try and not nag! I am so excited about it so I have to just be patient and be very grateful that my husband is doing this on the weekends - he is a third grade teacher and those little kids can be just a little exhausting at times!

Now that we are into March the narcissus daffodils are starting to peek out of the ground and everytime I walk through the property there are new signs of life everywhere. I don’t think that I could anywhere where there are not four seasons. Working on a farm you are so aware of how quietly they keep moving forward.

I hope that your March is a good one and that the weather is kind to you wherever you may be.

Thank you for taking the time to read my musings from my little farm.

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Monthly Musings - January 2023

January 27, 2023

Good morning friends,

I am never one for making New Year's resolutions as such but I make little lists of things that I would like to accomplish in the year. One of the items on my list is to send out monthly musings of the happenings on the farm. This is pushing me well outside my comfort zone, I looked on my website the other day and saw that the last blog post that I did was in 2019….the only consistency there is that I just did not write a blog post…the other thing that has pushed me to start this is my increasing frustration with social media….the singing dancing reels are just not me…I can put together video clips but they are time consuming and honestly I would much rather look at a beautiful still photograph, that a bunch of reels flashing in front of my eyes with some rubbish music hurting your ears, do you feel the same?

So what happened on the farm in January I hear you say (or maybe you didn’t but I am going to tell you any!)…..I returned from a much needed break in England & Spain over Christmas with my family. I always try to leave the farm at the end of December so that I can recharge, take a break and come back ready to go again. January is usually filled with slower jobs, usually in The Potting Shed - for those of you that don’t know, a few years ago we converted our Potting Shed into a studio/office and I still refer to it as The Potting Shed. What I like about this time of year is that you don’t feel that you have to do everything at breakneck speed.

This month I have met with several lovely brides to discuss their wedding florals. I am so grateful that all my brides want gorgeous, colorful bouquets using seasonal flowers from my field…..that was always my goal for the weddings that I worked on and it makes my heart so happy that it has turned out that way. Along with wedding quotes I have been working on the dreaded taxes….owning a small business you wear so many different hats, and this hat is the most uncomfortable for me to wear, so I usually toss it in the corner and ignore it for most of the year….and then regret it come January.

Last season I started drying flowers in large quantities for the first time. I used our old goat shed for that…..however, it is not insulated….I knew I was dicing with devil using this, the plan was to insulate it this month…however I discovered that some of my flowers are starting to mold….so we have come up with a plan…..it was going to cost too much to run the correct power out to the shed and insulated it. Plan B is to build a small room inside my husband’s workshop…I can not believe that writing this…my husband does have a big shop, bigger than our house…it is his pride and joy and I am so very grateful that he is giving up a corner of it for me… and building it out so I can have a warm dry room to dry my flowers…over the next few months I will update you with the progress.

The last exciting piece of news is that for my wedding anniversary this month my husband gave me a “new to us” Kubota Utility vehicle, who says romance is dead! This will help me so much, hauling stuff around, going to and from the field. I think he has scored big points this month!

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