Integration: 2 Blogs Become One

 

After some consideration, I've decided to move all the blog posts that used to be part of my Bluebird Flower Farm business webpage, over to here.  I shut down that one with the move, at the same time as I closed my business. I am still unsure of what the future holds for me, business-wise, and I didn't want to continue paying for the webpage and blog while I figured it out.

Despite that, there are some things that I still want to reference, moving forward.

For those of you who were unaware of my business, this may give you some insight into what took me away from this blog for so long! So, if you see posts popping up where no posts have been before, that's why. Take a look! You may enjoy seeing my flowers. :) I miss them, so this will be good for me too.

Saying Goodbye is Hard to Do

 

This has been a big summer. Along with the rest of the world, COVID has changed my business and my personal life in big and small ways, across the board. However, before coronavirus ever reared its ugly head, my husband and I had been discussing the possibility of a move. He has been looking for a new job for some time now, and none of the options here in Utah were quite right.

So we decided to look further afield. We have always loved the Oregon Coast, so that’s where we began applying for jobs. After an interview trip in June, we decided to accept an offer in Astoria, Oregon. We are excited to move there! I think this will be a great move for our family.

However, I am sad about closing up my business here and all that I’ve built and grown over the past 2.5 years. In fact, I have put off writing this post for longer than I should have, probably. We are in the thick of packing up, and getting our house sold, and it really is time to say goodbye. I just hate to let this go!

I am thankful for all I have learned. It has been an intense season of learning for me, in all aspects of the business, from growing flowers for profit, to designing, to marketing and business-related things. I have loved every bit of it! It has brought me so much joy to share my love of flowers with you and your loved ones!

Thank you for all of your support. For your orders, yes, but also for your encouragement! Running a farm and a business are both endeavors with big ups and downs. I so appreciate all those who have helped me get up and dust myself off after the myriad of disappointments, and keep going. Also, for those who have cheered me on through the successes—thank you!

I don’t know what the future holds for my little flower farm and business, at this point. We have not found a home yet in Oregon, so we may be renting for awhile—which could make it hard to grow things. We are homeschooling our kiddos, and I already know that will take up a significant amount of my time moving forward. So, I don’t know any specifics yet.

What I do know is that I still love flowers! I will continue growing them and sharing them. There are many different farmer-florist business models out there. I’ve given some thought to changing directions with this business when I open back up again—possibly running it as a U-Pick, or a non-profit (deliver to seniors or hospitals, or….?) At the same time, I truly love the everyday flowers—seeing the spark of happiness on someone’s face when they open the door and realize that someone they love has remembered them and cares about what they’re experiencing—happy or sad. When the time is right to open back up, I will see what would be the best fit and go from there.

I am truly grateful to have had this experience. I will be leaving all my flowers behind, but I will bring with me all that I have learned—along with lots of seeds! :)

Let’s stay in touch!

I will keep my bluebirdflowerfarm Instagram account open and would love to see you over there!

The In-Betweens

Apple blossoms

Just delivered week 3 of my Spring Subscriptions. One more week to go! This has been such a fantastic experience—I am loving it! It makes me so happy to share my flowers with people who appreciate them and are excited to receive them every week. It makes me very tuned in to what is blooming each and every week, as well, and where I have gaps to fill. Just for my own note-taking, it’s time I make a list of what I have had blooming each week so far, along with ideas for filling in more of those gaps.

I’m going to list the date from each Thursday, as that’s when I have been and will be cutting blooms for subscriptions. I put in all caps what I had the most of in a given week.

Week of:

April 9: Earliest daffodils (too small to harvest for subs)

April 16: Frittilaria meleagris—still pretty short, 8-10” (kept growing taller each week, until eventually 2+ feet!)

April 23: DAFFODILS (most in gooseneck stage probably 4-5 days earlier.)

April 30: Early tulips, fully open. (Would need to harvest earlier if to be used for subs/cuts—so maybe 4-23?). Still daffodils, hyacinths, and also grape hyacinths. Camassia? (Picked some week of 5-14, but most were done by then.)

** May 7: TULIPS—mid singles (all my orange, red, and yellows,) and early doubles (my purples). Lilac buds—just swelling and turning a pretty purple color. Last of the daffodils.

May 14: LILACS. A few late tulips, including parrots. First of the perennial bachelor’s buttons and early alliums. ORNAMENTAL PLUM, apple blossoms, pie cherry.

May 21: PERENNIAL BACHELOR’S BUTTONS. (Harvested 1 bucket, could have cut 5 or 6 more buckets full.) ALLIUMS (these were the big purples, most of the smaller haven’t quite bloomed yet but have buds.) Ornamental plum foliage (blossoms all dropping,) ninebark foliage. 1 early iris blooming (not enough for subs.) Catmint—too short for subs. (I planted ‘Junior Walker’ to fit into the allotted space better, but if I plant the regular ‘Walker’s Low’ next time, I’ll bet they would be long enough to cut.)

Speculation for next week: (May 28): Bearded irises—they all have buds. More perennial bachelor’s buttons. Hoping for wintered-over annual BB’s to start up production. Right now have 2 blooms open on those. Possibly the smaller white alliums, although their stems are still so short! Will try pulling them, like tulips, and see if that gives me long enough for subs.

Spring subscription leftovers: lilacs, ornamental plum, and a couple of short camassias!

A couple of thoughts:

Maybe next year I should offer a 4-week Spring Flower Subscription from the last Friday in April to the week after Mother’s Day, then give myself a break during this gap. I’m really hoping my irises will come through for me next week, but I’m going to be combing through the rest to find stuff to put with them. I may have to purchase from a fellow farmer to fill out the bouquets.

All of my peonies have many buds on them (!) but the only ones that even stand a chance of being ready for next week’s subscriptions are the Coral Charm out front.

Other flowers with buds right now: columbine (out front), salvia (still very short), clematis

Flowers I need to plant more of to fill in this gap are: bearded irises, alliums, and flowering shrubs. I have leaned pretty heavily on my flowering trees and shrubs for filler during these early times. I haven’t cut any of the fruit tree branches to put in, although I would consider it if we had several trees.

I also want to try again at growing anemones and ranunculus next year, in hopes of them filling in this mid-May gap.

My cool flowers have pretty much just sat in their rows and done nothing for the past 6 weeks. I need to figure out what’s going on with them, because I think they should be blooming right now to help fill in as well. At least some of them should be. That’s the point of planting them in April, isn’t it? So I’ll be very interested to see when they actually start blooming. They are getting bigger and finally look like they’re growing, but no flowers yet. I think those really hard freezes mid-April may have set them back quite a bit.

Also, when are my hundreds of Dutch irises going to bloom? Seriously! I was counting on them to help a sister out right about now, but I don’t even see buds on them yet. Maybe they’re waiting for an invitation.

p.s. We are heading out of town in a week. If my peonies and Dutch irises all bloom while we’re gone I will be fit to be tied!

** Spring Subscriptions started. Also, Mother’s Day weekend (5-10).

First and Last

Last of the daffodils for this year.

This was a great week for us here at Bluebird Flower Farm! Our Spring Subscription started last Friday. YAY! I’m always watching for what’s blooming, but last week I was watching everything like a hawk, I tell you! Particularly the tulips—as I mentioned, tulips blow open very quickly in the heat, and I knew we were going to have some warm days mid-week. I needed every tulip I could get my hands on for the subscriptions (x 3) plus 7 Mother’s Day arrangements.

So I was going out a couple of times per day to pull up any tulips that were ready and get them in the cool garage. “Ready” meaning “still closed but showing a hint of color.” I also cut lilac buds and harvested the last of the daffodils, and the first of the perennial bachelor’s buttons. Fun times. I did end up purchasing some flowers from a flower farm in Ogden that sells wholesale, which was great too! Tom grows such beautiful flowers and I was happy to be supporting a fellow flower farmer. I purchased a little bit of greenery from the regular wholesaler as well. I had a good mix that was mostly locally grown blooms. Just a note: as my subscriptions are a harvest share, I used all my own flowers and filler for those!

I had a lot of fun putting together arrangements again. I missed that in April! I put together a few for myself last month, but there’s nothing like making them for someone else and then seeing the joy they bring to that person when you deliver them.

This is the exact stage my alliums are at right now—just breaking open. This was taken last year, on May 19. We are a full week ahead of last year!

This week I’m looking forward to subscriptions again. It’s going to be a purple week! I’ve got 2 different types of alliums in bloom, both purple, plus blue violet camassias, baby blue camassias, and purple perennial bachelor’s buttons. I may even find a few grape hyacinths (purple and blue as well!) to add in there. My daughter and I experimented last week, tugging the grape hyacinths down at the base, so that they come off the bulb itself underground. That gave us another good 6” of stem, so I think they would be long enough for the subscriptions. For foliage, I will probably cut the ‘Dart’s Gold’ ninebark that’s so pretty right now, as well as some of my ornamental plum branches which are flowering.

I want to add in lilac blooms, but I need to experiment first and make sure I know how to keep them hydrated. So maybe this week I’ll cut some and try some new tricks I’ve learned along those lines, and see how long they hold up. Then I can add them in next week if they don’t wilt in 2 days. The lilac buds were awesome in last weeks’ bouquets.

We are working on getting permanent irrigation installed in the garden (pvc pipes underground that connect to removable drip tape in the beds). That will be amazing, once we get it going. Then we can leave on vacation and not worry about everything dying off while we’re gone!

All the starts I planted out the first week of April are growing, but very slowly. I’m going to give them some fishy fertilizer this week and see if that won’t give them a bit of a boost. I need those flowers! C’mon ladies—get a move on! I’ve got dahlias hardening off, and phlox and statice still inside, that I need to bump up to 2” blocks this week as well, so I can start hardening them off.

I have found, in our dry and windy climate, that the 3/4” blocks just don’t do well at all in hardening off stage. If I want anything to survive past that, they have to be in bigger blocks, or in a plastic cell that will retain the moisture. I have a bunch of starts in peat pots, as well, but I’m not a fan. They dry out so quickly, and I think they are wicking moisture away from the roots of the starts, since the peat pot doesn’t stay moist. Again, wind. So I have decided from here on out, I will just collect the plastic 4” pots to reuse in that instance.

Lastly, I need to purchase some Wall O’ Waters for my kiddos’ tomato plants. They are hardened off and need to go in the ground soon, but we are still having cold nights. Again, I don’t want one night of frost to ruin weeks of work keeping those beauties alive!

Always more to do, right?

What do you have growing right now?

On Again, Off Again: Frost Cloth

 

Can we just talk about the weather for a minute? Hey—don’t roll your eyes! This is a farming blog, after all. Weather factors in to everything!

So, as to be expected in April, we have had some snowstorms. I grumble about those, but they melt off fairly quickly, and here in the desert—any water is good water, usually.

What I hadn’t expected this month was the super low night-time temperatures we’ve been having. I’m talking January-esque temperatures! There have been 2 different nights that we have gotten down to 15 degrees. Cold enough to kill a lot of plants. Several more nights have been in the low 20’s.

Mother Nature makes a rotten business partner! So what can you do to anticipate and plan for her mood swings?

First up—only plant things in the spring that can handle spring weather! All of the plants I’ve got out there right now are cold hardy annuals—they don’t mind a light frost, and laugh at a snowstorm. (Well, I assume they’re laughing on the inside.) Any warm weather lovers like tomatoes or basil are going to take a lot more work to keep alive if planted before nights have warmed up reliably.

Secondly, protect what you’ve got. While my snapdragons do fine with overnight temps in the mid-20’s on up, if it’s going to be colder than that, they need some help! One thing I’ve gotten on board with this year is frost cloth—specifically, Agribon-30. It’s all the white up there in picture, if you didn’t catch that already. Frost cloth keeps your plants a couple of degrees warmer than the forecast. It doesn’t sound like much, but it can be the different between slimy, frost-nipped plants, and healthy happy ones. Believe me.

A few of things to be aware of if you’re using frost cloth:

1. It lets rain through, but if you get snow on top of it, it can crush your plants. Rain—YES. Snow—NO! (Hey, that’s kind of catchy. Let’s make it into a rap! Or…you can do that on your time. Carry on!) I left it on through a rainy day last week, because the following night was going to get very cold again, but the one day it snowed I was out there pulling it off.
2. If your daytime temps get above 50 degrees, your little plantlings can get too hot under there, and that also will not be good. Off it comes.
3. It can be doubled up to provide even more protection, which is what I’ve done on those super cold nights.
4. It is quite difficult to put on by yourself if there’s any sort of breeze blowing. Just be forewarned.
5. Don’t waste your time with Agribon-19. It’s as thin as tissue paper and rips very easily, while not providing very much protection for your plants.

I am happy to report that nearly all of my plants survived our super extra cold nights so far this month! Have I been taking frost cloth off and on far more than I ever wanted to? Yes. Have I protected my investment from the wild swings in temperature? Also yes. The extra hassle of putting on and taking off the frost cloth has been worth it.

As a sidenote: I didn’t cover up anything that wintered over and they all also survived. So my parsley, Bells, the perennial cutting beds, bulbs—nope. I figured they’ve already been through a lot worse than this. They can take it!

I would love to get a cold frame at some point to help in these “shoulder seasons.” Another project for another day.

Time to Farm

Well, hello there! It has been a long month, hasn’t it? Since I last wrote, the coronavirus has swept through our nation and shut down all kinds of businesses in its wake. Including mine. My county issued a Public Health Order last week (seems like a long time ago!) asking all nonessential businesses to shut down. Not demanding—quite yet.

I had a hard decision to make. On the one hand, flowers are essential to me. On the other hand, I was having to go here, there, and everywhere to a) purchase the flowers and b) deliver them. I guess what tipped the scales towards “closed” for me, though, was that I’m doing this out of my home. There is really no way to guarantee that surfaces are sterilized. Not when I have my 2 year old climbing up to help and other children coming in and out every few minutes. Also, my husband works in the medical field, so the chances of him being exposed and then possibly bringing it home are higher than either of us would like to think about.

This one of the last ones I delivered last month, prior to shut-down.

So…until my temporary shut-down, I actually had taken 2 or 3 different orders from my Google listing and delivered them. That was fun while it lasted. I also have at least 2 people wanting to sign up for a spring CSA subscription (yay!), but I have told them we would just have to keep in touch on that. Here’s hoping I can start back up in time for that goodness.

Even though my floral design work has stopped for now, I have been using any and all extra time FARMING! It has felt good to get back out there and get my hands in the dirt again. I am happy to report that I have had some success with seed-starting this time around, as well. YAY!! I’ve got 2 trays full of forget-me-nots that I just potted up from 2” blocks to 4” peat pots today, in hopes of Mother’s Day sales, along with another full tray of petunias, and a smaller one of pansies for the same purpose.

I also have ammi hardening off, and rudbeckia getting close to being ready for that. I’m thinking maybe one more week for the rudbeckias and they should be big enough to put outside.

Just today I started 6 more small trays of various and assorted flowers: orach, more rudbeckia, 2 types of phlox, statice, and dahlias.

I also bought a whole bunch of starts from Plant & Grow Nursery in Clearfield. I had been debating about buying starts, but in the end, they had a great sale (50% off retail!) and I just went for it. So I have them to thank for my 2nd cool weather succession planting, which ended up filling 3 rows! One whole row of Ammi ‘Visagna Green’ (there were more than I expected of that one), Madame Butterfly snaps, 3 varieties of scabiosas (Red Velvet, Candy, and Raspberry Scoop,) and 2 varieties of dianthus (Amazon ‘Neon Rose’ and Amazon ‘Rose Magic’).

I’m not exactly sure where I’m going to put everything that I’m currently starting, but in the past I have always had bare stretches, so if nothing else, these can fill in all the bare spots out there. Although, I do believe I will have room for maybe 2 more long flowerbeds to fill up.

Other than farming, I have been doing about the same thing as you, probably: homeschooling my kids, hardly leaving my house for any reason, trying to get outside every day for some fresh air and sunshine. Keeping my distance and becoming even more socially awkward than usual with those who do want to chat (from 6 feet away, of course).

Here’s hoping we can get back to more normal life soon!

How are things with you?

Spring Fever

Since Saturday, we have had our first true spring weather around here. In fact, up until last weekend, I still had several inches of snow outside covering every flat surface. Guess what? It has melted off in 4 days!! I am thrilled! Even with more on the horizon. I laugh in your face, March snow! HA!

(Now please don’t hit me with a blizzard. Pretty please.)

 

Hyacinths are the scent of spring.

If this keeps up, my soil will be dry enough to plant this week! That will be a first since we’ve lived here. In fact, I planned all my seed-starting calendars based on the first week of April as the earliest planting date, because last year we had snow on the ground or wetness from the sky until then. I really want to get my first round of early spring flowers in ASAP: ammi, bachelor’s buttons, dill, daucus, buplureum, poppies, atriplex…. probably more that I’m not remembering at the moment. If I could get them in THIS week, just think—I could have flowers by May! That would be amazing!

I’ve also cranked up the seed starting machine. So far I’ve gotten decent germination on forget-me-nots, great germination on the petunias, okay for pansies. These are all flowers I’m planning to grow up big in time for Mother’s Day. 2 months away now.

I feel like a seed-starting elf over here—making a list, checking it twice!

It just feels so good to get out in some sunshine without even a jacket on! My kids are all wearing shorts. I had to make them go back and put on shoes this afternoon—okay kiddos, 50 degrees is not THAT warm! I’m feeling it, though. The fever gets in your blood and you just have to be outside! They had their first picnic lunch this week. It was awesome.

I can hardly wait for my Spring CSA to start up! Alas, I have 6 weeks to wait. Again, last year—no flowers until very end of April—so I wanted to be sure I would have something to put in these bouquets! Do you know what CSA even means? Let me tell you. It stands for Community Supported Agriculture. The idea behind it is that you lovely people purchase a subscription in the winter or early spring months, when farms are experiencing a slower time for revenue. Your purchase allows us to buy what we need to grow all the pretty things—seeds, irrigation equipment, weed barrier—all of that. Then when we begin harvesting, you get a share of our harvest. Yay!

I’m so tickled to share flowers! So this makes me excited. Here are the details for my Spring CSA Subscription:

1—Starts April 24, runs for 6 weeks until May 29.

2—Every FRIDAY I will drop off a paper-wrapped bouquet for you. It will be a mixed bouquet of whatever I have growing that week.

3—Delivered to your door…or the door of a friend if you’ve purchased it as a gift for someone else. :)

4—No vases. I’m not charging you for them, either. As I mentioned, these will be wrapped in paper. What I ask you to do, so your gorgeous flowers don’t die, is put a clean bucket or vase filled with water on your porch Friday morning for me to drop the flowers into.

Just think about it: 6 weeks of daffodils. 6 weeks of tulips. 6 weeks of alliums, and bachelor’s buttons, and grape hyacinths, and so many pretty flowers! It’s going to be so beautiful!!

In the meantime, get off your computers and get outside!! That’s what I plan to do, anyway.

Valentine's Day Flowers: A Recap

 Valentine’s week was amazing and busy! I ended up making 45 arrangements!! It was such a great learning experience for me, particularly in regards to systems and the business end of things.

Yes, you get to see my messy garage right here too. #keepingitreal or #toolazytocleanforapicture

The week before Valentine’s I counted vases (and bought some more), and made sure I had the hard goods that I would need.

I also put in my biggest ever flower order that week, by phone. That was a mental math problem that I grappled with for a couple of days, actually! There were so many variables to add in, namely: total number of arrangements ordered, size of arrangements ordered, types of flowers needed, numbers of stems of each flower type to put into each arrangement, number of stems per bunch from the wholesaler, and of course, cost per bunch. Then after all that, I got to move on to total cost vs. total budget and make them align. Fun times!

Added on to that was the fact that I am a very visual person, particularly when it comes to putting flowers together. I really prefer to go in person and wander the cooler, choosing what looks freshest and what colors will complement each other well. It was hard for me to get on the phone and work from a list. It was a long phone call, even with all my number crunching beforehand, as I tried mightily to picture colors and textures, and how they would work together. For this order, though, that was not an option. I needed to reserve the flowers in advance or I ran the very real risk of what I wanted selling out.

So after I got the flowers ordered, I went and picked them up the following Tuesday. Tuesday afternoon my oldest son helped me prep flowers for a couple solid hours in the afternoon. This entailed removing the plastic sleeves and rubber bands, stripping any lower foliage, re-cutting stems, and organizing them into buckets by color. In the past I haven’t organized them in that way, but with so many arrangements to do I felt like it would save time to have all of the same color in the same buckets.

I went back and forth in my mind between thinking “I spent way too much money on flowers!” to “I’m not going to have enough—I’m going to have go back and buy more!” Yeah, two extremes.

Wednesday was go time! The majority of my arrangements were orders from my BNI group (YEAH!) so those needed to be ready Feb. 13, Thursday morning, because I was taking them to the weekly meeting. So we homeschooled until 2pm, then I put my 2 year old down for a nap and started on the flowers! My oldest 2 helped me with several of the bud vases, which accounted for more than half of the total orders.

It was a little overwhelming at the beginning, even figuring out where to start. So I started on the arrangements that were going to be the most unique in terms of colors and flowers, then moved on from there. I started filling up our kitchen counter and table with the finished arrangements, which we then had to move aside to eat dinner. (Oops! Hey, at least I had put dinner in the crockpot early on, so I didn’t have to stop for that once I got going.)

From there I just kept going and going until they were done, packed into boxes for transport, and ready for the next day. It was very late/early when I got to bed that night.

At first I thought buying the purple statice was a mistake, but I actually loved how it played off the purple eye of the anemone!

Between Wednesday and Thursday I received 3 more orders by phone—from my Google listing! Yay! All 3 were for large arrangements. At that point I was thankful that I had built in a bit of a cushion in my flower order. I knew it would be close and I could always just go see what was left at the wholesaler, but I was pretty sure I could make it happen.

I was able to get those 3 orders done Thursday afternoon, which left Friday morning for delivery of the remaining arrangements.

A couple of things I learned from this:

1— I need to get back to work on building out systems for my business, including writing out specific, stem-count recipes for my different arrangements. I am reluctant to do it, in a way, because I don’t want to be tied down to a specific recipe—I like to make each one unique as much as possible. However, as my business grows, I am going to need that structure more and more. It can always be a jumping off point, but for figuring out how many flowers I need to either cut or order, I need hard numbers!

1A—If I ever get employees, this will be even more important! It was great to have in mind exactly what I wanted in the bud vases, so I could tell that to my kiddos.

2—Anything I can do in advance, should be done in advance! The right number and size of vases, all washed and ready to go; even labels pre-made and ready to put on boxes. Anything would be helpful!

3—I love the “everyday flowers!” It was so fun for me to deliver flowers to people and share in that moment of connection—even when it was just at the door for a moment.

3A—I need to rethink my delivery charges, in terms of TIME! I don’t think I’m charging enough for how long it took me, including packing the flowers for transport and actually finding the addresses.

Connections, Numbers, and Dance Flowers

 The past couple of weeks have been very full.

I’ll start with some happy news: I received my first customer from my Google listing! Woohoo! That was exciting, and I was more than happy to make an arrangement for them. I had to go buy more flowers to have enough, but it was great!

This ranunculus was so very gorgeous! Man alive, I need to plant some this year!

Then, thanks to my husband coming home early one from work one night, I was able to drive down to Pleasant Grove, Utah, to Snuck Farm and attend the Utah Cut Flower Farmer Association meeting. That was such a great night! It was so energizing to be around like-minded people, to see friends I met at the first meeting last summer and make some new ones.

Plus, the topic was just what I’ve been looking for: NUMBERS. In other words, knowing my numbers as a business. What is my profit? What are my margins? What is my breakeven point? All of these things that I currently don’t know. We were given a basic overview of a specialized spreadsheet to figure this all out—the “breakeven” sheet—and even given a free copy of it via email to use.

Since the beginning of my business, cash flow has been an interesting struggle. As the old saying goes, “It takes money to make money.” Well, that’s certainly true when you have to purchase products in order to fulfill orders that come in. So, essentially, you have to already have a portion of the money in your bank account, in order to pay for the stuff so that you can make the money. I keep falling short beforehand. So I plan to get to work right away on this spreadsheet and see how I can help myself do better in those areas.

Now let’s talk about dance flowers. I finally called the high school and just asked when their dances were going to be, since that information is nowhere to be found online. I learned that there was a Sweetheart’s Dance on Feb. 1. Yes, last weekend. I purchased some floral supplies that I’ve needed for quite some time, and I watched several online tutorials, and then I put myself out there and advertised on a local Facebook page. I had made boutonnieres before, and silk corsages, but not fresh flower corsages yet.

I received 2 responses from that, plus a repeat customer from before. When I first saw that DM pop up on my screen, my heart was pounding so hard. Why was this so scary?! I don’t know, but it really was! I ended up with 3 couples that bought both a corsage and a boutonniere from me. I gave them a discount if both were purchased through me. So 3 corsages, 3 bouts. Ready, steady go!

I knew that the day of, Saturday, was going to be quite a busy day because 2 of my kids had basketball games in the morning. So I knew I wouldn’t be home to even get started until 11am or so. I prepped the flowers the night before, using Sue McCleary’s hydration chamber technique.

Saturday came, we got home from basketball, and I started making flowers. I used Oasis Floral Adhesive, which is obnoxious. It was my first time using it, and there was a bit of a learning curve. It’s a lot like rubber cement—in fumes output as well as habit. The bouts were wired and taped the traditional way.

I had staggered pickup times, to give myself some leeway for getting each thing done. The problem was that one customer had ordered both items and so needed them both done at the same time. (Everything else had separate pickups.) I had done all the corsages first and was just starting in on the boutonnieres when she came to the door. That was when I realized my mistake.

I had to tell her that the boutonniere wasn’t done yet. It was awkward. She was super nice about it and said it was no big deal, and she would come back in a couple of hours. I even offered to drive it over to her as soon as I finished it, which she refused. Then I found out that she just lived up the street from me, so I felt a tiny bit better. Still, though—fail! If you tell someone it will be done at a certain time, it needs to be done by that time! Also, realization #2: I didn’t have a phone number for her to let her know in advance that it was going to take longer than anticipated. She and I had only interacted via IM online.

That was stressful. The middle pickups all went off fine. Then my last one came and I actually wasn’t quite done with that one either! Luckily, she’s a personal friend and was also very kind about it. It still added some stress, though to have to tell another person to come back later! I was going from one to the next nonstop, but it was taking longer than I had planned on. I was also a bit worried that with the glue, some of the flowers might fall off. They all seemed stable by the time I was finished with them, but that would have been bad to have this corsage that you just paid for start to lose flowers. Last week, I finally got up my courage and asked a few customers directly if their corsage had lost any flowers. The 2/3 I talked to, said they hadn’t. So that was a relief.

One reason I didn’t post last week was because I was still kind of coming down from the stress a little bit. It was still too recent. Actually making the corsages was fine—except for the annoying glue—but yeah, the timing. That was the kicker.

What worked well:

1. I was able to make each set unique from the others, even using some of the same flowers.
2. I think I did well with color matching for the colors I was given.
3. I finally just purchased some plastic clamshell-style boutonniere and corsage boxes from the wholesaler. I still want to find some that are not single-use plastic, but I needed something other than Ziploc baggies I had been using (those don’t give off quite the professional vibe I’m hoping for.) They were surprisingly affordable and were definitely a step up.
4. My awesome husband kept the kids out of the kitchen so I could work, then while I was still going and going, made lunch around me and got them all fed, and toddler down for a nap. Bless him!
5. I thought the finished creations were pretty. Hope the recipients liked them!

Here’s what I will do differently next time:

1. Get phone numbers for ALL my customers, not forgetting those who contact me via IM.
2. Use the full conditioning/hydration method so that I can make flowers the day before!! This one needs a couple of underlines!
3. Only promise pickup at a specific time if the flowers are already made, done, and waiting.
4. If I am running behind, use those phone numbers collected in #1 and let people know in advance so they don’t show up and not be able to pick up their stuff.
5. Learn more boutonniere finishing off tips and tricks. I get so focused on the flowers that I forget the boutonniere is supposed to have something tied around it to finish it off. I seem to use up all my creativity putting it together then I’m like “Well, now what?” That, or learn how to do the natural stems look. I didn’t put ribbons in the corsage, either. I don’t love that look, and even though it’s expected, I shy away from it.
6. Find some magnetic boutonnieres. The one gal said when she picked hers up—so how do these ones work, then? (I had forgotten to put a pin in with it! I quickly grabbed one.) She had only ever used the magnetic style.
7. Practice, practice, practice. I know the more I do these, the quicker I’ll get, and the less stressful the whole process will be. I just hope my current and potential customers will bear with me on those bumps in the road (like their stuff not being ready—ack!).

Some great experiences that filled me up, and a bit of struggle, which led to some good learning experiences. Definitely a net gain overall.

Then just a few days later, I made 9 mini corsages for the Daddy-Daughter dance at the school. Two of those were for my own cute girls. In fact, my 10 year old made hers with just a little assistance from me.

I think she did a great job! For those I was on the ball with my timing for the prep work (hydrating/ conditioning) and was able to make them the day before. Much, much better. Still not loving the floral glue, but I was able to get online (good old YouTube) and find some good tips that should help me have a better experience with it next time. I hope.

This coming week I will be doing Valentine’s flowers! So excited for those!

Always Learning

I love learning, especially learning more about flowers! The past couple of weeks I have been slowly getting caught up on my backlog of online learning videos. I signed up for Flower Farming School Online, which ran November into December, but fell behind when the December whirlwind came along. So now I’m finally getting to the end of those classes—almost! I have a few more hours left to do, but I’ve done all the main sessions. I’m actually glad I waited until now to take that class. I think if I had taken it back in the beginning, I wouldn’t have even really known what questions to ask.

For some reason, I seem to retain the information better if I have struggle a bit with it on my own, first. I think my brain is more actively engaged in finding answers to my questions and fixing my mistakes that way. I know I have taken all kinds of notes with it, particularly in regards to seed starting. It’s amazing, though, how you can pick up little tricks and things as you go along that you weren’t even looking for.

For instance, in this last session I watched, on Harvesting and Conditioning flowers, the teacher (Lisa Mason Ziegler) demonstrated how to strip the foliage from several different types of flowers—how much she leaves, how much she takes off, basically. So one of her examples was bachelor’s buttons. Now, I have grown bachelor’s buttons for the past 2 years—it is one of the few I have had some consistent success with. 

These purple bachelor’s buttons were volunteers that came up this spring. (Bells of Ireland on the left.)

However, it is a pain in the neck to harvest! I would put it off and leave it for last, because with the side shoots, stripping off the leaves seemed to take forever and they still would get all tangled up in the bucket! Guess what Lisa did? She cut off every single side shoot and all the leaves, leaving the one lonely little flower at the top! Wow, that really gave me something to think about! That would save a ton of time, and they are so prolific, that I could probably still get enough volume to be useful doing it that way. Even if not, I could save all the longest side shoots and strip them the same way, so I would have a single flower on a single stem.

In the picture above, there are several flowers already too old to use—they’re the ones that are a darker purple than the rest. Procrastination just makes your job harder. (I knew this already, but this picture is proof.) If you don’t keep a bed harvested, they start to get away from you, and then you have to hunt and peck to find any useable stems. So having a new way presented to me that would save me all that time and frustration? I’m going to take it and run with it! One flower, one stem on buttons. Ready, go!

See what I mean? I wasn’t going in to the class wondering how to save time prepping bachelor’s buttons, but there you go—a hidden gem.

There have been several “aha” moments like that throughout the class. I feel like it has been well worth the money spent on it. I understand succession planting better than I ever have. Also, I’m really wondering if my seedlings haven’t done very well the past 2 years because the dining room is too cold. I have been thinking about ways to make them a little warming chamber or something to keep the heat up in the 70’s. Another little bit of information that she had mentioned in one of the videos.

If you do what you’ve always done you’re going to keep getting the results you’ve always gotten, right? I feel like I had respectable germination rates last year, but then my seedlings just sat there in the trays and didn’t grow for a very long time. Then also, I tended to kill them off in the hardening off process. But maybe if I had much bigger, healthier transplants going into the hardening off they wouldn’t be so fragile.

On the Floral Design side of things, I have really wanted to get better at my personal flower skills. You know, corsages, boutonnieres, crowns, etc. The one lady I know of who is a rock star in the world of wearable flowers calls herself "Passionflower Sue” online. Anyway, she teaches courses! She has tutorials, but you have to pay for them, of course. For a long time, the only option was to pay $1000 to get full access to all her stuff. I just couldn’t spend that much! Several months ago, she came up with a monthly payment system. It is only $37 per month! Well, that’s definitely within my budget!

I have been signed up for it for 2 months now, but December came along.… (see notes above re: Christmas whirlwind.) So just today I have finally taken the time to sit down and listen to some of her tutorials. They are amazing! I have already learned so much about wiring flowers! Again, something I have struggled with on my own for the past 2 years now. In just a couple of 20 minute videos I learned game-changing techniques that are going to make my boutonnieres and corsages so much better! In fact, I’m excited to have a high school dance coming up in a week so that I can practice my new skills!

The more I learn, the more there is to learn…and I love that! Give me all the lessons! I feel like every class I take bumps me up to another plateau. From my new height, I try things out, succeed and struggle, until I’m in a place where I’m ready to add the next piece to the puzzle. Then up I climb again to a new plateau.

Who are you inspired by? What have you learned lately? I’m all ears!

It's a Jungle in Here!

 

I have started putting together planters this past week. I had one order, then 2 more came in. So I have spent some quality time purchasing various houseplants to put together into planters for my customers. It’s fun! Also, I may have purchased one or two for myself (cough, cough).

There were 2 maidenhair ferns that were just begging to be rescued from the Clearance shelves, which I did. They are getting some TLC now, in hopes that they will revive and live long! No, they’re not going into the planters just yet. I’ve never been great at keeping houseplants alive, so only paying a dollar or two for them helps with the guilt a little bit. Hey, I do try. So who knows? Maybe they will do great this time! One is upstairs on my bathroom windowsill and one is down here under the lights.

My first planter had a mini orchid in it, 1 dracaena, and one maidenhair fern (a healthy one.) It was pretty, if I do say so myself! I’m going to do a very similar one for someone else—and I even was able to find the same orchid, which is what she wanted. Woohoo!

The other planter will have red anthurium, a small croton with red in the leaves, and either a silverleaf fern or possibly some ivy. I’ve just got to double check and make sure they all have similar care requirements.

Hey, by the way—I found out today amidst my wanderings that Home Depot and Lowe’s use the same supplier for their houseplants. How about that? And for the most part, Home Depot was cheaper, but Lowe’s had a better selection.

I also have 11 amaryllis potted up now. I opened up the gift boxes I had in my booth for sale. It stays pretty warm in the store, so I wanted to see what the amaryllis were doing. Sure enough, 1 of them had a 6 inch long bud and stalk, all white from lack of lights and growing sideways up against the side of the box. Another couple had buds just coming. So the 3 that were already growing in the boxes, I brought home and potted up. Plus I FINALLY got the rest of mine potted up that I had ordered back in November. They were all growing crazy directions, too. In fact, one of them was blooming—barely poking out of the burlap sack it came in! I’ve got 2 more of those almost ready to bloom.

Not to mention all my anthurium from last year that I’m trying to keep alive with varying degrees of success, and all the aloe vera plants left from my sale last spring. I would love to have some houseplants with pretty leaves that I could add to arrangements. Think how pretty the ivy would be! Just have to keep the blessed things alive.

What houseplant tips do you have for me? I’m all ears!

If you want a planter, let me know! They’re fun to make and then you get to take care of them! 

Hee hee.

Seeds vs. Plugs

I’ve got a decision to make this winter. Rather shortly, as a matter of fact. Here it is:

How much of my flowers do I want to grow from seed myself and how many should I purchase as plugs?

If you’ve never heard of them, plugs are basically seedlings started by a commercial greenhouse. They arrive still very small, but should be ready to plant right out into your beds as soon as they arrive.

There are several factors that go into this decision.

1. Expense

Seeds are going to be much, much cheaper to buy. Your average seed packet costs around $3, and usually contains a significant number of seeds—25 or 100 or even more. The price goes down even more if you purchase a bigger quantity of seeds wholesale.

Plugs generally cost per plant. There’s a range with this too, of course, but on average they’re around $.35/plant. Still pretty cheap, right? Keep in mind that you often have to purchase an entire flat—too hard to split up flats between orders—and on top of that there are usually shipping minimums as well.

2. Time

In terms of time, plugs are definitely the cheaper option. Maybe once I get it figured out better, my seed-growing won’t take so much time, but I’m telling you, growing those tiny green babies takes TIME! It’s not a sprint, either, it’s a marathon—particularly with the ones that take several weeks to get big enough to plant outside. That’s weeks of daily tending! Also, heaven forbid you take a vacation during that time—that would be throwing away all your hard work.

Plugs arrive at the point where you can pop them in the ground—from what I’ve heard. Right around May, when I’m looking at 4 trays of seedlings that need to be hardened off, having a tray arrive ready to go in the ground sounds pretty amazing!

3. Difficulty of growing

Some flowers are hard to grow. Lisianthus, for example, has an entire Facebook group devoted to figuring out how to get it to grow from seed. As I’m still on 1st grade level seed growing, I don’t think I should attempt graduate level work quite yet!

4. Space & equipment for seed starting

I am fairly limited on space in my house. Until we can heat the greenhouse—even minimally—this one is going to be a big consideration as far as what and how much I’m able to grow. I want to direct seed as much as I can, but it would be nice to have the certainty of seed-grown plants. If it could be a certainty—ha!

5. Variety available

Very few of the plug trays are sold as a mix of colors or forms. For nearly all of them, it is an entire tray of that one exact type and color. In the small space that I have, I generally prefer to use the mixes. Unless it was something that was neutral, like Bells of Ireland that go with just about everything, I don’t feel like I can use the space on all of one thing. Also, I’ve got Bells coming up on their own accord and an abundance of seeds to direct sow as well.

So, essentially, I need to decide if it’s worth the extra expense to free up some time this spring. Last spring I found this flat of ‘Rocket’ snapdragons (pictured above) at the grocery store, of all places. Same variety I was attempting to grow from seed, myself, but these were already decent-sized plants. I bought the entire flat for $20 and got them in the ground. None of my own survived and I was so glad I had these to count on.

I am going to keep trying on the seed starting bit, despite my many MANY failures. However, my plan right now is to purchase some select flats of seedlings. I believe they do sell snapdragon trays with a mix of colors, so that may be my first investment in the world of plugs. I also would like to possibly purchase some lisianthus plugs—although those are going to be 1 whole tray of the same. The varieties I’m looking at, though, could be used with many different colors—white, navy, and a deep maroon.

I just saw someone in the UCFFA comment that they use soil-blocking to start all their seeds, and basically plan on it taking just 3-4 weeks from when they start them to planting in the ground. I think I need to call her and beg for more information, because there’s a crucial step I’ve been missing! Or perhaps she plants out her seedlings much smaller than I have been? 

Anyway, along with determining my growing plan, my “recipes” and all the rest, I will be perusing the plug options in the next couple of weeks as well! Wish me luck!

Planning for Next Year's Flowers

 I feel like the whirlwind that was December may finally be subsiding, just a bit. I’ve caught up on a few projects that got left in the dust. My hope is that I will have a few moments to breathe in this coming week and I can actually sit down and start planning my flowers for next year.

This is something that is so fun! My dreams usually outpace my skills, unfortunately, so inevitably I face a certain amount of disappointment. I am working on getting my farming skills up to speed so that my optimism will pay off glorious dividends of beauty. 
One of the things I need to do is finish watching my online Flower Farming course. 
I’ve already picked up so many valuable lessons from it—I need to finish it off!

One thing Lisa Mason Ziegler shared in the course—something she really just mentioned in passing—was that for succession planting, she has what she calls her “summer recipe.” So in essence, she plants the same mix of flowers for her cool flower successions, and then has a different mix she does for the warm-weather lovers. I mean, she may plant different colors or substitute one in for another at times, but overall it’s the same. This has inspired me to start thinking about what should be my “recipe” for cool flower planting.

Another point she had—your zone and growing conditions determine how many successions of cool vs. warm flowers that you put in. So where she lives, it gets hot by May, so she really can only fit in 2-3 successions of cool flowers, then she does more like 4 or 5 rounds of the warm. We had a frost in mid-JUNE last year! I had already picked up on the fact the cool flowers should be my mainstays, but this just brought it home even more. I need to be putting in 3-5 rounds of cool flowers (also known as hardy annuals), and may only get 1 round of the hot weather flowers in my garden.

There’s a reason my celosia failed last year, and my zinnias didn’t do much better. They hate the cold! She usually waits even 3 weeks after the last frost date to plant them, just so the nights are warm enough for them as well as the days. If I’m going to do that, it’s going to be the end of June before I get any of those heat-lovers in. See what I mean? With frost coming in mid to late September, there’s not going to be time for multiple plantings of those!

Okay, so all of this is just to say, I want to figure out my own planting recipes, then get to work this spring to put them in! If I could make the space to do 1 row of filler and 1 row of bigger flowers for each round, that would be ideal. Then, maybe by the end of June, the first round of cool flowers would be done, and I could till that under to put in my warm-weather flowers.

Spring fillers that I love include: ammi (Queen Anne’s lace), feverfew, and pennycress. I also want to try buplureum, atriplex, and chocolate Queen Anne’s lace. For my cool flower focals: snapdragons, scabiosa, Black-eyed Susans, Bells of Ireland. I would love to figure out how to grow sweet peas, and get some Icelandic poppies going as well. Of course, I will have all my spring bulbs and landscaping shrubs, etc., to help fill in as well.

If I only get 1 or maybe 2 plantings of warm weather flowers, I want to make them count! Zinnias and sunflowers are definitely on my list, along with cosmos. I would love to figure out how to grow celosia successfully. Their forms are so unique, I think my customers would get a kick out of them.

I started over 70 varieties of seeds last year! This year I want to really narrow that down. Focus on getting really good at growing a handful of varieties that will perform well under my conditions, and then maybe I can branch out some more later on.

However, I haven’t even looked at the seed catalogs yet. That is where the true test of my resolve comes in!! I always want all the pretty things! This is why I need a plan first—preferably written down—so that I’m not sidetracked into unprofitable paths.

Are you getting your 2020 garden all planned out? Do tell!

Merry Christmas!

 We are coming into the home stretch on Christmas now! This is the weekend of family parties. My family got together today and we’re going to see my husband’s family tomorrow. Fun times! It has been nice to close enough to get in on these fun events!

In addition, I’ve had several flower orders keeping me busy! Some florists really don’t care for the traditional red, white, and green of Christmas, but I’ve had fun with it this year. I am buying nearly all my flowers from the wholesaler during this season, and it’s great to have a big enough volume of orders to be able to get a nice variety for the arrangements.

Depending on the color of the vessel I’m using, I may switch up the dominant colors in the bouquet.

I loved the Christmas colors on my strawberry pitcher!! It matched so well!

Here’s what I’m loving in my Christmas arrangements this month:

Greenery:

Evergreens—that’s kind of a given, I guess. Pine and cedar with just a bit of the seeded eucalyptus thrown in for some added interest. I ran out of pine this week and still have several orders to fill on Monday. The Christmas tree may be missing a few (lower, unimportant, barely noticeable) branches come Monday morning!

Red pepperberries—I just can’t get enough of these! I bought out the last bunch at the wholesaler, and when I went back a few days later for more, all they had were the pink. Love those too, but now I’m in the red/green phase. The ones they had were so perfect to tie together my arrangements! Each stem had some bright red berries and some immature, green berries—all of them tiny and clustered on the same stems. I have a couple of stems left—I’m going to divvy them up very carefully on Monday.

Fillers:

Hypericum berries—I’ve got some in white that I’ve used, and just bought some smaller, red ones. Love how they look in the arrangement!

White alostromeria—these were so gorgeous! Just big, beautiful healthy blooms. Love them! Also, very long vase life.

Paperwhite daffodils—I grew these inside. Actually, time to start another round of them! I actually even like the green seed pod that is left once the flowers die!

Focals:

Red Carnations—That bright pop of red, plus their famous longevity. Win-win!

Deep red Ranunculus—I put a stem of this into every arrangement, just to add some depth to the color tones and for their beautiful form—rose-like, but with much better vase life than most roses.

For my centerpiece arrangement, I’m going to add some pinecones as well and possibly some wood slices with the bark still on. Going rustic!

Tonight is the winter solstice—the longest night of the year. So that means starting tomorrow, we’ll be on the upward swing! YAY! I believe in Jesus Christ, who lights my way through darkest, longest nights. So grateful to be celebrating his birth this week!

Merry Christmas!

Giver's Gain

 

A fun Thanksgiving centerpiece I did for one of the BNI group.

Over the past year, I have attended a business networking group that meets here in my town once a week, called BNI—stands for Business Network International. The first time I went as a guest. I was impressed by the camaraderie amongst all the regular attendees, and their friendliness to me.

Since then I have gone several times (8 or 9?) as a substitute for one of the regular members. Every time it has been the same experience: a room full of positive, supportive people, who enjoy being around each other. More than that, people who have built up relationships of trust, such that they feel good about giving each other referrals. That’s the point of it, after all. To help businesses grow. Yes, to make money.

However, the way they go about this goal is different than the norm. Their philosophy is “Givers Gain.” I don’t know how other chapters implement the philosophy in their groups, but the group I have been to really means it. They’re more interested in helping you be successful with your business, than they are in their own. They seem to rest assured that what goes around comes around, and helping you will end up being good for them too, in the long run.

I wanted to join right away, but there were a few things standing in my way. First and foremost—the cost. It’s not cheap to join, and when I first attended, I was just into my 2nd year of business. The cost to join was just a few hundred dollars shy of what I had made my entire first year. Granted, I didn’t make a lot (less than zero when expenses were added in), but I didn’t feel like I could make that leap just yet.

Another obstacle: I hadn’t really decided yet which direction I wanted to take my business in. Would I do weddings? If so, one wedding referral would pay back my membership fee. Was I going to primarily do everyday flowers? That would take a whole lot more to make up the difference. I have spent quite a bit of time over this 2nd year, pondering about those questions and figuring out what I want to focus on, and what direction I will be headed.

It’s also quite a time commitment—weekly meetings, some training, and one-to-ones—which are meetings set up individually with the other business owners in the group. How I would I fit that in to my existing schedule?

A final obstacle has been the uncertainty of our family plans. There is a job change coming in the future for my husband, and we weren’t even sure we would be around next year. I didn’t want to join up, pay the money, only to have to abandon the group halfway through the year.

Well, after talking with husband about it last week (I’ve attended twice this month as a substitute), I’ve decided it’s time to join. The investment still seems big and a little scary. It’s going to be a leap of faith, for sure. But, I also feel ready for this. I’m ready for where this will take me. With my husband’s support I can make the scheduling work.

I’m excited to be part of such a positive, supportive group! I will pick up my application on Thursday and go from there!