Happy Friday y’all!It’s been a lovely week out here. Some afternoons have climbed into “too hot and muggy” territory, but outside of that it has been beautiful. Mornings have been cool, dewy, and welcoming, with a slight breeze carrying us blissfully through the lunch hour. Evenings in the shade have been magical to be outside working. The crew is taking the day off, so it’s just you and the leaves and the birds as you go about your chores in the perfect weather. Mandy physically cannot be indoors if the weather is anything other than terrible, so she’s always working on something outside “after” work, and I do all the peony harvesting 3 times a day for about 6 weeks,...

Happy Friday Y’all!Exciting news for us!  Mandy and Rachel have been working with the good folks at Brown Parcel Press for almost a year now to really elevate and beautify our seed packages, and they are finally ready to share! Introducing our new seed packet designs! We never really intended to be a seed company, but so many things changed for us during the pandemic, due to significant family medical issues that kept us from returning to markets. When we shifted away from farmer’s markets, we stopped growing tons of beautiful varieties of flowers that don’t ship well. Most of them were grown by seed, so we had a ton of seed sitting around at the same time that supply...

Happy Friday y’all!We’re heading into a stretch of mid to high 80’s now. Time to fire up the a/c a bit.That section of spring where every single thing is bursting with freshness like you’re living in an 80’s commercial about mint gum or Irish Spring has come and gone. Beautiful plants are still emerging from dormancy, but all around them, things that were recently dripping with crisp freshness are now showing the other half of life. The hard truths we all must grow to swallow. Snowball Viburnum dropping its petals! I’m fascinated by people who utterly embrace the beauty of decay. Floral designers who treasure an arrangement in all stages – who love the dropped petals and wilted foliage as...

Happy Friday y’all! I’m looking forward to this weekend because we gots stuff happening in this Mayberry of a town we call Comer.Fourteen years ago when we drove across country with all of our belongings (mostly tools and bee boxes) in 2 trailers. It was a harrowing adventure. We got a flat tire on a trailer just leaving the driveway. That set the tone for the whole trip. 5 flat tires, 2 failed fuel pumps, a faulty ignition switch, some electrical problems, a trailer that almost flipped, a jack that busted and almost dropped the whole car on my leg, and much of that in the dessert Southwest during the heat of late summer. We slept nights in the tiny...

It’s Thursday evening and I’m sitting outside in the faint breeze with a couple of the neighbor’s dogs. It’s been a muggy day, our first of many, and the breeze and shade of a Japanese maple are kindly taking the edge off. It’s quiet, but for the occasional sighing exhale of Chaos, the birds chirping, guineas cacophonously being guineas, and Kali and Naomi laughing over in the studio while trying to film a video for Instagram and realizing the absurdity of all the little details required to do something like that in a way that seems effortless to the viewer. Everything is blooming on the farm! We are smack dab in the middle of Georgia spring here. Dogwoods blooming, spirea...

Happy Friday y’all!The mornings have been beautiful out here. The snowball viburnums are bursting with crisp whiteness, the purple lunaria is springing forth from the undergrowth, daffodils are still popping, the first iris has sprung up, the witch hazel continues to be fragrant, the mulberry tree is full with green fruit, the pineapple pears are already thumb sized, and the world is bathed in pollen. Butterfly Ranunculus sparkling and shimmering in the tunnels! Our butterfly ranunculus are having a moment in the tunnels right now, and I highly recommend them if you’ve not had them in a vase before. A lesser known flowering delight, whose super power is that it is covered in buds and every single one of them will...

Happy Friday y’all!Spring and winter are swirling together lately. Some days are so warm that we are sweaty and uncomfortable and then we’re hit with strong winds and freezing nights. You can tell it is later in spring, though, by the radiant effect of the earth. A warm day after a lot of cold is extra refreshing, because though the air is warm, the earth itself and every item of mass (trees, rocks, buildings) is radiating cold. That differential is what feels so refreshing to me. It works in reverse too. A fresh cool breeze while the earth is radiating warmth is so much better than a cool breeze on a cool day when everything around you is cold. I...

It’s warming up out here. Back to that time of year when it’s risky to run across the farm with your mouth open. The wingers with stingers have all burst forth from their pupae and are looking for a nesting site. In this newborn phase, our local wasps are much more inclined to linger and land. They aren’t going from hither to thither with great purpose and clear intent, but rather seem to be almost confusedly flitting about in great numbers, constantly buzzing my tower. Like a drunk guy on Bourbon street that keeps stumbling in elliptical orbit into and out of your personal space, stumbling away, then back again. Probably harmless and confused, but still annoying, with a hint...

I grew up in the suburbs and had a childhood kinda like the kids in E.T. Without the alien. Disappearing on bikes miles and miles away only to return at dark. Splashing around in creeks, cardboard sliding down country hills. Flashlight tag, egg wars, skateboard ramps, a touch of mischief, the occasional fight, but all in all I had it pretty easy. In my early 20’s I was struck with what I can only characterize as an intense aversion to my status quo based trajectory and found myself engulfed in an overpowering desire for meaning. It was burning me up. My passion was enormous, my compass swinging wildly, my emotions oscillating between ecstatic and devastated constantly, I took on the...

Happy Friday y’all! The pace is picking up out here. It’s that time of year when you feel the tide rise around you pretty quickly and realize you gotta get swimming a little faster. Spirits are still high, but you can feel that nipping sensation at your heels and an awareness that the stakes have just gone up. Though it's never awesome to feel your stress levels increase, it does mean that you’re invested in the outcome. Mandy and I have lived like that 7 days a week as long as I can remember. We desperately care. We’re a little on the fanatical end of the scale in our life approach. We are compelled to try and do everything as...