J. Foss Garden Flowers

01/01/2024

Lake Stevens Wa Farm during the 90’s one thing is we really didn’t take that many photos, it wasn’t as easy as it is today, plus you always forgot to bring the camera, or if you brought you had too much to do to take pictures. Anyway this farm grew beautiful products the soils was amazing. We sold at Pike street market and to a Seattle Wholesaler. They loved our callas which I haven’t posted a picture of yet. But callas opened doors for us because they were amazing.

12/21/2023

1985, still living in South Everett. as I’ve been going through old photos I must admit I have some mixed emotions, while these post are meant to be positive, we were having our share of trials. My goal is always to live with the secret of contentment, not that I have gained that even to this day. A really cool thing that happened was, we were looking for a real farm, we looked high and low, but we couldn’t afford it, or it was in a bad location, once th people changed their minds. So one night I asked Jim to pray with me that we might find the right farm! He agreed. The next morning at 7am I got a call from Jim, a realtor, who we had not been working with us called Jim at work and told him about a farm, in the best location for us, the price was $65,000 20 some acres. So in our price range as well. Jim said if you like it go ahead a make and offer, so that afternoon, it was signed and sealed! I always felt so blessed working there. The neighbors told Jim his wife was always out there singing hymns, I was but I thought it was all in private. Kind of looked around before singing after that!. While this farmland had been farmed in the past mostly used for cattle grazing. Nothing had been done to it for years. It was d**e land and the average elevation was like 1 foot above sea level, some was minus 1 foot. It was pretty much pure peat. The soil at my house was gravelly loam, so a huge difference. One thing about peat soil it doesn’t stick to your boots, and we never needed to irrigate. But boy did weeds grow!

12/13/2023

I loved being a flower grow, I can honestly say it was an amazing blessing, that I was always thankful for. Many times I was over worked and exhausted but I was ready to go again, especially if I thought about what it was like to work in an office. Once I was tucking Gunnar into bed and he said, “Mamma do you sleep?” I was a little surprised and said “Yes, of course, why?” He said, “ Sometimes I wake up and I hear you down stairs moving around.” Well some night were late nights, and some mornings were early. But still I loved it. Our first mini farm was a 750 square foot house on two acres, that was mostly wooded. I loved that little house it wasn’t fancy, but it was a blessing.

12/11/2023

More from the beginning. I told Jim even though gardening seemed expensive, it was ok cause, we could sell what we grew. When we came home from our honeymoon in Hawaii, I went back to work at Washington Natural Gas, he went down to city buildings and got us a business license, and got us signed up for the Everett Farmers Market at the mall. We didn’t have a clue what we were doing, I always think of this day when I see new farmers at the market and I have compassion for them.I remember we made $25.00 dollars and we though wow, we’ve made it now!

My favorite part of having a gardening Business was buying any plant I wanted!

12/09/2023

This a picture my mother in law painted of me and my booth at Pike Street Market it’s a personal treasure. I only sold at Pike Place Market a few years. But I sold in many other places around Seattle, as well. Unfortunately most people it seems think I spent my entire career at Pike place, but it was very little time, but I learned a lot, and had lots of florist customers, who encouraged me.

12/09/2023

We are getting ready to retire! And I thought I would share some pictures from out past. These pictures are from the beginning early 80’s and our first garden, which was 100 x50 or so. We had beds other places as well that we could cut from as well. The house in the pictures is my neighbors, they actually had the best view of my garden. Along the fence was Raspberries.

06/14/2023

I was thinking about my first day on a flower dock, almost 40 yrs ago, I still get excited and feel the competitive spirit everytime. The goal --flowers in the backdoor ( dock) and out the front door.

03/27/2023

Muscari

03/27/2023

Daffodil

03/22/2023

Match 22

12/07/2022

This lady owned Stadium Flowers, when we first started selling flowers, they supported us and helped us get started. We enjoyed our time selling to them.

View Cheryl VanWinkle's obituary, send flowers and sign the guestbook.