06/09/2026
If Iām not in the studio, and the Arkansas humidity isnāt trying to suffocate me, this is where youāll find me. šŖ“
Gardening in 2026 looks a lot different from how my great-grandparents did it 100 years ago. Farming and gardening are in my blood. Itās what my family did for generations. Even when they moved to St. Louis for work, they kept flower beds and vegetable gardens. Some of my earliest memories with them were in their gardens, covered in dirt, picking vegetables and flowers.
Every home weāve lived in has had a vegetable garden and flowers. And while wildflowers may be my flowers of choice compared to my grandmaās hydrangeas and peonies, moments spent here remind me of them.
This little garden sits beside my studio, and more often than not, itās where I go when I need to step away from a project, untangle a problem, or take a few minutes for myself at the end of a long day. The flowers change from season to season, but the feeling never really does.
So much of what I create in the studio is rooted in the same things I find here in the garden: slow mornings, changing seasons, growing things, and the memories attached to them.
My life looks different than theirs did. I homeschool my girls, run a handmade business, and spend more time behind a computer than any of them ever imagined. But when Iām pulling weeds, picking flowers, or checking on vegetables before the sun gets too high, I donāt feel quite so far removed from them.
Every season, when the flowers start blooming and the vegetables start producing, Iām reminded that some things donāt really change. A century later, weāre still putting our hands in the same soil and finding joy in watching something grow.
