Snow-covered lavender field, January 2022

It’s planning season on the farm (yes, planning, not planting)! Ever since I can remember, I have always loved the process of making plans. When I was little I would make pretend math lesson plans and teach them to my younger siblings, much to their dislike. When I was in college and especially in the early years of marriage, I was always planning out different trips and putting together itineraries so that when an opportunity presented itself, we could just grab an itinerary and go! Now I spend the winter planning for our next flower season.

For me, planning the next growing season starts when flowers are still in bloom the year before. I make notes about what I want to grow again, new things I want to try, how much I want to plant of each variety, and then order my seeds. I have most of this done before Thanksgiving and give myself permission to slow down for the rest of the year to focus on family. However, now that the new year has come, I am gearing up for warmer weather and looking forward to having flowers on the farm once again - and I have a long list of things to plan out before spring arrives. So here is what’s going on at our farm these days!

Ordering the last of my seeds and plants for the upcoming season. There are still a couple items I need to order because they were out of stock in the fall or because I was undecided about whether to grow them this upcoming year or not. I am hoping to finalize my last plant and seed purchases in the next few days.
Finalizing my dates for seed starting. Last fall I put together my seed starting schedule. I have added a couple more varieties to the list and switched a few things around based on seed availability, so before I start planting seeds in a couple weeks, I need to go through and finalize all the dates once again.
Getting organized! We need more storage for more flowers. Nathan and I have found that we are quickly out-growing our house. This past fall we decided to order a flower shed for the farm to help alleviate this issue. The shed should arrive in the next few weeks and allow us to have a dedicated work space for the farm this year. Once it arrives, we will have a decent amount of work getting storage added, organizing our supplies and equipment, and setting up a space for storing and arranging our flower bouquets this summer.
Hiring our employees for the year. Once again we are adding more growing space on the farm for flowers and planning on having more days for people to visit as well! With a full-time, off-farm job and two young kids, I definitely need help to make all this possible. At best, finalizing employees for the season will take a couple weeks, so I want to get started as soon as possible. Once March arrives, we are ready for some extra hands on the farm.
P.S. Let us know if you or someone you know wants to work on the farm this summer. We would love to talk with you!
Finalizing details for our uPicks and Date Nights in June and July. A few years ago we began hosting events on the farm so people could come and visit the flower fields. Starting in March, we also begin taking reservations for photo sessions on the farm. Dates fill up quickly, so before we open up for photo session reservations, I make sure to block off any days we want reserved for uPicks or other farm events. I also try to do as much coordination as possible with others who will be at our events too. I want to get all the “inside” tasks done while the days are still cold and short so that once the weather warms up I can spend the nice days outside on the farm.
Offering educational information. You may have picked up on this earlier in the post, but when I was growing up I wanted to be a teacher. While that isn’t the route I ended up going, I have found that the farm has given me an opportunity to teach people about nature and growing flowers. Each year, I receive many questions about how we grow our flowers, especially the lavender. I am working on putting together some courses with that information, and hoping to release my first one before spring.

Moreover, one of the things that got us started on this adventure, was to bring the love of nature to our kids, and I want to find ways to introduce other children to gardening too! I am not exactly sure what this will look like, but I know I want to make is possible for more kids to get out in the garden, engaging with nature and learning how to take care of our world. More brainstorming is needed here, but I hope to finalize a plan for this before February.

There will be a lot to do in the next few weeks, and in the back of my mind I know that not everything will get done as quickly as I hope. However, we are going to prioritize and do the best we can. And no matter what, in the end it is going to be a great growing season, and I can’t wait for those first flowers to show up on the farm!

It's Planning Season!