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Hello and welcome to the Wildly Native

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podcast , also known as

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the flower files , where you're going

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to hear me , Liza , Lizzy,

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and Amber all chat

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about the realities of being a flower

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farmer , a florist

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, wedding install and

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everything that kind of goes with

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that .

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Yeah , a driver that tries to beat traffic

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on a Saturday . A

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floor sweeper , a dig in the dirt , human

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seed people we

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are energized by

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the sun .

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A lot of the times , I feel like people don't understand

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what we do . So we started this podcast

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so we could actually talk about

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what it means to be a

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flower farmer , florist because

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a lot of the times , let's face it , a

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lot of people are either a farmer or

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they're the florist .

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Well , I feel like a lot of people when you think of a flower farmer

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, at least before , when we started and I don't know if it's just

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because that was our world that

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we were kind of already in like

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from the ag realm but I was sort of like

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Floret , is that what you

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said ? Wisconsin or something ? No , wisconsin , washington

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, somewhere cold . Yeah , somewhere cold . Yeah

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, somewhere cold .

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And slow and amazing .

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But I guess you kind of think that in a very

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typical way , like you have your florist , where

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they put stuff together , or you have your flower

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farmer where it's , you

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go through wholesale and you do all the things

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Florid is more of like educator , I

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feel like nothing

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that's a bad thing , but everybody has their own

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perspectives and all that . But you know

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, we do a little bit of everything and

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I'm standing or sitting at

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a counter with oranges

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because we're trying to figure out stuff with crafts , a

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vase that has flowers in it that are extra

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pieces from building bouquets . We've got dried

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stuff and wreaths and stuff

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sitting on top of the fridge like curly willow that's

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dried and a ton of

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arrangements behind me .

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But if you open the fridge , you're going to find all

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of our seeds that have to be cold stratified

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so that they can germinate and grow

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correctly . You open our cupboards and

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you find our warm season seeds .

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And tissue paper for boxes for packaging

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.

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So we're a little bit of everything and

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we get a lot of questions about what

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the heck do we actually do . So

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we wanted to start this podcast to answer those

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questions . Have some guests come

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in and talk about everything from

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soup to nuts , from

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what is it like being the florist

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, what is it like being the farmer and

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what do we do ? That's a little bit different

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in style and putting things together

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.

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How do we stay up with the trends

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? How do we get

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our name out there ?

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How do we function in all

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these different outlets and

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work with other people , because we are a customer

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service , like industry

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, like we're in that , like weddings , even

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in COVID , like still didn't stop

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. To an extent they slowed down , don't get me wrong

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, but they were still . They

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were still happening .

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They were still a thing , and I think I

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think there's a couple misconceptions that

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we want to clarify too is

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if somebody says , oh , you're

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a farmer florist , that means you've

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got , like you know , handfuls of zinnias

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and all of that kind of stuff and it's like , yes

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, we do grow zinnias , but we also

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grow a lot of the flowers that are

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used in weddings Lysianthus

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, dianthus , larkspur

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, delphinium , stock

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and Eryngium I mean , we can go through and list

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all of the things . We have about

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300 feet of eucalyptus Probably

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my favorite place to be on the farm , unless

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we cut it for hours and hours and the smell

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is like embedded in my fingers and literally

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wakes me at two o'clock in the morning because it still

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stinks .

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Yeah , because it's all vapor rub like times ten

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, but I

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feel like working with other people too , like we

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have to like know , what's

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edible , what's not . We've had chefs come

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to us . We've had cake people

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come to us and we've had to tell them , because they come

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in and shop out of our buckets technically

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, and then we've got to tell them like hey

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, that won't last or that's not sturdy enough

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or hey , they look at the picture and

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we say hmm, ranunculus .

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Nope , that makes your lips tingle , yeah . Or clearly

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that was a styled-shoot .

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Yeah , not like an actual

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thing . So

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it's . It's been interesting over the past

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couple of years to see how we're changing

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and people that we've met

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and how people offer services

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to others , and how our customers

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are now telling their friends who

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are getting married and their moms and their

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daughters , and god only knows

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like word of mouth goes a long way and you know

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, we had a phone call today and say that oh yeah , you

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did this one girl's wedding and I haven't seen

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her in years . But I was scrolling on your Instagram

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and it's just , it's so

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like it's such a small world and all the things and

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I was like , yeah , it's , it's weird

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, but it happens .

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So back in the very beginning , how

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did we get started with Wildly Native ? What

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did that look like ?

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So originally it

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looked like a what I thought

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was going to be like this amazing

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, amazing section

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of field . I was so excited I placed the order

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. I had like 1000 seeds . We were going to do all of

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the things . We were experimenting with different types

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of covers , so we didn't

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have to pull weeds no hoop houses

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, yet no green houses . It was

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like the imprint of

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somebody's living room space . Yeah

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, I was like this is gonna be great . And

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I distinctly remember standing there

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the one day going I don't need a thousand

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seeds , I need a thousand of each

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variety of seeds .

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And now we've far exceeded that .

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Yeah , lots and lots of thousands of seeds

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, but I started off with just wanting

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to grow flowers and I

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am incredibly lucky that Lizzie

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is my daughter and Amber's

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my adopted daughter . Lizzie

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is my daughter and she is very

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artistic and creative and I

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love the dirt , I love the outside , I

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love everything about the growing

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side and she has

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that artistic eye so she's able to

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take what we grow and make it pretty

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and Amber can

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live in both worlds , thank God

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. And she kind of grounds us sometimes

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too A lot of our .

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People live in both worlds . Honestly , we have a good

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balance of hey

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you do this or hey you do this , or hey I need help , or

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Kenley needs people out in the field , or we all go cutting

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the morning or we're in here late at night

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and Amber's putting greens together or corsages

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and along the way , like I'm still learning

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, like what's easier for what we do , like a corsage

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that we did two years ago does not look like what

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we do now , and not

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that we want to be fast and process stuff

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, but what's the quickest and easiest

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and the best way that they look and

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what's comfortable .

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The business has grown and we have to be more efficient

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.

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We're gonna talk about those growing pains and we're gonna talk

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about the things behind the scenes and I'm

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gonna be honest , in the struggles I

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mean it's pretty and

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it's amazing and it's fine .

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After After it's not pretty

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in the barn, but man .

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There's lots of things that we've

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learned and grown and

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cried and frustrated .

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The amount of times that I've cried in here , both

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with personal life and work

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life .

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All of it , all of it , all of it , all of it . So our

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audience , our audience , is anyone

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who's a flower enthusiast , from

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somebody who's a home gardener to

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somebody who just is a flower enthusiast

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, to somebody who wants to start a flower

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farm , to somebody who wants to learn more

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about the floral world , to somebody

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who wants to learn about the wedding world . Everybody

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and anybody . This podcast is for

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everybody .

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We very thankfully have taken in some

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of our brides to actually work with us

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. So it's the best job interview

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ever and you'll

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have a chance to actually

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hear her on

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one of the podcasts as well . Miss Sammie

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Love

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her . You'll hear

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why .

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When you listen , but

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we have a large variety of guests

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with so many different

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backgrounds .

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Vendors and jobs and education

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and time and experience and

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people that are off the wall and

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people that are super down to earth

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and chill and are just that's

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all of it .

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Yeah , yeah , our podcast is

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for everybody . So in

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you guys getting to know us and

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understand us as a

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family , and a little bit about us

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, Amber we're going to put you on the spot first . So

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what type of flower are you ? And

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tell me three things that define who

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you are as a person .

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I would have to be a sunflower , 100%

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agree .

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AKA wedding invitation flowers .

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And three things that make me tick are baseball

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. I'm a huge Orioles fan go O's

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and I

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am a book enthusiast

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and I love my dogs . My dogs

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are my first children .

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They are spoiled and pampered , squishy

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things . Yeah , how

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about you Honestly

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, I'd probably say at the beach

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, the gym and self care

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, and I

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would say flowers but it is my job so we

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don't have to talk about that but like art and tattoos and

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drawing and just just

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being in that space , I don't get to be in

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that world a whole lot because I'm in a floral design

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world and then I'm burnout on

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my right side of my brain for a little bit but

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, and t hen my my flower

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that I would choose would probably be . I've got two

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, but seasonally or

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location wise . My all

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time favorite flower is a Plumeria smells

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so good , so pretty , you

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can barely use it in

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a bouquet, I don't know how people use it , but it's so pretty . And

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then Dahlia's from like home

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, like here, love

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them, one of my favorites , even though they stink a little

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bit .

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Two years ago we didn't grow them , and

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it was just a twinkle in

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our eyes that we were like we could try this

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.

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Yeah , I think we started with like 20 .

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We're like okay , we did this , yeah

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they were growing in crates behind hoops .

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And we're like well , wow

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, Wow , they did it .

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Yeah , a lot has happened .

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What about you madre ?

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So I think for me , I

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definitely tick with some peanut

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butter ice cream . I

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love to swim from

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needing headspace and just needing a break

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, I love to be in the water and

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swim . I've really looked closely

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at water for your buds so I can actually

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listen to either other podcasts

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or a book or something like that and

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I don't know all things outside , I

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would say or the three things

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and peanut butter . So peanut butter and ice

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cream , preferably together , and

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my favorite flower isn't

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really a flower . I would say that my favorite thing

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that we grow and the thing that I

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love the most is our eucalyptus . I

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just don't know . You can touch it

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, you can smell it , you can see it . It's just it

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changes all through the season

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.

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And .

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I'm so proud that it comes back every year

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and we talked to it . I've sung to it .

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We cut it down to almost nothing every year and it always

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comes back .

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And we give it all kinds of pep talks . So

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that's a little bit about us . I'm really excited

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to share all of this with everybody

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and get feedback . Oh , yeah , stay

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tuned and join us .

12:25

Yeah , and see what we have in store ? Yeah

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, come tag along for the , for the

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ride , for the journey .

12:31

We are on Instagram as the flower files

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or wildly native . However you would

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like to reach us , we

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will have a patreon page . You can

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listen to the podcast wherever you stream your podcast

12:43

Spotify , apple podcast all of the above

12:45

and we will we

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have a Facebook to Facebook

12:49

, we've Instagram Facebook and we're just starting

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to play with tik tok .

12:54

Yes , tiky-Toky ,

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very slowly, but we're getting there . Yes , yes , oh the

13:02

place is .

13:03

the list goes on . Yeah , all

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right , we will catch you during

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the first real episode , I suppose .

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Bye .