I didn’t mean to start a flower business.

This was not on my vision board. I did not grow up dreaming about centerpieces or memorizing flower varieties — if I’m being honest, far from it.

With a background in marketing, communications, fundraising, and nonprofit work, I’ve always been drawn to work that connects people to something meaningful. I love shaping experiences, building momentum around an idea, watching a room shift when the right story is told well. Large-scale events especially had my heart — the kind where hundreds of tiny decisions quietly come together to create something that feels effortless.

Somewhere along the way, flowers became part of that language for me.

Not in a dramatic, cinematic way. It wasn’t a lightning bolt calling. It was quieter than that. It was something we got to do together — almost a bonding experience in simply figuring it out. We’d be asked to do a wedding or event for friends or relatives and would say “sure,” not fully knowing how we’d accomplish it, only that we would.

Over time, it became something more — something our family built together. What started as helping here and there slowly turned into long evenings at the table covered in stems and greenery, conversations layered between mechanics and design decisions. We discovered that we each brought something different to the process. I tend to live in the vision — the feeling of a space, the overall story it tells — while Melissa has an incredible instinct for structure and execution, the steady hand that makes sure the vision actually stands. It works because it’s balanced.

I think I’ve always been someone who notices the atmosphere. I notice when a space feels tense. I notice when it feels warm. I notice when something is slightly off balance. Flowers are one of the most immediate ways to change that energy. They soften a room. They elevate it. They give it intention.

But more than that, they hold memories.

A red rose will always bring me back to my wedding day — not in a vague nostalgic way, but specifically. I can remember the weight of my bouquet in my hands, the way it felt to hold something so carefully chosen for a moment that would divide my life into before and after.

Tulips will always belong to my grandmother. She loved them. I named my daughter after her, and now when I see tulips, there is this layered feeling — grief, legacy, love, continuity — all wrapped into something simple and beautiful.

Flowers show up at every threshold. Births. Weddings. Celebrations. Funerals. Anniversaries. Apologies. They are present when we can’t quite articulate what we’re feeling.

After I had my daughter, I returned to work and was unexpectedly laid off. It was disorienting in the way big life transitions often are. Not catastrophic — just clarifying. It forced me to pause long enough to ask myself what I actually wanted. Not what looked stable on paper. Not impressive titles or large networks. But what felt aligned. What worked for my family. What I had quietly been putting off as “maybe someday.”

The truth is, even before that moment, flowers had already taken root in my life. I just hadn’t given myself permission to treat them as something legitimate. They were my “fun” thing. The creative outlet I didn’t pressure. The thing that lived in the margins of my real career.

Being laid off didn’t create the business. It removed the excuse not to take it seriously.

What started as helping friends became inquiries. What felt like a creative outlet became systems, contracts, timelines, and responsibility. Somewhere in that shift, I realized this wasn’t just about arranging flowers. It was about shaping the emotional landscape of a day someone will remember forever — and building something meaningful in the process.

Flowers are the markers we place at the edges of our most important memories.

So no, I didn’t mean to start a flower business. I didn’t map it out or write it into a five-year plan. But when I look back, I can see the through-line clearly. I have always been drawn to work that creates meaning, that changes the way a room feels, that quietly holds people in their most important moments.

This is simply the form that calling took.

And sometimes, you are forced into opportunities you ought to have found yourself.