WTF has come a long way...
Repost from Sept 29,2017
When I got an opportunity to design {like when my husband came home with my favorite lilies}; THAT would completely make my day. It wasn't just my favorite flowers. It wasn't just being reminded how much my husband loved me. It was all I wanted to do. Strip them, cut them, and arrange them in whatever vase I had at the time. The other opportunities came during vacation. Yup! I planned our vacations back home to Montana every year {so many times right down to the minute}; I made damn sure to include a design day for myself while we were there. Because it meant that I got to go back the last flower shop I ever worked in and work with the family of designers that treated me like more than an employee, more than a friend, like that was where I belonged, like I was part of their flower family.
While I had worked in other flower shops before that also helped me fall in LOVE with the floral industry - Butte Floral and the Forsman family gave me responsibility, opportunity, and freedom. Freedom to create, freedom to make mistakes, freedom to explore, freedom to LEARN. I knew being a floral designer was it for me.
Ten point 5 years later, even though someone else owns that shop today {Jen is equally amazing and welcoming!!}, they still save a spot {and the most ridiculous orders} just for me. When I pop in, pick up my knife, and go about the day as if I'd never left the TEAM.
Seriously if I could choose anything... If I could DO anything... A floral designer is what I was going to be. But I also knew I didn't want to work for anyone else ever again. And if I'm being honest I just didn't have it in me to "shop hop" in order to try to find the right fit. The perfect "flower fit" is a really big deal to me. I also knew if I was going to design it couldn't be just anywhere with whomever had an opening. (I did that once. Stayed when I should have left. I'll never do it again. But that's for a later post.)
So what's a girl and her floral knife to do between all the wife-ing, and baby raising, and "California dreaming"? Getting my flower fix only every now and then...just wasn't going to cut it! {Haha! "Cut it." I'm so unintentionally funny sometimes!}