Worst First: The Hard Part of Setting Up a Garden

Welcome to the Grow youw Self podcast. Surprising stories about the food we eat and inspiring conversations about what it really takes to live the whole and happy life we're all craving. I'm Nicole Johnsey Burke, your host and the owner of Rooted Garden and Gardenary Incorporated and author of Kitchen Garden Revival.

Is it obvious yet?

I'm kind of obsessed with the kitchen garden. The kitchen garden may just be the answer that you've been looking for on your own journey to health and wholeness. In this podcast, it's going to inspire and enable you to make garden magic right in your very own space. If you're someone who wants to eat more good food that's actually good for you, fill your day with great stories you want to text to a friend. If you want to hear more about inspiring people and do a little bit each day better than the way you did it the day before, Grow Yourself is what your ears have have been waiting for. You won't just learn about gardening here. You'll learn how to make growing as a person a big part of your everyday life. And your life, your community. And your garden, of course, will be all the better for it. So put in your headphones, turn up the volume, and let's take a walk, go on a drive, or just hang out in the kitchen garden together. Welcome to Grow Yourself.

Welcome back to the Grow youw Self podcast. This is chapter three of the Kitchen Garden Revival Book Club, and this week we are diving into worst first. Doesn't that sound exciting? No. Literally, it is. Today, we're going to talk about how we have to kind of tear everything apart and make a mess, but before we can make it so much better. And I have a special guest on today's episode that you are gonna absolutely love. I can't wait for you to meet her. Don't forget that today's episode is brought to you by Gardenary Garden Coaches. Through the Garden Coach Society, I have trained over 250 gardeners around North America that are ready to help you with your own garden setup. So if today's or when today's episode intimidates you a little bit, you'll be ready to get through the worst part of your garden setup with the help of a Gardenary garden coach. So go check out the Gardenary coaches that can help you right away@gardenary.com coaches. Now let's dive in to today's episode for the Kitchen Garden Revival Book Club Chapter three. All right. I am so excited to have the Grow Yourself audience meet you, my friend, here on the Other side of my video. Will you tell everybody who you are?

Hi. Good morning. So glad to be here. I am Monica Meyer, and I have been working for Nicole. I started out as a consultant with Rooted Garden, and now I still help with Rooted Garden, but then I'm also helping more on the gardenary side. And when Nicole moved to Chicago, I kind of took over quickly and suddenly. And that's why I think I'm here, because there was many mistakes that happened and definitely learned from those. And so Nicole and I are excited to kind of share with you some of those.

Yeah. So we're not going to call them mistakes. We're just going to call them experiences.

That's right.

As you and I both know, these are just things that happen. It's part of being a human being. Right. That things don't go perfectly or as planned in every situation that we're in as humans. So today, as we dive into chapter three. So chapter three in Kitchen Garden Revival is called Frame. And it took me a second there, I almost forgot the name of my own chapter. So chapter three starts to dive into what it looks like to put your kitchen garden together together. And I thought, who better to chat through this process with me than you, Monica? Because you have put together probably as many Rooted Garden kitchen gardens as I have. So, as Monica said, she is my friend first. We had kids that were in school together way back in Houston, and Monica worked for the PTO at our school. And I saw how amazing she was with organization and implementation. When did I started asking you? I think it was, like, immediately. Maybe the fall of 2015.

Yeah. I don't remember when it was, and I don't know. It's like I just wasn't ready. We were friends, and I was. I hadn't worked in, you know, 10 years, except, I guess, all the PTA and PTO stuff and just different things in the mom's group group I would chair. But I don't know. It's like I was scared. I was like, we're friends. What if it doesn't work out? What if. I'm really bad at this. I felt like we were. I was going to ruin the friendship.

So, yeah, so it took. I just kept asking, kept asking. And then finally the end of 2017. So I had had two full years with Rooted Garden. So for those of you listening who don't know the background, my first business is Rooted Garden, and it's based in Houston, Texas. And I started it right out of my own backyard garden and met Monica really, like, she And I were friends, first time friends that fall as I was starting the business. So she was really one of the first. I think you're one of the first people I gave lettuce seeds to in that fall. So she got to kind of watch the business take off over the first two years. And then finally, in the end of 2017, Monica agreed to come on and start with me. So we started pretty simply. It was a little bit of a crazy time that January. I had a lot of speaking engagements, so Monica and I worked together. We spoke at a ton of garden clubs around Houston. And I have these memories. We had just gotten our puppies, Ponyo and Totoro. And so, Monica, how many times were you puppy sitting for me?

I don't know. I mean, I love dogs, so I loved puppy sitting them, but they would, you know, go chew on your pillows. And I'm like, no, I have work to do. You guys have to be good while I'm dog sitting you.

Yeah, so funny. So what Monica and I got to do in the first few months is I would say, you know, you started almost on the operations, the administrative side of things. And then business really took off that spring, as it always does, and pretty soon you jumped into the consultant role. So just explain quickly what a consultant, what that role look like for you.

So I still remember my first consultation with a client. It was, you know, as often clients do, they, you know, need something urgent. And so this client was having a party. You were already booked. And so I went out there and I remember being super, super nervous that I was just, you know, I didn't have the experience and the knowledge to be able to, you know, lead a consultation with a client. But we went out there and, you know, she already had existing gardens, so I wasn't designing anything new, but rather I was educating her on what was possible during that season. And if I recall, it was warm season, maybe moving into hot season. So just talking, you know, with her, a plan for her space. So, you know, I spent maybe about an hour with her, and then we. I went back, I think to your home and started an estimate.

Yeah, yeah. So that was. That was the early spring, I think, like you said, it was kind of an emergency thing. And then we went through a period there for a few months where we did consults and installations together. And then. And then my family relocated to the Chicago area. So you went from puppy sitting January to by the middle of the summer, you were literally doing consults and installations all over the city within like a seven or Eight month period. It's a little crazy.

Yeah. I mean, it was, but it's like, I think back to it and I'm like, oh, my goodness. I just learned so much. I gained so much confidence. I mean, it was, it was really good. But I mean, you sometimes have to be kind of uncomfortable in order to grow. And I just, I mean, I learned so much from you. It's been so good.

It's been so fun and I love getting to work with you. It's, you know, like you said, sometimes it can be dangerous to work with a friend because you could kind of mess it up. But so far, thanks to your patience, we've stayed friends. Oh, my gosh. So I thought it'd be so fun to go through go back down memory lane. And especially for our listeners who maybe they haven't put in a garden yet, they're thinking about it, or they've looked through the book and are wondering what the experience might look like. I thought it'd be so fun to go back down memory lane for installs that I did before you and I started working together and then some of your installations and talk kind of the good, the bad, the ugly, and the memorable.

Yeah.

So I thought together we could go through each little. A couple of different of the structures that are highlighted in the book and tell some stories.

Yes, Sounds good.

Okay, so the first one obviously is raised beds. So raised beds is all we do with rooted garden. That's like our signature offering is raised bed, kitchen, gardens. And so of course, there are so many things that can go wrong or be complicated with raised beds. So I thought I would say this was before you and I, you started working with me. This was the spring of 2017.

So I don't know about you, but.

When you were working, were you just using like a normal long measuring tape when you would measure out spaces for the gardens?

Yeah, just like a simple one you'd buy at the big box store.

Yeah. So I had one of those. I was with a client, a client who had been with me from the beginning. And it was like a second follow up. And he said, oh, no, Nicole, you don't need that. Let me give you this. This is really awesome. And he gave me a laser measurer. So it's like this little box and it sends a laser to one side of the yard and then measures for you. So you don't. Because, you know, like, you and I, I'm sure you did this. I probably broke three or four measuring tapes in my career with rooted garden outside because you're like stretching them out and then you're getting dirt in them and spray paint and, you know, sand and gravel. So I had broken so many and he, I think he was like kind of embarrassed for me. So he was like, here's this fancy laser measurer. So I use it for a very important client, new client, who is amazing. Actually, I'll just, I'll just say her name is Marcia Smart. So Marcia Smart, if you're out there listening, we love you. Marcia owns Smart in the kitchen. She is a family weeknight meal teacher. She's amazing. So super important client because she was going to be bringing her students out to her kitchen garden. So I use my fancy laser measurer and failed to double check the measurements on a normal everyday dirty measuring tape. So I just trusted the laser. Can you, can you guess what's going to happen here? So I placed the order. This is a huge raised bed. It's 25ft long. And nowadays probably we would break that into two beds, right?

I think so, yeah.

It's just, and I even talk about this in the book, like it's generally not a great idea to have a super long, one solid bed. Just there's so much pressure that's going to be on that long bed. But anyway, it's in her little pool house. So I thought, oh, we're just going to do one huge bed. She'll get tons of growth out of it. So I order a custom made 25 foot bed. Chris, who was our carpenter at the time, he gives me a call. He was there, we had done the setup and then he was going to show up and build the bed on site because it's such a huge bed. But he had already pre built all the sides. And he gives me a call, he's like, Nicole, I'm over about 4 inches on this bed here. So anyway, that was my first big measuring mistake. I learned my lesson. No laser, no fancy. Don't get fancy with it. All you need is a measuring tape. So. So I threw away the laser measure. Actually, I think I gave it to my kids to play with and, and I went back to the measuring tape. We did get the bed fixed. It just, it put us back a good number of days because he had to literally rebuild two of the sides to get it. It was so bad. All right, your turn.

Okay. So I had done a consultation for a client and the wife is going to give this to her husband as a 40th birthday gift. And so they didn't have a large, large space. So you Know, I had gone out and measured, and I think it was about 12ft by 2ft. The width was only about 2ft. And so we, you know, I put the. The order in for the garden, and it comes and gets delivered. And I didn't take into account the trim. So, you know, I learned that lesson that you have to think about the interior width and then the width with the trim. So this garden was 2ft with the trim. So it was only about 16 inches or so interior planting space. And so once we got the garden placed, that was one of the first things the client mentioned was how narrow it was. And, you know, she. She wasn't. Wasn't loving that. So anyway, we ended up having to take all the soil out of the garden, you know, on her driveway, and then extend the two side pieces of the garden to make it, you know, I think it was about 28 inches or so with the trim.

Gotcha.

That was another measuring, you know, experience I learned is that, you know, you have to put that order in, you know, with trim or without trim.

And do. You could. Did it feel too big, taking up too much space from the beginning? Like, if you had measured out further out, was that part of.

No. I mean, it would have been fine to go further out. We just. I don't know. I just, you know, it was my first time doing that, and I hadn't thought about. And he didn't ask with or without trim.

Yeah.

So, yeah, so I should have just given him, like, okay. Instead of 2ft wide, you know, 28 inches wide, and then we would have eliminated that.

But, yeah, so it's. It's, you know, it's one of those things. But did you fix the problem?

I was going to say we fixed the problem, and the client was super pleased with it, and she went on to become a monthly maintenance client. So, you know, we handled it quickly and professionally, and I, you know, it was a good chance to really prove. Prove what we could do. That even, you know, something wasn't exactly as planned. We were able to address it and fix it.

Yeah. And I think that's what, you know, I learned from my experience with Marsha's bed, too, is okay. At that moment, it felt like the world was falling apart. I can remember being home with my kids and him calling me. But in the end, we made it right and fixed it and got it built and it got done. And now Marcia's had her garden for three years, which is amazing. So. Yeah. Okay. So I think we could go on and on with raised bed Stories. I can think of one. I'll say in particular. I was at a garden space with my daughter, my youngest, Elaine. And at the time, she was in preschool school and she was learning how to write her name. Can you see where this is going? She's learning how to write her name. We have these gorgeous raised beds that have just been delivered. So for you guys listening, part of our system is we have the beds built custom for our clients, so they generally arrive ready to go. And these beds were very large. They were four by eights. You know, lots of custom work that's gone into them. So I'm turning around, working in the space, and I turn around and she has taken a carpenter pencil, which was left by the team, and written her name very large on the trim of the garden bed. So Elaine with a big circle on top of the I. You know, it's. And it's like the E is backwards. I mean, it was just the way she was writing in preschool. And it would be so obvious that it was my child that did this, right? So I had a major, major mom freak out moment. Mompreneur, I guess, freak out moment. Thankfully, the client wasn't home. We were able to just sand it off the top. But, I mean, she did a good indentation. Like, she wasn't. You know, preschoolers, they're not messing around with that pencil, right? Like, they are pushing down with all their might to make their imprint in the world.

So I haven't heard this story.

Yeah, I. I didn't tell anybody. I was super embarrassed. And like, she just wrote on a very expensive. That would be the equivalent, you know, of a child writing on a very expensive piece of furniture. So, yeah, so many things that have happened with raised beds. I think the major lesson learned here is my good friend Joyce. She was a quilter, and she always said this to me. I tried to learn sewing, and I'm awful at it. But she would say, measure twice, measure thrice, cut once. You know, and this idea of taking your time to get really, really good measurements before you start to take off and start building. Right. Like for both you and I, not the Elaine situation, but for both of our situations, really. You know, I think probably a reason why we haven't had those problems again is because we learned our lessons, right? So we did that and we're like, okay, now I know that's the. The trim hangs over this much. Or for me, now I know I'm never going to use this fancy laser measure again. I'm going back to my dirty Measuring tape.

You remember the time you had to carry it out? It wouldn't line back up.

Yes. So for those of you listening, this is what I mean. Like, there was one time I was at a consult, and the measuring tape had been used so much that it had so much dirt and gravel in it that it literally would not wind back up. So I'm at my first time meeting this client, trying to look fancy, and I'm walking out with 20ft of metal measuring tape around my neck. Were we working together at that time?

No, I just remember that story.

Oh, my gosh. So horrible.

Okay, so here's how you tell it.

But those are some good raised bed stories. Let's talk about trellises. We've had our share of fun trellis stories, too. So I had a client. I won't even go. This client's story. I could tell so many stories. So we started out. This is a wonderful family who trusted me from the very beginning. And I started out with cattle panel trellises for this client. And we grew so much food on these cattle panels that they literally collapsed no matter what we did to them. And I had not really started using fancy trellises at this point. So I just thought it was amazing to create these little arches, right? But they literally fell over underneath the weight of all this. So I started using nicer trellises. They saw them and they said, hey, you know, let's add those to our garden instead. So it was the Monet arch, You know which one I'm talking about. And so my first time ordering it, and I am, you know, I don't do this generally for clients, but in my own life, I am an I don't read instructions kind of person. Right. Especially if it seems to at all be like, you know, just an easy thing to do. So I pull out the pieces. They're all labeled like A, B, C, D. And I'm like, that's done. Like, this is just. All this makes sense. This is how this goes together. So my mom actually was visiting with me, and I was just like, let's just pop in, switch these trellises out. The garden had been established for more than a year at this point. So I had received the trellises. I was putting them together. Well, I'm just popping them together, and they are not. This is not working. Right? So my mom's trying to help me. And, I mean, she's my mom. She's a very strong woman. But, I mean, she has a couple years older than me. So we're Trying to pull it apart because I put it together in the wrong way. And we're trying to, you know, go back to the point where I should have read the directions. Mom and I are pulling, pulling. It will not come apart. So. So then the client arrives home from work. He's in his suit and comes out. Nicole, this looks so exciting. We're so excited about the trails. I'm like, yeah, there's just a slight problem, which is I'm putting this together the wrong way, and it's stuck. So he stands on one side, I stand on the other with my mom. I'm pretty sure his wife came out as well. And the four of us had to work. I think it took us about 15 minutes to pry the trellis apart from the wrong way. And then finally I was able to put it back together. So I, like, picked my ego up off the dirt and walked back to my car like, yes, yes, I am professional. I promise. I just had you help me for 15 minutes to take the trellis apart.

Well, and then putting that trellis in once the garden's been established probably wasn't easy either.

Yeah. And you know that from your experience. So tell us about. About that one.

Okay. So the installation happened a couple months before, and it was a little bit wider pathway than usual. And so that was kind of a challenge, finding an arch trellis that would work. And I think we had ordered one that we knew wasn't going to work, so we didn't even attempt to install it. And so this was a second one. And myself and Jen, our maintenance manager, the two of us were doing this together. And it was a June day, full sun in Houston, which is. You feel like you're on the sun. I mean, you just. And it's super humid. And so here we are, we're in the grass, putting together this huge trellis. And so that's probably mistake one. Don't put a trellis together in the grass, because we're dropping little nuts and bolts, like, into the grass. And so we're trying to find them as the sweat is dripping into our eyes. So we finally get it together, and it is. I mean, it is a huge trellis, massive. And so it's the two of us out there trying to put the trellis together or trying to put it into the garden. And again, the garden had been established, so the soil wasn't super soft. So we get one side in, we work, we get the other side in, and then we realize that it is really not wide enough. And so what's Happening is we are stretching the two bottoms too far apart and it just looked bad, it looked awkward. So once we, you know, we get this in, we are taking it out and then taking it apart and then trying to re box all these pieces back into a box to take to our car. So I just remember, you know, that after that experience talking to my mom and saying, you know, I just don't know if I can work here. I'm like, this is just really, really hard. I'm really bad at, you know, this trellis thing. But anyway, I mean, it all worked out and you know, that was over two years ago and that was.

And then we finally, we finally got a big enough trellis. Right. We did like two months later.

I was going to say it was, it was much later because it wasn't so hot.

Yeah. And then I think we. It was better because the vines were everywhere. And I want to say, did we bring in the rest of the team to help put it in?

I think we brought in. Yes, we did.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So for those of you listening, we talked about this in the book, that the idea of going ahead and choosing your trel, picking them and having them in the box before you start to plant. So our situation in this case was the client had not picked the trellis. So we've grown as a business now we, we really try to make sure the trellises are selected and ordered and there when we put the garden in. But sometimes it just doesn't happen. Like right now, even the trellis we love is back ordered. And we are gardening year round in Houston. But a lot of the market, for some reason, like, they only have stuff available in April or May, so it can be complicated. But for this particular garden, the opening, it's a formal potager and it's super wide opening. And so most trellises are set up for a less wide opening, something more like 3ft wide or 4ft wide. And this one, a different landscaper had put the beds actually in place. So we were working. You know, it was just a very unique situation. But I can remember chatting with you that summer and just the frustration and the hours. I think you guys had done like four hours, four or five hours of work that turned into basically just sending the trellis back. Right. Or actually, is that the trellis that you ended up using in your own garden?

You know what?

It might have been, because that's a funny story of mine too. Right. The one good side of this is that oftentimes Monica and I end up with the rejects I think she took the trellis that didn't work in that big garden and put it in her own, which was like your first garden. There was like a keyhole garden, which was so cool. We'll have to put a picture of it in the show notes. And then for me, we had ordered these custom trellises for. For another formal protege, of course. And this was also very wide opening. I want to say this one is like eight feet wide. It's super wide. So I'm not sure. Yeah, I had ordered these from a steel worker, a great company, and I'm not sure. I think they were in transition. They lost a couple of people. Anyway, two months later, they show up at the garden site, and the trellises look nothing like I asked them to look. And they're like three or four feet too narrow. So almost same situation as yours. The only difference was I didn't have to put them together because these were custom. So long story short, basically, they were supposed to be put in in June, and they had to go back and literally scrap those and start all from fresh and build two more that they put in at the end of July. So same kind of idea. We had to retrofit them in and just kind of try to keep the vines alive, you know, that had been planted there to grow on the trellises two months earlier. The good part about that, and I tell this story a lot, so many of you ask where my trellises are from in my garden. And the sad thing to say is they're not. They're not available everywhere because these are the reject trellises. So they had put some, like, ornate decals or like. I don't know what you call that, but like, detailing on the trellis. So that had come off. So then the trellises were just kind of plain. And my birthday rolled around. That was. What was that? The fall? That was the first. Were we working together? Yeah.

No, we weren't.

Yeah.

17.

Yeah, fall of 17. So I. It was my birthday and I was like, I want to buy myself something for my birthday. So I called the. I called the trellis company that had messed up on there's large trellises. I said, you don't happen to still have those reject trellises, do you? And they're like, yeah, we do. And we would like to get rid of them. And I was like, I know just the place. So they gave me a little bit of a discount, which was nice. And then I got to. Those are my trellises. And the hilarious. I Think. I talked about this on the podcast a couple weeks ago about money in the garden. When we listed our house to sell in Houston, the first offer that came in had the trellises as a requirement for the deal. I was like, you are not getting my trellises.

I remember that.

Jason's like, if it'll sell the house. I'm like, no, we're not going there. They cannot have my trellis. They can have all the trees that they want, but not the trellis.

Not the trellis. I remember that story.

So fun. Okay, well, we've kind of gone through some raised bed stories and some trellis stories. What about any other part of the garden installation? Have you had any tear out crazy stories or when you're putting in borders or pathways, have there been any, any moments where things felt a little bit crazy or overwhelming for you?

Well, I mean, we've had times where, you know, it's the morning of the install and we have forgotten to order the gravel. So we've had that situation. You know, it's just a, you know, a little miscommunication. We think the installer is getting it, but it was over the amount that he could hold in his truck. And so we just didn't realize that. And, you know, it ended up working out because they had a cancellation, the delivery. The gravel company had a cancellation that morning. It happened drizzling, so they were able to accommodate us, you know, but that's happened. You know, I've underestimated the amount of edging that we have needed. We learned that, you know, our steel edging that we use, we like to use steel edging because it's very, it's clean and it's strong and it just, it separates like your grass or your other area very nicely. The pieces are 10ft long, but they're essentially more like 8ft, feet long. If you're, I guess, adding the side pieces in anyway, they're not quite 10ft. And so, you know, we've gone out on jobs where we need 48ft of edging. We bring five 10 foot pieces, giving us 50ft and we run short by the time we, you know, curve that edging. So we've, you know, we've learned that, that we have to, you know, overestimate an extra piece so that we have enough edging.

I've done that too. We've been in place, ready to go, and we start to lay out the edging. And Chewy is generally, she's. He's our team member who helps install the gardens and he'll say, Ms. Nicole, we are short and what we like to do with Rooted Gardens. So part of our, I guess our offering is turnkey. So I wrote about this a while back, but I was influenced by watching Fixer Upper. When I first set up Rooted Garden. I loved the way that at least they portray on the show, you know, in all those HGTV shows. Right. But they're about home rather than garden, unfortunately. We'll change that one day and have a garden show. But is, you know, like the owner leaves and then, you know, maybe doesn't return. At least on the show, they're not for like 30 days or 60 days or whatever. And then they drive up, they see what it used to look like, and then suddenly, boom. You know, it's like instantaneous, instant gratification and everything's there. And I love that. I love that experience. And you know, to me, part of the value that we add is that people don't experience all the stuff we're talking about. Right. So our clients have to go through the stress of the ordering and things not working and this not fitting because we do that for them. So we take all that worst first away and then they just drive in and boom, there's their gorgeous garden. But there are obviously stories where we don't get to quite make that happen in a day's time or in a short period of time, because we do hit snafus. But some of that is we really work to have everything ordered and ready to go right on the day that we start. And so I think in some ways, I think we've kind of spoiled our team to where they. When they arrive and not everything's there ready for them. They're like, wait, what happened? Like, yeah, supposed to be a perfect system.

Yeah, I mean, it's a lot of behind the scenes because you're dealing with a lot of, you know, or several different people. You know, you have your wood contractor and your soil, you know, your soil delivery and your gravel and the plants and making sure we have their selection. So, you know, you just really have to make sure, you know, several days before. And we actually, we've just created a checklist where, you know, 48 hours before the installation, we are going through all these things to make sure everything's covered and ready.

Yeah, it's a lot of behind the scenes is. Taken us a while to get the system going. All right, so those are some of our. Those are some of our worst case scenarios. Some of our. The bad and the ugly. I thought we could close this by telling some of the more meaningful. I mean, they're all meaningful, but some stories, some garden installations that have really stood out to both of us and end with that just as a way to inspire our listeners and to remind them what it's all about, even when you get in the. In the dirt. So I'll start with the. I've talked about this story a while and this happened before you and I got to work together, but I had a great client. His garden is actually featured inside of Kitchen Garden Revival. His name is Andrew and I tell his story on the podcast episode where we talk about gardening for your mind first. So Andrew's incredible client who contacted me just as he was about to. He was basically. He could tell he was sick but had not been diagnosed yet and ended up being diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. I got to create the garden for him as he was going through treatment and he really saw the garden as part of his treatment and really a gift to his wife. I won't start crying here. I think I definitely started crying on the mind podcast. But it was just such an incredible. It was one of those moments, you know. The company at that point was only six months old and I really got to know Andrew. He ended up hiring me to do a workshop for his daughters. He has three girls. And he ended up hiring me to do a workshop for his daughters to teach them how to become an entrepreneur. And did that just. He was literally going through treatment, his first few rounds of treatment when we did the workshop. And yeah, just to see that when someone is going through something that's life threatening and that is so scary and hard, that he would want to add a garden to his life was so inspiring to me. I thought if this is something that someone wants, this is a first thought of something that someone wants to invest in when they know their time on earth may be limited. This is something I want to give my life to while I'm here, you know. And you had a similar experience just a few summers later?

Yeah, actually, I guess last spring I had gone and met with a client and she was. She was in at the time in remission from ovarian cancer. But she had, you know, she'd been in and out of the hospital and you know, it had been a tough road for. But she had a space in her yard where she already had two trellises and it was a space where her two daughters swing set used to be and her daughters were now one was in college and one was working. So they were grown but the space was empty. And she just had a vision to, like, look out her kitchen window and to see her garden. And she was limited in what she could do because of her suppressed immune system. She couldn't, like, get in the dirt, but she could enjoy the harvest. So we ended up designing. It was a very large space, so we ended up designing four ells, and then it was four squares. So she probably had about 150 square feet of garden space. And we got the garden installed, and then her cancer came back, and she was pretty limited on even being able to go outside, but she could see the garden from our kitchen window. And she just. I mean, the garden brought her such joy. I mean, she, you know, followed you. She liked compost. She sent me photos. By now, Jill was involved. You know, our new. Our consultant, Jill Oliver, was involved and actually knew Rena. They were personal friends. So Jill was involved and would go out there and, you know, we just, you know, we definitely were trying to just, you know, we knew, I guess her cancer was terminal, so we were going out there and doing whatever she wanted to make her final, you know, months or days or however long she had as enjoyable as possible because the garden did bring her great joy.

Yeah.

And she passed away. And. Yeah, my 10 year old still asks about Rena, and. Yeah, it's just very, you know, very sad.

It is very sad. She was such a neat woman. I actually got to meet her last summer when I was in Houston. Southern living feature. So I got to go out and see the garden, which was so gorgeous, and she gave me a tour. She knew everything that was planted out there, had lots of fun things to say. And just like you said, she could sit right in her kitchen and. And see the garden.

Yeah, she loved those garden. I mean, she just. She was. She loved it.

Yeah. Such a beautiful place. We've had so many clients. You know, I. It's been. It's been neat. I. I've recounted to Jason oftentimes where I'll come back from a consult, and I'm like, wow, so many people that. That we get to create gardens for have. Have really been through things. You know, I can remember meeting a client who had had a horrible car accident and lost one of their children, or meeting a client who just lost a parent and. Or meeting a client who had just survived breast cancer. And, you know, it's. If you realize very quickly, actually, I saw this inside of our kitchen Garden academy private group a couple weeks ago. Someone said, I think we're talking about a lot more here. Than just the garden. And I think we've both seen that. Right. Is that these. These gardens are really. It's really about people and their stories, and it's this. It's this unique thing that connects us all as humans because we all eat. We all. We all come from the earth. We're all going back to the earth. We all eat from the earth. And I don't know, I've gotten to hear so many incredible, inspiring stories and sad stories and happy stories from clients, like, getting to meet them when they're. They've got preschoolers, you know, and they want to introduce their young children to the garden all the way to, you know, end of life. It's like the full circle. And I don't know, I think it's. I think you and I have talked about this a lot of times. Like, we keep doing it and we stick with it because of the connection with neat people. It's like, I think the garden almost pre. Selects really, really special people.

Yeah. And even just while you're talking, I'm thinking of, you know, all the people I've coached, you know, whether they had a garden or didn't have a garden. And I've just met, and I mean, you two, so many just, you know, wonderful people that I almost feel like they're my friends now. So. Yeah, it's an amazing connection.

Yeah. I thought we could close with the email. I should have pulled it up, but we did get an email from a client, actually. You did her garden. For those of you who don't know, in Houston, we had a horrible hurricane in 20. 2017. No. Yeah, 2017, the fall. August of 2017, we had a horrific hurricane. Probably one of the worst that's touched Houston in ever. Or a century or something.

Like, ever. Yes.

Flooding all over our city. So many of our friends. It really impacted the school where Monica and my children go, and so many of the homes. There are still families in Houston who've not gotten back to their. The home they were in in 2017. Yeah. So you had a client who had. She was still in her home, is that right?

They were. They had moved out for a while. So the husband had contacted us, I guess she. She followed us. She was followers of us and loved the raised gardens. So he had reached out and so I met him and did a consultation, and so he supported. Surprised her with the garden, but they had flooded pretty badly. They had evacuated and then moved out of their house for renovations. And she just really was suffering from a lot of anxiety. And most, like, I Think safe to say, like, post stress, post traumatic stress from the flooding. So we designed this garden for her, and it's been over a year. I think it was a year last March or April. And she recently sent us an email, a long email, just, you know, thanking us for what we had done, how much joy and healing the garden has brought her, how the garden has helped her love her home again and be happy, you know, happy in her home. So, I mean, it is, I just think, really powerful when you are, you know, I am not a trained social worker, psychologist, but you know, that we can go out and put together a design and educate and coach clients, and then here they are writing you letters, how you've changed their life. I'm like, that.

I don't know.

Pretty powerful.

It is pretty powerful. I remember. I think she sent the email to you and you forwarded it to me, and we both kind of came together and said, all right, like, this is worth it, right? This is worth the moments of stress and challenge. I think I wrote at the beginning of chapter three, and I think you and I both felt this. When you wake up on the morning of install, it's a little scary because you. You've got, you know, you might have as much as 8 yards, 10 yards of soil being dropped right at that moment in front of a home somewhere in Houston. You've got dump trucks on their way. You've got a crew on the way. You're about to tear up somebody's yard. Like, literally go from, you know, there wasn't a garden there. There might be a garden there, but whatever is there, you're about to rip it up to pieces, right? And if your measurements are off, if your lines are off, or if, you know, I don't know about you, but sometimes I would have that fear of, like, what if the client walks out and just hates this? You know, what am I going to do? And so we go through these, you know, these moments of stress. And like I said, we're. Our goal is that we do this so that our clients don't have to feel those feelings, right? They don't have to feel the worry and the stress, because that's on us. But we go through it and then. And it feels crazy and messy in the middle, and the measurements may be off, and you have to pull the client in to tug at the other side of your trellis, or you're searching for nuts and bolts in the grass. But in the end, you've created this retreat for people, whether they're, you know, at A very happy, amazing time of their life, or a very hard, challenging time of their life, or somewhere in between, you've done the hard work to give them the soft landing space right outside their back door that they'll create memories in and grow in. And I loved her email. You know, she just said, we literally go out there every day to watch the butterflies and to see the growth. And she said, you know, I didn't want to live in this house anymore because of the flood. And now, you know, the garden has made this one of my favorite places.

Yeah, I know. And she sent us some pictures, beautiful pictures with her daughter, you know, harvesting and. Yeah. So good. So good.

Well, I just want to thank you, first of all, so much for finally saying yes to me and quitting the PTO so that you can work with Frida Garden and now Gardenary, actually. And I know so many people listening have been impacted by you, whether they know it or not, because Monica is basically. Or not. Basically. Monica is my integrator. So everything that I do, Monica helps happen. If you've ever heard of, there's a book called Rocket Fuel that talks about how every business really needs two personalities, a visionary and an integrator. So someone who's out there thinking of all these crazy ideas, and then someone who can actually make them happen. And so Monica is that for me. I'm the crazy one, and she's the. She's the one who makes things happen. So I just want to thank you so much. I know you guys will love getting to know her in the years to come, and I'll definitely have you back on the podcast. We'll have to walk through some other fun stories together.

Yeah, well, I mean, I love it. Like, it's just such a. You know, it's a podcast for another day. But, you know, I've had my own challenges the last few years, and, you know, working for Rooted Garden Gardenary has been like, you know, the bright light in some tough and dark times. Thank you.

Well, I love our friendship, and I love the work that you do. You're so talented and so multifaceted. Like, you created some of the most gorgeous kitchen gardens, and yet you can help me edit a blog post for the podcast.

Well, I mean, I guess when you love what you do, you just. I don't know, I guess it makes it easy to, I don't know, try your hardest. I don't know, but, yeah, well, you're good at it.

All of it.

Yeah. Well, thank you.

Well, Sarah, I hope our episode has encouraged you Guys, all of you listening, whether you've been through your own worst first already and you've had the wrong measurements or the broken trellises or the frustrations, or if you haven't yet and you're a little intimidated by what may be on the other side of that tear out, hopefully this episode has shown you that it is okay to have some mess ups. It's okay for things not to turn out exactly as you planned. Like we said at the very beginning, it's not so much an accident, it's just a human experience and you're going to make it through it. And like we talked about in our own stories, all those gardens where we had hiccups and frustrations, they're all now growing and beautiful and doing the right things. So yours will be too. And hopefully this also shows you one the value of a garden coach business like Rooted Garden. Our business, Rooted Garden is based in Houston. And then through the Garden Coach Society, we train gardeners to do this all over because we really believe that when we take out the worst first part of the of the garden process, we can get more people all over the world to be gardening because so many of us are intimidated by that little section. So if you're a gardener, then you should definitely consider joining the Garden Coach Society. We'll have links to sign up. We have an upcoming workshop this Sunday night that I would love for you to attend where I tell my story of how I built Rooted Garden. And we'll show you how you can join and be part of Garden Coach Society. So you could definitely, you should definitely consider joining us if you are a gardener. And if you're ready to get your garden started, then now you know where to go to get help, right? Of course. If you're in Houston, you need to call Rita Garden and you can check out the gardenary directory for Garden Coach businesses all over North America that can help you through the worst first part. Anything else you want to say, Monica?

I don't think so.

Well, I love.

Thanks for having me on. I love being on today. This is so fun.

It's so fun. Well, we will have to do it again. So now you, what are you gonna do next? Are you gonna go order some trellises or set up some raised beds? What's your plan?

I don't know. I might check in. We have an installation going on in Houston, so I might go check in with the team and there's some other projects I'm working on for Gardenary so.

See if they have any trellis problems or.

Yeah, hopefully not. Hopefully not, right?

Well, thanks so much for joining me. I will put a link up to more about Monica in the show notes and you guys can see. Stay tuned to hear more from her in the days ahead. All right, bye.

See you guys later.

Thanks so much for listening to the Grow youw Self podcast this week. I hope you enjoyed as we dove into the reality, the behind the scenes, the worst first of putting in a kitchen garden. You heard it straight from me and Monica. It's not simple and easy, but it always turns out the way it's meant to be. So if you're going through the worst first yourself, check out Kitchen Garden Revival for encouragement and directions. And if you'd like to have someone help you go through all this process and help you through the worst first for that fixer upper kind of feel, then check out Gardenary Garden Coaches. You can check them out@gardenary.com coaches. Don't forget that this Sunday night I am hosting a free live workshop where I will teach you the behind the scenes of how I built Rooted Garden and how you can build your own garden coach business through the Garden Coach Society too. We'll have links to that inside today's show notes, so come and join us on Sunday night. Thanks again for listening to the Grow youw Self podcast. We'll see you next week where we're diving in to chapter four all about that Dirt. See you then. Take of care here.