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Hello friends, bees, and other anthophiles,

This is my first newsletter, and I’m excited to share my little ¼ acre world with you all.

The season's happiest developments have been the chance to partner with several wonderful local businesses that will host Tabby Meadows bouquet pop-ups this summer. When the flowers are blooming in abundance, in a few more weeks, you'll be able to find them at:

• Bullfinchs in Sudbury
• Colour Salon in Sudbury
• Haute Coffee in Concord
• The Roasted Granola in Arlington

And I'll be at the SoWa Farmers Market in Boston on:

• July 12
• August 9
• September 13
• September 27

A flower farm is built from beautiful things, but first it is built from difficult ones. Before there are armfuls of blooms and bouquets carried home in brown paper sleeves, there is work. There is weather. There is uncertainty. There is a person standing in a field, looking at the ground and believing in something that does not yet exist.

My farmland lease began on March 1st, when the farm was still sleeping beneath several feet of snow. The field seemed quiet then, wrapped in winter's last blanket. But as the snow receded, it revealed what had been waiting underneath: weeds, rising from the earth with remarkable confidence.

So began the season.

March and April passed in a blur of weeding, tilling, irrigation tests, irrigation frustrations, irrigation redesigns, and soil amendments. For nearly ten weeks, my laundry room glowed with grow lights and held almost 2,500 seedlings at a time.

At the same time, I experimented with starting seedlings in the unheated hoop houses. The results were humbling.

The seedlings indoors flourished. Outside, some endured freezing nights only to face temperatures above 100 degrees during the day. This is my first year working with hoop houses, and I have learned that they are equal parts useful structure and stern teacher. Every lesson seems to arrive disguised as a mistake.

May has been the month of transplanting, of hauling in more soil, of weeding, and then weeding again, and then discovering there is somehow still more weeding to do.

Because I chose to use sprinklers and dense plantings, weed-preventing fabric wasn't a practical option. I still uncover fabric remnants left behind by previous farmers, tangled strands that catch in my weed whacker and remind me that all land carries traces of the people who worked it before.

The heat waves arrived early this year. They tested both the plants and the farmer. Still, each morning I walk the rows and find new growth waiting for me. The cosmos have already climbed past my knees. Every day the field becomes greener. Fuller. Dare I say… Lush!

One of the joys of farming is the amount of podcast listening it allows. Hours of planting and weeding go by much faster with good company in my earbuds. Lately, my favorites have been Dirt on Flowers, Stuff You Should Know, and Nobody Listens to Paula Poundstone. They’ve taught me a lot and provided plenty of laughs along the way.

Right now, the farm is full of promise. The flowers are still gathering themselves. Buds are forming. Stems are stretching. Everywhere I look, something is happening.

-- Julia

5/29/2026