Confession time: I'm tired. Like, really tired.
I normally quit working at 3pm and go pick up my kids from school and don't look at work again until the following day. Today, I had back to back appointments all day and left work at 3pm, picked up my kids, but had to bring work home with me. It is incredibly rare that I work at home with my kids around, but this is one of those rare weeks where there are major deadlines and extra hours are necessary.
Read MoreIn February, I got to take part in the Fleursociety Online Summit. I’m so thankful for any chance to share my story! As I often say, I made so many mistakes early on in my business journey. Whenever I share my story and what I’ve learned since starting my business, my deepest hope is that I’m saving others from making those same mistakes!
In the online Summit, I shared my story and talked about how systems and efficiency can lead to business growth.
Read MoreA few weeks ago, I shared how long-term planning can lead to a stress-free wedding week. If you haven’t read that post yet, go check it out before reading on! The truth is, without effective long-term planning, any tips I share today about shorter-term, wedding week preparation won’t be very helpful.
As designers, we put so much thought and energy into designing beautiful weddings and florals for our clients, that sometimes we can run out of steam by the time the wedding rolls around. We start to dread wedding weeks, especially if we know they’re going to be filled with late nights, little sleep, shirking all other responsibilities and being strangers to our families. Maybe you’ve been stuck in that rut for years. But let me tell you something: it doesn’t have to be this way. And the trick to turning it all around? It’s simple. Planning.
Read MoreThis beautiful Southern spring wedding was featured in Arkansas Bride Spring/Summer 2019 Magazine!
“From day one, Bailey envisioned her wedding day as a modern, Southern affair with lots of white and greenery. She decided on light blue for her bridesmaids, which was a perfect complement to the neutral color scheme.
Read MoreI remember when I first started my business and all these big dreams I had of my work being featured. My focus was more on the potential press than it was on the work. Looking back, it's so obvious why none of my early work was featured - it's not that the work wasn't good, it's just that my focus wasn't where it needed to be. It was only when I shifted my energy and started focusing more on my clients and their dreams for their day that things began to happen. Press features are no longer a top priority for me. More often than not, I'll receive an email from a publication or a text from a friend letting me know of a feature they saw of one of my weddings.
Read MoreI’ll never forget that sick-to-my-stomach feeling. It was the week of a big wedding and as I went to prep some floral foam, I realized we were totally out. I did the only thing I could do, and I scavenged any store in our small town and all the neighboring towns that might have some foam. No luck.
I ended up having to rig together a solution, wasting mental energy and time worrying and problem-solving. While I ended up delivering on the end result and gave the couple exactly what I promised, I knew I never wanted to feel like that again. Frustrated, out of control, and behind.
Ever since that wedding, long-term planning remains one of the most important components to our wedding day success and client satisfaction. It’s funny-- one on the best ways I can serve my clients is by perfecting a process they never see, and should never know about.
Let’s talk about why your team should start preparing for a wedding the day the contract is signed, and why this long-range preparation will completely transform your wedding experience, putting the fun back into the wedding week.
Read MoreI try to look at a popular venue where hundreds of weddings have been designed with the exact same layout as a challenge. The very first thing I do is ask myself, "How can I lay this out how it's never been done before?"
Read MoreI’ve been feeling a tug at my heart for a while now. Something inside me is saying it’s time for a change, it’s time to pivot, to try something new. I’ve had a very specific dream for the past 18 years. That dream has evolved over time, but it’s still there. On Mother’s Day, Brian gave me the best gift in the world, rest. He took the kids for the day and I caught up on some much needed rest. Those days of being all by myself all day long are so incredibly rare, but it’s those days when I get my best ideas. I’m writing this post for one reason, because I want to remember this moment. I want to remember this day as the day I finally stopped allowing this dream to be just a dream.
Read MoreWhen I'm first hired to design an event, the very first thing I do is make a site visit. I can't do anything until I've seen the space with my own two eyes. So much depends on the space! For this wedding, when I saw the farmland and particularly this garden with it's wide walkways, I knew we had to set up long tables in the walkways and serve dinner family style. The wooden posts in the garden were begging to be strung with cafe lights.
Read MoreIf you read my blog a few weeks ago, I talked about THE BIGGEST mistake most creative entrepreneurs are making: not building an effective team. If you haven’t read that post yet, do us both a favor and check it out before you read on!
If you did read that post, then you know I left off by encouraging you to identify your strengths as the leader of your team. You can’t possibly know how to build a team until you know what skills you do have, and which skills you’re lacking! Identifying our strengths gives us the power to own our own tasks and delegate effectively.
Now, for some of you, just admitting that you don’t have all the strengths might feel debilitating. As entrepreneurs, we’re used to doing it all on our own. While that mentality might be helpful for trailblazers, it’s not useful for sustaining a business. Let me say that another way. You’ll probably see a lot of entrepreneurs going at it alone. You will see ZERO successful CEOs with a team of one. In order to own a successful business and live the life you want, you need a team. So, while I feel for ya, get over it! We have work to do.
Read MoreIf you’ve been keeping up with the blog, you know we’ve been talking about how build your business team from the ground up.
I recently went LIVE on Instagram to share how building my team totally changed the game for me and my business. If you missed out then, but want to hear more about building your team, watch the replay here!
Read MoreHad I known, I'm not sure I would have agreed to do it.
See the little girl in this photo. She turned four a few weeks ago. We have never cut her hair. It has grown at it's own sweet, slow pace and I've honestly wished it would stay short forever. As silly as it may sound, there is something about her hair being short that makes me feel like she's still a baby.
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