Love Grown Locally
Growing up in Rural Texas, Robin Blood had the opportunity to watch her German mother, an avid home-gardener, work the hard-scrabble Texas soil with amazing success. Robin spent many days of her youth learning the trades of her mother’s talent and it was during those times that she recalls inheriting her nickname “Blumen,” which is German for flower.
These seeds planted in Robin’s early years seemed to stick with her as she found herself in awe of the beauty of the outdoors, specifically drawn to flowers and plants. Although her childhood memories were nostalgic, she never had much use for these passions as she grew into adulthood.
Upon graduating from high school, and working her way up in the restaurant industry through her college years, Robin was soon hired as a director of sales for an e-commerce company based in Austin, Texas.
Although this seemed like a tremendous start to a promising career, Robin found herself utterly unfulfilled with the amount of travel and the time away from family that her career choice required.
It was an inspirational trip to a nursery in Corpus Christi, Texas in 2019, that reignited her passion for flowers. It was this experience that reminded her of her roots, coupled with a host of unpredictable circumstances due to the pandemic that sprouted ideas for Robin to research and ultimately begin the process of starting her own floral business.
Her ideas began to blossom when life served up an opportunity to “go for it.” Robin bet on herself and won. With a little piece of land, a dream and the incredible support of her fiancé Jeffrey Conicelli, she took a leap of faith. Her faith was fruitful as the groundbreaking for the appropriately named B. Blumen Flower Farm began in August of 2020, and has been successfully open for business in Godley, Texas since April 1st, 2021.
The ingredients that nurture a great idea into reality are the same that go into making flowers bloom, patience, passion and fertile soil. With an abundance of all three, Robin and Jeffrey have developed an obsession with learning how to work with nature rather than against it.
“The goal at the farm is to create an environment for nature to express itself as it was meant to be.”
Robin and Jeff have prioritized soil sustainability and microbiological health above all by using a “No-Till” farming method that utilizes a hand held broad fork rather than a tractor to aerate. This technique disrupts the soil and microbiome as minimally as possible.
Robin says, “We believe that the protection of soil’s microbiology is exceedingly overlooked in modern farming operations and has led to the topsoil crisis we now have in agriculture. We also pride ourselves in the fact that we don’t use pesticides, insecticides or herbicides on our farm.”
The passion for sharing their knowledge and skills with their community is evident. They are committed to creating out-reach opportunities by designing and hosting classes for all ages, while also authoring written instruction through their blog and developing instructional materials via social media. The two also partner with educational institutions in their region to help expose the next generation to the craft of sustaining agriculture and floristry by providing hands-on educational experiences in growing and farming practices.
Aside from efforts to maintain an eco-friendly planet, it has not gone unnoticed that in a fairly short amount of time, Robin and Jeffrey are successfully reaping what they sow with the beauty of flowers.
The B. Blumen Flower Farm also offers floral design that reflects the seasonality of the flowers themselves. The design textures, colors and temperatures change with what is available in the field.
“It has been beautiful to see the connection that our customers and brides begin to have with the flowers in the field to the flowers on their tables and in their weddings.”
The method of creating the florals for weddings is rather unorthodox in that brides and grooms plan months in advance to pick out varieties of flowers that can be grown for them on site. The couples are then welcomed back to visit while they bloom, to have a bridal shoot or even a picnic amongst their wedding flowers right up until their big day.
The diversity and abundance of activities and events that the B. Blumen Flower Farm has created for the community are endless. They’ve even joined forces with other local farmers to create the first ever Hood County Farmer’s Market. From Sunset Yoga to Mother’s Day flower arranging and even on site monarch sanctuary, there’s truly something for everyone.
There is much to learn from Robin and the dream she has seen through to fruition. It is when we come home to our instincts that we begin to see the fruits of our labor and the beauty of what is naturally within us. Our gifts to the world are most abundant when we, like in agriculture, work with nature instead of against it. It is then that we bloom.