We were sick of suburbia, so my husband Brent and I moved to a property about 30 miles west of Kansas City. But when we moved, I realized how little I actually knew about prairie plants, about native plants Here I was, now responsible for this piece of Earth, and I didn’t know anything about it. The more I learned, the more I found prairie in my own backyard. I started growing native plants, then selling native plants.
I began to think about how much I’ve learned through growing plants to share with people, just by caring for them from the point when they come out of a seed until they’re blooming and ready to go into someone else’s garden. The familiarity with them really gave me comfort, and a sense that I am a caretaker, a nurturer of the Earth. I’m a person that knows this place, and it appreciates me back. It gives me so much enjoyment to interact with the plants in this way and have this relationship with them. And I thought, I’d like to be able to share this sense of familiarity with these native plants with other people.
So that’s how Botanical Belonging came to be. It’s because Happy Apple’s Farm gave me a real sense of familiarity and closeness to the plant communities in this area, and I had a strong need to be able to share that with others, and leave it behind after I’m not here anymore. If I could just start a movement, or a group of some kind, we might just be able to foster this relationship, this reciprocity with the places we live, in our community.
Read the full story on our blog: Botanical Belonging: An Origin Story
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- February 21, 2022: Life & Work with Patti Ragsdale, Voyage KC
Botanical Belonging 