Services

I will spend ½ hour with you and walk around your property and gardens while we discuss visions, goals, and ideas for what you need and want done, billed at $100 for a half hour for your initial consultation. After our meeting, if you would like, I will send a written summary of my notes emailed to you for an additional $25. It may take up to two weeks depending on the busyness of the season to get a summary sent to you. My rate for design work and sketches is $100/hr and time will vary depending on the size of each project and the depth.

I can help you figure out what plants can potentially work well in your space, with knowing light conditions, soil health, and what your personal tastes are. I can draft up a rough sketch of my thoughts and share with you a design from the ground up if you have a need for that after meeting in person, which will mean we need to have measurements of the space.  I will discuss potentially getting a soil test done, building up soil health, and a fertilizing program if need-be if plants are having a hard time thriving and/or decipher if they are just planted in a wrong location/site for optimal health. I will do my best to educate clients on how to properly water plants after they are installed, and maintain the conditions for optimal establishment. If plants are not properly cared for, they will perish. I do not guarantee any plants longevity because sometimes, even if properly cared for, a plant may just not be in a right micro-climate to survive, a disease or pest may afflict it’s life suddenly, or a series of significant weather events may occur and I can not prevent that from happening. Plants are living things, and I do my best to make sure they live to their fullest potential.

Please also keep in mind that different plants have different life spans! Some trees can live to be hundreds of years old. Some trees/shrubs live to be 60 years old, some live to be 30, some herbaceous perennials only live 2-5 years, some perennials even less. This is a good thing to be mindful of when planting, or understanding of, so you don’t get too attached to the idea that a plant may live forever, or die soon. We need to enjoy their company while we have it!

All clean-ups and any mulching/compost applications are billed at $50/hr per worker. I prefer to not do a full fall clean-up. This allows birds to feed on flower head seeds and leaving the leaves offers homes to beneficial insects. Leaving full plants in place also adds winter interest for different plant species add texture in your gardens, and allows for natural seeding for free baby plants to share with friends and family when spring comes. We can discuss accordingly what the possibilities are.

The size of the load(s) determines the ultimate cost, which can range from $20-$80 depending on size of load and distance to dump.

General maintenance includes weeding, pruning, watering, fertilizing, staking, re-seeding, and whatever other jobs need to be taken care of throughout the growing season.

I use Martin’s Farm Compost and Compo-mulch. I work with Jim Vieira who makes beautiful Goshen Stone stepping stones. Price quotes available upon request for any stone work desired. I use Delta Sand and Gravel for other stone needs. I generally try to shop locally for other products that your gardens may need.

I get my plants and gardening supplies from many different nurseries, and I also grow some plants from seed in my own greenhouse but am taking a break in 2024 for plant sales. I go to Nasami Farm, Andrew’s Greenhouse, Baystate Perennial Farm, Greenfield Farmers Exchange, Sugarloaf Nursery, Laurenitis Farm, Village Green and on occasion Wanczyk Nursery and Hadley Garden. I am trying to support growers who don’t use pesticides on their plants and am hoping to mainly shop this season at Nasami Farm for native plants and Andrew’s Greenhouse which do IPM or integrative pest management practices. Many plants are already dosed in pesticides when you purchase them and can be already toxic to nature and I am trying to be more mindful of that.

I work on building up soil health and use only organic practices when I garden. If plants have not been thriving in your garden for a while, I certainly recommend getting a soil test done to see what needs to be done in terms of building up soil fertility. We can then determine a simple program that can best suit the needs to keep your soil healthy and at it’s best for plants to live at their fullest potential. Applying a layer of compost is a great place to start. Any pesticides, herbicides, or insecticides that have been used at a property can harm soil health, beneficial insects, humans, and pets- not just the intended target. There are organic ways to solve most problems, and we can work together to figure out how to help a plant that is struggling after diagnosing what the problem is and its “root” cause. I will work with you on ending usage of chemicals around your property but can not work on properties that will continue to use chemicals if you chose to go that route for health and safety reasons.

Some people are interested in having planters done in entrance ways and decoration around their homes for a particular season, as they come and go. I can design spring planters for your front steps, entrance ways, or patios with bulbs and pansies for when spring arrives as well as window boxes. As the longer growing season approaches I can change those out to plants that will perform well in whatever growing conditions you have and explain care for keeping them healthy and growing strong. I will work with you on colors and combinations that bring you joy, and then change those out to fall decorative planters with pumpkins, grasses, mums, and gourds if you like. When winter is approaching I enjoy designing planters with evergreens, winterberries, magnolia leaves, as well as make custom beautiful wreaths with only natural materials bought locally from farms and flower shops, and sourced myself in the wild where I have permission to collect dried materials. 

If you are putting your house on the market and need a fast and quick clean-up I can offer my services to spruce up your home and do planters to make your home’s value increase and appeal to a potential buyer. The sooner the notification, the better chance I can work you into my schedule, as summer schedules tend to fill up quickly. 

I enjoy painting, creating and crafting with many different mediums! I haven’t made glass beads in a while but hope to get my equipment set up in the near future. I love sewing, braiding rugs, painting with watercolors, felting and sewing potholders out of felted old wool sweaters, working with clay, pen art, making jewelry, and more. I love to do blind-contour drawings of people and have done some for people as gifts to their loved ones recently. If you have a photograph of someone you love and want to submit it for an original pen and ink blind-contour drawing to give as a gift, please let me know. If you would like to see my art portfolio, please don’t hesitate to reach out. I have a number of tiny watercolors I am working on getting turned into greeting cards and can have them printed on request if you want a set of blank cards. Prices to be determined when we discuss what you’d like. 

I try to educate my clients about as much as I can that I discover in their gardens and love to learn new things myself about plants/insects/diseases I may not be familiar with. I don’t pretend to know what I don’t, and always enjoy researching all things garden related and educate my clients on what we may find in their gardens that I am uncertain about that may be of interest!