Me and my Plantman-new beginnings Aug 23, 2020

Greetings all on this warm Sunday evening. Wayyyyyy back when, in Mid March, our business and many others ground to a halt, because of You Know Who.   Our plant shows were cancelled, our main market downtown St. Pete had to stop abruptly, we ran a couple of weekends of yard sales then shut everything down and bunkered down to isolate for 2 weeks,  and like many, we scrambled to figure out a new path for our business.

When we decided to use the website to put out a list of our plants, offering for safe delivery, we were nervous..I sat at my computer, fighting off sleep, worrying and checking our website every 5 minutes......and when we got our first email from Anne W., we were thrilled !  She was our "number 1" and she got us going ! She referred us to others, and then, the ball got rolling, and has continued to be so.  Anne and so many others, especially the St. Pete Plant Society have kept us from drowning for these past 6 months. We are forever grateful for the customers, turned friends, that have kept us seeing the light.

So, we have reached that 6 month benchmark, and we think it time to evolve, revolve, keep growing and not get too dizzy. So, we decided, let's go back to basics...

I told Mitch back in March, the only thing I could think of to do, was to figure out a way to use our Blog that I had been writing for many years.  The blog had always been well received, and we loved the fact that we could write about not only plants, but personal stuff in our business and our real lives.   I would write the blog, then read it aloud to Mitch and he would smile and approve.  People were generous to read my musings and be supportive to our efforts.  I have to say, I got away from "blogging" too much these past 6 months in a scramble to focus on putting out Plant available list and numbers and pics, in order to spur business.   And I have to say, I miss doing that, and many close friends and supporters, told me they missed it too.  So....here I go, getting back all personal, and please forgive my ramblings, but I agree, it's time to get back to more sharing, and not just presenting lists. 

Not having a retail storefront, and being in a business that is hard, tough, physically grinding, and totally being dependent on a market day or a plant sale day, with it's ups and downs, weather impacts, social-economic impacts, has not been an easy road.

But, we don't ask for sympathy, we chose the life we wanted to live these past 16 years (our time of being together....call us partners, better halves, boyfriend/girlfriend, old man/old lady) , and have lived with it's consequences.   When Mitch was a young man, he did the large scale landscaping stuff, he drove huge tractor trailers, he dug a thousand holes for small and big projects. He drove for long distances way before there was an interstate and would trudge long slow miles up and down 301 and old 19. He is a 3rd generation plantman who learned the ropes from very young when his uncle would simply ask him to move a huge pile of dirt from one side of a road to another.  The plant business started with his grandmother who had, a nursery called interestingly  "Annie's Red Top Nursery" in Palmetto.   He road in buses out to fields to pick crops for pennies a day. He grew up in a time where you were no plastic nursery pots...you took old veggie cans and slap some tar on the side, and that's how you grew a new plant.   Sometimes dinner came from whatever you could hunt that day, rabbits, squirrels etc.  As he grew up, he worked for large nurseries,  supervised crews and did on-the-side lawn keeping and landscaping till dark many nights.  He married young, had a beautiful daughter, lived in small cramped trailers on the wilds of the family property.  As years progressed, he took master gardener courses, learned from the wise plantmen around him, and had very successful business at the Pinellas Park Flea Market for years.

The Armstrong family has deep connections in the little town of Palmetto, just south of us here in St. Pete.  Besides farming, family members drove the ferries from the south point of St. Pete to the port of Manatee before the "big bridge" was built, and  Mitch's dad was one of the first toll takers on the Skyway Bridge, where he remembers his mother driving out to to bring his dad butter bean soup for his break times.  Mitch's immediate 3 generation family comes from Spanish, Palestinian, and Cherokee Indian backgrounds - quite the mix.

In 2001, Mitch's life took a turn when he was invited to participate in a brand new community market starting in downtown St. Pete. It took him on a path to new beginnings, and on a path to meeting a young southside, native St. Burgian, little ole me....you will have to wait to hear about That evolvement on the next installment !

For now, No list tonight.....it's Road Time and time to do some Plant Hunting ! Look for our update mid week, meanwhile, Happy Gardening, and Keep Safe, Keep Believing in the miracle of Mother Nature that nurtures us all.

Bless you all for your continued support,   Love, Annie & Mitch