Yesterday I made a vision board to give me focus and inspiration for the upcoming growing season. I’ve never done this before, but I saw Erin at Floret talk about one she did a while back, and decided to craft my own! I prefer physical media, but didn’t have any magazines to chop up, so it quickly morphed into digital.

Well, I opened up Freeform, and half way through that process of gathering and arranging photos and words, I was hit with an intense desire to see all my upcoming flowers in one place. And this happened:

I adore it! Almost can’t pull my eyes away from it. It looks like a page from a flower yearbook. I can’t wait to see what sorts of flower friendships emerge from the mix—who ends up hanging out with who, which ones are more loners, who are the quiet workhorses, which ones crave the spotlight, who does well in this particular garden space… Time will tell!

And I didn’t do it intentionally, but the flower colors mesh beautifully with the color card up in the upper righthand corner—some of my favorites. Perhaps those colors have become more bit more ingrained in my mind than I thought…

Not everything will be in bloom at the same time (although most of my focus will indeed be on the summer and fall growing seasons) still, this helps me visualize what I hope to put into bouquets. And on the Freeform page, I can drag the images around into little groupings and see how the colors work together. I’ve got some stunning combinations here. Oooooooh, the possibilities!

And the “Flower Yearbook” goes along well with the 2026 Planting Info spread sheet I’ve been working away at. It’s a massive master information sink that has all sorts of flower-related info—from the company I purchased the seed from, to planned planting date, to actual planting date, to number of seeds in packet, to number planted, to number germinated, to general health of seedling… You get the idea.

I’ve been trying to calculate when to expect different plants to be in full bloom. I have basic ideas from previous years, but I never really kept track of the details. Plus, I don’t know how much of a boost planting indoors actually gives the flowering process. And I don’t remember how long it took different varieties of dahlias to wake up after their winter sleep. There are so many variables and questions! This year, I’ll actually document things, and next year hopefully I’ll be able to lean on that info to make better planning decisions!

But back to Vision Board, 2026!

It may not look like much, but these all have meaning to me, speak to me in one way or another, or remind me of something important that needs to be part of the picture for the year.

I’m glad I took the time to put this together, and I plan to add to it as time goes by!

Don’t despair, spring is coming! 🙂

-Angela