We are Tim and Lori Seaborg, college sweethearts who married decades ago.
He has dreams of skidsteers and tractors, building and earth-moving.
She (me) has dreams of hand-woven chicken pen walls, long barefoot hikes, old-timey techniques, and silent hand tools.
My childhood was half spent in a self-sustained American village of like-minded doers, and half spent in a primitive South Pacific island village. Due to that ‘odd’ childhood, I am what my very-American husband calls “ingenious,” in thinking up solutions to problems. He is what I call a “rigger,” thinking up solutions to problems as well, since he was raised by the American School of Hard Knocks, as a child in poverty.
We’ve been together long enough that we mostly (haha) get along. We know the other brings something to the land that is needed. I know where the moss grows best where the salamanders like to hide and when the Wood Thrush is likely to return each Spring. He knows how to build us a home and how to build solid structures for our farm animals.
Our passions and talents merged well when we owned a little 2-acre garden center in subtropical FloriBama years ago. We have frequently discussed how much we miss “potting up plants,” as we call it. As I saunter through the forest and meadow recently placed in our stewardship, I realize how many precious species are attracted to the native plants. I see who is missing, or in decline, and it breaks my heart. We want to help them out, and that’s why we created our native plant nursery.
Thank you for joining us on our adventure, and for supporting the littlest wild things,
Tim, Lori, and our kids @ FloriBama
I’m currently creating a forest farm and native plant nursery with my husband in the Smoky Mountains, within the Blue Ridge and Appalachian Mountains.
Simply put, I like to roam the forest and study how trees and moss grow. And I putz around the garden and wildflower meadow, creating cordage and cyanotypes when not planting seeds or tiny trees.
As I observed the decline of a butterfly species and a tree species near extinction in our mountain valley, I wanted to be part of the solution to help the littlest wild things among us. That desire led me to go back to my skillset and propagate plants and collect seeds as I once did for our 2-acre garden center. This time, the plants are sold in farmers’ markets and online in our native plant nursery. I also write about how you can create a backyard native plant nursery, too.
Let’s help the little wild things.
My childhood was odd: half spent in a self-sustained American village of like-minded doers, and half spent in a primitive South Pacific island village where laundry is done with rocks in streams. Due to that “odd” childhood, I am what my very-American husband calls “ingenious,” in thinking up solutions to problems. He is what I call a “rigger,” thinking up solutions to problems as well, since he was raised by the American School of Hard Knocks, as a kid in poverty.
That’s the background and the explanation. Here’s the now: We bought a 45-acre forest in the Smoky Mountains, Blue Ridge Mountains, and Appalachian Mountains (they all merge at our spot), where I hope to carry on the hopes of the 15 generations of American farmers in my family line. I have always wanted “a bit of soil,” as much as Mary Lennox wanted it in The Secret Garden. Finally, I have it, though it’s damp, mountainous, and absolutely challenging.
