Meet Alex Mudry-Till

We recently connected with Alex Mudry-Till and have shared our conversation below.

Alex , we’re thrilled to have you sharing your thoughts and lessons with our community. So, for folks who are at a stage in their life or career where they are trying to be more resilient, can you share where you get your resilience from?

Well my kindergarten teacher did say I was pretty tough back in the day…(funny and also true).

All jokes aside…I think lots of my resiliency has come from my former career as a chef.

As anyone in the food service industry knows, it is a challenging path faced with constant conflict/stress and challenges. When the ice cream freezer goes down in the middle of brunch and you have to plate another 10 ice cream tastings… you can’t just drop your tools and walk away. (I mean you can, people do.) But more often than not you need to figure out a way to push through the challenge.

In farming and sales we have so many challenges – the greatest of which (right now) is probably mother nature. And there’s a strange amount of freedom I find in that there is a large percentage of what we do is completely out of my control. I cannot force the sun to shine or the temperature to be what I want it to be or make it rain when I don’t feel like watering (though if I could that would be a delight!). We do not spray chemicals or pesticides so sometimes bugs get their share of the flowers or foliage I need.

I can, however, keep my plants as healthy as possible, I can keep them watered and fed (but not overly dosed with fertilizers). I can also do my research and observe what likes to grow in our region (or on the other hand what notice dies every time I try to grow it). And then I can learn from all those experiences and change my approach moving forward.

To me, being resilient doesn’t mean being tough all the time. It means being aware and flexible, being willing to make mistakes and learning from those mistakes on how to improve in the future.

Thanks for sharing that. So, before we get any further into our conversation, can you tell our readers a bit about yourself and what you’re working on?

Dan and I own Quince Blossom Ridge – an organic cut flower farm and wedding venue specializing in unique cut flowers within the D.C./MD/VA region. We grow a mixture of specialty cut flowers, foliage and filler that bring interesting forms and unusual flowers to our CSA and farmers market customers. We offer Stem Share bouquet subscriptions during most of the growing season for pickup from a variety of different locations in D.C., Northern Virginia and Southern Maryland. We also sell at two farmers markets per week – Saturdays at Monroe Street/Brookland Arts Walk in D.C. and Sundays at the Clifton Farmers Market in Clifton, VA. As we are also lovers of art, gardening and hospitality we offer a number of curated on farm workshops throughout the year. For those who are fans of DIY and gardening we also offer seedling sales, bulb sales and bare root plant starts in the fall and late winter/early spring.

We feel that we share our own joy and excitement about gardening, farming and nature to every interaction with our customers – whether its the gift of a Stem Share subscription, a gardening tip from social media or our newsletter or a happy chat with one of our farmers market customers. We are passionate about sharing our love of flowers and nature with everyone and trying to get our flower friends -new and old- to recognize the importance of slowing down and observing the beauty in nature.

We are extremely excited to be hosting Blooming Beauty in Watercolor – an on farm watercolor painting workshop with Sam Testa of Right Place Studio in October. We always love the chance to invite our customers to see the farm in person, experience the birds, bees and butterflies in person and enjoy a little adventure out in the country. Tickets are available on our online store.

We are also super excited to launch a curated collection of bulbs and bare root plants available for sale this fall. As we have access to so many wonderful varieties of plants we wanted to give our garden loving customers a chance to source some of our favorite items. There will be specialty tulip and allium bulbs along with bareroot peonies and bare root roses. These will also all be available from our online store once we launch that program in the fall.

Looking back, what do you think were the three qualities, skills, or areas of knowledge that were most impactful in your journey? What advice do you have for folks who are early in their journey in terms of how they can best develop or improve on these?

Grit/perseverance, flexibility, curiosity.

We have a poster in our office that is an image from the end of Jaws (my favorite movie) designed like one of those inspirational posters you used to see in a guidance counsellor’s office in school. It is the scene as the boat is just about to sink and Chief Brody is using the last bullets to kill the shark. The tag line says “Perseverance – because sometimes there may not be a bigger boat.” All of that is to say…you can’t rely on someone or something else to save you. You have to find a way to save your self/fix the problem yourself.

Growth happens when you’re willing to change (or it happens when you are not willing and deal with it anyways – haha). Challenges will come up and you have to be willing to change your plan/direction.

And you need to remain curious for a business to adapt overtime. I read a lot and listen to loads of podcasts but not only about gardening or farming or small business ownership. It is always surprising to see where you might find a helpful idea or tip or bit of inspiration so you need to keep your ears and eyes open at all times.

Awesome, really appreciate you opening up with us today and before we close maybe you can share a book recommendation with us. Has there been a book that’s been impactful in your growth and development?

The 5 Second Rule by Mel Robbins. All of Mel’s work has been hugely influential in my life. But I remember being at an extreme low back in 2018 and being so scared to take a chance or risk a mistake or error that I was afraid to do anything outside of “my lane” at the time. Her methods for overcoming overthinking and procrastination have truly been life changing for me. QBR wouldn’t exist if I hadn’t read that book and found a little spark of something inside myself that said “you can make your life what you want it to be”.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.quinceblossomridge.com
• Instagram: @quinceblossomridge
• Facebook: @quinceblossomridge
• Other: online store: https://quince-blossom-ridge.square.site/newsletter: https://subscribepage.io/IdhJ9y

Image Credits

Costola Photography
Farmhouse 451