A day brightener
Spreading smiles one bouquet at a time
WEST LIBERTY
Jerrica Dalton is the poster person for transforming dreams to reality. In three years, she converted a nearly empty acre of land on her property in Moon, Kentucky, into a flower farm she named Paint Creek Farms.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, Jerrica learned thousands of flowers were stuck on barges waiting to be shipped to the United States. That planted the seed for her flower farm. Instead of waiting for flowers, she’d grow her own and share them with her community. For Christmas, she asked for seeds, tubers and bulbs.
“It’s the hardest work I’ve ever done, but it’s so rewarding,” says Jerrica, a consumer-member of Licking Valley RECC. “I love watching a seed grow into a flower.”
A curious self-learner, Jerrica used books, YouTube videos, seed packets and conversations with flower farmers to learn the basics of growing flowers, but her friendship with neighbor Debbie Melvin taught her a lot, too.
“I truly don’t know what I’d do without her,” she says. “Well, she taught me all about dahlias and [she] is the reason I fell in love with those.”
Most of her adult life, Jerrica was a self-proclaimed “jack-of-all trades, master of none.” She grew up working on a tobacco farm and gardening, stayed home with her kids, owned a convenience store with her husband and worked as a physical therapy technician.
“When I started growing flowers, I felt like I’d finally figured it out. I love what I do,” Jerrica says. “I wanted to be outside. I wanted to play in the dirt.”
Jerrica loves hosting people at Paint Creek Farms. Church groups, sweet 16 birthday parties and teachers have celebrated by picking flowers at her farm. To avoid summer’s heat, Jerrica created Sunrise Buckets, a by-appointment visit to pick flowers and watch the sunrise.
“Flowers make people happy,” Jerrica says. “I love to see the smiles they bring and to use them to brighten people’s days.”
She shares her flowers in the community, too. Jerrica and her 5-year-old daughter, Finley, who can name most flowers, sell bouquets at the Johnson County Farmers Market. When she has an abundance, instead of selling, Jerrica makes bouquets and drops them off to people who “need their day brightened,” she says.
Finley Dalton holds bouquets she and her mother, Jerrica, owner of Paint Creek Farms, created. Every week they sell flowers at the Johnson County Farmers Market. Photos: Paint Creek Farms
Jerrica has big dreams for the future of Paint Creek Farms. She hopes to expand into educational events this year, like “How to Grow Dahlias.”
“I’m a happier person since starting my flower farm,” she says. “It’s very peaceful.”
MEGHAN CAIN-DAVIS is a freelance writer, mother and fitness instructor in Kentuckiana. She loves writing about her adventures in Kentucky and around the world.
