Charlotte sullivan

I grew up in Grayslake, IL and moved back home in 2014 graduating after College where I studied and received a BA in Environmental Science: Conservation and Ecology. That same year, fate helped me land a job as a farm hand on an organic vegetable farm located in the Prairie Crossing neighbor, a conveniently short distance from home, where I was planning to live after graduation. An already environmental enthusiast quickly fell in love with the farm lifestyle and access/knowledge to sustainably grown food. I spent 5 seasons working on the vegetable farm, moving up in management and extending my sales experience for other farmers products. I rented my own community garden plot and starting selling flower bouquets and cherry tomatoes to local businesses. In 2017, Sol-Ful blooms was created as a means to protect the land and water through food and flower production, as well as a way to jump start my passion and “The Farm Life” I have desired to live. Jeff and I decided to jump into this farm life together that year, having been good friends and getting to know each other as crew members, the love spark was ignited when I found out he was leaving on a trip out West with no return date. Thankfully that return date was sooner than he imagined and we now get to share our passions with each other while accomplishing our ultimate goal, being good stewards to the land. I am so grateful for the life and community we have been creating. Farming has taught me more about myself than I realized there is to know and most importantly, it teaches me to love myself as I love the land, a truly healing experience I wish to cultivate and share with others who seek a deeper connection with themselves and the land. It is my passion to be good a good steward to the land while providing healthy, nutrient dense food and chemical free flowers to our community.

Jeff Chapman

I am a natural born explorer and experimenter. I wish to discover, preserve, and share the miracles that natural systems offer. I didn’t expect to end up in community based farming, but the natural path led here. I hope to share a perspective that values every living thing and their complex interdependence. Grow your understanding with us @solfulblooms. I am blessed to come visit my wise doting Grandparents almost every week while I grew up in Libertyville. I am now the primary caretaker of this special family property, where I was taught to appreciate reciprocity through the forces of nature and the love of my Grandmother, Gladys (Donkle) Milne. She was a nurse with a passion for botany and married Jim Milne, a biochemist by profession and an ecologist at heart. They bought the property from Mr. Casey, who had previously used it as horse pasture. Besides a handful of native willows along the creek and an ancient ironwood, every tree was planted by hand or nurtured as volunteer seedlings. Natives were re-introduced to the property and flourished as a whole through ecological stewardship, which included prescribed burning of prairie. All these things I learned and experience growing up out here.

I attended university for 5 years, continuously gravitating towards plant biology, and got a job at a micro-greens farm in Urbana, IL. In 2010 I moved back to Libertyville to be the caretaker of my late Grandparent’s property. After spending a couple seasons shaping up the neglected property, I connected with Prairie Crossing.  This community introduced me to people that I was interested in learning from and allowed me to gain experience on farming techniques that aimed to restore resiliency and work with nature.

While working for Sandhill Family Farms at Prairie Crossing, I met an energetic and inspiring woman named Charlotte Sullivan. We worked together on the harvest crew, and soon realized that we shared enviable ethics and aspirations. The rest is history, and a story for another time. We now live together on the Casey Road property and also rent land at Prairie Crossing with our business, Sol-ful Blooms. We are proud to direct much of our efforts to keeping the land beautiful and healthy, which in return nourishes our bodies and souls to the same effect. Every year gets better here, with love being the best return on investment.