EP 170 She gave up art school to have a family

I'm re-sharing an episode from a few years ago, about a mother who really inspired me. When I first told this story, women heard echoes of their own deepest desires in it. I think you might too. 

It's about a woman named Jennie Butchart.

Resources from the Episode

• Mothers of Creation - Provo, Utah - September 26th
• The Butchart Gardens - Brentwood Bay, British Columbia. Jennie's sunken garden, now a National Historic Site of Canada
• As a Man Thinketh by James Allen - the garden of the mind passage Audrey reads
• The Strangest Secret by Earl Nightingale - both quotes on becoming an intentional creator
• Episode 158: A Husband's Take: What Saved Our Marriage - the conversation with Blaine that Audrey references

AI-GENERATED TRANSCRIPT

Episode 170: Mission Driven Story — Jennie Butchart

Introduction

AUDREY: Welcome back to the podcast. I'm Audrey Rindlisbacher, author of The Mission Driven Life and founder of The Mission Driven Mom, where we are empowering moms with principles and purpose. In preparation for our upcoming Mothers of Creation event this fall in Utah, I wanted to re-share with you a podcast I did a few years ago about a mother who really inspired me. Many women heard echoes of their own deepest desires in this true story, so I hope that you also catch the vision of how you can create and contribute in meaningful ways and bring your family along on the journey with you.

A Gift Set Aside

AUDREY: Our story today begins with a little girl named Jennie Kennedy. She was born into a modest middle class family and had a relatively happy childhood, but by the time she was twelve years old both her parents had passed away. She was orphaned and sent to live with her wealthy aunt, sort of a Pollyanna true story. Jennie's aunt was able to send her to a good school, one of the better schools in Canada, and there Jennie really thrived. She was intelligent and she loved to learn. She also proved to be an especially gifted artist. She excelled in her art classes, and her teachers and school administrators noticed her artistic ability. That is why, in her late high school years, she was offered a scholarship to go to Paris and study there. I am not exactly sure how old she was, but she was offered this scholarship. In the meantime, though, she met and fell in love with a man named Robert Butchart.

AUDREY: They had fallen in love, and she wanted to marry him and have a family so badly that she actually turned down the Paris scholarship. In 1884 they were married.

Cement, Limestone, and a Growing Garden

AUDREY: The Butcharts were well off, so there was some money in the family, and they were able to take a trip to England. While they were there, Robert began looking around because he wanted to be in the cement business. I don't know if his family had already been in the cement business, but this was Robert's interest at the time. Incredibly, he was able to obtain a recipe for cement while he was in England that would allow him to be the first person to produce Portland cement in Canada, which was a much higher quality cement than what was available at the time. So when the couple returned to Canada, he set his sights on a plant. He wanted to open his own plant and produce cement. They were in Victoria, on the western side of Canada, and there was a limestone quarry that he needed for cement production. So they bought some land, some acres for themselves, and a quarry so that he could produce this cement. I don't know how much land there was in total, but he began to mine the quarry. He had some success in the business, and he was able to send bags of cement for the first time down to San Francisco and other places in the US and Canada. For a time it was a thriving business, and the Butcharts were having quite a bit of success with it.

AUDREY: In the meantime, Jennie was starting her family. Remember how she was really artistic? Now that they lived out in this beautiful area, she decided she wanted to start gardening. She would express her artistic abilities in gardening. She started out planting flowers and shrubbery just around the house, learning about her plants, following her interests, and developing her artistic gifts and expressing them through gardening. She got better and better and better at it. As her abilities and knowledge grew, so did the garden. It got bigger and bigger over the next few years, as did her family. She worked hard to balance her mothering and wife roles with this artistic passion for gardening. It was wonderful not only to have this outlet, but to also garden with her children and teach them along the way.

The Pit in the Backyard

AUDREY: Well, within a few years, the limestone ran out. And when that happened, Jennie found herself with a huge three acre pit for a backyard. It was tall sheer walls of rock and this big ugly pit with debris all in it from all the tools that were used to pull out the limestone. It was really an eyesore, and Jennie hated it.

AUDREY: Then she had an idea. She was going to try to hide it. So she planted Lombardy poplars, Persian plums, and white poplars to grow tall behind the house, on the back part of her yard, to try to hide this huge monstrosity.

AUDREY: In the meantime, the garden right around her house was really beautiful. In fact, sometimes her husband would send workers over to move things around for her and help with her gardening, because it had become such a massive passion project. She had gotten better and better at it. By this point they had lived in their home, I think it was five or six years, before the limestone ran out. So she has had this garden going for several years and, like I said, she has gotten really good at it. And she looks out at this big pit in her backyard, at the temporary fix she tried to plant, and she thinks it is not cutting it.

The Sunken Garden

AUDREY: And so then she thinks, I will create a sunken garden. I will make it beautiful. I will use all the knowledge and expertise and extra money that we have now to find beautiful plants and make this into a gorgeous sunken garden. Now, I don't know that she actually thought much beyond the task at hand. Maybe she had in the back of her mind that someday people would come and see the sunken garden. I don't know for sure. But just know that this dawned on her and became an incredibly fun project where she could really express her talents and could beautify her home and her yard.

AUDREY: So she took massive amounts of topsoil and brought it in by horse drawn cart. She had the rubble on the floor of the pit pushed up against the walls of the pit. She put these tall mounds on each side, and then she used those mounds of rubble to plant terraced flower beds. She wanted to beautify the walls of this pit, so she used a bosun's chair. She hung from this bosun's chair on the side of these cliffs, and then she would plant in every crack and crevice that she found. She would plant ivy and other beautiful things to cover the ugliness of the sheer walls around the sides of the pit.

AUDREY: Once they had the rubble out of the way, and she had made some of the flower beds and brought in topsoil, it was a matter of deciding where to begin. She decided to start with a Japanese garden. She was able to work with an expert on Japanese landscaping for a little bit of time, who helped her get the details right. This was more than just an opportunity to develop her gifts. It was an exciting passion project.

AUDREY: As the gardens grew, more and more people wanted to see them. Not only did she welcome them to the garden, she always offered them a cup of tea. In fact, she often welcomed them to see the gardens and showed them around herself. Sometimes they didn't even recognize her or know that she was the gardener. They thought she was just a worker. She loved serving her community through her gifts in this way. So when they came, she would hand them this cup of tea and show them around.

AUDREY: Now, I don't know how many people she hired to come in and help over the years, but eventually there was an Italian garden and other themed gardens. The garden grew, the interest grew, and in the year 1915 alone it was reported that more than 18,000 visitors came. She and her husband named the estate Benvenuto, which in Italian means welcome. Over time, she and her husband traveled and brought back plants and fountains and sculptures from all over the world. She worked tirelessly for twelve years, and she finally pronounced the sunken garden done.

A Legacy That Outlived Her

AUDREY: The visitors increased and increased and increased. By 1930 she was named Victoria's best citizen for her work in her sunken garden, and its tremendous beauty, and also because there were visitors coming from all over now who brought interest and revenue into the town.

AUDREY: When World War II hit, there was a loss of manpower, and it was hard to keep the gardens going and to keep them as beautiful as they once were. In the meantime, Jennie's health declined, and her daughter started trying to keep up with the garden. When they couldn't do it anymore, they gave it to their children, and their grandson brought it back to its original state and then started to beautify it and grow it even more. It has since grown immeasurably from that first garden and Japanese garden to five themed gardens and fifty-five acres, and now it is 122 years old and famous around the world. It is still in the family. A grandson, a great-granddaughter, something like that. They manage it now. I can't remember all the details of how the succession went, but they keep adding to it. They have added other themed areas. There is a children's garden and other gardens. There is a stage where they do performances. They have a lot more walking paths, and they do fireworks shows. So they have really made this an incredible experience for the people who come.

AUDREY: It has also been named a National Historic Site in Canada. They employ at least fifty full-time gardeners who oversee everything. In fact, one of the people who visited said something remarkable about it. They were talking to the gardeners, and one of them said something like, we are experts at plucking dead flowers and leaves. There are not any yellow leaves. They are not allowed to stay. It just stays meticulous all the time for anybody who might come and visit.

AUDREY: Now, 122 years later from the time that Jennie first set foot on this property, she has built a legacy that has outlived her, that will continue to go on and be a place of beauty and interest and bless the lives of the people who visit. Millions of visitors a year.

Why This Story Matters

AUDREY: When I first heard this story, I was determined to find out more about it. There is not a lot of information on the history of it. It is really hard to find, and I scoured online. I have not been to the Butchart Gardens. I have seen pictures online and it is absolutely breathtaking. But of course I wanted to know more, because being the founder of The Mission Driven Mom myself, this story is one that I wanted to look more deeply into. Because it is a story of a mother focusing on her strengths, developing a talent, and serving her community in a way that has become a massive worldwide attraction.

AUDREY: And what is so key in this story is how small it began. It began with just one woman who was confident as an artist. She had the opportunity to study in Paris, but she chose a family instead. She even put her artistic abilities behind her for a while, and then she brought them out into the world around her. She understood that choosing motherhood doesn't mean suppressing your talents. She wasn't going to sit on her strengths. She chose to do gardening as her artistic expression. And then she worked little by little. And her children, she brought them along with her. They did this together. It bonded their family. It beautified their home. As her knowledge and interest grew, her confidence grew. And people around her saw what she was doing, and they affirmed it, and they helped her. They got plants from around the world and they fed and nurtured this desire. And it grew and grew.

AUDREY: Stories like these, where the mother nurtures herself and nurtures her family and nurtures her community, are such a blessing in the world. But it didn't start out that way. It started with one small and simple idea, a mindset. It started with how Jennie saw herself, and how she saw her talents, and how she wanted to bring her family on the journey with her. She thought, this is my passion. I can't be an artist in Paris, but I can do artwork around my home and bring my children with me. Something like that. She set the example. She paved the way. She showed her family that you can express your gifts and talents while still putting motherhood first and blessing your community.

AUDREY: So I want to share some quotes that combine these ideas of gardening and mindset and how we view ourselves, to highlight how Jennie was making her pursuits and her potential become a force for good.

The Garden of the Mind

AUDREY: James Allen taught:

A woman's mind may be likened to a garden, which may be intelligently cultivated or allowed to run wild. Whether cultivated or neglected, it must, and will, bring forth. If no useful seeds are put into it, then an abundance of useless weed seeds will fall therein, and will continue to produce their kind. Just as a gardener cultivates his plot, keeping it free from weeds, and growing the flowers and fruits which he requires, so may a woman tend the garden of her mind, weeding out all the wrong, useless, and impure thoughts, and cultivating toward perfection the flowers and fruits of right, useful, and pure thoughts. By pursuing this process, a woman sooner or later discovers that she is the master gardener of her soul, the director of her life. She also reveals within herself the laws of thought, and understands with ever increasing accuracy how the thought forces and mind elements operate in the shaping of her character, circumstances, and destiny.

AUDREY: Jennie Butchart did just that. She conceived a worthwhile project and she acted on it. And then she had a little bit bigger idea, and acted on that. And then she had a little bit bigger idea, and then she acted on that. And it grew and grew and grew. It was an amazing blessing, but she started small, with one idea that she could develop and nurture herself while still nurturing her family.

Focus on Your Strengths

AUDREY: You might be wondering, if it is really that simple, if we just need to plant the seed and nurture it in our minds and in our lives, why do so many women and mothers still struggle so much? It reminds me of a podcast I did a few years ago called Kickstart Your Self-Discovery. In that podcast I talked about the important component in motherhood of focusing on our strengths.

AUDREY: I have seen a lot of well-meaning, God-fearing, good-to-the-core women who are constantly belittling themselves, to themselves and in front of their own children. They say that they aren't talented. They put their needs last. And they set a poor example for their children about what womanhood is, about what motherhood is, and about how they ought to treat themselves. And unfortunately, children sometimes see and follow this example. That is why it is vital that we switch that paradigm.

AUDREY: And that is exactly the example that Jennie Butchart sets for us. She didn't belittle herself, her real needs, her gifts, her strengths, or her abilities. She didn't tell her children she wasn't gifted and didn't have anything to offer. She leaned into her strengths and she developed her talents while creating something beautiful that lifted and inspired people. She had plenty of weaknesses, and they definitely cropped up. But it was precisely because she was focused on her creation that she continued to have the motivation to move through those weaknesses and keep creating. She was a mother of creation.

Becoming an Intentional Creator

AUDREY: Earl Nightingale echoed these same truths about the importance of becoming an intentional creator who blesses the world with our gifts. He said:

Now it stands to reason that a person who is thinking about a concrete and worthwhile goal is going to reach it, because that is what she is thinking about. And we become what we think about. Conversely, the woman who has no goal, who doesn't know where she is going, and whose thoughts must therefore be of confusion and anxiety and fear and worry, becomes what she is thinking about. Her life becomes one of frustration, fear, anxiety, and worry. And if she thinks about nothing, she becomes nothing.

AUDREY: So we must become creators in our homes. We don't have to know the whole picture, but we have to have some kind of goal. We have to have something that we are working toward, so that our children can see us building on our strengths and working toward something meaningful. And they have the desire to do that for themselves as well, as they watch our examples.

AUDREY: Earl Nightingale also said:

All you have got to do is plant that seed of your creation in your mind. Care for it. Work steadily toward your goal, and it will become a reality. And not only will it, there is no way that it cannot. You see, that is a law, like the laws of Sir Isaac Newton, the laws of gravity. If you get on top of a building and jump off, you will always go down. You will never go up. And it is the same with all the other laws of nature. They always work. They are inflexible.

AUDREY: So our principles for today are to focus on our strengths and become intentional creators in our family's lives.

The Education of the Mother

AUDREY: This started with me when my children were young, just like Jennie Butchart. I worked hard in high school. I had gotten really good grades. I had gotten the ACT score, gone to the university, and spent three years there. But I felt cheated. I just did not feel like my mind and soul had been nurtured. I had not learned anything deeply, and I had not developed as a person and a woman because of my university experience. I felt cheated and I felt lost, and I didn't understand myself any better. I didn't understand marriage or parenting or finances any better. And I definitely did not understand this world any better. And there I was, trying to navigate all of those things and raise three children. I had no idea what I needed. I just knew that I wanted to grow somehow and I wanted to be more than I was.

AUDREY: When I prayed about this consistently, I was led to an opportunity to read the classics and be nurtured in them. This was going to cost my young family some time and attention and some money that I knew we didn't have. And even though these were accredited classes, they were just for my own personal development. It felt like a place where I could dig deep and grow as a person. A place where I could learn important ideas and talk to others about the things that matter most. A place where I could be nurtured as a whole person: my mind, my heart, my soul. A place where I could pursue truth and truly be changed.

AUDREY: My husband and I struggled over this decision for quite a while, until one day I ran across this quote: that the best investment a family can make is in the education of the mother. This opened everything up for me. I felt like it was an answer from God. And I had emotional permission from that point on to work on myself in deep, meaningful ways, because who I become matters immensely. In a sense, it is everything. For me, for myself, for my family, for my community around me.

AUDREY: And so I opened up. I acquainted myself with those things that matter most. I brought them home to my family. And as I pursued truth and infused it into my home, not only was I forever changed, but so was my family. In fact, recently in a podcast I did with my husband, I asked him what this had meant for our family. And he said, I think we still have a family because of it.

AUDREY: We have not regretted that decision for one day. It laid such a powerful foundation for our lives. When I dove in and worked on me, when I learned my strengths and began to build them, when I let my strengths lead, our lives became so much richer and more beautiful. And that path has led me here and will continue to lead me forward. I became a mother of creation. Jennie was a mother of creation. And so can you be too.

Closing Invitation

AUDREY: Ponder the life of Jennie Butchart and the example she sets for us, in making a little time and taking a little money for mom to build on her strengths, for mom to meet her own creative needs. And it doesn't have to interfere with your mothering. In fact, it can elevate your mothering. It can make your family better. Bring them on the path with you.

AUDREY: And if you aren't sure where to start, just ask yourself the question: what is something I would really love to do or know about? And start learning about it. Take the little art class.

AUDREY: If you want more clarity and direction on how to be a mother of creation, join us at our Mothers of Creation event this fall, September 26th in Utah. We will begin the day right where you are, and you will leave that afternoon with much more clarity about how to stay out of your own negative stories and focus on what you are creating and who you are becoming instead.

AUDREY: Whatever it might be, if it is gardening or running a marathon or taking the time to set an example for your children, to build a legacy of being creative, of meeting your own creative needs, of giving yourself and your children permission to build something that will outlive you, to build something that will make you and your family and your community a little bit better, then please start there and do it. What is it that you love? What is it that you want to create? Do more of that. Become more of the mother of creation that you were divinely designed to be, and future generations will thank you.

AUDREY: Thank you so much for joining me today. I hope to see all of you at our event in Utah, and I will for sure see you next time.