Your next chapter
starts with
you.

It started with a book for my people.

I didn’t start Happy Garden with some grand business plan. I started from nothing, with small dreams. I wrote a book for my friends and family because I wanted to tell my story—the childhood trauma, my drug and alcohol problems, and the things I had carried for so long.

That book became the beginning of something bigger. Happy Garden grew into a place for personal growth, honesty, and enough humor to help us face another day. My story is where it began. Yours has a place here, too.

The garden is still the dream.

The name Happy Garden—and “Let’s Grow!”—comes from a dream I still carry: to buy a piece of property and create a safe, judgment-free place where people can be themselves, garden together, and work through what life has handed them.

There’s something meaningful about caring for something other than yourself while you’re finding yourself. In a garden, you can see the results of your actions: something you watered, tended, and kept showing up for begins to grow. That’s the kind of encouragement I hope we can share.

That property hasn’t happened yet. But I didn’t want to wait to start building the spirit behind it, so I created this website anyway. For now, Happy Garden begins here—with kindness, humor, and room to grow as people.

I chose my path, and I hope everyone struggling with addiction finds sobriety and support. Mine may not look like yours. I respect that your choices and your journey are your own, and I’m rooting for you. You deserve compassion, not judgment.

The people who showed me another world.

My aunt and uncle took me in and opened a door to a different life. But most importantly, their daughter—my sister—opened my eyes to a whole new world. The years under her wing were the best years of my childhood. She helped me see that life could hold more than what I had known.

It was after I left from under my sister’s wing that addiction crept into my life.

Faith should feel like compassion.

When addiction took hold, I stayed away from family. My aunt is religious, and I pulled away. I also experienced judgment from people who called themselves churchgoing Christians, at a time when I needed understanding.

During those years, I found more Christlike kindness among some former addicts and alcoholics than I ever found on a church bench. That experience is behind one of my favorite sayings:

“Just because you stand in a garage doesn’t make you a car.”

My faith still matters deeply to me. So does how we treat people. I want Happy Garden to offer the kind of welcome that makes room for someone before asking them to explain their past.

Now there’s room for your next chapter.

Happy Garden is my happy place, and I hope you find a little of yours here. The journals make space for honesty, humor, and hope. The coloring books give you a moment that belongs to you.

You don’t need a story like mine to belong. You don’t need the same beliefs or the same path. Personal growth can be a fresh start, a small change, or simply showing up for yourself today.

From small dreams to whatever comes next—let’s grow.