why fa. exists
short version (the heart of it)
fa. with love exists because i needed something real.
after leaving a career i worked hard for, navigating motherhood, mental health, and a season of doing everything myself, i found candle making — and it woke something up in me.
this brand was born in a time of muddy boots, farm animals, long days, and learning the hard way. the moo moo’s on the homepage are a quiet nod to that chapter — where resilience, simplicity, and doing things with your own hands shaped who i am today.
these candles aren’t just products. they’re reminders to pause, soften, and come back to yourself.
with love,
ashli
the long version (if you want the whole story)
i appreciate you taking the time to actually read this page.
it feels like everyone has one, but how many people actually read it? i do, actually, but maybe i’m crazy.
hi, i am ashli, momma of two. my hubs, whom i will refer to as william, and i have been together now twenty years, married for eight. i am 35. we have a betta fish named blaze, two pythons named cinnamon and biggie smalls, violet our cat, warren our dog, and last but not least, our daughter’s dwarf hamster, sugar.
fa., formerly freckled acres, came to life in 2023, and life has changed so much. let me give you a little idea of where life was. i was in the thick of i can raise my own food, grow my own food, most meals/snacks from scratch, raw milk — like full send. this was also around the same time william started his business, r & l field services, in 2021. while he was building something with his hands and being an absolute badass, i was stepping away from my own career and trying to figure out who i was without it.
but let’s do a little story time since you’re taking the time to read it.
during 2021, we made the decision that i would stay home with our kids. the income i was bringing in was just enough to cover childcare plus two hours of daily driving, 5 days a week. could i have gotten a job closer? yes. but i wasn’t willing to get a mandated vaccine just so i could work. that choice mattered to me.
i was proud of the life william and i have built. we put ourselves through college, lived on our own, and raised a baby while doing it. when i look back now, it still feels wild.
but after covid, my field changed. and i did too. the work i once loved didn’t feel the same anymore, and grieving that version of myself was harder than i expected. i didn’t just lose a job — i lost something i worked really hard for and was deeply proud of.
so i started trying things. all the things. trying to figure out what i even liked anymore.
(turns out… i hate sourdough. deeply.)
we had different farm animals over a span of four years during this. we had horses and goats. then chickens. then meat chickens and pigs. and then cows. hence the moo moo’s on the homepage. they’re a small nod to that season — a reminder of muddy boots, early mornings, and a life that shaped this brand, even if it no longer looks the same.
but 85% of it was just me.
i learned how to do a lot of new things. it was really fun and exciting. i learned how to deal with gnarly belly issues and ear infections and countless other things I never thought younger me would be getting herself into. i got to learn how to use the forks with the tractor to unloaded pallets of feed. i learned how to use a hay spear for round bales. i've unloaded countless square bales, and unloaded like 1,500 lbs of feed with just me and rylie and landen crawling over the bags. i got pretty good at jerry-rigging whatever big thing broke until william could come save the day. per usual lol. he’s just my knight in shining armor. sorry, that was cheesy.
and somewhere in the mix of our daughter doing rec and competitive cheer with traveling, and landen doing mma and wrestling, and homeschooling, and trying to get them to church on wednesday's. while also doing all the other day-to-day things. you know, you’re probably a woman who can relate reading this. the meal planning, the grocery list, the grocery shopping, the bagging, the unbagging, the putting away. then i have to cook? ugh. can you tell i hate that part the most.
but in the midst of all that…
panic attacks, anxiety, and i found myself in a very dark place.
mental health hasn’t always been part of my story. but at one point, it became impossible to ignore. through a lot of trial, reflection, and listening to my body, i found that cannabis helped me in a way nothing else had. i use it intentionally — the same way many people use medicine — as support, not escape. it grounded me when i needed grounding. it softened things when they felt sharp. that clarity changed the direction of my life.
i tried candle making — and something clicked.
i don’t know how else to explain it except that it woke something up in me. for the last three years, i’ve been eating, sleeping, and breathing candles. learning wax the hard way. testing. failing. starting over. it was like finding me again, but for the first time, because i’ve never had a passion for anything in my life, and i thought i was so weird because i didn’t love anything or have hobbies.
freckled acres was rooted in what my life was like at the time — thick in clean living, non-toxic everything, working through my own personal mental health struggles, and talking to you guys about speaking kindly. and now we’ve evolved.
fa. with love exists because i needed something real. something that lit a fire in me again. these candles aren’t just products — they are reminders to pause. to soften. to come back to yourself.
we don’t have outdoor animals anymore — and i’m honestly grateful we’re past that chapter. i loved it. i learned so much. i wouldn’t trade the knowledge or the strength it gave me. but i also can’t believe i lived that life. it feels like another lifetime.
if you made it all the way down here, i love you for that. truly.
i hope you have the most beautiful day.
with love,
ashli