Meet Big Ocean: Alicia Moulton

Alicia Moulton and her husband Stan run The Honey Company, a sustainable beekeeping business in Spring City, Utah. She specializes in social media marketing and web content. She earned both bachelor’s and master’s degrees in animal science from Utah State University, and a bachelor’s in mathematics education from Brigham Young University. She worked previously for Utah State University Extension as an Agriculture/4-H County Agent, planning adult and youth education programming. Alicia is passionate about agriculture, education, and motherhood. She loves exploring the outdoors, finds relief and joy working with horses, and enjoys gathering people together.

Alicia is currently taking a leave of absence from the Board of Directors.

Alicia is currently taking a leave of absence from the Board of Directors.

Meet Alicia Moulton.  She is all-natural, like the honey from their family business. No added airs or layers – a pure, granola-ish woman. Her credentials are impressive, but she insists she isn’t. “I always think first of my relationship with God, then my relationship with my spouse, and then my relationship with my kids. That’s pretty every day. I’m a mom; I stay home with my kids and I love them and I just really value being there with them, especially while they are very young,” she explains.

Alicia and Stan own and operate a sustainable beekeeping business in the small town of Spring City, Utah. Like their bees, they are social animals sharing labor and life in their own family hive. Unlike bees, their days are often unscheduled and open-ended. However, they remain focused on core values and vital tasks. Beekeeping requires late hours, so most of the family sleeps in each day. Alicia often uses this time to devote to her roles of queen and worker bee.

Stan and Alicia were partners on a performance country dance team. He is several years older than she, and they were just good friends for seven years before dating. Stan was already a commercial beekeeper and used wax and honey to spell on her driveway, “Alicia, Marry me? Stan.” The bees were attracted to his message and became a part of the written proposal. When she said yes ten years ago, she knew it would involve bees. Five weeks later, they got married. Ironically, Alicia became allergic to honey bees. In her practical and positive fashion, she found ways to work in the business without getting stung. They work at the shop and website together. She edits videos and manages the office and marketing. The allergy became a blessing that defined their roles. Despite that, she added, “Sometimes I have to put on a bee suit and take videos for him.”

She loves to read and advocates for education, which she believes is not just what you learn in college. Earning her master’s degree taught her to learn in new ways and experiment with novel ideas and methods. Alicia explains that Stan is a left-brained artist married to a right-brained mathematician. She planned to teach math, but didn’t enjoy it as she thought she would.

An internship led her to pursue a master’s degree so she could work as an Agriculture/4-H Agent.  She worked in Wasatch County, honing skills in curriculum development and execution, teaching, and planning adult and kids’ programming. She transferred those skills to their business, adding the skill of web design. Stan is a genuine expert in beekeeping, logging more 10,000 hours over 25 years. She and Stan are both lifelong learners and have great hopes of giving this gift to their kids.

They have a unique partnership. They are married parents, business partners, and teach classes together. “You’d think we’d get sick of each other. We are both very independent, and make sure we each have some alone time,” she says.

Alicia fights for marriage and families. She and Stan had parents who did the same. She believes the best decision of her life was marrying Stan. She also remembers clearly a pivotal conversation with her father. He explained that it would be easy to give up on marriage, but he was committed to keep working and make it thrive. It worked. Her parents worked hard and sacrificed to keep her mom in the home whenever possible.

Stan and Alicia agreed with her parents. Clara was born early in their marriage and Alicia retired at the ripe old age of 29 to stay home with her. She enjoys cooking and trying new recipes, but not doing the dishes. She admits if you stop by to visit, there will likely be some dirty dishes in the sink– unless Stan has washed them. Her house is messy in an organized sort of way and there are always projects in the works.

Alicia is a board member and media leader for Big Ocean Women. Here, she reminds her team to be real, to be beautiful, and to be light. How did she become a moving force here? At a meeting with other home school moms, she met Carolina Allen, the future founder of Big Ocean Women. Carolina was chagrined that no one was defending families at the United Nations.  She suggested that they gather a group of moms to go there and defend maternal feminism–women’s rights with a healthy dose of traditional marriage and family values. And Carolina did! That resonated with Alicia who decided to add her voice and talents to the cause.  Stan encouraged her and that sealed the deal. The tenet of Big Ocean that spoke most strongly to Alicia is, “We value the irreplaceable role of fathers and build interdependent relationships with men.”

Carolina was full of wisdom and ideas, but needed help organizing and writing down her vision and goals. Mara offered to help and she and Alicia, with help from Carolina and others, created a website, fleshed out the organizational structure and long-term goals, wrote articles, and found photos online. They were a two-woman team who jumped in with more passion than experience and started waves that have grown rather rapidly. They found that while maternal feminism was not represented in modern organizations, there were many women eager to embrace the cause.

By this time, the Moultons had added Elizabeth to their family, but it marked the beginning of a long and continuing struggle. Alicia suffered a miscarriage between the two girls and has subsequently endured eight more. Yes, eight! She affirms that the powerful women of Big Ocean and their love and support have helped her process and survive this most difficult trial. She has also found it healing to give of her time and love to advance the cause of motherhood, despite her own struggles. She believes birthing, sharing your body with another person, is sacred no matter the outcome of the pregnancy.

Recently Alicia took on another role. She was invited to oversee the teen girls in her church congregation. This involves weekly Sunday services and at least one activity during the week, in addition to her home schooling, parenting, Big Ocean duties, and assisting with the honey business.

So, why does Alicia stay and work her heart out in Big Ocean? She says the other magnificent women in the organization make it possible, particularly Carolina and her vision and passion. The two-woman media team has grown to 12 capable women who help carry the load and carry the message to the world. She also has capable assistants in her church work and the girls themselves are wholesome and helpful. Herein lies the secret and the wonder of Big Ocean Women:  each of us can contribute our “wave” of good, no matter how small, to create a tsunami of power. This concept speaks to Alicia and mirrors the work of each bee in a hive.

Does it ever get to be more than she can face and handle? Yes, but she has found solutions that calm the storms. She is a woman of faith and daily holds a personal devotional with God. She recognizes the abundance, joy, and blessings in her life, and she relies on other determined and like-minded women.  Her husband is her friend and partner in every facet of her life. Sometimes, the storm may require healthy doses of chocolate, “The Office,” solitary time reading a good book, or even a meltdown and lots of tears. She examines her life and makes certain everything in the family hive is intact. After that, she gets up, brushes herself off, and goes back to work! She is a wave that may be small, but is certainly mighty. She is a worker bee, a queen bee, and an irreplaceable part of the hive.

 Written by Norma Hendrickson