There are  2 occurrences of Rose!
There are 1 occurrences of Daffodil!

There is a Rose!
There is a Rose!
There is a Daffodil!

public void find2(String searchName){
    Node theNode = firstNode;
    int occurrences = 0;

    if(!isEmpty()){
        while (theNode.getItem().getName() != searchName){
            if (theNode.getItem().getName().equals(searchName)){
                occurrences++;
            }
            else if (theNode.getNext() == null){
                System.out.println("Flower not found!");
                return;
            }

            theNode = theNode.getNext();

        }

        System.out.println("Found " + occurrences + " occurrences of " + searchName + ".");
    }
}

else if (theNode.getNext() == null && occurrences == 0){
    System.out.println("Flower not found!");
    return null;
}

Exception in thread "main" java.lang.NullPointerException
    at LinkedList.find2(LinkedList.java:69)
    at FinalProject.searchFlowers(FinalProject.java:81)
    at FinalProject.<init>(FinalProject.java:37)
    at FinalProject.main(FinalProject.java:10)