A Beautiful Winter Landscape

We had our first real snow just a couple of days ago and more is expected tonight and tomorrow. I just love it when the snow piles up on the tree and shrub branches.

Here is a little photo tour around the Greenville Arms 1889 Inn.

This in the front of our inn. We like to call that shrub "the wild hair" bush. Every Spring I give it a crew cut and by winter it has all those lovely curving branches.

Some may think my garden looks sloppy in the fall because I don't trim back the cone flowers (Echinacea), but I just love the look of the seed pods with their little snow hats!

Winter is a lovely time to visit our inn and our area. The snow lends a peaceful and quiet grace to the landscape. We also offer some mid-week winter specials on our rates.

Glorious Fall Colors Abound

The trees on our property have finally decided to put on their Fall show.

This is the view stepping out the front door of the Greenville Arms 1889 Inn.

Looking to the left on the front porch.

Looking down the driveway of the inn.

Looking at the driveway entrance from the sidewalk.

Looking down the front of our property from the street. Notice the "Chocolate Shop is Open" sign! Life By Chocolates has created some fabulous Fall chocolates with the flavors of pumpkin pie and homemade marshmallows.

Looking down the sidewalk in front of the inn. The sign is the logo for our Hudson River Valley Art Workshops. We still have some wonderful art quilting workshop this year, plus the retreat week- Nov. 1 - 7 - when anyone is welcome to sign up for 1 night to 6 nights and make use of the spacious studio to work on whatever they wish (painting, quilting, knitting, scrapbooking, writing, collaging, etc.) and get great meals, too!

The Red Squirrrels Are Going Nuts

As winter approaches it is always fun to watch the squirrels in their annual frenzy of gathering nuts. There is one little red squirrel that always sits in the same spot every day in one of our trees and works on chewing the shells off walnuts.

I wish I had a better zoom lens for a close up, but you can still see his cute little face!

Summer Events at Hunter Mountain

There are some wonderful events coming up at Hunter Mountain. During the winter Hunter Mountain is, of course, one of the two ski resorts within 30 - 40 minutes of the Greenville Arms 1889 Inn. But they also have a lot of great activities happening in the summer.

Besides the Skyride, a 5,500 foot long chairlift to the summit of Colonel's Chair where you can see tremendous vistas of the Catskill Mountains, there are the following fun events:

• August 8/9: German Alps Festival
  
• August 15/16: International Celtic Festival
  
• Sept 26/27: Microbrew and Wine Festival
  
• Oct. 3/4 and 10/11: Oktoberfest Celebration
  

There are still plenty of flowers in bloom around the inn and the weather has stayed in the 70s with a couple of 80s now and then. Perfect for walking around town or sitting on the front porch.

Another Dalmatian on the Way to 101!

Delores, our office assistant, chocolate saleswoman extrordinaire, and all around nice person, gave me a new dalmatian figurine for my collection on my birthday today. It's it so cute!

I've had 6 dalmatians in my life so far and use to do the show circuit with some of them. So I've built up quite a collection of dalmatian figures. The entire collection is displayed in the dining room of the Greenville Arms 1889 Inn in the wonderful built-in display cabinets.

Hudson is our current Dalmatian and he is a dog with a great sense of humor, but I don't think he'd ever wear bows in his ears!

It's Not As Rainy As You Might Think

The weather sites are predicting rain for the rest of the week, but it's not as rainy as you might think. Mostly it has just been a couple of sprinkles during the day and then totally sunny and beautiful. Then the real rain happens at night leaving everything nice and refreshed in the morning. This makes it perfect weather for a walk around the grounds of the inn to check out all the flowers!

This is the Dalmatian Foxglove. Not quite as spotted as Hudson, our dog, but probably has a better scent! ;-)

We have wonderful patch of wild strawberries that is doing particular great this year. I have been using them as a little accent on top of the peppermint brownie pie that I make for dessert.

A fabulous workshop on painting expressive portraits with Paul Leveille, a master portrait artist from Connecticut, just finished here at Greenville Arms, home of the Hudson River Valley Art Workshops.

Rain, Rain Means Green, Green in Greenville

We are finally get a bit of rain at the Greenville Arms 1889 Inn. I love the rain, especially if I just planted something new!

The gardens are coming a long nicely and our gardener and I are keeping the weeds at bay. Here is little photo tour of the new garden growth.

Ok, so I like Lamb's Ear and have some in practically every area of the gardens. It is just so soft and I love the tiny lavender flowers. Of course, the other reason I like is because the deer don't!

Today was perfect weather-wise. In the 70's, a nice breeze, and the sun peeking through the clouds. Mark and I enjoyed our espresso and latte beverages up on the second floor porch in the main inn. Just marvelous - to feel the gentle breeze and see the maple tree leaves waving.

It was such a nice day that we so took the dogs, Hudson and Bree, out to the back for a nice run around lawns in the "back 40". Hudson loves to fetch and Bree loves to fetch Hudson.

World Wide Knit In Public Day - June 13th

Did you know that it is World Wide Knit In Public Day on June 13th this year? I just heard about it myself through Twitter, but being a knitting fiend myself, I jumped on the bandwagon or yarn-wagon as the case may be!

I know this is short notice but I plan to spend the day on the front porch of the Greenville Arms 1889 Inn knitting and I invite one and all to join me in this fiber-love fest. I'll be knitting from 11:00am to 6:00pm.

I've got my projects ready to go!

I'll provide the coffee, tea, and cookies - you bring your knitting!

As a special deal, just for those participating in this event, all room rates for Saturday night will be half price! So the knitting frenzy doesn't have to end at 6:00pm!

Cheers to the Beers

We have quite an extensive wine and beer (and now cider) menu at the inn - over 100 items. And now for the even better news - I've reduced the prices on just about all of the items on the menu! Cheers!

We just added a couple of new items to our wine and beer menu for this year. We now have a couple of the award winning beers from the North Coast Brewing Company in Fort Bragg, California - Red Seal Ale and Blue Star wheat beer. I use to frequent the north coast in the Fort Bragg/Mendocino area and remembered this brewery fondly, so I'm happy to now have some of their beers on our menu.

Also added to the menu is Woodchuck Draft Cider from Vermont. We currently have the Granny Smith version and will soon be adding the Amber cider. You may not know it but our parent company is called Woodchuck Ventures, Inc., so when I found a product called woodchuck, I just had to check it out. I found six pack at a store in Albany and brought it home for testing! Well, it definitely passed the test. Delicious and refreshing - and has a cute woodchuck on the label!

So next time your visiting, ask for a cold one on your tab and take a meander down our woodland path just to enjoy the day!

Spring Planting and Parades

Last weekend, Memorial Day weekend, was yet another wonderful Spring day and I finally had the chance to get some new plants to put in around the inn.

I had been itching to add some colorful annuals, but held back just in case there should be a last minute frost before Memorial Day -- and there was! It was a good thing that I waited.

We have a great nursery near us in Freehold. It is Story's Nursery and it is open year around.

Really nice people and they have a terrific selection of old favorites and unusual exotics. They really know their plants. We have people who come to our inn who make a special trip down to Story's to pick up some plants before heading home.

In this first foray to the nursery I wanted to get some flowers for the various pots and planters around the inn. This pot is on the front porch of the main inn. I like geraniums with verigated leaves and paired this one with a green and pink coleus.

Here is another pot for the front porch. This one with a wonderful bright red dahlia. Love dahlias! I forget the name of the other plant, but it will have deep blue/purple flowers.

The next spot to fill in was the herb garden. I bought 2 of each - basil, thyme, sage, and oregano. Then filled in with several types of marigolds. The herb garden already has chives and mint that you just can't cut back too far!

This pot features a lovely coleus and a datura, also known as Angel Trumpet.

In this long planter outside the windows of the carriage house studio, I planted zinnias and snapdragons.

More zinnias filled the planters on the south side of the carriage house.

Our ancient lilac bush is bursting with fragrant blooms, as are all of the lilacs around our inn.

As I was saying, Story's has some interesting plants! I found these native Australian flowers called Joey's. They are suppose to do well in hot dry conditions, so I've planted them on the south side of the round garden by the pool. This garden has tall grasses in the center, so in the summer time when the grass is tall, one side is in the shade and the other the blazing sun. Anything I've planted on the sunny side has wilted in the heat. We'll see how the Joey's do!

This planter is near the back steps of the main inn. It has the varigated leaf geranium, a datura, and another of those purple/blue flower plants!

And last but not least is the rosemary in a pot by the back door - for good luck!

Now what about that parade you were talking about, you say. Yes, Greenville had it's yearly Memorial Day parade and it had a really nice turn out. It was a beautiful day.

The Green is Back in Greenville

Green, green, green. Lots of green around the Greenville Arms 1889 Inn in Greenville, in Greene County. Good thing I like the color green!

The maple trees are fully leafed out, the grass is practically growing before your eyes, and the weeds making their yearly attempt to take over the gardens!

Good thing we have a secret weapon - Vera, gardener extrodinaire!

She keeps the weeds at bay, while I do the major trimming and planting. With beautiful Spring days like we have been having, gardening is high on my list of things I want to do around the inn!

Spring Time Garden Tour

The recent rains have really given the gardens a boost of growing and greening. Here is quick little photo tour of some of the highlights.

This is the kitchen herb garden, all spruced up and ready for the new season. Last year it was over run with mint, so all of that was cleared out. After all how many mojitos can one consume in a summer. ;-)

We did leave the chives in the center, though. They've already come in handy for the Leek and Potato soup that I made for dinner on Wednesday.

We will probably be planting some Tarragon, Rosemary, Basil, and Thyme this year, as they seem to be the herbs that we use the most.

The White garden has a interloper! Who put the red tulip in there? Probably a squirrel.

Well, there is a little bit of blue in the White garden, too. A Jack Frost Brunnera. Maybe it was a patriot squirrel - wanted some red, white and blue in the garden.

This is our huge ancient lilac, which is next to the carriage house and cottage. It is magnificent covered in deep pink blooms, but also awesome covered in snow!

This is one of the pool side gardens. I'm still working on getting the right mix of perennials for this area. Because of the tall grasses in the center, one side is in full sun and the other is in the shade. Another issue to deal with is that the plants have to be very hardy - our dogs sometimes think the inner ring, between the grasses and the flowers is a great running track.

There are violets popping up all over, but I loved this little scene against the trunk of a maple tree near the main inn. Great moss on the tree trunk, too.