Horses, Marvelous Views, and Hospitality Plus!

Returning from our recent trip to Virginia, we stopped for a one night stay at the Inn at Westwynd Farm in Hershey, PA. What a wonderful place! I could have moved in at once and stayed forever! But, alas our stay was to be all to brief.

I'm definitely marking this inn down for a repeat visit. I want to hang out on the front porch swing watching the sunset and the horses. I also want more of those "fudgey cookies!" The inn is also only a short drive from the Hershey chocolate center of the world, with fine dining (we ate at Devon Seafood Grill - excellent!), a huge amusement park, and historic tours.

Below are some photos from around the inn.

Unexpected B & B Discover in Harrisonberg, VA

Mark and I took a week off to go visit Mark's mom in Danville, VA recently. We had planned to do the 10 hour drive in one shot, because we had done it that way before. However, after being about 9 hours on the road (including a marvelous lunch break at Emeril's Italian Table at the Sands Casino in Bethlehem, PA - an expected discovery, too) we pulled into Harrisonberg, VA to look for somewhere to eat dinner.

Using the handy feature of our GPS to find restaurants nearby, we decided to eat at the Joshua Wilton Inn & Restaurant.

Wow, what a find it was! A beautiful Victorian inn, but what was even better was the restaurant. For starters, I had the AUTUMN OLIVE FARMS PORK BELLY - with a.m fog mushrooms, grilled bread, poached egg and a truffle-chive buttermilk dressing. Mark had GRILLED QUAIL - turner ham-cornbread stuffing, fire roasted corn salsa and ancho chili vinaigrette. For the main course, we both had GRILLED DUCK BREAST - creamy polenta, pan roasted green beans and a maple balsamic glaze.

After a meal like that, enjoyed on their outdoor patio, we just weren't ready to face another 3 hours of driving. So we asked about rooms at the inn and were lucky to find that they had a couple available.

Harrisonburg is in the Shenandoah Valley region of Virginia and is home to James Madison University. The town's nickname is "The Friendly City" and they weren't kidding with that. When we took a walk though town after breakfast the next morning, everyone we passed greeted us with a big and friendly hello.

The Virginia Quilt Museum is right in downtown, just a short walk from the inn. Unfortunately, we didn't have the time to wait until it opened that morning, but it would be worth taking a look another time.

I love mosaics and this one is in the downtown area.

The unexpected discoveries on a road trip are what make road trips so appealing to me. We always stay at B&Bs for the unique and special experience that each one has to offer, which is something we've done since way before we became innkeepers ourselves. It is definitely the "Better Way to Stay"

Using Natural Dyes for Easter Eggs

This year we decided to try using natural dyes for coloring some Easter Eggs. We always have on hand various fruits, vegetables, and spices that can be used to create dyes, so it was easy to get started.

We started by hard boiling a bunch of eggs.

Next up was preparing the ingredients, in this case, we selected blueberries and beets. You need about 2 cups of each. The blueberries were mashed up a bit and the beets were roughly chopped.

Then in separate saucepans, you boil the blueberries and beets in 2 cups of water for 10 minutes. When done, strain the colored water into bowls. The remains of the blueberries and beets can be thrown away or eaten!

Add 1 tsp of white vinegar to each bowl of dye, stir and then allow to cool to room temperature.

Now you are ready to dye the eggs! We poured the dye into two glasses so that we'd have a nice deep well to cover the eggs.

What was surprising with the results was that the blueberry dye was much more intense and fast acting than the beet dye. This was unexpected because the beets colored the water the instant they were put in, even before they were boiled. The blueberries didn't color the water until they were boiled. To get any serious color with the beet dye, we had to leave the egg in the dye at least 5 to 10 minutes, but with the blueberry, it took a minute or less.

This was a fun thing to do in between customers coming to our Life By Chocolate shop to buy up all of the chocolate rabbits and bunnies!

Next year we'll try some new colors.

Innkeepers Holiday - Rabbit Hill Inn, Lower Waterford, VT

For our 21st wedding anniversary we were able to slip away for a marvelous stay at the Rabbit Hill Inn.

What an experience and an inspiration! It easy to see why they have garnered all the awards and press that they have. We were pampered and taken such good care of the second we arrived right through to the moment we departed. In fact, we had such a grand time just enjoying ourselves, that I didn't spend much time taking photos!

But here is an example of the hospitality and romance of the place. A cute rabbit (there are rabbits everywhere at the inn), along with a "Happy Anniversary" card, and out the picture, a bottle of champagne.

On following nights the rabbit greeted us with chocolate and maple sugar candies in the shape of rabbits.

We stayed in "The Nest", a romantic room on the 3rd floor of the main inn. I choose it for the cozy knitting areas . . .

and Mark choose it for the hugh whirlpool tub!

Of course, I loved it also for all the rabbits. Here a bench that was outside the front for the inn hiding in the snow.

We took advantage of the mid-week special and stayed 3 nights. One of the major bonus's of the inn is that you can also arrange to have dinner there and the food is divine! We ate there 2 nights and would have done the third, too, but they didn't serve dinner on one of the nights we were there.

The food was SOOO good. Each night I couldn't believe I had that much to eat, but each bite was so good I couldn't stop! Breakfast was delish, too.

This inn is definitely worthy of repeated visits and it will go on my list of all time favorite inns!

New Quilts for the Rooms

I've been sewing like crazy this winter, working on some more quilts for the guest rooms. A king size quilt from one of the rooms was sold to a guest last year so I felt the pressure to not only replace this one but make some headway in my goal of at least one quilt per bed at the inn. There are 21 beds and I had only made six to-date, minus the one that was sold!

This is the new pinwheel quilt in Room 15 made to replace the one that was sold.

This is a twin quilt made for Room 18 to match the queen quilt that was made the previous year.

I also completed 3 more quilt tops that will be quilted in the not too distant future. The goal is getting closer!

Snow Day

Despite what the woodchuck said, Mother Nature thought another good covering of snow was called for before Spring. We got about 6 - 8 inches of the fluffy white stuff and it was a joy to walk around the property snapping pictures! I just hadn't had the moment to take my usual winter snow pictures, so I was happy for this extra chance.

So here is a photo tour of the property in all it's snowy finery!

Vera Kraker - Rest In Peace

Vera Kraker had been our head housekeeper since the day we bought the inn in 2004. But her history with the Greenville Arms 1889 Inn goes back much further than that. She began working at the inn for the Stevens family around early 1980s and continued on through the 15 years that Eliot and Tish Dalton owned the inn. I think she ended up knowing more about the inn than any of us owners!

You could always count on her smile. Her dedication and work ethic was inspiring. Vera will be sorely missed.

In the Spring, we plan to plant at the inn an American Sycamore in her memory so that her history at the inn will live on.