Snug Hollow Farm

When do we get to go back??? This B+B was amazing beyond my wildest expectations. Well, once we got there. MAYBE an hour into our trip we're suddenly at a dead stop on 75S. FOR TWO HOURS. Poor Brian drove about 3 miles in 2 hours. And with a stick shift folks, that's not fun. An RV had pretty much exploded all over the road. They loaded it onto a flatbed truck and it was literally like a sandwich with each side of the RV stacked on top of the other. Total destruction. So anyways, we finally arrived around 8pm. The thing is, it takes a good 5-10 minutes to get to the farm after turning off the "main" road. You know to turn because you get to the barn with this quilt square on it:

Apparently it's a "thing" to have quilt squares on your barns. I never realized it till I was actually looking for one!
It sure beats confederate flags if you ask me.

You're driving and driving and wondering if you're going to get jumped by hobbits and woodland creatures when you see this sign:

And you think hallelujah we're almost there. 

And then after another 5 minutes you finally reach the cattle gate (which you have to get out and open and then shut behind you).

No hunting. Bummer.

After we got through the gate it was just another minute around the bend to the house. The first time in we saw a little 2-4 point buck! It just stood there and stared at us. We sat there and stared at it. It was very curious, but not scared until we started driving again and the diesel engine wasn't to its liking.

So we FINALLY get there and Barbara made us a delicious dinner. I sadly didn't get pics of any of the food, but I can describe the meals for you here:

Bowtie pasta with lemon cream sauce, snap peas, corn off the cob and strawberry pie

Oat pancakes and poached eggs with fresh fruit and yogurt

Scalloped potatoes, baked beans, corn succotash and cornbread with apple dumplings

Breakfast potatoes, scrambled eggs, biscuits and granola with fruit

Everything is vegetarian and homemade. We of course bought her cookbook. And I found two new products to add to my cooking repertoire: nutritional yeast for some added protein and a nutty flavor and Tamari, a gluten-free soy sauce that gives dishes a bit of a meaty flavor. 

So the first night we were exhausted and after some wine and poking around the house a bit retired early to bed in our beautiful room: 

It had a private bathroom and a little room off the back with two twin beds in it!
Yes, those are fresh flowers by the lamp. :)

The only problem was it felt like Christmas to me. I couldn't believe the place was so perfect. I couldn't believe the people were so nice. And I couldn't fall asleep to save my life.  Saturday morning I woke up about 6:30 (darn you work habits!) and I was so excited I just got up. Nobody was awake yet so I peeked out the back door (which was left open all night, like all the others, for air flow--no central air!) and it was so foggy and misty and eerie it was just awesome. So I ran back upstairs and got the camera and manual to try and play around a bit. 

The problem is the sun was rising so fast that I didn't have enough time to play and get it quite right. But here's a really crummy example of how cool the mist was: 

It was much darker than this photo would have you believe. 

So I sat on the porch for over an hour by myself and just rocked away in a chair. So peaceful. I wasn't actually watching the sun itself rise, but it was wonderful to listen to the world wake up (and get rid of the bat that had been flying around the porch with me!). 

I spent a lot of time out there in the chair and here: 

Heaven is anywhere there's a porch swing.

So Saturday we really didn't do much of anything. It was blazing hot, and Brian wanted to take his first of 75 naps of the day, so we didn't start our little hike around the property till at least 11:30 (not a great idea). I should also mention we didn't go around the ENTIRE property--it's 300 acres--but stayed within the mowed paths to catch some of the highlights quickly: 

I think there may have been horses here once.

A little hill of tall grasses.

A pond by the bigger cabin. Barbara said people used to swim in it
but now there's turtles "as big as you" in it!

Now, many of you may know that I am quite a morbid person and love a good, old cemetery. Snug Hollow just happens to have a little cemetery on it that added to the creepiness off in the distance as the sun rose that morning. So of course I wanted to go check it out and see how old the gravestones are. Turns out--not THAT old. Someone was buried there in 2001 for goodness' sakes! However, still a cemetery and still cool in my eyes. 

There is just something so creepy and wrong and awesome about this picture. I looked down
and realized both our shadows were over the grave and made Brian stay put. It just
makes me think of mortality and life and death, young and old. Amazing.

Handsome husband. He really was having a good time. The cemetery just had about
a million bugs and I thought WE were getting eaten alive, but turns out, as usual
it was just me. 

So after that adventure we headed back towards the house via the vegetable and flower gardens:

Here's a photo of the farmhouse from the path leading back:

The screened porch there is where we ate all our meals.

And one of the cabin we'll be staying in for our mom/daughter weekend: 

It looks SO SMALL but I swear on the inside there is room to sleep at least 9,
two stories, and a mini kitchen! Plus a covered porch on the back with
tons of rocking chairs.

I'm going to have to do a second post of all the awesome little touches that Barbara has throughout the house that just make you feel at home. There's always something new and interesting to discover. Here's us on Saturday, so thankful we found Snug Hollow:

Thank you Barbara for a wonderful weekend!!!

Saturday night after dinner Barbara taught us how to play Fast Scrabble (awesome game) and then we retired pretty early again. Since I had been up since 6:30 I was ready for bed!!

This is the second time we've stayed at a B+B. The first time was for our first anniversary, and it was really more like staying in the guest house. It was our own little cottage separate from the main house. Peggy brought us breakfast each morning and then we did our own thing for the rest of the day. It was very nice and relaxing and the food was delicious, but it wasn't Snug Hollow. 

I really, really enjoyed being in the main house. I was a little apprehensive and couldn't remember if we had a private bathroom or not. But I loved getting to meet new people. I know this sounds weird, but at the end of every meal I would be racking my brain to make sure I'd really never met any of the other guests before. They just seemed so familiar that I felt like maybe I actually did know them in "real life." Everyone stayed for 30 minutes to an hour after every meal just talking and sharing stories and getting to know one another. 

And I couldn't end the post without mentioning Barbara's wonderful helpers that we met: Olivia, Nikki and Connor. Everyone was just so nice and accommodating. They would introduce themselves when they arrived and then be sure to come say goodbye on their way out. Such thoughtful, hard-working people. 

Needless to say, we'll be back again and again and I think I may have found my new preferred mode of travel: B+B to B+B.

(Check out the second post about Snug Hollow here)