OCCASIONAL RAMBLINGS FROM THE FARMHOUSE INN

The Farmhouse Inn has Reopened!

Sat, 14 Jan 2012 13:45:15 -0500

We celebrated our post-Irene re-opening during the
holiday weekend with a warm and inspiring group
of guests and friends. One of the highlights and an
auspicious beginning to 2012 was the farmhouse
marriage proposal that resulted in the engagement of
Jeff and Cheryl, a wonderful couple from Minnesota.

We look forward to 2012 with renewed hope and spirit. All of the mechanical systems have been repaired and tested and the basement is in good shape. A miracle of community effort! A number of large puddles around the grounds make it clear that we aren’t finished with yard repairs yet. Spring will bring more grading, reseeding the lawns, and replanting an expanded kitchen garden with tons of color and variety. The generosity of this community and of our friends and past inn guests is unmatched and their help was instrumental in our being able to reopen. There are still others in the area who will take longer to recover so we will be donating five percent of our "Inncome" to the Sustainable Woodstock Flood Relief Fund until the first anniversary of Irene on August 28, 2012.

Our monthly music jam nights will resume on February 21st, then move to the white barn in May as the evenings become warmer. Mark you calendars then bring your instruments, some songs, and a dish or snack to share on the 3rd Tuesday of each month at 6:30 pm. Kerry Rosenthal will be keeping local musicians posted as well. Fun times!

We are thrilled to share the news that two of our favorite local places, the Woodstock Farmers’ Market and The Back Behind Family Restaurant in Bridgewater Center, have both recovered and reopened after sustaining significant flood damage during Hurricane Irene. Although the White Cottage Snack Bar was destroyed, a new foundation and framing are in place for their spring return. We are looking forward to treating ourselves to an ice cream there after our days of yard work.

It finally snowed and it looks beautiful around here. It’s time to dust off the snowshoes!
Happy New Year

Wassail Weekend - Scrooge! The Musical

Wed, 14 Dec 2011 08:43:23 -0500

Hannah just performed wonderfully (and joyfully) as part of a 60-memeber cast in the Yoh Theater Players production of Scrooge! The Musical during Wassail Weekend. The spectacular show was directed by the wondrous Harriet Worrell and assisted by scores of helpers. The Saturday night performance was attended by many guests of the Woodstock Inn, which included the show and shuttle service in one of their weekend packages. All of our audience neighbors that night were visiting from out of town and were very impressed and delighted.

Irene visited Farmhouse Inn

Thu, 3 Nov 2011 19:15:03 -0400

It has been challenging time for us and many in our community. We give our humble and deeply heartfelt thanks to everyone who helped us in so many ways and in doing so, have been critical to our recovery following a flash flooding of the Ottauquechee River during Hurricane Irene.

The farmhouse basement was flooded with seven feet of rushing muddy river water that permeated everything in the basement with silt and left five inches of muck on the basement floor. Luckily, the water only lapped at the joists but did not rise high enough to enter the first floor. Water was over a foot deep in the garage but only inches deep in the barn. We were forced to close for the foliage season because of damage to the heating, water, electrical, and fire suppression systems that are all in the basement. The fields were covered with sand, silt, and gravel, portions of the driveway and parking area were eroded into a big rocky muddy hole, and the garden was completely washed away except for the rhubarb, mint, and one fence post.

Barn Jam

Wed, 3 Aug 2011 06:46:03 -0400

What a joyous way to spend a Vermont summer evening! Last night, we hosted the fourth biweekly barn jam organized by Kerry Rosenthal. Guitars, mandolins, ukeleles, pipes, drums, feet, harmonica, banjo, voices, accordion, and wonderful fellowship of accomplished and learning musicians sharing great music starting at Bluegrass and ranging from Irish reels to new originals and familiar pop and folk classics.

The white barn is our favorite room on the
property and the perfect space to gather in tune.

Join us on August 16 and 30!

Bring your instrument, your voice,
and a favorite song, snack, or beverage if you like.

Helicopter

Thu, 28 Jul 2011 16:52:38 -0400

A Bell 407 helicopter spent part of a beautiful summer day ferrying equipment from the farm to a cell tower located on the ridgetop to the south. The passenger helicopter had been retrofit with an attachment
for a fixed haul line.

An half-ton, refrigerator-sized, equipment cabinet arrived in the morning on a flatbed truck from Woburn, MA. Conveniently, the hayfield had been cleared a few weeks earlier so it was easy to stage the truck away from the house and garden in the field near the new orchard.

After flying by the drop site, the helicopter circled our property and selected a landing site in the field by the run-in barn. Following a safety talk, the helicopter made three brief trips to the drop site to carry equipment and return transport and installation tools after the case was installed.

Haying

Mon, 18 Jul 2011 07:08:43 -0400

Another year’s worth of hay for Yuma is stacked in the barn now. John MacDonald from down the road arrived shortly after sunrise on Friday to begin cutting our hayfield. Look for the dark spot just in front of the house.

Jewels in the Garden

Sun, 12 Jun 2011 08:44:58 -0400

We wish these Milkweed Tortoise beetles weren’t so determined to lacify the ornamental potato vegetation in our window boxes but they sure are eye catching in opalescent gold.

Farmhouse Gifts

Tue, 10 May 2011 18:15:30 -0400

We have added new products to the Farmhouse Store! We have only limited quantities but are really excited to be able to share these items.

Bees

Wed, 20 Apr 2011 17:46:49 -0400

Our new bees spent the weekend traveling from Georgia to Gilsum, New Hampshire where I picked them up on Monday morning. There were about 30 cages there and I did my best to select the 10,000 or so that I thought would be happy here. Not quite like choosing a puppy from the pound because of the limited feedback from the bees - no lapping or tail wagging that I could recognize and each 10,000 bees looked pretty much like the next. I chose a package that appeared to have lots of live bees, few dead ones, and that was nicely clustered and relatively active .

In the above photo, my left hand is holding a can filled with sugar syrup that I pulled from the top of the package. The bees that are hanging onto the bottom of the can are eating. My right hand is that queen cage that is grasping the queen cage that you see below .

Here she is looking robust and ready to rock. The white spot was applied at the apiary to make it easier for us to pick her out of the crowd when she starts mingling with the rest of the colony. It will take a few days for the worker bees to tunnel through the white “candy” on the right to release her from the cage where she will be fed by her attendants while the colony gets accustomed to her pheromones. I can’t wait to get back into the hive to see how they are doing but I’m going to wait a few days until it warms back into the 50’s - Friday hopefully.

Bread

Fri, 8 Apr 2011 19:36:28 -0400

Our recent guest, Angelo, spent a week in a phenomenal bread making class taught by Jeffrey Hamelman at King Arthur Flour in Norwich, about 30 minutes north of here. He and his classmates would work on four to six kinds of bread in each of their daylong sessions and Alberto generously shared his portion with us every evening. Baguettes, challah, miche, croissant, sunflower seed, levain, whole wheat honey, brioche . . . all beautifully shaped, perfectly baked, and delicious.

We love bread and this was bread to love. We enjoyed it throughout the week with every meal and as many meals. The most amazing feature of these loaves was the crunching sound of the perfectly hard crusts. Each squeeze was a symphony of high end crunch yielding to low end soft center. We have been spoiled and urge everyone to take the class - and stay here!

Signs of Spring

Thu, 17 Mar 2011 20:38:50 -0400

The bees survived the winter and are looking fit, organized, and robust! They were out in force today enjoying the 50-degree sunshine and they weren’t bothered by my presence. If you look closely you can see some scattered around the front of the hives but fifteen minutes before I returned with my camera, there was a cloud of a thousand or more flying out in front. Next warm morning, when the bees are quiet, I’ll remove the black wrap and insulation and give them some sugar water or candy to help ease them into spring.
We ordered a replacement bee package in the winter, concerned that one or both of the colonies weren’t going to see spring. It looks like we’ll be adding another hive when the newbees arrive next month.

Winter at Farmhouse Inn

Thu, 10 Feb 2011 07:47:38 -0500

Winter this year has been spectacular as captured in this long-exposure evening photo by Michael Brown, a recent guest at the Farmhouse Inn. The snow has been too deep and fluffy for sledding and too dry for igloo-building but the clear-air beauty is breathtaking, snowshoeing on the hills above the property has been wonderful, and early morning ground fog rising from the river with a sparkling crystalline coat of ice on the trees - magically surreal.

Stanley Steamer

Thu, 19 Aug 2010 23:44:54 -0400

This beautiful car is nearly as old as the barn with a sound as comforting.

Artists for Barns

Fri, 6 Aug 2010 08:32:39 -0400

A little over a year ago, I was admiring the barn one afternoon with Chip Evans, a fine art painter who owns the Gallery on the Green in Woodstock with his wife Opal. The light was magical and Chip remarked that he had admired the barn for quite some time and that he would love to paint it. I noticed the bare wood, curling clapboards, and failing windows and told him that I would also love to paint the barn - and that Tory and I were hoping to treat the barn to a new coat of stain for its 100th birthday. That started Chip on a thought path to Artists for Barns.

Needed structural repairs and painting and staining of the metal roof, exterior walls, and windows will assure that the barn stands proudly for generations. Beginning September 15, sixteen artists from Chip and Opal’s gallery will gather at the Farmhouse Inn at Robinson Farm for four days to create paintings of the property. There will be a barbeque ($25/ticket) here on Saturday, September 18 from 3:00 to 8:00 with live music. A nice opportunity to socialize with friends and neighbors, enjoy the Robinson Farm, support the barn, meet the artists, and view their paintings. The paintings will be auctioned on October 2 at a tent located in the riverside field behind the Dana House in Woodstock. You can view details of the event here.

Thirty percent of the auction proceeds will be placed in a fund to be used for repair and staining of the barn shell. This is the inaugural Artists for Barns event and its success will assure that is carried forward to help preserve barns across Vermont and, hopefully, across the country.

The Artist for Barns model is a beautiful blend of private enterprise, community involvement, support of the arts, and preservation of Vermont’s agricultural heritage. We are looking forward to the event, anxious to see the artwork that is created, and grateful to the many community members who are supporting this event and helping to underwrite it with their time and gracious contributions such as food and lodging.

Please join us!

Megan and Erik Marry

Sat, 17 Jul 2010 08:52:49 -0400

Twelve years ago, when Megan was 14, we spent a hot Norman Rockwell summer day driving through Vermont with Sean, Megan, and Keith fidgeting and bickering in the back of the car complaining relentlessly about boredom and begging us to turn around to go back to Grandma Pat and Grandpa Ed’s house. As we rolled through the maple lined streets of Woodstock with its fresh cut lawns, white picket fences, bright orange day lilies, centuries old architecture, covered bridges, and boy scouts helping little white-haired ladies cross the street, the car became silent – all noses pressed to glass. As we passed the west end of the town green, a picture perfect wedding poured out of the white-steepled church and the silence was broken by Megan who shouted pleafully, “Mom!
We should move here!” In hindsight, this now appears to have been part of Megan’s long-range wedding plan.

Third Floor is Finished!

Wed, 7 Jul 2010 12:50:00 -0400

Motivated to have full capacity at the inn for Megan’s wedding later this month, we pushed through to finish the two remaining guest rooms on the third floor. This was a task that we began four years ago by removing the narrow room-long closets to create more floor space. Each room is unique so there is a nice variety of choices for guests and we can now comfortably accommodate a total of sixteen.

As the third floor was historically used for housing seasonal farm help and visitors, these rooms are now back to serving their original purpose as guest rooms. They overlook the row of sugar maples planted by Stan Robinson in 1964 as a mother’s day present for Bea. These are the trees that we first tapped during our first spring here to make our own maple syrup. We hope that we didn’t overstep the cute/corny boundary by naming the rooms “Sugar” and “Maple”.

Fourth of July Cultivation

Sun, 4 Jul 2010 07:38:50 -0400

John MacDonald cultivated his sweet corn patch on the Fourth of July with his 1961 Farmall. Besides tending the corn regularly, John will be returning later in the summer to hay the field for Hannah’s horse Yuma.

Dream Made True

Mon, 24 May 2010 14:16:27 -0400

Hannah fulfilled a long time dream. With the expert advice of Sonja Blanchard, our friend and Hannah’s 4-H leader, she found a sweet and beautiful eight year old bay mare quarter horse. “Dry Smarti” developed power steering and power brakes during her four years at college with her previous owner while they worked toward Sarah’s equine science degree at Otterbein College in Ohio. Hannah renamed the horse “ Yuma” in honor of a devoted legendary horse memorialized in a tragic cowboy poem by Henry Herbert Knibbs. Find a few quiet minutes to listen to Waddie Mitchell’s heartbreaking recitation of The Walking Man.

Winter/Spring 2010

Mon, 17 May 2010 07:02:32 -0400

Sugaring
Sugaring came in strong this year but record warm weather in March brought the season to an early end. Despite a shorter season than last year, we were able to produce more syrup by tapping seven more trees including the old sugar maples at the east end of the field. We enjoyed serving our own maple syrup to our guests over the course of the past year and look forward to the same this year.
Chickens
Our two year old flock of chickens are happy and settled into their new home with a family in New York. We miss them and are in a bit of a funk over saying goodbye to them. They are a great group that we enjoyed having around and making memories for us but their production had tapered off too much for our needs here at the Inn. Our new flock of 15 chicks are growing fast in the coop and just enjoyed their first day in the sunshine.
Bees
We have 18,000 new pets after setting up two bee hives. We spent the winter reading beekeeping books and magazines (including a great guide sent by our guests Bill and Jill), asking lots of questions, and preparing two hives on a new frame that Hannah painted with friends. Due to extreme rains and cold weather, the bees were delayed for a week in Georgia so their arrival coincided with one of Barry’s work trips to California so Tory bravely installed the bees on May 3 with the help of our neighbor, David. We hope they are happy here. Our own honey! That is something we have dreamed of for a long time.
Cats
You were earlier introduced to Tilly. She has made it abundantly clear that she is not a barn cat. She performs a clown act all hours of the day on the stairs just outside the kitchen window. She really is too friendly and sweet to be out in the barn, so we have arranged for her to eat and sleep in one of the front porches. She is thriving with the extra attention she now gets…..demands. Dexter and Frank are perfect barn cats. A bit shy with strangers, but regularly leave proof of a job well done in their dry food bowl.
Rooms
We have been making good progress on completing the two remaining rooms on the third floor bringing our total bedspace to 16. We are very excited about the Sugar and Maple rooms, which will be ready by the end of May. They are going to be bright and beautiful and feel very private. Both rooms will have individually controlled baseboard heat, a pretty vessel sink, classically tiled showers, and crown-height views of the sugar maples that line the driveway. The Sugar room will have a queen-sized bed and the Maple will have two singles. The third-floor Sunrise Room will be converted from two single beds to a queen, which we expect will be a better match with the large bathroom and clawfoot tub. It is thrilling to finally finish preparing the guest rooms and our attentions can now move toward figuring out how to create an event venue in the barn!
Local Food
The seeds, potato and onion sets have arrived and we are planning and preparing for this year’s vegetable garden. It’s going to be full of variety, and color. The farmer that hayed the meadow last year will be starting a rotation of sweet corn this spring and fertilizing the field for better hay production. Beside the corn that he will be selling at his farm stand and hay that he will be feeding to his cows, there will be enough hay for Hannah’s horse. We bought half a pig from him in early April that we had processed at a smokehouse in Windsor and are looking forward to our guests enjoying bacon and nice sausage – at least until it runs out.
Love
Love is in the air. Preparations are being made for three weddings that are happening here this summer. They will be awesome celebrations from a quiet intimate union to large events with family, friends, music, and great food.

Henstein

Tue, 17 Nov 2009 22:45:34 -0500

One afternoon we were visited by a friend with a dog that had never seen a chicken, and before we realized that was the case, he had one of the Buff Orpingtons in his mouth and was proudly running around the yard with it. We finally got ahold of him and took the rigid bird from his mouth. She was alive but we didn’t know the extent of the damage. It didn’t look good.