Lost between off the beaten path & fairy land, In forest & mist, sits an old red salt box homestead. Edible gardens, goats, flowers, woods, trails, near skiing & apple picking. Experience the enchanting romance time forgot. Be nearly everywhere in an hour. Escape the city, go adventure, rest, or soul search, inside a colonial fairy tale, out where There Be Dragons on the map. Great for artists, dreamers, rebels & free spirits. 5 minutes to history, 45 to Boston, 15 to Worcester & 10 to Marlboro.
The space
I am prouder than proud of this listing and the beautiful house it is in. As of 10/10 it has been under consideration for a feature in the world renowned home design magazine, A Primitive Place!
Please note and pay careful attention to our Covid policies located in the additional rules section. They are strict and 100% non negotiable, for your safety and mine. Know that you can count on us providing as safe a place for you as is possible under the current circumstances.
In December, the house smells of a blue spruce Christmas tree, and a fir forest with hints of sweet orange, and an array of warm spices from the kettle on top of the lit up wood stove. You can often also smell bread and other treats baking in the oven. Fresh New England style granola, Christmas gingerbread cookies, pears baking, and many other delightful aromas. The laundry smells of apple orchards at their peak and a little bit of cinnamon creamed together with the tiniest hint of vanilla a memory of the autumn.... Outside smells of the leafless, skeletal winter woods. But only until the snow falls, when it smells like snow storms and cold. When the wind blows you may pick up the light fresh scent of horses from the neighbor's place which even in the winter is close to invisible from here through the trees... Completely invisible when the leaves are in and full. The fragrance here changes with the season.
In spring, expect fragrances of snow melting outside and an earthy fragrance through mud season. Followed later in spring by the heady fragrance of lilacs and wisteria. Inside, we smell bread baking and early flowers along with other fragrances of spring time, such as a beautiful anticipation for the coming summer and sunshine. Summer time, the house smells of warmth and of rich vanillas, BBQ carried in on the breeze from outside, goats and living things, growing gardens of vegetables, fresh cut grass, and a wild array of flowers straining their way upwards trying to reach the sun. Autumn, smells like.... Hmmm.... Thanksgiving turkey and other rich traditional foods and baking granola, it smells of fresh from the oven bread, and apple pie. Hints of the goats on the hill outside and in through an open window, the nearby apple orchards, and touches of vanilla and cinnamon are frequent fragrances here around the harvest months... Outside, in the late autumn, you can smell the mist and the earth, just as the smell of the woods changing color is fading.... But I think the smells of winter and Christmas are my personal favorite.
The Foxglove Room, is a lovely, cozy, room with a comfy bed, a bureau, and a closet. Look out at the green, and the wildflowers, or the woods while you work from the comforts of bed. The Foxglove Room, boasts several windows, making it a cheerful, sunny space. It is just down the hallway from the private bathroom. We are an old fashioned colonial style farm house, so ensuite bathrooms aren't a thing here. If an ensuite is super important to you, every hotel in the area offers one. Come down from your cozy crow's nest where you are up at tree height, for breakfast in the morning.
Breakfast is included in the price of the room, and is usually set out at about 10 am most mornings on the dining room table right by one of the wood stoves, making breakfast a cozy romantic meal and super nice in the winter. In the spring and summer, we can serve it in the dining area, or, out on the back patio where you can watch the goats play on the hill while listening to the birds sing. In May, the wisteria blooms and that is a very special time on the back patio... Or, we can set out a picnic blanket somewhere of your choosing in the farm yard, and breakfast can be served there... We won't get in your way if breakfast eggs are your delight. We welcome our guests to go right out to our coop to collect their own breakfast eggs. Or I can do that if that is your preference... In late July through September, you can take advantage of the wild growing black raspberries, or the mulberry trees full of pickable yums... In June, there may be some fresh strawberries in the vegetable garden, unless Pikku, the dog or Beelzebub hell's own ground hog, get to them before you do...
We care about the world we all share, 15% of each booking, goes directly to charity, to aide displaced people due to medical issues, and or climatic events such as storms, or wild fires, or earth quakes, or Loki killing Balder and starting Ragnarok. We also volunteer on Open Homes, to give displaced people, such as refugees from war torn regions a place to stay should they need one. Not only are we proud to do both these things, we only wish there were more we could do. Being a light in dark times when all other lights go out, is something this farm was created to embody.
I try to provide homemade homestead self care products herbally designed to improve skin. If time is an issue and I am out of these things I may offer something/s/all things store bought, but that isn't common. Something will always be there for our guest's self care needs.
Our sheets are made from bamboo or cotton they are environmentally friendly. We recycle what we can. Keep all food we provide local. Much of it as local as our own barn yard. We use the environmentally friendly company Caldrea, for over 80% of our household cleaning needs, some cleaning supplies may even be made right here on property, and some may be standard variety. Not only do we compost, but we also feed kitchen scraps to our chickens in an effort to be sustainable and less wasteful. Everything here runs on solar power! We make an effort, but we are imperfect. As we learn better we do better. So if you have something to teach us, we are happy to learn, as doing better is what we are all about.
We insist on paying all our employees a minimum of $35 an hour, because we care about them and their welfare, and their families. We consider them a part of our family. We care about our environment, and we still keep a rate competitively lower than most high quality comparable B&Bs in our area. We keep hearing this is the kind of business people want to support. It's a risky experiment... Will people choose to utilize a business like mine instead of a business that is cheaper and of a lower quality. Or much bigger with a more established position, that does a third of what I do in these important areas. My family tells me I am crazy to bet on people. Can you be decent and in business at the same time? I don't know. But I am gathering data to see. And I am betting on you. I am hoping we make it through the winter on the winter bookings we receive.
The best compliment I have ever gotten on this little homestead farm came from a visiting photographer. Who once came out for a few hours to photograph. She called my home, "alive." I like to think that it is in fact alive. Always growing, and changing form, ever so slightly, developing over time, almost like a biological organism. With a personality, spirit, and soul, that are all it's own. Unlike anything or anywhere else. Unique. An experience in living closer to nature, a bit more self sufficiently, and more harmoniously with the earth we all rely on.
Listen to the rain, play in the sunshine, wander the forest, look for fairies in the brush... Build a snow man or that snow fort you always dreamed of building as a child. Go snow shoeing, or ice skate down at Gates Pond... collect the wild growing violets that pop up all around the farm bring them in and learn to make a beautiful jelly. Go antiquing, apple picking, skiing, walk the local trails, play board games by the wood stove when it pours rain. Help us feed the animals or play with them in the yard. Hold a chicken, raid the coop of it's eggs. Forage the woods and the wood's edge for beautiful things for salads such as dandelions, plantains, mustard garlic and more. Help out in the garden if the mood strikes you, or watch a snow storm make the world white from the cozy by the fire with a hot mug of hot chocolate and a good book. The world seems to disappear when the snow gets heavy. Visibility goes away, just the bright warm cozy of this magical place seems to be left, floating in the whiteness. Enjoy the gardens, go horseback riding somewhere local, Paint a picture outside in the sunshine, have a picnic with some good wine and a nice blanket out in the farm yard. Do yoga with the goats, play hide and seek in the fog with the white tail deer... Listen to the night birds sing...Watch the edge of the woods where the glow bugs light up the evening... Bring a guitar to sing some camp fire songs for the lady of the moon and Tess the maple tree, make a small campfire.
Named For The Beautiful New England Wildflowers that grow all over, the five acre farm sits surrounded by woods. A distance from the public road to town... Set apart in what seems like a world all our own. We are located up an old gravel road, follow it, just past the fruit trees... The view opens up. You see the old fashioned red salt box farmhouse, beyond the sign that verifies you have arrived and are welcome.
