So we started unpacking the boxes. First was the crèche my grandfather made many years ago. As far as I know he only made two, the one that I have, which was my grandmother’s and the one my mom has. My grandmother bought the figures and antiqued them herself. Before she gave the crèche to me, my grandmother used to pack it away in their basement. One year she took it out and one of the animals had his nose chewed off by a mouse over the summer. It never fails to make me smile when I unpack that figure and put it in the back, left corner of the crèche. I hide the baby Jesus behind it until Christmas day when he is born. Actually, we put him in the manger the night before so he is there when we get up in the morning, like magic. The chore of putting the baby Jesus in the crib is handed down to the youngest child year after year. Now it’s the duty of Moira’s nine-year-old niece. I also enjoy moving the Kings and Sheppards closer to the crèche as it gets closer to Christmas Eve.  After all, they are traveling! Being an ordained Minister of the Universal Life Church, I respect and honor all religions, however, being raised in the Christian faith I tend to follow my own traditions. Many of them are not so much based in any set religion as much as just the way we did things.

            Next we unpacked several boxes of random Christmas figurines such as angels, Christmas tree candles, snowmen, sleighs, etc. We also unpacked the small, lighted Christmas tree we put in the front foyer to greet guests. Of course there are also window lights and many outside lights that were put out as well. As always we put the lights on the gazebo, front bushes and backyard pine tree on the coldest day of the year! It always seems to happen that way. Somehow it seems more festive if your toes and fingers are freezing off! We also unpacked holiday table clothes, place mats, napkins and dishes, etc.

            Finally came several boxes of Santas. Some of these Santas I have had for many, many years. I can remember who gave me each and everyone of them – well, for the most part! It always takes the longest to put out the Santas because each one has a very special story and we enjoy reminiscing as we put them all out. Moira and I don’t always agree on who gave me a certain Santa, when it was given or the story behind it, but this is all part of the fun!

            Now that the Holiday’s are over, the task becomes packing everything carefully and trucking it all back down in the basement. It’s sad in a way, but also exciting. It is the beginning of a new year. A clean slate you might say. Many changes will occur in the coming year. We will have a new president for one thing. Lots of opportunities to make change, make a difference, both at home and afar. This year will be whatever we make it. We will pray for good health, abundance and above all peace on earth!

As a parent, it’s the call you never want to receive.  The call that creates a crazy, surreal moment in your life that you will never, ever forget. It’s the call that one of your children has been injured in an accident.  As a parent, you stop breathing, literally stop breathing, for what seems like hours, and maybe it is. Our son was in a serious motorcycle accident four months ago and I don’t think we’ve taken a breath since. As an innkeeper, there are any number of crises you will have to deal with. There is the occasional burst water pipe or over-flowing bathtub, maybe a double booking or sick guest. No matter what the crisis, my hope is that you never have to deal with this one.

It was a Saturday morning in July. We had a wonderful couple staying with us and were enjoying our time at breakfast, which included great food (if I do say so myself), wonderful conversation and lots of laughter. Along with this couple was their teenage daughter, who they were dropping off at a camp not far from us. It was the first time she would be away from home on her own. The parents would drop her off and then continue on up to Québec for a short vacation and then back to stay here for a night before picking up their daughter to head home.

The phone rang around 11am and I excused myself from the conversation to answer it. As I went to the phone, our guests made their way out of the sunroom to track down their daughter. My spouse headed out to the deck to tend to her hanging plants. I answered the phone as I always do, “Donomar Inn, this is Mary, can I help you?” The voice on the other end was clearly shaken and distraught. It was the voice of a local parent whose son was our oldest son’s best friend. Our oldest son was spending the summer in Los Angeles where he had lived for 6 years with this best friend before coming back to Vermont to finish his degree. Our daughter is a costume designer and also lives in LA. Our youngest son had decided to join his siblings in LA for a weeklong vacation.

As I struggled to listen to this parent I noticed my spouse’s reaction to the change in my voice. All I remember is hearing that my youngest son had been in a serious motorcycle accident and it was really bad… really bad was all my fellow parent could say. It was his son who was driving the motorcycle and my son was on the back. They were driving down Sunset Boulevard at 1:30am and a drunk driver pulled out in front of them. They hit the car at approximately 70 miles per hour and careened off and hit a parked car at approximately 50 miles per hour. There was no word on the injuries to my son.

As calmly as I could I told my friend I would have to hang up and call the hospital. As soon as I hung up I looked at my spouse and said our son has been in a serious motorcycle accident. At this point I was having an out-of-body experience. I had no idea what had happened to my guests. Had they over-heard my conversation? What had I been saying? Where were they? Had they quietly drifted out of earshot? All I knew was that I wasn’t breathing.

The world of inn keeping is full of unexpected ups and downs. You really have to be ready for almost anything. No… I think you have to actually be ready for anything, anything at all! I’ve had guests come to breakfast with their ski boots on or in their boxers, spill red wine all over a white coverlet as well as all over the wall/floor/ceiling, return to the inn injured after a day of skiing or hiking, or become ill on their vacation, etc.  I’ve driven guests back and forth to restaurants so they could enjoy that extra glass of wine or when they have ridden their bicycle.  When it comes to being an innkeeper I think I’ve learned how to bob and weave, adjust to what comes along. If I only had to wear my innkeeper’s hat it would be easy, but how do you blend having guests in your home and your own personal life?

I think the answer is -- honesty. Sometimes I am reminded by my guests that I am welcoming people into my home and they understand that life happens. I am happy to make concessions when their lives get complicated and they give the same back. I am constantly surprised and renewed by the caring and compassion of my guests. I’ve had guests that have suffered enumerable painful experiences, whether it’s illness or injury to themselves, a family member or friends. Everyone seems to have a story and all are happy to share it, and I am happy to listen. We share sadness and joy and it all seems to be quite healing. One more unexpected treasure in the making of a Vermont Innkeeper! Oh… by the way… our son is on the road to recovery after two surgeries, lots of physical therapy, hard work and much love and support from family, friends and even guests!

Ever thought about making your wedding all about the planet? In this age of Al Gore, global warming concerns and record high oil prices, why not? Consider a pre-wedding day hike, kayak tour, bicycle ride, etc. How about sticking to a smaller wedding, say 75 guests? A reception in a natural setting would save you money. Every little bit helps toward healing global warming so let’s see what you can do to reduce your overall environmental footprint.

            First we’ll start with the location. It’s easy to embrace the earth without sacrificing style! Choose a natural setting and save money. Using a farm or an Inn for the reception instead of a hall or hotel is cheaper. Even better, choose a ‘Green’ Inn such as Donomar Inn Bed & Breakfast in Jeffersonville, Vermont. If you prefer a resort or hall make sure they recycle and wash dishes with biodegradable liquid. Make the honeymoon ‘Green’ by staying at a ‘Green’ Inn or resort. Also, stay locally to avoid transatlantic flight emissions.

            Hand in hand with the reception is the caterer. Find a caterer that uses only locally grown ingredients. Have an organic menu. How about an organic cake and organic beverages? Try locally brewed beer and wine. Some caterers use biodegradable plates and utensils. Avoid throw-a-ways. Choose favors that help save endangered species. What about edible flowers? Don’t forget organic table linens. Check out Back to Earth organic catering in Berkley CA.

            For wedding gowns and groom’s suits choose vintage or organic cotton, even hemp. Check out vintagewedding.com and weddingsutra.com.

            Flowers are a must. You can use a local flower farm, organic is even better, and pick your own! Use flowers and plants that are in season. Maybe go as far as using flowers grown according to sustainable farming practices. You can always use potted plants and donate money or plant for future weddings. Maybe silk flowers or dried flowers are to your liking. How about an organic herb bouquet? There are also numerous organic florists such as OrganicBouquet.com.

            Look for a ‘Green’ photographer. Ask the following questions: Do they recycle packaging, inkjet & laser cartridges? Do they offer paperless image workflow (high-resolution digital photography)? Do they offer 100% electronic image exchange (documentation submission using PDF files instead of proof prints)? All important questions!

            To wrap it up, here are a few odds and ends. Instead of traditional gifts sign up for renewable energy and reforestation projects or have guests donate money to them. Give plants as favors. Use tree-free invitations. How about acoustic music? Last, but surely not least, choose wedding rings made of 100% reclaimed, recycled, ecologically responsible gold. Check out coopamerica.com and nodirtygold.org.

            A ‘Green’ Wedding can be fun, stylish, less expensive and most importantly – guilt-free! If you would like information about Green Weddings in Vermont, feel free to give us a call at Donomar Inn in Jeffersonville, Vermont – 802-644-2937.

March 24, 2007, I tapped my trees, four taps. Yes, that’s more than enough for me to handle. I’m tapping a little late this year because we’ve had some very interesting weather in Vermont lately. Rain, snow, sleet, sixty degrees above zero, twenty five degrees below zero, you name it. So today was finally the day. In order for the sap to run you need below freezing temperatures at night and about forty degrees during the day.

I set my taps with an old fashion hand drill just like the one my eighty-some-odd year old neighbor used when he set the taps for me at our old house. He and his wife taught me everything I needed to know when I was learning how to boil the sap into syrup. When I first started out I would burn the syrup every time. I finally asked our neighbors if there was a trick or if they had any words of wisdom. His wife thought about it for a moment and said, “Well, all I can say is when it goes, it goes quick!” “Huh.” I said, scratching my head. “Is that it? That’s all I get? When it goes it goes quick!” Marion said, “Ayah.” Of course, that advice was all I needed and I can honestly say I haven’t burnt a batch since!

Last year was the first time I tapped trees here at the Inn. I ended up with about a gallon of syrup. That’s pretty good considering it takes forty gallons of sap to make one gallon of syrup and at the moment I boil it on our stove in the kitchen! I’m hoping to build a little sugar shack, but until that happens I’ll continue to boil inside with the big vent over the stove on high and several windows open. In fact, I’m boiling the sap from today as we speak!

Normally tapping is quite uneventful; get the drill, the taps, the buckets, and the hammer. Drill the hole up at an angle so the sap will run down and make sure the hole is cleaned out before you hammer the tap in. I use a half inch drill bit, the kind that starts out with a sharp point about a quarter of an inch long that ends in a shoulder before it spreads out to the half inch width for the hole. I guess you’d call that a starter bit. As I said earlier my drill is an antique like the one my neighbor used. I traveled to many antique shows and antique shops before I finally found it. It has a handle on one side and a crank on the other. There is a curved piece of metal on the end that fits on your thigh for leverage. I love it and wouldn’t ever tap with a power drill. I guess if I had a stand of sugar maples I might think differently, but for setting four taps; this is the only way to go. Plus if it was good enough for Wilbur, my neighbor, it’s good enough for me!

I was so glad it was Saturday and Moira was home from school so we could tap together. I drilled and set three taps and asked her is she would like to drill one herself. She said she would try. She did a great job, but couldn’t drill the hole deep enough so I finished it. In all fairness she was slightly distracted because she was afraid she would be late for yoga. After I set the fourth and last tap Moira was about to leave. She turned around and came running back to me to give me a kiss goodbye. I was standing several feet away holding the hammer and drill, which had tipped in my hand so the pointy bit was sticking straight up in the air.

The kiss goodbye was successful, however when she dropped her right hand to turn and leave she hit the drill bit and punctured the pad right below her thumb! She let out a slight yip and immediately grabbed the hole in her hand. I kept saying let me see it, but she wouldn’t let go. I actually think she was going into shock! I finally got her to release her Herculean grip on her thumb so I could look at the wound. I was expecting a gusher of blood, but there it was a tiny, tiny slit that wasn’t even bleeding. She covered it up quick and started to cry. I said, “It’s not even bleeding!” She said, “Yes it is. It’s going to!” As you can tell Moira isn’t very good with blood or injuries. Childbirth was a breeze, three times! But this was just too much.

I got her into the house and said she’d have to let go of her booboo so I could wash it and put a little butterfly Band-Aid on it. I made her sit while I washed my hands and prepared for surgery. I got my old softball training kit out from the basement with all the paraphernalia I would need. I washed my hands and turned to her pale face and she extended her shaky, injured hand so bravely. I checked out the wound again and, in all fairness, it was a pretty deep puncture. It was about a quarter of an inch long and very deep. I’m surprised it didn’t hit the bone! I had to actually squeeze it a little to get it to bleed, which was very interesting. I had the same thing happen to me one time when I cut my hand down to the bone. I looked at it, I could see my bone, but it didn’t bleed, until I got to the hospital. Once it started, well…

Anyway, I washed it with warm water and soap. Moira was very brave. I then put a big glob of anti-bacterial cream on it, then the butterfly Band-aide, then a regular Band-aide for good measure. Then I had Moira sit in a chair with her head between her knees. Wow, she was so shaken. Of course it could have been much worse. I could see the vein she had just missed! When she had settled down and was getting back to normal she suggested I run out and get some lunch and she would be fine. I said okay and ran down to the corner and grabbed a sandwich and a treat for the brave patient and ran back. When I got back there was Moira sitting in the chair with her face all pale again. I said, “What happened? I looked at her hand and it had started to bleed. She said, “I wanted to vacuum while you were gone. I needed to use my injured hand to take the attachment off. I made her let me see the injury again. I tried to peer under the bandage without taking it off. I could see a little blood stain on it. I determined it would be better to leave it alone and I forbid her to use that hand.  She grinned at me; she loves being in trouble! We sat and shared my sandwich and her treat while we talked and laughed. He hand felt better and so did she. We walked our dog and all was well.

Later Moira was getting ready to go out with some friends to a show so I told her I wanted to change her bandage before she went. She was nervous, but said okay. I took the first Band-aide off without any surprises. In fact, there was the tiniest speck of blood from the vacuuming incident.  I decided to leave the butterfly Band-aide on and put a new Band-aide on top of it and then I wrapped it with another bandage so she wouldn’t forget she had an injury. She seemed happy and off she went. Now I’m boiling the sap I collected today and writing this blog. I can smell the syrup and see the froth in the pan so I better go check it because as you know, when it goes, it goes quick!

It started snowing Wednesday, Valentine’s Day, around 2am. It didn’t stop until, well, it still hasn’t really stopped. It’s been flurrying for days! It snowed so hard on Wednesday that my spouse, my oldest son and myself shoveled the walkways more than ten times. We tried to keep up with the snowfall because we had guests at the time. They checked out Wednesday morning only to call us in the afternoon to say they couldn’t drive because of the storm so could they come back. Of course we said yes.

On Thursday morning at 6:21am my plow guy called and said his plow trucks were both broke down so he wouldn’t be able to plow for us. What! After serving breakfast, I went out to start shoveling once again. By now the snow was over three feet deep! I attempted to get the snow blower going, but couldn’t. I just stood in the barn wondering how we would get the walks, driveway and parking cleared. I prayed for a miracle to get the snow blower started. I knew it would still be a ton of work snow blowing, but it beat shoveling. Suddenly I heard a plow truck in the driveway. I went out and a wonderful young man in the truck stopped plowing and yelled, “Hi, I’m your neighbor!” Prayer answered. Apparently my spouse saw him plowing down the road and ran down to ask him if he could help us out. He came right up and pushed as much snow as he could, but we soon realized there was just too much snow, especially after he got his plow truck stuck! At least he had cleared enough for our guests to get out. After he made a few phone calls, all of a sudden we heard a little bobcat bucket loader coming down the street. It was his younger brother. Once he freed his brother he moved a ton of snow out of the drive and walkways in no time. What a miracle these two young men were.

After they left, my son and I finished shoveling, but not before I got stuck in a snow bank. I was trying to reach the light for our sign and I fell into about 5 feet of snow. My son actually had to shovel snow from under one of my legs then pull me out! After that we decided to take a break and have something to eat. After lunch I started shoveling off the decks. We have three! The snow was about five feet deep! I finally gave up shoveling for the day, but because we had more guests coming in the next day I had to go grocery shopping. I was nearly paralyzed from shoveling, but off we went to shop. Luckily it had stopped snowing and I have a four-wheel-drive truck so we braved the roads.

On Friday the entire inn needed to be cleaned and beds made. Luckily most people weren’t going to check in until late, however, I had no idea how late. I was exhausted from two days of shoveling not to mention stiff and sore. The last guests checked in around 12:30am! I think I was finally in bed around one in the morning. Normally we have two breakfast seating’s, one at eight and one at nine. I was hoping, because of the late arrivals, everyone would pick the later breakfast time. Unfortunately, every one wanted an early breakfast so they could get on the slopes. No rest for the weary!

Saturday, after breakfast, was a day of rest. I was still stiff from shoveling all that snow, but our guests had the skiing day of a life time. Everyone was so excited when they got back at the end of the day. Luckily we were able to go to bed relatively early Saturday night, but all through the night I heard a drip from the third floor shingled roof onto the second floor tin roof, which is common and usually I love the sound. However, when the alarm went off Sunday morning I realized the drip was inside, not out! The water was pouring in to our third floor room from all the ice on the roof. There was actually over five feet of snow on all the roofs. So, after breakfast, I called our neighbor (my new best friend!) and asked him if he could come over and help me clear some of the snow. He came right over, but we couldn’t reach the third floor roof so that would have to wait. Luckily the leak stopped by Sunday night. We got up on the roof over the sun room and worked like crazy to clear all the snow. It was a start.

Monday morning I served breakfast to ten people. It was actually one of the most relaxing breakfasts we’ve had in a long time. Everything was so beautiful covered with fresh snow. As the guests were packing up to check out one came down to the kitchen and told me there was a leak in the second floor hallway. He hated to tell me because he knew how much snow clearing we had done already. In between checking people out, I went upstairs to check the leak. Yes indeed the roof was leaking! I got a bucket to catch the drip and of course I called my neighbor once again. He had to go to class that day but said he would come over Tuesday. I had to rent a 45 foot lift so he could get to the highest roofs. So, today, Tuesday, he worked for seven hours on that lift clearing the roofs of the house and barn. He even replaced some missing roof shingles on the third floor where it was leaking Saturday night!

So, even though we asked for snow, we had no idea we would be blessed with such a wonderful neighbor! Thanks Ben… you came to our rescue and saved our home and business!