Windsor Wonderland this Saturday!


Is it really the last day of November? Before we know it, 2011 will be knocking on our doors! This next month is going to be chock-a-block with festivities and celebrations. Our little New England town is celebrating the season this Saturday December 4th from 1-5PM with Windsor Wonderland. The highly anticipated visit from Santa on the fire engine will start at 2PM, followed by carolers from one of the local congregations and the tree lighting on the corner of State and Main streets at 3:45PM. There will also be crafts at the Nuance Gallery as well as a Wreath Sell and a Student Art Show going from 1-5PM to benefit project graduation. Sounds like the perfect community celebration. Does the town you live in have some sort of celebration? What do you do?


Weekend snow

Lights and snow on the Snapdragon fence

Local Christmas tree Farm

Paradise Park: Perfect walk for a wintry day

What did you get up to this weekend? Did you pick out a tree? We have some wonderful places nearby where you can scout for your perfect tree, cut it down, and take it home. This place seems to have a big selection but there are also places here and there as you drive the back roads. Makes for a fabulous activity. While our friends were doing just that on Saturday afternoon across the river in Cornish, we had quite a little snow burst and within 10 minutes the earth was covered in a blanket of white which made the tree hunting that much more exciting. I think the first snow brings a bit of a thrill to everyone, young and old. It really got the holiday season off to a fun start. Of course, it is all gone now, and there is no forecast for anymore this week but it whet the appetite for future sledding, snow shoeing, and skiing!

Tis’ the season to decorate

How was your Thanksgiving? Ours was wonderful and full of good food, good friends, and some good football watching. Big Red put the last touches on the holiday decorations, completing K80′s decorating plan right on time. Are you getting out your Christmas gear? Here are a few more pictures of the Inn filling with holiday cheer. Looks like we have a bit of snow forecasted for the weekend and it feels like now snow is appropriate and even necessary to ensure a white Christmas. Enjoy this weekend and the beginning of this wonderful time of the year.

We are thankful…


Today we’d like to give thanks to our family, dear friends, loyal followers, and wonderful guests. If you ask any of us, this year has been a total blur (especially June thru October) but we have been humbled by the friends who spent humid summer days & nights working inside and out to help us make opening and those memories are not a blur. You all know who you are and we are very thankful for your remarkable support. We are also thankful for the fantastic guests that we have welcomed into the Inn since opening in September and the way their presence has filled this beautiful home once again. We feel the virtual support of our online followers and appreciate your excitement as well as the amazing community support. Finally, we are thankful for our Innkeepers, Big Red & Chaz who attend to and nurture this beautiful space everyday. It is no small task, as we have learned, and are grateful for their efforts.

Enjoy this wonderful holiday!
The Snapdragons

a very colorful experience


No doubt this has been buzzing the web for months now but we spotted it on the always inspiring, Dwell last week and sorta kinda think it’s amazing! It’s the Pantone Hotel in Brussels, Belgium. Designed by Belgian interior designer Michel Penneman and architect Olivier Hannaert and it is a color feast.

In case you aren’t familiar with Pantone, it is an innovative system for matching and communicating accurate colors across industries and countries for graphic arts, fashion, interiors, paints, plastics, anything with color. It is most recognizable as one their fan decks but they also have an incredible assortment of extremely useful products if you work with or are passionate about color (here here on both accounts!)
That’s why it is thrilling to see a Pantone fan deck visualized into this hotel in Belgium. We love how they used a white palette and popped the colors in each room in the details because that is a technique we used in the Inn just not as funky. Each of the hotel’s seven floors are dedicated to a different color palette: 2718 c (blue); 7487 c (green); 7441 c (violet); 106 c (yellow); 1795 c (red); 4705 c (brown); and 1375 c (orange). They also have a lounge, a store with innovative color products, and even color consultants on hand the likes of which have influenced color choices in some of the biggest companies in the world (Tiffany, Nike, Barbie…) They say it best on their site,

The PANTONE HOTEL combines the strong emotions evoked by color with exceptional, vivid design and unyielding comfort. Guests enjoy state-of-the-art accommodations, distinctively chosen at reception to compliment their mood. Luxurious beds, inviting pillows, LCD TVs, and central A/C with individual controls are standard at The PANTONE HOTELTM; many rooms are illuminated with unparalleled views of Brussels.

Brussels showcases the color of emotion with a distinctive hue on each colorous guest floor. From vivid to subdued, for business or leisure, our unique boutique hotel perfectly suits your savvy palette and colorful imagination.

From a design perspective, The PANTONE HOTELTM, Brussels is built on an exceptional use of contrast; a white canvas provides clean space for saturated colors to pop. Guest rooms feature unique photography by esteemed Belgian photographer Victor Levy.

Welcome to the center of the color universe.


This hotel combines to passions, color and well designed interiors. It is so so so cool. Usually when we travel it is hostels and guesthouses but next time we are anywhere near Brussels, this has rocketed to the top of our must stay list. What color room would you stay in?