This year, we’ve put together Our Favorite Things – a short list of places near the Inn on Mill Creek B&B where you can find the stuff that brings joy. Thinking of a small town often evokes the image of a family-run country or general store. Well, it’s not just an image in our neck of the woods – we have three small towns nearby, each with their own store:
| [photo credit: BM Tailgate Market Facebook Page] |
Many people who visit the mountains of North Carolina have “go to a farmers’ market” on their list of things to do. And for good reason: an abundance of small, family-owned farms are in the mountains, many of them organic, and many of them make their items available for sale at local tailgate markets. Seriously, what’s better than farm fresh strawberries, tomatoes and other fruits and veggies, beautiful cut flowers, and delicious local honey?
| Inn on Mill Creek mugs from Deneen Pottery |
| Abby style mug |
The stoneware mugs were each handcrafted from scratch by Deneen Pottery right here in the USA, and feature original custom-made artwork depicting the Inn on Mill Creek. Each piece is created by hand, lead free, and durable enough to be oven, microwave, and dishwasher safe. And did we mention, they are beautiful.
The 36th annual Sourwood Festival is right around the corner! This fun street festival, presented by the Black Mountain-Swannanoa Chamber of Commerce, is the quintessential awesome small town event, featuring hundreds of arts and crafts vendors, food that ranges from vegetarian to BBQ, as well as ice cream and festival fare, kids’ activities and rides, live music, and the part we like best — honey and bee demonstrations.
The Arrowhead Artists & Artisans League (A3L) is a group of local artists who are dedicated to promoting the arts in Old Fort, NC. If you like art, you’ll appreciate their efforts to preserve the art culture of the mountains in our fabulous little town. This year, A3L opened an art gallery and studio space — Arrowhead Gallery & Studios — on Catawba Avenue in Old Fort, complete with a gorgeous painted quilt block.
Can we talk chocolate for a moment, because not only is Asheville known as Foodtopia, but it’s also Chocolatopia as far as we’re concerned. Early this month, we perused three chocolatier shops in Asheville: French Broad Chocolate Lounge, Chocolate Gems and Chocolate Fetish. Nom nom nom.
We can’t wait for August, when Black Mountain’s Sourwood Festival is back in town! If you’ve ever been to a small town local festival and found that kind of irresistible small town charm that puts a smile on your face, then you’ll know why we love this one. The Sourwood Festival, now in its 34th year, pays tribute to the local area in the form of hundreds of arts and crafts booths, awesome food, entertainment, and a singing contest, plus honey and bee demonstrations. And it’s FREE. The festival is named after the sourwood tree and the fabulous honey produced from it {thank you honeybees!} which we use quite often at the Inn.
The weekend of December 3-4, 2010, will be a special one for residents and visitors to Black Mountain, the closest town to the Inn on Mill Creek (approximately 10 minutes west).
From time to time, we check statistics from our website to see where you all find us and which pages you like to visit. Would you like to know whose page is in the top 3 of our most popular pages?
