New Website, New Blog

We have finally launched our new website along with a new blog.  Please come visit our new website and our new blog page.  Thanks for visiting.

Love,
Susan

New Year's Day Musings from Americus Garden Inn

As I say “hello” to 2018, my heart overflows with the love and friendship we have enjoyed over the last few weeks.  Although it has been the busiest December in all our 15 years of innkeeping, it has been the most enjoyable.

We are often asked, what is there to do in Americus?  I truly believe that the magic of Americus is in the “being” in the moment versus the “doing”.  Allow me to elaborate by sharing some of our own experiences with our wonderful guests.

Three very special ladies, Amanda, Keyshonda, and Joanna, all celebrate December birthdays.  They chose to stay with us at the Americus Garden Inn for their girlfriends' getaway, even though they were attending a concert in Albany, about an hour away.  What a joy it was to see them celebrate their friendship, sisterhood, and life, away from the cares of their families and children.  You could see how much they love each other and really enjoy being together.

Mike and Lynn have stayed with us before and decided to stay a little longer for this visit.  Lynn homeschools their children, and they were enjoying some much-needed adult time while their kids were away at Christmas camp.

This is the second Christmas we had the pleasure of Ron and Nanc’s company for a 3-day visit.  Nanc has been working on a WWII book about her Uncle Tim.  The day she was born, was the day her family received notice that her uncle’s plane had been shot down.  She is honoring him by learning everything possible about him and those around him from that time.  She actually found the location of the downed plane, in Greece, and recently arranged for a service at sea honoring all those lost.  Coming to our home was an emotional respite for her.

Larry and Ellen stayed with us for their ninth visit.  At this point, they truly are like family.  They have an RV in Florida and their permanent residence is in North Carolina.  We get to see them on their way to and from North Carolina.   They recently moved into a retirement community with lots of activities and great food.  We’re learning about possible options for when we start thinking about the next chapter of our own lives.

Susanne and Ingo came all the way from Germany to our area to visit Richland Rum to add the artisan rum to their rum collection.  They were absolutely delightful guests.  The conversations we have with our international guests are always enlightening.  Wish they could have stayed longer than one night, but, they were on their way to visit friends in Ocala. Florida.

Joan and Larry live quite a distance away from each other.  Americus was a midway point, a perfect meeting spot for a 3-day romantic getaway.   It was Larry’s first B&B and I believe that it will not be his last.  Although he usually would choose the Waffle House for breakfast, he was pleasantly surprised that he enjoyed what I prepared for them.   Larry likes raisin bread, Joan likes tea.  So, for their last morning, I decided to make them a special bread incorporating both – English tea bread, made with English breakfast tea and raisins.  I really do try to make people happy.

What do all these guests have in common?  They came to our home to just “be” here.  To spend time here.  To allow us to open our home and our hearts.  I feel blessed.

Happy New Year.

Love,

Susan

Life in Americus

You may or may not know this.  This month marks our 15^th Anniversary as the innkeepers and owners of the Americus Garden Inn Bed and Breakfast.  It’s hard to believe that 15 years have gone by.

So many people ask us how we decided to become innkeepers and, more pointedly, how did we end up in Americus, Georgia.  As the Christmas season is the season of nostalgia, I decided to share some of our first impressions of Americus.

We were living in Tampa, Florida.  It seemed everyone had a Lexus and a cell phone.  We had neither.  People seemed to always be in a hurry, moving quickly from place to place with a total lack of courtesy or consideration for those around them.  There was a bar on every corner,  everyone was in a hurry, and people shouted or yelled at each other with hurtful tones.

We had been exploring areas around the country looking for the perfect Bed and Breakfast to purchase and had told each other repeatedly “don’t fall in love with a house”.  There are so many notions about the romance of innkeeping.  We knew we were reinventing ourselves and wanted to keep our heads in the rational world.  Our search took us to Colorado and Utah, New York. and Vermont.  We thought we wanted to be in a ski area in the mountains.  That was romantic thinking, on our part, coming from Florida…  Things just didn’t work out the way we thought they should.

Then, we made our first trip to Americus.  It was Halloween weekend.  The first thing we noticed was that there was a church on every corner, as opposed to a bar.  People smiled and waved with all five fingers.  In the grocery store, a person would just say “Hi.  How y’all doin’?” and actually wait for an answer.  It was like the old favorite television show “Cheers”, everyone wanted to know our names, and everyone seemed genuinely glad to meet us.

The folks who owned the inn at the time were open, friendly, kind. and honest.  And, although their vision of Bed and Breakfast was different from ours, they had done the major renovations and started the business.  We did fall in love -  with Americus, with the people, and with the house.  Time felt different here.  It seemed magical.  We decided to make Americus our home.

Fast forward to the present time, we still feel the magic.  We still do not have a smart phone (so please do not text us) or a Lexus.  We believe in the importance of genuine interpersonal interaction.  We consider each of our guests a gift, an opportunity to make a difference in someone’s life for the better.   And, they, in turn, have truly enriched our lives.

Merry Christmas!

Love,

Susan and Kim

September Garden Highlights from Americus Garden Inn

Here are some of my favorite photos from our garden this month:

A lady butterfly in the butterfly bush

An anole in the purple queen

The very fragrant bloom of the banana shrub

A green/bronze frog beside our pond

Our resident bullfrog underneath the waterfall of the pond

The canna lilies in bloom

Black Tiger Swallowtail

The state butterfly of Georgia - yellow tiger swallowtail butterfly (female)

Yellow tiger swallowtail butterfly - male

Common whitetail dragonfly - female

Common whitetail dragonfly - male

The young fox that has been visiting our garden.

A perfect gardenia blooming beside the porch

A goldfinch in the echinacea

A crab spider in the echinacea

A gray hairstreak butterfly in the echinacea

Whirling butterfly bush - gaura

A gulf fritillary in the lantana

A hackberry emperor butterfly on the red tip tree

The fragrant flowers of the creeping jasmine

One of my favorites - lespedeza

In the lantana, a longtailed skipper

Another fragrant bloom - magnolia

Mexican petunias

A praying mantis saying hello

A mockingbird almost ate this praying mantis for lunch.

The flowers of the purple queen.

A beautiful red spotted purple butterfly.

A six spotted fishing spider in our pond.

A sulphur butterfly resting in the garden

Thanks for visiting the Americus Garden Inn Bed & Breakfast online.  We hope you'll come stay with us for a few days and let us share our garden with you in person.

Love,

Susan

An August Afternoon Butterfly Tour in Americus

Allow me to transport you to my garden for a quick butterfly tour.  If you were here, these are the things I would be sharing with you.  Please understand that our garden is private and exclusive for registered guests only.

(If you want to see larger photos, just click on them.)

In the butterfly bush, there are lots of silver spotted skippers, like this one.

Silver Spotted Skipper at Americus Garden Inn

Another brown butterfly, a duskywing has just appeared.  Check out the beautiful design on those wings.

Duskywing at Americus Garden Inn

No, that is not a bee or a butterfly.  It is a bee mimic, a hummingbird moth, also known as a clearwing hummingbird moth.

Clearwing hummingbird moth at Americus Garden Inn

It looks like a couple of skippers have found each other.  Notice the slight color variation - one is male and one is female.  Love is in the air.

Skippers at Americus Garden Inn

Look at those huge eye spots on the wings of the buckeye butterfly.  They are so incredibly vibrant.

Buckeye butterfly at Americus Garden Inn

A gulf fritillary butterfly on the purple queen.  Wow!  The orange really stands out against the purple.

Gulf Fritillary at Americus Garden Inn

Another buckeye with its wings totally open.  Absolutely gorgeous!  I love this photo.  It is exactly as I saw it.

Buckeye Butterfly at Americus Garden Inn

Another gulf fritillary.  There were so many of them.  They do not look real, they are so incredibly colorful.

Gulf fritillary butterfly at Americus Garden Inn

This sleepy orange butterfly was not very cooperative, so, this is the best photo I could get.

Sleepy Orange at Americus Garden Inn

A duskywing on the salvia.  So easy to miss these brown beauties.

Duskywing at Americus Garden Inn

Do you hear that?  It's a cicada on the bald cypress tree.

Cicada at Americus Garden Inn

A little brown skipper hanging upside down on the lespedeza.  I love the word - lespedeza.

Brown skipper at Americus Garden Inn

Did you notice that small bluish white butterfly?  It is an azure butterfly.  It just landed on the lespedeza and it appears to be depositing eggs.

Azure butterfly at Americus Garden Inn

Can you see it?  Take a closer look.

lynx spider at Americus Garden Inn

Let's take a closer look at the green lynx spider hiding in the  black-eyed susans waiting to jump out an catch a meal.

green lynx spider at Americus Garden Inn

A longtailed skipper just landed in the butterfly bush.

Longtailed skipper at Americus Garden Inn

Another buckeye makes an appearance. 

buckeye butterfly at Americus Garden Inn

A dragonfly has decided to join us on the tour and is posing for photos.

dragonfly at Americus Garden Inn

The silver spotted skippers are almost always hanging upside down, like this one in the abelia.

silver spotted skipper at Americus Garden Inn

Another hummingbird moth is in the abelia.

clearwing hummingbird moth at Americus Garden Inn

A red spotted purple landed on the river rock of the pond.  I placed my hand next to it and it climbed onto my hand.

red spotted purple at Americus Garden Inn

Imagine your hand next to mine, sharing this magic moment.

red spotted purple butterfly at Americus Garden Inn

Thank you so much for allowing me to share my garden, at the Americus Garden Inn Bed & Breakfast, with you.   Come stay with us for a couple of days.  It would be my pleasure to share this with you in person.

Love,

Susan