Cabin Vibes | A Weekend in Vermont

Just prior to Michael leaving for his deployment, we snuck in one last weekend getaway. Thanks to Airbnb, I found the coziest little cabin in the middle of nowhere Vermont, complete with no cellphone service, a family of bears and train set for Graham. Seemed just about perfect.

Our first adventure (mishap?) of the weekend occurred when we arrived at the hole-in-the-wall pizza place I had picked out as our stop on the way to cabin. One tiny detail had been left out of the glowing online reviews; the establishment was closed during winter months. Not an issue…I had backup options. The real issue was the fact that as we re-calculated the GPS, it was then that we realized we had officially entered the no cell phone service area. Picking a general direction to head in, our only option was to drive until we reached coverage. Thankfully we picked the correct direction and twenty minutes later found a larger establishment of civilization, as well as pizza.

Our bellies satisfied, we finished the drive through Vermont’s curving mountains (in the dark), arriving to the cabin freshly covered in snow. A moment of panic ensued when we struggled with the lockbox, but with a hearty ‘click’ we gained access and started settling into our home for the weekend.

Michael soon had one woodstove roaring briskly, and heat pumped through the cabin. Graham and I stocked the cupboards while Michael worked on the second stove in the bedroom. Twenty minutes later, when we heard the sound of the fire alarm going off, we went to investigate. We opened the door to see (through a dark gray haze) Michael on the bed, attempting the silence the alarm, while puffs of smoke billowed out the stove. As it turned out, that stove worked in the opposite way as the other one. We gave up on the stove till the morning.

In spite of (or rather because of) the little mishaps of the weekend that kept us laughing (and me only slightly panicking), we soaked up our weekend away. Little things…hearing Graham’s giggle as we sledded, an uninterrupted hot shower, finding a local coffee shop, the sound of crackling fires throughout the day, time to just sit and play together as a family…were so simply, good and life-giving. We didn’t accomplish anything noteworthy that weekend, except one thing, tending to our little family.