Located on Farm to Market Road, just outside Bow, Rosabella's is a country-style bakery and gift shop tucked inside a red barn next to a 50-acre orchard of apples, pears, and berries. It's owned by orchardists Rose and Alan Merritt, and it's the kind of place where you can't help feeling you've stepped back in time to life at a slower pace. Have a seat. Take a load off. It's what Rose would want you to do.

In fact, the barn is new, and Rosabella's opened January 2006 in response to a flagging apple business. Faced with the need for change, Rose and Alan took six years to study farms around the country to see how they were handling business downturns. Noticing a trend toward bakeries, the Merritts settled on opening their own so Rose could "turn high quality apples into apple pie."The red barn exterior was a must for her. "I wanted to take what we have and enhance that in such a fashion that the barn looks like it's always been," she says.

While Alan continues to run the apple farm, Rose devotes herself to Rosabella's. She buys local goods as much as she can afford, and carries products with her own label, such as apple butter and bottled hard cider, both made from Merritt apples.

Throughout the blooming season, Rose offers cut flowers and bouquets. Come fall, it's harvest time. The Merritts sell apples by the pound, u-pick apples, sweet corn, and pumpkins from their pumpkin patch.