nana and nonno visit sturbridge

on morgana's last day (august 30th), nana and nonno came to sturbridge to see her. we wheeled them over all the dirt roads! chanda was a big help.

 smelling the pickles which had been fermenting for awhile!

today they were making a special summer soup. it had cucumbers, peas, herbs from the garden, and leftover lentil soup from the day before.

oh my!! did it ever smell good! morgana says that many of her co-workers have tried recreating the recipes at home, but nothing compares to the wood fire and the cast iron pots.

posing for nana.

included throughout the buildings are authentic china, glassware and furniture. the freeman farm even has a few old letters written by a friend of the freemans sitting out on a desk in the living room. in the letter the writer describes a journey he made by stagecoach from boston to a town west of boston.

onions that morgana picked from the garden and braided together.

even the chickens smelled the delicious summer soup and came calling for tidbits! chanda scattered some leftover pudding crumbs for them.

these are the shoes they're talking about in the above film. i guess they were sometimes used to go to the barn on a muddy day so as not to get the women's skirts or shoes dirty.

nana and i enjoyed watching the chickens at the door. they were very entertaining!

all of us also enjoyed talking with victoria, morgana's favorite staff person. she's very knowledgeable and loves her job.


victoria always has her handwork with her.

a delicious blueberry pie! actually, morgana called it whortleberry pie, which she says is another name for blueberry in 1838. whortleberry. now that's a fun word to say.

 

 

the delicious and special summer soup.

off to lunch. the interns and volunteers and staff have an office above the tavern with comfy chairs, a table, stove, refrigerator and microwave. very 21st century!

we had lunch in the tavern below. the food isn't too bad. we had chicken pot pie, macaroni and cheese (my sister's favorite), baked chicken and new england clam chowder.

afterwards, we went to visit the potter.

one could watch them spin pots and vases on the wheel for seemingly hours.

chanda liked to feed the pigs crab apples that she found on the ground in the meadow.
 

viewing this movie now, i find it very amusing how nervous i was about chanda falling into the pigpen or getting bitten by the pig! you can tell i know nothing about pigs!

morgana said she found it cute how they would bump into their wooden hut and ramble along the fence post. i don't think they can see very well! they do have such little piggy eyes!

the volunteers and staff people are very friendly and get to know the friends and family of the interns. they offer special rides on the coach and the river boat! here, we even managed to get nana and nonno up the narrow and steep stagecoach steps for a ride around the green.

george the coachman with his horses. mike the belgian is on the left, and pat the percheron is on the right. i would see george pass by on the stagecoach while i sat knitting on a bench by the green . . every day! one day he gave morgana a ride up on the coachman's seat.

sometimes the workers sit down at the dining room table all together for a meal, and it's placed on the itinerary of the day for visitors to observe. but today they ate individually in the kitchen.

this was a lamb stew from wednesday's dinner. yes, the lamb was from the farm! and the potatoes and herbs were from the garden.

i believe this was corn pudding, boiled in the pot in a cloth with the stew.

sometimes morgana is allowed to milk the cow. she loves this!

morgana says the cow is very sweet (her name is daisy), but always manages to swipe morgana a few times in the face with her tail.

i don't think i'd mind having a cow of my own . . 

this was morgana's last day of the summer at sturbridge. she keeps bugging me for a few days work in the autumn and winter. this is not easily done. it's three hours to my sister's home, and then another hour to sturbridge. and that's not considering nutcracker rehearsals every weekend (auditions will be held september 22nd and 23rd).