a poem for sunday, getting ready for kittens, and pics from ellis island

the wind and the leaves

(traditional)

come, little leaves, said the wind one day,

come over the meadows with me and play.

put on your dresses of red and gold,

for summer is gone and the days grow cold.

soon as the leaves heard the wind's loud call

down they came fluttering, one and all.

over the fields they danced and flew,

singing the soft little songs they knew.

 

dancing and whirling the little leaves went,

winter had called them, and they were content

soon fast asleep on their earthly beds,

the snow laid a coverlet on their heads.

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tomorrow morgan and i will pick up our kittens that we adopted from meow parlour. surprise! yes, we decided to adopt cricket and fern . . they are both very friendly and my hope is that they will be welcoming to any foster kittens or cats that we bring home. (the team at meow parlour thinks that they will be terrific foster mentors.) so, today i decided to not visit ellis island with greg, morgan and lisa-lou as i was still very achy from the terrible cold i've had, and also because i wanted to prepare the apartment for the newcomers. i cleared the nature table from the piano . . 

and moved it to a cubby hole on the book shelf . . 

cleared off most of the figures, stones and shells from the windowsills and replaced two bins by the dining room window so they can nap together in the sunshine. 

more photos tomorrow!

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but first here are some ellis island photos from today's adventurers:

 

heading out . .  (all photos by lisa-lou unless indicated)

immigrants disembarking on ellis island? no, simply tourists . . 

in the great hall . .

(photo by greg)

 

(italian immigrant family departing from central railroad station, milan, 1889)

(i'm not sure what this photo is of, but i thought it was interesting to see the layout of the exhibit.)

 

greg in the hall of records looking up my grandparents . . (photo by morgan)

i think he found entries for the four of them . . i have to check in the morning the names of the ships and the exact dates they arrived. they came over between 1895 and 1921. my mom's parents sailed from bremen and hamburg, and my father's parents sailed from palermo . . both couples came separately and met in nyc. (photo by morgan.)

 

looking for my grandparents' names on the outdoor wall panels (my parents paid to have the names inscribed in the early 90's when the idea for the panels was first introduced - i have a warm memory of all of us together standing in front of them when they were first installed . . so long ago before the children were born . . it's too shocking and funny that we haven't been until now . . and now i need to get chanda and korrina out next).
 

found: giorgio from catania, sicilia.

it was a beautiful day for the trip . . 

heading back to manhattan . . (photo by morgan)

bellissima!

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and in the evening . . 

morgan carved a pumpkin . . 

and lisa-lou helped me bake the pie . . (of course morgan pinched a beautiful crust for it).

 

we also played another round of may-i and this time lisa-lou went out at the end. so, morgana still leads with greg second, lisa-lou third and me . . last (oh well).