Hi, everyone!
I’ve been teaching LIC about winter in Rochester! A week ago Thursday, I got to show LIC one of our special places, the George Eastman Museum! I told LIC that Eastman was famous for improving photography, so that everybody could take pictures. His company also made film for movies. Eastman’s house was turned into a museum of the art, science and history of photography! I showed LIC the display of technicolor dyes used in movie film. Then we looked at some very early moving picture machines and I introduced LIC to Mr. Eastman.
Grandma chose that Thursday for our visit because it was almost the end of the Dutch Connection display. Mr. Eastman used to import spring flower bulbs from the Netherlands and grow them inside so they would bloom when it was still winter in Rochester. The displays were very pretty and the hallways smelled like spring! The helleborus were much bigger than my outside flower friends in the Poets Garden at Highland Park!
The main display of flowers in the conservatory reminded me of Keukenhof Gardens! In addition to the spring flowers, the Orchid Society shared some blooming orchids. LIC and I saw orchids growing outside at Diamond Botanical Gardens on St. Lucia, and LIC says they grow outside in Florida, too!
I helped LIC climb up the grand staircase to the halls overlooking the conservatory. There were more flowers on the windowsills and we could see all the flowers in the conservatory at once. I introduced LIC to the elephant on the conservatory wall! This year, because we had very cold weather, all of the Dutch Connection bulbs bloomed later than expected. Some of them were just coming into bloom for the very last days of the exhibit!
On our way out of the museum, LIC and I saw a sign offering bulb planting for children. A very nice lady offered to help us pot a bulb to take home, but LIC and I couldn’t decide what kind to plant!
Last Sunday, we had a big windstorm! It started in the afternoon and lasted through most of Monday! The wind gusts were very noisy! Uncle Steven’s family lost power at their house on Sunday afternoon, so they came over to Grandma and Grandpa’s before it got dark. Grandma and Grandpa have a generator, so if their power goes out, they still have lights and heat. James and Thomas took their baths and got into their warm winter pajamas before they went home. Their power was back on when they got home, but it went out again the next morning for a few more hours. School was canceled for both James and Thomas on Monday because of the wind!
On Monday, when the wind died down, it was very cold! Grandma and Grandpa decided it was a good time to defrost the big freezer! LIC and I helped Grandma take all the frozen food out of the freezer and put it in coolers. Then Grandpa took the coolers out to the garage so everything would stay frozen in the cold! When all the food was out of the freezer, Grandpa used a hair dryer to melt the ice off the freezer coils. LIC and I could hear thunks as chunks of ice fell off onto the shelves below! After that, Grandma wiped down the walls and shelves and dried everything off. Grandpa turned the freezer back on, and when it was cold again, Grandma put all the frozen food back in. Grandma said she found some food she had forgotten was even in the freezer!
Grandma finished another jigsaw puzzle on Monday after the freezer was defrosted. On Tuesday, she invited Thomas over for lunch before school so he could be first to look for all funny images in a Jan van Haasteren puzzle. He found the shark fin and the pink spotted octopus right away, but I had to help him find St. Nicholas and the saw blade! After lunch, Uncle Steven and Thomas found another box of Transformer toys to take home. On Wednesday, it snowed all day! LIC and I helped Grandma make the baby beavertails to serve at the travel dinner next week. Now that the freezer has been defrosted, there’s plenty of room to store them!
Yesterday was sunny and a little bit warmer. Some of the Wednesday snow had melted., but I finally got a chance to take LIC out to play in the snow with me! The weather people on TV said we’ll have at least one more very cold week and maybe even more snow before winter is over! Last year, Grandma had all the apple trees pruned before the end of February. This year, it will be much later!
Last night, Grandma invited Uncle Steven’s family over for dinner again so they could help her decide what to serve for the travel dinner. She made two different sauces for lobster poutine. Everybody liked the same one better, so that part of the menu is now settled! We got a big box in the mail this week and Thomas used it as an airplane! He got Grandpa to push him down the hall all the way to Uncle Steven! When Thomas comes over, he has started putting me in jail! He says I shouldn’t mind because he puts LIC in jail with me for company. I’m glad Grandma knows where to look for us and bails us out!
Love,
Lion-san
We didn’t know that the George Eastman House was now a museum. They were all pretty flowers, it would be hard to pick one out. That was nice that James and Thomas come over even if they do put you and LIC in jail! We got our freezer defrosted too. We also found food we didn’t know we had although it was in the frost free freezer which needed defrosting because Nancy-san found frost that was in it and threw down a shoot which I guess she shouldn’t have done. We hope that LiC doesn’t think it is like this all year long.
Seeing all those flowers at the Eastman museum is a great treat at this snowy time of year. So much beauty.