Norman Rockwell

We loved Vermont so much yesterday that we decided to go back today! The highlight of our day was a Norman Rockwell exhibit.... in Arlington, VT which is where the Rockwells lived for 14 years. Many of the people that he painted were from this small town. Amazingly we actually met 3 of the "models"... those who posed for his paintings. It was so COOL! One of them was an 8 year old girl at the time and now she is in her late 60's. I'll fill in more details about this when we get home but it was soooo incredibly neat. I've always enjoyed his pictures but I have a new appreciation for them now. This was not the formal "museum" but rather just the small town's "gallery" of his paintings. The museum is actually in a different town. Two of the models happened to be volunteering today. The 3rd model we met down the road at a restaurant. wow.

Vermont is very pretty... looks just like the calendar pictures. The leaves have 25-50% turned in color now. Next week I'm sure they will even look better. We spent the rest of the day shopping at the Vermont Country Store which is a huge store in a very tiny "berg" of a town. They send out a catalog that my mom has gotten for years. We went to a Cheese House and also the Chocolate Barn which had over 800 antique molds for chocolate. They hand dip 100's of pounds of chocolate each day and over 35,000 pounds of fudge each year. This was also just a small shop along the side of the road... not even in a town.

We've been taking the back roads, the scenic routes, and today I felt a little car sick winding through the mountains. We're having a great time though.

I've heard that Madison's team won their first tournament game tonight for their CYS team, 2-1. Boy it sure is possible to have two feelings at once... glad to be here and sad to be gone from home.

More adventures to report later...

Love, Leah