a grand day out

Yesterday I took an afternoon off from school. Was it deserved? Maybe not. I should have spent more time working on the neglected statistics studies, but I did a homework assignment that took an hour and a half, and that’s my limit. But page limits on papers are helpful at times, and since I’m running up against one for the latest Afghanistan paper, it was time for a break.

Hubby suggested a trip to Cold Spring for a little antique shopping (not that we ever get things at antique stores except old postcards). It sounded good to me, except for the fact that the highly regarding yarn shop was closed on Sundays, and it was already past noon when he floated the idea. We had to get back to cook our local pork chops for dinner, you see.

So we decided to stick a bit closer to home and visited Kykuit in Tarrytown. Built by John D. Rockefeller, and turned over to the National Historic Trust a couple of years ago, it was a fairly grand home (but nothing compared to some of the mansions in Newport). JDR was quite a devout Baptist, and they didn’t go in for the drinkin’ and the dancin’ that amused the wealthy of Newport.

Originally I hoped that we’d be able to wander through the house, and camp out in a garden or two for reading and knitting. But Kykuit has tight security, and there was no dilly-dallying allowed. We had about five minutes to view Nelson’s art collection in the basement gallery. Forward, march!

We decided to end the afternoon with the Rockefellers at another part of their estate: the Stone Barns Center for Agriculture, home of Blue Hill north. Stay tuned for those pictures tomorrow (which are much better, I think, and feature a sorrel margarita).