happy things! (art museums, historic houses, and my birthday)
Whew! Been busy lately. Today is my birthday, so hopefully I'll be able to at last stay home and do nothing! (With the exception of going out for lots of ice cream and other junk food items!)
I didn't count on any more traveling this year, but the weather was so unseasonably warm that I decided to go to Milwaukee on Friday, and I went to all the museums and had myself a history-and-art filled fun time. The Pabst Mansion was my favorite, of course, since overly exhuberent and cheerfully overstuffed high Victorian architecture and interiors are my favorite things ever! The Ladies' Parlor was my absolute favorite room, all pink and gilded and flowery Rococo revival, I think I nearly keeled over of happiness when I walked in! That is exactly the sort of room I want! The tour guide was really good, and it was neat to hear about all the little tidbits of Victorian life that you don't get in most history books. The reason some of the chairs in the same set have different heights on their arms? High armed chairs for the gentleman, and low armed chairs for the ladies, so that they could drape the skirts of their huge dresses over the arms rather than having to try to squish them in between. Makes perfect sense now! Only one of the rooms on the second floor is fully restored, so I hope to go back again someday when they get the others done!
Villa Terrace Museum, buildt in the 1920's in the style of an Italian Villa, was also beautiful, it's best feature in my opinion being the enclosed center courtyard garden, because you can look around, and there's nothing you can see to tell you that you're not in Renaissance Italy. So pretty! Would be great for taking pictures in Italian Ren costumes too!
Eek, no more time to type now! (Plus my arm still hurts from that tetanus shot I had to get after scraping my knee on a rusty metal kitchen cabinet.) Will have to go on about the rest of the awesome houses and art I saw later!
I didn't count on any more traveling this year, but the weather was so unseasonably warm that I decided to go to Milwaukee on Friday, and I went to all the museums and had myself a history-and-art filled fun time. The Pabst Mansion was my favorite, of course, since overly exhuberent and cheerfully overstuffed high Victorian architecture and interiors are my favorite things ever! The Ladies' Parlor was my absolute favorite room, all pink and gilded and flowery Rococo revival, I think I nearly keeled over of happiness when I walked in! That is exactly the sort of room I want! The tour guide was really good, and it was neat to hear about all the little tidbits of Victorian life that you don't get in most history books. The reason some of the chairs in the same set have different heights on their arms? High armed chairs for the gentleman, and low armed chairs for the ladies, so that they could drape the skirts of their huge dresses over the arms rather than having to try to squish them in between. Makes perfect sense now! Only one of the rooms on the second floor is fully restored, so I hope to go back again someday when they get the others done!
Villa Terrace Museum, buildt in the 1920's in the style of an Italian Villa, was also beautiful, it's best feature in my opinion being the enclosed center courtyard garden, because you can look around, and there's nothing you can see to tell you that you're not in Renaissance Italy. So pretty! Would be great for taking pictures in Italian Ren costumes too!
Eek, no more time to type now! (Plus my arm still hurts from that tetanus shot I had to get after scraping my knee on a rusty metal kitchen cabinet.) Will have to go on about the rest of the awesome houses and art I saw later!