hilltop

Today we went to Hilltop, which is Beatrix Potter's home.  It's really interesting because she left it to the National Trust in her will (so either she was already famous and pretty confident that people would want to see her house or she was just really full of herself and figured she'd be famous someday. Not sure which). This means that even the furniture is exactly how it would have been when she lived there. In each room was a little version of one of her stories, and it was opened to a specific page. On the page there would always be something she'd drawn from life -- a cabinet in the corner or a mouse hole under the door or something like that.  It turns out she found a lot of inspiration for her illustrations in her daily life. And then we wandered through her garden and happened to see a bunny, which was obviously Peter Rabbit taking a break from Mr. MacGregor's garden to hang out in Beatrix's. So cool. I had to buy a cute little Peter Rabbit book just because I love those stories (I'm pretty sure that my first real book report was Jemima Puddle Duck. Is that right, Mom? You might remember). And in little towns like the one Beatrix lived in, they still whitewash the houses just like they would have done when she was there. So quaint. Don't be surprised if I'm checking real estate listings there for the next 50 years and drooling over a little house with a garden and lots of bunnies hiding in my vegetables (because let's face it, I don't really like them anyway. Bon apetite, bunnies).