August, 2004 - Nr. 8
Toronto Connection
Dear Echo Germanica readers,
I hope you’re all keeping as happily busy as I am!
I just came back from our friends’ organic farm in Kincardine, Ontario, where I was not only visiting but apprenticing as well. I learnt in just ten days what their other apprentices learn over three months! I found my daily activities and chores very enjoyable and revitalizing. My ten days were filled with cooking and baking and learning about herbs and how to make fresh tea from them and making "Quark" (a light form of cream cheese made from their own cows’ milk), making jam, and learning many other household things one does on a well-run family farm!
Hanging laundry out on the line was one of the most fun and
![100 loaves [photo: Rachel A.I. Seilern]](408c-Rachel-100-loaves.jpg)
helping
with baking 100 loaves of super-healthy spelt-rye bread in a huge oven at
5:00 in the morning was the most memorable!! It’s good to be home, but I
miss the family, their cute children and spending the night in their
homemade school bus mobile home!!
Also this summer I worked at a summer theatre camp for children. I taught stage make-up to groups of as many as 22 children at a time, all from the ages of four to thirteen! After my initial exasperation in the beehive-like atmosphere, I started to really marvel over the children’s creative energy. And I really miss it now that camp is over!
But I don’t have much time to be sad --- my family is off on another of our adventures. No summer would be complete without our yearly trip to the Carter Family Fold Festival in rural Hiltons, Virginia. We’ve also been invited to play our family’s country/folk music on the local radio station! The special atmosphere and those warm people have such an impact on me.
As if I don’t have enough happening, my immediate family will be off to Austria again at the end of the summer. So, I will be back with more to say, as soon as I can!
Happy Summer!
Yours,
Rachel J
P.S.: Oh, and I was asked to pass on to you that my whole family says, "Hi!!"
Comments to: rachel@echoworld.com
