Kate Middleton Visits Downton Abbey, Gets A Souvenir For George

We're sure that if you watch Downton Abbey in its country of
origin, you do not conflate its fictional 1920s setting with real-life England.
But, for the Yanks watching on this side of the pond, sometimes it's hard to
remember that the Grantham family isn't actually flitting about between
Yorkshire and London, hanging out with the royal family and such. Today, when
the Catherine, the Duchess of Cambridge herself, visited the set of the ITV
show, the lines between fiction and reality were further muddied. And, there was
much rejoicing.

We're not exactly sure why the eight-months-pregnant Kate
Middleton visited Ealing Studios, where most of Downton is shot — except, given
the chance, wouldn't you? While the cast and crew worked on season six, she got
to watch a scene being taped, visit the costume and props department at work,
and, of course, meet a bunch of the cast in costume. She was greeted by show
creator Julian Fellowes. Molesley (Kevin Doyle) welcomed her to the boot room
(prob Kate's favorite), Bates (Brendan Coyle) demonstrated the servant bells,
Mrs. Patmore (Lesley Nicol) and Daisy (Sophie McShera) showed off a cake. Exactly
as one would wish them all to do, right?

All of this is nicely documented by
Kensington Palace's social media team on Twitter (though the quality of some of
those pics leaves a bit to be desired). The best, most reality-bending moment for us is on
Instagram, where the palace posted a photo of Michelle Dockery (Lady Mary) and
her TV son George (Zac Barker)
handing Kate a toy train for her own little George. They even kind of look
alike.