Pioneer Days

Right after we originally did week 5 (I reviewed it before I made the last post), we went on a field trip to a local Pioneer Days village. It was a very rainy day, but we had such a good time!

The village is actually made up of houses that were built in our area and were all moved to this site. I can't remember the exact dates, but some of the houses were from the 1700s and others were in use up until the 1960s. Here is one of the older houses. One of the most fascinating things was that they knew the history of the homes and even had many of the families' belongings which made it seem more real to the girls.

One of our first stops was at the smoke house. The girls were a little grossed out by the idea of killing the animals and rendering fat, but they loved eating those cracklins! I think that was Sadey's favorite part of the day!

The blacksmith told us all about making horseshoes and even made me a plant hook for the front porch. I love it!

There were a few arts and crafts stations. Here the girls are learning about making quilts and even got to make their own squares. At another station they got to make and decorate marbles and were excited to learn how easy it is if you have some clay and lots of time to let them dry in the sun.

Here's the family outside the general store - waiting for the rain to slow down a little bit.



During a particularly bad part of the storm, we were stranded in a house with a wonderful older couple who were all about re-enacting the pioneer lifestyle. They gave us warm biscuits and homemade jam, and then taught the girls some games that pioneer children might have played. Here she is showing Delaney how much fun you can have with a button and some string.


Thankfully it didn't rain the whole day! Delaney had fun making us some butter.


We had so much fun talking to this woman about the baskets she was weaving from pine needles. Pine trees grow like crazy around here - we have more needles in our yard then grass! She told us how she collects, washes and prepares the needles and then makes the baskets with just the needles and some string. Someday it would be nice to take a class from her and learn the technique - but it doesn't SOUND like it would be too hard once you get the hang of it.