Little House on the Prairie

A long time ago I promised I would do the story on how we visited the Little House in Kansas on our way down from Iowa to Texas, and now the time has finally come. This is not the actual house the Ingalls lived in, but someone has replicated the cabin on the same site where they believed the original house would have stood.

Joseph checking out the fireplace.

I had sewn Jessica this pioneer dress last year, and had no idea then that it would be put to good use like this! Laura would have been very much her age when she lived here, so it was easy to imagine what she might have looked like.


This is the well Pa and Mr Edwards dug. I think it must have changed a little since then, but at least you can say you've seen it.

On our way to the creek.

Prairie. I think there is not nearly as much prairie as was in Laura's time, because I did not see what she wrote about, endless prairies with no trees in sight. There were always trees in sight, no matter which way I looked.

Picking the wildflowers.

As we got to the creek, it was easy to see where Pa could have gotten his rocks from to build the chimney.

I think this creek would have been wider back in the day. There was a lake upstream, and the creek now was hardly deep enough for a girl to drown in, like it says in the story.

We visited the site in April of this year, and it was simply the best time of year to do so. We were the only ones there, and the weather was great. It is a place worth seeing, especially if you have little girls that love Laura!

Field Trip to the Museum

The homeschoolers made a field trip to a Pioneer Museum. We all had a grand time.

Many of the girls decided to dress up Pioneer style, so I decided to join in on the fun. I never had the chance to dress up Pioneer style when I was little, but I still have a little girl in me, and my daughter loves it when I play dress up with her!

Last week after learning that we were making a field trip and other children where dressing up for it, I scrambled to get a pioneer dress made for Jessica. It was well worth the effort. She likes Laura Ingalls so much, and now she will be able to play Laura when she wants to!

Patiently waiting for the train.

I am sure the kitchens all look very similar in museums, but I never get tired of looking at them and imagining what it would be like to be working in them.

What I found of special interest was this cradle made out of a barrel.

I thought these two looked so cute and alike in their blue dresses and braids.

This is Grandma's glasses, this is Grandma's hat.... :)

"I gotta see what's in here!"

Giggly little girls.

After the museum trip we went to the park in town and had our lunch there and the children had a chance to play.
It's great to be a homeschooler!

Back in time to -- the Civil War Days

My hubby loves American history. He could tell a person a thing or two when it comes to the Civil War. When I found out that there was a battle re-enactment in Lamoni Iowa on Labor Day weekend, I told him about it and sure enough, he wanted to go see it. We went and were impressed. For a re-enactment it was very good.

I assume most of you know what the Civil War was about. If you don't, well, I won't bother to explain it right now.

The blue, versus the gray-

-and the red, hehe.

Let's get em, boys!

Bloody murder. Except in this case there wasn't any real blood. Or real murder, for that matter.

Dem Yankees. Always so uniformed.

Mmmmmm... As for me, I'm glad the North won, and that's all I have to say about it.

Camps. Very authentic.

A cute old-fashioned family. Some of the soldiers hadn't showered for 4 days! Whew. I guess they really took this re-enactment thing to heart.

Aw, lookie here. My little wanna-be-soldier gets to hold the General's pistol. It couldn't get better for a 4 year old than that, can it now? He didn't even know whether to smile or to look mean...

This is Rain Woman, from the Blackfoot tribe. Jessica has waited so long to see a real Indian, and finally had the chance! She felt mighty special to be so close to one.
Ah, the lovely ladies from the civil war era. Too bad my little girl has her eyes closed in this one.

Don't feel too bad for the one-armed soldier. Later on I saw that his arm had grown back. If only it had worked that way in real war.

To hear these canons fire sounded real good! Movies can't make it feel that real. In fact, we both decided this was much better than a movie. We got to see the big picture of what happened all around the fight at the same time, instead of focusing only on a small area.

Maybe some day we can join in on the fun as re-enactors! Yeah, I think we would enjoy that!