Learning from Rembrandt

I am tutoring Miss A’s class, and this week we discussed Rembrandt and portrait drawing. With four and five-year-olds, I was intimidated by the thought of having them attempt a portrait, but they all did really well. The goal was to teach them about facial proportions and attending to the detail of facial features. Here is Miss A’s result from the class — a far cry from Rembrandt, but I think she learned a lot.

A Quick trip to Ouray

The kids have been working on presentations about ancient inventions for their co-op history class. I think this is a great opportunity for them to practice research and writing a speech. For their topics, K chose glass blowing, and AJ chose water clocks. There are no local glass-blowing facilities, so we drove to Ouray for a quick trip to interview the glass-blower who lives and works there.

Upon arriving, we found the glass place and unloaded our crew to visit Sam, the local artist. He was kind to take time out of his day for us, but I got the feeling that he did not expect K to know or understand as much as she did about glass-blowing. He answered her questions, but I think that we both were a little disappointed that he did not offer her more in-depth information. It was still a successful trip in that she gained some interviewing experience as a form of research, though.

After the glass store, we walked to Mouse's Chocolates, a local chocolate, coffee, and ice cream place that is known for its tasty treats. The kids enjoyed hot chocolate and milkshakes, and I devoured my "hippie bar", a scrumptious blend of dark chocolate, pumpkin seeds, sunflower seeds, and coconut.
Walking back to the car, I spotted a cute crocheted sweater that I needed. Timo took the boys while I shopped with the girls. Then we met again a few stores down. AJ wanted to go into a mining store to see if they had pickaxes. Not that he needed one. He just wanted to see one. They did, and they were about as tall as S. We left them all there, loaded up in the car, and drove to Box Canyon. We intended to do some hiking, but rain cut our climb short. I did manage to get photos of the kids, though.

AJ photobombing K

K photobombing AJ

A hanging out in the backpack

Deep crevice

That's a long way down

Sweet AJ

Beautiful K

Cutie Pie

A little waterfall

My gorgeous girl

A rare photo of me, courtesy of K

I almost didn't get a photo of S

This photo doesn't do justice to the beauty of the area

I hope to return to Ouray sometime in the future. I would like to finish hiking around, and there is always room for more chocolate.

A Journey to the Past

My sister's visit prompted me to plan a field trip to Old Sturbridge Village. This living history museum is set up to bring to life an American town set in the 1830s. Most of the buildings are actual structures from that time in history that have been relocated to the museum. I was surprised at this because I thought they would all be more recently constructed to represent what the buildings might have looked like at that time, much like what we saw at Plimoth Plantation.

When we arrived, the children immediately wanted to visit the children's area, called Kidstory. This is an indoor version of the village, where kids can "farm", dress up in period clothing, cook, shop, and "wash" clothes. I finally had to drag them away from it so we could see the rest of the place.

H working on his crops

Farmer S

K serving a customer root beer

K working at the general store

AJ cooking

Once we moved on, we walked by a small house, a Quaker meetinghouse, a barn, and some sheep. Then we arrived at a place where a lady was washing wool yarn and preparing it to be dyed. There were several colors of yarn hanging up to dry that had been previously processed, and the colors were amazingly earthy and natural. A nearby building showed what they used to arrive at each color, and there was a display showing various types of yarn and how they were processed. There was also a lady at a spinning wheel spinning some of the raw wool into yarn. Upstairs was a display about quilting, and the kids enjoyed playing with plastic squares and triangles to design their own quilt squares.

H in the Quaker Meetinghouse

H in a barn

K and AJ with the lady washing yarn to dye

The beautiful colors of dyed wool

Spinning

Weaving

AJ designing a quilt

One of the display quilts

The chair where the lady of the house would have done her knitting and mending

A cute little doll's bed

At this time, I took S down to sit on a bench and eat some lunch. The others soon joined us, and we ate in the shade while looking out across the common. When we finished, we started toward the schoolhouse. I pushed the stroller while everyone else rode a horse-drawn trolley. The kids told me one of the horse's names is Jim.

Upon arriving at the schoolhouse, we stepped inside where a lady was explaining the building, the school, and the requirements for the teachers at that time. One thing that stuck out was that the teachers did not have to have much training, and they usually ranged from 15 to 25 years old. The literacy rate at that time was about 90%, whereas it is now around 75%. S was getting fussy, so I stepped out with him. K and AJ wanted to experience a "lesson", so they stayed inside until the "class" started. They could choose from reading, math, or spelling, and they chose math. The questions were oral word problems, and my kids aced them. The actual math was very simple, and I wished they asked them more challenging questions. K was disappointed that she did not get to use a quill pen, but at least she could write on the slate.

S at a desk in the schoolhouse

A well-used desk top

K practicing her letters on a slate

AJ peaking out of the schoolhouse window

After their lesson was over, they came outside and played with the schoolhouse toys -- jump ropes and a pair of stilts. The stilts were a bit broken and therefore very difficult to use. My sister, Jaime, helped my kids walk on them, but no one could do it solo.

H walking on stilts with Auntie Jaime

AJ walking on stilts with Auntie Jaime

 From the schoolhouse, I stepped over to look at the pottery making building. As they only fire up the kiln twice a year, it was full of unfired pottery. After that, we hurried back to where the musket demonstration was supposed to take place.

The kiln

Pottery waiting to be fired

We arrived at the musket demonstration just in time for the guy to fire off the final round. He showed us how to load a musket and explained why the muskets of that period were so dangerous to shoot. The barrel was formed out of a sheet of metal and welded on the bottom. If that weld failed, the shooter could lose life or limb.

Musket man

The kids wanted to try out the town pump next, so we followed them over where they took turn pumping and playing in the cool, refreshing water. From there, we headed to the bake shop and store, where H convinced me to buy a Colonial soldier costume and AJ bought a hat.

Fun at the town pump

 

 

Jaime pointed out that the craft center would be a fun stop for the kids, so we strolled in that direction. When we arrived, K, AJ, and H chose to dip candles, and Jaime took S to the nearby play area to keep him happy. H grew tired of the tedious process of dipping candles, so my niece, Edith, finished for him while I took him out to join his little brother. When they finished, K asked if she could make the sconce as well. My response? "If you pay for it." She headed back to the craft shop to complete her project, and the rest of us sat in the shade and watched the boys play.

Dipping candles

A cute little sheep

K making a sconce for the candles

A familiar cow and farmer's wife

Once K finished her sconce, we realized that she was missing her bonnet. She claimed that she had it at the well, but after retracing our steps back there and inquiring at the store, it was still MIA. At this point, we split up. Jaime and Edith took the boys to the beekeeping exhibit while K and I retraced our steps even further until we found it at the schoolhouse. Praise the Lord. We then hurried to catch up with the rest of our crew. When we arrived at the beekeeping exhibit, I realized that S had kicked off his shoe somewhere along our hurried way. We turned around and had only walked about 100 feet before someone who had found the shoe returned it to us. Another praise.

At this point, I was ready to get out of there. We made our way to the exit, paused to peruse the gift shop, stopped at the bathrooms, and headed to the car.

It was a busy, day, but I think everyone enjoyed themselves. I don't know what I would have done without Edith and Jaime. They made the trip so much easier, providing two extra sets of hands (and eyes) to help with the kiddos. I am so thankful for their visit out to see us.

My little Continental Soldier

Indian Pudding

K has to give a speech in history this fall for our co-op. Since her assigned date is close to Thanksgiving, we chose to have her present some information regarding the first Thanksgiving as opposed to modern-day Thanksgiving. She will be focusing on food, so we chose to cook a dish which could have been served during the original feast.

After searching the web and a few colonial cook-books, we settled on Indian pudding. This would have probably been what they ate for dessert instead of the traditional pumpkin pie. We found a basic recipe to try this rainy afternoon, and it just came out of the oven.

My thoughts on the dish are that it tastes basic and earthy in a good way. The two main flavors are cornmeal and molasses, with no added spices (those would be added by the colonists later in the 1700s).

Indian Pudding -- Not much to look at

 K qualified her opinion of it by stating, "They didn't have much back then." She seems to understand that they didn't even have what we would consider the basics. I am not sure the kids in her class will appreciate the taste. K is unsure of it, but AJ likes it. As for me, I think it is fun to taste something the pilgrims could have shared with the Wampanoag people during that historic time.