My family swears I was born about 100 years too late, lol. Back home, there's a county park venue that is an historical re-enactment village, called Crossroads Village and Huckleberry Railroad. I always loved going there, and when the time comes for a pilgrimage back home for a visit, I am sooo going. Including the 45-minute train ride. If you are ever near Genesee County, Michigan (county seat, the not-so-great city of Flint - yeah, the same one that's always getting panned for crime and everything), be sure to go to the northernmost part of the county and visit Crossroads. It's one thing I really miss. Yeah, the Ozarks has Silver Dollar City, but it's more of an amusement park with an old-fashioned theme to it. Crossroads is all 1850s buildings from all over Genesee County, and the people who work there have to wear period dress and everything, and even do demos of the kinds of skills people used in those days. The blacksmith does metalwork, the toy barn makes toys with pedal powered tools (I loved the pedal powered jigsaw and lathe in there!), there's even a barn and a schoolhouse and a church where they do actual special services and weddings.
The schoolhouse is most folks first introduction to the village, as every middle school has a day sometime in the year where the girls all have to make a mobcap and all the kids have to wear something resembling period dress so they can get bussed to the village and attend school like our pioneer ancestors did, complete with slates and chalk and McGuffey's Readers! When the church does special services, men and women sit on opposite sides of the aisles, just as in the old days. The doctor has an herb garden, there's an old fashioned barber shop and opera house where shows are put on, and a restaurant, and pretty much everything. And you're probably asking why they called the train the Huckleberry Railroad. The train is an authentic narrow-guage steam locomotive which runs on part of the original tracks that ran from Flint to Pere Marquette. The story for the train goes that it ran so slow at times that passengers could jump off the front cars, grab a few handfuls of huckleberries off the bushes that grew in profusion next to the tracks, and hop back on at the caboose. (Yeah, you can tell I've been there LOTS of times, lol.) I always felt a close affinity for the place, and loved going there any time of the year. (The Christmas light show drive-through and walk-through are amazing, especially the Tree of Lights - they take a tree by the train depot and literally wrap it in white miniature lights, so that every tip of every single branch has a light on it. It comes out to about a million lights a year on that thing!)
So because of all the time I spent there, and all the knowledge I soaked up and all, then add in my love of homesteading and all it entails, and you can understand why my family has often said that I was born a century out of date. Life then wasn't easier than now, or better, but simpler, and I think a lot of the love I have for homesteading is the ability to simplify our complex world down to a way of living that comes as close as we can these days to life back then. Of course, given a chance to live then, I'd mostly fit right in, I think. I am just that old-fashioned in so many ways.
With it threatening to rain tonight, the boys and I are hunkering in the bedroom tonight for comfort. I just finished dinner (penne pasta, chicken, spinach and carrots in a garlic-butter sauce I threw together, though I got a bit too much garlic on it. WHEW!). The boys are snuggled up on the other half of the bed engaging in their mutual bathing committee. It's so funny to watch them washing each other in all the spots they can't reach for themselves, and they will go at it for an hour or more. Gotta make sure their gorgeous fur stays that way, ya know!
So that's been my day, mostly, and I think I'll go see what I can find in the way of books for y'all. Hugs everybody, I'm off to have fun and relax! Oh hey, I got my SD card slot and the lappy to be friends again, so here's a few pictures for you!
This is from the last snowfall, looking off the deck towards the mountain road as it passes the bottom of our place. You can see my "solar clothes dryer" (aka the clothesline) in the photo.
This is taken on the deck, looking back towards the two junk trailers. You can see our tv satellite dish. All the snow looked so much like fairyland - till about noon when it hit near 60F after only 30F or so the day before. By noon that day, the snow had all melted away. Yes, there were spots that morning that had no snow at all and were slightly green!
And this was Smudge last night on the end of Quentin's side of the bed, all comfy and sprawled in a bit of last-minute sunshine.
KINDLE FREEBIES OF INTEREST
Only a few tonight as it's Monday - wait till later in the week, I'll inundate y'all again!
Permaculture Chicken: Pasture Basics
Creative Homemaking Guide to Make-a-Mix Recipes - I smell money from making these up in small batches to sell at the farmer's market!
29 Gluten Free Cookie Recipes - Mouthwatering Gluten Free Cookies To Try Today (Gluten Free Cookbook - The Gluten Free Recipes Collection)
Top 50 Most Delicious Spinach Recipes (Superfood Recipes)
How To Crochet Vol. I. A Complete Beginners Guide with Step by Step instructions with Pictures!: Learn the Basics from Hook Selection , Yarn type and the Different Patterns. Become an Expert - Wasn't someone asking about learning to crochet a bit ago?
THE EVERYDAY CAR PHYSICIAN: THE EVERY DAY CAR Home-care tips your mechanic wont reveal to you. (THE CAR PHYSICIAN SERIES) - Really could have used something like this these last few weeks, ya know?
No comments:
Post a Comment