It's Good to be Home!!

Yay! We are home! We had such a wonderful time, but it's grrrrREAT to be back in our own home with our own beds to sleep in. Even though we were sightseeing parts of every day during our trip, we also had times to just hang out at the condo or swim in the condo pool, which was really fun and relaxing. In this picture, my husband and our youngest are doing some snuggling.

Some things remain the same even when our location changes! Here our son G, our resident builder, is making an amazing lizard out of K'nex.

C and L goofing around with their new "hotch potch" dolls from Williamsburg. These dolls bend at all their joints enabling them to form every letter of the alphabet.

It was rather a loooong drive home. When we finally got to our midway point on Saturday night, it was 9:00 PM and the 2 year old hadn't had a nap all day. Need I say more? So in an effort to keep him entertained while waiting for our food, the menus became dancing people. Anything to comfort and distract a toddler!

Then he decided he wanted to try a lemon. Before.....

and after!

I'm so glad we could go on this unforgettable trip, AND I'm so glad to be home. Our children are all asleep in their own beds and I think I'm going to join them!

The Yorktown Living History Museum

Before beginning our drive home on Saturday, we spent several hours at the Yorktown Living History Museum (called the Yorktown Victory Center) which was really fantastic! There were several galleries inside the museum that explained the war from several different perspectives (soldiers, women, black slaves) and then out back there was a continental army encampment with costumed interpreters who demonstrated different aspects of military life.

Sons C and G, pretending to be General Washington, writing an important letter to one of his officers.

One of these circular oven units was built for each company, and then one man from each tent (of 6 or 8 men) would come and cook for his tentmates. There was no such thing as a camp cook back then.

This gentleman explained all the different types of artillery to us. In this picture he is talking about the 6" cannon.

Then he fired off a 4.5" mortar for us. It was VERY loud! (no live ammo in case you were wondering!)

We then learned about muskets, and everyone got a turn holding one. They were quite heavy. Here is L.



and daughter G



and son G

and son A.

It was a wonderful way to end our trip to the historic triangle!

Yorktown Battlefield

On Friday we visited the Yorktown battlefield. To refresh everyone's memory, the battle of Yorktown was the last major battle of the Revolutionary War and essentially destroyed any remaining will the British had to fight. It was fascinating to learn a bit about war strategy during that time, and particularly what the continental army's strategy was at Yorktown. General George Washington himself led the continental army in this campaign, and pictured below is his sleeping tent. Yes, THE actual tent he slept in during the war. It is the only known surviving 18th century American officer's tent, which I thought was very, very special.

The French were instrumental in helping the continental army win this battle, particularly with their navy which sent the British fleet packing back to New York after sinking several of their ships. Below is A with an actual cannon recovered from the H.M.S. Charon on the bottom of the York River.

This shot of us sitting on cannons was taken at the battlefield, at the first line the continental army dug and occupied, facing Cornwallis's troops. After heavy artillery fire for a number of days, they were able to take a second line only 400 yards from the British troops.

L pretending to fire off the cannon.

This is one of two "redoubts" (earthen fort) built by the British and captured by the continental army.

A climbing up the redoubt the hard way. Boys!

All our children had a grand time running around the battlefield. They could have stayed here all day long!

A view of one entire redoubt from a distance. After learning just a bit about this battle and all that went into its planning and execution, I can see why George Washington was so loved and revered. He was brilliant!

Colonial Williamsburg - Part 2

Our second day in Colonial Williamsburg started with about a half hour private audience with Patrick Henry himself! They had arranged these "private audiences" with different founding fathers all week long as part of home educator's week, so a group of about 40 homeschoolers gathered in the backyard of a home to hear Mr. Henry's thoughts. I was absolutely riveted throughout his entire talk. The man portraying Patrick Henry was totally in character, his speech was very 18th century, and his perspective on events happening in 1774 was fascinating! It was a highlight for both my husband and myself and really made history come alive for us.

On our walk to the main street we happened upon this pair of oxen pulling a cart. The driver told us that ox would have been seen more frequently in Williamsburg than horses. Of course the horse population would have increased greatly any time the House of Burgesses met because so many Burgesses would have come in from the surrounding countryside.

Next we visited the foundry. The founder was working with liquid pewter when we arrived, in this picture he is stirring it in a pot buried in hot coals. The liquid pewter was about 700 degrees! He made several pewter spoons while we watched, pouring the liquid pewter into a mold and then cooling it (which happened very quickly) before taking it out of the mold.

Each of our children took turns pulling on the bellows cord. They would pull on this cord which was attached to a wooden arm that went to the large bellows located up by the ceiling and attached to the chimney above the fire. It was hard to pull!

Our daughter G took this picture of a British flag against the white backdrop of a building. Isn't it nice? She takes some very creative pictures! I think photography is becoming a hobby of hers.

Another one of the tasks that our militia recruits had been given on our first day in Colonial Williamsburg was to go to the post office and collect a letter from Boston. They were to deliver this letter to the printer because it contained information that may be printed in the Virginia Gazette. Here is the printer at work:


Later in the day our family split up. My husband took 4 of the children to one end of town to hear a drama on the courthouse steps while I took our 5 year old son C for a carriage ride. This was the one thing he really wanted to do. Going in and out of historical buildings is not really that interesting to a 5 year old! Again we had to make a choice based on finances, the carriage rides were $10 per person. So we chose the child who wanted it the most and off we went! We had a wonderful ride around town in this 18th century carriage with a nice couple from California.

There were so many lovely houses and gardens in Colonial Williamsburg! Here is just one of them. Doesn't this make you want to sit a spell?

On our way out of town we stopped to tour the jail. The two cells pictured here are the only two original cells to have survived since the 1700's and they once housed Blackbeard's pirates while they waited for their execution! Since the jailers young daughters were helping to care for the prisoners, they did have food slots in the cell doors to slide the food through, and they had toilets in each cell so the prisoners would not need to come outside for any reason. I believe this is where the word "throne" came to be used for toilet. They really did look like thrones, with a couple steps up to a seat that was about the same height as my chest. So that was some trivia we learned on this trip!

Colonial Williamsburg - Part 1

Wow. What a fabulous two days we spent in Colonial Williamsburg! I highly recommend it! We had planned on renting costumes for the boys (daughter brought hers from home) but when we got there we learned that it was $20 per person per day for costume rental, so we just rented one boy's costume and had our boys share all day long (minus A who wasn't quite big enough for it). In fairness to all of them, here is 7 year old L and daughter G:

Here is 5 year old C:

And here is 8 year old G. They each had so much fun carrying around the wooden rifle, L especially really got into the role of being a recruit for the militia. There were lots of other children (and some adults!) in costume so it added a really fun element to the day.

The first thing we did after renting the costume was tour the Governor's Palace. It was a beautiful building inside and out, and was home to the British Governor appointed by the King. Did you know that the first elected governor of Virginia was Patrick Henry? He lived in the palace at 3 different times, and it was absolutely fascinating to learn more about this patriot. We had fun going through a hedge maze in the palace gardens.

Then it was on to the main street, where everyone had fun (?) pretending to be in the stocks and the leg irons.

I really enjoyed everything about Colonial Williamsburg, but if I had to pick a favorite spot it would be this colonial garden. I could have sat in there for the whole day, soaking up the colonial aura and asking questions of the gardener! It included a large working garden, where gardeners tend the garden using tools and methods from the 18th century, as well as a little shop tent where you could purchase books, plants, and gardening tools/knick knacks. It was so beautiful and peaceful!

When we rented the costume for the boys, we were given a list of special tasks for our militia recruits to accomplish throughout the day, and one of the listed tasks was to go to the colonial garden and plant some seeds. More recruits would mean more mouths to feed in the winter, so everyone was to chip in and do their share of planting. Here is the colonial gardener with our daughter G and sons L and G:

The 3 of them planting cabbage seeds.

Son G watering the row of newly planted seeds.

2 year old A trying on a straw gardening hat! I was soooo tempted to buy it, but I'm sure I can find one cheaper somewhere else!

After exploring many streets and building and shops, we ended our first day in Colonial Williamsburg by watching a fife and drum corps as they marched and played down the main street. They were very good!

The Original Jamestown Site

On Tuesday we visited the site of the original Jamestown (called "Historic Jamestown") where they have been excavating for about 12 years and think they are about 50% done. It was absolutely fascinating and such a beautiful spot. I can see why the original Jamestown colonists thought it would be a good site to settle, but I can also see why it was so bad. It is a very swampy area, and we got several mosquito bites while there. Here are the children with a statue of Pocahontas.

Right in the middle of this picture you can see a red brick wall, which is part of a wall of an original brick building inside Jamestown. The mud and daub houses they built initially were quickly replaced by more permanent brick structures. So this wall is nearly 400 years old! You can't tell from this picture, but it is about 10 feet below ground.

This church tower is the only "original" structure still standing on the Jamestown site. The church building was destroyed by fire, but the tower survived. The church this tower was originally part of was built in the early years of Jamestown.

Inside the church, the original brick foundation can be seen below this glass in the floor.

23 of the original 104 colonists are still buried in this Jamestown cemetery. Church tower can be seen in the background.

Excavation has revealed where the foundations of most of the structures inside Jamestown were located. This beginning of a mud and daub building was reconstructed on the actual site of the barracks, and is an exact match of the original floor plan.

One of the wells outside the fort walls. This was built in the early years of Jamestown's history, and when it was no longer usable as a well it became their garbage dump. Archaeologists were thrilled to find all sorts of artifacts in this well which revealed much about the colonist's daily life, and which are now on display.

To see where it all really happened, and walk where the colonists and indians walked, was a very moving experience for me. It was also very interesting to see the colonist's lifestyle and the indians lifestyle contrasted with one another. So different! And both so fascinating. I wonder how the course of American history would have changed had Jamestown not been successful as a colony? We might all be spanish speaking! It makes me so grateful to God and to these men and women who sacrificed so much to plant an English colony here. I'm sure they had no idea what an important piece of history they were writing. What history are we writing right now? How will we be remembered?