I was fortunate enough to get to take a great trip with my dear friend Caroline. She lives with Lissy's mom, Grammy, but Caroline's real time period is 1812. Caroline and I had become interested in the pioneer days and started researching it to learn more. In fact the trip we took was part of our research. We went to Silver Dollar City which is an amusement park in Branson, Missouri. The park is all pioneer themed and feels like you have traveled back in time. A few years ago Lissy went there with Kirsten and took some nice photos. You can see them and learn more about the park by clicking HERE to view that post written by Lissy.
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Anyhow, Caroline and I had traveled about three and a half hours by car with Lissy and Grammy from Kansas City to Branson. At some points I grew really impatient and I felt like the drive would never end. I was just anxious to get there and begin the fun.
Once we finally got to our hotel to check in we were able to refresh ourselves and plan our research at the park. Caroline has the American Doll version of Kirsten and brought her along. She also brought Kirsten's story books. We read the first couple of chapters and soon realized Kirsten had to travel about six weeks to America from Sweden in a cargo ship. It made our measly 3.5 hour trip to Branson seem a lot better!
The worst part is she had to say good bye to loved ones and could only bring with her the things she could fit into a trunk.
I found this terrific book at the library called Welcome to Kirsten's World. It tells all about what Kirsten's time period was like and how the pioneers lived. We used this book and Kirsten's story books for most of our research.
After we read and rested a little we were ready to put in a few hours at the amusement park.
When you get into the main part of Silver Dollar City it is like an old fashioned town. Caroline and I imagined how excited Kirsten must have been to travel into town from her family farm. We really liked the General Story especially the candy display! We learned from the book that a general store was usually the first business in a frontier town and it is where everyone bought or traded what they needed. The general store would even be where they would pick up mail.
We also got to see a couple getting married at Silver Dollar City's tiny chapel. So romantic! There was a whole page in our book that talked about pioneer weddings so this was a cool connection! We read that most weddings on the frontier took place in the winter when they didn't have as much work to get done. And guess what!... in Kisten's Swedish culture the bride would be crowned queen for the whole day of her wedding!
My favorite part of the trip was seeing the little farm in the park. They had baby goats and a miniature horse to pet! I loved that sweet horse so much! Her name was Cotton! The pioneers on the frontier had a lot to do each day to maintain their farms or homesteads. They had chores such as making soap, watching the fire, cleaning the outhouse, spinning wool to yarn, churning milk to cream and butter, hauling water, watering flowers, harvesting crops, keeping track of the farm animals, plowing fields, and so on!
Before the pioneers had farms and crops to keep up with they had to build their homes and barns. Caroline and I thought it was really interesting how people like Kirsten built their homes from logs. It was a long time consuming project that started by clearing out trees and stumps from the land, then preparing the logs, then lifting them into the frame and walls of the cabin. Once the logs were in place and roof was on the women and children would fill the cracks with mud. At Silver Dollar City we saw a man demonstrating how pioneers would have cut the logs to build their houses with. I was exhausted just watching him!
When we got back to the hotel we were pretty tired from all the excitement of the park and traveling!
We fell right to sleep and dreamt about our pioneer friend.
The next morning we felt energized and ready to experience another pioneer day!
We started with some hot chocolate and biscuits in bed!
The day before we were pretty impressed by the log cabin making so it was even more exciting for us when we got to see a real log cabin at Silver Dollar City. We imagined Kirsten's home to be pretty similar. But did you know that some pioneers built homes out of sod (or mud) bricks. Those types of homes were called soddies.
With all the difficult labor that had to be done it's hard to imagine that there was time for any fun but they made time for childhood activities too. We took our picture in front of the one room school house that would have been just like the school Kirsten went to. In her time period students only went to school in the winter and summer because they had less work to do then, rather than in the spring and fall when their families needed them home all day to help.
We did so many other fantastic things but I couldn't get photos of everything, sometimes you just have to live in the moment and not worry about capturing a photo of it.
Overall we learned a lot about this time period and would really encourage you to learn something new about a past time period as well. You might find some pretty cool things to inspire you or to connect with!
We had such a nice trip, the weather was perfect, the fall leaves and Ozark mountains were gorgeous, and most of all the company was lovely :)
We were pretty sad when we had to pack up our things and leave the hotel. But we have awesome memories, photos, and souvenirs to remember the trip by.
By the way Caroline got a beautiful turquoise leather journal handmade by an artist in the park. I got a stuffy of AppleJack, my favorite My Little Pony, who reminded me of the miniature horse, Cotton, who we meet in the farm. And Grammy, who is the most generous lady ever, bought me a trinket box with horses painted on it; it was also handmade by an artist in the park.
Is there a time period that you would like to know more about? If you could live in any time period what would it be?
