The best day of summer

Yesterday was our last day before the new school year. Our summer break went by too quickly, just like everybody I have been talking to and there was no unscheduled time at all, except for yesterday. So we all slept in and just decided during breakfast what to do with that lovely and beautiful Monday. Our library has a great program of museum passes and we checked availability and decided on Old Sturbridge Village. We had been wanting to go for quite a while anyway, since the kids have been on a kind of american history trip and they had their old fashioned dresses all ready from our pioneer party the day before. We packed our picnic basket and filled our water-bottles and headed west.

A few years back we made our way out there on a cold January Sunday and got so cold between the car and the entrance, that we opted out. Yesterday was the perfect day though. OSV (Old Sturbridge Village) is offering a plethora of activities and demonstrations on any given day and we decided right away to just do a few houses and things and come back - come back often! We watched a demonstration of dying wool and then of handling a musket. The poor man showing that must have damaged ears for sure. After a brief stop in the tin shop, we headed for the old school house and on the way tried some shuttlecock and trundle rings. At the old schoolhouse we encountered a wonderful and funny young lady teacher, the children absolutely enjoyed it. Our next stop was the potterer and the children had never seen somebody working at the pottery wheel and their faces lit up like candles, they thought that was the most amazing thing they had ever seen. Having tried and failed the pottery wheel, I was just as amazed.

Next on our agenda was a demonstration of broom making, followed by a stop at the bake shop, trying to milk a (plastic-) cow and a break on the playground, where they were working on their skills of playing Graces. This was followed by a hands-on craft making a tin candle holder, which was not as elaborate as the girls had hoped. S being a lover of horses needed to have a horse drawn ride around the mill pond, actually she wanted more than one, but we were in desperate need of lunch, as it was already tea time. We headed to the tavern, got some uninspiring modern kids food and then concluded our visit with two women filling paper tissue balloons with hot air over an small charcoal oven and letting them fly into the sky. S. did not want to stop watching all the failed attempts due to the breeze sweeping down the common. Only a visit to the village bookstore and gift shop could get her moving. We bought a game of graces, though we really loved the trundle hoops too, and they each got a candy stick to sweeten the way home and saying good-bye to summer.

On the way home J. remarked, that this has been the best day of all summer for her and this would have been a lovely ending, but of course S. literal to the bone, had to point out, that the day was not over yet and J. would have to wait with such a statement until the day was truly over. Since it is over today, we can say that it was the best day of summer!