Be Strong and Courageous

The month of August seems to have flown by.  With Family visits, trips back to 1861, baby sitting for friends for date nights,  going back to work, visits with friends for dinner (home made tortillas),   wisdom teeth being pulled, summer weather finally arriving bringing  fruits to perfection, birthday parties, and a new car. The blessings have been overflowing this month.  The time of new teachers and new schedules has arrived, Sophomore with  JROTC on his mind and lots of hopes for the new year, 8th grader with braces coming tomorrow along with finding out her fall schedule and cross country practice around the corner (the girls loves to run - God is so great to have blessed her with a love run), and a first grader who just wants to stay with her kindergarten teachers because she loves them and she "just knows the new one will only talk Spanish to her", silly girl. The quiet before the storm of  homewor...

We very first saw a handful of reenactor's at a local school and followed them through the summer to an event at Ft. Simcoe, WA and then to Tieton Days, in nearby Tieton,WA as well a trip to Ft. Stevens, OR on the coast. Our oldest loves history almost as much as my husband and asked if he could go off to the battle while we were there at the beach.  So we joined as a family and away he went to the battles of the day while the rest of us spectated and enjoyed the wonder of the 1860 life. We decided to reenact because it is a chance to educate the kids as wells a those we come in contact with about the ordeal that was our countries greatest battle for freedom. Freedoms from 'big government' and freedom for us to get to a place of equality for all. As advanced as we are as a nation we are still so judgemental and prejudice, and unloving to others who look different than us. There is much to still learn. For us reenacting is a time to get away together and turn off the outs...

Our Weekend was lovely, this is our 2011 style home for our 1861 reenacting. The girls took and evening walk with daddy and Emma photographed tons of it, I love the way the light shines through the rifle holes in this old outpost building. We took a break and relaxed with a few families from church, thank you McBride, Davis, and Vipond families for making the trek out to visit us. Addysen was being quite a little lady (not), for Emma's photo. The 'guys' (I say that because there were some gals that took to the field as well) had 2 battles a day and there was even a great medical display by the sweetest little family of 'Doctor', Nurse and 4 helping children. 3 of the 4 homes are open to view by public when the park is open. Again Emma was great at capturing them for me. She took over 100 pictures this weekend ( I will not post them all - but more to come for sure). It was so fun on both days the ladies, myself included (on Sunday) got to be int he scenario o...

  It's Friday again and this weeks prompt from Gypsy Mama, is BACKWARDS. So here goes: How perfect that this would be this weeks prompt, as we are getting ready to head and go BACKWARDS in time to 1861. We have been Civil War reenacting this year as a family and it has been a great time. Back in April we attended an event at Ft. Steilacoom (near Tacoma, WA) and our oldest daughter, age 13, said the best part was just being together. This weekend we are able to stay pretty close to home at Ft. Simcoe and I am glad to say the weather is gorgeous for camping out. The reason we like going BACKWARDS in time varies from each one of us, I am sure if you asked a group of reenactors why, you would get a dozen reasons. I love doing it because it seems to bring joy to everyone in the family. My history buff husband likes the meaning and remembering of it all, it took our nation much loss to have great gain and understanding of true freedoms. My son, age 15, love the action ...

On the first Morning of our event after a very cold night of camping, Addysen was glad to put on her layers - tights, drawers, petticoat, camisole, (modern day long john), dress, and Pinafore (made by yours truly), and bonnet to top it all off. Emma is dressed in the same style (I was able to make all her clothing - excluding the bonnet); and the women who held the fashion show was so polite with her words about how beautiful and correct the girls were in their attire. Sunday morning I convinced Addysen to wear her matching outfit. Welcoming brother 'home' from the fight. Daddy and his girls. The amazing thing is 'in that day' Andrew  at age 15, would have most likely fought at some point. Addysen grinding coffee with one of the Civilian Confederate women, she had her butter churn there and showed us the butter from the morning that she had made. President Lincoln (a very good portrayal of him) was there to talk to the troops. On the second day our tro...

Just wanted to shout out and say thank you to Liz for helping me get the sleeves attached correctly (even if it took 2 tries to pleat it right - my fault for not knowing where the shoulder seam fell), and for showing me how to set up the skirt for pleating. The waist band for the dress came to 31 1/2 inches, it is at a higher than natural waist position, circa 1860's style (Emma was thrown off by the number because she knows her waist size :) ), and there were 3 panels of fabric measuring at just under 2 yards, 70" to be exact, that make up the skirt. You guessed it, I had know idea how to uniformly  pleat all that fabric, and attach it to the done bodice. I was even ready to pull out the calculator - here came Liz again to help me take baby steps to complete it. After Liz pinned it into 1/4's, she needed to get going so I took over and pinned it into 1/8's which each got 6 pleats each. If you can believe it I only poked my finger 3-4 times and viola ---- a ski...

Our summer will be full of outings and adventure this year as we embark on a full season of Living History with the WCWA and our unit the 12th US Regular Army, the girls and I will of course be portraying a family from NY that is back home waiting for our men who are at war. The Washington Civil War Association   is the group we belong to and do our reenactments with (you can click  on the link for dates of the events). There are plenty of events all over Washington State and even some in Oregon that we may attend. I am having my dress made by Lavenders Green.  and I am so excited to be making the girls dress myself with some help from a friend. This dress was made by Lavenders Green, I love the shimmer and added designs, my dress will be much simple, more of an every day dress.  We chose a simple green calico for my dress. I cannot wait for it to arrive in just a few weeks. The girl's dresses will have pinner aprons I think, instead of just waist ones, ...