Fun Saturday at Shaker Village

After a week of heavy rain, Saturday proved to be a beautiful sunny day. 

What to do?

What to do?

I mentioned maybe going to Shaker Village if it wasn't too far. I googled it on my phone and seen it was only a little over an hour away. 

We got in the van and headed out. 

It was a perfect day to be out and about. 

We stopped for a quick lunch at Taco Bell in Danville and that's when I couldn't find my debit card. Luckily, I had Tara's phone bill money in my wallet and I was able to pay for our food. 

That still didn't help the "where is my debit card" pandemonium. 

Maynard went and searched the van because that's where I last had it. I was busy the night before and he had handed it to me and I remembered sticking it down my shirt. Ha ha. Yeah yeah. I know what y'all are all thinking. Anyway....I knew that I told myself to get it out before I lost it and I was most postitive that I had put it in my wallet. I looked and looked. Couldn't find it. I called and transferred all our money into Maynard's business account just in case someone had stolen it. That helped me breathe a little easier. Then I opened my wallet again and pulled out my checks. There was my card in a little pocket behind my checkbook. Hallelujah!  So glad I found it. 

Now I could enjoy the rest of our trip without worrying about my debit card. 

Moral of that story would be to just bypass sticking anything of value down your shirt. Ha ha 

Finally, we arrived to Shaker Village. 

Our first part of the tour was in The Dwelling House. 

It had lots of history about the life of a shaker. It showed replicas of their living headquarters and even had demonstrations on how to make brooms, leather/woodworking, and weaving and quilting and such. 

We missed the shearing of the sheep, but it was neat for my kids to see the sheep's wool being made into yarn. 

There was a children's room we spent a lot of time in letting the kids explore. 

You never get too old to play dress up. Yes, I know this dress didn't do me any favors. Ha ha

I fell in love with this dining room table. 

Those knobs in the table are for turning the table so everyone can serve themselves. How fun would that be?? I can see my kids fighting over that right now. 

"No, I want the last biscuit."

"No!!  You got all the macaroni and cheese."

All this while the table is being moved left and right. 

Yeah. Maybe that wouldn't be such a great idea. Lol

All that stair climbing made Maynard thirsty. 

Speaking of stairs.............................

This was the highest point in the house and the stairs were so steep I got lightheaded and felt faint. Maynard was very supportive. Poor Josiah refused to even climb this set. He was scared to go up stairs, but going down didn't bother him. I'm the opposite. I don't like climbing back down. I made the mistake of peeking down through the rails from the highest point and that wasn't smart. 

We made it!!!!!

We walked across to the other side to the Meeting House. It was the church house the the Shakers used. I took pictures on my snapchat, but forgot to save them. Here's one of the family sitting on hard benches waiting for the "meeting" to begin. 

 We were told a lot of history about how the Shakers worshipped and examples of how they sang. 

Men sat on one side and the women sat on the other. They would come and sit and wait to feel the presence of God. If they didn't feel anything they just went back home. Sometimes worship could only be 15 minutes and the longest recorded service was 23 hrs. 

My kiddos were getting bored and antsy so after 30 minutes we walked out. I made the comment as we were leaving, "Y'all couldn't last 30 minutes let alone 23 hours." Ha ha

I took this picture of a horse and buggy ride from the church house steps. 

Because my kids wouldn't hush until they found all the farm animals we went on straight to the barn. 

Titus made a friend right away with this horse. The horse followed him around the fence and would nuzzle his head. It was pretty cute. 

They were pretty excited about getting to hold a bunny too.

 

Inside the barn was baby chicks, rabbits, sheep's, goats, and rams. 

This Momma sheep was in a bad mood. She had just had twins on Easter Sunday, but she was mad because she wanted out in the pasture. The tour guide said she seen the horses come back in and she knew it was time for them to go out to pasture. She made this horrible sound that sounded like a loud burp expressing her anger. It was cracking us up. Amelia kept petting her even though she was warned that she was angry and may charge at her. That didn't stop her. That girl loves animals. She of course didn't inherit that from me. 

Titus was petting these rams and goats when he gasped and took off running. I asked him what happened and he said, "I forgot I was wearing red."

Ha ha. I explained that it wasn't a bull just because it had horns. 

We walked out of the barn in search of the bull they did have though. 

Amelia stopped to pet a huge cat. 

A cute picture right?

Well, let's zoom in. 

She was about to get bit. Ha ha

This cat did not want to be bothered during its nap time. 

By now the kids were hot, thirsty, and dirty. 

We walked back to another building and decided to go take a look inside. 

It was so cute how it was set up. Little bedrooms with old time beds set up. Of course we assumed it was to show us their old living quarters. 

Titus ran in and jumped on a bed. Yep, dirty, sweaty and all. 

As he lay there a lady walked in and said, "Hey!  This is my room where I am staying"

Oops. We just toured inside the Inn where people payed to stay all night.  Of course that would be the norm for us Parker's. We always have an adventure wherever we go. 

We apologized and walked on back to their little kitchen area because we spyed a pop machine. Plus there may have been an ice machine in there too that I took an advantage of. Ha ha. We sat at their table and cooled off and enjoyed our drinks and the free ice then we headed back out again.

We learned that if a building had curtains inside then it was an inn and not for tour. That's always helpful to know. 

Before long it was time to go. We stopped for a family picture and then headed out. 

We stopped for a nice dinner at Texas  roadhouse to finish off our fun family Saturday. 

I enjoy spending time with my family and making memories that will last for a lifetime.