Vacation Part 1

We are home from our trip and I have had a chance to go through the first 200 pictures! These were from my camera...now begins the work of helping the kids go through their pictures. Our first day was LOTS of driving, but we made pretty good time and everyone was pretty happy. We stopped for a while at lunch time and played at a rest area. One benefit of having kids out of car seats is that we were able to switch places in the van at each of our stops. This helped change things up a bit and kept arguing to a minimum. Matt and I even each took a turn in the back! We arrived in Mitchell, South Dakota shortly before bedtime.
Our first stop the next morning was the famous Corn Palace! This is what it looked like the last time I was there in 1981--and what it looks like today.











On the way home I asked each person to tell me something that they either learned, loved, or remembered about the different places we visited. Here are our memories of Corn Palace:

Quinn: They change the design every year.
Clara: You can make a lot of stuff from corn.
Zane: There were lots of leaf bugs outside Corn Palace.
Millie: We made pressed pennies and got a book to hold them in.
Matt: The reason they built Corn Palace was to hold a corn expo.
Janette: They use 12 different colors of corn to make the designs.

After leaving Corn Palace, we were off to DeSmet! I have always loved the Little House on the Prairie books, and have wanted to visit DeSmet for a while. We took a little detour off of the interstate and headed up to the site of the Ingalls homestead. There were a couple of buildings and a well that were original to the site--the kids pumped water from the well that Pa dug! I have another post below with more info on what we did there, but here were our favorites from this stop:

Quinn: The wagon ride the to schoolhouse pulled by mules (when Millie drove we almost had a runaway wagon!)
Clara: We dressed up as pioneer children at the schoolhouse
Zane: Looking at the dugout made of dirt and the shanty made of wood and newspaper. "You could just read the walls to get the news!"
Millie: We saw a puppy and then me, Zane and Clara all rode a horse.
Matt: The one room schoolhouse which was used for grades 1-8 until the early 1960s. Unbelievable!
Janette: We got to see how Laura and Pa twisted hay during the Long Winter. I finally learned how to pronounce the word "slough" (rhymes with "blue")

Clara had us all in shock when she very quickly solved this Mother Goose riddle on the board (there were four adults in the schoolhouse and none of us had a clue). See if you can solve it--leave us a comment. Check back soon for the answer!

In marble walls as white as milk,
Lined with a skin as soft as silk,
Within a fountain crystal clear,
A golden apple doth appear;
No doors there are to this stronghold,
Yet thieves break in and steal the gold.

Our last stop before arriving at the lodge that evening was Wall Drug. The kids learned all about jackalopes!

Click here for more pictures. Check back in a day or two for Part 2!