The past few weeks I have been showing you skies from our May/June trip. This continues today with a sky over the prairie in North Dakota. I think it is North Dakota. It could actually be South Dakota; there is not a lot to tell the difference in most parts of both states. But I am calling it North  Dakota because Prince Charming is from there, and I am sure would want a North Dakota sky to be part of SkyWatch. (We were driving at the time, and the time stamp on the picture could have been either.)

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To see LOTS more terrific sky pictures or to find out how to participate in this meme, head to the SkyWatch blog.

Prince Charming is out-of-town. He’s in a god-forsaken desert at some kind of meeting. (Not this desert.) The girls in this house are not happy when Prince Charming leaves–none of them. But he rarely travels now, and it was only two days and one night, so we are surviving.

To make the best of it, I never do any real cooking, and we sometimes watch a movie later than regular bedtime.

But since it is summer, I decided to go all-out and make it a Girls’ Night. (Unfortunately we have an early and long day today, but it was fun last night!)

First, Chic made cookies while Chicklet was taking a nap yesterday.

Chic using the mixer to make chocolate chip cookies.

This is Chic’s first real attempt at cookies without constant supervision. I helped get things she couldn’t reach since I was there, but she did most of it herself. I was so proud of her!

Cookies exactly the way I like them.

I have never been a master cookie chef. That is until I found a Mrs. Fields cookies cookbook. My cookies are always flawless now (at least to my taste), and I taught Chic the secrets which include not overmixing, baking longer at a lower temperature and letting them cool on the counter rather than racks.

Next was popcorn.

I will admit that Prince Charming has made the popcorn in this house since Chicklet was on the way. (I was really sick at the time. He started doing it, and it has just been that way since.) I do not like microwave popcorn, so we use a crank popcorn maker. The one in the picture is the 4th or 5th one we have owned in the past 11 years of marriage. I LOVE popcorn, and we use it a lot.

Popcorn in this house is made in this pan; never in the microwave.

I was a little nervous because I burned the popcorn the last couple of times I tried it (thus assuring that Prince Charming always does it), but he was gone. I actually thought of having him make some before he left, but he was SO busy that I did not have the heart to ask.

I am proud to say I did not burn it, and it turned out wonderfully! (Probably because I forced myself to stay away from the computer for the three minutes it was popping.)

I thought a little plate of cheese with at least a little nutritional value might be a good idea. (Turns out that was mostly for me. I did not pick the favorite cheeses of young girls.)

We settled in to watch a move–a long one.

Just the view of this makes me excited!

Yes, Anne of Green Gables. I am a little bummed I did not get the title page. It was an afterthought to take pictures of the screen, and I missed it and was too lazy to rewind and did not want to extend the viewing time longer than necessary because of our schedule today.

I would be happier if I didn't have errands all day and we could stay home and watch the next movie!

The girls enjoyed their “food.”

I am sure they each had at least four of these bowls full of popcorn.

When I learned that Chicklet was going to be a girl, one of the first things I thought of was Girls’ Nights like this. This is complete contentment and bliss to me. (Prince Charming will watch with us, but it’s fun to just have a Girls’ Night.)

And yes, we will read the books. That is slated to start next summer. (Chic can read them any time she wants, but I will read the series to both of them then. Right now we are reading the books by Laura Ingalls Wilder.)

Last week I showed you a little of what we did in DeSmet, SD, with the Laura Ingalls Wilder Memorial Society. I forgot to mention, however, that Laura did not move to  South Dakota. At the time it was the Dakota Territory.

This week we are going to the homestead site. I’ve decided to break this one up because there was so much to do there.

We only had a couple of hours at the homestead. It was enough to do everything, but I would like to spend more time the next time.

The site has many building reproductions and is very informative. Some of the buildings are full of displays, but many have people to help make the experience more real and interesting, especially for children.

The first building we went to was a school house. You can tell the girls are excited. (There is nothing quite like running children on the open prairie.) Inside was a stationary covered wagon on which they could place and LOTS of displays with photos and information about the Ingalls family and their travels.

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We then went to a dugout house and a small shanty.

Imagine six people living in this space.

The above photo is a “half-shanty” which is what was usually built for a homestead claim. When Laura moved here, there were six people in the family. The quilt on the bottom right is the one bed. I cannot imagine living in such a small space, but definitely the bright side would be that one would not accumulate as much crap stuff.

We then went to a larger house. It was a full shanty (two bedrooms were normally the next addition), and it had a large sitting room added onto it. The sitting room was larger than the rest of the house combined. The Ingalls built a room onto their house for Mary’s organ.

Nothing in this room is original Ingalls Family possessions; it just gives as idea of what it might have looked like. I was particularly drawn to the "what-not" in the corner. I remember that vividly from the books.

At this house there was someone to show the girls how the Ingalls girls made paper into decorative designs for shelves, let them play the organ, and asked them to help with the laundry. First she sent them to the pump to get some water.

Pumping water was hard work for two little girls!

They had a tough time getting the water to come and wanted to quit, but their mean Mommy made them keep trying, and finally they were successful. (Though it would have taken a LONG time to get enough water for laundry at this rate of drip.)

Success at last!

After that they had to get their lye soap wet and wash a dish towel on a washboard.

Chic washing her towel.

Next was the wringer to get out the extra water. (I was grateful the helper pushed the cloth through.)

Chicklet turning the handle of the wringer.

Then they hung their linens on the line to dry.

Chic's linen drying on the line.

I loved seeing that crisp, white towel drying on the line. We were not there to take it off the line, but my guess is that after it dried, it smelled so clean and fresh!

The girls were amazed at how much time all of this took.  They were beginning to realize that pioneer girl life did not involve as much play as they are accustomed to!

Next week I’ll show you more of the homestead.

My World is a weekly meme in which participants are virtual tour guides. Go check it out and see the worlds of others. Or better yet, take a look at the guidelines, and do your own My World Post!

Another Prairie Sky. I have a thing for windmills. I do not often photograph them because I usually see them when buzzing down the highway at high speed. And they pretty much all look alike. (But I also love wind turbines and anything the wind blows for power, I guess.)

Windmill at the Laura Ingalls Wilder Homestead site near DeSmet, South Dakota.

To see LOTS more terrific sky pictures or to find out how to participate in this meme, head to the SkyWatch blog.

Note: I don’t normally advertise my posts during SkyWatch, but if you like Laura Ingalls Wilder and are not a regular reader of this blog, my last post (for My World Tuesday) was about visiting some of her childhood haunts, and my next My World post (Monday, July 13) will be about the homestead where this picture was taken.

I'll admit to shamelessly looking like a tourist while taking pictures on this trip!

Last month after my semi-annual sojourn to Missouri, we took a “side trip” to North Dakota. (Prince Charming is from North Dakota.) But on the way to North Dakota from Missouri is South Dakota. And South  Dakota boasts De Smet which was one of the places Laura Ingalls Wilder lived. Like many American girls, I became smitten with Laura when my elementary school teacher read the “Little House” books to us during rainy recess periods. I related to Laura because I had mud-brown hair as did she (and all the charmed people had golden hair), and I was born in Mansfield, Missouri, where she lived a great deal of her married life.

DeSmet was full of these giant locust trees whose blossoms had a most pleasing scent.

Her house in Mansfield has been turned into a museum, but I have not taken my children there, even though we visit so often.  We took many field trips there when I was in elementary school, an I must admit I was a bit bored with it. Touring houses full of antiques does not hold the attention the average 5- and 7-year-old, so I decided long ago to wait until my girls were older to do that. Plus we are near there twice a year, so we can do that any time.

The surveyor's house where Laura lived when her family first moved to South Dakota. This house has been moved from its original site.

But DeSmet is different.  There are two areas devoted to Laura Ingalls Wilder. One is mostly in the town of DeSmet, and one is at the old homestead. The Laura Ingalls Wilder Memorial Society runs the town portion, and they have some very fun things to do.  They have collected several original buildings, or point out where you can see them, and made replicas of others. We did not tour houses and schools for the same reason we have not visited Mansfield (though I personally REALLY wanted to–but we’ll be back there again), but they had a fun scavenger hunt that was just perfect for our girls. They got to ride in a “covered wagon” all over town while Prince Charming pulled them. At various stops (landmarks from Laura’s books), they found postcards to put in a mini scrapbook. They had a blast. They were Laura and Mary, I was Ma, Prince Charming was Pa, and our dog was Jack. (This  happens quite often, but they were really in the spirit of it there.)

What is better than being in a "covered wagon" pulled all over town?

This post includes  a few stops we made in the above wagon. Next week I will take you to the Homestead.

At the depot we found a letterbox AND a scavenger hunt postcard. We were lucky enough to get there when a train was coming through. The girls were mesmerized.

At the site of the memorial society is a replica of the school where Laura taught. My girls honestly could have spent at least a couple of hours there pretending to be teachers and students.

This was the house the Ingalls family had in town after Laura married. This house offers tours. Hopefully next time...

"Pa" helped build the frames for the stained glass windows in this church. The Ingalls family would probably flip if they saw the VBS program they were doing this summer. (The same one my church did which nearly made me flip.)

This was a replica of the school Laura and her sisters attended. Inside was a hands-on discovery area. In this photo, Chic is writing her name in braille by gluing split peas to paper.

My World is a weekly meme in which participants are virtual tour guides. Go check it out and see the worlds of others. Or better yet, take a look at the guidelines, and do your own My World Post!

The promised post about the winners of my giveaway is not going to be now. I made extra cards which have not been photographed. The banner has to be made with materials I need to order (ASAP). And there will be photo cards which I have not yet assembled, so I will save it until everything is ready–which could be a couple of weeks.

The winners have all been notified and responded, but I’ll tell you who they were. (And if you know me, I did not only pick two. There were four.)

Maria of One Day in Hania and Organically Cooked won a small pile of hand-stamped cards.

Painted Maypole won the “summer” banner. The colors she likes are exactly the ones I was going to use to make my own, and the paper for that JUST because available.

Leia of We Love Luna won another pile of hand-stamped cards.

Fishing Guy won photos cards–my choice!

Thanks to all of you who entered and read this blog! There will be more giveaways from time to time. I love to make stuff, and I especially love giving it away!

Dogs and horses, especially horses are always dressed up for the occasion.

So usually for Independence Day we go to a small-town parade in a neighboring town. We have done this every year since moving here, but we will not be going today. It’s a bit of a bummer, but we went to an even SMALLER parade when we were in North Dakota last month (and got WAY more candy), so I think the girls will survive this year.

The images in this post are from last year’s parade.

My two girls and a friend, anxiously awaiting the next candy throwing, but intrigued by the horse-mess clean-up--maybe the most integral part of the parade!

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This is the Big Sky on the Prairie as we were leaving DeSmet, SD, last month.

To see LOTS more terrific sky pictures or to find out how to participate in this meme, head to the SkyWatch blog.

To those of you who have already seen this, I apologize, but I wanted to remind everyone about my giveaway, and the last post had other things that were not exactly pleasant. (Cut finger.) So I thought I would just copy the giveaway part from that post and paste it here.

This is your last chance to sign up. I’ll be drawing winners tomorrow (Thursday) and hopefully do a quick post about the winners on Friday.  (But Prince Charming has Friday off work for the holiday, and we’re going to spend the day with our “gaming friends.”)

First, I do not like to do this to get more traffic or comments, so you are required to E-MAIL ME if you want to be entered! Just e-mail louisestamps at aol dot com and let me know you want to enter. (Please put “giveaway” in the subject line.)  There will be two winners. Prince Charming will draw names, and the first one has first choice of what s/he wants.  The other person will get what is left. (But I do not make slouchy things, so I think that is OK, and it is free, OK?)

Here is an idea of the prizes:

1) Handmade cards. There will be these four, but I will probably throw in a couple of others for which I did not immediately have samples. (I have already made two others to go with this pile.)

2) A Banner. But not this one or one even like it, but you get the idea. I have not made it yet, and I decided to wait because the winner can pick the colors (within reason). It will be a “SUMMER” banner (NOT “MERRY”). It is a home decor item–large enough to fit over a double window or in a hallway. Each pennant is about 6″ wide and 9″ long. (I did not measure, but am doing this from a memory. I am too lazy at the moment to get out something to measure.)

You have through TODAY, Wednesday, July 1, to e-mail me. If these things do not interest you, but you think they might interest someone you know, consider entering to give as a gift.

I am also thinking of adding a third prize, but you can tell me if you would be interested. I am not a great photographer. I take some very good pictures, but I do not edit them (other than occasional cropping when I am not too lazy) and I have still not figured out all the manual settings on my camera. I hesitate to do this one because I am so small in a big photography world. But I know a few have really liked some of my pictures. So I could also make a set of cards from my pictures. If you want to enter and that interests you, let me know. It could be a “Louise’s choice” thing, or the winner could choose from pictures I have posted.

OK, I think that’s it for today. But I forgot to tell you THANK YOU for hanging with me for a year. I went back and read a few of my first posts, and many of my readers are the same. I cannot tell you how much I appreciate that you come and read the drivel things I write and look at my photos. If it were not for you, I know I would have quit blogging entirely the couple of times I have had to take extended breaks due to my crazy schedule. YOU keep me coming back! Thank you.

Last week I showed you some of the rides at Silver Dollar City, an 1880’s Craft Village. The next time I go (which could be years from now, but I hope not), I will leave the kids with  someone else and attend to the crafts which to me would make a much more interesting post. However, on the way out, I saw something I had to show my girls.

It was the Wilderness Church. This church has been part of Silver Dollar City as long as I have been going (at least 40 years), and if it has changed at all, it is not much.

It is built of rough-hewn logs and even has rough-hewn log pews.

Every  Sunday they have a church service in here. I will admit I have never been to that. I prefer to go in when it is more empty and quiet.

I do not remember the picture window at the front when I was little, but it may have been there. I could easily find out if I could go through my dad’s enormous slide collection because when I was six, I was the flower girl in a wedding in this church. I felt SO important because I got to be in a wedding in SILVER DOLLAR CITY! I wore a red cotton dress that had white hearts and “I love you”’s printed all over it. I was also missing two front teeth and made sure that was noticeable in every picture. I wish I had the first idea where to find those pictures. Someday I will.

This was the view out the picture window when we were there. But if you were sitting in the pew, you would only see green trees.

Whether or not the picture window is original (the text plaque above it is; I remember that distinctly), it is good for it to be there. There is a pretty view out it. And if I were sitting in church there, it would be nice to see the green woods behind the minister. (Or imagine the rich colors of autumn–a fabulous time to visit.)  Of course I would be looking out the window and not at the minister, but at least it would be in the right direction.

Silver Dollar City celebrates Christmas in November and December. I have not been to that in many years, but they used to have a live nativity scene, and at least a year or two, that was visible from that big picture window in the church. And the sun would set behind it. I wish I visited Missouri at Christmas just for the chance to go to Silver Dollar City then. (And instead of giant snow cones, hot cider is my refreshment of choice.)

My World is a weekly meme in which participants are virtual tour guides. Go check it out and see the worlds of others. Or better yet, take a look at the guidelines, and do your own My World Post!

This post is for Daryl at Out and About in New York City. No, Daryl, I am not gloating, but I always (and likely forever) will think of you when I see a rainbow. (For the rest of you, Daryl has never seen a rainbow.) You know how when you collect something and for no reason people bring you a variety of said thing you collect and say, “I just had to get it. I always think of you when I see X.” Well I always think of Daryl when I see a rainbow. So Daryl, lately I have been thinking of  you a lot!

Maybe I should have saved this for a Skywatch post, but I did not want to. (And if you are here for SkyWatch, it is the next post. But this is the sky, too, so it doesn’t really matter.)

This week was Vacation Bible School. I thought about doing a post for that, but then I decided there was no point. What this meant to us is that we were driving to church around 6 p.m. every evening this past week. (And driving home around 9:30 p.m., but that has nothing to do with the sky, except there was some cool lightning one night way in the distance.)

On Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday we saw rainbows on the way to church. I did not have my camera Tuesday, and it was not a stellar one anyway, but the fact that it was there was nice.

This Wednesday rainbow (previous two photos) reminded me of the Northern Lights. Not the color or anything like that; I have only seen them in Iceland and they were a greenish color. But the colors in this rainbow danced and shimmered like Northern Lights.  It seems that would make sense because the color is coming from moving rain, but I have never seen such movement before. If I had not had to be at VBS for the opening program, I would have stayed to watch until it went away.

The Thursday rainbow (next two photos) was not big on the way to church, but after my part of the program, I went to do some repair to a letterbox. This is what I saw when I got there.

It was too good to not use the windmill as a model for photos. The rainbow is still there, pale and low.

On Friday, there was no rainbow on the way, but there was one during VBS. (My participation in this endeavor is to be the leader for the opening part which means I talk to the kids and introduce songs for 25 minutes–then I am finished–so I go outside and look around.)

I only got a tiny bit of the Friday rainbow. I know it was bigger while I was inside. It is difficult to see in this picture, but it’s the pink near the middle. And I can tell it’s a rainbow and not sunset because I can see green to the left of it. OK, I did not see the best of Friday’s rainbow, but my point is that there WAS a rainbow four days in a row. It makes me wonder how many other times there are rainbows that I do not see.

So that covers Tuesday through Friday, the four rainbows.

On Monday there was a sundog. First, I have NEVER seen a sundog in warm weather. I have seen more here than I have seen in my life (I see more here in a year than I saw in my life previously), but summer? Never! Not even here. The day I saw it, my car said the temperature got up to 99 degrees F. At the time I spotted it, it was still 97 degrees F. (36ish C.) I realize the sky is much colder than the ground, but it still amazed me to see one in summer.

And the funny thing was that usually when I see a sundog here in New Mexico, I see two sections–the ones 180 degrees from each other. This time there was only one. On the other side of the sun, there were stormy clouds.

And later, when I was driving, storm clouds covered it up. I am continually in awe of New Mexico skies!

So there you have it. Four rainbows and a sundog in one week.

I did this post for Daryl, but I would also like to recognize Mrs. Chili who is going through some tough times right now with taking care of her lovely mother who has terminal cancer. I know Mrs. Chili has seen rainbows, but I want her to know I am thinking of her.