Fifth Step: Rockford Peaches and the AAGPBL ~Exploring~

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Before our big move to Oregon we managed to make it up to Rockford,IL to see Beyer Field, the Peaches home field. There isn’t much left of what was originally there, but the brick entryway where patrons would enter and ticket windows are still there. The field is in the midst of being restored with new amenities being added every year and a new team calls Beyer Field home, the Rockford Starfires. We didn’t get to see a game there but we did get to a little sneak into the Midway Village Museum. Unfortunately, they were closed to the public the one day we could go out there! 😦 However, someone there did let us into the gift shop and we got Peach bobble head, a t-shirt and we got see some pictures of the Peaches that were hanging in the halls. I was so bummed to miss the actual museum. Argh! So, no game and no museum. The trip felt a little like a bust but we did go to fabulous children’s museum while we were in town and the kids had fun and got to see a little bit of history. 🙂

Fifth Step: Rockford Peaches and the AAGPBL ~Wise Words~

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Fifth Step: Rockford Peaches and the AAGPBL ~Introduction~

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Summer is here and so is baseball. I grew up in the Midwest and lived there my whole life…until a month ago. When spring and summer come, so does the excitement of baseball! While girls and womens softball is hot hot  hot now, there was a time when womens hard ball baseball was the place to be and that was in the mid 1940s to the mid 1950s. One of the most well known All-American Girls Professional Baseball League teams was the Rockford Peaches, based out of Rockford, IL. You might know them from a little movie called, A League of Their Own. 🙂 Today, Rockford is home to the Rockford Starfires, a new hard ball team looking to revive women’s baseball on the Peaches old stomping grounds. However, that doesn’t mean the Peaches are gone, or forgotten! They live on through the WWII Girls Baseball Living History League! They play at different historical reenactments, museums, and events in Wisconsin, Illinois, and Indiana and we had the pleasure of seeing them play at Cantigny Parks and Garden before our move west. They are fabulous and you should really get out and see them play if you can(or even join their league if you have a passion for baseball and fun–I was seriously considering it myself if we weren’t moving)! Check out their schedule at the link to their site above! The ladies were happy to talk to the kids and spread their love of history and baseball. They even asked Big Sister and Little sister to come try their hand at hitting the ball and running the bases DURING their game! How fantastic is that?! They even let Little Sister keep their practice ball.  I have to say the kids really felt like they hit the jackpot and so did I! Such a great experience and memories! These are some of my favorite photos to date! Please enjoy!

Could barely keep her off the field!
Off to home plate!
Dang sun! It was hot hot hot and the sun was bright!
How cool are these ladies!
Good game!
Love this!!
They let baby girl keep their practice ball!

Fourth Step: Jane Austen ~Conclusion~

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After all this tea and partying we had to try it ourselves at home! The kids each got a little toy tea set of their own to play with and I got my grandmother’s tea set out of storage so that I could play too. 🙂 We prepared by making some yummy cookies. I got 3D printed cookie cutters of Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Darcy, and also 3D printed cookie cutters of my kids silhouettes to make cookies with(links on my Pinterest page here). We decorated them and baked scones and got some Jane Austen inspired tea by Steep Show Teas(Miss Bennet’s English Pear black tea and Jane’s Regency Rose green tea). We didn’t make tea sandwiches like I had originally planned and cut them out with cookie cutters, sigh. In the end it was hot dogs. You win some and lose some I guess. 😉 Next time(and there will be a next time)! The kids at least tried the tea(not without some lumps of sugar of course), but in the end drank mostly apple juice in their tea cups. We had a fun time and definitely plan to make this more of a regular activity. It’s kind of amazing how a little nice china and beautiful plating and food can bring out the civility in your kids at the dinner table. I’d do this more often just for that!

Mixing up some cookie dough!
Getting ready to ‘paint’ our cookies!
Cookie decorating time!
Cookie decorating time!
Cookie decorating time!
Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Darcy ❤
Silhouette cookie cutters of the kids ❤
Kiddo cookies!
All done!
Yummy Jane Austen tea, loved the pear tea!
Time to party!
Time to party!
Time to party!
Getting a lump
Can’t have a tea party without tea!
Mmm!

Fourth Step: Jane Austen ~Exploring~

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Ack! Life has thrown me for a loop the last couple of months and the blog as suffered for it. Time to get back on the wagon! After moving from my lifelong home in the Midwest to the Oregon Coast I have finally settled in enough to whip out a couple of blog posts. Admittedly, part of the problem is that it is summer too. The kids are home. All day. It is exhausting and I don’t get a minute to myself. The days keep slipping by without much getting done, but I’m going to try  and embrace it rather than let it drive me crazy. 🙂

For Jane Austen I had intended to do some different activities, but due to the interest of the kids, all activities pointed toward tea parties! I was perfectly fine with that! We got to bake and learn about the history of tea and how to make a good cuppa. A book that I really enjoyed reading and was a great resource was, ‘Tea with Jane Austen,’ by Kim Wilson(see links for many things mentioned and pictured on my Pinterest board for Jane). I also found some Marvel graphic novel adaptations of Jane Austen books such as; ‘Pride and Prejudice,’ ‘Sense and Sensibility,’ and ‘Emma.’ They were right up my alley as a comic fan and fun for the kids to look at because of all the pictures. 🙂 Another fun find was ‘The Beautifull Cassandra,’ a story written by Jane Austen when she was 12 years old. It was great to show the kids that even as a young girl Austen was writing and honing her craft, she didn’t have to wait until she was an adult to do something she loved! While searching for activities for the kids I came across some Jane Austen themed temporary tattoos and had to get them. 🙂 The kids loved them and I’ll admit I got a kick out of them too. Temporary is a relative term for these tattoos, lol! They adhered to the kids skin for weeks! Finally, we used some alcohol wipes to clean them off when we wanted some new ones. I was really impressed with their staying power! They obviously don’t fit in with the Regency era of activities, but I couldn’t pass them up!

We had a few fun outings during our time as well. We went to a lavender festival at Helvetia Lavender Farm here in Oregon and had some lavender tea and scones with berries while enjoying the most beautiful view up in the hills. We also got to cut our own lavender to make some lavender infused goodies for tea parties at home. The lavender lemonade was delicious! We also visited La Tea Da in Tillamook, Oregon, a wonderful tea house that really knows how to enjoy tea! We ate among antique decor on a myriad of beautifully decorated china, and all the accouterments that comes with a proper tea party. They also had a back room with some dress up items for the kids to enjoy. It was so fun, and the food and tea so tasty, we went back again a week later!  I think we may finally be ready to throw a tea party of our own! 🙂

 

Some of our Jane Austen reading…
More Jane Austen Reading…
Jane Austen fun!
Capt. Wentworth
Captain Wentworth
‘Imprudent’
My favorite, Mr. Knightley ❤
Jane silhouette
Making a fan for our tea party
A the lavender farm
Tea in the hills at the lavender farm
Scones, berries and Devon cream
Yummy!
Cutting fresh lavender
Dressing up for high tea
Dressing up for high tea
Dressing up for high tea
Sandwiches, scones, and dessert

Fourth Step: Jane Austen ~Wise Words~

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Fourth Step: Jane Austen

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The beautiful spring(finally!!!) inspired a garden shoot for the blog! Some of my favorite gardens are English, which led me to Jane Austen! It was a sunny and humid morning which brought out all the beautiful colors at Cantigny Parks and Garden, but it made for a sweaty mama, squinty eyes and frizzy hair for Big Sister. I curled her hair before we left, all super cute and they fell by the time we got to take any pictures! 😦 They still turned out pretty cute, but darn it! All the best made plans….. I didn’t quite capture what I wanted the first go ’round(did I mention squinty eyes and frizzy hair?), which might have had a little to do with the fact that I went by myself with 3 kids under 6 and forgot the stroller. I was running around with clothes in my arms, a camera on my neck and a baby on my hip! Little Sister did not like my elbow in her face while I was trying to shoot, lol! So, we made a second trip, this time just me, Big Sister, and lots of glorious sun blocking clouds! It did make for a bit of a chilly shoot, but we braved it and I am thrilled with the outcome of the second set of pictures. I’ve included pictures from both shoots below. Without further ado, I present Miss Jane Austen. 🙂 P.S. If you are interested in where I got the dress or any of the activities I do in upcoming posts you can check out my Pinterest board for Jane. 🙂

Little Miss told me she was going to do one of her own poses 🙂 This picture just makes me think of Scarlett O’Hara!

Fourth Step: ~Sneak Peek~

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IMG_1289-1editwmOur next lady is one of the most widely read authors in English literature! Her writing has gained her historical importance among critics and scholars for her irony, social commentary, and realism. 😉 

Third Step: Amelia Earhart ~Conclusion~

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So this month has been crazy hectic! Turns out we’re moving. In a month. Needless to say the blog has taken a back seat and so has Amelia Earhart. We’ve still been doing activities and reading, but it hasn’t been as well thought out it as it as been before. Which is unfortunate, but that’s life sometimes, right?! So, our move involved a trip to our new, soon to be home in the Pacific Northwest, which meant a trip to the airport!

The airport was so fun for the kids! We’ve been before, but it’s been two years so the excitement and anticipation was new all over again for the older two. We spent a little time at the Battle of Midway Memorial exhibit at Midway International Airport.Part of the exhibit includes a plane recovered from Lake Michigan in 1991, the SBD Dauntless Dive-Bomber. It hangs from the ceiling as part of the exhibit and is the same type of plane flown in the Battle of Midway in WWII. The exhibition also includes interactive kiosks with videos, pictures and sculpture commemorating the battle. The kids had a good time exploring it while we waited at the airport. Unfortunately, my camera was packed and I only have some terrible iPhone pics of us at the airport. The timing of this trip was perfect and so fitting while we learn about Amelia Earhart and aviation! (Excuse the iPhone pics from the airport, I accidentally checked my camera! 🙂

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Once we got back we did a little experimenting with some different planes in our backyard. It wasn’t very scientific at all, but it was fun! We had a very large styrofoam plane, an inflatable vinyl plane and foam plane that launched from a gun-type device and we flew them all off our deck in the backyard to see which went the furthest. The kid were a little surprised that the largest plane went the furthest. I could go into more detail about why some planes worked and some didn’t, but this was just about fun. 🙂

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We also read some great books about Amelia Earhart this month. My daughter’s favorite by far was ‘I AmAmelia Earhart,’ by Brad Meltzer. She brought to school when it when it was her turn to bring in a book for read aloud and carried it with her for a couple of weeks. It’s a really fun and cute book for young kids the puts an emphasis on following dreams and working hard to achieve them. Admittedly, it’s a favorite of mine as well. We also read ‘Night Flight: Amelia Earhart Crosses the Atlantic,’ by Robert Burleigh, which was great for describing what is like to fly alone across the Atlantic Ocean. Finally, we used ‘Amelia Earhart: The Legend of the Lost Aviator,’ by Shelley Tanaka as reference for Amelia’s life and achievements.

We still have a couple more weeks until the move, hopefully I can get back on track soon! It will be quite interesting to take an adventure of our own!