Saturday, July 7

7/7/07!

It didn't start off too well. My cell phone got stolen or destroyed or something. I left it charging in the bathroom over night. We were right next to the bathroom, but that didn't matter. The parks guy helped me look and found the charger, stuffed high up in the rafters, the big wooden planks that made up the roof of the bathroom building. It was definitely a prank.

My cell phone company said they wouldn't replace it without a police report, so I called and a police officer came out right away. That was kind of exciting, I guess...

I haven't gotten a new phone yet, mostly because I feel ashamed and embarrassed that I did something so dumb.

We decided to take an unplanned detour when we saw a sign for HARKIN STORE, a historically accurate General Store on the way to Walnut Grove, Minnesota. We were so glad we did!!!

The place was an original store from the time that Laura Ingalls was alive. The man who ran it showed us all the items that were in it and how they would have been used, like slates and slate pencils, which students used instead of notebooks. They looked like small blackboards but you scratched them instead of using chalk. he showed us how to grind coffee by hand in a coffee mill. We tried on old fashioned hats and examined all kinds of things that they would have sold in a general store back then. He was really cool and had a station wagon with radical political bumper stickers all over it and gave us free water. We liked him.

Then we got to Walnut Grove, Minnesota. That isn't actually so important to the real Laura story, but when they made it a TV show in the 70's that's where the story took place.

We decided not to see the Sod House because they were charging too much for admission. That turned out alright because we saw lots and lots and lots of Laura stuff!

We went to the actual site that they lived in a dugout, which is a house dug into the side of a hill. They are cool and easy and inexpensive, but Laura's Ma did not want to live in one. She wanted to live in a REAL house so they didn't stay there. I have a piece of wheat or grass or something in my scrapbook from there.

My scrapbook is falling apart. I bought it because it says Wendy on it, but the pages are perforated. That wasn't so smart. Oh well. Maybe I will staple it all together when I am done.

We then went to see something called FRAGMENTS OF A DREAM, The Laura Ingalls Wilder Pageant. It was a play about the story of her life. Apparently anyone from Walnut Grove can audition and everyone gets at least a walk on role.

The actors were TERRIBLE but the set was amazing and if you love the books you had to love the play just *cause*. It was SO cheesy it was wonderful. And we missed dinner so we bought something there called a "walking taco" which was pretty popular in Wisconsin and Minnesota. It was a bag of nacho chips opened up and tossed with lettuce, ground meat and cheese. I've had that before called a Frito Pie. They're both kept in the bag.

I had to go buy another because I dropped mine on the ground. They were SO nice, they didn't even charge me for another!

The play even had pyrotechnics! They acted out the time in the books when there was a prairie fire. I kind of knew there would be some fire because at intermission, a stage hand came and lit something on the floor and covered it up. I would have been really scared if I hadn't been a little prepared!

After the play I met the cast and asked some of them on video some questions. I even said, "What would you like to tell my drama students back home?" Most of them said "Work hard!!!".

That was a really fun day other than having my cell phone gone.