I was awake early this morning. On Saturday, when I could sleep in, my nap was up shortly after 6, and I was out on the patio drinking coffee by 6:45. It was a beautiful morning by the way; crisp and clear--60 degrees. As I was pondering the day and what to do with myself as Collin was once again already at work (the fall rice harvest has been quite the head ache this year), I was reminded of several advertisements that this was the weekend of the Parker Homestead activities held annually at Harrisburg, just south of Jonesboro. On a whim, I thought, "Why not? I've never been before; there always seems to be something else going on." I called my mom, she had no plans, and agreed to go along. We left home at 11 for whatever the day would bring.
We had a great time together. Here we are, mother and daughter, at Parker Homestead and I'll share a recap of the day.
We went a little ways off the main highway on a narrow country road and let me tell you, my car hasn't seen a dusty road in quite some time. It took me back to the days of gravel roads that we used to drive on and I was reminded of the blessing that now I drive on paved roads. Thank you, Lord.
Once we were parked and off to the sights, we embarked upon a patch of sorgram (not sure that this is spelled exactly right). It grows on a cane and I've never seen any before. If not for my mom and her experience, I would have been clueless. She began to relate how her dad went about growing it, how you had to strip the stalk, getting the inside pressed for the juice, cooking it down for the syrup, and so forth. It was very interesting to me and I had no idea about any of these details.
We actually got to see the mule turn the press getting the juice from the cane. If you look very closely you can see it dripping into the barrel from the spicket.
Here, we are watching it being cooked off. We got to taste a little sample. Now I've tasted sorgram molasses before and have always thought it was good.
They had animals in pens for the kids to enjoy. I thought all goats were white; that's all I'd ever seen, but I was quite mistaken. They also had a deep brown one as well as a black one. This fellow came up close. I think he thought he would be fed.
They also had mules.
There were lots of log buildings including the school
and the church. It even had stained glass windows which were beautiful.
One fellow was making corn brooms. I had never seen this and thought it to be quite interesting. Once again, my mom could reminisce of the time when my grandmother would get so excited because my grandfather would take corn straw and get brooms made for her. Mom said when Nanny got a new broom, brother how the dust would fly. She was in a cleaning frenzy.
I was also privileged to see a grist mill in operation and converting corn kernels to pulverized corn meal. Again, my mom had quite the story of Pa taking the corn in to make meal and bringing it home along with the remnants that couldn't be used but to serve as chicken feed. One thing about yester year--nothing went to waste. Again, if you look closely, you can see the meal falling from the shoot.
Of course, they had tons of old farm implements and equipment. I made some of these photos because I thought Collin and Bryan might enjoy seeing some of them. Those two would have tarried several hours just looking at the equipment.
After making our rounds, we headed back to present day to see what else we could get into. We hadn't particularly noticed while looking around, but walking back to the car we both discovered we were parched. As quickly as I could drive back into civilization, I pulled into Sonic and we ordered cherry limeades. I believe it was the best I've ever had.It was so early still that I thought we might as well shop a little. We hit the Dollar General and perused the aisles. Back in Jonesboro, we stopped off at Kohl's. We hadn't been there in a while and thought they might have some seasonal items that we would be interested in. Sure enough, we hit pay dirt. Take a look at my new throw pillows for fall--1/2 price. I'm so pleased. I've wanted some since last fall.
We finished out the day in Sam's and decided to call it a day. It was around 4.I enjoyed the Parker Homestead. I saw some interesting things, I learned something new that I didn't know, and I got a better insight to the life and times of which my grandparents lived. I never knew Pa Wood. I was 9 months old when he passed at 90. Today, in fact, would have been my Nanny's birthday. We calculated in the car that she would have been 118 years old. These are precious times and memories that my mom could tell me about and share with me and that is a priceless treasure. I've seen Parker Homestead now and I don't know that I would care to go again, but I had a great time. If you haven't visited, I would encourage you to give it a whirl.
Marcia
