A Victorian Christmas

This book was used in the Victorian Christmas Card Presentation

The boys and I attended a wonderful home school history program at the Gaston County Museum today: A Victorian Christmas. We rotated through several different well-prepared and captivating presentations covering everything about a Christmas in the Victorian Era including, decorating, stockings, gifts and toys, Christmas trees, tree ornaments, sleds and sleighs, and cooking.


Sam got our party started immediately at the first presentation by revealing our unchurching. It was some Victorian toys, under a little Victorian Christmas Tree....a really nice wooden Noah's Ark complete with the Two by Two's. He admired it, I could tell, and as Mr. Jeff talked, Sam sat as close to it as he could. Finally, Mr. Jeff called attention to the ark..."Who knows what this is?"...and Sam, excited and still enamored with the boat and the animals, is going to allow another kiddo to answer a question about HIS boat LIKE HELL...Sam eagerly raises his hand, almost standing he raised it so forcefully...Mr. Jeff calls on Sam....Sam exclaims, "It's...one of those...........um.......JESUS THINGYS!" Bwahahahahahahahahahahahaha! I am standing in the Bible Belt, amongst a clan of Baptist home schoolers and their parents I'm sure, and Sam calls Noah's Ark A JESUS THINGY! You should have seeen the look on Mr. Jeff's face, but graciously he replies, "Well, yes, but what IS IT?"...and all of the good little Baptist school-at-homers sing in unison..."NOAH'S ARK!" Freaking hilarious! Love it!



The things we found most interesting (besides the Jesus Thingy):

 Postage was like a collect phone call. If you sent mail, the person you sent it to had to pay the postage. People wanted to send beautiful Christmas greetings, but they didn't want to burden the recipient with the costs. This eventually reversed postage costs to the sender. We made Victorian Christmas Cards at this presentation!

We loved the wax ornaments, the real gingerbread ornaments, and the peanuts-wrapped-in-colorful-paper-to-look-like-candy ornaments, real popcorn as garland, and real fruits on the tree. We were fascinated that they put REAL candles all over the tree, and stood around the glowing tree soaking it all in for fifteen minutes, because fifteen minutes was the max the candles could burn without burning the tree and probably the house down with it. We don't have our tree up yet, so I'm sure the boys aspire to put REAL things on our tree now that they are impressed with the Victorian way....we will NOT be doing the REAL candles, and Mom will be watching closely to assure that no one ATTEMPTS it. We made Victorian Cornucopia Candy Holder Ornaments! They boys have already put pecans and who knows what else in theirs.  

We have talked about this before from seeing pictures in books, but they had the REAL stockings (socks) hung on the fireplace, to be filled with small toys, nuts, and fruits. The socks were usually hung by the fire anyway, any day, to dry. The speaker emphasized just how big of a deal something such as an orange would have been at that time of year back then, due to being out of season and lack of transportation. Wow the things we take for granted today.

We loved going into the carriage house and seeing the sleighs and sleds! The Transport Sled was most interesting...the Victorian Era's eighteen wheeler, minus the sleazy truck driver!

Our last presentation had a beautiful Victorian Christmas table setting that included a Gingerbread House and our favorite, a Gum Drop Tree!

There was a snowy model of the little town of Dallas, NC. Josiah LOVES models.They also have some really cool models of a mill and a mill town in this museum.

 

Last but not least, the Stereoscope! Too cool...Read about it here:  http://www.dlt.ncssm.edu/collections/toys/html/exhibit01.htm



One of those JESUS THINGYS....Bwahahahahahaha!!!!