Thursday Mason & I went with my dear friend Sherry and her grandson, Mason’s good friend Will to check out this place.  I had heard of it but never been.  It actually was too young for Mase & Will, but they managed to keep themselves occupied for an hour.  There was a small but very well done museum – Sherry & I loved the fact that this woman they were rescuing had her hair in rollers.  This fire engine #2 is the one a fireman was driving, and I can’t remember his name, back in the 1930’s when he had a fatal heart attack.  The other firemen managed to get control of the truck, but his death is the only one in Rock Hill by a firefighter in the line of duty.

The boys had a good time crawling through these dark tunnels, to teach them to stay low to the ground and that it may be very dark if they are ever caught in a fire.

Yesterday Mallory, Clara, Meg, Little Hope, & I headed to Lancaster County, where our first stop was the Buford Massacre Battlefield.  I had heard of this for a long time, but had never been.  Yesterday we finally made it happen.  It was a very small battle, officially known as the Battle of the Waxhaws, but was such a brutal defeat – the Patriots tried to surrender to the much larger British force, but almost every man was slaughtered – very few escaped.  Word of the awful battle spread, though, and helped increase sentiment against the British.  This monument is one that was erected in 1955, I think it was, by the DAR, because the original monument was becoming unreadable.  This back of the monument reads, In order that all may continue to share the sentiments of that group of patriotic citizens of Lancaster County who erected a monument here on June 2, 1860, the inscriptions on this memorial are the same as those on the original monument.

From there we were off to eat lunch at Mariachis Mexican restaurant.  We loved how they had the guacamole & sour cream in this little shell 🙂

It was so muddy on the grounds that we didn’t get to really explore like we wanted to while we were there.  There was even a great looking nature trail leading down to Little Sugar Creek, but was so muddy we decided not to try it.  Next trip!  We did check out a bit of the garden area, and the kids were interested in the cold frames.

I loved knowing that Lady Bird Johnson was here to celebrate when the Birthplace was officially opened 🙂

June got this picture of our tour guide Adrienne as she was talking about the big house.  She did such a great job – obviously loved her job, and loved when the kids, and anyone, really, asked questions. 

The big house really was interesting and impressive.  The wall paneling was original to this house, which while not the one the Polks lived in, was still 150 years old.  It was just beautiful.

Yesterday Charlie, June, Adam, Mason, & I headed to Pineville on our Christmas Break adventure, to visit this museum that I’d never been to.  We spent some time in the museum to begin our time there, where half was devoted to his early life in Mecklenburg County – his family moved to Columbia, TN, when he was 11, the oldest of five children (five more were born after they moved) – and about half to his presidency.  I missed a lot of the presidency information – the kids were getting antsy – but I loved the part about this childhood that I did get to see.  And I especially loved reading this where his father took him home from his baptism, and when he was finally baptized, it was as a Methodist 🙂

We absolutely loved the guided tour we went on of the actual old buildings, although they were not the buildings that James K Polk actually lived in.  Of course no one knew he would someday be president, so those buildings weren’t preserved.  There were three buildings there, though, that had been moved from other parts of Mecklenburg County, and were from a little later era than when the Polks lived there, but fairly close.  June had taken my camera by then, and got this picture of the little guys  listening to our tour guide.  This was in the kitchen building, which would have been their original cabin, until they built the bigger house.

Today Lindee, Mallory, Clara, Emma, & I made our annual trek to the Grove Park Inn in Asheville, to check out the gingerbread house competition.  As always, the entries were amazing, and we just had such a wonderful time.  This was one of my favorite entries – Hansel and Gretel.  This side of the house was all beautiful and fun and cheery, and the other side was all black, and the sweet old lady had turned into a witch.  There were the cages for the children and everything.  So creative.  It was one of the top ten, and I can certainly see why.

It was an absolutely gorgeous day, so we had a nice time walking around on the patios and stairs outside – it’s usually way too cold for us to do much of that.  Lindee took this picture of me with the girls while we were out looking at the fountains.