July 4th Happy Birthday America!!

July 4     Happy Birthday America!

The Stuhr Museum in Grand Island, Nebraska is noted for its July 4^th Celebrations.  The festivities take place in the restored prairie railroad town.  The museum focuses on the expansion of the railroad into the west; Grand Island is the town it is today because of the railroad.

All of the buildings are original time period buildings that have been moved to a new location and restored.  It is similar to Conner Prairie rather than Sauder Farms.  The main attraction on July 4 is the parade down the main street.  Think Disney 150 years ago.  The townsfolk all dressed to the hilt wearing their Sunday best including elaborate hats.  The Christian Women Temperance Association was politicizing the event and all the businesses carried banners to advertise their wares.  The museum people nabbed little kids from the crowd to carry banners and flags.  It was fun to see.

My favorite building has to be the prairie farm house from the 1880s.  The restoration process was nicely done and the docents were in their period clothing, sweating, and ever so friendly.  It is interesting to note that most of the museums that dot this area appear to be well funded, but not so well attended.  I’m thinking it is because it is the dead of summer.  Perhaps more people attend during the school year.  When I inquired about the quilts in the house the docent asked me if I had read the book No Time on My Hands by Grace Snyder.  It is a book written to document the quilting of her mother,   Nellie.   The docent explained that as a young child of the prairie Nellie begged her mother for scraps of fabric and began to spend all of her idle time making quilts.  One of her quilts is now on display at the International Quilt Study Center---it contains thousands of  fabric pieces—none larger than a dime.  I knew exactly what quilt she was talking about.  She was quite the stitcher.

I did finish putting the borders on my wall quilt and now it needs to be backed and quilted.  I still need a backing yet.  I usually look for clearance or end of bolt bargain fabric for the backs of my quilt as nobody really sees them.  Laura and I both purchased several (Nick—do not read this) bargain backings the last time we went to our favorite quilt store in Cedar Rapids.  Oftentimes you can spend as much on the back as you have in the front, which to me seems wasteful, so I prefer to look for bargain fabric.

Tomorrow it is Westward Ho---as some of my “friends” are calling my trip.  It is wonderful to work with people you love and who love you enough to refer to you as a “ho.”  Gotta love’em because they are all so darn special and I wouldn’t be who I am today without them.

The Silver Coronet Band at the Stuhr Museum

My new wall quilt.

My little house on the prairie.