Little Finds

I love visiting small museums in little out of the way country towns. There is one particular museum that we have been planning to visit for a few years now. Today we were finally driving past while it was open. It was a wonderful little wattle and daub house from the 1870s that had been converted into a museum. Inside it was a treasure trove of Victorian and Vintage items.

Of particular interest to me was some amazing shell art and hair art.

 Floral Shell Picture

 Floral Picture made from Human Hair

The museum was set up like a house with items relating to each room. In one of the bedrooms there was a large collection of vintage and period garments. Some were in an open wardrobe where you could touch them and others were hanging on the walls and on mannequins. 

This beautiful circa 1850 orange pleated fan front dress was hanging against a lime washed wall on a normal hanger. It is beautifully made and in amazing condition (for now, unfortunately I hate this type of treatment of original garments. They had it labelled incorrectly as an 1887 wedding dress for a particular lady whose name I have forgotten).

 This dress was also labelled as 1887 going away dress for the above 'wedding dress' (It looks Edwardian to me). It was also unfortunately stored in the same manner and is of almost perfect quality. I could not spot any visible damage. It really is a shame. 

The back of the dress. It had a plain panel down the back of the skirt and visible white stitching creating detail down to waist. 

This was a bodice made in the same ridged silk fabric as the dress it was next to, but it is of an earlier design. I was curious as to whether the dress was altered into a later Edwardian design to extend its life? The decoration was a beautify braid with paste stones stitched on. The center panel is a beautiful gold silk brocade.  The collar is a very stiff mandarin collar.

 The cuff detail

 The three garments hanging on the wall. They were really an amazing find and I am glad that I was able to photograph and document them. I just hope that they get preserved better in the future as they really are in amazing condition. Unfortunately, there is a black lace evening cloak next to them which was is a very sad state.

Safari Adventure

After last weeks fun at the zoo, a few of us who live near Murray Bridge decided to take up the half price offer of attending Monarto Zoo. This was a last minute decision, but it was still great fun. Nic and I decided to dress in 1860s. This meant that Nic was able to research which type of pith helmet we should wear. It turned out that the tall ones were first used in the 1840s. In the past I have always linked pith helmets with the Edwardian and Late Victorian Period. While they were army issue, Nic believes that they would also have been available to civilians travelling in areas requiring them. Jessie was in 1890s and dad in 1920s so they wore the later rounded style. We also had Theresa and Andrew to keep us company in modern clothing. I think we are blessed to have so many interesting places that we can go and visit. We are looking forward to more fun adventures in the future.

 Monarto Zoo has an interesting set up. You drive into the park and park in a visitors center. At the center you get on a bus. The buses go ever 20 minutes. The buses take you through the enclosures. At a few locations you can get off the bus and follow walking trails to amazing lookouts over the various enclosures. These lookouts gave some of the most amazing views.

 Nic looking for a new trophy at the waterhole lookout, which looks out over the giraffe, ostrich and some types of antelopes. 

 Nic lent me his telescope to get a better view.

 Dad, just enjoying the day.

 Dad and Nic looking for the elusive cheetahs. It was a warm day and we found them sleeping under a tree on the far side of their enclosure.

 The footpaths to the lookouts were really nice. Volunteers have been planting a lot of local native plants to re-vegetate the area. 

 We had a picnic lunch at the Visitors Center (not very period I know, but I have been very busy with sorting out work this week).

 We ended the day at the Chimpanzee Enclosure. They were amazing. We were able to watch them go into their night quarters for dinner. Wow they are scary when fighting over food.

 On the walk back to the Visitors Center we saw this amazing Yellow Tail Rock Wallaby. So Pretty.

 To end the day we had a group photo. Left to right Jessie, Paul (dad), Nic and Me.

The group photo was taken near the Meerkats. This little guy was fascinated by the size of my skirt and came over to investigate. 

Happy Birthday

Today was my birthday. It was also a Zoological Promenade Day for the Victoriana Society. It was great to see my friends, dress in period attire and visit the zoo. Nic had not been to the zoo since he was little and I had not been since I first moved back home from China.

This month was also Jessie's birthday and Nic's birthday so we decided to celebrate all of our birthdays today.

 I know I mentioned my hair the other day, but it is amazing the difference longer hair makes. This took only 10 minutes to tease, rat and braid. The same style used to look a lot smaller and took me over half an hour. My bonnet also now sit on my head a lot better and tighter. I do not have to rely on hat pins to keep them attached anymore.

 Everyone gathered at the front gate awaiting any late arrivals. It was quite a shame, but they made Nic place his sword in safekeeping at the visitor station at the entrance. I guess they don't trust Victorians around all those amazing pelts, which is funny as they had a pelt stand just inside the door to educate against killing animals and all we could do was discuss the merits of each pelt and recommending different articles that they would be most suited to. This is especially pertinent as it is almost winter here and we do have an ice skating day in a few months and I could use a muff and winter hood. Thankfully the staff did have a good sense of humour. 

 We had 3 birthdays this month so I shared the day with Nic (13th March) and Jessie (24th March). We each had our own cupcake and candle.

 Sorry it is blurry, but the camera had an accident and it took a while to get the settings sorted.

 Adelaide Zoo is the only zoo in Australia with a Panda breeding program. It was happily ignoring the crowd and eating bamboo. I must have made an impression as it stopped eating to stare at me for a while. 

 Today was exciting as it was the first time that Nic was able to wear his French Crimean War chasseurs d'afrique uniform. It is a very striking uniform. 

The avairy was amazing. There were birds flying all around us. 

I think that the lion saw Nic's pants and thought of dinner as a second later she gave a huge raw that almost made me drop the camera.

 

This little fellow was sooo adorable. He was cuddly and licked my hands. He also tired to steal the sandwiches from my basket...

 At the children's petting zoo I begged my dad for $2 for a bag of food to feed the animals. It was great fun. They gentlemen made fun of my wanting to join in on the feeding, but they still had a turn and I'm sure I see laughter and smiles. I believe it is important to get in touch with your inner child sometimes.

 Some of the goats did get a little demanding for the food. It was funny how at first one of them bounced off of my crinoline, until they learnt how to hook their hooves onto the wires to keep themselves upright.  

I don't think I would want to spend my birthday any other way. A few of us are thinking of heading to the safari park at Monato next Saturday. Still in period, but exchanging our bonnets for pith helmets. 

Chicken Coop Fun (part 1)

In exploring the past, we do more than just make and wear historical clothing. We have many interests including gardening, produce, preserving, and period pets.

We recently had chicken problems. Our old chicken Dotti (standard large red hen) was getting old and lonely. We went looking for companionship for her. Instead of just buying some more standard Isa Browns on point of lay.... we fell in love with a cranky OEG partridge bantam and her 3 babies. As a result we gave the OEGs our commercial coop and built a temporary run across the creek for Dotti.

She loved her new home, until...

1. New neighbours purchased the house next door with little white dogs that yap through the fence at her and also keep escaping into our yard and running around her run yapping at her.
2. We separated the mother OEG (called Lucille) from her babies to get her to stop being broody so that we could get her to lay and stop being cranky.
3. A friend had issues with his own flock of Isa's and asked us to take 2 of his that were point of lay and being bullied. These poor chickens were soo scared when we first got them, they very different hens now.
4. None of them getting along and yes the bantam bullied the Isa's.

This resulted in the run being separated into three and no eggs, due to the stress of the dogs yapping.

To solve this problem we build a new run on the other side of the house to the dogs. To save money we used branches from trees that had fallen down, chicken wire and an old metal framed door from the creek that had been on the property since at least the mid twentieth century. We were also able to line the floor with terracotta tiles that we found on the back lot. For the coop we decided to make a wattle and daub chicken house. We did not have any wattle branches so we used pieces of flexible wood that we had around the garden. The daub was a mix of cut straw, clay from the creek bed and lime mortar that Nic found in some archaeological research papers (we chose not to use dung as research currently has the impression that the quantity in tested specimens is soo low that it could have come from small pieces of dung that came from recycled hay and on testing has made no difference to the outcome of the mix). It took 3 wheel barrow loads to complete the two walls and about 2 weeks to dry properly. The weather has been crazy here so we put a temporary metal sheet roof on it. The next step will be to use some thin pine that was left over from a fence to make a shingle roof. Once it is completed we also plan to lime wash the walls.

This project is more historically inspired and so far is working well. The chickens love the new run. Dotti and the new Isa's (Henrietta and Polly) started to get along straight away. We could not put Lucille in with them and her and Dotti were fighting and Dotti had pecked off Lucille's comb (thankfully it did grow back). We put Lucille back with her babies, but she kept flying out at night (we suspect she didn't like her children on re-introduction) until one morning we found her with the big chickens and she has been happy their ever since. I guess this goes to prove that chickens function better in a nicer and less stressful environment.

The basic run down the side of the house. The branches were put in holes and back filled with gravel and then dirt.

 The framework with Polly and Henrietta supervising construction.

 The daub mixture

 Nic almost finished with the walls.

 The house, waiting for a new roof and white washing.

The chickens enjoying the run.