I Went To Morristown National Historical Park And All I Got Was Lost In Jockey Hollow

And my national park passport stamp, of course!

I seem to have randomly obtained the questionable distinction of having visited the sites of two out of three of the Continental Army's most significant winter encampments. 

...yay, I guess? 

Although maybe I should stop bragging until I've also been to New Windsor. I'll really celebrate then, lol!

Anyway, in some ways Morristown is a "Washington slept here" sort of scenario. Which makes sense, since see the Ford Mansion?

Washington slept here!

Well, kind of. During the first winter here, he actually stayed at Arnold's Tavern (which no longer exists), and honestly that was probably for the best, since poor Mr. Ford was busy that winter dying of pneumonia in his mansion. He left behind his wife, five children, and his parents, but only for a little bit, because his father actually died there as well just a few days later. 

I don't know what his father died of (other than being 73 years old in 1777), but Washington's army did also bring a smallpox epidemic with them to Morristown soooo...

Touring the mansion, it was kind of wild to see how little we know of the actual Ford family and their house and their stuff, especially compared to how detailed all the family info was at Hampton National Historic Site. But that being said, I also appreciate that the site doesn't take any risks in interpreting the mansion as it might have looked in the winter of 1778-1779, when Washington brought his army back to Morristown and ensconced himself, his aides (including Alexander Hamilton!), and sometimes his wife in with Theodosia Ford and her four remaining children (The army wasn't there in the winter of 1777-1778, because they were in Valley Forge!).

So, for instance, although this bedroom, one of the two rooms in the house that was preserved for the use of the Ford family, is as busy as you might imagine for a family of five living in two rooms, you can see that there isn't any art on the walls:

The hallways are similarly completely bare, which was, again, particularly notable compared to Hampton National Historic Site's maximalism. When I asked the ranger about wall art and other decorations, he explained that it's not present because there are no records of what would have possibly been there. However, I found in an old guidebook to Morristown the statement that "[t]he furnishings of the Ford Mansion today may appear restrained (if not severe) by comparison with other historic houses, but they do reflect the type of furnishings that were in the house during Washington’s occupancy and provide a glimpse at the lifestyle and circumstances of a prosperous provincial family in the midst of the American Revolution," so maybe they really just didn't have a ton of stuff on their walls and other pretty knick-knacks?

I could never. I LOVE a knick-knack!

Anyway, guess what?

Washington slept here!

And Alexander Hamilton probably slept here!

These camp beds are super rare genuine Revolutionary War camp beds.

Speaking of Alexander Hamilton, the Morristown claim to fame that I'm personally more interested in is the fact that this winter of 1778-1779 is when he met General Philip Schuyler's wonderful daughter who was way too good for him but she married him anyway.

But when he wasn't busy courting, here's where Hamilton (and, fine, the other aides and Washington himself) got the job done:

And here's where some of the servants slept:

Washington's servants (were some of them enslaved? Lmk if you know!) and Ford's servants (at one point they had at least three enslaved people, but I'm not sure of the timeline) did NOT get along, and apparently fought so much over the kitchen in particular--

To be fair, it's a wonderful kitchen! So spacious!

--that Washington had another entire kitchen built separate to the house that his servants then used. 

After the tour, I wandered through the museum in the visitor center, feeling an eensy pang that my phone was blowing up with texts as the rest of the family organized our weekly Zoom without me (sob!), buuuuut I'd just seen one daughter the day before and the other daughter three days before and would see her again in four more days, so I let myself be sufficed by sending a few interesting photos of my current adventures (an old house! A Revolutionary War camp bed!) to the group chat and then carried myself away back to the pursuit of knowledge and culture.

My favorite part of the museum was an exhibit illustrating the daily life of a wealthy family in the decades before the American Revolution. They had such lovely things!!!

Check out, for instance, this display of some lovely things that men could keep in their pockets:

There was also a pen knife in the case, but I apparently was so zoomed in on these guys that I inadvertently cropped it out.

I tend to keep only a pocket knife and a mini hand sanitizer in my own pockets, but I now feel very invested in the idea of also owning a tiny compass/sun dial, like the object on the right, and a tiny microscope, like the object in the middle, with its carrying case on the left.

When I showed this to the big kid (in order to win the argument I was having with her in which I'd told her that I'd seen a pocket sun dial in a museum and she claimed that was ridiculous how could one use a pocket sun dial and I insisted that you definitely could if you knew your latitude and she said there is no way that would work and I said well pre-Revolutionary War dudes disagree with you and here's a picture to prove it!), I also told her that it was now my personal mission to also carry a pocket sun dial and a tiny microscope.

"Ha!", the rude child said. "Then you'd have to carry a purse! Hahahaha!"

"Nonsense!" said I. "That is why God invented cargo pants!" I can fit an entire paperback in my favorite pair of cargo pants, as long as it's more, say, Killer Angels-sized and not Dune-sized.

OR I could borrow this dude's style and carry a pocketbook, but maybe also in my cargo pants pockets because I have to have my hands free. Genuinely, I HAVE to:

All the handmade items in the exhibit were incredibly charming--imagine having so much leisure time that you could get really, really, REALLY good at embroidery!--but my favorite was this quilt:

I definitely read the label, because I remember reading about the embroidered flowers in particular, but then I guess I got so excited looking at the quilt that I forgot to photograph it, and now I'm irritated that I don't remember why it's this shape? The shape clearly came afterwards because it cuts into the star piecing, and that binding is only there at the corners, but why on earth would they have done that? I guess it would drape nicely over one end of a table or bed, but again, WHY?

So annoying not to know!

However, I am SO interested in these star blocks!

Studying this quilt, I first took it as a lesson that our quilting ancestors did not fuss nearly as much with precise piecing as we do today. And it would make sense, right? Most quilts were made for necessity first, and then beauty, so why not relax and have fun with it?

But then I remembered that Martha Washington's quilts from this same time period are SUPER precise. So now I don't know. Did some quilter's first quilt end up in this display? And that's why it's cut weird, because she wanted to put it to use even though it was her poorest work?

I'll add it to my list of mysteries to solve, I guess!

Shout out to Gilbert Stuart, the world's most ubiquitous painter of George Washington! Talk about having a Special Interest, lol--dude would have KILLED with an etsy shop!

In grad school, I took a class on early American children's literature, and I loved it enough to wonder if maybe I shouldn't be uselessly studying early American literature rather than uselessly studying Medieval literature, but if I'm going to earn a degree I'll never use, I'd rather earn it via dragons, werewolves, and bawdy friars than Puritans, Puritans, and Puritans.

LOVE myself a primer, though!

Found some Revolutionary War cosplayers in the wild!

This book was labeled "George Washington's log book," and seems to be a record of the labor done at his various farm sites. I can see Dogue Run listed, and Muddy Hole:

Under the Muddy Hole entry, the log reports that Gabriel was sick for 2 days. This slave list tells us that Gabriel lived at Muddy Hole along with 41 other enslaved people, but his wife, Judy, who was blind, had to live at Dogue Run.

Like, I'll look at where he slept and stuff, but basically, George Washington sucked.

In other news, you know I love an old clay pipe!

This bowl was decorated with shamrocks and a harp. One of my Irish kin!

The basement of the museum has kid-friendly exhibits!

It's giving Children's Museum of Indianapolis. I'm charmed!

And the BEST part of this basement children's museum is that there's an exhibit in which you can be part of the Continental Army and Baron von Steuben can inspect you!!!

He said that I was his best soldier!

I'll save you the full tale of woe of how after this, I tried to go see Jockey Hollow but it was raining and getting dark and I somehow managed to get lost and did not find any of the things that I wanted to find and was pissed, so instead I let my GPS take me to my hotel, instead, where I took a hot shower, put on comfy jammies, and ate a noodle cup and peanut butter crackers while reading and watching hockey for the rest of the evening.

I'll just say that now I've got a reason to go back to Morristown.

P.S. Want to follow along with my craft projects, books I'm reading, road trips to weird old cemeteries, looming mid-life crisis, and other various adventures on the daily? Find me on my Craft Knife Facebook page!

How to Make a Thanksgiving Turkey Photo Garland

I originally published this tutorial over at Crafting a Green World!

Because all your loved ones are just a bunch of turkeys!

Looking for a fun, festive, fuss-free decoration for Thanksgiving? I LOVE this personalized turkey garland that illustrates all of your guests and loved ones as their truest selves. It’s super easy to create, can be displayed just about anywhere, and is guaranteed to be the hit of the holiday! For bonus points, it also allows you to show all your loved ones that you love them so much that you’re willing to sneakily print photos of them off of social media for your own nefarious purposes. Everyone needs regular reminders that their photos aren’t safe online!

Here’s how!

Materials

Here’s everything that you need to make this personalized turkey garland:

• photos of friends, family, and pets. Choose 4″x6″ photos that are cropped so that the chosen head is between 3″ and 3.5″ tall. It doesn’t even matter if this makes the head a bit pixelated or blurry–we’re not making an heirloom that will be passed down to future generations here… or ARE we?!?
• brown cardstock or similar paper. Construction paper or brown paper bags would also work well for this. Thin cardboard food packaging could also work in a pinch, but it’s not quite dark enough for a perfect match. If you get really desperate, just take a brown crayon or marker to white cardstock–a bit of scribbly effect would honestly make this look even funnier!
• white paper. Junk mail envelopes or any scrap white paper, including the backs of receipts, is fine for this. I used the non-watermarked parts of the backs of the cropped photos for this, and I managed to squeak out juuuuust enough!
• white printer paper and a pencil for tracing. Any thin white paper will do.
• scissors and glue. For my first iteration of this project, I used double-sided tape, but maybe I keep the thermostat too cold in my house, because it would not stay stuck! Using white Elmer’s glue took only a few seconds longer, and I’m confident that everything will stay stuck. You could probably also get away with using hot glue, but you’d have to be careful not to warp the paper with the heat.
• twine and tape for the garland.

Step 1: Create the turkey template.

Because this is just for your own personal use, Google to find a copyright-free line art illustration of a cartoon-style turkey carcass, blown up on your computer screen to approximately 6.5″ tall. You can absolutely use a different size, but remember to resize the photo heads to be proportionate.

Gently rest a piece of white printer paper over the image, then gently trace it with a pencil.

Cut out the image to make the turkey template, then separately trace and cut out just the leg bone to make the leg bone template.

Step 2: Trace and cut out all the pieces.

For each turkey, you need one photo head, one turkey cut from brown cardstock, and two leg bones cut from white paper.

For the best photo heads, try to cut exactly around each person’s head, omitting any part of their neck and all their extra chins. I tried to keep most of each person’s hairstyle, although I gave little haircuts as necessary.

If you have multiples of these to make and a computerized die-cutter, I HIGHLY recommend creating a vector image that can be machine-cut. I have a Cricut, and although I don’t use it for most projects, I loooooove using it for tedious and time-consuming projects like this!

Step 3: Glue all the pieces together.

Place the head to slightly overlap the top of the carcass, place the white leg bone pieces over the brown leg bone template, and glue everything in place. If there’s some brown leg bone peeking out around the white leg bone pieces, just trim it away.

Step 4: Attach the finished turkeys to the garland.

Tape the twine to the back of each turkey in two spots, adjusting the spacing however you prefer. Leave enough twine at each end of the garland to tie it.

Alternatively, you could mount these decorations to a window or mirror with Command strips (I sent a set of my kid and her roommates to them to stick to their dorm room door), or attach them to place card holders to show everyone where they should sit at the Thanksgiving table.

I know it’s probably a little immature, but I absolutely CANNOT stop laughing at my Thanksgiving turkey photo garland. Why is the one with the dog randomly the funniest?!?

Don’t eat turkey? It would take a little more work, but I also think you could pop someone’s head on top of a piece of cardstock pumpkin pie for equal humor, or rig each person up as their own personal Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade balloon. I call dibs on Snoopy!

P.S. Check out my Craft Knife Facebook page for photos, resources, and other bits of the weird stuff I do all day.

I Drove 12 Hours To Visit Baron Von Steuben, The Queen of Afternoon Tea's Favorite Shop, and I Guess My College Student

You know, since I'm in the neighborhood!

Also, it was actually 13 hours with traffic, but that's fine because it gave me plenty of time to get acquainted with my newest Special Interest:

Omg Grant is struggling so hard with his alcoholism! I feel awful for him, and also increasingly exasperated every time he goes on another drinking binge. But he's so sad and lonely! He had to transfer stations to California, and apparently the most reasonable way there was to get on a ship and sail all the way around the entirety of South America, so he told his wife, Julia, that she shouldn't bring their toddler and her massively pregnant self along on the voyage. It was definitely the right call, because all the soldiers' children who did travel with them died, but still, it was months upon months before he even knew if she and their baby had survived childbirth, much less what the baby's name was, and that baby was two years old before he saw him for the first time. And meanwhile, Grant was completely unable to cope with how much he missed them and got so continually drunk that he had to resign from the Army, and then he was too broke to get home because he just keeps on falling for conmen. 

Also, Julia's family are slave owners, which is obviously a huge issue. And they HAAAAATE Grant! Grant's family also hates Julia, and to be honest it's a little bit funny but I'm sure it sucked so bad to live through. Grant's dad sucks, too.

ANYWAY, Grant and Julia will at some point in their future live reasonably close to the hotel I finally poured my creaky self into after 13 hours on the road:

Speaking of creaky...

You know who else didn't have a safe elevator?

THIS GUY!!!

So, yeah. I drove 12 hours (13 with traffic!) to visit my beloved child for a couple of days, but by "visit," I generally tend to mean that I want us to do a bunch of sightseeing at tourist destinations that I have chosen in advance, and we will yap constantly at each other and catch up on all our gossip, etc., while we do this sightseeing, with interruptions in the conversation only for the purpose of taking one million photos of the sights I brought us to see.

We therefore yapped our heads off while I admired and photographed the Grand Parade in its autumn splendor--

--and then we yapped our heads off while we got afternoon tea at the very first tea shop to ever earn a full 5 out of 5 stars in the Queen of Afternoon Tea's series, "The Good, the Bad, the Ugly, and the Yummy":

We agreed that those 5 stars were very well earned, although the prices have gone up since the Queen of Afternoon Tea visited:

Nevertheless, we thought our afternoon tea was well worth the price. Everything was lovely and comfy and relaxed (these are important criteria since our afternoon tea at the Wolseley in London, which was lovely but we have come to realize was NOT comfy and relaxed), our tea was delicious--

--the food was beautiful and also delicious--

Coronation chicken and 35th anniversary blend tea!

--and there was so much of it that I was still finishing up the last of the desserts two nights later, in one of the most delightful evenings spent alone that I can remember. Imagine a hotel room all to oneself, a VERY good book on one's nook (second book in a very good series, with the third book ready to go right after!), hockey on the TV, and the last few bits and bobs of this to munch on:

In short, it was just really nice to sit for an hour eating and drinking and people watching and discussing everyone we had each interacted with in the past 6 weeks and everything they had said and what we had thought about it and what books we'd read and how much we like Jack Wolfe's singing and when we thought we'd see him again and what show he might be doing at that time. 

The whole precious two days that I got to spend with my kid went just like that, yapping and shopping (she never brings enough clothes to school, even though I tell her every semester to bring more clothes!) and meandering around campus--

--poking around various interesting spots, like this autumnal photo setting that was just randomly hanging out in the sunken garden--

--or the obligatory old cemetery that MUST exist on every college campus--

--snooping around for interesting books in the library--

--eating SO much cafeteria food that I did not have to prepare for myself--

--and discussing the symptoms of alcohol poisoning just as some poor soul was loudly vomiting in the bathroom down the hall:

My favorite campus spot is the dye garden:

Cotinus coggygria makes yellow!

Flax also makes yellow.

The woad had gone to seed, so I grabbed a plastic sandwich baggie out of my backpack (one must ALWAYS travel with ample sandwich baggies--one never knows what one might want to contain!) and collected some seeds. I will be VERY excited if I manage to cultivate my very own woad plants from seed next year.

One of the dorms used to be an ancient office building, with these lovely interior doors with multi-paneled glass that let in tons of glorious light. But it turns out that dorm rooms don't actually work with giant windows in their doors, so every year the residents get to paint their windows however they like:

Residents tend to preserve the best ones, so some of these paintings have been up for a very long time!

All the halls have themes, and all the themes are unhinged. This hall's theme is Viral Internet Animals:

One of the nights that I was visiting, the dining halls hosted a Halloween party for their student employees, and the kid let me be her plus-one. She fetched me apple cider doughnuts and hot apple cider, and let me paint over the lines that she drew and even do a little bit of carefully-managed coloring in (ahem):

The most important steps were left to her artistic expertise, of course, because otherwise--

--our little Pottsfield resident wouldn't look so cute!

The kid kept her pumpkin to decorate her dorm room, and I left her to get ready for a Mean Girls movie night with her buddies ("On October 3rd, he asked me what day it was. 'It's October 3rd'") while I crashed back in my hotel room, because I needed my sleep for the next day's travels: New Jersey! Thomas Edison! Leaf peeping!!!

The worst thing about hotel rooms is how I'm always pretty sure I'm going to be axe murdered, but don't worry, because this elaborately constructed tangle of clothes hangers is actually not fragile and about to fall apart if touched but instead the key to my feeling of safety:

The BEST thing about hotels rooms is hockey on the TV!

Notice the leftover pastries from our afternoon tea. Not pictured: me in my pajamas, awesome book on my nook, Diet Sprite liberated from the dining hall Halloween party.

Next stop: New Jersey!

P.S. Want to follow along with my craft projects, books I'm reading, road trips to weird old cemeteries, looming mid-life crisis, and other various adventures on the daily? Find me on my Craft Knife Facebook page!