Pinewood Derby 2018

I can't believe it's been a whole year since Bladen started scouts.  His first scouting activity was the Pinewood Derby & here we are again doing his 2nd pinewood derby.

This year Bladen has been obsessed with sharks so he made himself a shark pinewood derby car.  He called it Jaws Jr. & he loved it.

He worked SO hard on his car & was VERY proud of it.

And much to our surprise, he actually won a trophy for the fastest car in the bear den.  (He's a bear scout now).  He was pretty excited.

Great work Bladen!!!

Sutter's Mill

The last day of our Spring Break, we headed north to Coloma, CA & stopped in Marshall Gold Discovery Park to see Sutter's Mill.  Sutter's Mill is where the first piece of gold was actually found in the CA mountains.  It started the gold rush.

Taya was SO excited to tell us all about Sutter's Mill.  Her 4th grade is putting on a musical play this month called "Gold Rush!" so she's our current expert in all things gold rush related.

When we parked at the visitor center, we went inside & the man running the museum was SO excited to have such a captive audience.  He told us all about the gold rush, how the gold was discovered, who came when, & all sorts of facts.  He even let the kids hold some of his REAL gold.

Taya loved the gold coin.  It was SUPER heavy.

And these 2 pieces of gold were found right there at Marshall Gold Discovery Park.  Gold right now is $1350.00 an ounce so those little nuggets are worth quite a bit of money.

Marshall Gold Discovery Park is great.  You just explore the historic town on your own & they have people dressed up all over town that will tell you stories of the history & even let you take part in the history yourself.

We walked across the river there where the gold was first found.  It was beautiful.

Then we hit up the old jail.  It's the original jail & it's still somewhat standing.  The kids got a kick out of "being in jail."

After than we wandered to a log cabin.  There were 4 mormon missionaries (senior couples) whose "job" on their service mission is to reenact the time period of Sutter's Mill & teach visitors about the Mormon influence of Sutter's Mill.

One guy taught the boys & girls how to carry 200 pound logs around to build log cabins.

Then all the kids were treated to a wheelbarrow ride in his wheelbarrow.

Trek & I got to saw logs for our log cabin.  We were given 1 minute to saw through a FAT log.

Cadence was just excited to find some good Mormon influence there.  She loves her religion & is very proud of it.

It wasn't until this point that we figured out that these were mormon missionaries.  Of course once we figured it out, we sat & talked with them for over an hour about genealogy, missions, pioneer treks, & all sorts of fun things.

The actual mill was pretty impressive too.  Sutter's Mill started out as a saw mill for sawing wood to build cabins & a city.  Little did they know that they'd find gold!  Soon after gold was discovered, everyone stopped building the city & just searched for gold instead.  The city was never completed.

This is where Marshall discovered that first piece of gold next to the river.  Isn't it a beautiful view?

We also wandered into a little Indian village where the kids got to try on animal pelts, cook salmon over the fire, got their face painted, & made bracelets.  They loved it.

Everywhere you walked, there were old buildings (stores, post office, blacksmith, etc.) & just old machinary.  These are large stamps that would separate the gold from the quartz.  The whole trip was SO interesting.  I'm SO glad we decided to go up there.

Historic Folsom, CA

After visiting the temple, we headed into town to visit historic Folsom.  We heard there were some original buildings that are still standing & I just had to see them being the historian that I am.

Right when we parked, we ran into the cutest little "pioneer museum."  It cost us $5 for the whole family to go in & even that was a "suggested" donation.  It was small, but packed with some really fun historic stuff for the kids to do.

First we explored the blacksmith shop.  Taya had a blacksmith make her a horseshoe with her name engraved on it.

After that they let all the kids pan for gold.  They gave them a 15 minute lesson on how it was done & different strategies the minors used to find gold in these mountains.  The kids each got to try it & any "gold" they found, they got to take home.  It wasn't real gold, just fools gold, but boy did they love it.  Taya's been studying the California gold rush in history (4th grade history is state history) so this was extra fun for her.  She already knew so much & the museum leaders LOVED her & loved that she taught them some things.

Canyon mostly just slopped his pan around in the water.  He then decided to fill it with water & throw it all over his sisters.  Little stink.

After panning for gold, we got to go inside a real caboose of a train.  The kids loved climbing into the conductors box.  They felt pretty tall & high up there.

We also explored the wagon shed, the outhouses, a surplus store, & a typical log cabin.

The kids also got to use this old mill to grind grain down to flour.

After spending a good 2 hours at the pioneer museum, we walked up to the historic part of Folsom.  The buildings were extraordinary.  They were amazing.  I can't believe they're still standing.  There are actual shops in them stilll & I think it's fabulous that they've kept them true to their original forms.

We had a blast just exploring & learning about the architecture & time period these buildings were actually built.  The kids learned a lot & really appreciated how beautiful these buildings were.

After exploring Folsom, we went back to our hotel to swim.  The kids had been BEGGGING to swim, but they forget that Northern CA is COLD!!!  They only made it about knee deep before their teeth were chattering & they were crying to go back inside.  ha ha ha.