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Friday 22 August 2014

Cowboys, country girls and Indians

A few months ago our friend Henry was trying out his Cowboy outfit and asking his mum for more horses so he could play Cowboys and Indians with his friends.  This gave Henry's mum Lorraine and I an idea for some summer fun.  While Henry was visiting the USA for the 2014 Sasha festival he went to the Grand Canyon and saw an Indian tepee and this gave me a further idea for our summer fun day.  A date was set and Henry, Molly, Stevie, Peggy Sue and Kayla brought Stratford the horse with them to visit Laura, Reuben, Miranda, Florence, Nicholas James, the babies, Emily the white horse & the Gotz pony yesterday.  In the days before their visit, I worked to grant Henry his tepee wish...

A certain little bear called Clemence (a cousin of Mossy from Sasha Village) decided to get involved.  These are some of his observations:

In the Indian village Miranda was visiting the babies in one of the tepees.  
Clemence wandered up to Miranda to ask "where is Laura".
"I don't know, you will have to go and look for her" said Miranda
Florence was pretending to be an Indian woman
looking after the babies Leo and Mabel in a tepee
Clemence spotted Peggy Sue and asked her "have you seen Laura".
Peggy Sue replied that she didn't know.
Leo and Mabel caught sight of Clemence and wanted a cuddle.
Clemence gave Mabel a great big cuddle
Peggy Sue realised that there were some babies in the tepee
but at least there weren't as many as at the Sasha Festival earlier this year!
Leo and Mabel came out to see Peggy Sue
Leo babbled to Peggy Sue...
...while Mabel held up her arms for a cuddle!
Peggy Sue sat down on the grass with the babies and Clemence the bear.
She felt slightly less overwhelmed by babies than at the festival!
For anyone who doesn't understand why Peggy Sue (a very old wooden Shoenhut doll) went to the 2014 Sasha festival you need to visit Lorraine's blog and what happened to her when she got there!

Kayla the American Indian girl was sitting enjoying the sunshine in front of her tepee.
She could see the beautiful horse called Stratford grazing nearby.
Molly came to visit Kayla and asked all about what it was like living in a tepee.
Kayla decided to show Molly some of her treasures,
such as her bow and arrow, papoose, little drum
and her new friend the Canadian Indian boy (from my doll cabinet).
She explained that the Bison painted
on her tepee meant courage and honour.
Other symbols on her tepee also have meanings.
In the meantime Henry the Cowboy mounted his horse
Clemence the bear climbed onto Stratford to ask Henry "have you seen Laura?".  
"No, I haven't seen her yet" said Henry,
who was really pleased to see Mossy's cousin and gave him a great big hug.
Laura was riding Emily, her beautiful white horse
Stevie came to admire Emily
Laura told Stevie how wonderful her horse was to ride
Clemence approached Stevie and asked "Have you seen Laura?"
"Yes, I have" said Stevie, "She is riding her horse".
Clemence was so pleased he gave Stevie a cuddle
"Laura!" cried Clemence "I've found you at last"
Henry and Stratford trotted round to Laura and Stevie came to greet Stratford
Stevie stroked Stratford on the nose as Henry and Laura chatted
Meanwhile Reuben was stroking the pony which Nicholas James was trying to ride
"You know Reuben, I wish I could ride Stratford,
I feel a bit silly riding this little pony" said Nicholas James
Lorraine and I had a lot of fun and laughs trying to get the two tepees to stand on a windy afternoon in my back garden.  They stood fine on the dining room table, but proved a bit fiddly in the garden so I'm experimenting with a solution to make them really easy to put up (and stay up!).  Henry has taken his tepee home with him.  More about the tepees in another post.
Florence and the Navajo mat from Lorraine
Florence sitting in our tepee with the lovely woven mat which Lorraine brought for my daughter all the way from the Navajo Indians near the Grand Canyon.  The Navajo traditional house is a hogan (made of wood and mud) rather than a tepee.  Lorraine also gave my daughter a beautiful silver bracelet from the Navajo.

We tried to dress all the girls as if they were from the time of Laura Ingalls Wilder (Little House on the Prairie), though Laura is wearing more modern cowgirl clothes (part of the 2012 Festival raffle doll ensemble won by Laura H).  I know that Nicholas James would love a cowboy outfit especially after seeing Henry's clothes, so I'll need to try making something.  Reuben quite fancies a Native American costume, though he knows that wearing a full feather headdress is something only the revered elders of a tribe are allowed to wear, so he is asking for a couple of feathers in a headband instead.

6 comments:

Serenata said...

Fabulous post! We certainly had a lot of fun and I know that Henry, Peggy Sue, Stevie and Molly have been telling the rest of the family all about their wonderful day ever since they got home. Little Owen Peggy Sue's teddy bear and Henry's little Trojan bear were quite disappointed they didn't get to meet Clemence.

Thank you for a lovely day and such a fun filled post.

Ginger said...

Anna, I really enjoyed this post and greatly appreciate your and Lorraine's patience in setting up the tepees. They are just great! I love seeing Henry and Stevie and especially Peggy Sue visiting your Indian village. The outfits and horses are perfect in your setting and it is nice to see the babies too. Thank you! :) xxx

DollMum said...

We loved having you here for the day Lorraine, the time seemed to go so fast as we were all having fun.
Glad you liked it Ginger, I wish you could have joined us too, however blogging about our day of Sasha doll play does share the enjoyment more widely.

Kendal said...

What a very clever 'crafts-woman' you are!

The Tepees are just a perfect size for the Sasha Dolls. Love the painted on decorations and their meanings.

I remember in school one year we had a visiting group of North American Plains Indians and it was an absolutely fascinating day with them erecting several Tepees (Tipi, Teepees)on our sports field for the children to go in.
We learnt so much about their roaming way of life and traditions following the herds of Buffalo.

Afterwards I had managed to get loads of off-cuts of brown imitation suede material from a sofa factory and from which the children made up 'rough' Indian costumes for themselves to wear at an assembly.
I had always taught all the children to sew the basic stitches (tacking, running, back, blanket, cross and chain.) The girls learnt during their needlework lessons and the boys at Christmas time when they all made their own Christmas stockings.

During a craft lessons they designed, constructed and decorated the head-dresses from card and a batch of feathers that I had sent for. After that they made wood and card replicas of some of the Indian tools.

Loved the set up Sasha Tepee scenes that evolved during the day. Looks like a truly fun filled Sasha day was had by all!
Thanks for sharing it with us.

twizel said...

Fantastic post really loved the outfits and Henry on horseback.

PrairiePosy said...

A very enjoyable post, DollMum! Thanks for sharing your day!