Spirit of Vincennes Rendezvous
How do you spend your anniversary? Yesterday marked 12 years Bill and I have been married. He came home from work with a beautiful boquet of roses and a mushy card.
After breakfast we spent ours at the Spirit of Vincennes Rendezvous. We have watched the skillet throwin' contest, ate buffalo burgers with roasted corn on the cob, served in the husks and drank some freshly queezed lemonade. 
We saw the opening ceremony where they present the colors, have watched the battle reenactment and had a very memorable family day. The kids love going to this event. This is our third year. The same side wins every year. I wonder if they will notice a pattern.
The kids bought rock candy, had their faces painted and wanted a turn in the stockade. Carly picked out a necklace to buy and Jacob picked out about a dozen things, but in the end - bought nothing. He is realizing how hard it is to earn that money and he's blowing it less and less. Except on Sophie. He would buy her something every time we hit a store if I let him. Not sure where he gets that from?!?
My favorite part was the jugglers. I don't know if those knives are really sharp or not, but I would not want to be the guy standing on the ground with somebody on my shoulders juggling them. Come to think of it, I wouldn't want to be the guy on top either. Wes and Ryan bought wooden swords and of course the first thing they had to try was juggling them. Not a pretty sight.
Speaking of not a pretty sight, I saw way too many men's butt cheeks that should never be seen in public yesterday. There were probably about 20 "Indian allies" there yesterday. Thank God they at least had some flap of leather covering on themselves. They also had on full body paint and they looked miserably hot. The younger men had their hair buzzed into some wild hairdos. They take their past time seriously.
There are vendors of all types selling their goods. We saw blacksmiths, basket weavers, chair caners, wood carvers and weavers all hard at work and dressed for the part. All of the people involved camp out in the park - in heavy canvas army tents thrown over poles. They cook in holes dug in the ground and you do not see any modern things around this tent city.
Vincennes marks the spot where on Thurs., Feb. 25, 1779, British Lt. Gov. Henry Hamilton surrendered his garrison of 80 soldiers after a siege which lasted less than two days. It was here that George Rogers Clark, with fatigued, poorly trained farmers in their shabby uniforms, became the victor in a battle over the smartly dressed, well trained British army for Fort Sackville.
As we left the park, the kids stopped to play Hoops with some children who were dressed the part. Not Hoops as in basketball, but Hoops as in "ye olden day kids game". You hold 2 sticks (about the size of drumsticks) crossed in front of you and you put a large wooden hoop (about the size of a dinner plate) on your sticks. Next you uncross your arms while while going in an upward motion in order to toss the hoop off of your sticks onto another persons sticks.
Jacob was approached by a pretty girl his age in a long dress and bonnet and they played a game together. I don't know the name of it, but I'm sure you've seen it in movies. You have a large wooden hoop about 30" tall and you just roll it along the ground, hitting it with a stick and running along beside it. No batteries required for either game.
We loaded up and went to The Black Buggy for dinner. We all enjoyed an Amish buffet, then went next door to the gift store where Jacob managed to find something to buy - for Sophie. So I bought it since I will be the one using it no doubt. I also bought some Amish Spread - a wonderful concoction of marshmallow cream, peanut butter and corn syrup. So yummy on hot biscuits.
Once we got home, Bill went to the video store while I got the kids showered and then we all settled in and watched Nanny McPhee. All in all - it was a wonderful way to spend an anniversary.
