Mummies, Drums and Faires

On Friday, we went to an children’s event at the local museum. There were lots of kids there; if fact, it was a bit crowded. The event itself was lackluster, but the museum seems pretty nice. They have collections of local Derby porcelain, Egyptian artifacts, paintings, and local biology and geology. It could be a bit more interactive, but we’ll definitely come back to explore it further.

After lunch we went to a drumming workshop organized by some local home educating families. The workshop was quite good – we got the opportunity to try a number of different types of drums, learning a different rhythm for each instrument, and putting them all together in a complex, syncopated, if a bit cacophonous, piece designed to accompany the story of Anansi the spider.

River surprised me by telling one of the Anansi stories – the one about how Anansi and the turtle trick each other to get out of sharing their dinner. I was impressed not only with her recall and her ability to put the story together, but also with her courage to tell it in front of a group of people she had never met before.

Anyway, the families we met there were very nice and gave us encouragement that we would soon have many friends and have more to do than we could actually fit into our days. It was nice to meet so many friendly people.

We went to the Chatsworth Country Fair on Sunday. I think Molly was sad about missing the Three County Fair in Northampton this year. Unfortunately, the weather did not cooperate. Beautiful and sunny in the morning, we didn’t think to bring warm clothing for when the wind blew in the clouds. And we certainly weren’t prepared for the rain.


We spent some time under tents looking at the craft booths, got coffee and ice cream in the restaurant in the old stable house, and watched bagpipe bands, dog shows, archery, horse-drawn carriage shows, vintage cars, and clay pigeon shooting during breaks in the rain. They don’t seem to have the demolition derby (or at least we didn’t see it on the program) but we did pass a sign advertising the world championship tug-o-war competition on the way home. The rain didn’t entirely dampen the girls spirits – River went on the swings and Sage and Molly tried the Merry-Go-Round.


Chatsworth is reputed to be one of the finest houses and gardens in England. We might try to come back sometime to see it again in other circumstances. The grounds and the views from outside were certainly impressive. We stopped on the way home for a curry. There are plenty of Indian restaurants around and many of them are quite good. So far, though, India House in Northampton is still my favorite.