Copper Culture County Park

Ocanto takes it's name from an early Indian settlement bearing the name "Oak-a-toe".  The first inhabitants are called the copper culture people. The  oldest metal smelting site in North America is in Ocanto, WI. It dates to somewhere around 5600 to 5500 BC. The French claimed the region in 1671, the English in 1760 and the United States after the Revolutionary War in 1783. The Territory of Wisconsin was established in 1836 and it became a state in 1848. We also saw a bee tree like pa found in our Little House in the Big Woods book Pitty-pat has been trying to read. The book is also set in Wisconsin. So we tied that in to our trip as well. Not a bad field trip but because we were there on Saturday of  Memorial Weekend the Museum wasn't open. It didn't open until Monday despite being advertised as being open in the flier. There really wasn't anything to see other than what we took pictures of above but it was free and it did have a nice walk down to the river.

Bread success

The sourdough loaf from the bread machine looks so good and smells wonderful. I found the recipe at allrecipes.com I used my left over whey from our cheese making to feed my starter and in place of the milk and water in the recipe. I have frozen the rest of the whey for more bread making. I just hate to waste anything. The cheese we made yesterday tastes rather bland so we will have to herb it up or use it for baking. Not quite a spread for crackers unless we make a cheese ball again. But we really just made it to go along with Pitty-pat's Little House in the Big Woods pioneer unit study. I plan to put the facts I learned about cheese on the time line I am putting together for our history study. I just don't know how I want to show the timeline. One poster isn't enough space and a wall is too much room to dedicate to this project. I just want to show the time from the pilgrims (last years history lessons)to the pioneers for now with a few things far before and after as we learn them this year

Little House in the Big Woods Unit Study

I am doing a unit study with Pitty-pat using the book "Little House in the Big Woods" by Laura Ingalls Wilder. So far we have made butter, baked bread, and rendered lard--all things my mother who lived during the depression taught me. I also know how to make soap and plan to do this with the kids. We are using templates from homeschoolhelper.com for our lapbook to go along with the story.

Home made Butter Recipe:
1 pint whipping cream in the dairy aisle of the grocery store. Put in a clean glass jar with a lid. I recycled a plastic peanut butter jar because it had a very tight fitting lid. Now let kids shake until butter forms. when enough butter forms pour off the buttermilk. Rinse and salt butter if desired. Taste best on warm bread.

Single bar recipe for soap making
(**use caution not for small children Lye is VERY, VERY Dangerous!!)
use safety glasses when handling lye

1/2 cup cold water
2 heaping tblsp. commercial lye
1 cup tallow or lard or mix of each

slowly add the lye to the water, then bring both the lye solution and tallow to about body temperature. Combine the two in a glass bowl and mix slowly and steadily until the consistency is about that of sour cream. Pour mixture into a mold and age. (original recipe from "Back to Basics"book published by Reader's Digest. My mother always used red devil lye and the recipe for a large batch was on the can. The older the soap the better it was for getting stains out.