Thanksgiving

Detail from "The First Thanksgiving" (1914), by Jennie Augusta Brownscombe

Essay by Polly and Bubbles

The year is 1620. A ship called the Mayflower is being boarded by 102 people, 30 children among them. They seek freedom to worship God the way they choose. Their destination is the New World, later known as America. The Mayflower is a small ship in comparison to other ships, and they will be crossing the wide Atlantic Ocean. But the captain of the ship believes the Mayflower will get them to the New World.

For the first days of their journey, everyone is fine. The 30 children laugh and play, while adults talk and enjoy themselves. Everyone enjoys the view of the ocean, and the winds are favorable. Oh, but many dark days await them.

Soon many people are seasick from the rocking of the ship. The sky is not blue anymore, but a dark gray color. Storms are frequent, and children are frightened by the thunder. The passengers are forced to stay below deck so they are not blown into the raging water.

After one terrible storm, the crew discovers that one of the main beams has cracked. Many people believe that the captain should turn his ship around and sail back to England, but the captain will not turn back so easily. He just tells them to fix the beam and they will go on. He knows what they have been through, and he believes that they will make it to the New World. He says that they decided to get on the ship, and there is no turning back. They will go on!

The beam is pushed back into place, and is supported to keep it from bending again. And they sail on.

On a day several months later, they spy the New World! Everyone hears the word that they have wanted to hear for many months: Land! They did it! They crossed the Atlantic! Their number is 103; one passenger has died, and two babies have been born.

For the first few days, a team of men is sent to explore. They see miles of forest, just waiting to be explored. The men are eager to go, but soon troubles await them. Traps set for animals that catch them indicate Indians. One evening the team spies a group of Indians. The men try to be friendly, but the Indians are afraid of their guns and run away.

Meanwhile, things are going much better at the ship. Clothes can finally be washed and dried for the first time in months. Wood is burned in the stove on the ship to get rid of the sickening smell of vomit and dried sea salt. The Mayflower is cleaned, and food is cooked on land.

Soon the men return, and they start to build houses. By the time winter sets in, they have one house built, known as the Common House. When winter comes, both the Common House and the Mayflower are turned into hospitals. Many people die during the winter, and those that are not dreadfully sick are expected to build houses. Surprisingly, all 30 children survive, and are expected to do the work of their parents. But many believe that if they can make it through the winter, they may have a chance.

Winter is gone now and spring has come. Flower buds start peeking out of the ground, and to the Pilgrims they are signs of hope. Then, one day, a tall Indian walks right into the settlement!

The Indian is welcomed into a cabin, and he surprises them by saying in English, “Welcome!” All are surprised by his words. They ask him how he knows their language. He simply answers that several English fishermen north of them taught him their words. He says his name was Samoset. The Pilgrims ask where the rest of his tribe is. He answers that they had all died of the fever, except for himself and one other man named Squanto. He promises to send Squanto over in “2 sunups”.

Squanto helps them, and he surprises them by speaking English also! He proves himself to be smart, and teaches them many tricks for planting and harvesting, including that “old Indian trick” to put fish on top of the corn seeds while planting. The fish would serve as fertilizer for the soil, making the corn grow better.

It is now 1621. The Pilgrims have decided to have a feast to celebrate how thankful they are. There is an abundance of food to eat. The Pilgrims are calling the feast “Thanksgiving” because they are glad to be here and they are thankful to have food. They have invited many Indians to celebrate with them, and they are bringing deer venison.

President Lincoln declared Thanksgiving a national holiday in 1863, and we still celebrate it today.

 

A Big Bath for a Little Boy

I had a big bath today. You see, Mommy thought that a sponge bath wasn't bad enough. She put me in this big blue thing and splashed water on my tummy, and that made me cold!

He helped!

"Hey, I helped the most!"” Yes, he helped too. Mommy had him get the soap. This is what she did to me then...

Can you believe it?

As if that wasn't enough, they had Polly take pictures of me! She even looks proud to be the photographer! Preposterous!

At last we're done. That was bad, but at least I kept quiet and didn't cry. A guy has to be tough, you know. The whole thing was scary. Sometimes I don't know what gets into Mommy.

 

Project Fair: “George Mueller” by Polly

This year for the project fair, I chose to talk about George Mueller. Not many people know about him, and not many people today believe in miracles. But God still does work miracles today.

My display board

Facts about George Mueller

Me presenting

Me in front of my display board

My Essay:

“Many Christians today say that they depend on God to supply all their needs. But what if we didn’t take money for our jobs? What if we trusted God to give us food every day? Imagine a man who was a preacher but didn’t take a fee from his congregation. A man who ran six orphan houses. A man who trusted God to supply all the meals and money he needed for 2000 orphans at a time. Imagine a man who did all this without telling anybody except God what his needs were. There was really a man like that, and his name was George Mueller.

George Mueller was born German. He was badly behaved when he was young. He stole and drank. Once when he needed money, he pretended someone had stolen all his money that his father had given him. His friends were sympathetic and gave him lots of money, more than he had wanted to get. A few times he went to jail for not paying rent at some hotels.

When George was a young man, he went to a university. He became friends with another young man named Beta. Beta was a Christian and every Saturday night went to a Christian meeting. One night George asked Beta if he could go along. He thought that it would make a great story to tell his friends. But at the meeting, after they had prayed, George didn’t want to say anything funny about the meeting anymore. He kept going back to the meetings, and he soon became a Christian.

Becoming a Christian changed his life. His father had paid for all his schooling before, and George felt bad about this. He told his father that he wanted to pay for his school by himself, and his father readily agreed to this. Now he had a problem. He had to pay for his schooling, but he didn’t have any money. George thought it was a childish idea, but he got down on his knees and prayed that God would send him some money. After he had finished praying, there was a knock at his door. It was one of the school professors, and he had two young gentlemen with him. The professor explained that these two young men were from America, and they needed to learn German. He asked George to teach the young men German. They agreed to pay George a lot of money, more than a normal tutor would have been paid. This provided the money that George needed to pay for his schooling.

George realized that God could be trusted to supply all his needs, and he depended on God for all of his needs for the rest of his life. He never again borrowed or asked for a single penny. In fact, he actually told the people in his church not to pay him any fee for preaching. He prayed for all the things he needed, and God would always send them.

George met a woman named Mary, and he married her. They moved to Bristol, England, and there were many orphans living on the streets. George and Mary wanted to help the orphans. So George asked God to help him find a good place for an orphanage. Soon he had a good building for the orphanage. It was for girls from ages 7 to 12. On opening day, George expected to have children flocking to the orphanage, but none came. Then he remembered that he never prayed for children! So George quickly prayed, and the children started flocking to the orphanage only a few minutes after he prayed.

After a while George needed a new and bigger orphanage because the people in Bristol complained that the children were too loud. George prayed that he would be able to build a new orphanage. He never told anyone about any one of his needs. He only told God, and people would come to the door and give him money. Soon he was able to buy a piece of land called Ashley Down and built several new orphanages for boys and girls. These could hold 2000 children at a time. George never told anyone but God how much money he needed to pay for food or any other things. God would always fix the problems.

One day at breakfast time the children were sitting at the table, and there was nothing for them to eat. George wasn’t worried! He said that they needed to pray, and God would supply something to eat. George prayed and no sooner than he had finished there was a knock at the door, and there was the baker. He said, “I couldn’t sleep last night because I thought you needed food. So I baked you some bread.” After the baker left, the milkman knocked at the door and said, “My cart broke down, and I can’t fix it with all the weight of the milk on it. Could you use any?”

Another miracle happened one winter when one of the boilers was broken. The workmen said that it would take a few days to fix it. The orphans could have frozen, but George believed that God could do a miracle. George asked God to change the direction of the wind, and to make the workmen want to work late into the night. The next day a warm south wind came in through the window instead of the expected north wind. Not only that, but the workers said they would like to stay up all night and fix the boiler instead of going to bed! Everyone stayed warm and they didn’t even have to light any fires.

Then something terrible happened. Mary died. Many people mourned for her. She had been like a mother to many orphans.

Years later, George married another woman named Susanna. George and Susanna decided to go on a preaching trip. They actually ended up going on many. On one of his trips, George got stuck in the fog on a ship. He went to the captain and asked how long it would take to get to the church the next day to preach. The captain said that the fog could stay down for weeks. He said that it would be impossible to get to the town on time. George took the captain down to his room and prayed that the fog would lift. When they opened the door, the fog was gone! It hadn’t lifted by chance. God had lifted it!

But then Susanna died too. George was almost ninety years old! Soon after Susanna died, a friend suggested that George get a personal assistant. George told him to get one “the day after tomorrow.” But the next day did not come for George. At 5:00 am the next morning, George died.

George Mueller, the boy who lived a bad life as a young man, grew up to help over 120,000 orphans. In today’s money, the amount of money that George Mueller had gotten in his lifetime for the orphans would have been $180 million. He never asked any other person for money. He never even told anybody what his needs were. He only told God in prayer, and God supplied everything he needed.”

 

5 Things About Fred

Five things I love about Fred:

1. I’m glad that Fred is my brother.
2. I like that he always wants to play with me.
3. I like the way he reads.
4. I’m glad that he is nice to Princess.
5. I’m glad that today he is five.

 

Cinderella

Last Friday Mom, Bubbles, Princess and I went to a Cinderella musical. On the way we read about the different versions of the story. Did you know that there are from 340 to 1,500 different versions of the story?

The first recorded version was from China, written by Tuan Ch’eng-shih over a thousand years ago. This one is a little different from the story you are used to. Instead of Cinderella, her name is Yeh-shen. And instead of a fairy godmother, there is a fish who helps her. But there still is a golden shoe that is used to identify her.

The Grimm Brothers of Germany wrote a version that does not have a fairy godmother. Cinderella plants a tree on her mother’s grave and her help comes from a white dove and gifts.

The version we saw was similer to the French one by Perrault. It was written in 1697. Someone else told Perrault the story, and he added the pumpkin carriage, animals, and glass slippers.

Most of the stories have the same idea-a heroine who is a servant to her stepmother and her stepsisters; she goes to a ball, but no one knows who she is. The prince wants to marry her and uses her shoe that she left behind to identifiy her. He finds her and marries her. (And they all lived happily ever after.)

 

My Trip to the Beach

This year for vacation, I went to the beach. When I first saw the ocean, I was a little worried. The waves were very loud. The water was cold. When I accidentally swallowed some salt water, it hurt my throat.

When I started to get used to the water, I really liked it. I went boogie boarding, but it didn’t work where it was shallow. Dad said I could go out where it was deeper. It worked. I could go much farther on my board.

We also picked up a lot of seashells.  I found a clam that was closed and a huge mussel shell. We found a lot of purple shells too.

Game boy spent most of his time boogie boarding and picking up seashells like me. Once we went out deep with Mom and the waves picked us up and dropped us again.

Bubbles was in the shallow part of the water and she picked up a lot of seashells too.

Happy mostly splashed around in the water and played with his kickboard. He and Bubbles spent a lot of time together.

Princess stayed away from the water. This is about as close as she got.

She mostly played in the baby swimming pool and played in the sand with Cutie.

Cutie stayed close to Mom and Dad, playing in the sand and taking naps.

I had a lot of fun at the beach.

 

The First Death

My mom wanted me to write about the most interesting thing I’ve learned in  school this week.

 After Adam and Eve sinned, God killed an animal to show Adam and Eve that death would come into the world. The animal represented Jesus, who would come later to save them from their sins. He used it’s skin for clothes to cover their bodies, just as Jesus’ death would cover their sins.

 

Swimming

We went swimming today! It all started when Dad threw Gameboy in the pool with his regular clothes on! Gameboy laughed and thought it was awesome! Then we all wanted to go swimming. We played Loch Ness Monster. I was Nessie most of the time.