Shipshewana Field Trip Fun

Diella, Alegra and Josiah Bovee

Yesterday the children had a field trip to the Davis Mercantile for their Homeschool Event that they are hosting all week this week. If you are a homeschool parent in the Shipshewana or nearby area, you'll want to check it out. Several families from our church came out to take advantage of this fun time. There were a total of 23 children (and 3 babies) that attended from our group. We had so much fun!

If you want to participate, go to the third floor and register at Aunt Millie's Candy shop. From there you will be given the instructions for the scavenger hunt that sends you all over the building. This will take from 1-2 hours depending on how old your children are and if you husband comes along. Jonathon and the other guys I think forgot every now and then that this was for the children not them. :) There is alot of counting and estimating, learning new things such as candle making, an old fashioned button game, pretzel making, making music with your nose, and The Red Wagon let each family pick out a book of their choice under $10 (that was my favorite part). You'll enjoy it and so will your children!

Haley Booher and Zeky and Elli Brothers at JoJos Pretzels where they watched them make pretzels.

And some enjoyed eating them too, like the Wren family.


This was the nursing station. We all enjoyed good fellowship!

The Booher family looking for clues during the scavenger hunt. Elli joined in the drama too.

At Simple Sounds music store, the children learned how to make music with their noses. Very interesting.

And they took a shot at making music with other instruments too. What a great hands on activity for them all. Even Grandma Deborah joined in the fun.

The Danberry family getting ready to hear the nose music.


In this store the children loved seeing all the statues, but they also had to find how many USA made products there were. We did a lot of looking as this store was pretty big and there was so much to look at.

Finding soft blankets on their way out of the store. What a lovely feeling...I just want to snuggle with it.

At Lolly's Fabric Store they had to buy a button with the coin they were given at the start of the day. Then at the end, the lady at the Scrap Yard made an old fashioned button game with it. Great lessons!

This was the end of the scavenger hunt and the children (and some adults) got to ride the carousel. Most of the men just hung out and visited.

Here is Zeky and Alegra waving to the crowd.

Me and Diella.

Zeky, Alegra, Diella, and Eliyahna all at the end of their ride.

Waiting for everybody to get finished and take their turn on the ride...and figuring out lunch plans.

Here is the picket posse. All the children loved watching everybody take their turn. Loved how they all peeked over the fence to watch their friends having fun!

We packed lunch and walked to the park. What a beautiful day to picnic and play.

After lunch we went back to the Mercantile to watch Horton Hears a Who in the theater. Everyday at 2:00pm they are showing a different movie in the theater. After the movie, if you signed up, you then would go to the Daily Bread to decorate a cookie. They had sprinkles and all different colors of frosting. They really had fun with this...

Everybody was creative, making pictures or just piling the colored frosting high like a mountain.

But the end results were pretty and delicious. Here is Diella with her cookie...

And Alegra with her cookie....and a little brother wanting to taste her cookie. :) We finished up around 4:00 and were all whipped when we left, especially the mom. It was a full day, but the fellowship, fun, and learning were wonderful during that gorgeous day with friends.