Christmas at the Wren's Nest

Madison woke up and told us that Jingle Bell took all her sea turtles, a manatee and even Winter the dolphin.  Down below on the main floor, we saw this - what you see above.  It looks like she has a new nutcracker now, this one with an "under the sea" sort of theme to it.  It literally has two sea turtles attached, and some starfish and other sea life.  

We got up later this morning, had a nice breakfast, and eventually we made it out the door to make a drive down to Atlanta, or at least a little south of Atlanta.  We were there for this:

Yes, the date is off.  But the last one was actually postponed due to the inclement weather - all the snow last week.  In fact, there is still snow on our front yard.  All the snowmen are still planted in the front yards of our neighborhood, obviously reduced due to a week's worth of sunlight.  But they still are there.  Our three snowmen are there, a little stronger in appearance due to the fact that they have been in the shade mostly.  But it's been eight days.  Tomorrow will be nine, and they'll still be there.

Anyway, we got in the car and drove south, and in a little over an hour, we made it to the Wren's Nest.

It was something we'd been wanting to do for a while.  Here's Mommy and Madison at the front steps of the place.  It's the home of author Joel Chandler Harris, who is most famous for his Uncle Remus tales.  The house was in great shape.

We toured through the house, checking out the original furniture, photographs, and walls too.  The picture rails - something I had never seen before - were all along the top of the walls, with plenty of vintage photos on display.  Also on display were plenty of Christmas decorations:

You can see here one of two or three live trees in the place, each one decorated with handmade ornaments.  The stockings - socks, really - were hung by the chimney with care, and garland stretched across antique furniture to give the entire place a festive feel.

These two here should be familiar.  I believe it's Br'er Fox and Br'er Rabbit, although the two seem to be on friendlier terms in this sculpture.  The bookshelves had plenty of books, and after today, we'll be making it a point to watch "Song of the South" together.  It's one movie Daddy has never seen, nor Madison.  But it really goes well with he recent project Madison did for school yesterday.

You can see Madison and Mommy above at one of the many fireplaces in the building.  The amount of wood burned in this home could have been stunning.  There were plenty of fireplaces to pose in front of, and plenty of mantles to put more pictures and decorations on.  But here's the question:  which chimney does Santa come down?  A great mystery indeed!

Here it is, the original Wren's Nest.  Basically, it's a mail box.  But neighbors noticed that wrens kept putting their nest in the author's mailbox.  So whenever anyone was looking for the home of Joel Chandler Harris, the neighbors would just tell the people to go looking for the Wren's Nest.  And the name stuck.

Doesn't this bed look cozy?  This entire room looked cozy, actually.  It's not far off from what Daddy remembers at his grandparents house.  It was a beautiful old home, a pleasure to walk through even without knowing who lived there.  

Speaking of which, apparently there are some wrens that are living there now.  This is the current mailbox in front, or at least a decorative one.  It's the same shape and size as the original mailbox, and yes, as you can see above, there's a nest inside!

Also on display were a few things given to the home by Walt Disney himself.  You can see above Br'er Fox and Br'er Rabbit again.  There was a tar baby and a bear as well.  They were all used in a premier of the movie at the Fox Theater, and afterwards donated to the house, where they remain on display to this day.

It was an open house there today, as as you can see above, a harpist was playing some beautiful music as we walked from room to room.  There were singers as well, and then there was a rambler also.

This is our storyteller, who entertained the kids (and adults) with stories from Uncle Remus and more.  He was great fun, and at one point used Madison to help in his story as well.

She was a happy - and quiet - hippo.  She raised her hand to volunteer, but got somewhat shy when she was up there in front of her.  How do you make a hippo noise anyway?  She really enjoyed this time a lot, smiling broadly as the man told us stories somewhat the way they may have been told to Joel Chandler Harris himself.

Afterwards, we went to another room, this time to do a bit of dancing!

This is Daddy and Madison doing a bit of the Carolina Promenade.  There was a group called Atlanta Historic Dance that featured several performers in period costuming.  They did a few dances, and along the way invited us to learn a few ourselves.  The Carolina Promenade was an easier one to learn, so we were quite happy to jump in.

As you can see here, Madison was loving it.  She got the hang of it pretty quickly.  It was a lot of fun!

But all good things must come to an end, and we had to go back and face the awful traffic of Atlanta. Even on Saturday, the roads are thick and clogged, backed up and simply no fun at all.  But we did make it home, and upon getting there we ate a bit, made reindeer mix for handing out tomorrow, and played some "Epic Mickey 2."  Madison requested that.

We're going to bed early tonight though.  We read from the devotional, and from "The Polar Express" as well, before heading off to bed.  We have one more trip back in time with Mr. Scrooge tomorrow, and it's going to be wonderful!