Little Red House- Meet COAL HOUSE!

HUGE excitement today as we met up with some home ed friends and visited 'Stack Square' in Blaenavon, which featured in the BBC's Coal house programme.http://www.bbc.co.uk/wales/coalhouse/ which the children followed avidly.

They were all thrilled to be able to visit the 'set' which is housed in the Blaenavon Ironworks museumhttp://www.cadw.wales.gov.uk/default.asp?id=6&PlaceID=145

Its very muddy! No wonder the families in the programme struggled to keep anyone/thing clean! Especially two toddlers with 8 people in one 2up,2down!

We met the chickens, saw the tin bath everyone bathed in and looked round the houses .We were struck by how tiny the house was... much like our own!( only we have a loft extension)Suddenly the penny dropped, our house was probably built on the footprint of the old miners cottage demolished to make way for it!Thankfully mine has more mod cons!

I cant imagine having to sit in front of this hearth, as charming as it is all day every day undertaking endless drudgery! Connor just had to try the outside loo where we discovered evidence of 'cheating' in the programme. It appears they had a proper 2007 potty for the babies!( and who can blame them?)

Later we moved on to 'Big Pit' http://www.museumwales.ac.uk/en/bigpit/

Where we saw the pithead baths which the women in the 'coal house' programme were seen campaigning for.

Then we moved onto a fantastic tour of the mine underground with an ex miner as a guide who was really knowledgeable and explained everything he also gave the kids some information about the universal colliery disaster of 1913 which killed someone from every house in this village( many of whom were never recovered) and the children left really enthusastic and wanting to find out more about what happened almost 100 years ago but only 100m from their front door! They also visited a really interesting exhibition at the baths/medical centre/canteen about life down the mines. They were especially interested in the idea of children having to work underground from just 5 years old and relieved that wasnt their reality!

We had an interesting reaction to the question "No school today?" from one of the miners/guiodes... The kids told him they were home educated and he added "How you gonna learn them,if you aint in school then?"

Clearly the irony of him, working in a museum asking that question had completely passed him by.. I wonder what he thinks hes there for? I should have asked him but then I'm a great one for thinking of what I "Should" have said when its too late!

I was really touched by the incriptions on these plates on the dresser...

The top left hand one reads "It was hard work, you were always doing something, it was never done"So us 2007 welsh mums have lots in common with our ancestors after all! Especially when Home educating!