A Pleasant Day at Pleasant Hill...

Outside of Harrodsburg, Kentucky is the community of Pleasant Hill where Shaker Village is located. The Shakers were a religious community that lived in families in this beautiful piece of countryside. They did not believe in marriage but men and women made up their families. They would have a men's side of the house and a women's side of the house. The same with the meeting house (church). They are the group from which we get the lovely piece of music "Simple Gifts". There are no Shakers living there now. However, the community has been restored and it is a fascinating place to visit.

Each year our Countryside Homemaker's Club goes somewhere very nice for lunch and we try to include a shopping or sight-seeing adventure with this lunch date. This year, as the president of our club, I suggested we go to Shaker Village for lunch. The ladies all agreed that would be a great outing. It is only about an hour from our home. So we had the added bonus of a nice ride in the Kentucky countryside.

December 5th we met at my home and collected the canned goods each lady brought for the Soup Kitchen in Georgetown. In the past we have exchanged ornaments. This year, instead of exchanging ornaments, we determined we would all donated to the Soup Kitchen. I gave each lady a Christmas treat and Charlotte Archer, our vice president, made each of us a crocheted scarf. There were only eight that ended up being able to go so we divided us between Charlotte's car and mine and we headed out to Pleasant Hill with Charlotte in the lead.

Janet and I got to talking and I completely missed my turn into Lexington. My car was on automatic pilot to go and teach Institute. We made a U-turn and went back to the correct exit off I-64 and we were on our way again. 

Janet and I got talking again. As we approached Versailles Road I remembered the instructions saying something about the Martha Layne Collins Parkway. I took Versailles Road just in case as Janet quickly tried to read the directions. We should have gone down one more exit to Harrodsburg Road off New Circle. Goodness. Well, I determined we would go on down and take Man-O'War across to Harrodsburg Road instead of turning around again. That worked out fine and soon we were headed the right direction on Harrodsburg Road. 

By this time we had completely lost Charlotte and her car of ladies but I knew we would all meet up at Shaker Village so I was not worried about that in the least.

As you near Shaker Village there is place where Hwy. 68 veers to the right. Janet and I thought that was the way we should go. Elaine, Janet's mom, was riding in the back seat and really felt we should have gone straight. I made another U-turn and went back to the gas station at that fork in the road. Janet went in and they confirmed we had been going to correct way. Back onto Hwy. 68 we headed and on to Shaker Village.

Unbeknownst to me Charlotte's car full of ladies had grown concerned about not seeing my car full of ladies. They had pulled over to the side of the road somewhere to wait for us. They actually called City Hall to get my cell phone number for Cindy, our city clerk. Claude was at City Hall with Cindy and knew about the call when Cindy asked him my cell phone number. The ladies were trying not to worry Claude by calling Cindy instead of Claude. That plan didn't work for them but I truly don't think Claude worried about me a bit. He knows I can pretty much find my way around and have done so many trips across country by myself. The ladies saw us zip past them on Hwy. 68 somewhere and knew we were okay.

My car made it to Shaker Village. We found a white SUV with UK stickers and license plate on it and we assumed that was Charlotte. So I pulled in beside her only to have Charlotte's SUV pull in after us and park behind us. Geez!!  We all had a laugh about our adventure getting to Shaker Village.

Lunch would be at the Trustee's Office Dining Room.

It was a beautiful buffet lunch with so many good home cooking foods. We all ate till we were full and then asked one of the servers to take our picture beside one of their Christmas trees.

Our next stop was at the craft shop just outside the Trustee's Office Dining Room. Our ticket for lunch included 10% off at the gift shops. We also enjoyed a ride on the Jingle Bell Sleigh down the main street of the village.

 

We headed to our cars and determined we were going to the main entrance and see if the big gift shop at the main entrance was open. It was and more purchases were made.

 

Then we all headed back to Sadieville. It was a lovely afternoon with delightful ladies and good food and fun.