Wanna Be a Steader!

Wrapping Up the School Year with Princess Diana...

We live in a little rural town just about 15 miles North - as the crow flies - of Dayton, Ohio.  As some of you may know, for the last year an exhibition in honor of Princess Diana has been touring the U.S.  Dayton is the last U.S. stop.  We finished our school year yesterday and capped it off by going to the Dayton Art Museum of see the exhibition.  We're not huge fans or anything, but this is probably about as close to royalty (other than seeing President Bush 3 times during the 2004 election season!) that we'll ever be.

Oh my!  It was a beautifully done exhibition.  Yes, ladies...we DID get to see the WEDDING GOWN!!  Wow-wee-wow-wow-wow!  Simply incredible.  But I'll get to that later... 

The exhibit started out with a family history of other Spencer women and how they effected British history.  Very informative; I was impressed that my teen daughters were reading every word of each marker and watching all the home movies showing throughout the exhibit.  In particular, it was amazing to see the resemblance between Diana and her grandmother, Sarah.  There were also interior pics of Althorp, the family manse.

The next room held childhood memorabilia.  Many things that we've all seen so many times when some special shows childhood home movies of Diana:  the little red toy fire-truck that they would ride in, a school uniform (as a homeschooler, I just can't imagine sending my little ones AWAY - really away - for school!), a small wooden trunk that she used when going away to school, stuffed animals, little animal statues that any teenaged girl would have on her shelves, ballet shoes...all the while, family movies were showing.

The next room covered the engagement and wedding of Prince Charles and Princess Diana.  As I said before...WOW!  The wedding gown was simply incredible!  A 25 foot long train!!  Sheesh...mine was only 5 feet long and I had enough trouble with that!    Every bit of the gown was hand-sewn.  That would be SOME home-ec project, huh moms?  Even her wedding shoes had around 160 small diamonds on each shoe.  I guess we know where some of that 80% British tax goes, huh?  The diamond tiara/crown on her veil was a Spencer family heirloom from the either the 1800s or 1700s - pardon me, but I read so much I can't remember.  They even had one of the little flower-girl gowns.  Precious.  All around the room were pictures and other momentoes of the occasion:  a little guest cake box, invitation, autographed keep-sake photo of her for her father.  And a video of the wedding ceremony and festivities was showing the whole time.  I remember being 22 years old and watching that whole wedding and festivities.

The next room, unfortunately, was dedicated to her funeral service with a video of the procession showing all the while, with Elton John's "Good-Bye England's Rose" playing.  In this room were photos of the millions of flowers and mementoes laid at both Buckingham Palace and Althorp.  I have to say that I nearly cried while reading Elton John's hand-written re-write of "Good-Bye Norma Jean" that he re-wrote for the occasion.  It was very touching to read that while the recording of him singing it filled the room.  Next to that was Charles Spencer's reply that he read to the press after Diana's death became public.  Another very interesting item was Charles Spencer's rough draft of the eulogy he read at her funeral...complete with cross-outs that you could still read.  I was always a little amuzed by the "politely scathing" remarks he made towards the royals (minus the boys, of course) at the funeral - in his original, you can read what he REALLY wanted to say to them - hmmmmmmmmm.

The next room was probably one of the most incredible.  It was literally HUNDREDS of VOLUMES of condolence books from all over the world!  Some they had opened - one of those was from a lady from Tulsa, OK who told the boys how sorry she was and that they would find their comfort in the arms of Jesus as their Lord and Savior.  Wonderful. 

After that was a room dedicated to her humanitarian works.  I have to say that the most interesting thing I saw there was a small prayer book given to her by Mother Theresa.  It was opened to the inside cover where MT had written a beautiful little poem about letting the LORD lead.

The next, and final, room was a display of many of her outfits with a photo of her wearing each one.  Many of those I have seen film footage of her in.  Of course they were stunning.  All it takes is money and a good trainer and you, too, could wear those stunning outfits!! 

Since I have 2 teen daughters, it was a totally GIRLIE thing to do and we enjoyed it.  And now.......on to the graduation of our oldest (on June 17th!) and on to SUMMER!!!!!!!!!!!!

Blessings from Ohio, Kim Wolf<><

Will this go overseas?

01:20, 2006-May-20 .. Posted by TheGoodLife

Hi



I would like to see this display do you know if it is travelling the world?



We have been & seen her dresses before & that was airie - it felt like she was present.



We also went to Parliment buildings in New Zealand & signed one of her books.



Leanne