When life gives you lemons make green tea lemonade. So, when one lives in the midwest why not make the best of it and explore the sites in this area? You don't need a lot of money or even a passport. That brings us to Holland, Michigan a Dutch settlement in America. Obviously the city is very proud of its Dutch heritage, as shown in the klompen picture at the top. Klompen is the name of the Dutch wooden clog dance. There are many dutch settlements in Michigan but what makes Holland so distinctly Dutch are its two festivals: the tulip time festival in the spring and the winter festival.
The tulip festival is held in mid-May and lasts for 8 days. The festival includes tours at the local windmills, tulip farms, local dutch houses, as well as dances, concerts, street scrubing, and a dutch marketplace. One interesting thing about the Dutch costumes that are presented during the festival is that they are from the 8 out of 12 different provinces of the Netherlands.
Here is one interesting comment about the Dutch dancing girls: " A question frequently asked by tourists watching the dancers is whether the girls from Dutch descent commonly have such thick ankles. The answer is, of course, no. In order to walk and dance comfortably, in the wooden shoes, they all wear several pair of heavy socks. In general, the clothing in our festival represents styles of the mid 1800s through the mid 1900s" The province that our family originally came from is Noord-Holland so here are a few costumes that we could traditionally have worn.
The first are workday normal wear and the sunday best for men which aren't so bad...
Workday wear Sunday Best
Voldendam girl Voldendam Boy
Marken Girl Marken Boy
if the links don't work here is the link for the costumes
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Deventer is in the Overijssel province which actually has not so outlandish looking clothes. Check it out.
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