Update from August 2023 to May 2025

 The last time I wrote was August 2023 - two months after I became the Associate Director of Gammelgården Museum. Between then and now, I have become the Executive Director of the museum (since January 2024). 

These 21 months have been exciting, challenging, and rewarding. I've had opportunities to oversee the historic restoration of a 1930s building, revamp the way the museum presents exhibits, improve the way artifacts are stored, began the digitization of the museum's collection by using a collections management system that not only benefits the museum, but that the public can see on MNCollections.

We have had many major community events that have grown in size from a couple hundred of people in 2023 to over 1,000 people in 2024. Our Season Opening Day this year had over 960 people - up from about 250 last year. 

The number of staff and interns are increasing which enables us to accomplish even more. 

With all of the good, though, comes the loss of balance and free time. I have struggled with trying to find the things that I once enjoyed - photography, gardening, quilting, and having enough time to spend with my family. My goal is to get my life in better balance during the 2025 season. 

Below are some photos that I have taken recently. I've taken more photos on my camera which I have yet to download to my computer. There's not enough time it seems. 

At any rate, here are some photos that represent my life over the past year.

I have been photographing artifacts at the museum so we have a digital record of each one that staff and volunteers can use plus the public can see. Below is a courting candleholder. 

At the museum's Season Opening Day, we had farm animals from Little Blue's Traveling Zoo. This is Melvin. He's a Scottish Highland Cow. The stuffed cow is something that we bought for the museum as one of our mascots. This breed of cow is the only one that legally can be kept outdoors during the winter in Sweden. 

One of the things that is important to me is providing training opportunities for tour guides. Below is the meeting in April with our returning and new tour guides. It's in the classroom where the main exhibit is shown (which was still being installed at this point).

Scandia Fire & Rescue held a fire extinguisher training so tour guides and staff could get experience with using them. 

Here's another item in the museum's collection that I photographed. It is one of hundreds of Charlotte Weibull dolls in the collection. These are all handmade dolls, some representing different provinces in Sweden.

During January through April 2025, I was photographing and entering information about artwork and other artifacts into CollectiveAccess. This had never been done. Now, we have over 660 items in the collection that are in the database. This is just a fraction of what we have. I was told we had about 3,500 items. 

In doing this project (along with another co-worker), over 37% of the items entered were not accessioned prior to my start as the Associate Director/Executive Director - which means information about the item was never recorded. So, we have no idea how the piece was acquired or any history about it. 

In March, I drove to Kansas for an open-air museum conference which was informative and relevant to what I am doing now. One of the classes I enjoyed taking was about historic shoes. This is a sampling of shoes and tools that were used to make and repair them.

This photo shows how the soles of shoes were attached to the vamps/uppers - by pegs. These are all little wooden pegs that went around the perimeter of the shoe.

Another class I attended at the conference related to condiments used in the 1800s. 

During the conference, there was an opportunity to visit the Arabia Steamboat Museum which was a fascinating museum. This is one of the pairs of shoes that were restored and are on display. During our visit, we had the opportunity to go behind the scenes to see the restoration and cold storage areas. They are still working on the hundreds of artifacts that are in cold storage. 

 

Part of the open-air museum conference was held at Mahaffie Stagecoach Stop in Olathe, Kansas. It's a nice facility with well-presented exhibits. I particularly enjoyed seeing the farm animals, including this sheep. 

 

I also had the opportunity to visit the Harry S. Truman Presidential Library. Not having ever visited a Presidential Library, I didn't know what to expect. The exhibits were fascinating and I learned a tremendous amount while there. 

Back at the museum, I was purchasing items for the current exhibit, including this print of a watercolor by a Swedish artist. 

In March, Sophia and I took care of my grandnieces for a couple of weekends. We had some craft projects for them to work on which they enjoyed doing. 

We took them to the museum. I was surprised to hear they had never been to a museum, so this was a good experience for them to see what one was like. Maya enjoyed the wool processing exhibit. 

We taught the girls how to make pancakes. Maya learned how to crack an egg which she was proud about doing.

We played games with the girls as the dogs, Danny and Ellie, wanted to be a part of the action. 

We visit the St. Croix River. There was still ice on part of the river (look to the right of the photo). Surprisingly, there were people already fishing on the section with open water.

In February, I went to Karpeles Manuscript Library on my way to Grand Marais. I had never been to this museum and it was well worth the stop. There were documents and images that have been collected by a family that are being shared with the public. This one was from Martin Luther King, Jr.

Karpeles also had a display about historic telephones. This one was an unusual one.

In Grand Marais, I took a class about Swedish embroidery. I was impressed with this 3D installation that was done by various art/education instructors - each depicting a different craft or skill taught at North House.

My hotel room faced Lake Superior and one morning there was smoke coming off the water. It was beautiful.

During the embroidery class, we made pouches that could hold embroidery tools - scissors, needles, pins, and a small project. My project is on the far right - the purple one. 

One of the projects that I am happy about is the non-lending resource library that we created at the museum. There were literally hundreds of books that were never accessioned into the collection. If they are not historic or fragile, they were put in this library for the public to browse and read. Some of the books are in English and others in Swedish. 

I also created a Board and Card Game Library - something that is new to the museum and community. People can come to the museum to play a game. The goal is to get away from technology and do something fun with friends and/or family.

Here's another piece I purchased for the museum. It is over six feet tall and is all hand-felted. It's two birch trees which are significant to both the Ojibwe and Swedish immigrants who lived in this area. 

Winter always seems to offer stunning sunsets. 

This is Ellie with the girls at Christmas 2024. She is our newest dog after multiple and unexpected deaths of pets from 2022 through 2024 (Scooby - November 2022 from some type of weird bacterial/viral infection that got progressively worse; Aspen - December 2023 went in for surgery to remove three masses. When she was recovering from surgery, she was anxious and doing a lot of panting, and - to make a long story short - developed a twisted stomach which was too far along by the time we got her to an emergency hospital, and Cooper January 2024 from Hemangiosarcoma - a type of cancer that only dogs get. No one knew he had it - us or the vet).

On a more positive note, this is what the museum's second floor looked like at Christmas. This exhibit had lots of different mini-themes that showed what the holidays in Sweden look like. The tables are set for the Luciadagen breakfast that was served after the program in the Old Church. 

From August 2024 to March 2025, we had kitten - Juniper - who we rescued from being outdoors. She was by herself, tiny, and hungry. She lived with us and had an active and full life until the last week in March. She developed a neurological condition that would have severely impaired her life. Her condition appeared almost as if she had a stroke. The emergency vet said she would have had seizures for the rest of her life, be unable to walk steadily due to issues on her left side, etc. It was devastating. 

The girls and a couple of their friends doing the annual puzzle competition at the museum.

Sophia brought Olivia her birthday cake to celebrate her 22nd birthday.

Sophia helped serve food for a volunteer and member appreciation event at the museum in January 2025.

My sister and nephew were at the volunteer and member appreciation event. 

This was Juniper at Christmas 2024. She received gifts...just like everyone else did. She loved playing with the crumpled-up paper.

Danny was intrigued with the gifts at Christmas. His favorite gift was the one for him: dog treats!

Sophia helped at the coffee parties at the museum. I appreciated her help during the busy holiday season. 

Just a final photo of Olivia with Maya and Emma plus Melvin the Scottish Highland Cow who, interestingly, was afraid of the stuffed Scottish Highlight Cow. 

And...there we have it. An update from August 2023 to May 2025. Certainly this didn't include everything that happened, but it was a glimpse into this period of time. 

ESG: My Favorite Photos - December 2022

 Here are some of my favorite photos from December:

At the beginning of December, we attended the Festival of Christmas. Olivia is on the tech team, so she was operating a camera. She worked with the team to set up the stage, lighting, and sound.

Sophia performed in the Festival of Christmas on handbells. There was a pre-concert performance which I really enjoyed.

This is what the stage and lighting looked like. Throughout the performance, the lighting and images projected onto the walls would change. It was beautiful!

After the performance, Sophia - along with the handbell choir - went "caroling" throughout one of the buildings. The college was hosting major donors, so this is one special feature they do as part of the event.

On the 10th, the Lions held a Breakfast with Santa + Bake Sale. It was a fun morning. I was in charge of the five collection drives, and was so pleased with how generous people were to help local organizations.

Also on the 10th, was one of the Annie's Coffee Parties across the street at Gammelgarden Museum. 

All the windows had these lights in them.

Although this isn't a great photo, I was thrilled to see a flock of cedar waxwings in the apple tree. We left apples on the tree and a wide variety of birds peck away at the frozen apples.

There are five cardinals that are hanging around our feeders a lot - three males and two females.

I've been getting some new plants during December. It seems like the big-box stores had a nice variety of houseplants this year. It's nice to have some different types of plants. This is a jasmine.

I like the one too - the flower is still blooming over a month after I purchased it.

This is a Christmas Cactus that belonged to my dad. It's about 45 years old now. I realize, as I look at the photo, that it needs more height. I'm not sure how to do this.

This is another plant that is doing well. The jade plant/small tree is about 15 year old now and has just begun flowering during the past few years. It was one very small plant that Sophia, Olivia, and I got when we built a terrarium when they were about 5 and 7 years old. The little plants outgrew their terrarium.

On the 11th, I attended the Lucia Dagen service at Gammelgarden. Typically, up until this year, we've attended the St. Lucia Day service at another Lutheran church. Without the girls here, I did something different. 

it was held in an historic church that was built in the 1800s. It is unheated, so people had to wear coats, gloves, hats, and boots just to stay warm.

While I was at Gammelgarden, I enjoyed walking through its prairie. 

There were a variety of native plants - all now in shades of tan and cream.

Inside the historical church, everything was lit by candles. The half-hour service was done all in Swedish.

During December, there were a few significant snowfalls. This was the first one that blanketed all the plants in snow.

Everything was covered with snow. It was very pretty.

Cooper enjoyed burying his face in the snow and looking and listening for activity near the ground.

I liked the look of the snow clinging onto seed pods. 

The apple tree in the backyard was gorgeous. It kind of reminded me of a willow tree.

The snow left an interesting pattern on the fence. 

The trees in our front yard were loaded down with the heavy, wet snow.

This is the view of the trees along the road from our driveway to the west side of our farm.

Even the Christmas lights were covered with snow.

Inside, the St. Nicholas Christmas Village grew by two new buildings - a ski chalet and a home. It started with two buildings that belonged to my parents. There were a few more buildings, but when we had a fire in the hobby shed, we lost them and a lot of other items that I had inherited.

The Christmas stockings were hung by the wood stove. At one time, both sides were packed with stockings that I had made for all the pets and livestock. The years have passed and animals have died. We now have three dogs left.

The windows in the dining room and living room had stars that I made throughout the years. Some are coming apart, so I'll need to make some new ones for next year. 

We had a second major snowfall. This is the picnic table that belonged to my parents. We have not seen this much snow in the first month of winter for as long as I can remember. 

This second snowfall didn't load down the trees as much this time. The snow wasn't as wet.

This is the view down our driveway.

On Christmas morning, I woke up at 6 a.m. to make this maple twist coffee cake. It took four hours to make from scratch. 

During December, I bit on some items that were on an auction that the humane society where we adopted the dogs from was having. One of the items I bid and won was this wooden Christmas tree that was loaded with lots of dog treats and dog-themed items. Needless to say, the dogs loved it!

I love seeing how happy the girls are when they open gifts.

Here, Aspen is checking out the Christmas tree for dogs. Her favorite toy from it is a stuffed lamb. She loves to carry it around with her and have it next to her while sleeping.

Cooper is playing with "Long Husky." It has crinkle-paper in it and multiple squeakers. 

Here's Aspen with the stuffed lamb.

On Christmas, we went to dinner at my sister's home. This is the "young cousin" table.

This is the adult and "older cousin" table.

My brother brought his dog, Bear, a Corgi. He's such a good dog.

When we came home, we rested a bit and then opened some more gifts. One of the gifts I gave the girls were handsewn hats that someone made. Unfortunately, they didn't look quite right on either Sophia or Olivia. Sophia was a good sport and put it on.

For Sophia's 22nd birthday, she spent it in California with one of her roommates. She had never been to this roommate's home or met her parents, so - being it is her senior year - it was a good time to visit. At any rate, we celebrated Sophia's birthday a couple days early.

On the 29th, I was invited to a luncheon hosted by the director of Gammelgarden and the Butik manager. The other ladies are volunteers - greeters and tour guides. It was such a nice luncheon.

On New Year's Eve, my sister came over and we watched hundreds of slides that my parents took and that we inherited. This is my dad and me - I would have been about 4 months old.

This was my favorite costume that my mom sewed: a kangaroo complete with a kangaroo baby (joey) in my pouch.

My first tap dance outfit was for the song "Secondhand Rose." My parents planted red geraniums and white flowers in their raised flower bed.

In 1974, my parents acted as contractors and oversaw the building of their home.

This is one of my favorite photos of my mom when she was a little girl. Even as an adult, my mom loved dolls - so this captures one of her loves in life.

This is a photo I never saw until New Year's Eve this year. It's of my Grandma Olive by part of her garden - tomatoes. This was take in 1960 - six years before she died. She would have been 48 years old in this photo. 

On the 30th, I went to lunch at Famous Dave's with my friend, Karen. I made her an apple pie. Although it got a little overdone on one side, she said it was delicious. She loves pie, but never makes it from scratch. 

On the 31st, I made another apple pie for my sister and me. She, too, doesn't make pie since she lives alone. So, this was a treat for her too.