Column: Preserving Our Past

Published 12:00 am Sunday, April 23, 2006

April has been a busy month at your museum

By Pat Mulso

The museum is nearing the end of a very busy April that has included many events.

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We hosted training for tour guides and researching for 11th-grade humanities classes

(in preparation for Discover History presentations).

Linda Evenson, our librarian, and I worked, researched and attended meetings with many of the individuals and groups working on programs and events for the sesquicentennial. I gave programs for Red Hat groups, Travel Class, and Lions Club and we hosted a community service project for ninth-graders that included raking and other jobs involved in preparing the village to open on May 1.

I attended the Minnesota Historical Society Workshop in Austin, many committee and board meetings and regular happenings.

We have two dates you need to put on your calendar yet this month that will take place at the museum.

On April 27 at 7 p.m. we will be co-sponsoring a workshop with the Minnesota Historical Society at our museum (1031 Bridge Ave.) titled: &8220;Preserving Family History: Minnesota’s Greatest Generation.&8221;

This workshop will be interesting and informative to all who attend with the desire to learn the proper techniques to save and preserve our family history and belongings.

This workshop is free, but please RSVP to 373-8003.

Sunday, April 30, from 1 to 4 p.m. will be our agriculture open house.

Please join us to enjoy all the agriculture displays in our Heritage Hall as well as throughout the museum.

There will be no let up in activity during the first week of May at the museum. On May 2 and 3 we will have approximately 160 fifth-graders experiencing history with the assistance of 65 11th-grade humanities students.

History will come to life for these students as they participate in the events of the day.

May 4 will be clean-up day. May 5 we start our school tours in the morning and the afternoon will be busy as the sesquicentennial education co-chairman and I work to set up the displays on education, with the help of some of the local schools. The education open house will be Sunday, May 7, from 1 to 4 p.m.

The remainder of the month will be busy with school tours and programs that will benefit more than 1,000 of our local and surrounding communities’ youth.

Remember that May 14 is Mother’s Day and we should all honor our mothers!

Remember that children learn through the examples we set and the way that we live our daily lives.

My mother recently moved into St. John’s Lutheran Home after living in our home for nearly three years with my husband and I as her primary caregivers.

While I was baby sitting for my young granddaughter last week she was helping me to clean and rearrange the bedroom that had been my mother’s for the last few years.

Morgan said, &8220;Grandma, this will be my room now and when you get old like Great-Grandma, I’ll move in and take care of you.&8221;

What a comforting thought from a not-quite-5-year-old with big brown eyes and a smile that would melt anyone’s heart.

She did say that her brother could stay in our other spare bedroom, but that she would be in Great-Grandma’s room, which is right across from our room, so she could hear me if I needed anything.

During the last three years my son, daughter-in-law and my grandchildren have also been an important part of my mothers’ caregiving team, as they provided a safe and loving atmosphere for her two days a week while I was working.

Morgan and Great-Grandma became very close, as my mom loves to read and play cards and those happen to be a couple of Morgan’s favorite pastimes also. My grandson Dylan, and granddaughter Sesley also shared special times playing cards, reading and watching shows with Great-Grandma.

My mother attended St John’s Adult Day Service two to three days a week for the last two years and that helped tremendously for her transition to St. John’s on a full-time basis.

Since she had already attended many of the regular activities that St. John’s offers to its residents while she was attending the Adult Day Service and many of the workers already knew her from this connection, she has been able to adjust to her new, but not completely unfamiliar routine.

We went to visit and play a couple of games of cards on Friday night and when we were ready to leave she said, &8220;Thanks for stopping by. The people here are friendly, the food is good and I have great neighbors!&8221;

We are so lucky to live in a community with so many caring individuals.

This week is National Volunteer Week.

We want to say a very special thank you to all of the volunteers who work here at the museum.

Whether you are a tour guide, a library worker, a board member, a committee member, a mentor, help move machinery or equipment, work on our computers or volunteer in some other way, you are all very important and we appreciate all that you do!

Without volunteers we would not be able to maintain our many programs and events.

Pat Mulso is the executive director of the Freeborn County Historial Museum in Albert Lea.