nordic heritage musuem and a few other things

if you read yesterday's post, you already know that i visited the nordic heritage museum.



that is not the official entrance. i just like that the building still resembles the daniel webster elementary school that it used to be in a former life.

i was soaking up nordic heritage yesterday 1) because i'd never done it before 2) because padre and my step mom are going to be in town next month and i'm scouting museums. i guess given that padre is a minister and that i'm kinda stressed about the impending visit, it was appropriate that this religious mannequin in the american settlement section scared the hell out of me.



he just sort of materialized in my blind spot. gah!

the museum consists of three floors. the first shows the difficulties of immigration and settlement. normally, lars brekke, a blacksmith who lived in ballard, would've been able to quote things at me but he was feeling under the weather. poor guy.



the second floor is dedicated to fishing, logging, folk art, a library and a special exhibit area. the third consists of separate rooms devoted to finland, iceland, sweden, denmark and norway respectively.

the finland room smells like church due to the donated pews and alter. i felt an overwhelming desire to drink welch's grape juice.

i'll be going back to the museum. (esp for tivoli/viking days) i wasn't able to see as much as i would have liked since i was actively avoiding five bus loads of children. but i did take away a quote about swedes that's been making me giggle for no reason. that quote being "give me a bunch of swedes and i'll build you a railroad to hell!".

i'm giggling again already.

wednesday's bday food was chocolate covered strawberries.



sorry it's so blurry. i was more into eating them than making them pose for long.

after dinner, leff and i headed downtown.



we took the monorail and sat in the very front since neither one of us had done it before.



don't give me flack about using the monorail. it's a hell of a lot faster than the bus esp if you live in lower queen anne and are headed to the westlake center area.

tonight leff and i are doing the member's preview at pacsci. dinosaurs!! dinosaurs from china!!