Christmas Craft Fayre 2011

Stowmarket is getting exciting! There's a lot happening in this town, and the recent Lights Switch On proved that, with the people of Stowmarket proving they are more than happy to embrace events that take place, with fantastic numbers of people making their way into the town centre itself, but also making their way up to us here at MEAL.

We played host to a Christmas Craft Fayre, as well as providing our annual Santa's Grotto and taking orders for Christmas trees which we sell as part of the Museum's Social Enterprise. From 12pm-7pm we saw fantastic numbers of people take a look at what Craft stallholders had to offer,  as well as be treated to a rousing performance of carols from our next door neighbours, Abbot's Hall Primary School.

Located in the barn itself, our trusty volunteers had helped us create a beautifully decorated area that had a real traditional Christmas feel. An atmosphere needed to help people get into the Christmas spirit a full month before the day itself! We had a fantastic selection of stalls, despite us not having the space to accommodate large numbers of people selling, we instead made sure we chose a diverse range of crafts that more than made up for it. With art and prints, Christmas cards and paper, jewellery, cakes (and what fabulous cakes they were!), handcrafted wooden decorations, all sorts of fabulous fabric fancies and some really superb handmade crayons that made very special childrens gifts, there really was so much to choose from.

As anyone that's familiar with the Museum knows, we're passionate about sustainability and supporting local economy. That's why we love events like this, that show off brilliant handmade items, but that also draw people into the Museum that may not be familiar with what we have, and what we do. We also really love to involve ourselves with the community, the town council did a really great job providing entertainment that kept people in the town, supporting local business.

So it's a massive thank you to all those that attended, another big thank you to the stallholders who braved the cold of the barn for over 7 hours! And an extra special thank you to Santa Claus himself, who listened to many, many childrens Christmas wish lists.

Skills for the Future at MEAL

Throughout the course of this blog, I've mentioned the Skills for the Future programme on numerous occasions. It seems only right therefore to give a bit of explanation as to what exactly Skills for the Future is, and how you could get involved in the programme.

Skills for the Future is a heritage lottery project that is funding numerous programmes within the sector, with the aim of preserving heritage skills by offering work-based training in a wide range of skills. These include looking after buildings, landscapes, habitats, species, and museum and archive collections. These skills will give all the participants a real chance at pursuing a career in heritage.

The Museum of East Anglian Life is working in partnership with Gressinghall Farm and Workhouse to provide a series of programmes over three years. I've included all the details of these programmes at the end of this post, including the latest advert for a Farrier post at Gressinghall. 

End of the Season

We've just had a smashing half-term week, which saw an exciting hunt for the Were-rabbit and a brilliant Big Read and Big Draw, though sadly these draw us to the end of our season here at the Museum. We love to go out on a high, so thanks to everyone that participated in our half-term activities, or who just paid us a visit last week. October has been very kind to us with the weather, and you've certainly all taken advantage of that with a few extra trips to the Museum! Of course it's always sad  when we close the doors, but with two events still to come, there are always ways that you can continue to support the Museum this winter.

This Saturday sees an explosive, fun-filled evening with our annual bonfire night and fireworks display. It's a truly fabulous, family event. With traction engines in steam, and a selection of Old Tyme amusements from an East Anglian fairground family, this is so much more than your average fireworks display. Gates open at 6.30pm and food and refreshments will be available throughout. Tickets are available in advance from Mid Suffolk Tourist Information, Adults £4, Children £3 and a Special Family ticket £12 (2 adults, 3 children) or you can buy your tickets on the night, Adults £4.50, Children £3.50 (no family ticket available on the night).

After the Bonfire's been put out, we start the preparations for Christmas! Headed by our Christmas Craft Fayre on the 25th November, which promises a fantastic range of quality Christmas gifts, decorations and food all within our beautiful thirteenth century barn. As well as this, Santa's grotto will also be open and we'll be taking orders for our fabulous Christmas trees. It's free to come into the Craft Fayre so it's worth checking out what's on offer! 

Santa's grotto and the Christmas trees will continue on every Sunday up until Christmas (with the exception of December 25th!), so there are plenty of reasons to come up to the Museum.

Meanwhile, we're still incredibly busy behind the scenes, as we put lots of effort into the big move into Abbots Hall, ready for opening in the new season. It's an incredibly exciting project, and I'll keep you updated right here at MEAL Blog!

A lucky tale

Here at the Museum we preserve the past in lots of different and interesting ways. We have a keen interest in the Suffolk Trinity and we always like to report on any activities of developments to do with the animals we have here on site.

So it's with great pleasure I bring you the story of a new calf here at the Museum, born last Wednesday, the first heifer calf on the ground. It's the story of a calf that nearly didn't come to be, and a very lucky mum with a lucky name to match!

The Calfs mother, is very aptly name Lucky Stripe. Aptly because Lucky was, before she came to the Museum, in the fattening pen at Downham market. Things weren't looking promising, the future was looking bleak, until a breed secretary on Dartmoor got in contact with Jeremy Perkins, who owns the herd who graze here at the Museum.

A frantic race to save Lucky was underway and after a few phonecalls to a cattle dealer, Jeremy became Lucky's hero and the deal was done to save Lucky from the butchers knife, and bring her into the herd. Despite being a black Riggit, Jeremy knew that she carried the red gene, and gave her the name Lucky Stripe because it was her Riggit markings that saved her from the chop!

Lucky Stripe and Rosy

Lucky's luck still hasn't run out, and her beautiful calf is proof of that. Named Rosy, even the new calf has an interesting story behind her name. The name Rosy was given to Jeremy by a wonderful family of visitors he encountered here at the Museum, the little girl, Kelsey having the honour of naming the calf.

Beautiful Rosy!

Rosy has been registered as Two Mills Rosy, and will go in a separate group of Red cows to be started at the Museum. Eventually she will be mated to Rugus of Hindhope, a very handsome, solid red, shaggy bear of a bull calf, brought from a Mr. Elliot at Hindhope,  Jedburgh on the Scottish borders.

Rosy and Lucky can be found on the Nature trail here at the Museum and are definitely worth a look!

Thanks to Jeremy Perkins for all the information http://twomills.weebly.com/

More trainee news

Another week, another blog from another trainee. This time it's the turn of Jed one of our Collections trainees, who's put together this piece for the Association for Suffolk Museums newsletter, which he's kindly offered to share here on the MEAL Blog. It's fantastic to share some of the day to day life of a trainee, and to highlight just how interesting and rewarding the schemes being offered here at the Museum are.

'We’ve now been at MEAL for four months and we’re amazed not only by how quickly the time has passed, but by how much we’ve already done in this short time. Over these four months we’ve attended numerous training sessions, teaching us the expected standards relating to documentation, handling, and conservation to name but three. Significantly though, this traineeship has not just been a prescribed set of training days but a flexible learning experience, and most of our time at the Museum has been spent not in meeting rooms but getting on the job experience.

Fellow trainee Laura labelling an object at the Labeling and Marking objects training

The main focus of these four months has been getting involved in the everyday management of the museum’s collections; using the cataloguing system, finding items in the stores, and adding items to the database. We’ve also been heavily involved in the museum’s HLF project, inventorying items, conducting research, and contributing to interpretation. Alongside our work in the collections, however, we’ve had the chance to get involved in the museum’s events, including the Beer Festival, On Landguard Point and the Steam and Crafts Weekend.

Jed pouring a pint at the beer festival

More recently we have begun to get training as Museum Assistants, looking after the museum’s day-to-day operations but more importantly looking after the museum’s visitors. All of this has been great experience to count towards the Cultural Heritage Venue Operations NVQ we are undertaking over the course of the year.

Visiting the V&A, who are running the NVQ programme

Overall, it’s been a busy but rewarding four months!'

Skills for the Future update

For this blog update I've recruited two of our Skills for the Future trainees to give you their opinion on the heritage skills course. It'll give you a great idea of what's happening here at the Museum, and what we're offering in terms of courses. For more information on Skills for the Future check out Skills for the Future PDF and Upcoming Posts.

Hannah and Becky hard at work!

'We are Becky and Hannah, two students on a three month heritage skills taster course here at MEAL. The course is funded through the HLF and started in July and there are 6 of us on the course in total. We thought we’d give a quick update on the first two months of our course and show you some of the photos of the activities we have been involved with.

Becky getting a helping hand from the basketry trainer

We have been able to sample a large variety of traditional skills such as Blacksmithing, Bodging (carving traditional wooden tools and implements), working with willow/basketry, traditional printing and working with heavy horses including the wonderful Suffolk Punches. As well as learning the basics of these skills we have been able to demonstrate some of them to the public visiting the museum.

Two of the gorgeous horses Hannah and Becky were lucky enough to work with 

We have also been involved with estate work including livestock management, nature conservation and clearance,  building an eco-friendly children’s play area and making scarecrows.

Fellow trainee Luke helping to put up the Scarecrows

We also learnt how to organise a museum event - the Steam and Crafts weekend, which went really well............and we are fortunate enough to have been taught to drive a Steam engine!

Fantastic Steam engine! Riding one of these is a rare opportunity

In the next couple of weeks we are going to Gressenhall Farm and Workhouse in Norfolk (who are also running the training programme) to learn more about ploughing with Suffolk punches and other interesting things.

We are really enjoying learning the different traditional skills that have shaped the culture of our country and keeping them alive for future generations. Over the next few weeks we will be thinking about how we will take this forward as part of our future careers. We’d certainly encourage other people to get involved with the Skills for the Future programme at MEAL or Gressenhall – there will be another 3 Month taster course at MEAL starting next summer and there are a number of internships available at both museums.'

Working outdoors, learning traditional skills

Hannah all geared up for Blacksmithing

The Clay oven the trainees made, produced some tasty jacket potatoes!

Steam team harvest 2011

With all that's been happening here recently, we almost didn't get the chance to show you how our Steam Team harvest went! The weather halted original plans to harvest at the end of July and almost scuppered the new date which was set for the 7th August.

Smiling in the sunshine

Luckily for the Steam team their journey from 'seed to slice' could still be realised after some sunshine in their favour, and they were able to successfully harvest a 'fine, even wheat crop.' A hard grained bread wheat was chosen to produce a good grain yield and useful straw of normal length, which was harvested using a reaper-binder from the 1930's pulled by a David Brown tractor from 1953.

The crop

David Brown tractor with reaper binder

The journey doesn't stop here though, and we will keep you informed on plans to thresh the crop using a Ransomes threshing drum which will be powered by out 'Empress of Britain' Burrell steam traction engine. The final stage will be milling the wheat grain using Alton Watermill, a quern (a hand turned millstone), or a small portable mill. 

And of course this effort will have its rewards with the result being wholemeal flour to bake that perfect loaf of bread!

Thanks to Roger Barnes for providing additional information on the entire process.

Steam and Crafts Weekend 2011

We had such an exciting weekend that it's taken us this long to recover and sit down long enough to write about how much fun we had! Our Steam and Crafts never fails to interest our visitors and we see people coming back year after year to watch craft demonstrations and view a selection of commercial vehicles and vintage tractors in steam on our site.

One of our fantastic engines

This year saw a record number of craftspeople demonstrating and selling at the weekend with over 20 stalls set our offering a range of crafts with jewellery, lace-making, rag-rug making, spinning, weaving and natural dyeing just a few examples of what was on offer.

Some interesting baskets

We also ran our Steam driver training scheme, which saw the trainees given the opportunity to learn how to operate an engine, our popular scheme gives many the chance to live out childhood dreams, and we saw many happy smiling faces driving round our site.

Getting the hang of the steam roller

Visitors had an opportunity to experience everything the Museum has on offer, as well as try out some of the crafts themselves with a helping hand from our demonstrators. We have a fantastic relationship with Suffolk mental health partnership who had a stall at the weekend, and we got to see a real insight into how art can be used to express peoples feelings and opinions on the subject. 

We had lots of visitors through the door, and spent the weekend asking about our leisure courses and what we could offer to you. If you missed out, but would be interested in giving us your opinion, we have an online survey Click here to take survey

Summer Holiday Activities at the Museum of East Anglian Life

So it's that time of year again, the kids are off school and you're desperately trying to keep them entertained. Thankfully MEAL comes to the rescue at this time of year, so whether you're looking for a day trip, or considering investing in a Season ticket. The Museum has plenty to offer.

Seed workshop

Wednesday 10th August- Seed workshop

Friday 12th August- Suffolk Rusk and Butter Making

Wednesday 17th August- Pond Dipping in the Mill pond

Friday 19th August- Seed workshop

Wednesday 24th August- Bird day

Friday 26th August- Pond Dipping in the Mill pond

Wednesday 31st August- Seed workshop

Friday 2nd September- Bird day

Pond dipping

Summer holiday activities are just £1 per activity user with normal museum entry, so not only do you have a fun activity, but also a day at the Museum. We have historical buildings each of which contain childrens activities and play areas, an outdoor play area and lots of animals. 

Meeting one of our small animals

In addition to our special Summer holiday Activities we also have other family events happening over the next few months.

Saturday 13th- 14th August- Steam and Crafts Weekend

Sunday 28th August- Printing for All

Saturday 3rd September- Traditional Music Day (in association with EATMT)

Thursday 27th October- Big Read and Big Draw in the Big Barn

Saturday 5th November- Bonfire Night Celebrations

Bonfire night

Blacksmithing

As our Skills for the Future courses continue, so do the traditional skills and crafts that our group of six 3 month trainees get to try out. This week they headed down to the Smithy, on their first day mastering the basic techniques, as well as finishing the day having created a poker.

Day two and they had to engage their creative side, and let the ideas flow as they were set the task of designing and making something that could be sold in the Museum shop.

With creations such as a picture frame, a sun shaped wall hanging, an egg cup and an ash shovel being made its clear that there's some excellent teaching and fast learning going on. Our trainees are always so incredibly eager to learn, and its fantastic to see these real traditional heritage skills being taught on site to the benefit of not only those learning, but to everyone who visits us who can watch a live demonstration.

Steam and Crafts 2011

Our annual Steam and Crafts weekend is coming up in just 10 days time, it's the 5th year of this fantastic event so we're sharing some picture memories as well as this years information to give you an idea of what's coming up.

Just one example of the beautiful engines that you will be able to see in steam at the weekend

The event also includes a selection of Commercial Vehicles and Vintage Tractors owned by enthusiasts from the area. We are particularly pleased to welcome members of the Ferguson club who are celebrating their 25^th anniversary this year, as well as our regulars from the local David Brown Club who will be demonstrating their machines throughout the weekend.

David Brown tractor club

This year we will have over 20 craftspeople from around East Anglia who will be demonstrating a variety of crafts and techniques, where possible we will be encouraging our visitors to give it a go, and perhaps spark your interest in one of our crafts.

Handmade crafts that will make you smile

And beautiful jewellery for even the most fashion conscious of craft lovers 

And we really do believe in the hands on approach here at the Museum Training Officer Paul Palmer says, “this year we will be promoting our Traditional Skills and Leisure courses, which will be open to all visitors and age groups. On the weekend we have Natural Dyeing and Water Colour painting work shops, as well as the traction engine driving. This is just a few of the opportunities we have on offer for 2011”. 

Very cute!

So there you have it, we've been having fun for 4 years and we're pretty certain that this year will be no different, in fact if anything its going to be bigger and better than before with a larger selection of Steam powered vehicles and more crafts being demonstrated than ever before. More than anything its the perfect event for any age of steam enthusiasts, or for anybody that enjoys traditional crafts.

A big hello to Molly

Everyone that visits the Museum knows we love our animals, especially a new arrival, and we've got a gorgeous girl bringing some piggy glamour to the place. Molly is a Suffolk Black, a breed of domestic pig the same as our current Museum residents Doris and Boris, and as you can see from these pictures she really is gorgeous!

Molly

Molly is a fabulous young girlfriend for Boris, and though small at the moment by the end of this year she'll be getting a lot larger, similar to Doris.

Doris and Boris