Lindsborg is busy planning for the annual Midsummer's Day Festival held on the 3rd weekend in June.
Mark your calendars to attend this year's event, June 19th, 20th and 21st 2009!
Check out the new official Lindsborg Midsummer's Day site:
Lindsborg celebrated Midsummer's yesterday, and a great time was had by all. As previously reported, the format changed quite a bit for this year; the result was a pleasing mix of old and new!
The new layout in the park, the booths representing various aspects of traditional Swedish village life, and of course the wonderful Swedish dancing, all made for one of the best Midsummer's celebrations I've attended.
On the photography front, this year turned out much better than last year. Though I took around 1,000 photos last year, I was disappointed with most of them, and only published a handful.
This year's results speak for themselves; the 15 shown below were chosen from the set of 80 I posted on Flickr, and those were the best of the 178 that made the first cut, chosen from 784 total images.
Using Adobe Lightroom, it's taken me about 5-7 hours to sort, process (crop, straighten, color balance), convert to jpeg and publish to Flickr and my web sites. Well worth it, I might add. I love trying to capture a fun event like Midsummer's and then sharing it with the world.
Susan and Becky did a tremendous job in leading the team this year, as we pulled off one of the best Midsummer's in recent memory!
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Traditional manly dance.
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Swedish dancers.
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Swedes love their coffee!
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More Swedish dancers.
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I just love the dance with the flower covered hoops!
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More of the hoop dance.
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Wheee!!
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The Swedish dancers continue to be the highlight of Midsummer's for me.
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The dancers head to Sweden soon after Midsummer's; think they look excited?
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A master at work.
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Main street even had a Maypole this year.
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Midsummer's isn't complete without the traditional Maypole raising ceremony.
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Leading the charge. The live musical accompaniment provided by these local musicians adds greatly to the days' proceedings.
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The frog dance, a humorous dance made more fun by the audience's participation. Even the bishop is in the mood.
It's hard to believe we've come this far since our first Midsummer's committee meeting in January, but Lindsborg will be celebrating Midsummer's this weekend, Saturday June 21st.
You can visit our Midsummer's Day web site for more information, and a PDF of the full-color, 8 page program is available:
I've been involved with 4 Midsummer's celebrations and this year promises to be one of the best ever! Quoting from a recent Midsummer's press release:
Festival organizers have dramatically changed the festival this year with new events and activities intended to embrace the community's Swedish heritage and to involve guests and participants more intimately in the celebration.
Visitors can enjoy the magic of summer by stepping into a quaint Swedish village, which features artisans' shops, settlers' homes, artists and craftsmen's studios, a storyteller's den, and a homemaker's kitchen. They can absorb as well as observe. For example, the Svenska Vänskaps Gruppen (Swedish Friendship Group) will welcome casual visitors, explaining traditions, customs, and folklore handed down over generations - even helping them learn Swedish phrases.
Finally, to further get you in the mood for Midsummer's this weekend, here's a few photos from Midsummer's past:
Press the "reload/refresh" button in your browser to see a different set of photos. You can also view more photos of Midsummers in Lindsborg from years gone by.
If you haven't finalized your plans to visit Lindsborg and celebrate Midsummer's Day on Saturday, June 21st, this may help. We're pleased to make available the event program, featuring information about all of the new activities planned for this year.
The program is available as a full-color PDF file:
2008 Midsummer's Program
Step back in time and enjoy the magic of summer: Midsommardag 2008
Press Release
CONTACT:
888-227-2227 (Lindsborg Chamber of Commerce)
http://www.littleswedenusa.com/midsummers/
May 22, 2008 - For Immediate Release
"Midsummer's Festival to be held on Saturday, June 21st."
LINDSBORG, KS --Mark your calendars for the 3rd weekend in June to attend Midsummer's Day Festival in Lindsborg: Little Sweden USA. This traditional Swedish festival, which is celebrated worldwide, welcomes the arrival of the summer solstice. Now in its 37th year, Lindsborg's 2008 Midsummer's Festival promises to be a fun-filled day for everyone in the family!
Midsummer's will be celebrated on Saturday, June 21, beginning with opening ceremonies in Swensson Park at 9:30 a.m. (the park opens at 9:00 a.m.). Festival organizers have dramatically changed the festival this year with new events and activities intended to embrace the community's Swedish heritage and to involve guests and participants more intimately in the celebration.
Visitors can enjoy the magic of summer by stepping into a quaint Swedish village, which features artisans' shops, settlers' homes, artists and craftsmen's studios, a storyteller's den, and a homemaker's kitchen. They can absorb as well as observe. For example, the Svenska Vänskaps Gruppen (Swedish Friendship Group) will welcome casual visitors, explaining traditions, customs, and folklore handed down over generations - even helping them learn Swedish phrases.
As always, there will be music and dancing with the youthful Lindsborg Swedish Folkdancers and their elder counterparts, the Lindsborg Folkdanslag, each celebrated locally and nationally for their talent and jubilance. Visitors will be given the opportunity to join the dancers and learn a few steps. Special guests include author Kathy Bernstrom Lerfald and John Berquist, a teller of Scandinavian folk stories and musician.
The festival will also feature a children's area with crafts, games, and story-telling. Throughout the day, many Lindsborg residents and visitors will be in Swedish costume, adding to the flavor of Midsommardag.
A style show and other activities will be held in Bethany Lutheran Church in the afternoon.
The Volvo Car Club will host their regional rally at the north end of Swensson Park, which will be followed by a Road Rally on Sunday at 9:00 am.
Visitors are invited to join in the Midsummer's Interlude in downtown Lindsborg between 4:00 and 7:00 p.m. for live music, food, games, and shopping. Mainstreet, a five-piece show band from Manhattan, will perform jazz, rock, blues and R&B. Downtown restaurants will serve Swedish food, and folks can judge the local businesses' individual maypole entries.
The Midsummer's Day celebration continues in the evening at the Old Mill Museum and its Swedish Pavilion and Heritage Complex. Visitors will experience the traditional raising of the maypole, followed by traditional Swedish dances. For those still left standing, the day will conclude with a swim at the Lindsborg swimming pool.
Kansas' Swedish Smorgasbord
That's the headline for a nice feature story about Lindsborg published on AAA's online travel website, Home & Away. The article covers a broad variety of topics, including the Wild Dalas, Swedes' love of coffee and the newly opened Swedish Crown restaurant. The article even includes a mention of Lindsborg's Midsummer's Festival, held on the weekend of June 21st, 2008. There's no real news for residents and frequent visitors to Little Sweden, USA, but it's a great article to share with family, friends and other potential visitors.
You can read the article here: Kansas' Swedish Smorgasbord
Lindsborg Kansas will once again host its annual Midsummer's Festival the weekend of June 21st, 2008. Festival organizers this year are planning dramatic changes to underscore the community's Swedish heritage and, at the same time, offer visitors the experience of stepping into it.
In early February, Lindsborg News-Record publisher John Marshall conducted an interview with Midsummer's Festival co-chairs, Becky Anderson and Susan Achenbach. They discussed the changes planned for this year's festival; we hope this information helps make you more excited about attending this year's festival.
Full festival information, including schedules and pricing, will be posted here in the next few weeks.
Changes Coming for Midsummer's Day 2008
Midsummers Day returns to Lindsborg, "Little Sweden USA," on June 21 with new events and activities to embrace the community's Swedish heritage and to involve guests and participants more intimately in the celebration.
The festival (Midsommardag) celebrates the beginning of summer and is one of the most popular of all Swedish celebrations. This year, Lindsborg will host this family-oriented, Swedish-American festival for the 37th consecutive year.
Festival organizers this year are planning dramatic changes to underscore the community's Swedish heritage and, at the same time, offer visitors the experience of stepping into it.
"We felt that the event, over the years, had sort of lost a lot of its original intent, which was a celebration that focused on Swedish heritage and invited people to be an intimate part of that," said Becky Anderson a co-chairman, with Susan Achenbach, of this year's Midsummers.
"We have had meetings with others who have long experience with Lindsborg's Midsummers, and who also had been to Midsummers festivals in Sweden," Anderson said. "It seems that our Midsummers had become very performance-driven, with visitors and guests outside looking in. But in Sweden, people are able to participate, take part in so many ways, much like, say, our Fourth of July." "When people go somewhere, they want to experience, not just observe," Anderson said.
A Swedish village is planned for this year's Midsummers, and in it will be, among many features, the shops of artisans, the homes of settlers, the studios of artists and craftsmen, the den of a story teller, the kitchen of a homemaker. Perhaps, even, a food market. (Potato sausage, made with an original iron stuffer, is one example.)
We'd like to creat a charming, engaging space that invites people to 'come in.'"
"One of the great features of Midsummers is the blomkrans," Achenbach said, an activfity in which young, old and in-between can make their own decorative head wreaths, or blomkrans, at a long table stocked with fresh cut flowers, and with assistants ready to help.
"Wouldn't it be great if people could, for example, paint their own Dala horses? Or make an item - participate in an experience and have something to take away with them?" Achenbach said. "It would be so absolutely Swedish."
Visitors would be able to absorb as well as observe. For example, Midsumnmers planners also envision a kind of parlour with the Svenska Vänskaps Gruppen (Swedish Friendship Group), in which the casual visitor may hear people speaking in Swedish, or in English, explaining the traditions and customs handed down over generations - or they may help visitors learn Swedish phrases, or the meaning of certain customs or folklore that have never been fully explained.
"A visitor might come into this 'home,' or 'parlour,' and sit down with them and say, 'My grandmother used to have this custom ...' or 'My grandfather used to have this gadget...' and ask, what was it? Or they might just want to learn how to say 'Happy birthday' in Swedish," Anderson said. "In this village, we'd like to have lots of parts of life that you would find in a Swedish town."
"We hope that Midsummers is not so much about climbing on bleachers and watching, as it is about people walking around and doing, taking part, and we hope people from Lindsborg will participate, help us with these new features," Anderson said. There is a Swedish game, she said, called "Kubb," similar to lawn bowling. "Wouldn't it be fun to have the first annual Kubb tournament, showing people how to play it, and then go with a tournament?
There will be music as ever, and dancing, with the youthful Lindsborg Swedish Folkdancers and their elder counterparts, the Lindsborg Folkdanslag, each celebrated locally and nationally for their talent and jubilance. The festival will feature a children's area with crafts, games, and story-telling. Throughout the day Lindsborg, its people and many of its visitors will be in Swedish costume, adding to the flavor of Midsommardag.
The celebration will continue later in the day downtown, and ultimately to the Old Mill Museum and its Swedish Pavilion and Heritage Complex for the traditional raising of the maypole and more Swedish dancing.
Midsummers, said Anderson and Achenbach, is not simply about Lindsborg, but it is also about visitors having an enjoyable day and taking away a good experience. "The educational experience of this is important," Anderson said. "It's about a wonderful, rich heritage passed down to the generations, and along to visitors as well, so that others can take it away, too."
Another Midsummer's Festival has come and gone, and from all reports this year's event was one of the best in recent memory! Hurrah for the Lindsborg Midsummer's Day Committee; if I do say so myself, we did a great job this year.
From the excellent stylings of the Swedish rock band Tiny Toads through the always excellent performances by the youth and adult Lindsborg Swedish dancers, the weekend was almost perfect. Sunny skies, happy crowds, great selections in the crafts vending area and a wide selection of children's activities contributed to a wonderful celebration that was capped off with the raising of the Maypole and more dancing! Even the food was more varied than in years past, but fans of Lindsborg's Viking on a Stick were still able to satisfy their cravings.
I took a few photos, but it may be a while before I get a chance to review and publish them. In the interests of more quickly sharing our wonderful weekend I'm going to link to fellow area artist Julie-Ann, who has posted a great Flickr set of Midsummer's 2007 photos; enjoy!
Here's one of the pictures I took:
Just wanted to make sure everyone is aware that Midsummer's is happening this weekend, June 16th 2007, and will be held rain or shine! In the event of rain, all Saturday activities will be held at the Smoky Valley High School, located in west Lindsborg, along Burma road. There is plenty of free parking, so don’t let rain cause you to miss one of the most fun events of the summer. In addition, the street dance that is being held in downtown Lindsborg on Friday evening will take place at the high school in the event of rain.
Celebrate Lindsborg's "Midsummer's Day Festival"
Midsommardag '07
Press Release
CONTACT:
Mike Rodriquez
(785) 227-2928
msd07@littleswedenusa.com
http://www.littleswedenusa.com/midsummers/
This press release is available in Word (.doc) format, as a PDF, and as a plain text file.
May 23rd, 2007 For Immediate Release
"Midsummer Festival to be held on Saturday, June 16th."
LINDSBORG, KS -Mark your calendars for the 3rd weekend in June, as Midsummer's Day, a traditional Swedish festival celebrated worldwide, returns to Lindsborg: Little Sweden USA, the weekend of June 16th. This festival, held to celebrate the beginning of summer, is one of the most popular of all Swedish celebrations, and Lindsborg is proud to host this fun-filled family oriented Swedish-American festival. Now in its 36th year, Lindsborg's 2007 Midsummer's Day promises to be a fun-filled day for everyone in the family! This year's Midsummer's will honor the 15th anniversary of the establishment of sister city ties between Munkfors, Sweden and Lindsborg.
This year, very special guests will be performing at Midsummer's. From Sweden, we welcome the Tiny Toads, a musical group with ties to Lindsborg. In addition, honorary Lindsborg citizen Alf Brorson, an award winning international author, will speak. Of course, the high school group Lindsborg Swedish Folk Dancers and the adult Lindsborg Folkdanslag dancers will also be performing the weekend of Midsummer's.
While the dancing is large part of what makes Midsummer's enjoyable for the whole family, there's much more happening at Lindsborg's Midsummer's Day Festival. There will be a vending area featuring a wide variety of arts & crafts, and in addition, a number of food vendors will provide food and drink for visitors.
There will be other entertainment throughout the day, including a full slate of children's activities, including crafts, games, stories, and more. There will also be a preview of Lindsborg's premiere outdoor theatre, Broadway RFD, that will be performing Damn Yankees this summer. Throughout the day, many Lindsborg residents will be dressed in traditional Swedish costumes, adding to the atmosphere of Midsummer's Day.
From 4 to 7pm visitors are invited to downtown Lindsborg where they will find entertainment, fine dining and shopping.
The Midsummer's Day celebration continues in the evening, moving from Swensson Park to the Old Mill Heritage Complex. There, visitors will experience the music of the Tiny Toads, followed by the traditional raising of the maypole, concluding with traditional Swedish dances.
*New* Downtown Lindsborg Merchants are hosting their Midsummer's Madness event the day of Midsummer's. On Saturday, June 16th, Midsummer's attendees are encouraged to take the short walk from the park to downtown where they can both experience more of what Lindsborg has to offer as well as enter into a drawing for a fine piece of artwork made by a local artist.
Attendees will receive a coupon that needs to be marked by 3 participating merchants and then deposited at Axels, downtown Lindsborg. The lucky winner of the drawing will receive a fine piece of Swedish Folk Art, a Valkommen sign painted in Kurbit design by Carla J Wilson (www.flipartlindsborg.com).
Carla's art may be purchased at Axels, the Swedish Country Inn and the Old Grind, all in downtown Lindsborg, or from her website. An image of the piece being awarded as the prize this year is available: http://www.littleswedenusa.com/midsummers/images/msd07-mm.jpg
*New* Children's activities have been enhanced and expanded this year. The young ones will be sure to enjoy games such as the Lutefisk toss and Swede Ball. There will also be miniature Maypole decorating, face painting, and lots more; be sure to see the expanded children's schedule elsewhere in this press release. This year truly promises fun for the whole family!
Admission for the day's events (not including the Smörgåsbord) is $5 adult, $3 children ages 4 to 10, and youth under age 4 will be admitted free. This price includes the evening's entertainment at the Old Mill.
Full details, including vendor list, full schedule and more is available below the fold.
Continue reading "Midsummer's Day 2007 Second Press Release" »
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