The thoughts and life of me

On an overcast Sunday in June, we decided to take a little trip to Stavanger Museum. One of the museums in town that we have a year subscription to. They have quite a lot of different animals on show, mostly the ones that can be found locally, but also some that are mostly found far away.

There was a small exhibition on the history of midwifery and a larger one to show the 900 years history of our town (this one was a little scary for Ickle Pickle). They did offer hot dogs and ice cream in the café, so she was not worried for too long.

But our main goal of the trip was to visit the Norwegian Children’s Museum located in the same building. They have a selection of old toys with both a permanent and a changing exhibition and a really great fort, a stage where kids can dress up or try puppet theatre.

The main exhibition they had at the moment was called “Once upon a time there was a clog».  On their page the museum writes: “The exhibition is about a man called Åsmund Lærdal a childeren’s book publisher and toy factory and the place he had in toy history. The company became one of Norway’s largest picture book publishers and toy factories. Lærdal started out as a publisher, but in 1943 began making toys under the name Tomte Småvareindustri. The toys were first made in wood, then in soft vinyl from 1950. The ‘Anne’ dolls and the vinyl ‘Tomte cars’ became international classics. ‘Anne’ was a bestseller in Europe, and 100 million ‘Tomte cars’ were exported to 110 countries.

“The Anne doll got a sister: the CPR manikin ‘Resusci Anne’. Norwegian school children were trained in mouth-to-mouth resuscitation using these dolls. The toy factory is now history, but the soft vinyl and the name ‘Anne’ live on in a new period of industrial development in Stavanger.

The museum came after an initiative from a local comedian and politician called Per Inge Torkildsen, who has also donated a lot of toys to the museum. There are now a lot of interactive spaces in the museum, so kids can see and hear a little bit about how it has been like to be a child in different times, both seeing their toys and listening to their stories.

We had a really good time, and both me, my mother and Ickle Pickle enjoyed looking at the toys, seeing the history and getting to play with them.

Hope the week is treating you well.