December 2021 – The Wee Museum of Memory

December guidance for Omicron variant

Due to the increasing spread of the Omicron variant, the Scottish Government has introduced new guidance to maintain a safe environment for staff and visitors. Most visitors have been wearing masks, as have staff and volunteers, but we are reminding people that they must be worn and to avoid crowded spaces and maintain social distancing during their visit. We have not re-introduced a one-way system yet but we may do so at some point.

The Wee Museum has been a wee bit quieter the last few weeks but we are still seeing a reasonable number of visitors per day. Again to keep the museum a safe space – and allow people to view our materal comfortably – we may limit numbers at times, if necessary.

We hope to remain open with a small number of staff over the holidays, but Government guidance may change and we may have to close to the public. Please do check our social media for information before visiting.

Even if we are not open, our staff and volunteers will continue to work from home: FB posts, designing booklets and newletters, planning new projects, applying for funding, collating information about our collection, updating the photo archive, recording and editing podcasts, and, of course, continuing our knitting project. We’ve completed a few squares – of varying sizes – and hope to start joining them together in the New Year

Knitted squares: completed and in production.

The uncertainty about the new variant means that we all have to be sensible and ensure everyone is as safe as possible. If we do close you can follow our work on our social media, and we look forward to welcoming visitors to our Wee Museum and to some new and exciting projects in 2022. Watch this space!

These are a few of our favourite things…

We put out a sweetie jar for visitors to leave their comments about their favourite objects in The Wee Museum of Memory and have had lots of interesting comments from people of all ages.

Wee Museum of Memory favourite object sweetie jar.

The Viewmaster has been described as having great 3D images. The Creamola Foam tin was named by a few people and someone even noticed their favourite Smiths Crisps packets.

The beauty and the hairdressing displays were also popular, in particular the heater rollers were a favourite with someone. The Daktari Album was the choice of a couple of visitors and brought back many memories for one in particular. The Cuisenaire counting rods reminded a visitor that they demonstrated how to use them to a school inspector when they were at Wardie Primary.

Dolls, the dolls’ house, toys and more dolls, and even more toys, as well as the reading sofa and balloons, are well-liked – and played with – by quite a few of our younger visitors. As are the old-fashioned Hoovers, typewriters and phones, which regularly receive hands-on investigation. One of our visitors was on the design team for the Viscount phone between 1979-1982 so this was his favourite in the collections.

One of our typewriters and a Viscount phone.

Changes in technology seem to intrique visitors – from early Hoovers and washing boards to rotary dial phones – and one noted that they found the Macintosh Classic interesting to compare with the newer IMacs. Perhaps because the screen is so small?

It’s always a pleasure to get this kind of feedback; it shows that our visitors respond to our collections and find objects in the our Wee Museum that they find interesting or remember. A couple of visitors loved everything …what more can we say to that?

Thank you to all our visitors who have supported us during 2021.

It’s beginning to look a bit like Christmas…

We’re now in December so The Wee Museum of Memory is getting ready for Christmas with trees, tinsel and presents…

This week we had a visit from a group of lottery jackpot winners organised by Camelot, who brought us a new tree, decorations, presents and hampers for some of our regular users. Due to concerns about the new Covid varient, we decided not to hold a party as we had planned, so will give out the hampers individually. We’re sure that they will still be much enjoyed. May was delighted with her one yesterday.

Jackpot winners with some staff and volunteers.

Kermit has been having a look at some of the presents under the tree and wondering if there is one for him…Maybe one of them might be a selection box or a Beano album? We’ve been sharing memories of our childhood Christmases with visitors: treats, family rituals, favourite foods…

Some of our visitors have added their memories to our Christmas Memory Tree… ‘Dressing the tree and eating Christmas lunch together and then showing Granny my presents from Santa.’; ‘Making trifle on Christmas Eve with my dad and eating all the sponge fingers!’ ‘ Leaving my dad’s long woolly scout sock at the side of my bed. Having a good feel of it in the morning before starting to empty it. Always had a pack of chocolate cigaretts, a mandarin and a threepenny bit among other things.’ ‘Kids wanting to get up at 4.00 as Santa had been…LOL.’

There’s still room on the tree for your memories if you are passing.

We are also pleased to have two new members of staff working on cataloguing our collection of objects: Louise and Naomi. This is going to be a mammoth task, as regulars will know our museum is packed with donations. Louise started earlier this year to help co-ordinate our application process for museum accreditation and Naomi started last month as part of the Government Kickstarter programme. Welcome and good luck!