Spring 2020

Hello everyone!
I will be attempting to record some general thoughts and comments about Elim's cemeteries on an irregular basis throughout the years.  This is an attempt to let you know a little about what goes on in our cemeteries.

Spring seems early this year, today (Monday 3/23) several cemetery committee members started the annual Spring clean-up in the North and South cemetery.  During the work, we also practiced personal distancing... One of the members commented that this was the earliest he's ever remembered working on the cemetery.  As we talked we realized that mid-April was really early!  Here's why we were out today.

Each winter, in conjunction with Elim, the Gammelgården and the city of Scandia, the Elim Foundation puts up Christmas lights on several of the tress in the cemetery.  We turn them on in January and leave them through Vinterfest (1/25/2020) and into February. 

On Wednesday, 3/18 we took them down, removed all of the extension cords and Dan  & Rick Sandager pruned almost all of the recent plantings (from the summer of 2015).  To keep them from encroaching on the sidewalks, they were pruned quite severely.   The cemetery crew filled a trailer and minivan with the branches and dried out Christmas wreaths on the graves.  We also removed old plastic flowers and other memorabilia like solar lights that didn't work anymore.

In late April and May we'll be

• Removing the stakes (that mark blocks in the cemetery)
  
• Turning the water on.  (mid-May)  Last year we had 5 serious leaks at during May and June.  We hope we don't face this again.  (Last winter there was very little snow cover through the 1st half of January.  The frost penetrated almost 5' deep in some areas of the cemetery and caused the breaks).
  
• Doing some additional clean up.
• Preparing to place 187 Veteran's Stars and Flags on our Veterans grave sites.
  

We understand with Covid-19, many people are sheltering in place and don't go out.  We'll try to help with the normal cleanup tasks the relatives and friends usually handle.