We celebrate Mother’s Day to thank our mothers, expressing our love and gratitude. Mother’s Day is celebrated to make our mother’s feel special. My mother is someone who is special to me because she always has time for me and gives good advice. I am so grateful for her.
Our midwifery issue (47.2) talks a lot about mothers and the miracle of life. If you haven’t had a chance to read it, you could stop by our office at 3 Courte Manche or shop online at http://www.themdays.com
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everyone my name is Erica Watkins. I have worked with Them Days in the past and I decided to come back and work as a social media manager. I am so glad to be back and I can’t wait to see where this adventure brings me.
In my spare time I like to bring my dog for walks. I also like watching surfing movies and playing video games. I enjoy a pretty quiet life. This summer I will be working on blogs for Them Days and giving you a sneak peak of the archives.
Erica
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Our Annual General Meeting is next week. Stop by if you would like to learn more about what we’re doing, have a bite to eat, or get involved! We will be giving away a Them Days hat and t-shirt of your choice at the meeting.
If you’re not going to be in town, you can still attend by joining with Google Meet. The code for the meeting is ewd-xyig-nov
See you there!
Filed under business/announcements, Events
The launch or celebration for our midwifery issue was originally going to be held in December, but unfortunately, Covid caught hold of our office in December and then it was the holidays, then we were short-staffed, and I had a long-planned vacation, etc., etc. With a literary festival for HV-GB planned for this week, we decided to plan our midwifery launch around that week, and crossed our fingers we’d have a new staff person by then. As you know, that worked out for us, but the literary festival was postponed. I didn’t want to postpone this event any further, so literary festival or no literary festival, it was going ahead.
And what a day we had!
Part of our grant from the International Grenfell Association involved giving 50 copies of the special issue to physicians and other people who currently work with pregnant and birthing people in our area. This gift is in celebration of the return of midwifery to our area; the magazine is a compilation of the history of midwifery in Labrador, from lay/traditional midwives, to the introduction of formally trained midwives from the UK through the IGA and the long history they had here until the past decade, when midwifery disappeared from Labrador entirely. In recent years, there has been the re-introduction of midwifery into the province as a formally recognized practice, and we are slated to be the next area to get them. Congratulations on working towards this worthy goal, and thank you to the members of the Midwifery Implementation Committee for coming out to our celebration.
In addition, the Innu Roundtable Secretariat has started an Innu Midwifery Program, which is training the midwives of the future (and the program is profiled in the magazine). In recognition of their important work, we also gave them several copies so the midwifery students all have a copy of their own, and they have others to share when needed. As you can see, they also set up a wonderful information display and brought a box of menstrual products for our washroom. Thank you for helping eliminate period poverty through your Moon Time Connections program!
We also donated more copies to the Mokami Status of Women Council and the Healthy Baby Club at the Little Tree Family Centre.
We had an amazing cake, a fun scavenger hunt, and we all had a great time!
Aimee
Time for everyone’s favourite type of update… screenshots of Excel sheets! While not the most exciting visual, these images show the type of work that has been going into the soon-to-be-released audiobook editions of Them Days.
The above screenshots are from an in-progress issue, specifically Volume 2 Number 3 from 1977. The Excel sheets show how I (Alexa) have been tracking the progress of this project and the other images show the editing process. I use a program called Reaper to edit the audio files from every article which includes taking out background noises and any extra “ums” and “uhs” that come up during the recordings. After that, the files get rendered into MP3 format and labelled by title and chapter number. I am following ACX guidelines for these audiobooks which means that the final products should sound as good as anything you are currently listening to on Audible!
It has been so fun to hear the community effort it took to record every single article and I cannot wait for you all to hear the final versions of these audiobook editions of Them Days.
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Big news: We have a new person in our administrative role!
I’d like to introduce you all to Amanda Budgell. If you live in Labrador, you may already know Amanda from her previous work at the Indigenous Skilled Trades Office of TradesNL, or from the Labrador Friendship Centre. Or perhaps, you remember when she worked here years and years ago! We had a great time working together back in 2009-2010, and got a lot done in the magazine and archive together. Now she’ll be concentrating on the administration side and working in the archive too. I know we’re going to have a great time again. And it is so good to have someone here on a permanent basis again!
So welcome back to Them Days, Amanda, and I am so looking forward to moving ahead with plans and getting lots of work done with you here in the office!
Aimee
Filed under Aimee, Amanda, business/announcements
Looking for an administrative job in Happy Valley-Goose Bay? We are looking for someone who will work with our customers and perform basic bookkeeping tasks (payroll, sales, invoicing, filing taxes) and perform administrative and basic archival work (filing, scanning, etc.). Please apply ASAP if you are interested!
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Hello, all! My name is Alexa Nicolle, I am the newest intern at Them Days in my second week at the magazine. For the next few months I will be conducting remote work from St. John’s focused on interviewing Labradorians who have moved to the island as well as some archival and audio projects.
I moved to St. John’s from Winnipeg, Manitoba to go to Memorial University for my masters. My internship at Them Days fulfills my final co-op work term for my degree in Folklore. That may seem like a long way to go, but Memorial is actually the only university in Canada that offers a degree in this field. Despite some troubles with housing and a few wayward professors, I can definitely say that coming here was the right decision: my cohort has become some of my best friends, I love the city, and I met my partner through school. Before coming here, I finished off an interdisciplinary undergraduate degree in Narrative Studies at Canadian Mennonite University and worked as a curatorial assistant at Dalnavert Museum and Visitors’ Centre in Winnipeg.
The most common questions I have received since moving here are “How do you like the weather?” and “How different is the ocean to the prairies?” The answers are simpler than most expect. Growing up in Saskatchewan has prepared me well for long cold winters and I am perfectly happy in any environment where I can see the sky, ocean and canola fields included. I would also argue that the people of the coast are quite similar to the people of the prairies: both sets are kind, hard-working folk who understand that the only way we are going to survive the weather is with a lot of warm drinks enjoyed together. My impressions have also been corroborated by friends who once worked with the Mennonite Central Committee while it was still in Labrador, who have told me similar stories about their time as teachers.
I am looking forward to my time at Them Days and am more than happy to talk with anyone who is in the St. John’s area. You can find me through our website, Facebook, or email me at alexa@themdays.com. Thank you all for the warm welcome and you will hear more from me soon!
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To start, I want to make it public that one of my work New Year’s Resolutions is to post more regularly on the blog. So here we go–the first post of mine for 2024. Let’s look back at the year that was 2023.
January
In January, Laquita Normore, our Midwifery issue project researcher, came to Goose Bay on her way to the North Coast for the midwifery project. Unfortunately, she just ended up sitting around the airport all week. I joined in on the waiting, as I was supposed to go to Makkovik for the Nunatsiavut Heritage Forum. Neither of us made it out. But all was not lost, as we got to plan some things in person and get excited about the midwifery issue with each other!
February
Because Laquita’s contract had now come to an end, it became my turn to head to the North Coast for midwifery research. I visited Rigolet, Hopedale, and Natuashish. All in all, it was a great trip. I squeaked out of Hopedale and into Natuashish JUST before the weather hit and we got socked in (you could see the weather literally changing just before we landed). So I had a couple of extra days in Natuashish…but hey, that’s life travelling on the coast. I’m used to weather delays, and it just means I get extra work done! I had a lot of great chats and heard many stories in Natuashish.
March
In March, the weather and everyone’s schedules finally co-operated and the 2022 Nunatsiavut Heritage Forum in Makkovik went off! If anyone in Labrador remembers what it was like during Cain’s Quest last year, when the weather changed and warmed up and there was rain…well, that was the week I was there. We got weatherbound an extra six days in Makkovik. I love Makkovik and I have lots of family there, so it was the best kind of situation, really…but my kids now hate dropping me off at the airport because they think I’m never coming back! I got lots of work done there too and pretty spent a paycheque at the craft store. It was a memorable trip, for sure!
When I came back, we had Alyssa start in the office. She came in at the 11th hour for several deadlines, on a very-part-time basis at first, just to get us through a rough patch, but then she enjoyed herself so much and the Board was so impressed with her work, they asked her to stay on! So she did.
April
Something interesting must have happened, but I’m not sure what.
May
We had a visit from the Uncommon Bonds project to launch their work, and Tom Gordon launched his book here. It was really neat to meet some archival counterparts from the Moravian Archives in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, and I hope I can visit their facility sometime for a course in reading older German script. It was my first time meeting Michaela Doucette, a member of our Archives Committee, in person. We also welcomed Andrew Cabot, our summer student.
June
We brought our tent to the College grounds for National Indigenous Peoples’ Day, where we met David Stewart, with whom I’d been talking to for a couple of years about genealogy. David came all the way from New Zealand, so that was very exciting.
David gave a talk the next day at the Them Days building and it was well-attended and well-received.
July
In July, we got started with the travel for the Healing and Commemoration travelling exhibition about residential schools. This was put together as part of the Newfoundland and Labrador Residential Schools Settlement, and Them Days is the custodian of the archival material relating to the Healing and Commemoration sessions that took place in 2017-18 and now we are bringing the exhibition around. Kayla Williams is the main person for that project, and we all brought it to Nain for the launch. Unfortunately, there was a very scary incident that happened just before the launch started, and it delayed the project by a few more months.
August
I was gone on vacation, but Alyssa and Andrew got the exhibition materials back from Nain, and Andrew finished his time with us. There were also a lot of things in the works leading to September…
September
Some signage that we’ve had in the works for a long time went up on our building, thanks to these fine fellers, Joshua Davis and Barrie Massie.
We also held a fundraiser for a new roof. It was our first time doing 50/50 tickets since I’ve been here, too. We also launched a merchandise line because we have been asked for Them Days t-shirts so many times over the years.
October
In October, I went to Rigolet for the 2023 Nunatsiavut Heritage Forum. What a trip it was!! There was unseasonably warm weather, so we were walking around in t-shirts and the fall colours were in abundance. I walked to the end of the boardwalk with friends and saw the archeology site at Double Mer Point for the first time. It was absolutely amazing!! I love visiting Rigolet, and this was one of the best visits. I can’t wait to go back.
In October, we launched the travelling exhibition again, in Happy Valley-Goose Bay. We were eager for something low-key and uneventful. We were fortunate. The opening was powerful and impactful and healing, but it was also nice and calm. No emergencies.
We also had a few more finishing touches put on our building, plus the new roof on the front half.
November
In November, Kayla took the travelling exhibition to Rigolet. Wish I could have gone too!
December
We had our first Christmas Parade float for the first time (at least, in memory). Lots of fun!
Our long-awaited Midwifery issue came out. What a relief. It had been going on for a very, very long time–even longer than an actual pregnancy. Thank you to the International Grenfell Association, who funded the project, for the ability to put out this labour of love, and for being so patient with us.
And then, just before we closed for New Year’s, the Christmas issue arrived back from the printer too! It was still within the twelve days of Christmas–phew!
Filed under Aimee, fun, Special Projects, the magazine, travel
Hello! My name is Uapukun Rich. I am a summer student at Them Days, I work as the Editorial assistant.
It is one of my last weeks with Them Days and I’d like to just go over everything we have been doing this past summer. I’d also love to give an idea as to what you would be doing if YOU worked for Them Days one of these summers!
Some things I do as the Editorial Assistant is organize the magazines that we use in our office, I also have organized donations like for example: Someone came in and donated a bunch of boxes of our old and new issues, and I went through them and kept note of what they had donated and also kept an eye out on rare issues. I also am in charge of the Them Days Calendar! I look through the archive for pictures and for dates of special events that has happened in Labrador. This is a thing basically everyone does in the office but I interviewed my Dad on Lobstick and how his life was like there. I helped plan A LOT of our events, I supplied our events with activities and people to perform.
Over the summer we have worked on getting our magazines into audiobooks, we have also been digitizing our magazines. We have been planning events for our come home year. Lastly we have been brainstorming ideas for future issues.
Working at Them Days, we do a bit of everything. Everything gets a lot of attention. We work with the archives, media, and editing no matter what our job position is!
That is all for today!
Uapukun
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Today at Them Days 