Kulturun Museum, Lund, Sweden

It is getting cold now, and it is time to begin to hunker down into our cozy homes. If you are Snow White and the Seven Dwarves, or farmers from Old Sweden, your house might have looked like this. You grew grass on your roof to keep warm.




You wore clogs to keep your feet dry in the mud and wet.


You churned the butter every day, and swung the baby in the wooden swing while you cooked at the open hearth.


Perhaps in the dim candlelight of the long, dark winter days, you carved something special for the children.


You lived in one or maybe two rooms with the whole family. It was crowded and the winters were long and snowy. But there was one place where you could keep something of your own, and lock it with a key. What would you put in this cabinet?


At night, as the embers dimmed, the warmth would ebb out of the house and the cold would penetrate. But you were cuddled with your child or spouse in a little bed with drawn curtains, a nightcap on your head, the air warmed by your breath. Only your nose would get a little pink and cold.


The coziest time of year is well on its way.