Lutefisk lawn art is my kind of cod
I had driven by Earl "Swede" Sands' lawn ornaments for some time before I decided to stop by his house one recent afternoon to get an answer to my burning question: Who in the world erects a barrel full of lutefisk in their front yard?
It's not an actual barrel of fish; rather it's a wooden ornament depicting a barrel with lye-soaked cod brimming from the top. It's a brave Scandinavian who can profess his love of lutefisk in this manner, especially along a busy highway like U.S. 93.
It's my duty here to explain to those unaware that lutefisk is, indeed, soaked in lye and often has a sort of jelly-like quality when Scandinavians consume mass quantities of the stuff at Christmas or at Lutheran Church lutefisk suppers. I love it and I'm not afraid to say so.
Sands' display, put up because he thought his older sisters would get a kick out of it, includes a Viking, an ax on a wood stump and the word "Swede" spelled out. It's clearly a Scandinavian hotbed of lawn art.
I dropped by and found Earl's wife, Mabel, knitting an afghan. Earl wasn't home.
Mabel is Norwegian, raised in Northern Minnesota, as was Earl. She dutifully fixes Earl lutefisk at the holidays, but doesn't care for it herself.
"They ruined good cod," she confided about the unusual fish delicacy.
The lutefisk lawn art has attracted a few folks actually wanting to buy lutefisk, she said. I wondered myself if there was a lutefisk shop there when I first noticed the fish barrel a couple of years ago. Mabel said the owners of Norskstar Seafood in Whitefish, who are renowned for their delicious firm lutefisk, gave the Sandses some free fish for promoting one of their trademark products.
Come to find out, Earl's artistic abilities go way back. He once was an editorial cartoonist for a San Diego newspaper. He gave that up to work in the heavy equipment industry most of his life.
"He still talks and writes in Swedish," she said. "His sisters (who are in their 90s) really like that."
Mabel, who worked as a nurse at North Valley hospital for years, fills her days with knitting hats, mittens and afghans that she delivers to the county, which gives them to people in need.
She also satisfies Earl's appetite for Scandinavian pastries such as rosettes at Christmas time and makes a cheese spread called Mosmor out of cream and Gjetost goat cheese.
Earl likes to putter around with his lawn art and it's hard to say what might come next. He likes to add things here and there, Mabel said.
Lawn art is a quirky thing. Remember pink flamingos? And gnomes? My mother went through a phase of painting slabs of wood that looked like contorted Holstein cows. She still has one in the yard. I bought her a pair of gigantic wooden Monarch butterflies one year and she loved them. I think they're still on the wall by the front porch.
I'm pretty sure Earl's lutefisk barrel will remain a one-of-a-kind ornament. But he gets my tip of the hat for professing his Scandinavian heritage in a way that makes people sit up and take notice.
Features editor Lynnette Hintze may be reached at 758-4421 or by e-mail at lhintze@dailyinterlake.com