Labor of love results in peaceful garden
When the Knife River Lutheran Church built an addition several years ago, the congregation was left with an ugly ditch outside the basement’s French doors.By: Holly Henry, Lake County News Chronicle
- Pastor Susan Berge and Artist Laura Stone
- Memorial Garden Fish
When the Knife River Lutheran Church built an addition several years ago, the congregation was left with an ugly ditch outside the basement’s French doors.
Four years of labor and creativity later, the church now has a stunning memorial garden, complete with stone mosaics and a water feature.
“It was a labor of love and creativity,” Pastor Susan Berge said this week as she helped ready the area for this weekend’s dedication.
“This project brought a lot of people together who otherwise wouldn’t have come together.”
The mosaics were created under the direction of local artist Laura Stone. The stones were collected from the shores of Lake Superior and dumped on the floor of the Knife River recreational center where volunteers sorted them into colors and shapes.
“I never even knew there were white rocks and pink rocks,” Berge said. “They had to be just the right size to fit into the mosaic.”
When completed, hundreds of hours of work had gone into the project.
The area was crowned with a stainless steel fish sculpture/water feature created by Knife River artist Dale Burton.
“Because we are a fishing community and because in Christian theology fish and water are symbolic I thought this piece would be fitting,” Burton said.
Of course the four-year-long project was not without its obstacles. Deer ate several young trees and a culvert overflowed, flooding the area.
“That is the way with any undertaking,” Stone said. “They are never without what seem like insurmountable problems.”
The dedication will take place on Sunday at the 8:30 a.m. worship service. A reception will follow at 9:30 a.m.
Tags: two harbors, knife river, knife river lutheran church, garden
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