A Statue of the Fairy Guardian Angel honors the day’s first light as glimmers of fairy dust twinkle all around.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This will be a fine day.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The sun will shine for awhile

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

and later, a welcome rain will fall.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tiny wonders around us, everywhere and always.

September is a generally a month of superb, kind weather. The heavy heat of summer has passed and cool nights have settled upon us.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is the time of year when my gardens have grown beyond their borders, boldly heralding their abundance.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I am busy collecting seed for next season’s plantings as fairies twinkle, scattering fairy dust where ever they go.

Elecampane, also known as Elfwort rises regal behind me, yellow and proud. Elfswort grows up to 5 feet tall, is a perennial plant that flowers from July through September here in Maine. He is the favorite plant of Elves and attracts Fairies, butterflies, hummingbirds and bees.

Purple Loosestrife is in love with Elfwort and the two in my garden are often found side by side. Though Purple Loosestrife is very beautiful she is also aggressive and dominating, it takes a steady hand weeding to keep her from free ranging and growing wildly out of control.

 

 

 

In September we harvest peaches from our orchard.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Fairy Folk and Wildlings come together with children to sample the first ripened peaches.

Little Penelope Porcupine loves peaches.

 

 

 

 

 

 

As temperatures begin to cool our Wolf River Apples start to ripen.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And later our pears…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Mid October is harvest time in our orchard on the north side of a small mountain in Maine.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Organically grown with fairy dust our trees bear an abundance of fruit which fills our pantry, as well as supplying a food source for Wildlings and Fairies.

 

 

 

 

 

Adults and children, Fairy Folk and Old Horse,

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Family, neighbors and friends,

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

All gather together harvesting natures bounty.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Turning work into play is the Fairy way and we always take time for merriment.

Old Horse is Guardian of the Home Place Fairies as well as to a mortal girl and her younger sister.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

He was long ago enchanted by fairy folk and though he ages he never grows old.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Yesterday we harvested pears, eating as we picked,

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Later we delivered our pears to the Apple Wizard and his Fair Lady who along with a young wizard in training pressed them into cider.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We will dry fruit; freeze fruit, make sauces, bake pies, pastries and tarts.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A Pixie Pear Tart sweetened with fairy dust.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

After her belly is full of peaches, apples or pears Penelope heads home.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Cutest little porcupine I have ever known.

 

Childhood unlike Fairyland (which is a permanent and very real place) is a temporary Kingdom unto itself.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Kingdom of Childhood is a limited time of Magical Thinking and Infinite Possibilities.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In Fairyland there exists no measure such as time; everything is simply happening, all of the time.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Imagination, hopefulness and pure believing are the very essence of what Fairies and Dreams are made of.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Glory persists in the garden where children play and Fairies reside.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Poetry

Websters definition;

po-et-ry

noun

Literary work in which special intensity is given to the expression of feelings and ideas by the use of distinctive style and rhythm; poems collectively or as a genre of literature.

The following excerpt from the poem Little Gidding was written in the year 1942 and is the fourth and final poem of T.S. Eliot’s, Four Quartets, a series of poems that discuss time, perspective, humanity, and salvation.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thomas Stearns Eliot won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1948 and remains a highly distinguished poet, publisher, essayist, playwright and critic.

He was born in St. Louis Missouri in 1888.

 

Little Gidding by T.S. Eliot

Music; On the Nature of Daylight by Max Richter

 

 

On the north side of a small mountain in Maine sits a happy little farmhouse surrounded by gardens of vegetables, flowers, berries and herbs. This little farmhouse is circled round and round by meadows of rich hay to the south and a lovely hardwood forest to the east.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Directly north and to the west lay a barren of blueberries which stretches far and wide.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Early on one particular evening late in July as the sun sets heavy in the west, fairy folk will gather atop the blueberry field’s tallest hill.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Their mission; to sweeten blueberries to ripeness as only Home Place Fairies can.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Fairies undertake this mission seriously and with great pleasure every other year because these fields are organically grown, which means they yield a crop for harvesting every other year, taking one year off to rest and grow.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

First just a few fairy folk come to gather, then more.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

They fly in from all points of the farm, arriving from the orchard, the gardens and meadows of tall grasses which will be harvested as hay. This is the time of that blueberries are blue and fully ripening. Harvesting begins the next day.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Together Fairy Folk work their magic sprinkling the barren’s with fairy dust, by twilight these fields will glimmer and glow.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

On a particular morning, someday in time,  a little girl will rise and walk far out into the blueberry fields for the seasons first harvest and she will notice the last lingering traces of sparkly dust and she will whisper a thank you to the fairies.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Happy Birthday Old Horse !

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Happy Birthday to you!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Born in July on a bright sunny day you were long ago enchanted by  Fairy Folk and though you age you never grow old.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Your most loyal companion and her friends three, bring a cake topped with carrot candles all a glow.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A magnificent birthday cake made of freshly cut hay; a bit of grain, molasses, pink clover and carrots for you!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Make your wish as we wish along too.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Carrot candles are for eating once your Horse wishes are heaven sent.

 

 

 

 

 

Cake to eat and children to pat and groom you as fairies flutter  about… what more could a Horse wish for on such a fine day?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Later two sisters ride upon your back , their hearts filled with love and gratitude for a companion such as you.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Another child shares the joy of living this dream.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

You are the Fairy Best Friend a child could wish for and we love you dearly.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We have always cherished you and will continue to love you to the moon and back.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Happy Birthday Old Horse!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Such a Fine and Grand Old Horse, if ever there was one!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As the sun rises here on the north side of a small mountain in Maine

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

everything is exactly as it should be.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Fairy Folk rise early and begin dusting their magical fairy dust ground precious and fine.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

My greenhouse is bursting with an abundance of fresh herbs, tomatoes and scented geraniums to name just a few varieties of flora that happily reside within.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Large Lemon Verbena, nasturtiums and over flowing flats of Basil are vibrant and fragrant with scent.

 

 

 

 

 

 

All is as it should be on this very fine wonderful July day.

 

The Fairies and I want to wish a very Fairy Happy 11th Birthday to Grand Daughter Delfina!!!!

All our love and blessings we send to you wherever you go, where ever you are…always.

With Love From,

Nana and the Fairies

 

 

 

The day began just like any other and then something happened and nothing was ever quite the same.

Anniversary: A day of acknowledgement, a special occasion of gratitude or woe.

On the 20th of July, the Home Place Fairies and I celebrate a private anniversary of great significance.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We rise at dawn eager to take part in each and every moment of this day. Together we tend our gardens, softly singing gratitude to the powers that be.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A very Long time ago, my Grandmother Catherine gifted me with an introduction to the inhabitants of the Fairy Kingdom, reminding me to, “Have faith and to believe in that which you cannot see”.  Gramma lived her most of her entire life within a garden, just as I do now and almost always have, thanks to her, and thanks to the fairy folk.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Many years ago after a long and wandering time, when I first began transforming a woodland glen into a garden of my own and before even the first of the Home Place Fairies arrived …

 

 

 

 

 

 

my Gramma traveled a great distance to witness the beginnings with her own eyes, her heart wide open and she whispered, ” It takes courage to plant roses.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

After Gramma left I cleared trees and framed up garden beds with old timbers and rocks. I wandered the woodland and filled buckets with rotten sweet smelling stumps which I stamped down fine all soft and squishy and mixed with old dried oak leaves; rinsed off seaweed and soil, creating a deep rich black loam. I filled the beds with seeds and herbs and perennial divisions from Bonnie my dear friend, along with roadside gathered or old home site dug perennials. Which back then there were many of, now there are none or few.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Home Place Faires observing my hard work and efforts and sensing my sincerity began to hover about, finally introducing themselves; they have lived beside me ever since. With the help of the fairy folk I added herbs and vegetables and our gardens flourished and grew.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Gardens draw all kinds of Wildlings to them, including a wide diversity of butterflies and birds. They also draw children; artists, musicians and poets, adults and the elderly, the sad and the joyous. Stell Shevis was one such artist and painted images of my garden through many years, over time.

In time I met a wonderful Wizard and together we planted an orchard and tended a barren of blueberries that stretches far and wide.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

For me it has taken courage and faith to plant a garden just as it had taken Gramma to plant hers, because the planting of a garden signifies letting roots down; believing that I had finally arrived at my own safe home place where I too, could begin in earnest to root, sprout, blossom and grow.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Like my Grandmother, I converse with fairy folk and the Home Place Fairies and I love to garden, cook, sing, dance and sew.

Some fairy fine Lemon Verbena Rose Petal Cake seems like a very good way to celebrate an anniversary.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In loving memory of my Gramma Catherine and her garden.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Big hugs to all those Fairy Grandmothers out there!

 

 

 

 

The last tears I shed, let them be upon flowers grown closer to the ground.