Fairy Magic

While wandering up and down the aisles at my local grocery store I saw a stock boy cleaning up a smashed apple sauce container. I thought about how lowly that job is, admiring how he went about his work with quiet diligence, and quickly hid a fairy journal on one of the shelves behind him. I never imagined that he'd actually be the one to find it, or that he would care much if he did. And then...

"Hey! Look what I found!" I heard a boy exclaim. And there they were, three aisles away, two 16 year old stock boys huddled together looking very intently at something very little :)

How lovely is that and how lucky am I to have witnessed it?

Mr & Mrs Creepy Pants

I got a nice chunky stack of photos in the mail today. Some of them are absolutely lovely and will make outstanding leprechauns and fairy godmothers. Some of the people are absolutely stunning though I usually avoid buying photos of people who are too pretty. I prefer people who look like high school weirdos living 100 years ago. I like people with a bit of something extraordinarily ordinary about them.

Here are two characters in the lot that sort of give me the creeps. Although I'm not entirely certain why, I'm thinking it's the direct 'look into the camera' eyes. Usually people will be looking dreamily into the distance not giving a hypnotic stare.

I'm probably wrong but I can't help but think that they must have been kinda pervy or murderous... I'm sure I'm wrong ;)

Well, click on the images for a nice fat full res version you can use in your own making. I don't think I'll be using these folks myself. Hmmm, unless I do a Victorian murder series... which actually doesn't sound like such an awful idea.

Apparently Blueberries Need Fairy Godmothers

This morning while mowing the lawn I saw the most perfect mushroom (which I mowed around much to my husband's dismay), a teeny weeny frog prince escaping the blades of my mighty mower, a beautiful golden feather and several loverly, fluttery butterflies. Then I heard a *clunk* and the mowing ceased.

The rest of the day was 'one of those days' until after dinner when I went to do some making. It seemed as though the planets aligned, the gods smiled and everything just fit into place for a short while. It's nice when that happens.

I'm so proud of this gal. I really and truly love her. I spent ages on her but she was worth it. I'm so pleased with the finishing touches that happened tonight.

She is a fairy godmother to blueberries. I don't know exactly why blueberries need fairy godmothers but there are loads of things I don't understand so I'll just go with it. Anyway, she comes out at night and shoos away critters that eat more than their fair share from the bushes... as critters often do. I understand that she also likes to chat with fireflies. Who doesn't?

The Clurichaun

One of the things I've been working on over the past day or so is this fellow. I've had it in my mind to make something for the wine cellar... a clurichaun!

The clurichaun is a cousin of the leprechaun. They are well dressed, always in green and red, and are never without drink. If you are very lucky, and treat them well, a clurichaun might just move in and take care of your wine cellar. Mistreat them however and you will find your wine spoiled and havoc run amok!

Butterfly wings and bees wax

Our house guests are gone and we now have a couple of weeks all to ourselves. The pull out bed has been tucked away and my craft room is now mine once more! Time to get on to the making.

I had about a dozen mini canvases laying about and it was about time to put them to use. The result are these sort of dreamy mini collages covered in beeswax. They have lovely things like lavender buds and four leaf clovers stuck in them. A couple even have real butterfly wings embedded in the wax.

Don't worry, I didn't go butterfly hunting for this project. The wings have been sitting in my stash for ages after finding them along a beach years ago.

Please don't let it be a dead cat!

It's a lovely drizzly day here today. A fog is hanging over the tree tops and everything looks dreamy and out of focus. Hang on a second. What's that down there? A black spot on the laneway at the bottom of the hill. It's not moving. Can't be an animal can it? Oh please don't let it be the neighbours cat!

We're expecting a full house this weekend so I've been cleaning, scrubbing, washing, and mopping all morning long. After a few hours of glimpsing the black spot on the laneway my curiosity got the better of me and I strolled down to investigate.

Thank the gods, it's a hive! Must have fallen out of that old maple tree. No bees or wasps flying about(though the mosquitos are out in full force). I was just thinking about hives last night and so I carefully gather it up and take it back to the house so I can dry it out and have my way with it.

What a beautiful thing.

Horseshoes & Pirates

My husband came home on Saturday with a lovely surprise. He'd gone to an auction and bid on a nice stack of old photos for me to play with. Some of them are from local photographers and it's fantastic to think that I've got some local history in my wee hands.

I'm in the process of scanning and cleaning up the dust and scratches in photoshop. This poor fellow had a scratched up eye (click to enlarge).

I like the aged look so I don't go over board with the 'fixing' but I do explore these people pretty closely. I was thinking about how intimate the process of fixing these photos is when I came across a lovely surprise. Check out the tie on that stuffy fellow above...

Horse shoes! How utterly awesome is that? I'm now madly in love with that old stranger :)

P.S. The pirate festival was a load of fun and we managed to pull costumes together, not only for ourselves but for our houseguests too! If anything, this encourages me to have more dress up clothes and costumes on hand at all times :)

Fairy Wands & Peeping Toms

I was sitting in my craft room watching Excalibur and making fairy wands when who should appear my my window? Another peeping tom frog!

 

I know he's a tree frog but it still amazes me that such a wee thing can make it all the way up to our second story window. I still prefer to think they are jumping up :)

Here's a sneak peek at the wee wands.

We're off to the local pirate festival in the morning and I'm very excited about maybe possibly dressing up. Hope the day is full of "Arrrgh, matey!"'s

Cleaning, cleaning, cleaning....

We're all in a tizzy here as we're expecting house guests tomorrow. Our good friends from our old home town are coming up for a little stay. The kiddo is extra excited to see his good friend, whom he has known since pre-school, and has loads of things he wants to see and do with him. I'm crossing my fingers very tightly that no one gets into the poison ivy. Just in case I've done a happy home spell to encourage only good things :)

Not too much going on here craft wise. I've been organizing my stash which had somehow made it's way into four jumbled boxes. Now I just might be able to find those little bits and bobs that were escaping my crafty fingers. Here's a completed page for the the Round Book Tip In Swap now on it's way...

"Things with Wings"

A visitor in the clothespeg bin

I adore our new home. The air is fresh and the views are stunning. The night sky is filled with gorgeous stars that actually twinkle. Birds sing to us all day long. It's a dream land. I just thank my lucky stars every day that bugs don't creep me out because they are everywhere, and they are huge. If I was, in any way leery of the creepy crawlies I'd be in serious trouble here.

This morning, as I was hanging laundry to dry, I found this fine fellow at the bottom of my clothes peg bin.

He was such a strapping thing that initially I thought it was a plastic bug my kiddo had misplaced. Nope. The legs gave a bit of a wiggle and I knew he was the real deal. I felt sort of bed for the guy, he was pretty sluggish and looked a little 'dented'.

After a few photos we returned him to the wild. It was a pretty exciting few moments for a seven year old boy... okay, I admit that I thought it was pretty cool too.

P.S. So, I guess this guy is a member of the scarab family. He likely lives in a hollow of one of the old trees that we have on the grounds. Apparently you can keep them as pets! If I find another maybe we'll feed it lovely things for a while before sending him back out to fend for himself.

Ta da!!!!

Phew! It's not 100% but I figured it was close enough to upload.

Yes, I have FINALLY updated my web site.

knickertwists.com

Go ahead, snoop around!

More small things

HO. LEE. SMOKES. I've been working like a crazy cat lady trying to update the Knickertwist's website. It's coming along but it's also taking ages upon ages.

I've been photographing little things to freshen up the place... gosh I'm lovin' small things at the moment.

Seriously, what the heck did I do before my digital camera? It wasn't that long ago that I was still putting film in a camera. When I think of all the $$$ I spent on film processing...

My kiddo was horrified when he saw me photographing that wee eggshell. He found it upon the lawn the other day (that lovely blue sticking out against the green green grass). Anyway, he was sure that I was going to claim it for my crafting stash. I guess he's had one too many marbles go missing for the sake of art :)

Tiny Books Left to be Found

So I've spent the last couple of days making 9 new tiny faerie journals. These ones I will leave around my little town for strangers to find and scratch their heads over. The only thing left is to make "Read Me" tags and hide the wee things.

Each of them has the same little rhyme inside, and the same elements, but all are slightly different in their design. None are signed or have any contact information on them... the giant K on the front page is the only clue to it's maker and no one will decipher that ;)

Fingers crossed

Last night, while putting the wee fella to bed, we were talking about crossed fingers. He had asked me if I had ever made a promise that I didn't keep and I replied, "Yes, but my fingers were crossed so it didn't count."

That certainly got his attention.

My 7 year old said that crossed fingers were for making good things come true, as in hoping for something and good luck, as in 'keep your fingers crossed'. He was totally unaware that fingers crossed behind your back meant an untrue promise.

The next 15 minutes were spent making fake promises with our fingers crossed. "Tomorrow I promise to give you ten dollars!" followed by a fit of giggles.

More Teeny Weeny Stuff

I've been on a bit of a faerie kick lately. Here are a few pics of my latest thing-a-ma-bobs, wee Handmade Faerie Altered Journals.

They each measure about 1.75" x 2.25".