Faerie Holidays

I love Holidays, and not just the present giving kind. I love the idea of taking a day and making something unique and special about it. Too often these days Holidays and celebrations have become these mass marketed machines created by greeting card companies and big business. While I love walking around stores during  Christmas season just for ambiance, the holidays themselves have really lost their magic for me. 

I try to take current popular holidays and make them my own. Adding something a little more special and unique into the mix. On Halloween I like to do "The Great Pumpkin" with my nephews; I get them to carve pumpkins and if the Great Pumpkin likes their work they are rewarded Halloween  morning with little treats inside the pumpkin. Not only does this give us time to spend together to do something fun and creative, but it is fun for me because I get to play my version of Santa to them. 

Every year pretty much without fail for 7 years or so, I purchased a Brian Froud artwork calendar of some sort. Hands down he is one of my favorite artists but also along with the traditional holidays, he lists some "Faerie Holidays" which I do my best to observe. Some examples of these holidays include:

January 2nd: Snowflake Matching day (also known as Fairy frustration day)
January 11th: All Mornings Eve: Breakfast is eaten at Midnight and Midnight snack is eaten at breakfast.
Febuary 10th: Elbow kissing day. A very difficult assignment so dome faeries chat and kiss each others elbows.
March 30th: Balderdash Day: Ridiculous games are played and all bald fairies run about without their moss and braken wigs.




You get the idea. 


Making up your own holidays is  your assignment for this post. Create your own Faerie type holidays. You can leave little notes on the day of the holiday describing its purpose (or lack thereof) in your tree mail box, or you can simply share with the children and people around you. 


One example I have personally and I celebrate to this day is Saint Edwards day, named after Edward Scissorhands. This was the brainchild of my friends Cindy and Tara. on the first snow of the season you run about outside in the snow. Simple, effective, and no hallmark card needed. 


I am going to attempt to sit down within the next week or two and list all of the Holidays on the Froud Faerie Calendar. Hopefully it will help inspire you. I would also like to find a nice public calendar type page where I can help to list all of the holiday ideas you come up with.


See you all next week, and in the meantime, keep wishing and keep dreaming!

Craft Project 1: Tree Mail!

I thought it was about high time I post an actual craft project. This is for a hanging container for notes, trinkets or just about any kind of Faerie messages you want to pass on. I like to call it the tree mail box.


Supplies include:

• A clear container (I used an Archer Farms butter crunch cashews from Target, because they are just darn tasty). It is plastic so it is light weight and non breakable. 
• Glue or some form of adhesive. Depending on your situation there are a multitude of adhesives out there. If you are going to do this with kids you may want to look for non toxic or tacky glue. You can also use Hot Glue (if you are doing this on your own) or Fabric glue (this contains acitate so if you have a manicure you may want to avoid it). If this is an outdoor tree mail, you may want to use something more weather resistant like the fabric glue or the hot glue, and it works well with plastics.
• Ribbon of all sorts. For mine, I used some organdy ribbon and thin satin ribbon.
• Fake leaves, silk flowers, feathers, beads, bells or whatever tickles your fancy.

Step 1: I took a strip of the organdy ribbon just slightly longer than the circumference of your container. Of your satin ribbon cut 7 24 inch strips.Fold the satin ribbon half way and knot them equally and evenly on your organdy ribbon. 

 Step 2: Take 2 strips of ribbon from 2 knots and tie them together. this will create a V shape. Continue this with the other 7 knots.You may want to put a dab of glue on each knot not only to keep them in place and to attach them to the container.

Step 3: Create a new row with the ribbon, knotting the ribbon with its mate from the knot. You should get a basic diamond shame and should look like this when you are done.

Step 4: With the remaining ribbon knot it all at the bottom. Add some extra organdy ribbon or anything else you like at this point to the tassel.

Step 5: With the lid, I wrapped the side with ribbon and covered the top with leaves. The open mouth of the lid wrap some satin ribbon and secure it around the base of the mouth. Make it long (I would say about 36 inches) so you can use it as the hanger. 

Step 6: On with the ribbon tassel I like to tie charms, bells, buttons, leaves, feathers or any other little things to add interest. You can also collect things with your child and tie items on the ribbons together. It may also be a fun idea to occasionally leave items in the tree mail for your child to add to the ribbons. 

And there you have it. Simple, easy and pretty. I like the idea of a clear container so they can see that there is something inside for them. What you put inside is entirely up to you. Like I mentioned before, charms, bells little trinkets with a note attached is fun. You can also leave them notes or assignments for them. Hopefully there will be plenty of ideas coming in the near future. 


That is all for this week! See you all next week, and in the meantime, keep wishing and keep dreaming!