Flower Fairies of the Autumn

 Autumn will always be my very favorite season.  It seems to be coming a little later this year, the trees hit their peaks at the end of October and November is still burnished red and gold.  I like to take this little book out and display it with the rest of our Fall decorations.  The colors and drawings and poems are just right.  It's also fun to look for the plants and trees Barker illustrates while we are out on our walks.  

The sweet Spring came,

And lovely Summer:

Guess, then, her name- 

This latest-comer!

Flower Fairies of the Autumn

Cicely Mary Barker

Winter Flower Fairies

December is over and the living room looks lonely and dark on these cold mornings without the Christmas tree lights.  Outside the earth may be brown and grey but Cicely Mary Barker had no doubt that fairies were about.  The sweet Snow-drop, the Spindle Berry, the teasing Burdock:

Wee little hooks on each brown little bur,

(Mind where you're going, O Madam and Sir!)

How they will cling to your skirt-hem and stocking!

Hear how the Burdock is laughing and mocking:

Try to get rid of me, try as you will,

Shake me and scold me, I'll stick to you still,

I'll stick to you still!

This little volume of Flower Fairies of the Winter has just the right pictures and words to brighten dull January's gaze.

Flower Fairies of the Winter

Cicely Mary Barker 1985

Deep sleeps the Winter,

Cold, wet, and grey:

Surely all the world is dead;

Spring is far away.

Wait! the world shall waken;

It is not dead, for lo,

The Fair Maids of February

Stand in the snow!

Other books by Cicely Mary Barker:

The Complete Book of Flower Fairies

Fairies for the Summer Solstice

We celebrated the summer solstice tonight with some friends.  Our yard is a pretty magical place on most nights.  There is a large oak tree under which we often sit and have a fire.  The shade garden is edged with an old iron headboard that I found curbside years ago.  Then a row of flat rocks leads around the forsythia bush to a bench and clusters of ferns and hostas.  Our tree house sits at the edge of the woods and if you duck your head under the low hanging maple branches you can walk down a worn path to the tall Beech trees and the rope swing my husband made for my 30th birthday.  There is "Puck's tree" which has a large hollow at the bottom and one summer secret notes were left back and forth from Puck and the kids. 

I love all the moss and roots and secret places.  Just the sort of places you might find fairies, especially on Midsummer's Eve. 

Tonight we had colored lanterns and watched for fireflies and there was a secret note tied up with string written in a fairy hand.  Our friends brought new potatoes with dill and sour cream and delicious cold salmon- a traditional Swedish Midsummer dish (I was told).  Madeleine read Mercutio's speech about Queen Mab from Romeo and Juliet then the grownups sat around the fire late into the night.  Everything was wonderful.

And in this state she gallops night by night
Through lovers' brains, and then they dream of love.


The past few days we've kept these books about.

Fairyopolis

A Flower Fairies Journal

2005

Fairyopolis belongs to Madeleine and is one of the best collage type books. It's designed like the journal of Cicely Mary Barker (creator of the Flower Fairies). The illustrations and handwriting and all the little extras are just wonderful. 

Several years ago I had to buy the Deluxe Book of Flower Fairies.  It contains Barker's detailed illustrations and accompanying poems.  The fairies are divided into season and there are notes about each plant and a nice end note about the traditional meanings and uses of plants.

A Deluxe Book of Flower Fairies

Cicely Mary Barker 1998