Mug Monday

"Functional fixedness is a cognitive bias that limits a person to using an object only in the way it is traditionally used."

"When I use a word" Humpty Dumpty said, in a rather scornful tone "it means just what I choose it to mean -- neither more nor less". Through the Looking Glass

Prowling around the house for just one of my mugs for Mug Monday ( hosted by the talented Valerie of Acorn Moon and Pat of Weaver of Grass), I discovered that most of them were already in use for anything but their intended purpose of simply holding a warm beverage. Needles and thread were in one, paint brushes and pencils in another, pennies in a third. Even the Portmeirion milk jug is stuffed with brushes. And so it was all around the house and garden,


Old canoe paddles double as useful garden stakes,


A lidless teapot and Limoges dinner plate have been home to an African Violet since 1997 (it thrives on benign neglect),

And the cloche that should be protecting strawberries in the garden is sheltering fairies in the house.


In Psychology 101 we were told that a sign of flexible intelligence is the ability to overcome functional fixedness, to perceive new applications for existing tools. And that is my excuse for filling the charming, stylish mug on my worktable with more paintbrushes, like feathers in her cap, rather than topping her up with hot chocolate or mint tea.

Speaking of tea, where's the coffee pot?

Fairy Gazettes

A flutter at the mail box, a knock at the door - a nice weighty box has been delivered, well sealed with packing tape and bearing the sticker "cleared by customs". The fairies have arrived at last.

Or rather, The Illustrated Fairy Gazettes, "By Fairies, for Fairies", a labour of love that began some time ago, now realized in these pretty volumes.

This is not their first incarnation. The true original fairy gazettes have a closely guarded history, and the small-format desk top gazettes that we stitched together with poetry and vision and rainbow thread were our best approximation of those delicate little editions and the glimpse of fairyland they offered.

In these new expanded books we have done our best to be faithful to the originals and the fairy virtues therein, and I have had the pleasure of indulging in my childhood past-time of paper dolls.

In an envelope nestled between the back cover and jacket flap is a "Posy's Fairy Wardrobe" doll, with outfits and accessories...
and busy as we are with the next volume in the series, I took time out for a little fashion parade...



Which would you prefer - morning glory blue or columbine's pink hues?

A Fairy Path

The deluge of new work is upon us and I have to separate myself from distractions for a time, like the little maid in this endpaper from my copy of Louisa May Alcott's An Old Fashioned Girl. But there is time for a walk first....
Despite the encroaching suburbs the woodlands are still to be found along the creeks and deep ravines. We went for a long walk in our nearby provincial park, where in a short while masses of trilliums and trout lilies will appear.


We started into the tall woods




following the edge of the ravine









then down the sloping trail
to the creek










for a stroll along the sunny banks





before starting home again,










to the fairies (in whose company time seems beckoningly elastic). As a child I bought every paper doll available in the local book stores. Now I design for Posy, her models and their wardrobes, for our Illustrated Fairy Gazettes.