The Story Teller's Dwelling

Ones upon a time, and perhaps this very day, a story teller called through the window of her heart to the children playing in the hills, 

And they came, merrily, merrily

Decorating the outstretched branches beneath the window with their blossoming bonnets and leafy layers, they stepped in to the story dwelling’s loving welcome.

Gathering together the story teller listens to the children’s stories, 

She listens to the feeling of raindrops on their tender faces,

She listens to their play of follow-my-leader with the sun’s shimmering rays, 

She listens to the astonished baby’s rainbow song,

She listens to rhythm of the new dance steps patterned out by tiny toes skipping with the windy grasses, 

The story teller weaves the children’s stories into the heart of her dwelling, that all that lives might hear the way to become anew in the children’s world 

......

And all that lives hears the love of the children’s stories

And love heard by water overflows splish splash,

And love grows green dancing dancing,

And love breaths into the wind’s song that flutters the children’s petals,

And love temps the sunrays to bend and flitter that the children might catch their light.

And here is the Story Teller's story held within her Dwelling

 And here is a child's story gathered there

And here my telling of the story today, playfully with the wee ones...

Beings of Love

Today is celebration of love I want to express the immense feeling in my heart, my gratitude to all of you who meet the wee beings that come through my hands and recognise them and love them and hold their magic into your lives and that of your playing children. It is not always easy to entrust them into the unknown, for when I am stitching them and they are forming themselves in snippets of silks and soft colours, my finger tips feel the heartbeat of the elemental world and I love each and every one. 

But how strongly they want to become, sometimes in the middle of the night, sometimes struggling to squeeze their great feisty beings in through the eye of my needle, but always there knocking on the hidden doorways of inspiration - and how heartbreaking it would be for me if they were not experienced fully in their magicalness... but they are, they are! Across sky and sea they travel into waiting hands and hearts to live ever more fully through your love - and I am in awe every time I receive your words. I am deeply honoured that the wee beings have introduced me to so many kindred human beings.

And so I am sharing with you, just a few of these words in a weaving together of love...

♡

A Valentines Baker

There is something so magical them that escapes my ability to describe accurately...they have some enchanting aura that transport you into another realm, realm of fairies, pixies...they bring you to the world where everything is possible and where magic happens..to the same world we were so familiar with when we were children and our eyes were still open to this beauty.                    

♡

Bibi, the gnome of change

My daughter was sitting next to me while I was stitching and we both noticed this gnome tremble when he came alive in my hands. He now lives in wonder on the other side of the world, having blessed me with an introduction to a dearest friend

These are some magical moments from his life:
 My daughter and I were telling stories and settling down for the night, and it was that time of brushing hair and seeing which one of her friends/dolls/beings need a blanket etc...when she noticed Bibi. "Look mama, Bibi is walking" and indeed he was. He has one foot in the air and looks like he is going somewhere. Well the mystery is how...how did he get like that since my daughter has him in another position? So my baby must have crawled in there....I have seen him before and he is much enchanted by Bibi. 

 My daughter  came into my room tonight while I was feeding her brother and he was settling for the night. She held Bibi tenderly and said "mama, Bibi has asked for new flowers for his beard.Look", and she showed me the beautiful flowers which she had picked and dried herself and which he now wears on his beard. She then looked at him and held him so tenderly. I had to tell you about it. Bibi has been down on the farm helping Lali with the horses. But I was afraid my daughter  had him on his feet for too long. I didn't say anything but felt that he wanted to sit or rest. For the past 3 days I have noticed Bibi has been resting in bed, in the cottage next to the mushroom house. I asked my daughter  why and she said he needed his rest because his leg hurt. It is so amazing to feel how he communicates about such things.

I am sending you a pic of Bibi who managed to place moon thread around dragon--- he seems to have tamed her.

♡

The Story of Peepo

In February 2014 I wrote this on the Magic Fairy facebook page:
The other night, late, I had just sealed up a package to post when I found myself forming a small head, cutting a bit of green silk, folding and stitching. Then a little square of soft blue green wool became the body and… yes, gathered at the bottom… that’s right like a finger puppet….ok ok, the hair and then the silk hat. But with the silk hat (a wisp of rainbow) I had started to grumble to myself and also a little out loud ‘there’s no need for this, why am I doing this, no one expects anyone extra in their packages, this is silly, I should be in bed, and if I am doing this why this complicated little hat eh?!’ With that I must have been a little brusk with my needle, because I got a sudden ‘Hey!’ ‘this is me, I may be small but I am here, just as much as the others, not insignificant, the rainbow hat is not up to you! its mine!’ I don’t think I exactly heard all those words inside, but I felt them. So I breathed and I stitched the hat and then gently dreamily we made a pink star flower too.
There in the middle of the night sitting on my floor I felt again the great blessing of my creative dance with these beings. I was humbled, for I had been somehow imagining that these little dear ones who occasionally need to slip into packages, (nearly always at the last minute) were something to do with me, and my love of little gifts. But I was reminded and it makes much more heartfelt sense, in all their often inconvenience - that these are the wee ones who want to go play and who might not get out any other way. I unsealed the package and popped this one in so that she could go and perhaps play peepo with babies in a far off land.
Now as I come to the end of this overlong fb post I think I know why I am writing it, it is to say…. If it so happens that you receive, alongside the wee ones that you are expecting, a small little other one, please know that often they have worked extra hard, with their whispering and tiny foot stamping, to get to you 

Somehow the lovely Mamma who I sent this wee one too didn't read the post at the time, Six months later I received this message:
I never read that post! But you're going to get chills now, as I did when I read it. Peepo has always seemed very , very interested in my newborns up until around 8 mos. she's still loving after that but before then it seems as of she's extremely insistent that she come out to play or join us for knee bounces or nose tickles. She kisses their eyelashes after I tickle their nose with my nose. My daughter  has recently started asking if she could handle peepo to the babies and I always said "one day you may" of course I popped little Peepo on her finger a couple times to satiate her, but Peepo and I weren't sure if my daughter  would be gentle to the babies with Peepo and I never wanted a sad, crying upset feeling tied to Peepo as my daughter  loves babies so very much that at times she can be carried away and become a "squoosher" and a squeezer. So yesterday when I got home from a full, joyful yet exhausting day with an older group of children,, I walked in and my daughter  had just woken up from nap all dreamily lying on the couch. She said "when the baby wakes up, can I play Peepo to her instead of you this time?" I said, without pause "yes, and I'll hold her on my lap while we sit on the rug" sure enough,  the baby wakes up no more than 5 mins after we planned. I changed her and she had some water then I gave Peepo to my daughter  and she imitated exactly how she's watched me all these months, playing with Peepo and the babies. Peepo seemed to thrive with my daughter  helping her this time. Peepo has always seemed so spunky and insistent: for example, if I'm feeding a baby or changing them or making a snack....I'll often feel a "Oh, right now I should be playing with Peepo. Go help her down from the shelf and play!" It seems that was her way with you, too. And now I'm just in awe again....I am blessed to know you this little bit. And that you sent her to me.

♡

An Excited Birthday Visitor 

This was my experience of the becoming of this dear one:
In fairyland there must have been a great moonlit planning, for they woke me with such deliberate flurry...a tart, a lemon tart, we made especially for Lucinda's birthday, and there is someone waiting to come and carry it to her, so forget all your day, the bakers will wait for their books and the washing and writing and all will be there still tomorrow, today is the day, now is the moment to lend us your cloth and stitch hurry hurry...

This is how much she is loved:
The spreader of JOY through a silken toy, bearer of spirit for needy souls...endearing hearts with silken faces and strawberry tarts , filled with love and light as glints of moonbeams , wee feathered flight and waving fern fronds, green and bright... you are an angel to the heart & the weary soul , a mission so precious , helping many feel happy & displacing woe.... your hands an instrument of the spirit , making things beautifully whole.
Dear Sylwyn, those are my words which just tumbled out, feeling the movement of from spirit about. The Wee one who has come is some part of me, in her face is a child that I see as me. It takes me again to to some poetry I have loved...finding many years ago , it still echoes in my heart...

♡
Gnomes with hugging hats

 They were delivered first thing of what was shaping up to be a very stressed, cranky morning as we were heading out for school. My daughter  literally tripped over the parcel left on our doorstep. As she picked it up, her whole body just released the tension that was threatening to coil itself around her little frame tighter with each step. She beamed at me with "mama, it's from Sylwyn - the magic lady" She recognised your handwriting. Her joy simply sliced through my crankiness of a rushed and tense morning.

The two little ones arrived on the first day of advent. I try to weave a lot of magic in the 23 days leading up to Christmas Eve, and lots of acts of kindness, so your parcel literally ushered those things through our front door. My daughter was so excited to open the parcel once she returned home, she would not stop telling her teacher and her school friends about the "Magic Lady" who speaks with faeries and gnomes and all other creatures.

Initially, my daughter  created a winterland for them, so that they would not get too homesick and too scared of the heat. They were very excited to see Rosie and Little Sunshine - their friends from home. Now, they are with the rest of the little beings. Not quite at the beach, but fishing and sunning themselves by a river. Their boots come in handy for carrying the fish back to camp or for picking berries.

Thank you again. My daughter  is really enamoured by them, and loves that their little hats hook like two kitty cat tails

♡

A magical Boy

Your work is truly inspiring! I must confess I got a little teary-eyed when I see how you had captured my child in such a magical form! 

♡

Lucida 

I was asked to call this etherial girl into being by a very special grandmother for her granddaughter, this is part of what I wrote about my experience:
It has been an incredible honour to work with this little being, she has come so easily and taught me so much, a new variation on how to make their little bodies, a beautiful way to have wings on the back that can fold into a flower and open up, but most of all she has confirmed my capacity to hear through my hands that which wants and needs to come, I am delighted to now know about your granddaughter's rainbow aura as that is one of the first impressions I felt of this being, even before I started stitching.

This is the telling of how she was welcomed into the little girl's life:

This afternoon my granddaughter, her mother and I enjoyed the unveiling of sweet one. Placed gently on my granddaughter, silk baby blanket, wrapped just as you sent her with flowers picked by her mother and tea we enjoyed the reading of the first part of a new story. (written by the grandmother)

The Magic Fairy Lady
In the green of England lives a dear wise and very sweet woman. Her name is Sylwyn which means good friend. And a good friend she is indeed. Sylwyn is friend to all things, her home called The House of Friend lies in a lovely nest of nature where the beings of elementals and the shy folk can come and go without worry.
It is here in The House of Friend that she sits with her basket of silken threads and gossamer cloth singing as she stitches the small beings of light and air into being. For you see Sylwyn can see the face of fairy folk, she hears their song and knows the sound of their dancing feet.
Each morning Sylwyn rises at pre-dawn, the time just before the sun peeks its golden yellow over the horizon. She slips into her woolen shoes and with cloak in hand steps onto her threshold to greet the mystery of her day. As quickly as her door opens she hears the breeze of flying feet, the flutter of fairy wings and the wind of the forest night whirl in a rush behind the unseen veil of mother forest.

I then told my granddaughter, and her mother the story of our meeting and how you brought this miracle into our lives. With wide eyes of awe and wonder the story of Sylwyn, this amazing woman who lives in the seeing became part of our family. I wish you could have heard all that was said...marveled by your generous heart we sat with peace and those feelings of grace and fortune one cherishes when touched by the profound. I will share with you that the unveiling was slow and gentle, each precious aspect of your creation poured over with complete wonder. The song of "oh's" and "look mama" in soft voice rang through the crystal blue sky. Sylwyn, this is a miracle that will be part of our forever. Well there is so much to make note of, the sweet precious note tucked into the heart on her beautiful coat, her sweet nose, her rainbow hair, the precious dress and snugly for her seven babies which my granddaughter, counted and very carefully told us which baby was for which year of her life, her beautiful wings when discovered were met with the sound of innocent delight. Each aspect of her is so precious and beautiful. 

♡

Blossom, given and received in trust

She is gorgeous. She has a little patch of flowery silk on her body under a petal (that my friend just discovered) and I love her snub nose and little plaits and best of all her little yellow legs under all those petals. She is so so gorgeous. Thank you so much. I am also moved by your generosity, offering a work of art that is so full of soul and innocence to a stranger, just trusting that they will be able to see it.. . I imagine that there are my two future children somewhere in the spirit world, hovering and waiting. And there on my fairy are two tiny baby buds, just waiting above her head, just in bud... waiting to descend. It is truly the most beautiful present anyone has ever made me and I will treasure it forever. Have I said thank you yet? Thank you. So moving, and so perfectly what I wanted. I have places in the woods where I feel that beings dwell, and this little fairy feels like that, she has that energy. So now I have her in my home...

 ♡

Deeply shared wonder of the earths birth of seeds of love for life

You are like the midwife to these wee ones and create the narrative through which the love is carried

Each one is a promise of the new

♡ My love to you - Sylwyn ♡

Happy New Year Trees.... a blessing story for Tu b'Shvat

Though this day may seem to some as cold and bleak as yesterday, those who breath in time with the trees will feel the beginning of a new year

In nightgowns of last year’s lacy leaves earth’s beings rise

between night and day

Some half dreaming remember the warmth of blossoming sun 

While some new buds are just begun and need mama to sing her awakening stories

 And so the beings of the trees emerge

And call on each other with gifts of love

Sharing the courage to skip along with new vigour

and joyfully rediscover, 

While the forest resounds with children's playful voices blessing...

'Happy New Year Trees'