"Fairy" Houses

The rain is raining all around,
It falls on field and tree.
It rains on the umbrellas here,
and on the ships at sea.

--Robert Louis Stevenson

Ominous gray clouds shroud the bright blue dome of sky we played under only yesterday, yet I cannot help smiling to see them. After all, this mid-March shower will moisten God's palette of watercolors, transforming our dull winter grays into verdant spring greens. The rain did not discourage the children, who played outdoors as eagerly as before. Here is what eight-year-old Margaret had to say:

"Yesterday, we made our own fairy houses from mud, moss, sticks, bark and leaves. This morning, a shower of rain consumed Theresa's fairy house, which was mostly dirt and grass, so I ran outside and fixed her creation. When Theresa came out, she loved it, and we looked under stones and bricks and found lots of different inhabitants for the house, including snails, centipedes, worms and sow bugs. All the fairy houses were a big success."

"Here are some photographs of them:

"The first is a picture of Agnes and Theresa's. Agnes' is a log cabin with a door and threshold made from birch bark. A roof of bark, moss, and clover shelters the tidy room inside. The garden consists of pine needles, a tuft of grass (for a bush) and a bit of garlic mustard. Agnes re-planted some tiny wildflowers too, but they wilted.

"Theresa's is made completely out of dirt, dried grass, moss, and pine needles, except for the chimney peeping out of the top. It stands behind Agnes' and is meant to be a tenant's cottage. It has no door except for a single rock covering the entry. Her garden is made with some different types of moss, wildflower leaves, and tall green chives that look like water spouting out of a whale's back.

"This is the cottage I made. It has a fence of birch logs and a brick with two gates, one a birch bark triangle and the other an arch from a white pine twig. The hut in the left back corner has a little bit of the ceiling uncovered. It leans on a brick and some poles sticking out of the ground. The roof is made out of Rhododendron leaves, and the entrance is made from a tunnel of birch bark which opens onto a fenced garden filled with different types of moss and a pine tree to shelter some wildflowers (front right corner). At the back, under the arch, there is a chair made out of a rock. If you look closely, a little fairy made from 'model magic' is sitting in it. At the front left corner, mudpies are set out to cool on a tray of birch bark supported by the fence. Also at the front left corner, there is a crack in the birch log. Inside it is a bit of moss."

Comments

[Rebecca]

Alice, What a gorgeous post! Your writing is simply eloquent and the houses are so sweet.

[Denise]

My daughter will love to see this. She has been thinking of ways to invent fairy furniture. Recently she sewed by hand some little fairy clothes and set out some of her hair trimmings for the fairies to weave with.

[Lissa]

How lovely! You inspired my girls--they spent the morning working on fairy houses of their own. We'll try to get some pictures up later.

[Alice Gunther]

Thank you Rebecca, Denise, and Lissa!

>>We'll try to get some pictures up later.

Hooray, I can't wait to see! BTW, if any of you would ever like to send me pictures of something wonderful your children are doing outdoors, I would be honored to post them here as well!

[Theresa]

Oh, thank you for sharing this! It brings back wonderful memories of my childhood family camping trips where I used to wander off to build fairy houses of my own! Yours are so sweet!

[sophie]

these are really good, i have seen a few fairies in my time. could you send me instructions on how to build a fairy house? thank you
your, sophie