People work all winter on their costumes to wear at the May Day Fairie Festival. Not just women and girls wear wings, but dogs and manly looking guys have them, too. These photos show a sampling of characters from around the fair and in my tent in years past. The Festival will be held from April 30- May 2 this year at Spoutwood Farm in Pennsylvania. You can see more photos and find out about the festival here.
Ah, the fascination of mushrooms, with their bizarre, alien quality. This group includes some real mushrooms I found and used as props and some I made. The first photgraph is of some mushroom houses that I made for a scene that was used in an educational reader illustration in 1979. To see more mushroom houses and read about the story in another post go here.
mushroom houses, 1979
Skip ahead 20 years to this photograph, which shows some of the first Blossom Fairies that I offered as kits in 1999.
Blossom Fairies on a mushroom, 1999
This is a pair of wee folk sitting in a cluster of mushrooms that were growing so fast that I had to run home and get my camera before they changed shape.
Wee Folk under mushroom, 2002
I molded the next mushroom from clay, glued kid leather on top and painted the leather red. For the photo shoot, I put some drops of glycerine on the mushroom to look like rain.
mushroom made from kid leather, 2005
This last one is from my up-coming book, Pocketful of Posies (Sept. 2010).
detail from "Pocketful of Posies" 2010
Note: See other posts in the Close-ups series archive here.
Here are 2 fabric relief pictures that incorporate the story of St. George and the Dragon. These pieces were personal projects and not made for an illustration job or to be published in a book. Both “George’s Chair” and “The Storyteller” illustrate the power of the imagination, one through reading a book and the other with storytelling.
The chair was made with worn upholstery fabric and sticks out about 1″ from the surface. It has a lace doily on top and the chair’s legs are polymer clay.
George’s chain mail hood is made from metallic fabric and his arms, legs and sword are wire wrapped with metallic thread. The princess has an acorn cap crown sprayed with gold paint.
Among my family treasures is a doll collection that came from my grandmother, Louise Salley Hartwell. My first name comes from my grandmother’s maiden name. As children, we weren’t allowed to touch most of the dolls, but just gaze at them high up in shelves. She found many of the dolls in her travels and collected them throughout her long life of almost 100 years. Here is a photograph of my grandmother on her Gramma Lou’s lap, with one of her sisters. Gramma Lou lived with the Salley family in Orangeburg, SC and taught all 5 daughters how to sew.
my grandmother, Louise Salley Hartwell, on lap (1892)
Here’s a group shot of some of the dolls from the collection.
from my grandmother's doll collection
This wooden doll is about 10″ tall and most likely has been in the family its whole life. I have no information about her, but she looks very old.
Her face is painted simply, but with an intense expression and it looks like moths have eaten her wool felt hat.
Inside the silk dress hem is a cloth tag that has this written: 35-25:100-M in red ink. Her legs and arms are simple wooden pegs.
She has such a delicate little sliver of a nose attached to the wooden head.
Wee Folk Studio went to the May Day Fairie Festival for a few years when we were still making fairy kits. We set up a tent and displayed many fairy related items. There were Blossom fairy kits, Ltd. edition dolls, note cards and books for sale. We don’t sell at fairs anymore, so we won’t be there this year, but I highly recommend going if you are at all interested in fairies and fantasy. The fair will be held April 30 – May 2nd this year at Spoutwood Farm in Pennsylvania.
Along with the 12 x 15 canvas tent, we transported a trailer full of trees, branches and vines to make an arched entryway. For me, decorating the tent , inside and out was as much an art project as making miniature dolls and illustrations.
Inside our tent, we set up tables and hung ivy and flower garlands. Here I am, early in the display phase, with the tree stump base.
We brought boxes of moss to use around the tree stump display, which I sprayed with water all weekend.
Some customers came in wearing these wonderful bark back packs. They said that they made them at a workshop.
This wooden rabbit has been around since my childhood and may have been my father’s toy in the 1920’s. The front leg joints have been repaired with a knotted cord. At about 4″ long, it’s easily held and manipulated by a child. I love the simple and durable form.
Thank you to all of you who read the 5-part story about my first book, The Way Home. Congratulations to the 3 winners of the giveaway! Nancy, Nikki and Carol have been selected at random and will each receive a signed copy of The Way Home. I had a lot of fun piecing together the past and would like to continue writing more stories about my other books, so keep visiting!
“Sit quietly, doing nothing, spring comes, and the grass grows by itself.” Zen saying
With spring comes hope and eggs and rabbits. This series begins with a childhood drawing of a rabbit hauling an Easter egg in a wagon. Then there’s a wool tweed rabbit from a 1986 piece called “Picking Peas” (see on earlier post) and a painted faux tile that’s in my kitchen. See all the faux tiles in another post here. A rabbit tucked in bed from my book, In the Heart, comes next. Two projects from Felt Wee Folk appear; a felt pin made with a rabbit button and an appliqued felt purse.
crayon drawing by Salley, age 6
detail from “Picking Peas” 1986
faux tile 1993
detail from “In the Heart” 2001
felt pin from “Felt Wee Folk” 2003
felt purse from “Felt Wee Folk” 2003
Fairies and other fanciful creatures come to Spoutwood Farm in Pennsylvania every spring. The 19th annual May Day Fairie Festival will be from April 30 to May 2nd this year. Wee Folk Studio was a vendor at the festival for a few years, when we sold fairy kits. One of the highlights of the weekend is seeing the costumes that people have made to wear at the event. If you live anywhere within driving distance of southern Pennsylvania, go to this fair! You will feel out-of-place unless you wear a costume or at least something celebratory. We have a lot of pictures, so in the future, I’ll be posting more photos from past festivals. These masks are made by Mythical Designs.
Here are some gorgeous green men who came by our tent in 2005. Their incredible leather masks are made by Fantasy Guild Studios, which will have a booth at the Fairie Festival this year.
Continued from The Way Home (part 4)
The book was now in production at MacMillan and it would be a year before we would see bound copies of The Way Home. There was a lot for the publisher’s staff to do; select and set the type, write the book jacket flaps, prepare the pages for the printer and arrange the printing in Hong Kong. Judy and I were so excited to see the first printing proofs. We felt this was also proof that our years-long project was really going to become a book!
The Way Home, pages 26/27
I learned that producing a book is a lot more complicated than one might think. Everyone involved, the writer, the illustrator, the editors, the production staff and the sales department all play an important part. I was also impressed that everyone I met during the process truly loved children’s books.
The Way Home, page 30
In the spring of 1991, boxes of The Way Home arrived and Judy and I celebrated its publication at the Woods Hole Library, with a party and book signing. You can see an earlier post about the library quilt I worked on here. We shared the event with Molly Bang, whose book, The Yellow Ball, was coming out the same spring. Our friend, Terry (who gave me her daughter’s pants) made a cake for the occasion. She decorated it with marzipan elephants and a yellow ball made of frosting.
setting up for the book party
Terry’s cake
Molly, Judy and Salley signing books
We were so proud of The Way Home and did what we could to promote the book. We had our picture taken with an elephant that came through town for the county fair.
Judy and Salley with elephant at fair, 1991
We gave talks, did book signings and visited schools. Judy led banana poem workshops with children and I’d have them sew and stuff yellow felt bananas.
Judy visiting a preschool
Our book did pretty well for an unknown author and illustrator and came out in paperback the next year. Later, Judy and I collaborated on a sequel, Come to My Party, which MacMillan published in 1993. In this book, the red bird character is named Harold and co-stars with Savi in another adventure.
Harold in an illustration from “Come to My Party”
Both books have long been out of print, and I can remember how surprised Judy and I were to get the letter telling us the news. Being new to the book business, we did not know how common it is for children’s books to go out of print. We’ve since learned that only the very best sellers are reprinted and stay available.
Salley at a book signing (note the elephant earrings!)
All in all, the best part about publishing a book was when we heard from parents who said their children wanted The Way Home read over and over. Even today, we meet grown up children who remember Savi and the banana trail. I’m still friends with Judy and Molly and am grateful to have had their help and encouragement throughout the years, but especially in the beginning, 27 years ago, when we all were inspired by a little elephant named Savi.
The End
The Way Home, back cover
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SALLEY MAVOR 