A Year and a Word

We woke up yesterday to find our  backyard blanketed in many more inches of snow than we had expected.  It was the thick, heavy snow that bends small trees to the ground and breaks off large limbs from the great white pines.  It also temporarily turns our funny little garden shed into an enchanted fairy tale cottage.  

Earlier in the week we'd walked the icy trails at Gilsland Farm, seeking quiet amidst the chaos of the season.  This year's holidays have felt even more tumultuous than usual.  I think the news of the world after this long, often terrible, year has left many of us exhausted.

In the face of unrest and suffering in the world, I've found myself turning more and more to the wintery landscapes and seascapes of my home state for solace.  It's there in the bone-colored branches of birches, the grey ocean waves laced with white, and the dry tufts of frozen grass in open fields that I look for the escape my heart longs for.

I haven't become a complete hermit, I promise.  I welcome the cries of seagulls as I walk the cobblestoned streets of Portland, the rush of winter robins' wings overhead in the trees, and the laughter of school kids swooping down hillsides on makeshift sleds.

And the companionship of loved ones.  I'm not always up for talking these days, but I am almost always up for a walk, and a shared cup of something warm when we return home.

Choosing my word for 2017 was easy.  I didn't even think about it.  I just knew: peace.  That's all I hope for this year.  Peace for those I love, for myself, and for the world.  Over the summer I taught myself how to play ukulele, and one of the first songs I learned how to play was John Lennon's "Imagine."  As I learned the chords and gradually discovered how to weave the words in as I played, I found myself experiencing the song in a new way.  I've always loved the lyrics, but each time I now come to "Imagine all the people, living life in peace," I feel it so strongly that I often have to stop playing for a few moments.  Peace is what I hope for, for me and for you, my friends.  I will do my best to help make it happen in the tiny ways that I know how.  Wishing you a year of joyful adventures, truly funny moments, inspiration, love, and peace.  xo Gigi

Vintage Spring

Hello, chickadees!  Just stopping in to share some spring blossoms.  The crabapple is blooming in the front yard, and the lilacs and azaleas have just joined in, too.  Next up will be the viburnums and rhodies, and then the weigelas, mock oranges, and bridal veil spirea will follow not long after that.  

Life is a rush of activity this spring, but we did take one day to hit Brimfield Flea Market with our friend Kazeem, from Portland Trading Co.  I'll have some photos and finds to share soon!

My photo above was featured by DistressedFX on their Instagram feed and Facebook page this week.  If you haven't tried this app, I recommend it for photos that you want to really manipulate and push in exciting directions.  I use this app as well as Stackables to create moody effects for some of my iPhone photos.  I think I ended up using both apps on the top photo of the crabapple blossoms.  Before I used the textures, though, I upped the exposure and desaturated the photo a bit.  The background of that photo is my picnic table, which most people would think really needs a paint job, but I use it a lot for photos, so it will stay shabby chic a while longer.  ;)  

For photos I take with my big girl camera, I often use fewer textures and stick to subtler processing techniques in Lightroom.  I do some of that processing from scratch or with my own presets, but I also use presets by other folks, including this exciting new set from Kim Klassen.  Presets provide me with so much flexibility, and they give me ideas for creating several moods with one shot.  If you've never tried them before, take a peek at Kim's collection.  I think you will love it.

Vintage finds from Brimfield in the next post!  I have some exciting things to show you.  

Happy weekend, my friends! 

Spring is like a perhaps hand

Spring is like a perhaps hand

E. E. Cummings, 1894 - 1962

III

Spring is like a perhaps hand 

(which comes carefully 

out of Nowhere)arranging 

a window,into which people look(while 

people stare

arranging and changing placing 

carefully there a strange 

thing and a known thing here)and

changing everything carefully

spring is like a perhaps 

Hand in a window 

(carefully to 

and fro moving New and 

Old things,while 

people stare carefully 

moving a perhaps 

fraction of flower here placing 

an inch of air there)and

without breaking anything.

The Gifts of Blogging: A Publication and a Giveaway

Happy November!  Here in Maine it has started off just as any self-respecting November should: with bone-chilling cold and torrents of rain.  I don't mind one bit, as this gives me the excuse to drink cups and cups of chocolate yerba mate latte, and to sit down with the latest copy of Artful Blogging.  For years I've looked to the pages of this gorgeous magazine for inspiration and community, so it's with giddy joy that I get to share the news with you that my writing and photos are featured in this issue.  And I'm even more excited to tell you that to celebrate, I'm giving away one free copy of Artful Blogging to a reader of The Magpie's Fancy!  Read below for more details about how you can enter the giveaway.  

Somebody pinch me.  What a thrill to see my work included with so many talented bloggers, writers, artists, and photographers.  I was especially over the moon to learn that two of my blogging friends, Kim Klassen and Beth Mcwilliams, are in this same issue!  That makes the whole experience all the sweeter.  

I've been writing and publishing for more than two decades, but this particular publication means more to me than most, because when I started blogging six years ago, I had no idea that it would become such an important part of my life.  I write a bit about that journey, and about how the more I played and experimented with photography (a real trial by fire), the more I couldn't tell where writing ended and photography began for me.  Each inspires the other so much now that I can't imagine not doing both.  I hope my article will give other writers and bloggers some inspiration for their own work--where to begin and how to enjoy the process along the way.

There is one other reason that this publication means so much: simply put, I had nearly given up blogging when the editors at Artful Blogging contacted me about doing a feature.  It wasn't that I had stopped loving writing posts or that I no longer wanted to connect with readers and fellow bloggers.  It was that feeling that I've heard so many writers and bloggers talk about of being pulled in too many directions by social media, by work, by family, and life's many other obligations.  

The early years of blogging had been straightforward, but now I felt like once I had published a post, I needed to share it on Facebook, Tweet about it, Instagram it, Link to it on Flickr, and otherwise communicate in every way humanly possible short of sending smoke signals to subscribers.  My old warm and friendly blogging community had become scattered over the years by the onslaught of social media.  We were doing our best to keep up with each other, but sometimes it was just overwhelming.

And so, I had cut back dramatically on posting.  I was working on writing and photography projects, and I didn't even realize that I was missing blogging.  And then I began work on the Artful Blogging piece.  It reminded me all over again of why I'd started to blog in the first place.  This place, this blog--this is pure joy for me.  Whether I have 10 or 10,000 readers, I get to write about and photograph the things that inspire me.  I get to connect with likeminded people.  And I get to read their stories, too.  I can't imagine a better reason to be here.

And so, as a gift of friendship and community--and of my heartfelt thanks for visiting me here--I'm offering a giveaway of this new Winter 2015 issue of Artful Blogging.  To register for the giveaway, simply leave a message on this post by Wednesday, November 5, at noon Eastern Standard Time.  

All are welcome to enter, wherever you live and whether this is your first time visiting or your 500th.  I know many of you prefer to send me emails or Facebook messages.  If you would, for this contest, please leave your message here on the post.  That way I can be sure to keep track of entries.  You don't need to type in one of those awful codes to prove you're not a robot.  Just leave your comment along with your name and an email address where I can reach you, and I'll see it and then approve it for publication.  Please let your friends know about the contest, too.  

If you've ever read Artful Blogging, you know what a truly gorgeous and inspiring publication it is.  If you don't want to wait for the contest, you can purchase your copy at any local bookstore that carries Stampington & Company publications in its magazine section, Barnes & Noble, or Books a Million.  You can also buy it directly from Stampington & Co.  

Thanks, as always, chickadees, for being so wonderful.  xo Gigi  

The Way Life Should Be, or, How to Think Like a Mainer

If you've ever driven into Maine, my home state, you know the sign: Welcome to Maine: The Way Life Should Be.  Mainers (pronounced Mainahs) take this slogan very much to heart.  It's true that our state is unique.  Time and space are different here.  Where else can you go upta camp (If you click on this link, audio about camp starts at 3:50) and downda wharf all in the same afternoon?     

If you're from away, I'll tell you that in order to travel up the coast in Maine, you've gotta go Down East.  And if you don't know where Down East is, then I'm sorry, but you can't get there from here.

Mainers are proud of many things about our state: our wild forests, our rocky coastline, our blueberries (the wild, low-bush ones), our potatoes, our lobstahs. I have the distinction of being the only person I know from Maine who doesn't like lobster.  I mean, I'll eat it, but give me a basket of fried clams or a bucket of mussels steamed in white wine and garlic, and I'm a happy camper (especially if I'm upta camp).

Mr. Magpie and I live in southern coastal Maine, which is wicked good, but we love the whole friggin' state.  I shot these photos last weekend when we were visiting friends on Mount Desert Island, which isn't a desert at all, and which most Mainers I know pronounce Mount Dessert (a lot of us are of French origins, so we tend to pronounce things kinda funny up here).

But thinking like a Mainer has less to do with how we talk, and more to do with this place itself.  

It gets under your skin.  I've lived in many states over the past couple of decades, and I've loved so much about each one of them, but I always longed to come back to Maine.  Life is a little slower up here in the most Northeastern state.  Even in the age of the interwebs, it's easy to unplug and unwind here.  I know when a patch of wild blueberries is near just by the scent of lichen-covered rocks baking in the sun in a clearing in the woods.  

And then there's the fog.  Sit by the ocean on a driftwood log and let it roll in.  If there's a foghorn in the distance, all the better.  It doesn't matter if you're from here or from away.  Pick up a sea-polished stone, breathe in.  Salt and pine and beach rose.  You can barely see beyond the end of your nose, but you can hear the waves and the sand is cool beneath your toes.  This is home.

Our Backyard Fairy Village

The snow is falling, falling today.  Our world is swathed in white, yet my mind keeps thinking of what lies beneath the snow--the fairy world we built last Fall with our niece.  Right now, the corner of our yard beneath the great Eastern White Pine looks like this:

But in the Fall, the village thrived.  

It all began with a pile of pinecones left by the squirrels for our niece.  We took the hint and went out gathering more building materials in the forest.  It was a rainy weekend, but we knew, just as the squirrels did, that the time was ripe for fairies, and the village needed to be built.

Once we had our supplies and had drawn up our plans--there was nothing left to do but build!

And I do mean build: ladders and swing sets and arbors and roads.  We fashioned street signs and wagons and tables and chairs.  Nothing was left unmade.  

So, as the snow falls and I sit inside finishing up piles of work, I thought I'd share some photos of our handiwork.  I'm not sure who loved building the village more, but I will say that Mr. Magpie is quite a carpenter when it comes to crafting fairy furniture!

"No child but must remember laying his head in the grass, staring into the infinitesimal forest and seeing it grow populace with fairy armies."

~Robert Louis Stevenson, Essays in the Art of Writing

The farmer's wagon above was made from half a gourd.  Mr. Magpie sliced a corncob to make wheels, which he attached to a bamboo skewer.  The wheels actually turned, and we filled the wagon with crops from the fairy farm, including sage and nasturtiums, of course!

The farm is pictured above.  Miss J and I planted cabbage and cauliflower crops (tiny flowers) and Mr. Magpie built a miniature wattle fence.  Dried hydrangea blossoms make wonderful rooftops for birchbark buildings.

Above is the restaurant--totally organic, supplied with veggies from the farm, of course--complete with birch bark table and benches. 

If you climb the ladder, you can go to the fab condos in the pine tree.

Miss J thought of everything for the village, including a hospital, a Senior Center,

pine needle roads edged with pinecone guardrails,

 a school (complete with a swing set by Mr. Magpie),

and even sculptures for the town square.

Among our favorite houses were the ones we made from pumpkins.  I think the fairies loved them, too. I know the squirrels found them delicious.  This one is topped by a little crocheted roof.

This wasn't the first time we'd built fairy houses with our niece, and I've posted about them before, but this is the first time we'd built them in our own yard, and I can say that it is about as fine a way to spend a day as I can imagine.

And the best part of building the village came later that night, when we peeked out our windows.  The fairies had come!

And they'd lit the candles we'd left them with their fairy wands.

"The iron tongue of midnight hath told twelve; lovers to bed; 'tis almost fairy time."

~William Shakespeare, A Midsummer Night's Dream

The Journey Back to Quebec: Part I, Go on Up to Jackman

Bonjour, mes amis!  I'm sorry I have been away for so long--from my own blog and from yours, too. This is the longest blogging break I have ever taken.  It wasn't expected, but it was necessary. Summer swept me away this year with weekly visitors at our home in Portland, lots of work, and then, at last, a long-awaited journey to Quebec City avec Monsieur Magpie.

We are lucky here in Maine that Quebec is our neighbor to the Northwest.  This means we have a little taste of Europe just a short drive away.  Still, it had been many years since either Todd or I had been to Quebec City.  In fact, neither of us had been there since we were children.  We suspect that perhaps we both visited during the same summer back in the 1970's.  Maybe we passed each other on the same street, no?  A romantic thought, and one I choose to believe.

This year it just felt right to both of us that we make a pilgrimage there to celebrate our 17th wedding anniversary, summer, childhood memories, and life in general.  My heritage on my father's side is French Canadian, and Quebec City is the place where my own parents spent their honeymoon 50 years ago this summer, so what better place to visit?  And what better time to do it?  

When I was a girl, my parents packed us kids into the back of the faux-wood-paneled station wagon, and we headed up to Canada during a heat wave.  Back in those days nobody in our part of the world had air conditioning in their cars, so it was a sticky, grumbling trip through logging towns and the low mountains of the Kennebec River watershed.  Moose country.  Lumber country.  The maple-sap and pine-scented world of my roots.

Then we hit Jackman, Maine, the last real town before the Canadian border, and even my eight-year-old self knew we were at the edge of anything familiar.  Border towns tend to be edgy in more ways than one, and Jackman didn't disappoint with its diners, roadhouses, and ramshackle motels.

And all these decades later, Jackman feels nearly the same.  I won't lie.  For me it possesses a slightly ominous air that was only enhanced on this trip by the fact that when I walked over to take photos of the abandoned train station, a young man pulled up next to the station and stared at me from his car.  He just sat there in the empty lot, watching me, one finger tapping the steering wheel.  I edged as far away from his car as I could as I made my way back to the convenience store where we'd parked, but he never took his eyes off me.  It wasn't until I met back up with Todd at our car that the creepy guy finally drove away.  This, coupled with the motel in Jackman that doubles as a place for all your taxidermy needs, lent our fifteen minutes there a distinct Hitchcockian flavor. 

Once we were on our way, though, our temporary case of the heebee-jeebees disappeared as we sang songs about Jackman to the tune of the Johnny Cash/June Carter Cash song "Jackson," dove back into practicing our French, and tossed around possible plans for our stay in Quebec.  Other than our B&B reservations, we had no firm itinerary, for Mr. Magpie and I are avid travelers, but not very good tourists.  What I mean is that we bristle at itineraries and pamphlets listing the requisite "attractions," preferring to stumble upon wonderful surprises as we go and to strike up conversations with locals and fellow travelers alike.  Quebec, we would discover, is one of the best places in North America to do just that.

Next Installment: Part II, How to Recover Four Years of Forgotten High-School French in Four Days