Next stop... Faerieworlds!!!!

So it has been quite some time since I have blogged anything, so quite a lot has gone on since last I posted, which was just in January. Had the opportunity to attend and perform fire dancing at a wonderful Beltaine ritual put on by the Pagans of Norfolk County, here is one of the videos of my performance with Brian Duguay aka Singing Willow on vocals and guitar, and Tony Guerriero from Prance the Witches Path on drums.. So I have been fairly busy this spring, was off selling my artwork at the Spoutwood Fairie Festival and Maryland Faerie Festival and most recently with my little fae child we vended at the Winslowshire Renaissance fest with proceeds benefiting the Winslow Farm Animal Sanctuary in Norton, MA. And somewhere in there I found time to go to Wildfire as well! So what is new on the horizon for Lennon Studio?? Flying off to Eugene, Oregon for the epic festival Faerieworlds!

This New Year

So far this I am not quite sure what to make of this New Year... Last year on this blog I was trying unsuccessfully to write often and tell of my adventures, and then I found that with so much adventuring it was hard to find time to write.. so I am not sure what type of shape this year will take in my life, and how that will outwardly manifest in different realms including the cyber one.. but we shall see. So what has been going on of note? Well of course of note to the whole world this past week was the Inauguration of President Barack Obama. The influx of energy surrounding this is palpable, and it is amazing to be able to witness history in the making. America seems once again a country filled with hope and possibility, even in these very troubling and difficult financial times. Also of note to literary people this past week was the bicentennial of Edgar Allan Poe's birthday (January 19th, 1809). There was a movement here in Boston to reclaim Poe as it's native son, and Mayor Menino even named a place to be Edgar Allan Poe square. I had the good fortune to attend some of the Poe festivities at BC with my mum, who is a BC alum. Through circumstance of chance at the first evening of lectures I had the pleasure of sitting next to the actor and film maker Brent Fidler, who was brought to Boston from Vancouver to premier his film Poe The Last Days of the Raven It was a wonderful film, and dvds are available on his website. I am extremely pleased to announce that I am having an article published in Faerie Magazine, so that is very exciting! I have Kim, Be and Yama at Faerie Magazine to thank, it has been really cool to see my name in print! To have my article in this issue in particular was especially cool as my good friend and fabulous artist Matt Hawk is the artist who is featured in the Five Questions article. Since I had an article in I was able to sneak peak before the issue went to print and it looks fabulous. Kudos to Matt! He is a phenomenal artist and you can check out his work on his website Great Scot Productions With the coming of the New Year comes the sorting through of the previous year, shifting and re prioritizing what is important and vital in my life. One thing I have done so far in the New Year which I am determined to continue is getting back into yoga practice, it has been a great way to center myself and lovely to be in those super heated rooms when it is so frigid out. I find that life is a balancing act, and certainly as a single mom, artist and dancer, with a full time job and lots of goals and ambitions, sometimes I can get a little off the beam as far as balance is concerned, trying to do too many things at once. One thing I find difficult is trying to manage all of this online realm, very hard to keep up with it all, and so easily I am sucked down the super highway and it has a kind of faerie like quality in feeling like no time is passing and yet I emerge from the cyber realms to find hours gone by.. so on that note I am going to extract myself from this cyber-reality and go paint!

Eastern MA Pagan Pride and some letterbox ramblings...

So I last left you, dear reader, when I was on my was to Tuatha na bPréacháin Naomh, the Tribe of the Sacred Crows in East Bridgewater. It was a fine night, though I stayed later than I should, especially give the fact that I was supposed to be in Andover at 8 am to set up my booth at the Eastern MA Pagan Pride Project and I probably didn't get home from East Bridgewater till around 1:30 or 2 am, not quite sure. Well, I figured that this year that seems to be my trend, not getting any sleep the night before the PPDs, so I figured I would make it a tradition.. So regardless, the next morning I was up bright and chipper, at least this time most of my car was packed, but I still had more things to pack up and finally hit the road. Luckily for me my friend Debi was also vending at PPD and when I called her she was only about one exit further along on the highway, so I sped up to catch her, and followed her to the site, since she had been there before and I never had. It was rather twisty and turny up there, and it was at Harold Parker State Forest in North Andover. So, you may or may not know, that I also do this hobby called letterboxing where wacky individuals like myself hunt out hidden tupperware containers in the woods or other locations, that have in them a logbook and a rubber stamp, which sometimes are hand-carved. To see some examples of my stamps you can check them out on my blockprints page So if you want to know more about the hobby you can check out www.letterboxing.org. I found my first letterbox while I was hiking with my daughter over 5 years ago, and the rest is history, I have been letterboxing ever since.... if you are interested about more of my letterboxing adventures you can check out my letterboxing blog called Various and Sundry Musings I guess I am all about the Musings... So, the reason I bring up the whole letterboxing thing here is that I had decided I would have a one day only letterbox at my booth, and post it on the local letterboxing lists and have letterboxers visit me. Now, this is something I also did at Faerieworlds in Eugene, Oregon, and plan on doing at Faeriecon in Philadelphia Pennsylvania, next weekend, Oct 10-12.. so if you happen to be at any event I am at, call me Dragonfly and if I have a box at that location I will give you the clues.. so when I was vending my art at the Eastern Massachusetts Pagan Pride Project in North Andover, MA, on September 21, 2008, it was my pleasure to be vending next door to Sha the Loon Witch, who is also a letterboxer whom I had met but not previously exchanged with (when letterboxers stamp their personal stamps in each other's logbooks), and also to get her EMPPP letterbox which she was replanting. My first letterboxer to arrive and get the box was Choi, it was a pleasure to meet him, he plants many beautifully carved boxes in my area, and it was great to finally have a name to put to the face. Also, my friend Kyerstein tried boxing for the first time and she wrote in the logbook that I got her hooked on it... so look out for a Dragon Fairy coming your way ;-) My next visitors were letterboxers who were new to the area, and if I hadn't posted they never would have known about the event, so I was pleased that something I had done had a positive ripple in the universe. So Nature and Caipora came on by with their lovely backpacks full of their greyhounds, who also stamped into the logbook, Peeky and Vito. Such wise and sage faces on those dogs, to me they were reminiscent of some of Brian Froud's pixies or something. Next up were The Merry Pranksters and the Woodland Wanderers with Go Catman and Music Man, and The Sparrows Interest. I had previously met Pete of the Merry Pranksters, but it was a pleasure to meet Deb. It was so wonderful to have all these lovely letterboxers come out and see me :-) Rounding out a perfect day was the visit from Old Hounder and Siamese! They didn't have their stamps however, so we will have to finish their half of the exchange at Fright Night.... And speaking of Fright Night, after many years of missing this wonderful event, Maine Kokopellian was finally able to get me to commit to coming, and I will even have some of my art with me. I believe there may be some night boxing Faerie Hunting going on ..... so speaking of hunting faeries.. I was very excited when talking to all of these letterboxing folks at EMPPP because Faerie Magazine was interested in having me write an article about letterboxing... It all started because I am on the online Fae community called Enchanted Folk and I had mentioned in my profile under hobbies that I enjoyed letterboxing. Well when I got my welcome message from Be Montague who is the wonderful woman behind Enchanted Folk, she wrote to me asking about letterboxing, wondering if it had to do with decorating our mailboxes, as she is from England and over there mailboxes are called letterboxes... actually letterboxing originated in England, and was called letterboxing because in the early days it was done with pre-addressed post cards that would then need to be posted in a letterbox. Well in any case, I wrote back to her a lengthy email about what letterboxing is, and how it originated in England, etc. Well I didn't hear back from her for quite some time, so I thought I must have bored her to tears in my rambling on and on about letterboxing.. well it turns out that was not the case. I wrote to Be to ask if I had bored her, and sorry I rambled on so long etc, and she said that to the contrary she found it very interesting, and as the UK Editor of Faerie Magazine that she thought it might make for an interesting article.. so it began, and she asked if I would write one, but said she couldn't promise me anything, but that she would run it by Kim Cross who is the Editor in Chief of Faerie Magazine. Well a few weeks ago I happen to call Faerie Magazine about my advertising and ended up on the phone with Kim , so I asked her if Be had spoken to her about me, and Kim didn't think so, but asked why she would have had occasion to do so, so I said about letterboxing, and Kim recalled talking to Be about it, but didn't realize that it was me that would be writing the article.... So she said she was interested in knowing more info and could I email her about it. I did, and that Saturday night before PPD I got my first response from her, which was that she did think that it was something her readers would be interested in, and would I write an article.. so this was all very exciting, and I sent her off the article, which I have since heard back from her that they will definitely use it in their Winter or Spring issue!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I am so excited, and I am also very excited that they will be featuring my Faerie Luminaries in their Things We Love section of the Fall 2008 Issue, which I will get to see at Faeriecon, where I happen to be vending on the same block of booths as Faerie Magazine (you can stop by and say hi to me at booth 1512) So I had been babbling to all of these letterboxers who were so kind to come and visit me that this article was a possibility, so I am very pleased to say it is going to be a reality. If you would like to know more about my letterboxes you can check out my profile and logbook on atlas quest (another letterboxing site) Well, the letterboxing was only half of the excitement that day, had a wonderful time listening to The Gypsy Nomads, Jenna Greene, and Sharynne NicMhacha from the Moors but also meeting so many wonderful people and connecting with wonderful friends. Among the highlights was seeing all of my Pagans of Norfolk County Folks, including Marie and Tony from Prance the Witches Path, and Marie was kind enough to be glowing about my artwork to Christian Day of Festival of the Dead and Hex fame, so he came over to meet me, and was interested in having my work in his store, so visit Hex and keep your eye out for some bad faeries... It was wonderful as well getting to hang with Doug Greene, Jenna's husband, and I look forward to seeing the both of them at Faeriecon. Also a bunch of the Salem fire performers came out to hang, so that was really cool (nothing was on fire though, but will be this weekend at Wildfire) and more of the PNC crowd were great to see and hang with, and some even bought my art! So thanks for keeping me company Glinda, Gaia, Babs, Brian and Kate, Tony and Marie, Delysia, Reuladair, Darla, don't think I am forgetting anyone. If you want to see more pics of this you can check out my pics on my myspace well after that very long day I headed out to Salem, to help build a dome for Wildfire, but by the time I got there people were gone.. which was fine, as I was exhausted!

The Crow took my Keys!!!

so the top of my car key was broken, and I figured I would fix it with some polymer clay, guess I went a little overboard, but I have to say it is kind of fun to turn a big crow head to open the doors or start the car....off to the Crow Mobile!

King Richard's Faire

Well, when I last left you faithful reader, we were waiting outside the gates of King Richards for my friend's to arrive and the festivities to begin... So upon the arrival of Sadie, Andy and Dan, we entered "The Realm" and began our day to the tantalizing aromas of cinnamon baking at the bakery right by the gate, and headed over to Seams Like a Dream where my lovely friend Lisa was, so I could introduce her to those she didn't know yet (she had met Sadie and Andy last year). Now mind you, everyone was all dressed in garb except for Michael (aka Reuladair) and Noah (can't remember his gaelic name off the top of my head...) so Lisa generously offered to outfit them, her treat! Noah did not take her up on the offer, but Michael did, so off he went to transform in the dressing room. And after some catching up with Lisa, we headed out to enjoy the faire. first I wanted some of whatever was making that delicious cinnamon smell, but upon arriving at the bakery we found them cinnamon-less! :-( But I tarried on, sans cinnamon roll, like the brave soul that I am... So for a short time we were all meandering around to the vendors together, but I quickly got Sadie to ditch the boys ;-) so we could do some girlie shopping and they could throw knives and whatnot. I actually want to learn to throw knives, we have contests every year at Lughnasadh, but I was more interested in seeing all the vendors and the animals and the forge. We went in search of a garland for Sadie, and there was a beautiful one with purple flowers and black feathers, and I could tell from how her eyes lit up that she wanted it, but they wanted $42 for it! So alas, I may have to make one for my fair friend Sadie, because she walked away (and good for her!) It can be very hard to talk away when we find some bauble or bit of glamor that we have tried on, I struggle with it myself.... So we continued on shopping, and off we went to where there was some lovely jewelery to behold. Last year when I went to the fair my boyfriend at the time bought me a lovely necklace and earrings to match from this same vendor. Now last year, this vendor had me in the palm of his hand with his lovely Irish accent, I have always said I will be in trouble when i finally get to Ireland, as I am a sucker for an Irish accent ;-) Now mind you, the necklace from last year was absolutely beautiful, yet the first day I wore it it fell right off of my neck when I was out and about somewhere, I retraced all of my steps that day, and yet never could find it. So now, this year, here is the same vendor, same lovely jewelery, and yet here he was with an English accent. Well it just wasn't the same for me. So I tell this vendor, as he is trying to ply me with his wares, and saying all of his "m'ladies" and whatnot, that I had a bone to pick with him... I recounted my tale of woe about my necklace falling off, but also how last year he was Irish, which I much preferred, and now this year he was English, and he says he would let me in on a little secret, he is actually from Texas! Well, he did offer me a discount on the beautiful tree of life necklace I was eying, so I did procure that for my collection of sparklies, so I leftoff the chain mail necklace that I had originally bought at Faerieworlds in Oregon that I had been wearing and promplty donned the Tree. He took the chain mail necklace and asks for a minute, and he places the necklace on my head, well with his help, and Sadie's and one lovely celtic hair barrette that I had purchased at Icons from Joseph Keane of Celtic Revival I now had myself quite the fancy hairpiece. Well after some more shopping our tummies were a-grumbling, so after fetching Lisa from her shop we went off to the racket that is the food at King Richards. For those who have never been to King Richards, beware, all of the food must be purchase with food tickets, and you have to buy at least $5 worth, and the whole ticket system makes you one stepped removed from the amount of money you are paying for food, so you may spend more than you bargained for because you are just spending "tickets" kind of like rides at a carnival... but that is neither here nor there, just a little pet peeve of mine, and many other faire goers I know. So this year, I didn't do the gnawing on a turkey leg, just opted for some fries. And the bakery at the food court area also was out of mostly everything but cookies, so I never did get my cinnamon fix. So I was having a wonderful time, and enjoying the flirty attention that is abound at the faire. Lisa introduced me to her friend "Lord Seamus" who is "protector of the realm" and other such stuff I can't remember. He did have quite a penetrating gaze... with a blue-grey eyes with a ring of orangy-brown around the pupil, just like mine, and he had no moons on his fingertips... Around this time the boys contacted us and said they wanted to eat,and they found us where we were. After eating the boys went off to the joust while Sadie and I did a little more shopping, I bought some fabulous ear cuffs to use with my faerie ears at Faeriecon. Sadie and I got our pictures with the Berzerkers, and we finally did get Sadie a hair garland from Kevin... Sadly, the faire closes at 6, so after Sadie and I met up with the boys at the joust, and a little more eying of leather goods and whatnot we were off for the evening, where we all traveled to East Bridgewater for our meeting of Tuatha na bPréacháin Naomh

Well I figured before the forward momentum of this new weekend took over, that I would post about last weekend, so as to try and keep current. Between Facebook and Myspace and Tribe and Deviant Art and blogging, I feel like I own too much online real estate and need a management company to keep up with it all while I am out having fun ;-) Actually I hadn't been on Myspace before, or had only really lurked, and now that I am on there I have been sucked into that vortex.... but I digress, last weekends tales are waiting patiently to be told... Well Kaileigh and I spent a quiet evening home on the Friday night, as we both were going to have to get up fairly early in the morning. Originally, the plan was that Kaileigh would come with me to work, and go out with her dad later, but it turns out that his car was in the shop so we needed to coordinate with her grandmother instead (called Memere), and earlier on Saturday was easier for her to pick her up, so Kaileigh escaped from having to go to work with me. Though on this particular Saturday, it probably would have been a fun event, I work as an activities coordinator at an assisted living facility, and also work in the marketing department, and for our outing on this particular weekend I was taking my residents to a Native American Pow Wow that is held every year in Bedford on the grounds of the Bedford VA hospital. The only glitch, this happen to be the one day that my friend Lisa, who co-owns Seams Like a Dream at King Richard's Faire would have comp tickets for me, so while I was happy to take the residents to the pow wow, I was kind of distracted while there as I was anxious to get on the road to Carver for the Faire and meet up with my friends there. But the pow wow was wonderful, some of the residents even went into the circle during a time to honor veterans, one of the women was "Rosie the Riveter", another woman was one of the WAVES, and a third resident was also a veteran, but not sure what branch of service he was in. There was some wonderful dancing in the circle, and some amazing vendors, including one named Patsy whom I would love to try and locate.. I was going to go back early on Sunday morning to pick up some hair braid lacings from her, as I didn't have cash on me and she didn't accept cards, but by Sunday morning I was running late to get to Andover for the Eastern MA Pagan Pride Project, so I never did make it back, if anyone happens to know how to get in touch with Patsy, please contact me at katie@lennonstudio.com :-) So it really was a nice time, and in ordinary circumstances I would have been happy to stay longer, but the residents had a wonderful time, and had the chance to enjoy the circle, eat some food and check out the vendors... Next was King Richard's Faire, I drove straight from work to there, and it took about an hour, my friend Michael (Reuladair) and his son Noah were there when I arrived, and shortly afterward we were joined by Sadie, Andy and Dan.... but more will be revealed a little later on...

The Saga continued....

Well, I figured I better finish up writing about that weekend, as I have another whole week and a half to catch up on since then! So where did I leave you, faithful reader? Well Joseph and I were set dancing to the whimsical tunes of Lunasa.. after which Joseph decided to go back to his booth to relieve Athonwy, whom I promptly kidnapped to come with me to see Solas, after getting some free coffee, as I was starting to need some caffeine boostage... Well Solas was incredible, new singer and all, and I danced my heart out the entire time... what an enchanting evening it was dancing in the light of the full moon with kindred spirits.. amazing! Well eventually Nancy and Joseph both made their way over and we were all dancing and having a lovely time until the very last strains of the last Solas song. After which we all journeyed back to the hotel where all the musicians and such were staying, and there were sessions in the lounge and the lobby and the hallway... and just about everywhere. I had the opportunity to do a bit more dancing, though it turns out I must have danced a little bit too much, as one of the soles of my boots developed a crack across the entire sole, and this is rubber that was about an inch and a half thick! If anyone knows of a good cobbler, let me know, as I am loath to let these boots go, I originally purchased them to keep my feet toasty for Samhain a few years ago, and I have worn them faithfully ever since. So the evening wore on into the morning, and I knew I should be heading home, I had to sell my art at the South Eastern MA Pagan Pride Day the following morning in Lakeville, and I was supposed to get there for 8am, and here is was 2 am and I was no where near home and my car wasn't even packed yet! But my feeling was I would rather be up having wonderful experiences and pay for it the next day than to miss out and be home sleeping. And what experiences there were to be had, I had the great fortune to meet Aoife Clancy, and Luka Bloom, and even Brian O'Donovan himself, from a Celtic Sojourn noticed and commented on my dancing. But eventually I really couldn't fight off the sleep any longer, and I made my way home around 3:30 AM, and had to awaken the later that same morning in only a few scant hours to shower and pack up my car and head off to Lakeville for the South Eastern MA Pagan Pride Day So there I am driving to Lakeville, and it is down-pouring, and I am thinking that I am really tired and that if it is pouring like this when I get there I am calling it quits, as I would be setting up my tent for the first time ever, and it would be pouring rain, and all my artwork would get totally soaked and destroyed. So I was on the phone back and forth with my friend Debi who was vending as well, and my tribe-mate Reuladair, to see what their status was, and they were on the road a little bit ahead of me, so I kept checking in to see what weather was doing. It was a little bit lighter rain when I got there, but not by much. So I went over to the check in booth and was pleasantly surprised to find that the vendor coordinator had decided to put me and another artist inside so we wouldn't get our artwork ruined. So I drove around and started to load in all my stuff inside. Also setting up inside were Kevin and Heather from Pentacle Press, who also put together the event Celebrate Samhain in New Hampshire, this was my first time meeting them, and they were lovely to share the space with, and had a great booth. Next to them was the author Trish Telesco so I was fortunate to get to see some of her workshops. Two of the musical acts came inside to avoid the weather The Harper and the Minstrel that was very soothing, and then of course I loved dancing to the lovely sound of the Gypsy Nomads while being the Pied Piper for little girls, though I wasn't piping, just dancing, so I guess I would be the Pied Dancer, but it doesn't sound quite right ;-) The other artist arrived and his name was Golden True, and it was interesting talking art with him, he is learning to use his art for clairvoyance... I think I will have to hear more about that...