Izannah Walker Dolls Celebrate Queen Victoria's Birthday!

Tillie Tinkham the Mouse Is Seen Under The Queen's Chair!

Little girls love to play as though they are Princesses!
Princess Bridget tells the others,
"I am the Eldest and Heir to the Throne!"
Though Bridget is not usually as assertive as her sister Eliza, on this point she insists.
She holds a portrait of Queen Victoria when she was a baby.
The portrait of Bridget is surrounded by a fancy tintype frame. 

Bridget and her sister Eliza are Izannah Walker inspired dolls made by talented dollmaker Margaret Flavin. Margaret Flavin named Bridget and Eliza after Izannah Walker's real sisters and Bridget was the eldest of the real Walker sisters.

The chosen music to accompany this post is Canon in D:
Click Here for Specially Chosen Musical Entertainments.
Return Here to Read the Corgyncombe Courant.
The music is so delightful whilst reading!

The Turret at Castle Corgyncombe.
Heirloom sweet peas are on the arbor.


The girls are delighted to roam about the lovely hills and dales gathering flowers in their vasculum and observing nature!


One morn a little Quail was spotted!


Gathering flowers of May in a vasculum, Violets, Forget-Me-Nots, and Lily of the Valley on a mossy log.


An antique Herbarium with many pressed flowers and plants gathered during a European Tour.
The flowers have all been sewn in place.
Above is Ivy from Kenilworth Castle.
Queen Victoria visited Kenilworth Castle when she was a girl of eleven years.


The girls enjoy gathering and pressing flowers.
After the girls have gathered their flowers they press them in their own flower press.


On the art stand is a small book
"Victoria, The Good Queen and Empress",
that is just the right size for Bridget and Eliza.
Tillie Tinkham, the seamstress mouse at Corgyncombe, made the miniature bobbin lace bookmark.
The book is open to a drawing of little Victoria,
as it says at the top of the page "The Child Princess".
The book was found near the area that A. A. Milne was inspired by to write about the
Hundred Acre Wood in Winnie the Pooh.


Eliza holding the "Little Dear One" and a bouquet of Forget-Me-Nots, Lily of the Valley, and a Violet.


Heather from Loch Katrine in Scotland
The Corgyncombe Courant chose to feature from the Herbarium, specimens gathered in places that Queen Victoria visited.


The shawl Bridget is wearing was woven in Scotland.
It is "Stewart Victoria" Tartan.

The girls celebrated Queen Victoria's birthday,
which was May 24th!


Bridget thinks that the baby portrait of Queen Victoria bears a resemblance to herself!


The Turret at Castle Corgyncombe.


A Remembrance Book of Queen Victoria's Jubilee.





A pressed plant from Edinburgh Castle.


Peonies gathered from Corgyncombe Gardens.


Tillie Tinkham the Seamstress Mouse of Corgyncombe was
Frightened by the Royal Kitty Whilst Under the Queen's Chair!


A small bouquet of Forget-Me-Nots, Lily of the Valley, and a Violet.





Bridget and Eliza's Cousin Charlotte has lovely braided and styled red hair.
It is delightfully old fashioned and reminds us of Queen Victoria!
Charlotte is looking for her coral beads and suspects that her younger cousins might have borrowed it.
Charlotte and all her wonderful clothing were also made by Margaret Flavin.





Charlotte found her beads but the frock that she desires to put on over her chemise and petticoat is amongst the missing...





An old fashioned Corgyncombe rose tussie mussie by candlelight.


Pressed leaves from Holyrood Castle.


Eliza with pressed flowers from the bouquet that Bridget held with Lily of the Valley, bleeding heart, and a violet.
Princess Eliza is wearing the frock that she "borrowed" from her Cousin Charlotte.
She thought it looked fit for a Princess!

 

Some of the Queen Victoria Ephemera from the Corgyncombe Collection.
The art stand made by Seth Tudor is a replica of the art stand that Tasha Tudor had.


A flower specimen from Melrose Abbey.


Wild Violets at Eliza's feet!


Bridget holding the "Little Dear One" and a bouquet of Lily of the Valley, bleeding heart, and a violet.


A specimen from Abbotsford, the home of Sir Walter Scott.





A rose, thyme, forget-me-not, and lavender tussie-mussie from the Gardens about Corgyncombe.


The vasculum with old fashioned children decorating the door.


The lovely flowers within the vasculum rest upon a carpet of moss.



Cousin Emma arrived at Corgyncombe after the Queen Victoria Birthday Celebration.
Here she is taking a moment to adjust and admire her dainty, lovely shoe!
Emma, her clothing and shoes were made by Margaret Flavin.
Emma's shoes look very Queen Victoria!


Some of the photographs and some of the writings on this post are from previous Corgyncombe Courant posts that can be found here on the Corgyncombe Courant and from our web site and our previous postings elsewhere on the internet.

Please do not "Pin" our photographs.
Please do not post our photographs on facebook.

Our email:
atthecottagegate@yahoo.com
If you receive an email you think is from me from this email, please make sure it is atthecottagegate@yahoo.com, and not just something that sounds similar.

Photographs, images, and text copyright © 2000-2012 Diane Shepard Johnson and Sarah E. Johnson. All rights reserved. Photographs, images, and/or text may not be reproduced in any form without permission in writing from Diane Shepard Johnson and Sarah E. Johnson.

http://corgyncombecourant.blogspot.com/2012/07/izannah-walker-dolls-celebrate-queen.html
copyright © 2012 Diane Shepard Johnson and Sarah E. Johnson ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Dandelion Clocks!

The Common and Abundant Dandelion!

Dandelions fill the days of May, first with sunny yellow! How pretty they are on the lawn when they first flower, yellow and short. As the flowers turn to seed, the dandelions are topped with a round ball of white fluff.

What fun it is to blow the dandelions when they go to seed and turn white and then to see the fluff flitter, flutter about!

It, however, doesn't take very long, as dandelions grow like weeds, before they are tall, the seeds are blown away, and the stems are tough. At Corgyncombe they can grow two feet tall!

The chosen music to accompany this post is Arabesque by Debussy:
Click Here for Specially Chosen Musical Entertainments.
Return Here to Read the Corgyncombe Courant.
The music is so delightful whilst reading!

In the story "Dandelion Clocks", written by Juliana Horatia Ewing, the children blow the dandelion seeds in a sort of amusement, a game to make a determination as to the time. As Juliana Horatia Ewing wrote "You blow till the seed is all blown away, and you count each of the puffs - an hour to a puff."


In the story, Little Peter Paul was perplexed as to why one child's time was so different from the other. He was quite the literal thinker and knew that each person had the same amount of hours each day. His sisters thought that dandelion clocks told "fairy time". When you blow on the dandelion seeds they do give a twinkly, fairy-like appearance. When Peter grew up he went out to sea, where he traveled a great deal and enjoyed the life of a sailor. When he came back to his sisters and the farm for a lengthy visit, time stood still and hours dragged and he could barely wait for the time to be over until he could return to the sea.

Hours sometimes seem to go faster or slower for different people, depending on how dull or interesting things are to them.


"Dandelion Clocks" illustrated by Gordon Browne.
In the 1981 version of Robert Louis Stevenson's "A Child's Garden of Verses", illustrated by Tasha Tudor, on the next page after the title page, is an illustration of a little girl telling time by blowing dandelion clocks, which is very similar to the illustration of the little girl on the left, done by Gordon Browne.

Under Tasha Tudor's illustration is the quote:
"To me, fair friend, you never can be old,
For as you were when first your eye I ey'd,
Such seems your beauty still."
Shakespeare's Sonnet CIV


A drawing from the Corgyncombe Art Collection,
children telling time with dandelion clocks.




The goats at pasture, amongst the dandelions.

When I think of May and dandelions, I remember my neighbor Marika who made the best dandelion wine. She gave me the receipt for making it. Marika was a few years younger than my grandmum and was of European heritage. Oft' times we would go over to Marika's house for an evening and discuss knitting and crocheting, baking, and gardening. Usually the evening would be topped off with a glass of her homemade wine. Marika's husband, who was also of Old World ancestry, always walked us safely home to our door. Not that we were tipsy, mind you, he was just being a gentleman.

During the spring and summer Marika usually had something fermenting in a large crock.

Marika lived in the most wonderful old house with a marvelous wing on the back that had an old summer kitchen that held an old beauty of a black cast iron wood cookstove. Marika did the finishing off of her maple syrup on that cookstove.

Marika's kitchen cupboards, instead of having doors, had curtains of old fashioned material. She was a wonderful artist and her paintings covered her walls.

Marika loved to garden and she had vegetable gardens and flower gardens. I especially loved the outside area around and about the old ell (the part that housed the old summer kitchen) off the back of the house. It was so charming and pleasant there with flowers round.

Marika's husband was in charge of lawn mowing. Marika liked to transplant some of her flowers to unusual and unlikely places about the lawn and we could always tell, clear over at our house, when he, uhh, accidentally ran her plants down. You could frequently hear her bellowing his full name, all the way over to our house, and "You just ran down my ...."

A hand coloured plate with dandelions in the antique book
"New Cyclopaedia of Botany and Complete Book of Herbs".

Every Christmas Marika would make a delicious pastry called potica.
She would put a cloth down on her huge table and work the potica dough very, very thin to cover most of the table. A delicious mixture of milk, honey and sugar were heated to a boil and, with the addition of nuts, cinnamon, and other good things, the mixture was spread on top of the dough. The dough was then rolled up, like a jelly roll, so that it had many layers with the delicious goodness in between. This was cut into sections and baked.

When you visited Marika she always sent you home with something, such as seeds, plant cuttings, old issues of her Workbasket magazine, frames for making pompoms, a fork for making hairpin lace, a couple of kittens, and a purgative herbal mixture to eradicate hairballs from cats.

Does this not bring to mind, in Mrs. Gaskell's "Cranford", when the kitty swallowed the favoured lace which had to be brought up with a purgative?

It was always so interesting and fun to go visit clever Marika. Her house and grounds were so full of charm and beauty and had so much personality!

Alas, Marika is gone now, her house bears little resemblance to the quaint old place it used to be. The old wing has been taken off, the summer kitchen is no longer there, it has been replaced with another modern wing, just so dull inside and out, compared to the place where I pleasantly spent many the hour!

An old calendar from the Corgyncombe Ephemera Collection, featuring Dandelions for the month of May and the poem by James Russell Lowell:
"Dear common flower, that grow'st
beside the way -
First pledge of
blithesome May"

http://corgyncombecourant.blogspot.com/2012/05/dandelion-clocks.html
copyright © 2012 Diane Shepard Johnson and Sarah E. Johnson

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Melissa, Birds, Hearts and Flowers!

Valentine's Day!

Melissa, Willy Nilly Tweet Sweet, and Chirpy Cheerful
Finch Post is busy during Valentine season, delivering lovely sentiments!
Displayed on the art stand is a dove surrounded by flowers.
The art stand and red bench were made by Seth Tudor.
The art stand is a replica in miniature of the art stand that Tasha Tudor had.


Do you see Trilly up on the cupboard?
Trilly Tweet Sweet seems to have a natural sparkle about her as she flies in with exciting news!
But, Dear Readers, you will have to wait to hear more about it!
Trilly Tweet Sweet is Willy Nilly Tweet Sweet's wife.
Above, hangs a portrait of Sarah done by Tasha Tudor.


Trilly Tweet Sweet


A Finch Post Box.
Finch Post serves the dolls at Corgyncombe with superb mail delivery service. Diane and Sarah were inspired by Tasha Tudor to have their own doll Post. Tasha Tudor's post was named Sparrow Post, where cards and goodies were delivered to her children.

Trilly, Willy Nilly, and Chirpy fly for Finch Post.


Chirpy Cheerful and Willy Nilly Tweet Sweet are both perched in chairs that Seth Tudor made.
The chair in front, that Willy Nilly is in, is a miniature replica of one that Tasha Tudor sat in do her artwork.


At Corgyncombe's Finch Post, Chirpy Cheerful holds one of the official Valentine Dolly Cards. Tasha Tudor had the children use buttons to buy goods for their dolls and animals and Sparrow Post to deliver mail. The currency for the dolls at Corgyncombe is buttons, as well. A little button box can be seen near the base of the scale.


Bleeding Heart


Melissa is wearing a heart shaped locket, much like the one that Tasha Tudor drew for the letter "L" in "A is for Annabelle".
Melissa reminds us of Tasha Tudor's doll Melissa... very much so.
Tasha Tudor wrote and illustrated books featuring her dolls, including "A is for Annabelle".
"A is for Annabelle" is about an old fashioned doll and some of her belongings from A to Z, such as her hat, earrings, hair ribbons, and her heart shaped locket.


Melissa shares a word with Trilly about the exciting news yet to come!

A delightful Valentine's Day to all our Dear Readers!

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