Minnesota Prairie Roots

Writing and photography by Audrey Kletscher Helbling

Embracing the magic of fairy gardens August 2, 2023

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 5:00 AM
Tags: , , , , , , , , , , ,
A sign marks the Fairy Garden at the Rice County Master Gardeners Teaching Gardens in Faribault. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo June 2023)

DECIDEDLY MAGICAL. Those words describe my reaction to fairy gardens, mini scenes created with small scale fairies, gnomes, animals and more in an unexpected spot within a flower garden.

A ground level view of gnomes’ rocky woodland home in the gardens of Susan and Dale Kulsrud, featured in a 2014 garden tour. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted file photo July 2014)

I saw my first fairy gardens during the Northfield Garden Club 2014 Garden Tour and have loved them ever since.

A unicorn-hugging fairy in the Faribault garden. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo June 2023)

Maybe it’s the kid in me or perhaps the creative in me that appreciates these delightful scenes that transport me from reality into a storybook world. We all need to escape the chaos of life occasionally, even if but for a few minutes. Fairy gardens do just that for me.

Love depicted in a bridal couple in the master gardeners’ garden. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo June 2023)

It’s OK to embrace the child within us, to imagine living in an enchanting place where goodness and kindness and love prevail and everyone gets along. I believe those truths when I spot a fairy garden in the tranquility of a flower garden.

An overview of a section of the master gardeners’ garden in Faribault. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo June 2023)
A variety of birds can be seen at the Faribault garden. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo June 2023)
Water bubbles from a stump water feature inside the pond. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo June 2023)

Recently I discovered a new fairy garden at the Rice County Master Gardeners Teaching Gardens located on the Rice County Fairgrounds in Faribault. This garden had already been a favorite spot to visit, to walk among the flowers and other plants, to observe butterflies and birds, and to watch water spilling from a water feature inside a pond.

Reflecting the cultural diversity of Faribault. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo June 2023)

A volunteer working there on the day I stopped mentioned that the fairy garden is especially popular with kids, who often move the figurines. I love that—envisioning children playing with the mini people and animals, rearranging the scene, stories spinning through their heads. Imaginative play is something we should all engage in, even as adults. We’re never too old, or too young, for that.

Stones imitate water in this bucolic scene. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo June 2023)

Unlike real life, fairy tales always have happy endings. The prince finds Cinderella. Little Red Riding Hood defeats the Big Bad Wolf. Jack climbs the beanstalk, outsmarts the giant, escapes, and saves the day to live happily ever after. Ah, if only happily ever after was always the ending.

A bunny welcomed in the Faribault garden. (Minnesota Prairie Roots copyrighted photo June 2023)

Fairy gardens offer a respite, happiness, if we we choose to pause, bend low, see them. If we choose to believe in their magic.

© Copyright 2023 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

Stitches of the past February 10, 2013

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 11:40 AM
Tags: , , , , , , ,

DECADES LATER I can still feel the slight resistance as I draw yarn through holes punched into light-weight cardboard.

I can hear, too, the grating of thread against pulp, as deplorable to me as chalk squeaking across a blackboard.

Yet, my remembrances of stitching yarn into sewing cards rate mostly as a favorite childhood activity I had long forgotten until recently rediscovering those cards tucked away in a chest of drawers.

I pulled out the cards and studied them, for the first time, as vintage works of art.

The cards are smudged and grimy and creased, corners bent, one even torn. But that adds to their character, to their nostalgic  folk art appeal.

It is during these years of aging, of realizing less of your life lies ahead of you than behind, that the past rushes back.

These sewing cards opened the doors to memories of nursery rhymes…

"There was an old woman who lives in a shoe..."

“There was an old woman who lived in a shoe…”

…and frightening stories of goats crossing bridges where trolls lurk…

"Three Billy Goats Gruff"

“Three Billy Goats Gruff”

…and Cinderella fairy tales with happily-ever-after endings…

...where frogs turn into princes

…where frogs turn into princes

…and vivid recollections of evil roosters that pursued and pecked (for real, not in any fairy tale)…

The real, pecking, children-chasing roosters were not at all this pretty.

The real, pecking, children-chasing roosters were not at all this pretty.

…and calves that needed to be fed and certainly didn’t smell of daisies.

The calves I fed were black-and-white Holsteins smelling of barn.

The calves I fed were black-and-white Holsteins smelling of barn.

Powerful memories are stitched into these time-worn cards that I now prop as rotating art on the chest of drawers once shared by my dad and his oldest brother.

It seems some days that my thoughts dwell more on memories than the future.

HOW ABOUT YOU? Do you have a particular possession that evokes strong childhood memories?

© Copyright 2012 Audrey Kletscher Helbling