Groundhog Day was Tuesday of this week. Punxsutawney Phil predicted an early spring, which I am looking forward to. I thought a groundhog tale would be appropriate. This one is a Cherokee tale.
Seven wolves once caught a Groundhog and said, "Now we'll kill you and have something good to eat." But the Groundhog said, "When we find good food we must rejoice over it, as people do in the Green-corn dance. I know you mean to kill me and I can't help myself, but if you want to dance I'll sing for you. This is a new dance entirely. I'll lean up against seven trees in turn and you will dance out and then turn and come back, as I give the signal, and at the last turn you may kill me."
The wolves were very hungry, but they wanted to learn the new dance, so they told him to go ahead. The Groundhog leaned up against a tree and began...
Coloring books for adults have become very popular. I know I have one and have been tempted by a couple others. I though it would be fun today to look at some of the Fairy Tale coloring books available. The cover photos are links to Amazon.com.
Rapunzel. Hansel and Gretel. Cinderella. Sleeping Beauty. Snow White. We've known these characters since we were children, but in this elegant new coloring book, these characters are waiting to be brought back to vivid life, through coloring. Based off of the masterpieces of the Brothers Grimm, acclaimed British artist Adam Fisher has created a black and white wonderland just waiting to be filled in. Here are a couple examples. I think clicking on them will show you a larger version.
The next one is cute, more portraits than scenes.
The magic of fairy tales spans across cultures and across time. Come take a journey with us as we travel the alphabet to meet the characters that make...
David and I watched a bit of a tv show last night that I think must have been on sneaky animals. It included a bit about sea otters. This male sea otter waited for a momma sea otter to leave her baby in a safe spot and go fishing. He then kidnapped the baby and gave it back, unharmed, in exchange for the food the momma had. The show made me look for an animal tale for today. Beaver Builds a Slide is a Shoshone tale. The Shoshone are a Native American tribe from an area around Wyoming, Nevada, Utah and Idaho. I read the story at Storyteller.net.
In the beginning, beavers had tails that looked very much like an otter’s tail, long and narrow and covered with hair.
Once, in the middle of winter, an otter was swimming in the cold river. She climbed onto a snowy bank, threw herself down in a belly-flop on her stomach and slid down the...
It's finally winter around here. My feet have been cold all day, even with a space heater blowing on them. Tuesday, Amber had the day off of school because of the snow. Not my favorite time of year, but it did make me want to find a cold tale for today. This one comes from Greenland and was retold by Knud Rasmussen in Eskimo Folk-Tales, 1921, edited and translated by W. Worster.
There was once an Obstinate Man — no one in the world could be as obstinate as he. And no one dared come near him, so obstinate was he, and he would always have his own way in everything.
One day his wife was in mourning because her child had died. Therefore she was obliged to remain idle at home as was the custom.
And while she sat thus idle and in mourning, her husband, that Obstinate One, came in one day and told her to sew the skin of his kayak. Sher...
We don't have water today, at home or at work. There's a water break down the road and apparently two across town, so who knows when it'll be back on. But it made me look for a watery story. I found Aesop's fable, "The Crow and the Pitcher."
A Crow perishing with thirst saw a pitcher, and hoping to find water, flew to it with delight. When he reached it, he discovered to his grief that it contained so little water that he could not possibly get at it. He tried everything he could think of to reach the water, but all his efforts were in vain. At last he collected as many stones as he could carry and dropped them one by one with his beak into the pitcher, until he brought the water within his reach and thus saved his life.
The translator, George Fyler Townsend, added the moral, "Necessity is the mother of invention." Avianus, a Latin writer from...
"The Elves' Dance on New Year's Eve" is a tale from Iceland. The story comes from Icelandic Folktales and Legends by Jón Árnason and Jacqueline Simpson.
The story introduce two brothers, one who believes the Hidden People, elves, exist and the other who denies it. The argument continued and eventually the one who didn't believe in them stated he would leave home and not come back until he knew for sure one way or the other.
Nothing of note occurred until, on New Year's Eve, he came to a farm where all the people were gloomy. He asked them why they were not celebrating and they explained that nobody would stay and guard the farm while the family went to the midnight church service, as anyone who kept guard on New Year's Eve disappeared. The traveler told them not to worry, that he would stay. The people gratefully accepted and hurried off to church. They were a little afraid for him, but...