Valentine Deliciousness

Happy Valentine's Day, everybody! To commemorate the beheading of St. Valentine, I made cookies and meringues. Weird, I know.

Acrostic: Valentine
Veritably, I love you
All quite a bit. The
Longer I know you, the more
Excited I get about how
Neat y'all are. I love you,
Though
I might
Never
Ever say it.

These meringues were supposed to be a light pink, but I misjudged the amount of food coloring necessary. :P Oh, well, they're still yummy. They're just plain vanilla meringues.

This one is huge...

 Aaand cookies!! Recipe here. It's brown sugar free, because I didn't have any.

 ~The Dryad, with love and cookies

Journalist, Poet, Writer, Man

G. K. Chesterton is amazing. He was not only a great theological writer, but also a writer of mysteries, both humorous and serious poems, and an artist. He wrote about four thousand essays in his lifetime. He also advocated fairy tales, which makes him that much more fantastic.
In fact, he was pure nonsense mixed with a knowledge of what life is really about.
He said that angels could fly because they took themselves lightly. (His pun, not mine) I don't know about  you, but I wish I could fly. You can easily find quite a few of his quotes on love, including this one.

 

He was extraordinarily large, but that never bothered him. He often made jokes about it, and drew a few cartoons about his girth. Reportedly, a lady once asked him during World War I why he was not out at the Front. He replied, "If you'll go 'round to the side, you will see that I am." 

He wasn't afraid to make a fool of himself to make others laugh. He believed in dragons. He wrote books on theology. Could there be anything better??? Well, yes, Jesus, but that's true no matter what. 

~The Dryad

Are you better than a book character?

It's amazing to me how we simply fall in love with people in books, but we (me at least) aren't nearly as quick to find good in the real people around us. One Year Novel  producer Daniel Schwabauer says that we like book people because we see how they react to stress. Through the course of a book, they are put in uncomfortable situations, and their virtues are shown in how they act in those situations.
Do we act as nicely as our protagonists when we go through troubled times? I believe that most of the time we do not. Occasionally we may meet someone who really can handle hard times, but I, for one, don't do very well with day-to-day life, much less real difficulties.
:) Just a thought that I had.

"Rejoice in hope, be patient in tribulation, be constant in prayer." Romans 12:12

~The Dryad

DIY Postcards

I made some postcards the other day with some friends.
You can find the tutorial here.

~The Dryad

Book Spine Cuff Bracelets

I saw a picture on Pinterest of these bracelets made from the spine of a book, but the link didn't work. I was really bummed.
Some of you may hate me for doing this to a book. I'm sorry. I do love books, but I think the purpose of books is to bring joy to people, and to teach them things, so these bracelets are like I'm advertising a book and saying how good it is. The beauty of a book is not in the bright new cover, but in the wisdom it conveys.

Let us begin. All you need is a hardback book, and a knife, and a bowl...and water...but hopefully you all have water at your houses.

First cut the book back off of the book. Before doing this, make sure that your book is really hardback and has cardboard on the spine. The Reader's Digest books do not. Their spines are just fabric and glue, so you can't use them for this craft.
To cut the back off, you need to take a knife and slice between the first page and the paper glued to the front cover of the book. Do the same on the back, and then cut the spine from between the front and back covers.

Then you trim any little bits off of the spine, and dip it in water, making sure it is fully soaked.

Now wind it into a circle, preferably smaller than your wrist. It will expand as you wear it, so you want to teach it to be small.

Blow it with a hairdryer until it dries and keeps its shape. If there is glue on it, make sure that the glue doesn't get too warm and start sticking it together. Otherwise, the glue is not a problem.

Bum ba dum! Wear that bracelet, people. Tell all the world of your beloved books.
By the way, you may want to store it curled, with a rubber band around it. That's what I do.

~The Dryad

These are a couple poems I wrote after reading a bit of a book about a schizophrenic over my mom's shoulder.

The Man and His Shadows

The man swept away silence

As he chomped his dinner

Thinking over the day's work.

He thought of the shadows

He saw hovering there

They curled around him to lurk.

Maybe he imagined it

Perhaps they were not there

He held his warm mug closer.

He didn't doubt they were real

Of course, they had to be.

Alone..he needed a hug.

Petrol

Blue petrol splashing

In waves away from my feet

It spilled

No use crying now

It will be expensive

My mind slowly reverts

Back to the real world

Away from the splashing petrol.

They aren't my normal style, especially 'Petrol.' I rarely write free verse. The influence of the book was upon me, I believe. 

~The Dryad

The Dragon's Labyrinth

     The red dragons flew south across the sky, gathering prisoners as they went. One of these unfortunates was the girl Thelwine, who had attracted the dragons' attention as she danced barefoot in a dense wood, her blonde hair floating with her. It is well-known that dragons only take prisoners that they admire - as well as their twisted and greedy hearts can admire. As Thelwine was kidnapped by the most dread dragon, there was little chance of her being set free.
     She lay sheltered in the dragon's claws as he flew, hoping that the dragons would not search her for weapons; she had a dagger hidden in her boot, but she could not get to it, since the dragon held her so tight. Her long hair streamed behind her, gleaming like gold in the light of the setting sun. Looking about her, she saw other girls in a similar predicament. Hundreds of dragons flew, each holding a young girl.
     The dragons flew on for hours, and Thelwine became impatient to be walking on the earth once more. Eventually the dragon who carried her landed at a ridge of mountains, overlooking a great portion of the land. It was as cold as ice on the top of the mountain, and as they entered the cave of the dragon, she thought she would freeze in the chill air as she slept.
     The dragon, however, did not allow her to sleep. She was set upon a high rock on the wall of the cave, and the dragon began to speak. He had a deep and caressing voice.
     "So, daughter of man, I have brought you to my cave. You should be flattered, for few have seen its majesty. Few, also, have shared the fate that is to be yours. Do you wonder why you have been brought here?"
     Thelwine nodded in silent assent, judging it wise to give some token of agreement.
     "This evening, when the moon has reached its equivalent of noon, you will enter the Labyrinth of Dead Maidens."
     Thelwine shuddered.
     "If you find your way out again and see the sunshine once more, you will be kept as a slave. If you do not find your way out, one hour after sunrise the dragons will enter the maze and eat every maiden found still wandering. You have your choice: death, or a life of slavery."
     The great dragon twitched his tail and slowly licked his lips, looking at Thelwine with mesmerizing eyes. Suddenly he slammed his tail against the wall, nearly knocking her off her perch.
     "I will sleep now. You must not disturb me. I will take you to the entrance of the labyrinth in six hours." He turned over and went to sleep, leaving Thelwine sitting her rock and looking down at his bulk. There was no way for her to get off the rock, nor could she reach to stab the dragon. She tought it wise to rest before facing the challenge of the labyrinth; she also slept.
     At midnight she woke with the jar of being set upon the cold ground. The dragon had dropped her face-down upon the dirt - she was no longer in his cave. Raising herself up, she looked around her. She saw girls, young women, all in varying states of dishevelment. Noting that she did not look much better, she began to dust off her gown.
     Her toilette was interrupted by the voice of the dragon which she knew, as he began to state the instructions for the labyrinth, which she had already heard. He finished quickly, saying that the exit from the labyrinth was near his cave. Thelwine caught onto this with a slight hope, seeing that it gave her a direction to progress in, for she could see his cave from where she stood. Hope is certainly a strange thing, for even when all odds oppose us, hope continues, giving us strength to carry on. Thelwine stood alight with her new hope, and all about her disregarded the disarrangement of her garments in their awe of her expression.
     The girls were sent into the labyrinth, and Thelwine set immediately to going east, toward her dragon's cave. Six hours later, she had found the exit, ahd she stepped out of the labyrinth at the break of dawn. As the sun rose, her hope rose with it; she felt the certainty that she had survived her ordeal. Her hope had served her well, and as she stood facing the rising sun, she saw a path down the mountain, outlined by the sun's rays. She turned and ran swiftly back into the cave, her heart full of purpose and her hand reaching for her dagger.
     There lay the dragon, his claws fouled with the fur and blood of his most recent meal. She slid the dagger softly from its sheath in her boot and resheathed it in his heart. He died without a sound, without a sigh. Standing back from her gory deed, Thelwine gazed sadly upon the dead dragon, for altough he had lived an evil life and there was nothing left for him but decay, it was still a majestic sight.
     Thelwine returned to her home in the forest and thanked God for her deliverance, but there were many that had a worse fate than she - girls who had died in the ghastly caves, girls who had never found their way from the labyrinth. Thelwine offered up a prayer for those children, who had met their death and would never walk again.

The End

Hope there aren't any typos! ~The Dryad