
If you are a lover of flowers, fairies, poetry and delightful little books then you might be interested in collecting for yourself Cicely Mary Barker's A Flower Fairy Collection. I ordered these when I was first married because I loved the illustrations. Now, I have discovered what a wealth of learning they hold - especially for the child botanist. Each fairy represents a specific plant and each plant comes with a poem. What a delicious way to learn about the flowers growing outside our door!

We have taken the challenge written inside this book:
Open Your Eyes!
To shop, and school, to work and play, / The busy people pass all day; / They hurry, hurry, to and fro, / And hardly notice as they go / The wayside flowers, known so well, / Whose names so few of them can tell. / They never think of fairy-folk / Who may be hiding for a joke!
O, if these people understood / What's to be found by field and wood; / What fairy secrets are made plain / By any footpath, road, or lane- / They'd go with open eyes, and look, / (As you will, when you've read this book) / And then at least they'd learn to see / How pretty common things can be!
We are going on a Flower Fairy Walk using this book from the collection - trying to find flower fairies of the wayside in our back yard. Each little poem tells us a little something about the flowers we are seeking- who knows perhaps we will see a little winged person on our trip.
I'll keep you posted as to what we find...