We are getting closer to the longest night (or Yule) on June 21 here in the Southern hemisphere and with the deciduous trees bare I was thinking over the folklore tradition of wishing trees/ribbon trees/clootie trees. I love to hang crystals or ribbons in our trees in our garden in Winter.
I first came across the idea of tying coloured ribbons onto a tree in a story - A Charles Delint book I think. The main character wakes up one day to find the tree outside her apartment has had brightly coloured ribbons tied in the branches. I thought this was magical - though now I kind of think possibly creepy!
There are folk traditions around the world of tying material or paper as wishes to tree branches. When the material disappears or rots away your wish or healing should be complete. These days however the practice has had some problems with non-biodegradable ribbons and objects being tied in such quantity that the trees have been pulled over by the weight of 'offerings'. Wishing tree of Tara
I ended up choosing to have balls of magical light in the tree - as we are welcoming the return of the Sun's light and warmth.
A longish wait at a bus stop - I sketched the tree in the brown paper notebook. Some pencil drawings of crows then experiments with blue-black ink and then onto watercolour.
If my final image is quite wide I often include 2 photo wallpapers to make the most of the image.
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