A Little of This...and a Little of Hat

How doth the little busy Bee
Improve each shining Hour,
And gather Honey all the day
From every opening Flower!

How skilfully she builds her Cell!
How neat she spreads the Wax!
And labours hard to store it well
With the sweet Food she makes.

In Works of Labour or of Skill
I would be busy too:
For Satan finds some Mischief still
For idle Hands to do.

In Books, or Work, or healthful Play
Let my first Years be past,
That I may give for every Day
Some good Account at last.
Against Idleness and Mischief by Isaac Watts

I am struck this morning by the busy-ness of the bumblebees as they still try to do their work, even though many of the flowers are in their swan song, ready to drop their petals and rest for winter.

Yet the bee seems frantic to get out every little bit of nectar it can...


And did you know, that Lewis Carroll's parody of this poem in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, How Doth the Little Crocodile?, is probably even more famous than the original?

How doth the little crocodile

Improve his shining tail,

And pour the waters of the Nile

On every golden scale!

How cheerfully he seems to grin,

How neatly spreads his claws,

And welcomes little fishes in

With gently smiling jaws!

And did you know that Tim Burton's 3-D version of Alice in Wonderland is being released in March 2010 with Johnny Depp as the Mad Hatter?


Look at that hat! The brocade, the ribbon, the feather...and that tea cup!

I cannot wait to see the costumes in this movie. I am often very inspired by well-costumed characters and the Mad Hatter is no exception...(Plus, there's rumor that teacups are used thematically throughout the movie...oh, I hope that's true!)



As for my hands, they are busy cleaning up from the Valentine, creating different colorways for the Jewel of India bracelet, resurrecting Audrey's Crazy Quilt block and planning my next bead journal project...

And dreaming of falling through a rabbit hole...

And to think this post started out thinking about Fall and its effect on the bees...


Oh well, since this is an embroidery blog after all...Do you know the story behind the bees that were embroidered on Napoleon Bonaparte's coronation robes?


Check out this link to the fabulous needlework blog, Needleprint, where there is a video of Madame Brocarde's Atelier and their work in re-creating the embroidered coronation robes of Napoleon and Josephine, now housed at the Kobe Fashion Museum...

And so, my friends, I leave you with a little poetry, a meandering thought process, a little of Alice, some bees and a bit of history...

So much for being just a needlework blog...