FOR THE LOVE OF THE ELVES!

~For the Love of Elves~

Elves have always had a Magick about them. And they have been on the Earth for centuries.

No one really knows now long they have been on our young planet and how they came, but one

thing is for sure in my mind, they are still here. But not in the way you might think.

In this post, I am going to show you my love of the elf.

Through photo's that I have found to be some of my favorites. All

of the paintings are different interpretations of what the elves might have look liked to

the artists who have either painted, photographic, photoshop, digital painting

or drawing if you will.

Many are Talented Artist who are able to make our

dreams come true through these images...

I give thanks to all the Talented Artist who

have created all these beautiful 

painting for all of us to Enjoy..

Love for the Elves

Love for the Elves

Love for the Elves

Love for the Elves

Love for the Elves

Love for the Elves

Love for the Elves

Love for the Elves

Love for the Elves

Love for the elves

Love for the Elves

Love for the Elves

Love for the Elves

 Love for the Elves

Love for the Elves

Love for the Elves

Love for the Elves

Love for the Elves

Love for the Elves

Love for the Elves

Love for the Elves

Love for the Elves

Love for the Elves

Love for the Elves

Love for the elves

Love for the Elves

Love for the Elves

Love for the Elves

Love for the elves

Love for the Elves

Love for the elves

Love for the Elves

Love for the Elves

Love for the Elves

Love for the Elves

Love for the Elves

Love for the Elves

Love for the Elves

Love for the Elves

Love for the Elves

Love for the Elves

Love for the Elves

love for the Elves

Love for the Elves

Love for the Elves

Love for the Elves

Love for the Elves

For the Love of Elves

For the love of Elves

For the love of Elves

For the love of Elves
I hope that you enjoy the image of the Elves
for my love for Elves
YOURWENDY

SLEEPING BEAUTY OF THE CAPUCHIN CATACOMBS

SLEEPING BEAUTY 

OF THE CAPUCHIN CATACOMBS~

Rosalia Lombardo of Palermo, Italy, was born on
December 13, 1918 and sadly passed just at two years later on Dec 6, 1920. due to influenza. However she was most likely to have died of bronchial infection which was sadly effecting many children at the time. What makes the young child so special is not who she is or how she died but rather how her body has survived the throes of decay.
Rosalia's was one of the last bodies to be placed in the 
Capuchin Catacombs in Palermo, Italy. She remains one of the best preserved too. The young child Rosalia was embalmed by noted embalmer/Italian chemist Alfred Salafia. He was famous for his embalming fluid and techniques. 
Also he was routinely called upon to embalm famous people as his methods left the body extremely well preserved.
As you can see with the child Rosalia Lombardo.

Alfred Salafia the famous embalmer of
Italy for the Capuchin Catacombs 

Good evening my dearest supporters, followers, readers & friends of course. Today I am going talk about a young girl life that was cut very short, however she lives on nearly over 100+years after her death at a tender age of only 2-years old. But before I get into the legend of the young Sleeping Beauty as they call her. I will first talk about where she is and where so many other have come to their resting place after death. It seems that the Palermo's Capuchin Monastery outgrew its original cemetery in the 16th century. So the Monks had to think of something to do with all the folks that died, for proper burial. So the monks began to excavate the crypts below the original cemetery. Then in the year 1599 they started to mummified one of their recently dead monk brothers Silvesto of Gubbio and placed him into the catacombs in 1599 in Italy.
The bodies were dehydrated on racks of ceramic
pipes inside the catacombs, then sometime later
or it they were washed with vinegar. Its seems that they
were overwhelmed with the death of bodies. Some
of the bodies that were lucky after looking at some
images were embalmed and others were enclosed
in sealed glassed cabinets. The Monks were
preserved with their everyday clothing and sometimes
with ropes they had worn as a penance.
Originally the catacombs were intended only for the 
dead friars. However, in the following centuries 
it became a status symbol to be entombed into the
Capuchin Catacombs.
This I have a hard time to believe after looking at
the condition of the people body's in which
they are preserved in the Capuchin Catacombs.
It is a very sad thing to see the way their bodies 
are treated centuries later and now they even
have tours & on Halloween contests to see
how long one would stay in the catacombs with
all the deceased relatives loved ones. 
I wonder if the relatives were alive today if 
they would be happy about it. Of course 
this is only my opinion. But I have been
always raised to respect your dead relatives.
Well, anyways, In the wills, of the dead, local luminaries 
would ask to be preserved in certain clothes or 
even to have their clothes changed at regular intervals.

The priests would ware their clerical vestments,
others would ware clothes according to the 
contemporary fashion.

It seems that their Relatives would visit to 
pray for the deceased and also to maintain their
the bodies of the dead, to keep them in

presentable condition. 
The catacombs were maintained at the
time through the donations of the
relatives of the deceased.
Each new body was placed in a temporary niche

and later placed into a more permanent place.
As long as the contributions continued the body would 
remained in its proper place, but when the relatives did not
send money any more, the bodies were put aside on a 

shelf until they resumed payment.
I believe this is when the bodies started to add up
and the catacombs became the tunnels of bones.

The last friar interred into the catacombs was
Brother Riccardo in 1871 but other famous people 
were still interred into the catacombs.
The catacombs were officially closed in the year

1880 but tourists continued to visit. 
The last burials are from the years 1920s. 
One of the very last to be was Rosalia Lombardo.
However, before she was buried the catacombs 
contain about 8,000 corpses and 1,252 mummies 
~As stated by the last census made by eurac in 2011~
That is what lines the walls.

 

The halls are divided
into categories; Men, Women, Virgins, Children,
Priests, Monks and Professionals.
Some bodies are better preserved than others.
Some are set in poses; for example, two children are 
sitting together in a rocking chair. The coffins were 
accessible to the families of the deceased so that
on certain days the family could hold their hands 
and they could 'Join' their family in Prayer.
It would seem that the young girl  was just 
recently rediscovered. And preserved with a 
procedure that was lost for decades, but was also
recently discovered.

The embalming procedure performed by
professor Alfredo Salafia, consisted of a formalin 
to kill bacteria. Alcohol to dry the body. Glucerin to keep
The girl from overdrying. Saliculic acid to kill fungi. Finally
the most important ingredient ---Zinc Salts--Zinc sulfateand
zine chloride to give the body rigidity.
The formula is 1-part glucerin
1-part formalin saturated with both zinc sulfate
and chloride and 1-part of an alcohol solution saturated
with salicylic acid.
Before I go on I thought I would tell you a bit about 
her life because even though everyone talks about 
her death so much I thing one should talk about her 
short life and her father's love who loved her
so much he seek out the most famous Alfredo Salafia.
I could find any photos of the child when she was alive.
It seems that it was custom to take pictures during
that time during my search for a picture for you
all to take a postmortem picture of you child, or love 
one that has died. I found a lot of images of 
these type. And I think of Rosalia too.

Rosalia just before
she died --- Maybe who knows?
Anyways she is known by many names
Which I didn't know of 
' Girl in the Glass Coffin'
'Sleeping Beauty'
'World's most Beautiful Mummy'
Best Preserved Mummy in the World'
Sadly in death she became something larger than
life than when she was alive for her 2-years of life.
Thousands of people flock each year to the 
Catacombs just to get a glimpse of the tiny 
girl that only lived 2 years.

Nearly 100 years after her death, Rosalia

has only changed a little. Still sealed
inside her tiny glass coffin. She sleeps, with her little 
head that pokes above a fading silk blanket.
She still has tuffs of blonde hair still flowing down 
her cheeks a silk bow still tied firmly around her 
head. The only sign of time has passed is an 
oxidizing amulet of the Virgin Mary which rest atop
her blanket. It's so faded, its almost unrecognizable.
This is the famous child mummy
Rosalia Lombardo. 

So who was this beautiful child in life? 
Besides the fact that she died in 1920 Rosalia
was interwoven with the Sicilian lore.
It was said as a young child she was born frail, and 
had endured more pain and sickness than most children
in her lifetime of only 2-years. Even thought she was
very much loved and her father tried everything to 
help his beautiful little girl sickness. But when she 
 die he was heart broken. 

Rosalia Father sought the help of the 
embalmer Alfredo Salafia to preserve his daughter
for eternity. Of course the result was nothing short of
miraculous. through Salafia's embalming process, 
she was perfectly preserved.
In her new state of immortality she was placed inside 
a glass coffin and interred  inside the 
Capuchin Catacombs of Sicily.
So the truth about her life has been lost for a time
However, some say she was the daughter of a 
wealthy Sicilian noble, a general in the Italian 
military named Mario Lombardo.
According to legend, The general wanted to
preserve his only daughter for all eternity and
consequentially contacted Alfredo Salafia to embalm
her . There are no known official documents
confirming definitively who
her parents were. 
As far as the embalmer Alfredo Salafia it seems
that his secret of the preserving Rosalia
 was nearly lost for a century. 
The exact formula remained a mystery lost
to the grave with Salafia until 2009 a biological 
anthropologist named Dario Piombino-Mascalitracked down
the  eternal formula through Salafia's living 
decedents. After that he discovered that-
The chemicals included formalin, zinc salt,
alcohol, salicylic acid and glycerin. The combination
of alcohol and the climate conditions with the catacombs
would have dried Rosalia's body.
Glycerin would have allowed the body to mummify 
and salicylic acid prevented the growth of mold.
the magic ingredient was zinc which gave the body
rigidity , essentially turning it to wax
Then is 2000s an special x-ray equipment was 
brought to the catacombs and Rosalia's coffin was
x-rayed for the first time in it's existence. 
what they discovered was not only a skeletal structure but
that her organs were still intact. Also her brain was 
perfectly visible only having shrunk 50% due to the 
mummification process.

Then is 2009 the National Geographic had a
MRI performed on the body producing the first
3D images of her body on both inside and out. The MIR
confirmed all of her organs were perfectly intact.
It also showed her arms at her sides. Nobody has ever looked
underneath the blanket that covers
Rosalia's body since she was sealed inside her coffin for 
90 years ago.

We have also discovered that her eyes have 

been mostly undamaged. Also we have  discovered

that they are blue. There have been folks that say 

they have seen her eyes open and close. There have

been several time-lapse photos that exist that appear 

to substantiate this claim, showing them opening at least

1/8 of an inch, revealing her intact blue eyes 

underneath. The most likely cause they say is the room 

temperature within the casket  & catacombs or 
simply an optical illusion.

Still yet there is a lot of folks that feel or believe
its Rosalia spirit returning to her body. Since 
the child was so young and innocence forever frozen
in time some feel it is a spiritual thing that she never 
left her body. That she is forever a ghost in the 
CATACOMBS
THE PICTURE ABOVE IS HER NEW HOME 
A FANCY NEW CASKET THAT FITS HER OLDER WOODEN
ONE COVERED IN A VERY THICK GLASS INSIDE SATURATED WITH NITROGEN TO PREVENT ANY HINT OF 
DECOMPOSITION.
I hope that you all like my new post 
on the young girl called 
Sleeping Beauty 
Love you all 
Your Friend Always 
WENDY

Garei The Picture Ghost

Garei-The Picture Ghost-

Good evening my dear friends & followers I hope you enjoy the music I have added a few new pic's to my music box. I always have a check on it now and then to make such none of the music has been taken off. It does happen more often then not. And I do check on my video's post once a month because I know that I find a few of the video's taken off and I always try to either replace or at least take off the ones that are not in use. So I do care for you all and keep up the blog my dears. Its getting close to video check so I will have to take a day for that...
For a few more posts before the month of June is out, I thought you might like the legend of the
Garei -the Picture Ghost... It is a very old Urban legend I believe from Japan... Sadly I could only find one drawing of the legend of the Garei the Picture Ghost... 
The tale was told in ancient times a very long time ago, when there was a dilapidated folding screen with the portrait of a woman holding her infant child. The screen was the property of the
Kanju-ji-temple in Kyoto, where it was kept buried away in a storehouse. One day there was a request that came from a retainer of the Samurai Honamiden to borrow the dilapidated folding screen with the portrait of a woman holding her infant child upon it. Sadly on the part of the Samurai, he thought is was nothing more than a worthless nuisance, however the temple was only too happy to comply with the request. The priests sent Honamiden to retrieve the screen from the old storehouse with all due haste. Even though the folding screen was very old and neglected, the painting upon it was still very beautiful & Honamiden proudly put the Folding screen on display in his home. Not knowing the history behind the mysterious woman and her young infant within the  painted, Honamiden had no idea that he would have ghostly happening that very night he brought it into his home. But that very night, there were many reports stated coming from a mysterious woman who appeared in the vicinity of Honamiden's manor. The woman was quite beautiful and was reported as carrying a small infant child. The unknown woman appeared every single night & she wandered on the grounds of the manor. Finally, Honamiden had one of his servants follow the woman, to see what the ghost does? He watched the ghostly woman as she entered his home, and gasped as she suddenly disappeared while standing in front of the ancient screen painting.
Upon seeing this, Honamiden returned the screen to Kanju-ji as quickly as possible, mentioning 
nothing of the mysterious woman or the incident that he just saw.
A beautiful picture was one thing, but he didn't need to attract strange spirits too.
Now, that same mysterious woman began to appear around the Kanju-ji temple.
Suspecting the painting was the origin of this apparition, a clever servant place a piece of paper over the head of the woman in the painting, hoping it would stop the strange ghostly spirits too.
Well, that evening when the ghostly woman was seen her head was covered by pieces of paper this time. So it work to some extend.
So Kanju-ji assembled some artists to investigate the painting, to see what is going on with this spiritual screen ghostly woman that comes out of it at night. The artists all agree it was the work of the artist Tosa Mitsuoki , very important work at that time.
Sadly the artist Tosa Mitsuoki was dead, and there was no way of knowing the history behind the woman in the painting, but the artist all agreed that it was a shame that such a valuable painting was allowed to degenerate to such poor conditions.
Once it was heard, that Kanju-ji had the screen commissioned to be restored to its former condition and then properly displayed, the mysterious woman never appeared again.
As far as this tale Garei the Picture Ghost, some have said it comes from the Fujiwara Ietaka's Monogatari-落栗物語-Tales of Fallen Chestnuts, is thought to be written sometime in the 1820's.
This tale of the Garei the Picture Ghost is build on the idea that certain works or craftsman are able to infuse some of their own soul into their art. And their art takes on a life force of it own...
This tale serves as a cautionary from the artist with a definite moral too! treat your works of art with respect, or they will come out and haunt you to the end of your times. Which probably is what happened to Tosa Mitsuoki ,the artist who did the painting originally. Tosa might have been  haunted by his painting so he tried to hide his painting, by buried it away in a very old storehouse so no one would ever find it. No one will ever know if it work or if the artist was haunted to death by the beautiful woman in the painting. Yokai researcher, Oda Kokki identified the Garei-Picture Ghost as a type of Tsukumogami.

Which is a belief in Japan that household objects can gain life after 100years. It is said that the Tsukumogami spirit will slowly gain life as human's infuse them with small pieces of their motive energy over the century. They tend to be house hold objects like that of a tools, instruments, containers etc... I did a post on the Japanese Tsukumogami-Spirit if you would like to check It out just check out this link - http://wendyjargonncom.blogspot.com/2016/06/japanesetsukumogami-spirit.html

This way you don't have to go to my labels to look for it...
I hope that you all enjoyed another urban legend of Japan, I love them myself... I hope you all have a lovely evening ...
Good night for now..love you all my dears Wendy🎶🎶❤💖💖💖☺☺😁😁😛💖💖💖

FOR MY LOVE OF THE HUMMINGBIRD-FEEDING

'For My Love of the Hummingbird'
Feeding~

THE DAILY APPETITE OF THE HUMMINGBIRD-

In this post we will cover the many aspects of the daily diet of the hummingbird. First I will cover their appetite. You might think these tiny birds (the smallest warm blooded birds in the Animal Kingdom) would have the smallest appetites... Well, actually its the opposite.
Hummingbirds have enormous appetites. The reasons for their enormous appetites is the frequent visits they make to rich nectar flower that will provide the fuel these tiny hummingbirds require to maintain their high body temperature. Also to give them the energy they need for their powerful flights with their tiny muscles to function efficient in flight and rest. During a normal day for the hummingbird, they will visit between 1000 and 2000 flowers a day.

As for the flowers that these hummingbirds visit everyday. Some flowers release nectar  gradually as other flowers will release lots at a time. As for the gradually releasing nectar in some flowers, these type will receive many more visits from the hummingbirds while other flowers were only visited once a day. It could be that some nectar producing flowers were able to control the amount of nectar and even make it available only at dusk when the hummingbirds are anxious to feed before going to bed.

This happens with the flowers that release special nectar only at dawn when hummingbirds are very
hungry after a long cold night of sleep. The reasons for the High-rich diet in nectar is so essential for these tiny beauty birds is to maintain their body temperatures. Why you might ask? For example humans temperature for normal is 98.4F degrees

However, the hummingbirds temp is much different at normal ... Its 102'F and a few degrees higher at different times of the year.
The reasons for this is, that these hummingbirds need to keep their body temp's  at least at 102 F degrees (38.5c)to keep alive.
This also provides their muscular activity with the heat which is needed during the many periods of rapid flight. It will also keep them warm during those long flights when they head home for the winter.

 
There is always a huge problem in maintaining their 102 temp during the night when these tiny hummingbirds are perching hidden in the trees.
Most hummingbirds are known to feed just before dusk so their bodies will have sufficient reserves to keep them going through the night. They are also seen to engage in frenzied bouts of feeding early in the morning to restore his/she fuel used up during the night to keep their bodies warm.

In order for hummingbirds to survive the long cold nights, they will enter a state of torpidity- this means their bodies temp will drop within a few degrees of what surrounds them.
Their rate of respiration and heart beat also will drop. They will remain in this state until morning .
Many will find a safe place to do this so they don't become prey. Like my Rosy at night sleeps deep in the thick pine trees. This is why it's very important if you happen to have an hummingbird from the South like Peru or Mexico that has decided  to make your backyard or porch his/her their permitted home.
You have to think about your tiny new friend during the winter conditions which they are not used too.
They need lot!!! of homemade nectar. So you must have a hummingbird feeder from at least late Oct- to April when the first froze has left and the nectar flowers have stared to bloom. Personally I keep on out 365 days a year just in case. And now for Rosy who lives on my porch year around I need to for his survival. You also need to make sure that they have lots of safe places for roosting, nesting and sleeping in the weather conditions.
Sleep- Lastly I am going to cover sleep-

When a hummingbird finally settle down for the night They will find a safe perch to prepare for the night lower their body temp. to a few degrees of the air temp around them. Most of these hummingbirds at this point will ruffle up their feathers to expose their skin to let the cool air to speed the dissipation of the heart. As the hummingbird descends into torpor it will settle on its perch into a
characteristic sleep posture. The head tilts backwards and the bill is pointed toward the sky. Once in the torpid state the tiny hummingbird will not respond to anything stimuli like sudden noises or movements near its perch. It is only the rise in temp and increase in light of dawn that will raise it from the torpid state back to its normal rate of activity. When it does it will flee and feed.
The word narcotization has been used to describe as overnight torpidity in winter hibernation to save energy.

I have been lucky to see this once back in 2010 when we had our last big snow or any snow for that

matter. Rosy would stay on my porch where the food was always full and I had put a homemade heater there. I remember seeing him sitting so still and his feathers all ruffle out he didn't move all night .. I was very worried . I checked on him all night but when the sun started to rise he was starting to move a bit and then he was just fine... I hope you enjoyed my hummingbird stories..Wendi💗