May Day Tussie Mussies

Have you ever celebrated May Day? It takes place on May 1st and is a lovely way to celebrate springtime and to surprise your neighbors with tussie mussies filled with flowers.

Louisa May Alcott wrote about May Baskets in Jack and Jill:

"The job now in hand was May baskets, for it was the custom of the children to hang them on the doors of their friends the night before May-day; and the girls had agreed to supply baskets if the boys would hunt for flowers, much the harder task of the two. Jill had more leisure as well as taste and skill than the other girls, so she amused herself with making a goodly store of pretty baskets of all shapes, sizes, and colors, quite confident that they would be filled, though not a flower had shown its head except a few hardy dandelions, and here and there a small cluster of saxifrage."





I had lots of fun making these tussie mussies and the girls and Benjamin will make some of their own on Thursday. We give them to several older neighbors who remember celebrating May Day as children.

Come on over to Seasonal Delights if you would like to make some tussie mussies of your own!

Oh, let's leave a basket of flowers today
For the little old lady who lives down our way!
We'll heap it with violets white and blue,
With Jack-in-the-pulpit and
Wildflowers too.

We'll make it of paper and line it with ferns
Then hide - and we'll watch her surprise when she turns
And opens her door and looks out to see
Who in the world it could possibly be.
~Virginia Scott Mike