"All this he saw, for one moment breathless and intense, vivid on the morning sky; and still, as he looked, he lived; and still, as he lived, he wondered."

On the Eighth Day of Christmas, my True Love Gave to Me…

On the eighth day of Christmas
my true love sent to me:
Eight Maids a-Milking
Seven Swans a-swimming
Six Geese a-Laying
Five Golden Rings
Four Calling Birds
Three French Hens
Two Turtle Doves
and a Partridge in a Pear Tree

Happy New Year! For some reason, the 12 Days of Christmas celebrate the new year by giving maids around and it’s always a little disconcerting that my true love would give me people as gifts but it is a British song after all.
A word of advice: you find lots of gross stuff around, by searching “maids a-milking” and I suggest you never do that. I did it for you. There’s also some handmaids a-milking but… well, you go and take a look yourself.

1. Larissa Holland

Do you remember Larissa’s partridge and pear, last Christmas. Well here’s her maid a-milking and she’s just adorable. You just have to buy eight of them.

2. Ameluria

Not so much about the maids because, to (mis)quote Hamilton, we know who’s really doing the milking. Here‘s her illustration for this day.

3. Muriel Clarke

All her decoration are charming, but her hollandaise a-milking is particularly lovely.

4. Andy Schumann

It does to me that only one’s a-milking and the others are just staring, but this is how teamwork is, sometimes. Only one does all the work and the others all take the credit.

I’ve decided to continue showing you beautiful stuff (or at least stuff I think it’s beautiful) even after Christmas, but instead of having monographic articles featuring single illustrators I’ll be grouping them with themes. As a theme I’m picking the Twelve Days of Christmas, a British carol I adore. If you never heard it (you’re clearly not Britsh) I suggest you take a look at this incredible performance.

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