Before I go into my actual question, I would like to start off by saying I know what I am looking in to. I am not new to any of this, I have an understanding of what faes are and that they are Earth spirits that don't necessarily have a physical form, but I believe in faeries and I would like to start really working with them on a closer, personal level. I have read about offerings and what different ones are more attracted to, and there was even a time a while back when I went outside to my vegetable garden and played a soft melody on my violin, it was overcast and beautiful, and I started to see little gold lights flickering from the corner of my eye, and I felt positive energies all around. I wanted to see if my music would draw them to me, and apparently some of them enjoyed my own piece. I am planting an herb garden with Rosemary, Thyme, and I hope to find some Sage that I am going to add in my box and hopefully they will feel at home there. I was wondering if anyone knows how to make faerie dust to help with my practices, to add more energy to my spells and rituals when I make them. I was also wondering if anyone knew of any good suggestions to help me better connect with these beings. I have been drawn to them through a large portion of my childhood. Even now, I always find things randomly showing up in strange places all over my house. I am also going to start leaving them offerings such as milk and cookies in my garden, but I am concerned that I will find that it is my familiar (kitten), chickens, dogs, and other cats that will eat it. Thanks so much!
(Standard disclaimers apply to reserve your right to your own opinion on this.)
Fairy dust? Have no idea.
When it comes to physical offerings, as you said they're not necessarily physical. The traditional offering of a bowl of milk wasn't, I believe, because the fair folk liked dairy but because people did, and offering up something so nutritious and valuable in those times was a gesture of goodwill.
I never know what to do with physical offerings that have been there for a while. One theory I picked up from somewhere I can't cite because it's just personal gnosis from somebody else, is that the offering carries a life force that the one it is offered to will feed on. The physical part of it is supposed to go to chickens and cats and ants and bacteria and such.
Usually, I stick to trading on favors and votive stones (votive stones are sort of a predecessor I guess to tossing a coin into a wishing well... you take a stone, of course, and either carve or draw what you wish for on it, and then leave it in any body of water--a lake or a river.)
To better connect with these beings... I think might be a matter of just letting down some inner mental inhibitions. So, just do what relaxes you, if music is one then so it is. If they want to interact with you, they'll show up.
And of course there's environmental activism like not chopping down hawthorne bushes and stuff. I do believe such practices have changed the urban planning of some parts of Iceland or other places where the fairy faith remains strong.