Story and Characters
Liewe Heksie is a rather incompetent and forgetful witch who lives with her friends the elves in Blommeland (“Flower Land”). Her stupidity and lack of magical skill leads to many funny situations in the stories. Her given name is Levinia.
Her best friends are the elves Blommie (“Little Flower”), her kitten Matewis (Afrikaans for Matthew and a common name for a cat in South Africa, possibly originating from this very series) and the sophisticated Karel Kat, an anthropomorphic cat who drives a car and owns a helicopter, from the city. Other characters include the magical horse Griet (who only appears whenever Liewe Heksie exclaims, "Ooo Griet!" ("Oh dear!") He has a girl's name, but Heksie claims that all the boys' names were taken by the time she named him), 'Koning Rosekrans' (“King Rose Wreath”) who rules Blommeland. Even though he likes Heksie very much, he gets frustrated with her, but not angry enough to chase her out of Blommeland. Kwaaitjie Kabouter ("Littly Angry Elf"), a bad-tempered elf, and his baby brother Kwaai Babatjie ("Angry Little Baby"). He even lets her babysit Kwaai Babatjie when he has to deliver messages for the king.
There is also the evil Geel Heks ('Yellow Witch'), who with her minions, the Gifappeltjies ('Little Poison Apples'), are constantly trying to take over Blommeland. The two Gifappeltjies are also dressed in yellow and orange, and aptly named Kerrie (Curry) and Borrie (Turmeric), and are menacing-looking elves who call Liewe Heksie 'die dom heks' (the dumb witch).
Blommeland is protected by the Silwer Roos ('silver rose') which is under guard in the palace. On a number of occasions the Gifappeltjies and the Geel Heks try to steal the Silwer Roos to take it to their land (Gifappeltjieland). Should they succeed all the other flowers in Blommeland would die and the beautiful land of the elves would become dry and barren. However, on each of these occasions Liewe Heksie manages to save the day (albeit accidentally) and is hailed as a heroine.
Sometimes the Feekoningin ("Fairy Queen") intervenes, and lets Heksie believe that she has done some real magic. Heksie sometimes calls her Koningin By (Queen Bee). Liewe Heksie is the only witch in Blommeland, therefore she doesn't know any other witches there. She once went to Gifappeltjieland (that is dry and arid, and resembles the lunar surface) with the help of Karel Kat and his helicopter, and thought mistakenly that she'd gone to the Moon.
She has a sterretjieskombuis (star-filled kitchen) because the corrugated iron roof covering her kitchen, was blown away by the wind when she rolled the rocks and pumpkins (that kept it down) off it, in order to paint it. The Feekoningin helped her by putting in a skylight, so that Heksie can see the stars above her kitchen at night.
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