Alma Appreciation Day is a one-day Encanto fandom event happening on December 7th, el día de las velitas, dedicated to creating and sharing works about Alma Madrigal. This is a multimedia event open to Alma-centric art, fic, meta, playlists, reclists, gifsets, and more!
Share your work by posting it with the tag #alma appreciation day, and/or upload it to the Alma Appreciation Day AO3 collection here!
Optional Prompts:
candle
chatelaine
family
locket
shawl
Posts do not need to utilize any of the prompts. They're meant to help inspire. Feel free to ignore or combine them as you like :)
Rules:
Works must be a part of the Encanto (2021) fandom.
Works must be Alma Madrigal-centric.
Series of Alma-centric works are welcome.
No incest.
FAQ:
Q: Does my work need to be Alma POV?
A: It does not! Alma-centric outsider POV and alternating POV fics can provide interesting perspectives on a character and her relationships.
Q: Is NSFW allowed?
A: Yes!
Q: Are crossovers/AUs/OCs allowed?
A: Also yes, as long as Alma remains the primary focus.
Have fun, and we look forward to seeing you in December!
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the
Organization for Transformative Works
Had her Pedro looked so afraid, wading through the river away from her? She could not see his face as the machete swung. But she remembered the blood. Decades later, she remembered the blood.
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Some Alma angst for Alma Appreciation Day! (Sorry, Alma.)
Truly, Alma is one of the most characters of all time, in my opinion. She is delightfully complex, a caring grandmother who goes about a lot of things wrong due to everything that went wrong. I believe she did her best and the best thing is that she grows right along with her family- the healing is for her too.
Couldn't decide on a name for this piece. Always With You? In the Past? Anyhoo, hope y'all like it.
En esta tierra lejana ~ An Alma Madrigal Fanmix🕯️💜
Made for Alma Appreciation Day <3 Listen on Spotify, Youtube
For non-spanish speakers, I reccomend looking up the full translations of the songs!
Masa - Daniel Viglietti
At the end of the battle, and the combatant dead, a man came to him and said: "Don't die; I love you so much!" But the corpse, alas! continued to die.
Tonadas de Ordeño - Soledad Bravo
Dark and gloomy night
Lend me your clarity
To follow in the footsteps
Of an ungrateful one who is leaving
Danza de Paloma Enamorada - Atahualpa Yupanqui
Dance of the Dove in Love [Instrumental]
La Verdolaga - Totó la Momposina
Look, I planted it, on the ground
It's not gonna be lost, look, the purslane, on the ground
Who says that I, look, the purslane, on the ground
It's not gonna be lost, look, the purslane, on the ground
Paloma Ausente - Violeta Parra
Five black scarves are the witnesses
Of the five pains that I carry inside
absent dove, white dove
Garcita - Cecilia Todd
Fruit of palm, fruit of palm, accompany me on my walk because with you and my sweat it's more beautiful to arrive.
Cancion de Amor - Angel Parra
Take away the mountain range from me
Take away the sea from me too
But you won't be able to take away
That I always love you more
What has been sown between two
Between two it must be taken care of
Love
Todo Cambia - Mercedes Sosa
And just as everything else changes
That I change is not strange
Summary: A glimpse into Alma's life shortly after the Encanto is created.
Trigger warnings: grief, mourning, pressure/stress, etc.
For Alma Appreciation Day.
The candle shined bright but the wax wasn't melting.
Maybe that shouldn't have surprised Alma given the fact that she was currently in a living house surrounded by mountains that had just magically appeared to protect them from the raiders. But it did.
But she guessed that could be attributed to her shock and maybe to the overwhelming grief she was feeling.
Her Pedro was dead.
Her sweet, loving, playful, immature, helpful, excitedable, impulsive Pedro was gone.
Never to write and read her another story again. Never to bemoan the fact that he was no good at poetry again. Gone and never able to hug her and their niños again.
Pedro, who despite fainting initially at the news that they were having triplets, had been so excited to be a father. Pedro, who had painstakingly saved up the money to buy everything they needed to decorate the nursery. Pedro, who'd spent hours with their friends and family painting the walls and building whatever furniture he couldn't find to buy between work.
He was gone.
And their children would never get to truly know him. Wouldn't remember his face.
Julieta, Josefa (or Pepa, as Pedro had so lovingly called her), and Bruno would never get to be hugged or carried by their father or be sung to sleep by him. They'd never get to read the stories he'd written them or see the nursery he'd made that was an odd mash up of yellow, green, orange, and teal with golden butterflies all over the wall that Alma couldn't help but love when she first laid eyes on it.
They'd never get to play the games Pedro had spent hours making up or get to ride on his shoulders and back when they got tired after a long day. The three of them wouldn't get to share in the traditions Pedro's family had shared with hers.
And Pedro would miss everything the two of them had spent hours talking and dreaming about at night after they'd found out she was expecting.
He'd miss Julieta and Pepa’s Quinceañeras. Would miss the Triplets' eighteenth. He'd never get to give Bruno advice or bond with their niños, yernos, and nietos.
He wouldn't be able to pass his shop down to their children ( Querido dios, his shop was gone—probably burned to the ground and in ruins by now ) and their children. He would miss their first steps, their first words, their first ‘papá!’, their first everything . All while she was left behind to experience it.
Alma wasn't sure she was ready.
Wasn't sure that she could be a good mother anymore. Not without Pedro by her side. But it wasn't like she had a choice.
Her niños needed her.
Even if she was scared out of her mind.
They couldn't rely on her and Pedro's wedding candle to raise them after all. She was all they had left (and wasn't that a depressing thought that Alma could absolutely not think about right now?).
Alma was all they had left.
And she had to make sure that she’d be enough.
The triplets were counting on her, the village (which wasn't much of a village right now) was counting on her, the miracle was counting on her—
Pedro was counting on her.
Alma couldn't afford to fail any of them right now.
She had to be strong.
Pedro’s sacrifice would not be in vain. Not on her watch.
Summary: Alma's grief runs deep—deeper than any one realizes.
Trigger Warnings: Implied death, grief/mourning, loss of family, etc.
Alma Appreciation Day.
Prompts: Family.
@almaappreciationday
Inspired by this fic.
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Alma Madrigal was strong and uncompromising. The perfect leader.
The one person everyone in the Encanto looked to for guidance and reassurance that the magic was strong.
It had been that way for fifty years and it was likely going to be true for the rest of her time here on Earth.
The strong, stern, uncompromising, protective, perfect leader of the Encanto was how her niños and their niños saw her—it was all anyone ever saw of her, if Alma could help it.
Because she couldn't afford to be anyone else.
The Encanto needed a leader and the family needed her strong so that the Miracle could stay strong—so that they wouldn't lose their home, like Alma had so many years ago.
(So they wouldn't lose what else Alma Madrigal had lost all those years ago).
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Alma Olga Botero Molinari was playful, clumsy, friendly, and realistic—but she was also graceful and lively and the epitome of a lady when she needed to be.
She wasn't perfect.
But she didn't need to be because her parents, while expecting her to set a good example for her younger brother and to be mannerful and ladylike, didn't expect perfection from her.
(And now, they were gone. Leaving her with memories that hurt too much to share).
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Alma pouted, miserable, resting her head in her mother's lap as the actress ran her fingers through her hair.
“Still feeling bad, Mi pequeña adulta?” Alba asked softly, her long black hair resting in a messy braid over her shoulder—nearly getting caught in her hoop earring as she shifted. Trying to get into a more comfortable position.
“Sí.” The six year old grumbled, scrunching up her nose. “I don't like being sick, mamá.”
“It'll pass soon, cariño.” Her mother assured, humming slightly as she took a sip of her herbal tea. Trying to prompt Alma to do the same, no doubt. “Prometo. But for it to do that, you need rest.”
“But mamá—”
“Sana sana, colita de rana.”
Alma sighed. “Si no sanas hoy sanarás mañana.”
------------------------------
Alma would look back on the moment when all three of her triplets were bedridden with a nasty cold shortly after getting their gifts.
And she'd comfort them using the same phrase her mamá always used to stay. Being strong, no sense, and uncompromising like her mother always had been when she and her brother were sick.
(Alma would look back on it whenever the scent of Julieta's herbal tea would send her spiraling into the past, through faint childhood memories that were graying and fading as the years went by).
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“Papá, why is your rat wearing a wedding dress?” Alma asked one day when she was seven or eight. Wrinkling her nose as the rat in question scurried across a little stage to meet another rat in a tuxedo.
“Because she's playing the part of the bride, mi pequeña princesa.” Her father responded, distractedly.
“Rats can act?”
“Sí, mi querida hija, anyone can act. Especially if they have someone as brilliant as your mamá teaching them.”
------------------------------
Anyone can act.
Act.
Put on an act.
Just like Alma Madrigal was doing every day as she led the Encanto and raised her niños and watched them raise their niños—pushing the memories of the before under the surface and suffocating them until they were out of sight, out of mind.
Never showing a moment's weakness to the Encanto's people.
Putting on a smile or a brave face as she slowly erased the girl she used to be, as was required of her.
Alma Olga Botero Molinari had to die so that Alma Madrigal Botero—and later, just Alma Madrigal— could live and keep her and Pedro’s children could live on.
Even if she was betraying the old her and the people she loved by doing so.
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“¡Ay dios mío! ¡Pedro!” Alma Olga Botero Molinari shrieked, splashing her boyfriend—her Pedro— as he hunched over with laughter.
The absolute traitor.
Laughing at her after she'd slipped into the river that was slowly becoming their spot.
She would have loved his laughter in any other situation. But right then, she hated it. Hated the melody that always made her heart skip a beat.
“Lo siento, lo siento!” Pedro gasped out between his laughter, not looking sorry in the slightest. “Lo siento, mi amor.”
Alejandra—the girl who was living with Pedro that Raimi had an eye for—cackled, but she at the very least was trying to hide it behind her hands. Unlike Alma’s very own younger brother, Raimi, who brayed like a donkey with Pedro's brother, Benito, at the sight of her drenched in water.
Raimi snickered, gesturing at Pedro like the little shit he was. “ I don’t think he’s all that sorry, mi hermana. Though I can’t say I blame him, how do you trip and fall into a river that’s six feet away?”
The nineteen year old scowled at him. “It was not that far away!”
“Was too.”
“Was not, tu pequeña mierda!”
“Ooo name calling are we now? What would Mamá and Papá say, Señorita Perfecta?”
Oh how she hated that name.
Alma glowered and splashed the teen in the face, which only caused the rest of the group—Pedro included—to laugh more.
“Pedro!”
“¡Lo siento, lo siento!”
------------------------------
Whenever Mirabel referred to Isabela as ‘Señorita Perfecta’, Alma Madrigal would bristle.
But Alma Botero Molinari?
Her heart would break into a million pieces all over again.
Just like it did the night Pedro was slain at their spot, where they had spent so many days and nights laughing with those she loved.
And just like it did all over again when a day after the Encanto saved them, Alma realized her brother and his two small children hadn't made it to the miracle with her.
Just like his wife hadn't.
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Raimi was a sweet, rather laid back boy who took after their father more than their mother and wouldn't hurt a fly—even when he was being a little shit. As was his right as Alma's younger brother, apparently.
Which caused him some trouble with other boys his age in the village.
Luckily for him, he had his big sister, Alma Botero Molinari, to bat those particular boys off with sharp biting words and an innocent smile that convinced most parents that their little angels had misunderstood the situation.
And luckily for him, when that didn't work, he had the girl he was courting to set them straight.
“Touch my betrothed again—” Alejandra snarled, towering over the two almost men who had been giving Raimi trouble when he'd gone to collect herbs. Her teeth scarily sharp as she began to transform into her red panda form, growing bigger than the many of the homes in their village.
"ALEJANDRA, DON'T—"
She pointed her sword, which was now tiny in her hands, at them.
“—and I'LL RIP YOU LIMB FROM LIMB!”
-----------------------------
Alma Madrigal lived to have a thriving village, three niños, and six nietos.
And Alma Olga Botero Molinari? She died so that Alma Madrigal could live without the weight of her full grief crushing her after the loss of everything she had grown to hold dear.
For the village. For the niños and nietos. For Pedro and their families.
For Alma.
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"Please, remember: they're my family.” Alma wanted to say, whenever people brought up her lost family and didn't have anything nice to say.
"Please, remember: he's my family.”
Alma wanted to say whenever people talked about Bruno like that. Especially after he disappeared.
Why couldn't these people realize just how much she had a lost to get that miracle? What she had lost because of it?
------------------------------
“Please remember, that bruja you're talking about is my son.” Alma did say, after getting her son back.
