Samhain Fun

Annika special ceremony

Babies grow up so fast. At five they're nothing like the baby you carried around endlessly, but they still have the emotional outbursts of a toddler, still walking the thin line between baby and child. But something happens at six. Annika has come through an enormous passage the last few months -- taking on so many more responsibilities, managing her emotions in a new way, just growing up tremendously. She's no longer a baby, she's a mature child, she's entered true girlhood. We wanted to mark the occasion in a special way, with ritual and celebration. We chose the summer solstice for our celebration, a traditional time of letting go -- of the sun's long rays, of the lengthening days, of moving forward and embracing what IS. Just as the sun was sinking in the sky, we made a ceremonial journey down to our sacred cedars for our own letting-go ceremony.

We hung this "veil" in the cedars and on one side we said good-bye to our "baby girl" reminding her of how she was as a baby, remembering all the things we loved about her as a baby. She had dressed very special for the occasion, wearing her favourite white cotton dress, but there were too many bugs/mosquitoes. I made her daisy crown from the wild daisies in our fields. She put her goddess necklace on herself and I think she really "got" what this was all about even more deeply than the rest of us, perhaps. I didn't expect to feel quite so emotional as I did, letting go of my little girl being a baby, but I cried openly! Then we wiped our tears and went to the other side of the veil and she walked through to our cheers and happy welcomes to her as a girl-child. I gave her a little piano music box (it plays "It's a Small World") that I'd received from my parents when I was little. She LOVED the whole ceremony. We hugged her and talked about what we were seeing in her that made such a ceremony important. She added to what we had seen and was beaming.

Afterwards we had our bonfire to celebrate the sun, sang our good-bye songs to the sun and had a wonderful feast and party. I love this picture of little Pedar listening to his big sister. Their growing, beautiful relationship is one of the things we were celebrating -- as she's matured they've fallen into a wonderful rhythm of playing and learning together. I can't describe how amazing it is, but I feel like this photo kind of captures it.

Annika wanted to cook her own marshmallow for the first time ALL by herself. This was her idea (as most things are in her life these days) and she was so proud of the results...

I can't believe it's been 6 1/2 years since I became a mother. I can't believe how beautiful my firstborn child is -- she has a gentle presence, a kindness, a thoughtfulness that can't be taught. She cares deeply about all things and is intense in a way that shakes the earth sometimes, and she is always thinking of ways to share herself, to help others lives be easier, to develop herself in new ways. I feel so blessed to be this little girl's mother. Humbled and inspired.

***Is she perfect? Absolutely not. Was the party perfect? Nope. Is anything ever perfect? Nope. I'd just picked a big basket of strawberries to eat with the daffodil cake I'd made for the occasion. I'd cut some in half and circled the top of the cake with them twice (so pretty) and gone back to the garden to pick more to eat alongside. I heard Annika shriek and looked up to see the cake had been half eaten by one very satisfied but guilty dog! At least she didn't pull the cake off the table, but had eaten as much as she could eat from the ground! I was pretty distraught, but my daughter reminded me of what dogs can really understand and so we had a good laugh about it all. We cut off the part that Kenai had marred (nearly half) and ate the rest. It was delicious! And we really only needed half a cake -- she was 6 1/2 afterall! Kenai figured that out before we did :o)

Samhain

We had a spooky filled-with-fun day on Halloween. Lots of scarey masks (to scare off the people who might try to prevent us from performing our rituals), telephone calls from our friends afar who were celebrating Samhain in their own way, lots of sweet treats (to celebrate the New Year), a big bonfire (The word 'bonfire', or 'bonefire' is a direct translation of the Gaelic tine cnámh. With the bonfire ablaze, the villagers extinguished all other fires. Each family then solemnly lit its hearth from the common flame, thus bonding the families of the village together) shared with friends, and pine needles woven into circles and then cast into the fire with a wish for the new year. We ended the day trick or treating (have you read "The Pagan Christ" by Tom Harpur yet? no reason to be anti-pagan. It's like saying you're anti-human. We are aLLLLLLLL pagan, people. Don't be anti-history! prove me wrong! really! do! READ THE BOOK and then prove me wrong. please.), eating delicious pumpkin pie (made by moi, the best EVAH!) and watching fireworks. Happy New Year!

Dinner for the Dead

The night before Samhain we had our annual ancestoral dinner. It was a very special time for all of us. We set the table for 4 extras and invited my mum and dad, my Grannie, and Brent's Grandpa, in a circular ceremony around a candle. We brought out photos of them all as well as special heirlooms we have from each of them. I have some old perfume ('Oscar') of my mum's and Annika and I wore a bit of it. We used our best china, our REAL silver (an heirloom from my mum), and when we said our blessing before the meal we held hands with our guests, who were seated between each of us 'living' folk. We told our favourite stories about each of our guests and it was really hilarious. (Aside: the night before we were watching "The Wizard of Oz" as a family and Annika suddenly turned to me and said "Who is Dorothy Anne, mum?" I got goosebumps. She shouldn't know that was my mum's full name.)
Pedar was a wee bit confused, asking frequently "are they here, mummy?" And then running to the door when I said yes. We explained to him that they're always here, always with us, but they're even MORE 'here' when we invite them special and tell stories about them. He seemed to get that...
We talked about what we want to let go of and what we each want more of this next year. And earlier in the day with very special friends we did some releasing from the year. We lit a fire in the very sacred circle of cedars down by the creek and we burned 'old stories' that we no longer want to hold onto or have as part of our lives in this new year.
I have to say, it was the very most special New Year's Eve for all of us.

We ARE the earth

A wee bit from a conversation between Bill Moyers and Joseph Cambell in 1986 (twenty years ago when Global Warming was not on the front page everyday)
Moyers: Don't you think modern Americans have rejected the ancient idea of nature as a divinity because it would have kept us from achieving dominence over nature? How can you cut down trees and uproot the land and turn rivers into real estate without killing God?
Cambell: Yes, but that's not simply a characteristic of modern Americans, that is the biblical condemnation of nature which they inherited from their own religion and brought with them, mainly from England. God is separate from nature, and nature is condemmed by God. It's right there is Genesis: we are to be masters of the world. But if you will think of ourselves as coming out of the earth, rather than having been thrown in here form somewhere else, you see that we are the earth, we are the consciousness of the earth.