Today we celebrated Mabon with a Wizard of Oz theme. You can read the ritual outline on the Mabon page. First we visited Curtis Orchard, where we bought apple cider, donuts, and other goodies. Then we went back to Fieldhaven for the feast. We had quinoa with black beans, a salad, and ginger gold apple pie along with the donuts and apple cider.
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One of our number is building a new house, so we're helping lay the wards. Tonight we gathered around a bonfire to charge items that will be going into a witch jar. The fire elementals really came out to play this time. \o/
Tonight we held our Beltane ritual with a theme of "fertility." Six people attended. We had a feast, a bonfire, and a Maypole. Much fun was had by all. We used a modular design this time, and plan to write up a presentation of how to do that for the website here.
For our Yule feast we had a ham, cranberry relish, cole slaw, garlic mushrooms, bread, peppermint chocolate bark, and dark chocolate cheesecake topped with raspberries. We had five people for the feast. Then we did the Chocolate Ritual, for which we had four people present and another by phone.
Our Samhain ritual had three people present. We had a feast with a ham, mashed yams, eggplant spread, and cornbread made from ancient cultivars. We went outside for ritual. There was a ring around the moon tonight. We lit a bonfire. The focus of the ritual was remembering the dead, particularly Raymond Buckland, one of the founders of modern Witchcraft. We sang "Gimme That Old Time Religion" with a lot of Pagan verses.
This year's Litha celebration had four people. We celebrated the joys of summer, and dogs. We had a huge bonfire, with brush that had been piling up for months. \o/ One of the fun things we did to capture the playful aspect of summer was cast the circle by blowing bubbles, one quarter caller at a time walking around part of the circle to the next quarter. We also did some drumming and dancing around the bonfire. We released the circle by walking it in reverse, with each quarter caller leading for their quarter of the circle. That's a new technique worth remembering.
I have posted our 2015 Beltane ritual on the Beltane page. This year we did it as a fire festival.
Today we held our Litha ritual. This is our tenth anniversary as a coven and a tradition! Our ritual was a water-sharing, inspired by the Church of All Worlds.
After the ritual, we picked black raspberries. Usually there's more fruit growing here at Fieldhaven than we can pick and use ourselves, so coven members and other friends are welcome to the extras. Last year the drought made for a meagre harvest. This year, there are raspberries and mulberries as far as the eye can see. Tonight we celebrated Beltane. We made a feast with chicken, yams, and asparagus. We built a bonfire, which burned quite well, even considering all the rain we've gotten recently. We danced around a Maypole. It was a vibrating Maypole -- I used holographic holiday ribbon, which when stretched out tight, hummed in the breeze. So that was amusing. The flower crown was made from blooming cherry twigs.
Yesterday, we held an esbat in which we asked the land spirits to ask the weather spirits for gentle rain. Tonight it's raining! Not a lot, but more than we've gotten in the last couple months. So, that technique works.
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AuthorElizabeth Barrette lives in central Illinois. She belongs to the Fieldhaven coven. Her first book is Composing Magic: How to Create Magical Spells, Rituals, Blessings, Chants, and Prayers. Archives
September 2018
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