Wednesday 25 November 2020

Winter Blessings and Beauties, Day 25: Marking the Midpoint Between Samhain and Yule


I have been posting daily Winter Blessings and Beauties now since the day after Samhain, 1st November. By my calculations, that means today we are halfway between Samhain and Yule, and more than a quarter of the way through the period between Samhain and Imbolc. From the perspective of writing a daily blogpost on winter, the first 25 days have gone by really fast! The days continue to shorten, the nights grow colder, and Yule grows ever closer. 


Apparently 25th November is St Catherine's Day, or to use its old name, Catterntide. Jacqueline Durban has written a wonderful blogpost giving a traditional recipe for making Cattern Cakes here. If you would like to mark the occasion, the Cattern Cakes sound like a wonderful way to do so!


Winter Blessings and Beauties: Day 25

Mark the Midpoint Between Samhain and Yule

At the midpoint between Samhain and Yule, take time to pause and sense the shifting energies. Samhain is the onset of winter and Yule its midpoint, when the sun reaches its nadir and pauses, before beginning to grow in strength again - just a little each day. can you sense a difference in the pulse of life? Does the air smell different? How is the soft animal of your body reacting to the shortening days and frosty nights?

Take a moment to recognise and give thanks for the patterns of the ever changing year. Take in a good breath of cold winter air, and raise a toast to winter (hot spiced apple juice, maybe?). Or celebrate by baking a batch of Cattern Cakes!   



No comments: