this is how we do it ...

Keeping warm (dangerous wind chills today and Moose had a peesicle it was that bad!) and counting down to the big day.

Earlier in the season I read Soulemama's From the Editor in the current issue of Taproot magazine (renewal of my subscription is at the top of my wishlist Santa!) and her words have been a cloak of protection I've gathered about me to shelter me from the collective impulse to spend/hurry/more is better.

And I try, each year hopefully more successfully than the last, to keep my focus on the hearth and home, family and love, celebration and comfort that this season beckons us to embrace. Simple and special, I've said more times than I can count (and to myself more than anyone else), about the holiday season with little ones. 

(Amanda Blake Soule, Taproot, Issue 8: Reclaim)

This has been my mantra: Simple and special.  I cannot judge how well I have succeeded, but I can say my experience of the season has been joyful, playful, celebratory with just enough frantic fun to make things spicy good. (I have two nights to finish knitting a hat, never mind the 4 other gifts-in-progress that will go out sometime.  Better done and late than never done at all!)

Here is how we've been enjoying the first few days of Winter break ...

Making snowflakes (we like tempting the weather gods - Let it snow!)

A little gluestick on the glass and voilá!  Window art!

 

When you leave art clutter on the kitchen island, all kinds of shy creatures appear and join in ...

Mornings are quiet time for some needlework ...

 

 

The best gift I've given myself was to offer a Solstice ceremony.  I admit, in the week leading up to it, I wondered why I had every agreed to leading a celebration with days woefully lacking in time to get things done, never mind time devoted to stillness, to quiet celebration.

But it was a fitting expression of Simple and Special as an intimate group joined with me to enact ancient ceremonies, chant, dream, and envision the year ahead that we all want to contribute to. It was a very necessary deep breath out which allows me to now breath in fully, deeply, and passionately what is to come.  The year ahead feels to me like it will be a very BIG one ... although after some time spent in reflection and releasing, I would say this past year was equally big and transformational, if not transitional.  Soon we will be saying goodbye to the year of the Snake and I know I've shed quite a bit in 2013.  Feeling shiny, supple, and ready to plunge deeper into the mystery, into the adventure.

Much Light and Love to you this season ... and always. xo