Yuletide

J and I celebrated Winter Solstice at Tim's. After Tim used the Athame to lay out the Magic Circle, he blessed and purified the exterior walls of the  house  for the coming year and thanked his beautiful old home for the shelter it's given. The west door and window were opened while I read this Scottish verse

Yule

Sing reign of fair maid,

With gold upon her toe…

Open you the West Door,

And turn the Old Year go.

            ---Scottish Yule Song

The symbols of yuletide are the colors red, green, and white, spinning wheels, holly, and wreaths.

Tim's house was lit solely by  candlelight and antique kerosene lamps, beautiful glass beauties with delicately fragile chimneys. The one that really fascinated me was this beauty, a spinning wheel of stars. Tim made the whirling vaned topper from a coffee can and not only did it function perfectly, but  it was also a thing of beauty.

. Tim and J enacted the battle between the Holly King (waning year) and the Oak King ( new year).

 Then I gave the blessing with the consecrated water of life anointing their feet as a  virgin  that they would find the right path in the new year, their groin as a maid, that their endeavors be fruitful, and their head as a crone that they might have wisdom for the new year. We finished the ceremony by blessing the Goddess Morrigan and the eastern star and inserting the Athame into the chalice, both ends, the blade to kill off the old year, the hilt for pleasure in the new. I must say I certainly don't mind symbolically killing off this year. It's been a tough one for me.