Ostara Egg Hunt

 

I meant to write this post sooner, but both my babies are sick, like... I-went-to-the-hospital-to-make-sure-they-are-okay sick (it's the first time I do in almost 3 years of parenthood!). Imagine Mariann falling asleep every where at any time of the day! Poor little things.

So here's the stuff Mariann found in her eggs on Monday (we had to go to an anniversary mass Sunday...) along with chocolate chicks and eggs and bunnies.

felt, pipe cleaner and bead flower girl

Baby sprout in with their beds (because they are still in bed here!)

Star child, idea taken from ecomilf

Daffodil Baby

Chicks and Daffodil Fairy

I did some chicks out of a very fluffy yellow polyester fabric I found once in a thrift store. The eggs are felted. I followed instruction by Nicole from Frontier Dreams that she published in Rhythm of the Home. It was very fun to do! You can't really see but the opening is blanket stitched. I plan on making some more eggs to hide more treasures in them.

I guess you could make the chicks with felt too. I didn't draw the pattern, but if one of you ask for it, I will post it :)

And this is my daffodil fairy!

Nothing that special, very easy to do! So easy, I was able to free-hand draw at the computer the shape you'd need to cut in order to make one yourself.

Just paint the head and dress yellow, let dry and pop the petal over! No sewing!

Really, I'm posting this for Wulf. ahah! Else I would have waited for my camera to come back. I really hope I have it by the equinox! So here's to my biggest fan ;) and better pictures to come someday.... Oh, I need to start making that Hen, too! Who would have let so many eggs every where in our house??

I will add this to the Sewing Bee. I thought I would share some practical sewing or a little dress this week.. but no. I haven't touched the sewing machine. At. All. (it makes me a little sad...)

Preparing Ostara

It snowed all weekend. And not lightly; It's still snowing, they forecast snow until tomorrow after-noon and there's around 20 cm that felt so far, around 15 other cm to come!

Maybe you wouldn't say it looks like spring's coming. But I do. In Québec, we have that last winter storm. That one where the thick, heavy snow stick to branches. And it's what's happening right now, so yay!

oh my.. look at those chubby arms!

Ostara is the name some pagans uses for Spring equinox. I love to use it, as I love using fancy names...ahah, not really. It separates  the equinox celebration from Easter. And I love the Sabbath of Ostara. You can read my post from last year about what it means to me.

And now, Mariann is old enough for an egg hunt! I'm thrilled! ahah. It won't be anything overwhelming... Not many eggs (as I try having them all felted by me). With little plaything and piece of chocolate she will most definitely enjoy. I have a daffodil fairy done in the same fashion as the Snow Drop fairy. I will make some chicks with plushy yellow fabric, pompom bunnies, lambs, finger puppets, those kind of things. She will also have a felted horse, should I find my pattern, and maybe a plush hen, if I find the right fabric in my stash. It will be our main activity, along with some colourful baking, for the day. I don't like planning a busy day on a Sabbath day.

We won't decorate real eggs, but I'll draw huge ones in a paper for Mariann to paint over, and we'll proudly hang it somewhere. I might even do a banner like the one we did for Valentine's day, with colourful eggs, flowers and butterfly.

As for meal, we'll have an omelette. Mariann loves cracking eggs! With lots of leafy greens to accompagne it. I think I'll try blowing one or two and decorate it for myself when my daugther will be in bed. It's kind of selfish but I haven't done that in ages! I'll just let her play (break...) it in the morning...ahah!

Do you do something to highlight the Spring equinox at home?

Going to the Sugar House

The weather was truly gorgeous, at last!

My daugther made new friends :)

(she's SO modeling on that one)

and ate lots of sugary goodness

She had her own little chocolate hen



And was kind enough to share


She even kept a bow long enough to take a picture....


...thanks to daddy's pencil case...

I really enjoyed going to the sugar house as a child.. It's truly a part of spring and Easter time. We only went for taffy on the snow... But that's my favorite part! I can tell Mariann loved it too, yay!

Simple Ostara dinner

----> That's what we ate tonight. My favorite milkshake recipe which is:
a block of mango flavored toffu,
strawberries, banana, yahourt, and other stuff on hand.

also...
We did rainbow cupcakes!

Yummie!

I know spring is really here...

...because I can't stop coughing, and usually I get this when spring arrives!



Ostara 2010

Yesterday was really calm. I wasn't feeling great for a ritual being sic (I wouldn't have stand incense at all!) So I've pass the night at my mom and we had a chocolate fondue. Great fun. Mom didn't want to eat it at first but she ended up fighting for the bowl at the end.


I'll still do "Ostara" stuff during the week...because frankly.. Why should we limit ourself to a date and stop once that date is passed? I wanted to cook with my daughter, a pretty colorful cake, or cupcakes perhaps. Because I know that Easter is coming in 2 weeks and Blogland will be filled with spring goodies I'll want to try :)

Ostara...Why Bunnies and Eggs ended up partying with Jésus

image taken here

If you're interested a tad bit into History, you know most of the Holidays as a pagan root. Thought growing up in a mildly catholic region, my mom chose not to get me baptized and Easter was really much more about chocolate and eggs in my family.

Transferring Pâques (French for Easter) to Ostara wasn't much of a problem for me. Instead of changing the date each year, I stick around March 21st. (The equinox is March 20 for the northern hemisphere this year).


I could do this the complicated way and talk about the Goddess Eostre (which might have never existed)and eggs (which might be a tradition coming from Middle East instead of europe) but I'll simply state what this holidays means to me like I did for Imbolc.

image taken here

The neo-pagan tradition is pretty much made up with lots of bits of other tradition, yet what always comes up is symbol.

Basicly, I celebrate spring. I love spring. Winter here in Québec is really harsh, often confinding us to our homes because the weather is too cold or dangerous (even with our snow-tires). I'm so happy when the sun start warming the earth; I love not having to put on boots to get out of the house, I love that my baby is able to move in her light spring coat.

It's a time of the year I'm glad to celebrate. It's an equinox, always reminding your should have a balance; Night and Day, your inner male and female aspect.

It's always a time to celebrate fertility; earth that will soon offer us flowers, the dairy animal who gave birth... Our own human fertility. Did you know most birth happened on March and April (according to a statistic from Québec anyway).


Tomorrow I'll be celabrating with my mom and daugther. We won't do anything special since my daugther is so young, but I'll find something to make it special anyway :)

I leave you with my little fairy....

Happy Ostara!

Ostara Swap

Here's the goodies I made for my ostara swap partner, and since she got them already I can post them, yay!

Close-up at the portable altar items;
Bottle of salt, bottle of water, tea light, incense, athamé(made out of a straight pin and beads), star (for pentagram) and a tiny witch ladder (works like a rosary)

She said she liked everything so Yay! :)