winter solstice activities

Great God of the Sun,

I welcome Your return.

May You shine brightly upon the Goddess;

May You shine brightly upon the Earth,

scattering seeds and fertilizing the land.

All blessings upon You,

Reborn One of the Sun!

Know that you are Blessed.

In previous years, I have honored the winter solstice in various ways: gatherings with friends, hikes up to Two Trees to watch the sunset, walks or bike rides along the beach, a pubic performance of a solstice ritual and poetry reading (I put up a post with the winter solstice ritual here last year).

On the day of the winter solstice this year, we celebrated  by organizing a bike riding Santacon which concluded with a fire burning late into the night at the Artbarn (see photos in previous post).

I did something else this year too: I organized a gathering and fundraiser at the Artbarn for my son’s kindergarten class.

Since many solstice rituals involve candles, and since I wanted to help the children understand the incremental nature of the growing days, we made candles, dipping wicks into heated blue or green wax, then cold water, over and over again. The children also made t-shirts with their handprints, the fingers as candles, the tips as flames (photo to be added soon!)

For a the third activity,  the children planted seeds for the Artbarn’s garden as well as sweet pea seeds to take home and grow.

At the end, we set up a mic and the children took turns on stage leading as song or telling a joke or  a story.

Great God of the Sun,

I welcome Your return.

May You shine brightly upon the Goddess;

May You shine brightly upon the Earth,

scattering seeds and fertilizing the land.

All blessings upon You,

Reborn One of the Sun!

Know that you are Blessed.

Image of the Tyrrhenian Sea and Solstice Sky
Credit & Copyright: Danilo Pivato

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