some solstice crafts and activities

Each day since St. Lucy's Day until Winter Solstice, we do an activity/craft related to the solstice or winter or Christmas. It has been a wonderful and easy way to integrate the seasons into our day, and tie us to rituals that soothe our aching souls.

Snowflakes are a perennial favorite for every preschool classroom. Hell, every classroom. And that is because they really are such an easy, lovely craft. I actually hadn't cut a snowflake since I was a child, so I had to look it up. I knew it involved folding paper and cutting. After I cut the snowflakes, I gave the children some glitter, glue and stickers to decorate their snowflakes, then we hung them on the studio windows. I love them. Beezus decorated her snowflake with strawberries, because she misses strawberries in December. *sigh*

The following day, which was the 15th, Beezus, Thor and I made pomander balls. I had seen these things before, but had no idea what they were or what they were called. I found the idea in the book Celebrating the Great Mother. Actually, all the crafts we are doing this season comes from that book or the book Circle Round by Starhawk. Perhaps I should have started with this part, but before St. Lucy's Day I sat one night with herbal tea and a piece of paper on a clipboard and looked through all my seasonal craft books. I wrote down ideas of things to do for our solstice celebration and things to do before solstice. Basically, a list of crafts, and every day, I have been doing one that pops out at me. I didn't make a formal schedule or anything, but just for idea starters.Maybe it sounds weird or hokey to share this part of my process, but I do get questions all the time about how I come up with crafts, and I thought I would share how. I read about crafts, ideas, ties into nature. I have collected a number of books on crafts and homeschooling, even though I don't homeschool. I just love homeschoolers and their awesome creativity with tying in crafts and activities to nature, seasons, science, math and language.

Oh, right, pomander balls. Pomander balls are an ancient tradition of aromatherapy and protection against infection and disease. They are fruits, apples, oranges or lemons, with perfumes. They are then dried and hung, or put into vases, closets, drawers, as a natural moth repellant and air freshener. I just think they look cool. The kids loved this activity and Thor was even able to participate fully.

 

We used a chopstick and poked some holes in an apple. Thor poked holes in a lemon.

Then we took some cloves and put them in the holes.

The kids loved this part. 

 Then we rolled the apple and lemon in a mixture of cinnamon, cardamom, cloves and nutmeg that I ground in a mortar and pestle.

We put it in a dish on our sidetable. But I wanted to show you another idea. You can wrap some cloth or lace around it and hang the pomander balls.

Festive, no? And they smell divine. Just take them out and dry them before wrapping them up, because they might get moldy, if you know what I mean.

The 16th, we made some ornaments with cardstock and tissue paper. We traced cookie cutters onto paper and then used glue, glitter glue, markers and tissue paper squares and created little ornaments to hang around our house.

On the 17th, we baked cookies, cookies and fudge. I love getting the kids involved. This year, this was my second baking day, and I anticipate another one this week some time.In the evening we all sat around the fire in big chairs. We actually moved our chairs around to face the fire. Sam was knitting and I was felting. It was so homey and lovely. The kids wanted us to entertain them. So, I told them to pull out their shiny rock basket and make a sacred spiral. Rocks, shells, and stones are just magical to children. My children are constantly looking on the ground to collect cool rocks wherever they go. We were given this basket by my mother many years ago. I shouldn't even say we, I was given it when I was single. And it has become what Beezus dubbed the Shiny Rock Bask. She named it at age two, so Bask = Basket. I had some stones, like lapis lazuli, quartz, an arrowhead that I found as a kid. And they went in there, then she began collecting. There are shells from Australia (thanks, Carly), Panama, Alabama, New Jersey. The rule is that all rocks must be put back in the bask with the lid on when you are done with them. Also, we have an s'load of river rocks outside (the previous owners put these lovely river rocks under the deck), so the kids are constantly finding cool rocks right outside our home. And not just cool to the kids, but cool to me. But the other rule is that the rocks must fit in the basket. If you find a cool one, and the bask is too full, you must take one out and back to the yard.
I have to say, I should probably do an entire post about the Shiny Rock Bask, because come to think of it, it is a totally versatile, awesome toy/play thing in our house. The kids pull the rocks out to drive matchbox cars on them. They become a gnome environ. They are studied. We talk about our travels and where we found rocks. We name them, put them back. We put them in color order. We also use rocks in our meditations. Rocks are serene, quiet, contemplative. When the kids are crazy, we pull them out, and I ask them to pick a rock that feels best to them--calming and lovely. I ask them to hold it and become like the rock. Sit still. I also ask them to imagine if the rock had a voice, what would it be? See, how cool rocks are?

It is the bask that keeps on giving. In our semi-circle, the shiny rock bask was pulled out, and the rocks were split in half. And the kids were asked to make a sacred spiral. I didn't explain what that was, but I explained what a spiral is. Did you know that the spiral is the oldest religious symbol found? The symbol is about the goddess and the womb, the everlasting life force. Part of why the spiral is used in solstice ceremony is that Winter Solstice is the time when the Earth Goddess gives birth to the Sun. It also is about change and transformation and acceptance. All things we have to wrestle with during Lucy's birthday and solstice.

As I felted, I watched Beezus' sacred spiral take shape. Thor occasionally stole a rock or three. His spiral was a pile of rocks. After Beezus was done, I told her she could take a photograph of her spiral, because it was an impermanent thing. And we worked together breaking it down and talking about that. Basically, it was me telling her about sand mandalas and meditations and impermanence.

Hope you enjoyed some of these solstice and winter crafts. I should be posting every day, but life is busy right now, and I am in the thick of my grief season.

a grove of trees

When my husband and I first married, we bought a house immediately. My husband was still in graduate school and we were saving for my maternity leave. Because we moved into our house at the end of November, we excitedly moved right into Christmas decorating. Sam and I rented a second floor apartment on Fabric Row in Philadelphia before house buying. We had a very little tree in the apartment with a minimum of ornaments. Suddenly, we had this seemingly huge house. (It seems quite small to us now.) And no decorations.

So, we were broke. (Did I mention that?) I actually think we moved to our house and didn't eat out for dinner for six months, because we were so afraid of spending money. I was really excited to decorate though, but I had to get creative. I was walking around Joann's trying to come up with something. I budgeted ten bucks or something. I do not sew, but something about seeing the Christmas fat quarters there for two bucks made me think--I can do something with those. I bought a few packs. I walked around the craft area and saw these styrofoam cones.

They looked like evergreens. I bought three in differing sizes, so they would look like a grove of trees. Then I took my fat quarters, and ripped strips from the fabric. All different green and red fabrics.

See, you need no sewing skills, or rather no skills at all for this project, except ripping and pinning. After I ripped the fabric, I took straight pins, and pinned the fabric into place. Funnily, my mother in law was visiting over Thanksgiving. I pulled them out with our Christmas decorations and she said, "What a clever way to use a thread spool." Or something possibly not thread. She is a weaver, so she thought I had glued the fabric on an old conical spool. You can! You can even glue these onto the styrofoam. They make styrofoam glue. I used pins, though, because that is what I had, and I like the sounds of pins going through styrofoam.

I pinned some red ribbon on top after I pinned all the fabrics. I really like the raw edges of the fabric when it is ripped. Believe it or not, I still have the fabric from those fat quarters. I made ornaments that first year too.

 

And that is it. Easy peasy, as Beezus says. I love them because we celebrate Winter Solstice, and having nature themed decorations is really important to us. And in context, they make a nice backdrop to our sideboard. Some really cheap decorations are on this sideboard too. For one, we cut a huge limb off our holly tree as a flower arrangement. I wrap the huge painting above the sideboard. It is just an easy, cheap decoration. And we use cuttings from our rope to line the nativity scene. We like to put greens everywhere. I also love displaying all the cards we get here.