Urban Farmer Seeds

I just discovered a cool idea: Urban Farmer Seeds (ufseeds.com)  "uses recycled magazines to package all of it's seeds.  Our eco-friendly seed packets are made using old magazines and catalogs that would otherwise go to a landfill.  We separate these catalogs by paper strength and size and then turn them into seed packets for our seeds!" They sell organic and heirloom seed packs and gardening products geared towards a small carbon footprint at reasonable prices. If you sign up for their newsletter you get a $5 off coupon of a $25 purchase that is good 24 hours from entering your email. Nice work!

The Wheel of the Year via Little Bear

I love the warm and wholesome children's series Little Bear, as do both of my children. One thing I enjoy about it is that they celebrate the Wheel of the Year, though they don't call it that. These episodes honor a few of the seasonal holidays:

Little Bear's Sweet Tooth  - It's the Harvest Day Picnic and everyone is enjoying the races and games- except for Little Bear. He's having fun sneaking off and satisfying his sweet tooth at the desert table, until his sweet tooth causes a sore tummy. (Lammas or Mabon)

Moonlight Serenade  - Little Bear dances under a Harvest Moon with a scarecrow, a family of pumpkins and a set of garden tools. When Little Bear and scarecrow get launched to the moon, he wakes up and discovers that it was only a dream...or was it? (Samhain)

Goblin Night - It's Goblin Night and Little Bear and his friends are dressed up in their scariest costumes. On their way to the big bonfire they practice scaring each other...and do a very good job! (Samhain)

Winter Solstice - Little Bear learns holiday traditions by celebrating the winter solstice with his family. (Yule)

The Blueberry Festival  - Little Bear and friends put on a play to celebrate the annual blueberry harvest. (Midsummer)

Because the friends spend a lot of time outdoors, the seasons and weather play an integral role in the show.  There are many snow episodes and several fall and summer stories as well. It's an earthy cartoon that we all enjoy! You can watch some episodes on Nickjr.com or you can buy episodes or seasons to watch on amazon.com/ondemand. Netflix also has several dvd's of the show.
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Have Youself a Sacred City Solstice

Those of us tending towards Paganism may envision the perfect winter Solstice as something along these lines:

Snow blankets the silent ground, unbroken for miles around but for the occasional animal print etched into its glittery surface. A full moon rises above the horizon, casting evergreen shadows long and mystical. Inside the cozy log cabin we gather before a crackling fire. We sip eggnog made from the milk of our own cows or goats, who are at this very moment tucked warmly into their hay-filled barn. As we sip our nog and gaze upon our children playing peacefully with their wooden toys, we tell stories and sing Pagan holiday songs like Deck the Halls and the Pagan version of the Holly and the Ivy. Our night is lit only by beeswax candles made from our own hives and the fire. After a meal of winter stew and mead, we push back the furniture and gather for the family ritual. We call in the ancestors and the powers with whom we work, we raise energy and charge the Yule Log which is placed reverently on the fire, and we share cakes and wine or juice before ending our circle. Then we snuggle down in our cozy beds, sleeping soundly, and rise just before light to sing or drum up the sun. Then we share our handmade, cloth-wrapped gifts, and break our fast with sunny foods like buttery polenta, fresh farm eggs, and cinnamon tea. Then we spend the first day of winter snow shoeing through the silent and sparkly morning to bring gifts of seeds and dried fruit to the woodland creatures.

It could happen. If you live in the city, however, this fantasy may be a bit far fetched. How best does a busy family in the heart of a city celebrate the Longest Night and the return of the Sun?

Here are a few suggestions.

• Celebrate around the dinner table. Light lots of candles, turn off the electric lights, and share a meal of seasonal foods like potato leek soup and home baked bread (or at least locally made bread). Discuss what the light returning means in terms of playing outside, the promise of spring, and so on. Ask your children what they think about the return of longer daylight hours. Discuss what kinds of inner light they want to devote more time to in the coming year, and what that might look like.
• Make a Yule log. This might be as ornate as an actual log decorated with boughs and candles (drill holes in the top of the log or attach candles with wax or hot glue), or as simple as sticks gathered on a neighborhood walk, which you then burn in your fireplace or a charcoal grill. It's the honoring of light that matters. You might also bake a Buche de Noel, or if you're really strapped for time, buy one at a local bakery. Discuss the meaning of the Yule Log as you eat it by candlelight.
• Take a walk at dusk for a week or two, or just go stand in your backyard at sunset. Notice where the sun sets and when. You might even want to keep a journal of this data, maybe the same night each week for the months of December and January. 
• Rise with the sun on the 21st. For families with little children, this won't be as hard as it sounds. You probably already do already! Go outside on the front porch or balcony to watch the sun rise. Eat polenta with lots of butter for breakfast. It's a sunny food! Discuss how corn is grown in the summer, at the opposite end of the Wheel of the Year, and now we warm up with its sweet sugars and starches as winter officially begins. If you eat eggs, serve them sunny-side-up!
• Read winter books, like When Winter Comes by Nancy Van Laan (ages 3-7), The Winter Solstice by Ellen Jackson (ages 7-10), or The Return of the Light: Twelve Tales from Around the World for the Winter Solstice by Carolyn McVickar Edwards (listening to chapter books to adult).
• Cut out snow flakes. Use yellow or gold paper to make suns. Hang them from the ceiling or stick them to the wall or hang them on a Yule tree.
• Bundle up and take a walk in a local park or your neighborhood to search for signs of animals. Discuss what the trees are doing. Gather trinkets like pine cones and feathers to decorate your family altar or centerpiece. Ask permission of the land to take these treasures home with you and listen carefully to the answer. 
• Here in Denver, many families drum up the sun at Red Rocks. You may want to find a community ritual, sun ceremony, or other local activity. Check your local newspaper for large events, or local New Age or Pagan book and gift stores for open rituals. Or make your own, inviting another family or your entire community to share Solstice dawn together.
• I like to offer one gift to my children on Yule and save the rest for Christmas morning. We are an eclectic family with strong Christmas family traditions. I've seen so many arguments as to when you should celebrate - as if it makes one a bad Christian to honor the Solstice or a bad Pagan to open gifts on Christmas. It is all about family, light, love, and gratitude. These are the important parts to remember, whenever you celebrate.

Hope these ideas resonate, or spark some of your own. Have a very merry Solstice! 

Magical Homesteading

It seems urban homesteading has passed through fad phase and settled down into a quiet way of life for thousands of people. You don't hear about it much on the news, and the featured book table has fewer titles related to homesteading, but internet groups and blogs are still going strong. I meet fewer people who say they wish they had chickens, and more people who report someone in their neighborhood who keeps a small flock. These urban and suburban homesteaders come from all walks of life: various religions, conservative and liberal, young and retired, women and men. It ranges from the city apartment with herbs on the balcony and a supplemental community garden plot to a small farm producing wool, eggs, and meat.

Urban homesteading is a magical way of life. Magic is the art of changing your consciousness - and the world's consciousness - at will. Magic examines our interconnections to everything around us and our responsibilities towards those things to which we are connected. Both of these qualities can also be said about homesteading of all varieties. I raise chickens because it's fun, because I like knowing where my eggs come from, and I like the responsibility of caring for the animals that nourish me. I like the surprise of my neighbors when they realize I'm growing my own food (especially the children), and I hope I am contributing to the world in positive ways by teaching others how they too might live more responsibly. I am working to change the current paradigm that says that farm and suburb are two different things, that life should be divided by zoning laws and labels.

Homesteading is also about really knowing your land, whether that land is your backyard or your neighborhood or both. This too is a very magical quality. To paraphrase Phyllis Curott, a witch is someone who pays attention. We notice how many squirrel nests we have in our neighborhood, where we can find wild herbs, how rain affects our property, the changing light through the seasons, and other ways in which we and nature coexist. The garden and our animals teach us about life and death, give and take, ebb and flow. These are all aspects of energy we must know intimately to work magic of any kind.

When I was thinking about writing this blog post I imagined I would post things like an amulet you might make to hang in the chicken coop to keep the girls safe from predators, or how conjuring a dragon can be a form of magical protection for your homestead. If you would like to learn some of these tricks, check out Magical Housekeeping by Tess Whitehurst or Cottage Witchery by Ellen Dugan. Both books have lots of great ideas to magic your homestead. I realized while writing this post, though, that homesteading is an act of magic all itself. Just like it's not the tool that holds the magic, but your consciousness, it's not the spells that make a home magical but the power in your heart.

Blessed be!