Simple and soothing family crafts and rituals. We decorate our home and hearth year round with handmade garlands. Personally, I like to make intricate and elaborate seasonal paper garlands. But, as a mother, I also love a garland project that can truly include my young children, without leaving us all feeling frustrated because it is over their skill level. The following garland ideas I share with you are simple, beautiful, family friendly garlands to make WITH your children.

The deepest dark of the year on earth, shines the brightest of heavenly lights in the night sky.

The Winter Spiral Garden is a ritual to honor winter time when, traditionally, light, warmth and food would be scarce.

The story of mistletoe begins with a superstitious kiss. Legend says, kissing under the bough brings good luck, wards off evil and blesses those kissing with love. The ancient Druids from the Celtic people were the keepers of the sacred mistletoe. They saw the plant as a gateway between the worlds because of the mysterious way it grows on a host tree, never touching the ground nor growing exactly towards the sky.

This bird is brined in apple cider over night and slowly roasted the day of the feast. It is tender, juicy and bursting with unique flavors.

The Autumn Lantern walk is an old, potent tradition of making paper lanterns and venturing into the dark, cold night. The ritual symbolize kindling our inner light as we cross over into the long nights of winter. Facing the unknown and the unseen, trusting our inner guides. We celebrate the loss of something we long for and trust in the lesson we have to learn in its’ absence. What does darkness have to teach us? How does longing work on us in the unknown or unseen realms? Perhaps like the plant world, we grow the more we root and like the spirit world, we shine the more we embrace the dark. As we venture into the dark and cold we find that we are not depleted by the lost of light and warmth but fortified by our connection to the cycles of nature.

This soup is simple, elegant and just the right thing to nourish us as we enter the cooler seasons. We love to serve it inside of scooped out little pumpkins.

On the honorable harvest.

The fullness, warmth and body of the growing season culminates with the Autumn Harvest. We gather, stock and store the high-density, nutrient-packed foods. The grains, corn, wheat, rice and rye, symbolize sustenance and a longevity of food security for the long winter ahead.

Family play for the longest day of Father Sun! This is an interactive game and art project we use to celebrate the solstice as a family. The children transform from a hungry caterpillar to a flourishing butterfly seeking nectar from the flowers in the meadow.

As the carousel of summer abundance twirls, the Mead Moon is in bloom. The flowers are bursting and the nectar of Mother Earth is gathered by her creatures. The pollinators are busy stocking up.

Spring equinox ritual and silliness.

Thoughtful Ways to Start the Day with Simple, Loving Attention to Her Five Senses.

This is traditionally an Italian Easter Bread. If you’ve been wanting to dip your toes into bread baking, this is a great place to start. It's an easy sweet bread and with a beautiful and unique result.

A fleeting sense of balance in the wheel of the year. Night and day are of equal length and polarities are in equilibrium - dark and light, masculine and feminine, inner and outer.

A Sap moon marks the transition from winter to spring and the spring equinox. Mother Earth fluctuates between warm thawing temperatures during the day and freezing temperatures at night. Life begins to wake up flow again, slowly at first.

With the beginning of summer moon, life has fully taken root in the rich soil and the busy work of gathering nourishment has begun for the natural world. The warmth and sweetness of Mother Earth is revealed…

The high summer sun dwindles and the remedies of the plant world are offered up for those who remember the ancient ways of healing. Concentrated constituents rest latent in the humble life of herbs.

The mid-spring, Egg Moon births the life of all of Mother Earth’s creatures and brings hope to the heart. We begin to see delicate plants sprouting, the birds are laying their precious eggs and the animals are birthing new life across the land.

A perfect needle felting project for beginners and children.