Hogmanay is the Scots word for the last day of the year, and is the Scottish celebration of the New Year. One of the most widespread customs associated with Hogmanay is the practice of first-footing, which starts immediately after midnight. ...
As we spiral through the cycles of the seasons on our homestead, Lughnasadh comes to us as a time of balance … between sacrifice and blessing, hard work and reward, safety and danger.
Here’s an article that I wrote for the 2023 Lughnasadh edition of the Òran Mór Celtic E‐Zine that looks into the Scottish legend of John Barleycorn and the traditional songs associated with it.
I’ve been reading a lot of Irish mythology in the last little while. Looking at the English translations of the Old Irish (Gaelic), it is easy to see that many of these stories were once oral poems (probably originally translated ...
Today is the spring equinox, and we finally finished cutting a trail from the cabin up to the center of the property. This trail will allow us to access the old logging road that runs through the upper reaches of ...
Once upon a time, long, long, ago, there was a Celtic band called Noctiluca. Now, you might say, Noctiluca is not a Celtic name. No, it is not. Unfortunately, no one in the band spoke Gaelic. Noctiluca was the best ...
Today is Samhain, or as most people know it, Halloween. What better way to spend a Halloween afternoon than on a hike through the damp fall woods, battling through spiderwebs and hunting weird mushrooms.
The Hawthorn, a tree that displays a prolific splendour of white or pink flowers at the beginning of May, is known by a variety of different names, such as “The May Tree“, “The Beltane Tree“, “The May Blossom“, “The Whitethorn“, ...