Yule is fast approaching along with many other holidays. How do you celebrate?

In my house we celebrate Yule by holding vigil with the mother while she is in labor (we stay up all night) and then going out to a Denver community event called Drumming up the Sun. It is held at an outdoor ampitheatre in the wee hours before dawn. We gather there with drums and coffee and bring up the sun.

Then we spend Christmas with the family because that is their holiday and we like to share the celebration with them as well.

I've always had a blended winter holiday season. Growing up, one side of the family was Jewish, one was not. Now that I am Pagan, we've got Yule bits mixed in.

I try and spend a Yule night with friends here in the Bay Area when I can, but I've also had years where it was just me, sitting up with my burning candles. The overcast and fog in the Bay Area can make sunrise elusive, so we usually check the sunrise time with a weather web site as you can't guarantee you'll be able to greet the sun visually, LOL....

Holidays with my biological family involves lots of good food and gifts that really touch the heart. We've all gotten away from concepts of "lots" or "expensive" over the years. Homemade things are given as often as store-bought. We get together whenever the most people can gather whether that date falls on any actual December holidays or not..

I will probably spend Yule with my parents and do a ritual myself at night. Then, I will go to my Aunt's house for Christmas because the rest of my family is Christian or Jewish.

Lark

These sound like wonderful Holiday plans!

One of my friends is having a Yule party at her house. We are going to decorate her trees outside with popcorn and cranberry strings as an offering to the critters. THen we are all going to have something cooked for the dinner. I am going to try my hand at making a Yule log this year!

Welcome to the board Jeanette!

Those sound like wonderful plans. We opted out of decorations this year for various reasons (one of which being that all of my holiday stuff is in storage!) but the critters would sure appreciate the treats! We just may have to do that <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

I just got invited to a Solstice ritual that will be held this coming weekend. There will be a potluck dinner, a small gift exchange and the ritual.

The email included the following instructions:

I'm curious to see what we do, esp with the 1/2 C. of natural item.....

Ohhhh I am interested to see what you will be doing with it too!

What natural item are you going to take?

Having looked over the kitchen for something that is both pleasing to the eye and which has meaning to me, I'm taking a 1/2 cup of red adzuki beans. They are a sort of burgundy color, and I grind them up to make a traditional Japanese face wash for myself.

I debated shucking the harvest corn from my altar, but really, I want to pop that next week when a friend here on the Solstice and since I have no idea what will be done at the Saturday ritual, it seemed best to save the corn for my in-house ritual.

*nods* sounds great!

My first thought was that I would take pinto beans because they are quite lovely and they are a connection to ny heritage and my childhood.

This is an interesting idea...

Does anyone here have a ritual they could share with me and any ideas about what my alter should look like?
Something simple yet beautiful... <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Jazzmin -- there's a good thread on altars over at
http://www.bellaonline.com/code/ubb/noncgi/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic;f=116;t=000062

Fiona -- all the natural items we brought to the ritual last night symbolized the energies we were calling back with the Sun for the new year. They also symbolized the resources and connections we have as a community. People brought river rocks (med and small), adzuki beans (me), mustard seeds, grains, sage, mugwort, pine trimmings, pinto beans (!), bay leaves and a few other similar things. One guy brought Good&Plentys, which was funny and appropriate.

The priestess said each year she somehow received something in her life that was appropriate and of which there was enough to hand out at the ritual. This year, she was given about two dozen tiny, hand-dipped, red candlewax bowls by an artist she met at a craftfair. Each was made by dipping a balloon into wax to build up the layers until a vessel was formed. Those gave her the idea for the ritual.. After the ritual we all got Ziplock baggies to put the bowls into so we could bring them home without spilling everything and add them to our own altars as appropriate. Lots of jokes about "don't put them in the altar near the sunny window" were made.... LOL....

What a wonderful sentiment for Yule! And how cool the little bowls must have been filled with those things!

Sounds like a great ritual.

Jazzmin-
Some ideas for celebrating yule would be to light lots of candles to call the sun back with sympathetic magic. At our group ritual we also have a giving blanket. For that we bring something that has served us spiritually but that dosent fit with us anymore. then we each choose something that someone else brought.