Our Beltane

Our Feast

I made fruit braids, since one of the traditional foods is a fertility bread with spices or sweetmeats (fruit and nuts) inside. I had meant to just make one loaf, but, shall we say, errors were made! So I ended up making a huge batch with three loaves. One had my (homemade) apricot marmalade, and it was too runny and as you can see the braid opened up in the oven. The second one had a cranberry filling, and the third was chopped almonds with butter and cinnamon.

The Feast Table

Bottom center are the fruit braid slices, to the right are the oatcakes, and in the center is a fruit plate. Barely visible in the bowl at the top left is cottage cheese with tomatoes and chives in it--that was our 'dairy' and also 'fresh herbs' from the official holiday foods list. On the other side of the fruit plate is fried zucchini and steamed artichokes (which aren't traditional, but they sounded good). In the crockpot was beef chuck, which also just sounded good to us.
My 4 year old wound ribbons around our candle wreath, and we got some potted flowers but had to take them off the table for dinner because there wasn't room.

The Blutkake "bluht-ka-ka" (Norwegian for "moist cake")

It is a dense cake, sliced into at least three layers with sweetened whipped cream and fruit between each one. The bottom layer also has fruit syrup poured in it to make it extra moist.

I had a ribbon wreath in my hair all day, and also I wore green with a floral skirt

The Battle between Winter and Summer

The "Winter" team, with snowflakes taped to them

The "Summer" team, with flowers taped to them

A moment from the battle...
(we make swords with foam swim noodles, they're great for having all out battles without hurting anyone!)

Some thoughts on the Three Fertility Festivals

Imbolc, Ostara, and Beltane are all fertility festivals. I've been thinking for the last few days about whether this is redundant, but I have concluded that it is not. Obviously sex is significant (and should be!), so it seems to warrant multiple celebrations in the year. But I think that these three sabbats honor different aspects of sexuality. To explain what I mean by that, I'll go back and briefly review some of the mythology of the God and Goddess in the wheel of the year.

At Imbolc is the wedding between the God and Goddess, and of course it includes the consummation of that marriage. On Ostara their union results in conception (of the Son God, who will be born at Yule, after the Father God dies at Samhain...of course that Son will then become the Father at the following Imbolc when he marries the Goddess...).

So here is what I see as the differences between the three sexual celebrations:

• Imbolc is a celebration of marriage, of consummation, and of the sacred, vow-renewing, side of sex.
• Ostara is a celebration of procreation, of conception, of birth; another awesome side of sexuality, yet also not all it can be.
• And what is left for Beltane? Sex just for the fun of it! Because the pleasures of sexuality are also important. 

What do you think?