Eliza Daley ~ Wordcraft & Musing on Home & Hope
The Perseids meteor shower begins its peak tonight. This floating pile of space gunk is left over from Comet Swift-Tuttle and is quite thick still, making for hundreds of collisions with our atmosphere as Earth's orbit passes through the debris between July 17th and August 24th. From the 11th through the 13th, you can expect… Continue reading The Daily: 11 August 2026
Supposedly, the Dog Days have ended, but you wouldn't know it by the weather. It has been hot and humid for days, with no rain to break the heat. Not even much of a breeze most days. Just relentless heat. And... well... I'm not going to tell you what temperature wilts a Vermonter and sends… Continue reading The Daily: 10 August 2026
Lammas It's the probably not-terribly-ancient festival of bread, Lammas, Hlaf-mas, Loaf Mass. This holiday is possibly an English variant on the Irish first fruits and fair festival of Lughnasadh, but compacted into one day and generally lacking any ritual or narrative. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, churches in East Anglia constructed elaborate… Continue reading The Daily: 2 August 2026
Lughnasadh It is Lughnasadh. This is my favorite time of year. Some may love midwinter twinkle; others may love the summer sun. But I live for the autumn blaze. The cooling weather, the increasing darkness, the slowing pace and renewed time for reading and introspection. The color and pageantry of fall. The scents of leaf… Continue reading The Daily: 1 August 2026
I was thinking about the symbols of Lughnasadh and how to short-hand the description of time and seasonal energy. The idea set that best works is that of the elements, but I’m reluctant to use that language because it carries such woo-woo magickal baggage that it puts up walls in the mind of any practical… Continue reading The Daily: 31 July 2026
Today at 10:35am the Hay Moon is full, so tonight's moonrise is the closest to full. This ninth moon of the year is also called the Corn Moon or the Mead Moon, for the meadows that are cut for hay at this time of year. The Hay Moon brings the shift of Midsummer, the Dog… Continue reading The Daily: 29 July 2026
Midsummer's Day is long past. We saw the last of the 15-hour days in my part of the world on July 20th, and the shortening of the days is hastening toward the autumn equinox. We lose over two minutes of daylight each day now, and sunrises and sunsets are rolling south on the horizon by… Continue reading The Daily: 27 June 2026
Crom Dubh Sunday In many northern communities, July is a hungry month. The spring flush of greens and quick-growing roots like radishes and beets may still be trickling out of the garden, but most have bolted and run to seed. However, those that remain are long on fiber and short on calories, and little of… Continue reading The Daily: 26 July 26
The Romans had concerns about drought at this time of year. Three very old festivals were grouped together at the end of July to honor deities who presided over watery things. The first was the Lucaria, the clearing of the groves. This was an ancient observance even in Varro's time (116-27 BCE), and little is… Continue reading The Daily: 25 July 2026
Nature, having stridently and unambiguously declared Her many objections to the hatred and corruption on flagrant display in my country's center this week, decided to release us from the hellscape weather Her fury has inflicted upon us of late, instead gifting central Vermont with an absolutely divine day. No smoke. No crushing heat and humidity.… Continue reading The Daily: 6 July 2026
By My Solitary Hearth 