Eliza Daley ~ Wordcraft & Musing on Home & Hope
The Blueberry Moon went dark yesterday at 2:06am. Today begins the eleventh moon of the year, the Nutting Moon. The Nutting Moon is new between 17 August and 14 September and full between 31 August and 28 September. It is one of two moons that may be dropped to accommodate the wandering Harvest Moon, which… Continue reading The Daily: 24 August 2025
The sweet corn harvest is late here in Vermont. We haven't seen the guy with the pick-up full of corn at the traffic circle. No cubic yard bins of corn at the grocery stores. Very little at the farmers' markets. The orchard I frequent announced that they have corn, but I haven't made it up… Continue reading The Daily: 18 August 2025
The Feast of the Assumption It is the Feast of the Assumption. In the Church calendar, this is the day Mother Mary was taken bodily up to heaven without the inconvenience of dying first. But in the older calendar of Europe, this was the time when it was recognized that the heat of summer was… Continue reading The Daily: 15 August 2025
The Perseid meteor shower begins its peak about now. 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 we pass through it. You can expect fifty or so meteor sightings an hour, about one a minute, from the… Continue reading The Daily: 11 August 2025
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 2025
The lingering thick smoke is scary. The inflammation in my spine is scary. The hospital bills are very scary... I am feeling in need of comfort food. I think we all get this way... More often than not, these days. We want something nourishing and simple, something quick, something that doesn't add heat to the… Continue reading The Daily: 28 July 2025
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 25
Neptunalia Today (or tomorrow, or both) is the ancient Roman (or Phoenician) holiday of Neptunalia, one of three obscure Roman festivals that honored watery deities in the last days of July. Neptune was the Roman god of both freshwater and the seas, but this festival, which shares many similarities with the Jewish Sukkot, is focused… Continue reading The Daily: 23 July 2025
The Old Farmer's Almanac says that it's time to start paying attention to the potatoes. In my garden you can hardly not pay attention to them. The potatoes are reaching out and grabbing attention. Passers-by are rubber-necking the veg. The potatoes are so prolific, I'm afraid there might be accidents. It's starting to feel like… Continue reading The Daily: 22 July 2025
My potatoes decided to flower... but they are nowhere near digging time! In my calendar, the season of Lughnasadh begins today. This is my favorite time of year. Fairs and food and the soon-to-be dwindling of summer heat — and dwindling of summer activity. (Hopefully, dwindling of summer bugs!!!) This season is marked by the… Continue reading The Daily: 21 July 2025
