Eliza Daley ~ Wordcraft & Musing on Home & Hope
The Winter Sleep Moon went dark yesterday. Today begins the Midwinter Moon. This lunation always feels like the shortest of the year, even though the nights are long. There is so much packed into this time of year, that a month can slip through your fingers before you even get a good grasp of the… Continue reading The Daily: 20 December 2025
Las Posadas begins today. In this Latin American Christmas novena, the community acts out the Holy Family's search for a place to sleep upon coming to Bethlehem for the Roman tax census. Starting nine days before Christmas Eve, a Mary and Joseph, with an entourage of angels and shepherds and others, walk door-to-door begging for… Continue reading The Daily: 16 December 2025
Lucy Light Shortest day, longest night —traditional English proverb Before Pope Gregory tweaked the Julian calendar and caused a great deal of confusion, 13 December was celebrated as the winter solstice in Scandinavia. The poem by the late 16th century English writer, John Donne, “A Nocturnal upon St Lucy’s Day, Being the Shortest Day” shows… Continue reading The Daily: 13 December 2025
St Nicholas December 6th is St Nicholas' Day. Nicholas is an interesting figure, or perhaps collection of figures, as the case may be. The official Nick was a bishop of Myra. His legends claim that he was born in about 270CE to wealthy parents in Greek Lycia. While still a child, he was orphaned by… Continue reading The Daily: 6 December 2025
New Year's Day is misplaced. This date has no real significance. It is tied to nothing in the solar year nor in the cultural year. It is historically wrong. When the Romans created these two new months in their calendar, January and February, and set their state calendars to begin on 1 January, that date… Continue reading The Daily: 1 January 2025
December 26th carries much significance. It's the second day of Christmas, in which two turtledoves show up (according to the carol). This year it is also the second night of Hanukkah, the festival of the miracle of the lamps. But it is the first night of Kwanzaa. I like this holiday though I don't do… Continue reading The Daily: 26 December 2024
Today, I set out to describe meaningful ritual at this time of the year... things went a bit sideways... A few years ago, I began this blog chiefly as a way to talk about how to mark time, how to meaningfully tie each Season to the seasons without creating harm and waste — and exhausting… Continue reading The Daily: 22 December 2024
Green Man in the cold morning light Today, 21 December 2024 at 4:20am, the sun appears to stand still at its most southern point in its apparent journey along the horizon. We call this period of slow change, where day length changes incrementally and then not at all, the solstice, the “sun pause”. In the… Continue reading The Daily: 21 December 2024
Saturnalia Saturnalia begins today. This year Saturn is sharing the night sky with the much brighter upstart planetary deities, Venus and Jupiter; but Saturn is still brighter than any star in the sky, shining to the south for several hours after sunset. In my part of the world, the earliest sunsets, 4:11pm have already passed… Continue reading The Daily: 17 December 2024
I spent most of my adult life and raised my sons in a place where traditions are still living and enacted. Moreover, these traditions are understood. The reasons we do the things we do are well known and the source of endless discussion and debate. Nothing is simply the done thing. There must be both… Continue reading The Daily: 16 December 2024
By My Solitary Hearth 