Solstice Offerings

a resource for the longest night (and beyond)

Photo by Rob Wicks on Unsplash

Merry Solstice, friends!

…and here we are, tumbling toward the Christmas feast!

First, a Quick Announcement: I will be taking a hiatus from The Wildroot Parables next week, so I can focus on Christmas festivities. But I’ll return with you on Monday, January 1st - the first day of 2024!

I wanted to make sure I left you with some gifts for the holiday, so here is a brief round-up of some things that might interest you for this long night (and beyond!).

Posts To Read:

• Kristin Haakenson
  ’s beautiful Thomasmas series! Full of history, folklore, and practical observances for this saint’s feast day…

  • The Thomastide Welcome

  • The Recipes

  • The Benediction

• The White Horse - For those who don’t know, I write speculative fiction over at my newsletter, Talebones. Normally I keep the two worlds pretty separate, but I think that my Wildroot Parables readers might be interested in the piece of “unfiction” I posted in honor of the solstice. In it, you’ll find a personal account of complicated true holiday feelings, wrapped in a somewhat-fictionalized tale. I hope you enjoy!

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The Twelve Days

I’ve always struggled a little with the idea of the “Twelve Days of Christmas”. While I love the idea of extending the feast beyond one day—and in this house, we definitely leave our tree up until Epiphany—I still wasn’t really sure what the “twelve days” were supposed to look like. I needed a map, a list. (I like lists.)

Last year, I put together a personal list of focuses for each of the twelve days, based on a saint or observance for that day. I didn’t share it last year because I didn’t put it together in time, but this year, I thought I would throw it out there and see if anyone else finds it helpful! Feel free to modify and expand this list, or create your own, and please share with us if you do!

Please note, friends, that this list is NOT meant to add to anyone’s mental load this holiday season, because no one needs that. Instead, it’s for those who, like me, often need a “hook” to hang your thoughts on, to help you meditate and reflect. 

So, without further ado, here are my Twelve Days of Christmas:

1. Family (Christmas Day): gathering, nostalgia, remembering, feasting

2. Creatures & Creation (St. Stephen): honoring nature and beloved pets

3. Work & Creativity (St. John the Beloved): dedication of our craft to God

4. Mourning & Grief (The Holy Innocents): allowing for tears, cleaning of ashes from the hearth

5. Friendship (St. Jonathan): honoring the companions who walk beside us

6. Social Justice (St. Frances Joseph-Gaudet): seeking God's heart in fighting injustice

7. Readiness (New Year's Eve): preparing to leap into new things

8. Beginning (New Year's Day): crossing the threshold into the unknown

9. Community (Handsel Day): supporting and serving our neighbors

10. Providence (St. Genevieve): blessing our resources and homes

11. Charity (St. Juniper): giving without reciprocation or hesitation

12. Mystery (Twelfth Night): leaning into the questions

BONUS:

• Epiphany: "Little Christmas", a small feast to honor the wisemen

• Distaff Day: take decorations down and return to "ordinary time"

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And Finally, A Poem (of course!)…

I leave you with one final entry from Pilgrim God.

Thank you, thank you to everyone who purchased and downloaded this little book—it has been SUCH a blessing to know you’re all reading along!

the sky owns
a dress
for every occasion;

tonight
she tried on
every dress she owned
one after another,
each more perfect
than the last;

and she twirled
like a child
for her Creator,
for the silent applause
of bare branches
for the slip and sliver
of a hushed
and gazing
Moon. 

Four candles flicker in the depth of winter, and the sky is a wash of brilliant color. 

Or perhaps it is gray and gloomy, slate with coming snow or low and pregnant with rain. 

Perhaps the trees clap and sway, or perhaps they are silent and still. 

Everything is waiting. Not long now. 

Advent draws near its close. The Old Story is a furtive whisper, now, a murmur, a muttering like a flock of birds, something swelling like the tide. Every corner of Creation knows the Story, tells it in their own wondering way. 

But the sky, perhaps she remembers it best. 

When the Word spoke first, He split the sky from the earth, and she flew upward and filled with cloud and birds and rain and fog and smoke and seasons and when she thickened, it was day, and when she thinned, it was night, and she held the earth in her embrace. 

When it was time for Him to be born, He did not declare it with fanfare. Instead, He adorned the sky—Firstborn, beauty!—with Star and angels and silence, so that we still sing of her when we sing of His birth. Silent night, holy night...

Sky still blushes with the memory, with love, when she was shot through with Light that deepest night, and all looked up at her with wonder.

Merry Christmas, my friends!

See you in the New Year!

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