Solstice

I went to a solstice celebration at my sister-in-laws last night. She lives in big house with lots of people, including her mother-in-law who is the woman who married us. I admit I'm still not quite sure who lives there and who merely shows up for all the parties.

We got there a bit late, but people still weren't really ready. However I found some candles to light. (I light candles on Friday for shabbat.) Meanwhile other people found bread and wine, so after I lit the candles we had some. The bread was really good too -- fresh out of the oven and made with honey.

Evidently everyone got organized and we did a solstice ritual, with mentions of Norse gods. The ritual involved singing, lighting a Yule long, and hanging cookies on the tree. I love there Yule log song which talks about the pour rain rather than snow! Which was just right for last night which was very wet.

After the ritual there was some time before dinner, and we still had our song books out so I encouraged people to sing more. I love to sing, but am not at all good at it. The song book is full of pagan carols. We sang a song about Thor and Loki to the tune of Good King Wenceslas, and few other songs.

Then it was time to eat. The main course was roast pork so I just had a plateful of sides there was barley cooked with mushrooms, Brussels sprouts, red cabbage and peas. For desert I had a piece of very chocolatey yule log cake.

After dinner I was get overwhelmed with too much noise and R was tired so we didn't hang out too long. Still it was good fun, and I got to sing.