Litha, the sabbat of the Summer Solstice is one of my favorite sabbats (I know I say that every year) because I am such a summer person.Celebrating this time of lush renewal and nature abounding happens at the perfect point in the year (halfway through) when I feel the collective powerof every summer I’ve enjoyed present upon me.

The last couple of years have been a struggle and for this sabbat I will celebrate endings and beginnings. I have a spell that I am casting for clients my Summer Solstice Wish Spell but also a new spell for myself that I may be offering in the future. I also had a number of clients purchase spells this past week and I will be casting them on the sabbat for extra power.

Here is some information and history on Midsummer:

History of Litha (MidSummer)

Also known as Summer Solstice, Litha, Alban Hefin, Sun Blessing, Gathering Day, Feill-Sheathain, Whit Sunday, Whitsuntide, Vestalia, Thing-tide, St. John’s Day

In addition to the four great festivals of the Pagan Celtic year, there are four lesser holidays as well: the two solstices, and the two equinoxes. In folklore, these are referred to as the four ‘quarter-days’ of the year, and modern Witches call them the four ‘Lesser Sabbats’, or the four ‘Low Holidays’. The Summer Solstice is one of them. (Though for me it is a more major holiday than most!)

Litha is usually celebrated on June 21st, but varies somewhat from the 20th to the 23rd, dependant upon the Earth’s rotation around the Sun. According to the old folklore calendar, Summer begins on Beltane (May 1st) and ends on Lughnassadh (August 1st), with the Summer Solstice midway between the two, marking MID-Summer. The most common other names for this holiday are the Summer Solstice or Midsummer, and it celebrates the arrival of Summer, when the hours of daylight are longest. The Sun is now at the highest point before beginning its slide into darkness.

Humanity has been celebrating Litha and the triumph of light since ancient times. On the Wheel of the Year Litha lies directly across from Yule, the shortest day of the calendar year, that cold and dark winter turning when days begin to lengthen and humanity looks wistfully toward warmth, sunlight and growing things. Although Litha and Yule are low holidays or lesser sabbats in the ancient parlance, they are celebrated with more revel and merriment than any other day on the wheel except perhaps Samhain.

The joyous rituals of Litha celebrate the verdant Earth in high summer, abundance, fertility, and all the riches of Nature in full bloom. This is a madcap time of strong magic and empowerment, traditionally the time for handfasting or weddings and for communication with the spirits of Nature. At Litha, the veils between the worlds are thin; the portals between “the fields we know” and the worlds beyond stand open. This is an excellent time for rites of divination.

Those who celebrated Litha did so wearing garlands or crowns of flowers, and of course, their millinery always included the yellow blossoms of St. John’s Wort. The Litha rites of the ancients were boisterous communal festivities with dancing, singing, storytelling, pageantry and feasting taking place by the village bonfire and torch lit processions through the villages after dark. People believed that the Litha fires possessed great power, and that prosperity and protection for oneself and one’s clan could be earned merely by jumping over the Litha bonfire. It was also common for courting couples joined hands and jump over the embers of the Litha fire three times to ensure a long and happy marriage, financial prosperity and many children. Even the charred embers from the Litha bonfire possessed protective powers – they were charms against injury and bad weather in harvest time, and embers were commonly placed around fields of grain and orchards to protect the crops and ensure an abundant reaping. Other Litha customs included carrying an ember of the Litha fire home and placing it on one’s hearth and decking one’s home with birch, fennel, St. John’s Wort, orpin, and white lilies for blessing and protection.

The Litha Sabbat is a time to celebrate both work and leisure, it is a time for children and childlike play. It is a time to celebrate the ending of the waxing year and the beginning of the waning year, in preparation for the harvest to come. Midsummer is a time to absorb the Sun’s warming rays and it is another fertility Sabbat, not only for humans, but also for crops and animals. Wiccans consider the Goddess to be heavy with pregnancy from the mating at Beltane – honor is given to Her. The Sun God is celebrated as the Sun is at its peak in the sky and we celebrate His approaching fatherhood – honor is also given to Him. The faeries abound at this time and it is customary to leave offerings – such as food or herbs – for them in the evening.

Correspondences

Purpose
Rededication to the Lord and Lady, beginning of the harvest, honoring the Sun God,
honoring the pregnant Goddess

Dynamics/Meaning
Crowning of the Sun God, death of the Oak King, assumption of the Holly King,
end the ordeal of the Green Man

Tools, Symbols & Decorations
The sun, oak, birch & fir branches, sun flowers, lilies, red/maize/yellow or gold flower, love amulets, seashells, summer fruits & flowers, feather/flower door wreath, sun wheel, fire, circles of stone, sun dials and swords/blades, bird feathers, Witches’ ladder.

Colors
Blue, green, gold, yellow and red.

Customs
Bonfires, processions, all night vigil, singing, feasting, celebrating with others, cutting
divining rods, dowsing rods & wands, herb gathering, handfastings, weddings, Druidic
gathering of mistletoe in oak groves, needfires, leaping between two fires, mistletoe
(without berries, use as a protection amulet), women walking naked through gardens
to ensure continued fertility, enjoying the seasonal fruits & vegetables, honor the
Mother’s fullness, richness and abundance, put garlands of St. John’s Wort placed
over doors/ windows & a sprig in the car for protection.

Goddesses
Mother Earth, Mother Nature, Venus, Aphrodite, Yemaya, Astarte, Freya, Hathor,
Ishtar, all Goddesses of love, passion, beauty and the Sea, and Pregnant,
lusty Goddesses, Green Forest Mother; Great One of the Stars, Goddess of the Wells

Gods
Father Sun/Sky, Oak King, Holly King, Arthur, Gods at peak power and strength.

Animals/Mythical Beings
Wren, robin, horses, cattle, satyrs, faeries, firebird, dragon, thunderbird

Gemstones
Lapis lazuli, diamond, tiger’s eye, all green gemstones, especially emerald and jade

Herbs
Anise, mugwort, chamomile, rose, wild rose, oak blossoms, lily, cinquefoil, lavender,
fennel, elder, mistletoe, hemp, thyme, larkspur, nettle, wisteria, vervain ( verbena),
St. John’s wort, heartsease, rue, fern, wormwood, pine,heather, yarrow,
oak & holly trees

Incense/Oil
Heliotrope, saffron, orange, frankincense & myrrh, wisteria, cinnamon, mint, rose, lemon, lavender, sandalwood, pine

Rituals/Magicks
Nature spirit/fey communion, planet healing, divination, love & protection magicks.
The battle between Oak King, God of the waxing year & Holly King, God of the waning
year (can be a ritual play), or act out scenes from the Bard’s (an incarnation of Merlin)
“A Midsummer Night’s Dream”, rededication of faith, rites of inspiration.

Foods
Honey, fresh vegetables, lemons, oranges, summer fruits, summer squash,
pumpernickel bread, ale, carrot drinks, mead.

• This is about the world coming to life again and you will need to celebrate nature in some fashion. Take a long walk in the woods if you are able or at the very least (like I do) relax on the back porch with a friend (Lucy especially likes this – ha!) and enjoy the sights and sounds of nature surrounding you.
• Buy flowers. If you are feeling especially inspired make a chaplet (wreath of flowers to wear) or a flower chain.
• Have a feast – bread, cheese and fruit are traditional Beltane foods, so bake a fruit pie or include raisin bread and sweet cheese in your meal. These are foods of abundance. I love to bake bread for this sabbat. I usually make a traditional Scottish Meat pie (meat pasty) for the feast.
• Make love. You don’t have to frolic in the forest certainly (but why not?) to celebrate this time of fertility and passion. Approach this time and connection with your desired one with wild abandon!
• Beating the bounds. This custom involves walking around the boundaries of one’s property to invoke protection. In some places, the entire community would walk the boundaries of their village, proceeding deosil (clockwise) around the boundary. This would be an excellent time to walk around your house, yard, apartment building, or just your personal space. You can speak, chant, sing or silently appeal for protection.
• Petitions for good health. Take ribbons or fabric strips and write requests for healing, then tie them to a tree. Hawthorn, Ash, Thorn and Sycamore are the magickal trees of Beltane, but any tree or shrub will do.
• May Day morning dew. Long ago, young women would rise very early on May Day and collect the dew from leaves and grass. Washing their faces with dew, perhaps rolling in the dewy grass, was believed to make them beautiful, thereby becoming more attractive to the young fellows. It would be a sweet thing to walk through the morning dew, thinking about the beauty of the day and the love of your life.
• Build a fire outside. Now is the time to put that fire-pit to use, likely for the last time before the Autumn. Burn some sacred sage or thyme in the fire.
• Do something creative. I have often used the afternoon on Beltane to craft sacred oils, dry herbs or even craft beaded jewelry. Make use of this powerful energy by putting your mind toward artistic pursuits.
• Drink mead. To me, any time of celebration is a good time for mead but today especially since the honey-wine is perfect for such spring festivities!
• Give love to the Earth Mother and the Green Man. Or to whomever and whatever your Higher Power is.

This is the spirit of Yule and one I treasure and value. I hope you all enjoy your holidays and have the brightest blessings for the New Year. Today I will be celebrating  Yule in a small ceremony this evening with friends and family as well as casting spells for extra power tonight. This is a wonderful day to cast and hopefully it will be nice and cool this evening for the bonfire and burning of the Yule Log.

I’m making some big changes around the homestead in the coming year, moving altars and doing some redecorating with sacred objects as well as cleaning the house out of tons of witchy clutter (and other kinds too). I’m eager to streamline things and look forward to what the new year will bring.

I also plan on upgrading the sites (which are somewhat overdue) including re-purposing my original site magickrituals.com, as I have talked about doing for some months now. There are many good things in store and I hope you will be with me my dearest friends and clients.

Rather then post another description of what fun we witches have on Samhain I thought I’d talk about my plans for the day (& night!)

This has been an incredibly active casting month for me – I’ve been casting nearly every night for the entire month. I took a little break while I was working on some other projects but  for the most part it’s been solid witchiness all month and I’ve loved it.

The weather is appropriately fallish and getting very cool at night which is perfect for the bonfire in the firepit. I use recycled paper (and coffee grounds) logs that burn wonderfully and clean. They also smell very nice. Things can get a little smoky once I start tossing herbs around but that’s part of the experience.

I’ve been doing the same ritual at Samhain now for many years but this year I want to cast some special spells on the day so I will do a shortened version of the ritual then just have a nice feast with my mother. very low-key, quiet, honoring those who have passed on.

I like to get a little wild with my feast, we have ale and I get some catered items from Publix so I don’t have to do anything but put out our party in the living room. I decorate the dining room and set-up all kinds of candles and spooky displays. We don’t have kids trick or treat here so it’s just reflective conversation,  casting and then feasting.

If you’ve been keeping up with me for a while you all know that my favorite sabbat is Midsummer, the Summer Solstice. I have wonderful summer memories from my childhood as well as always having had a bang-up Litha (the other name for the sabbat). This is the first summer in several years that I truly feel the significance of the holiday since so much has changed in my life recently. I will be conducting a special ritual and spell on June 21st. You can read more about it at mysticspells.com.

Here is some information on the Summer Solstice written by Sarah Todd:

Summer Solstice is also called Litha or St. John’s Day, and in Pagan times it was an important religious event. Tribes would gather to celebrate the longest day of the year. Whole communities would participate in the celebration, paying homage to nature and the planets. Mother Earth was commemorated as “The Goddess”, while “The God” was represented as the Sun King. The festivities were filled with color – yellow for the harvest, green representing nature and blue for the sky. Some of the rituals that took place during Summer Solstice are kept alive today by modern Pagan faiths. They include:

1. Staying up all night to welcome the rising sun at dawn.

2. Keeping a sacred fire burning all night.

3. Dancing around the sacred fire to the beat of drums.

4. Burning a Yule wreath in the sacred fire.

5. Making a promise to Mother Nature to do something to improve the environment.

6. Exchanging magical gifts with fellow Pagans.

7. Exchanging songs, stories and poems with other people.

Summer Solstice was celebrated by the Slavs, the Celts and many Germanic tribes, with massive bonfires a main feature of the festivities. The Druids celebrated it as the marriage of Heaven and Earth. Customs and rituals were performed all over Europe, and over time Summer Solstice evolved into a night of fire festivals and love magic. Oracles were consulted, predictions were made and spells were cast. Midsummer Night became focused on lovers and fortune telling, commemorating the magic of the year’s shortest night, nature and the woods. A maiden could learn the identity of her future husband, a pair of lovers could leap through the bonfire flames to bring them luck and spirits and demons would be banished. Other leapt over the flames in the belief that the higher the leap the taller the crops that year! Customs to ensure the health and fertility of the land, domestic animals and humans were performed, and the church, the nobility and the peasants would join in the celebrations. Cities and towns marked the occasion with parades, plays and festivals in the market place, the town green and nearby forests.

Adding to the celebration of nature and her gifts was the inclusion of herbal potions, water and brooks that were supposed to contain healing attributes. Water customs conducted during the Summer Solstice, such as cleaning and decorating fountains and wells persist in many European cultures to this day. The Germanic tribes called this festival “Johannisnacht”, and tell of the healing powers of a magical pool and a fern that blooms only at Midsummer. Herbs gathered at this time and specific foods like baked elder flower blossoms were also believed to be able to heal and bring health.

Beltane 2011 is not one I will soon forget with the death of Osama bin Laden. That was long from the start of the day however, when we decided to do things early since I had planned on casting that night. I was somewhat disappointed that some of the more prurient features of the holiday would have to be put off but actually I really had so much work to do that this ended up being a rather annotated Beltane celebration.

No maypole dancing this year – actually no dancing at all. Some candles on the altar and then sitting outside have a great picnic and just kicking back with sangria and enjoying the beautiful weather. I figured on doing my annual Beltane ritual that night when I was casting so it was a very mellow and easy going afternoon.

I was exhausted from being outside though so once we came in I lay down on my bed and napped for a few hours before I got ready to do the casting that night. I was slightly delayed however since news broke about Osama bin Laden and in the US at least for most of us – everything just halted. I watched CNN for a while, saw the President give his speech then went outside and lit the Beltane bonfire.

Like I said I never expected it to be so punctuated by such a historical event and yet I am glad it was because it was a moment long-awaited and prayed for by so many.

I don’t have much interest in politics. But I am a fairly patriotic American. I don’t mean that in a right-wing sense but more that I support our Military (and always have) and I am proud of what this country stands for. We are at our best when things are at the worst. I think I may actually be quoting a line from the movie “Starman” with Jeff Bridges, but you get what I mean.

I’m proud of the Team 6, the Navy SEALS who went in and got the job done as they will never have a parade, never get credit and no one will ever know who they are. But this grateful nation thanks them and I thank them too.

Blessed be to those who stand for what is right.

Better late than never – Ostara was on the Spring Equinox but I was otherwise occupied this year with plenty of relationship drama so I decided to celebrate it at Easter (which is this Sunday) rather than stress myself out trying to get it together on the equinox. I also had taken a nasty spill in my office and hit my head on one of my office cabinets and had to spend the night under observation in the hospital to make sure it wasn’t a concussion, so that put some limits on my celebratory zeal.

I usually celebrate both days so this Easter is going to be a combo-holiday, Christian and Pagan.

I don’t dye eggs (I buy them pre-dyed at Publix – hey they are really nice and make great egg salad later), but I do bake bread and make a lovely ham dinner. I’m having some family and friends to the house on Sunday which will be nice. I love to cook for a crowd (well it won’t be a crowd just eight people).

I thought I’d share some Ostara altars I found online that are gorgeous.

Love this altar with the Horned God statute and the Goddess.

Look at the gorgeous eggs in the cauldron!

I love the simplicty of this.

This is utterly charming.

This is my own Ostara altar right after the holiday so the eggs are missing.

I love Beltane, it is one of my favorite sabbats because it is dedicated to PASSION! It’s the quintessential Spring sabbat that celebrate flowers in bloom, lovemaking and the promise of renewal.

This year I’m casting a special Beltane ritual that I will offer to my clients. It’s a passion spell that will ignite sparks in any love relationship as well as get sparks flying for new relationships. There will actually be two versions – one for an established relationship and one for a new relationship.

On Beltane I craft flower chaplets and make sure the altars are brimming with fresh cut flowers. The colors are black, white and red. Above is a photo of my Beltane altar. I also decorate my staff and ritual sword with ribbons and flowers.

This Beltane will mark a special time for me personally; a new beginning in my life after a long winter. I plan on dedicating this Beltane to such energies and incorporating them into my life. It is interesting to see that life is never dull; things change and just when you least expect something will happen that will blow your mind. I welcome these experiences with open arms.

To check out my new spell click here: BELTANE PASSION FIRE SPELL.