Ostara Picnic with Lemon Thyme Tea Cakes & Violet Lemonade
This week on ‘The Rambling Rose’ vlog I began my Ostara celebrations by baking up some scrumptious lemon and thyme tea cakes and a sweet violet lemonade made with magical herbs and edible flowers from my garden. I also try my hand at one of my favourite crafts for this sabbath – pretty painted eggs in a traditional floral folk style! So, be sure to watch the video here, and don’t forget to like and subscribe if you’d like to see more.
Here in the Southern Hemisphere, we celebrate the pagan sabbath Ostara – otherwise known as the Spring Equinox – on or around September 21st, while our friends in the north are celebrating Mabon. The turning of the Wheel of the Year, has been recognised by rural agrarian peoples for centuries so it is not just witches and faeries who celebrate these special days, but farmers and gardeners and anyone who simply loves being in nature... and of course, the plants and animals.
Perhaps it could be said that they celebrate more than anyone! Especially when it comes to Ostara! I see daffodils nodding their heads, as if wearing ruffled Elizabethan collars of pure sunshine, masses of cherry blossoms, blue hyacinths, fluffy camellia and the scent of sweet magnolia on the breeze.
Moving from the city to lead a slower, simpler life in the countryside, and settling in this place with a Victorian-esque climate, I have fallen in love with the changing seasons and felt more connected than ever to the earth and her magical rhythms and cycles. The pagan festivals and their crafty, colourful rituals captured my imagination, and I feel like this is what led me to the green witch path. If nothing else, celebrating the changes we see in our gardens every six weeks or so, is just a fun way to make life more enchanted. And I just love any excuse to bake, craft and celebrate... and let my inner child enjoy some whimsy and wonder. So, this year, I decided on a beautiful picnic among the blossom trees, fancying myself like Anne of Green Gables just revelling in the Spring sunshine. She always used to say ‘it provides so much scope for the imagination’ and I adore that.
So, my lovely wildflowers, here are the recipes for you to enjoy:
Violet Lemonade
Ingredients
1 cup of violet flowers
2 cups of boiling water
2 tbsp of raw honey
1 cup lemon juice
Method
Simply add the violets to a teapot and pour over the boiling water. Add a generous helping of raw honey and stir until thoroughly combined. Place the teapot in the refrigerator to cool for a spell. When cool, add to a stoppered bottle and pour over the lemon juice. Give it a little shake. If the lemonade has not turned the violet colour you desire, a few butterfly pea flowers will do the trick nicely!
Lemon & Thyme Mini Bundt Cakes
Ingredients
1 cup granulated sugar
a handful of freshly picked thyme leaves
2 lemons, zested
115g unsalted butter
2 eggs
2 cups plain flour, sifted
1 tsp baking powder
1 tbsp Greek yogurt
60 ml fresh lemon juice
for the lemon glaze
2 cups icing sugar, sifted
1 tbsp yogurt
2 tbsp fresh lemon juice
a handful of freshly picked pansies
Method
Prepare the bundt pan and pre-heat the oven to 180°C (350°F). With room temperature butter, brush the moulds of your mini bundt tin.
Add the thyme and lemon zest into the bowl of sugar and rub it between your finger tips for one minute until the sugar is moist and fragrant. Next, in a large bowl, add the butter and sugar with the thyme and lemon zest, and cream them together with an electric hand-held mixer fitted with the beaters on medium-high speed, for 5 minutes until pale.
Reduce the speed to low and add in the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition until well incorporated. Scrape down the base and sides of the bowl. Sift into the mixing bowl half of the flour and baking powder and mix on low speed until just combined. Add into the bowl the yogurt and lemon juice and mix again. Lastly, sift in the remaining flour and using a rubber spatula, fold through until a few flour streaks remain.
Either scoop the batter into the prepared bundt moulds or fill a piping bag with the batter and pipe into the moulds until they are two-thirds full. Bake for 20-25 mins until golden brown and a toothpick inserted into the centre comes out clean.
Allow the cake to cool in the pan for ten minutes before turning out the bundt pan onto the wire rack. Give the pan a slight tap and the bundt cakes should drop out. Let the cakes cool completely and then decorate with the lemon glaze and pansies. The perfect faerie picnic awaits!
I so hope you enjoy these recipes and, if you’d like to see the full recipe, picnic, and crafting the painted eggs for my Ostara altar, please head over to my YouTube channel ‘The Rambling Rose’. I appreciate every comment and would love to hear how you went with the recipes and your own Ostara crafts. Blessed be, sweet souls and a very happy Spring Equinox.
All my love, Nancy xx
Watch the full episode here:
Six Senses Imbolc Altar
The next magical date on the fae-witch calendar is Imbolc, the cross quarter day between the Winter Solstice and the Spring Equinox. In the Southern Hemisphere, this day falls around the 1st of August and marks the end of winter and the beginning of spring. It’s when you see those wonderful signs of life in the garden emerging again, wildflowers burst into colour, and the sunlight returns. Also known as ‘The Feast of Torches’', ‘Candlemas’, or ‘Brigid’s Day’, Imbolc is a time of new beginnings, fresh starts, and cleaning out the old to welcome the new.
To fully grasp the significance of Imbolc, it is necessary to understand the life-and-death struggle represented by winter in any agrarian society. In a world lit only by fire, the snow, cold and ice of this season literally holds you in its grip, only relaxed with the arrival of spring. Although the Equinox does not arrive until later and spring is celebrated with Ostara and Beltane, Imbolc is the harbinger and the indication that better times are coming. For a sun lover like me, this pagan sabath brings relief from the dark days, and a glimmer of hope with every new wildflower I encounter on my chilly winter forest walks.
In Australia, yellow wattle flowers are a favourite decoration for the Imbolc altar, as well as other white, yellow and purple flowers like the gorgeous Warraburra. You can also collect gumnuts, and search in particular for ones that have a five pointed star on top. Imbolc signals the arrival of ‘Djilba’ season, named so by the original custodians of this great southern land. Djilba is a transitional time of the year that heralds a massive flowering explosion of yellow, white and striking violet blue wildflowers. As the days start to warm up, we start to see and hear the first of the baby animals appear. The woodland birds will still be nest bound, hence the swooping of the Koolbardi (Magpie) and even the Djidi Djidi (Willy Wag Tails) and the Chuck-a-luck (Wattle Birds). A walk through the wilderness at this time of year is a magical experience, filled with excitement as you spot signs of new growth and the arrival of spring.
Jumping back over to pagan traditions for a moment, I’d like to introduce Brigid, the goddess associated with Imbolc. Also long known as ‘The Mistress of the Mantle’, Brigid is a solar deity, blessing us with light, inspiration and fire. In the Celtic pantheon, the fires of inspiration, as demonstrated in poetry, and the fires of the home or forge, are seen as identical. Therefore, Brigid is celebrated as the traditional patroness of healing, poetry and smithcraft—a benefactress of vital energy, practical skills and creativity.
As the patroness of poetry, and filidhecht, the equivalent of bardic lore, Brigid, like ‘The Woman of the Fairy Hills,’ and the poet-seers of old, keeps our oral traditions alive. It is widely believed that those poets who have gone before inhabit the realms between the worlds, overlapping into ours so that the old songs and stories will be heard and repeated. Thus does Brigid keep these traditions alive by inspiring and encouraging us.
To celebrate Imbolc this year, I am planning to create an altar to Brigid, and I’d love it if you would join me! I invite you to take a ‘Sensory Journey’ into the forest to collect items to offer up to the goddess of Imbolc—one for each of the six senses: sight, touch, taste, smell, hearing and intuition. Think of it like a wild treasure hunt or a game you can play with the faeries of the forest, and your inner child. For example, you might encounter some fluffy wattle blossoms for ‘touch’, wild violets for ‘smell’, or collect a feather to symbolise ‘hearing’ after listening to the enchanting birdsong on your walk. For ‘intuition’, simply search for something magical and curious that awakens your imagination… I found the most perfect witch’s broomstick in the form of a twisted, ghost gum branch that had fallen overnight in a wild storm.
Gather your items and create an altar to Brigid. On the night of Imbolc, you might like to light candles, burn essential oils of orange, frankincense, cedarwood, cinnamon or rose, and say this little prayer:
Mighty Brigid, keeper of the flame,
Sister of the faeries,
Daughter of the Tuatha de Danaan,
Blazing in the darkness of winter.
In autumn, the nights began to lengthen,
and the days grew shorter,
as the earth went to sleep.
Now, Brigid stokes her fire,
burning flames in the hearth,
bringing light back to us once more.
Winter is brief, but life is forever.
Blessed Brigid makes it so.
May your Imbolc celebrations be warm and wonderful, enchanted ones. And if you are in the Northern Hemisphere right now, you’ll be celebrating Lughnasadh (for which you could also create a Six Senses Altar). As The Wheel of the Year turns, I wish you all the most magical time exploring the faerie realms and the world between the worlds. I would also love for you to write to me in the comments below and share what you find on your ‘Sensory Journey’.
Blessed be xx
A Winter Solstice Ritual
At the winter solstice, the face of the goddess, Gaia, hides from the sun to allow deep rest and introversion to replenish her spirit. It is a time of deep wintering, the longest night of the year. As creatures of the earth, we are guided to go within our body temple for silent reflection and contemplation. It is a time of profound revelation, deep healing and spiritual transformation. In goddess devotion, winter is personified by the crone archetype – the wise old mystic. She is the epitome of the darkness, death and rebirth, and this is the time of the year when her energy can be felt most strongly.
The pagan Wheel of the Year symbolises the continuous turning of time and mirrors nature’s cycles of death and rebirth. As a wildling, a gardener, and a lover of all things folklore and magic, I have found that living in tune with this natural calendar helps me feel like I’m one with nature herself. It has been healing to live my life in accordance with these rhythms; it feels joyful and creative (and utterly enchanted!) to celebrate the turning of the wheel and acknowledge the passage of time with reverence and wonder.
Wildlings and witches in the Southern Hemisphere will celebrate the Winter Solstice today – on June 21. This date also marks the beginning of the Midwinter, or Yule, celebrations for those of us in the lands ‘down under’. The origin of the name ‘Yule’, some say, comes courtesy of the Norse god Odin, for this was the time of his ‘Wild Hunt’ when he would fly through the night sky on his magical flying horse Sleipnir. The 12 days of Yule festivities begin tonight and celebrate the lengthening days and the return of the light. It is a time for flickering candles, mesmerising bonfires and twinkling stars on a clear winter’s night.
I felt this Winter Solstice was the perfect time to begin a series of posts on simple spell casting and rituals centred around The Wheel of The Year. I do hope you’ll delight in these posts throughout the year as we take this magical journey together, and I dare say, your ancestors will be thrilled to see that you are returning to the old ways; to know that we haven’t forgotten our sacred roots.
So, for all you beginner witches out there, here’s a simple ritual you can do to celebrate this year’s midwinter festival and call in the most wonderful, enchanted year.
Cleanse yourself by taking a salt bath and burn rosemary to cleanse the air
Build an altar – place natural objects found on walks in nature, like pine cones (symbolising the spiral dance of life), seashells with a spiral pattern (if you’re a sea witch), crystals like moss agate (to symbolise the new growth of living things) and citrine (to call back in the blessed light of the sun)
Burn a white candle and as your candle burns, meditate on the year that has passed and set your intentions for the new year and the return of the sun
Take your favourite oracle or tarot deck and lay out a 3-card spread. Ask the cards what to leave behind from the year that has passed, to reveal a gift hidden in plain sight, and what will grow in the new year
If it’s your first time ever celebrating solstice, know that your first time is your rebirth. You are stepping onto the wheel, and you’re stepping into that liminal space between time, between worlds. Let this be the beginning of your rebirth and let it be meaningful. Blessed be, dear souls xx