pagan-stitches

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Yes, the new uniform does things for his eyes, but I want my Mush back where he belongs!

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Preseason in less than two weeks!

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Salmon with Mimosa Oxymel Glaze

I’ve been spending so much time in St. Clare’s Glade—even when I’m not physically there, I’ve been stitching it everyday! Last night I decided we’d have a bit of the glade with supper by glazing our salmon with the oxymel I made with mimosa blossoms from its trees.

I thickened a 1/4 of a cup of the oxymel by simmering it on the stove with a little extra honey, and then brushed it on the fish with a little garlic and a sesame seed based salmon seasoning. I served it with potatoes au gratin and green beans.

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St. Clare/The Glade/Baby Dear Amulet Bag Day 6

I am almost done with the shiso patch! Very likely to finish it today.

Yesterday I started adding Carolina Elephant’s foot:

Day 5

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Got this Pinterest tag game from @prairiepetaled :

Rules: Search "character", "place", "color", "celebrity", "animal", "room", "quote", "outfit", and "aesthetic" and see how Pinterest views you.

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Czech Traditions on the Nativity of the Virgin Mary

On this day, the blessing of grains took place, which was associated with the upcoming sowing of winter crops. Girls would carry plates with wheat grains to the church, which would then be added to the new sowing.

Today is the last day of mezi matičkama, the between mothers time period that started on the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary on August 15th. Plants gathered during this time period were holy and potent.

Predictions:

On this day the snakes crawl back into their holes, because the earth no longer accepts them. They will stay underground until the Feast Day of St. George (April 24).

- O Mary's birth, the swallow is no longer here.

- Virgin Mary's birth - swallow farewell.

- Laštovice is among the holidays of Our Lady of the Annunciation (25.3. ) and the Virgin Mary's birthday.

- The Birth of the Virgin Mary - what has cold blood will dig into the ground.

- On the Virgin Mary's birthday, the sun must smile, even if it should get up at night.

- Mother of God, the fiber multiplies.

Swallows in photos available for purchase here:

Sources:

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Carolina on My Mind

Three of the wildflowers I’m stitching into the shiso patch section of the St. Clare piece have Carolina in their name: Carolina horsenettle, Carolina larkspur, and Carolina elephant’s foot.

Why?

Apparently, the word carolina in the names of many wildflowers (and other species) refers to the historic Carolinas, a vast territory in colonial America where many species were first documented by European naturalists. The names are not specific to the modern states of North and South Carolina but reflect a much broader region and the history of botanical exploration.

So according to this map the Carolinas stretched to the border of Arkansas!

The binomial nomenclature system was developed by Carolus Linnaeus in the 1700s. His work was heavily influenced by specimens from the eastern American colonies. He used the names virginiana and carolinus repeatedly in his descriptions, acknowledging where the plants were first observed by Europeans.

It would be neat if the Carolinas were named for the scientist, but nope, Carolus is just a coincidence, the region was named for Charles IX of France.

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St. Clare/The Glade/Baby Deer Amulet Bag Day 5

Yesterday I added a row of Carolina larkspur, the prettiest flower I saw on my May Day walk this year.

Day 4

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Foraging on the Eve of Narození Panny Marie/the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary

I wandered back to the sheep sorrel glade in the woods behind the house for the first time in awhile, and was delighted to find that in the recent rain and cooler temperatures some of it was popping back up. Baby sheep sorrel everywhere.

I also found a bit of wood sorrel. Ragweed had come up all over the place since my last visit and I saw some rather lovely mushrooms as well.

Once I finished in the glade I wandered about the woods to see if I could fine more beautyberries. This area didn’t have as many as the woods to the side of the house, but I did fill a small basket.

I popped by the creek and found more of what I had suspected were muscadines on my last visit. The branches overhead are covered by a canopy of muscadine, greenbrier, and honeysuckle vines, and I thought last time that I could make out green grapes hanging in the leaves—but it was to far away to be sure. This time I actually found two grapes attached to lower vines and was able to make a positive ID.

I gathered about a cup and a half that had fallen to the bottom of the forest floor. If I can double that in the next week or so I should have enough to experiment with Wild fermentation like I did with the black cherries.

When I got back to the house I decided to make the Czech sorrel soup that has become something of a ritual meal for me this year. I made the most filling version with ham, apple and potatoes (and topped with cut up omelette and bacon) in addition to the sorrel. I seasoned it with annunciation salt. Making a herb soup seemed to be a fitting way to honor Our Lady of the Herbs as mezi matičkama is coming to an end.

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St. Clare/The Glade/Baby Deer Amulet Bag Day 4

I don’t feel like I accomplished much, because I picked out the row of horsenettle that looked like violets and restitched it with another pattern, and I picked out the deer skull because I didn’t like the light brown in the glade. I’m trying to keep brown shades just in the center and having the color of the glade, the color of life, explode around her.

I’m much happier with the results, so it was worth several hours of work. I did add one row, working in the boneset.

Boneset, it has opened a little more since I took this photo.

Horsenettle

Chinese bush clover

Shiso

Day 3

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So here is a look at how fucked up AI is. Look up mezi matičkama on google and you get a fucked up description of it being an Ozark custom with roots in the Czech Republic. Their source: Moi 👋 🙄 :

Me, I’m the one harvesting in the Ozarks, me, not a fucking community.

And I picked berries once with mom.

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Tomorrow is the last day of mezi matičkama (the “between mothers” period between the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary and her nativity) but I am thinking of borrowing from the customs of my ancestor’s cultural neighbors in Austria and Germany and extending my observation to Our Lady of Sorrows on the 15th to give myself an extra week to finish my to do list. I’ve been feeling under the weather and though I managed to do some foraging yesterday I’m still behind on what I wanted to accomplish.

In Germany and Austria this time period is called Frauendreissiger, women’s thirties or lady’s thirties.

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Mezi Matičkama Berry Picking

After getting a bigger than expected harvest of beautyberries at Mom’s, I decided to trek into our woods and check our berries.

A section pretty close to the house is heavily populated with both beautyberry and trifoliate orange (flying dragon orange 🐉 🍊!!).

The fruit of one of the orange shrubs was turning yellow, but most were still green and the yellow were still hard as a rock when squeezed. I will definitely have enough to make the jelly I was hoping for when they ripen. Probably not a large batch once I get all the peel off, but enough to make it worthwhile.

If I had ever found much of a use for burnweed there would have been tons of it to forage. Since, I hadn’t foraged it (other than a little for a tasty fruit salad featuring pineapple), it had all grown quite tall, one was even over my head. I also, found some large shiso plants, since I had only foraged them here once on my last venture into the woods on Svátek Nejsvětějši trojice/the Feast of the Holy Trinity (first Sunday after Pentecost, June 15th this year). I mostly left it alone, but took a few of the largest leaves I had seen yet for some wraps I’ve been wanting to try.

Though the day had started out drizzly and gray, by late afternoon when I headed out it was sunny and the beautyberries were easily spotted through the overgrowth as they positively shone in the sun. I ended up with 3 Lbs and the branches hadn’t even fully ripened yet. I imagine I’ll be making more jelly and syrup as well as the wine I want to try.

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@henbane-and-honeysuckle

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Nature has always been my spiritual refuge.

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St. Clare/The Glade/Baby Deer Amulet Bag Day 3

I started working the shiso patch over the last two days. I’m using the knot work pattern to represent the shiso:

When you look down on it from above you can see that it grows in clusters of four leaves. Sometimes my variety has purple streaking on the tops of the leaves. It’s more common to see the purple on the bottom of the leaves, though, and on the stem.

I didn’t end up very happy with the pattern I used for the Carolina horsenettle even after tweaking it:

It looks more like a violet or a pansy. When I first stumbled on the pattern it was in light blues and with the five petals and yellow center reminded me of the nettle bloom. Horsenettle flowers range in color from white to light blue to light purple depending on the ph. I wasn’t happy with how the embroidery looked when I first stitched it in blue; it just looked too busy. So I changed it to purple and now it looks less like the nettle. But I’ve decided not to get overly worked up about it. For the characteristics I’ve noted, it will symbolize the nettle well enough.

The Saint is holding Chinese bush clover and I worked it into the top of the knot work:

The clover is a tall stalk with whitish green flowers with a subtle streak of purple. If you look closely at mine, you will see that some of the crosses are worked with one stitch in light purple and one stitch in pale green to blend the colors together. I also worked these colors into the bottom band of St. Clare’s skirt to give her a subtle bit of color.

Though I show baby deer alive in the middle of the patch with the Saint, I decided to note her death as well with a skull in the row of horsenettle.

I wasn’t too crazy about the coloring of the skull and may pick it out and redo it later. But I will wait and see if it grows on me.

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Though we are rural we can hear the school drums, too. The nearby tiny, tiny town and its football field are close enough that the wind carries the sound. So, so August.

Thank you for this last look at August. I missed it before my little break!

31/8/25

@pagan-stitches tagged me to do this ages ago and I decided to wait until the last minute possible to post it for some reason

Where I live:

August sounds like… a surround sound experience of cicadas and two separate high school drum lines in the distance for hours at a time, multiple times per day, most days Tastes like… tomatoes and corn and my new habit of adding cinnamon or cardamom to my iced coffee Feels like… the first crunch of leaves under your feet in the neighborhood’s grove Looks Like… longer evenings where it’s still quite warm for hours after the sun has set, so star gazing and watching the moon are quite pleasant And smells like… the freshness and sweetness of a sprawling and ripening tomato plant in the sun, hot asphalt, and pre- and post-thunderstorm petrichor