The Sacred Hearth

Welcome seekers to the Harvest Moon Edition of The Seeker's Trove Newsletter. If you no longer wish to receive this newsletter, please go to http://www.sacredhearth.com/newsletter/subscriptions/ to unsubscribe. We absolutely have no desire to send you news you do not want!
If you are having trouble reading this newsletter, please click here to view it as a webpage.

The Harvest Moon

Today marks the beginning of this year's Harvest Moon cycle which will peak with the on September 26th at 6:46pm EST with the Full Harvest Moon in Aries. The Harvest Moon is the moon closest to the Autumn Equinox which this year takes place at 5:51 AM on September 23rd. On the night of the Full Harvest Moon you will notice that the moon shines so bright that you can see quite clearly after sunset. This is an excellent night to watch the moon rise, which will occur at 6:53 pm EST.

Other names for this moon include the Fruit Moon, the Chrysanthemum Moon, the Barley Moon, the Singing Moon, the Wine Moon and the Rice Moon.

For many of us this is a crazy time of back to school. We scramble about buying sneakers and last-minute protractors and searching the office supply stores for that calculator the math teacher insists on. There are haircuts to be gotten, pictures to taken, blue jeans to replace and many many checks to be written.

Let's just hope our harvest was a good one and we don't all go broke in the process!

Remember as the Harvest Moon wanes and the insanity settles to take a break, relax and take stock of your blessings.

The Autumn Equinox

http://www.sacredhearth.com/bos/holydays/secondharvest
The Autumn Equinox is also known as Mabon, Alban Elfec, Cornucopia, Harvest Home, Second Harvest or as one friend of mine calls it, Pagan Thanksgiving. This is definately a day worth celebrating. Equinoxes are neat within their own right, even when you don't attach spiritual significance to them, and so many do! I would like to direct you to an article on the Religious Tolerance website which talks about the Equinox and how it is celebrated around the world. http://www.religioustolerance.org/fall_equinox.htm

Be sure also to check out the Sacred Hearth's overview of the the Autumn Equinox at http://www.sacredhearth.com/bos/holydays/secondharvest

Activities for the Coming Months

Learn to Bake Bread

Baking bread is a skill that every well-educated woman and many men had once upon a time. It is so integral that it seemed to just come natural. Many "old timers" will look at you blankly when you ask them questions about breadmaking and talk about "feel" and "texture" and can't give you measurements beyond "enough to make it smooth". Just what does that mean?
I can't help but make the parallel between learning this and teaching magic. When we teach magic we say, "you feel it", "you sense it". Our students ask, "how do you know it's real, how do you know you're doing it right?" and we say, "you just know". Helpful, aren't we? Making bread is like this, which makes it a great meditative activity for beginner magic-users.
Breadmaking is a wonderful family activity as the weather cools down. Kids love to get their hands on that dough and it fills up the kitchen with such warmth and nothing beats the smell of fresh-baked bread.
Loaves of bread make great offerings back to the Earth. You can make traditional loaf-shaped breads, or bake them in God or Goddess shapes, or in the shape of corn and other autumn-harvested treats, or eaven phallic shapes if you prefer. If you make bread once a year, now should be the time! Pile your Harvest Moon Sabbat altar or your Second Harvest altar with breads in all varieties and be sure to make extra to share with friends!
Now I'm no bread-making expert. So, I have searched high and low for useful breadmaking websites for you to explore.
Check out:
Rustico Cooking http://www.rusticocooking.com/bread101.htm
Also check out Bread Info at http://www.breadinfo.com/hand.shtml
If you're interested in sourdough, look here http://www.citi.umich.edu/u/provos/bread/
Homeschoolers can make breadmaking education time by learning the science behind the bread and sharing it with your kids or just meditating on the Mystery that is bread. Don't laugh! Remember everything is sacred. Everything is a Mystery. http://recipes.howstuffworks.com/bread.htm

Remember while you are making bread that you can infuse your bread with your intent- charging it with magical energy. Just remember to keep focus as you mix and knead.

Make Offerings to the Land

The land has given you so much. Really. Even if you don't grow your own produce, everything you eat comes, ultimately from the land. Now is the time to show your appreciation with offerings. An offering can be a physical item, such as a fresh baked loaf of bread or the best tomato your tomato plant produced this year, or it can be intangible, such as a song, a poem or a prayer. Don't be afraid to use your creativity to produce offerings. A clay statue or a drawing on paper is just as suitable as a piece of fruit, if not moreso because it comes from your heart. The more heart and energy that goes into your offering, the better it is.

Go Apple Picking

Or pumpkin picking, or whatever! If you live in the city, your hands aren't really in the harvest, so you can't really appreciate what goes into it. I'm not trying to be patronizing, I just discovered myself a few years ago how tiring it is- especially with kids along who only think it's fun for about the first 10 minutes. Set aside a day this month to visit a farm and spend some time harvesting (this is actually the easy part, of course). When you get home, you can share the fruits of your labors with family and friends or make sauces and pies to keep them for later. You can find a spot to go picking at http://www.pickyourown.org/

This Month's Lesson

You have a lot to think about this month. Think about the Mysteries behind the harvest and the making of bread. Think about how agriculture and bread making (and other products of fermentation such as beer and wine, which we will surely talk about another day) have affected the way we humans live. Is it any wonder we worship the Gods who rule these things?
The growth and ripening of fruits, the fermentation of yeast, the chemical changes that cause dough to become bread, this is Natural Magic. All magic works with the natural rhythms of the Universe. You do not need to learn all the science behind fermentation and glueten to make good bread, but you do need to learn how to "feel" when everything is doing what it should and it will always behave in a relatively reliable way, in accordance with the Natural Laws under which it operates. So it is with magic.