The Celebration of Easter + Free Chicken and Nests Patterns Updated 2024

Happy Easter: Ostern, Pesach, Eosturmonath, Great Day and Great Night and I hope you have a blessed and holy Passover!

The Jewish celebration of Passover, The Feast of the Unleavened Bread was practiced by ancient Israelites at the beginning of their New Year, the Spring Equinox. 

The Christian Easter, depends on Passover for not only much of its symbolic meaning, but for its dating on the calendar.

The Christian celebration is linked with the observance of the resurrection of Jesus Christ three days after his entombment. Falling on the first Sunday after the first full moon and the multicultural belief in the meaning of rebirth and the promise in the seasonal cycle therefore of life everlasting.

The name of our holy day 'Easter', is derived from that of the Teutonic goddess Eostre, or Eoster, or Ostern and was celebrated during the pascal month of Eosturnmonath, meaning Great Day or Great Night.

Connected of course to the earliest nature based celebration to welcome in Spring. It is common to see wild hares or rabbits which ushered in our conception of the association with bunnies or the bunny rabbit bringing in a new cycle of birth and rebirth year after year symbolized by the laying hens and their ongoing cycles of laying eggs.

What may appear as diverse rites of Spring reveal themselves as sharing common cultural beliefs in life, death, resurrection and rebirth.

As the night begins her retreat, and the dawn of the new light and life, begin their ascent and resurrection, the balance shifts within each of us.

It becomes a time of renewal, and rebirth and a time to lay down the old, and begin life anew. 

We set out our baskets of eggs and we celebrate this happy occasion, just as nature celebrates her own time of new growth.

In the wild forest, the hens sense the spring time change and begin to lay their colorful eggs. 

Perhaps our own ancestors went out to hunt them, perhaps bringing them back in their nests, or in baskets imitating them. 

Our nest-like baskets of decorated eggs and the Eoster Egg Hunt, remind us of this lovely revitalization of nature and our common sharing in the joys, goodness and abundance of life.

The symbol of the egg banishes the past and starts afresh. It is a symbol of purification and it is a symbol of rebirth. As we crack our eggs, we peel back the white of the melting snow, and we release and free the golden sun within.

Easter blessings to all of you, in all countries, with all customs and cultures. And happiest days of rebirth and re-awakenings for a new and blessed season.

Free Easter Quilt Patterns

Free Chicken Patterns Courtesy of All the Girls in the Coop!!!

CHICKENS, CHICKENS, CHICKENS! FREE PATTERNS AND TUTORIALS!

Steel Scraps: Chicken Pincushions with Thread Caddy Nests

http://steelscraps.blogspot.com/2008/12/chicken-pincushions-with-thread-caddy.html

Nests!

Monkeyroom: Tutorial

http://monkeyroom.blogspot.com/2007/01/tutorial.html

 

Weathervane wall quilt, free pattern by Debbie Busby at All People Quilt

(Sign in to see and to use for free)

Rise and Shine wall hanging, free pattern by Wendy Sheppard at Ivory Spring

 

Mr. Rooster, free pattern by Caroll at West Michigan Quilter

Cat's Rooster, free pattern by Jennifer Ofenstein at Sew Hooked

Jaunty Rooster, free pattern by Julie Lynch for Benartex

Birds of a Feather wall quilt by Cynthia Scott at Janome

Redwork Chicken Embroidery Pattern by Cheryl C. Fall for About.com

Rise and Shine Placemat Tutorial by Vicki Welsh

 Rooster Quilt Block, free pattern at How Stuff Works

Chickens in the Coop, inspired by “Birds of a Feather” from Kevin Kosbab, made by Laura Boehnke for All People Quilt 

Hen and Flowers wall hanging, free pattern at All People Quilt

Cocks Crow in the Morn, free pattern by Kaaren Johnston at The Painted Quilt with blessings and gratitude.

Michele Bilyeu Creates With Heart and Hands sharing an imaginative, magical, and healing journey from Alaska to Oregon and back again. Creating, designing, sewing, quilting, and wildcrafting from my heart and with my hands.

The Magic and Mysticism of Winter Solstice

From ancient times the winter season has been seen as part of balance of nature ‐‐ a time where the balance point changes between the darkness and the light.

With the shortening of the day and daylight, comes an increase in the lengthening of the night and darkness. It is a natural time for letting go of all that which seems dark within one's life and a time for making choices to bring in the light both to lessen the darkness within and to open ourselves to grace and beauty.

Throughout history and in all of the world's cultures, through belief systems, festivals, traditions and practices - the changes in the cycles of birth, death and rebirth have been intrinsically and symbolically honored. From this honoring comes our holidays - our "holy days".

When we walk between the veils of one season and the next or one change or one emotion and the next or even one 'holy day' and the next we find ourselves always balancing our emotions. We balance the dark emotions, the very ones which create power and change, or the light emotions, the ones which bring in joy and abundance.

One of hardest of the darker emotions is that of sorrow, grief and loss. Today, I am recognizing and honoring the gift that the darkness brings in, as I honor the sadness of all of us as we face, or as we remember the many energies of loss in all our lives.

And then I bless the transition into the coming in of the magical light we all carry as celebrate our beautiful solstice energies and come into our fullness of the new year and our always changing and ever transitioning new world.

Winter Solstice falls on December 21 (Northern Hemisphere) or December 22 (Southern Hemisphere) and is the moment when the earth is at a point in its orbit where one hemisphere is most inclined away from the sun.

Solstice is of a Latin borrowing and means 'sun stand', referring to the appearance that the sun's noontime elevation stops in its progress. It is both the shortest day and the longest night of the year. Many cultures the world over perform solstice ceremonies. At their root is the ancient fear that the failing light would never return unless humans intervened with some vigil or celebration.

Many ancient cultures built astronomical observatories ‐‐ tombs, temples, or cairns ‐‐ to align with the solstices and equinoxes. Structures such as those at Stonehenge or Newgrange are illuminated by the winter solstice sunrise. A shaft of sunlight shines through the Newgrange chamber and lights up its chamber for 17 minutes from dawn of the 19th to the 23rd of December. The light illuminates intricate carvings of spirals, eyes, and solar shapes. Hundreds of other megalithic structures throughout Europe are oriented in similar ways.

The celebration of "Yule/Jul/Joulu" or winter festival, is at the time of greatest darkness and the longest night of the year. In pre-Christian times, Germanic tribes celebrated Yule from the late December to early January. Thus, the terms Yule and Christmas came to be used interchangeably in many countries.

The Winter Solstice has always been associated with the birth of a divine king in many different cultures, long before the rise of Christianity. Since the Sun is considered to represent the male divinity in many pagan traditions, this time is celebrated as the return of the sun god where he is reborn of the goddess. Other cultures have similar beliefs and associations.

Many cultures celebrate or celebrated a holiday near (within a few days) the winter solstice...Yalda, Saturnalia, Christmas, Karachun, Hanukkah, Festivus, and Kwanzaa.

Christmas, like all holy or holidays, is a special time of remembrance of both the birth of the new, divining power, and the symbols of home and family. It is a time when we can most acutely feel the greatest darkness or the brightest light ‐- a time of giving, of receiving ‐‐or for some a time of loss of light, and a feeling of going into the dark.

Such is the sadness, the loss and the acceptance of the dark into our lives that each of us is asked to face at different times. Knowing that the dark will eventually find its way back into the light again is also the knowledge of the power of this holy time in our own lives.

Happy Winter Solstice with Blessings of Love and Light.

Michele Bilyeu Creates With Heart and Hands sharing an imaginative, magical, and healing journey from Alaska to Oregon and back again.

Creating, designing, sewing, quilting, and wildcrafting,

 from my heart and with my hands.