The wheel is turning once again as summer comes to an end and we welcome autumn. Mabon, also referred to as the Witches Thanksgivng and Harvest Home is on the day of the autumn equinox between September 20-23rd. Daytime hours are equal to the nighttime hours in a perfect balance and stability. Warm days give way to cool nights. As the wheel turns we will lose more daylight hours and enter the dark side of the year.
At the autumn equinox, the sun rises directly in the east and sets exactly in the west and is in zero degrees of Libra, which is ruled by Venus.
You will start to notice the feel of autumn in the air in the early morning and late evening hours. You will see summer flowers dying down, and the leaves are beginning to turn to their autumn colors. The stores are setting out Halloween items and selling chrysanthemums and pansies. Darkness will start to overtake the light. It is time for us to begin preparations for the dark side of the year.
In this post, I will write about,
- Mabon themes
- Decorations
- Activities
- Crafts
- Recipes
- Correspondences
It is essential for us to move in harmony with nature throughout the year to maintain balance and stability while honoring the change of seasons.
Themes
Gratitude
Mabon is primarily a time to recognize our blessings, give thanks for them, pay tribute to and celebrate those blessings. These blessings may include adequate nutrition, good health, a comfortable home, a good education, a loving family, an exceptional talent, or reaching a goal that you had set for yourself. Give thanks for unknown blessings that are already on the way.
Prepare a glass of harvest wine and go outside. Hold both hands together cupped. Visualize all the blessings you have received in your outheld hands. Give honor to the nature spirits for the bounty of your harvests. Give thanks to the Great Spirit, asking that your wine be blessed. Take a few sips of your wine and envision it helping you to have future blessings. Pour the remainder of the wine onto the ground as an offering. State, ” Thus, do all things return to the earth.”
Sacrifice.
Mabon is a time to appreciate the sacrifice made for the fruits of your successes. The gift might have been money, perhaps in the form of tuition. The sacrifice may have been the time that was donated by someone else to help you achieve your goals. Your hard work brought a plan to fruition. You may have given time to plant a garden for a bountiful harvest.
It is appropriate to provide a sacrifice of yourself as a way to express gratitude for your blessings.
There is a large variety of ways to offer a sacrifice. Donate your time to a good cause. You could volunteer at a homeless shelter, read to residents at a nursing home, start a food drive for your local food bank, volunteer at a wild animal shelter, share garden produce with your neighbors, or participate in a road crew clean-up.
It is always appropriate to make donations of money or goods to those in need.
An especially lovely donation is to make gift Mabon baskets for the homeless. They could include socks, knit hats, scarves, gloves, and sweet treats. Have a blessing ceremony for your baskets to send goodwill to the recipients before distributing them. As we give, so shall we receive.
Honor the animals that give their lives to nourish us. Give thanks and blessings and release its’ spirit to the next world.
Balance.
Mabon is a day for personal balance. The autumn equinox is a time the earth is balanced between light and dark. We must find our balance and stability.
Visit Astrodietist for a free individualized astrological chart. The house Libra is on may contain components of your life that need attention.
Meditate on the result and outcomes of the fruits of your labor. Did you reach your goal? If not, why not? Identify the outworn patterns in your life. Release the energies of things that no longer serve your best interest or the greater good. These actions will make room for new constructive experiences.
The owl lives between the worlds carrying messages. Owl can take you into the shadows to see what needs to be seen at times of reflection.
Turkey Vultures prevent pestulance by clearing away the dead. They represent what we need to remove from our lives.
Taking Care of Business
Take a personal inventory. Is your legal business in order? Do you have a will, a power of attorney, or an advanced medical directive? Have you set aside savings for an emergency fund? Create a home inventory with photos and place them in your safe deposit box for documentation. Please make an appointment with your insurance agent and review your coverage to ensure its adequacy.
Put your house in order. After ridding yourself of those things that no longer serve, do a thorough cleaning. Consider rearranging the furniture. Do a protective home smudging with sage.
Take responsibility for any personal wrongs and make amends.
Begin formulating your future goals. The dark side of the year is the time for reflection, evaluation, and planning.
After you identify those things you wish to free yourself of, take slips of paper and write an item on each one. You are going to take each paper slip and concentrate on your intent. Light the paper on fire and watch the smoke carry away that which no longer serves you. Do this in a fireplace, but if you don.t have one, it is perfectly acceptable to conduct this release outside. Prepare a metal bucket with dirt or sand and place your lit paper into the bucket to burn itself out. Have a hose available to put out the fire.
Decorations
The colors, botanicals, and stones of Mabon are all in harmony with the season and used in decorating spellwork and charm bags.
Colors of Autumn
The colors of Mabon are rich and warm and reflect the changes of the season.
Brown for balance and grounding.
Muted green represents generosity, harmony, growth, and rebirth.
Orange for balance, warmth, and optimism.
Red represents changes, action, and protection.
Gold for prosperity.
Yellow for happiness and creativity.
Botanicals of Mabon
Acorns for luck, protection, fertility, and money.
The acorn holds within it all the power of the great oak. Use an acorn when you are meditating and reflecting on your personal past.
Bay for courage.
Sage for protection and spirituality.
Carnation for wellbeing.
Sunflower for wisdom and spirituality
Tobacco, the most sacred botanical, is used to connect to the land and receive blessings from the spirits.
Mabon Stones
Golden topaz is used for health, protection, wisdom, and mental clarity.
Amber for purification.
Citrine for balancing.
Tiger’s Eye is used for mental clarity and intuition.
Produce and items associated with Mabon
Corn, wheat, apples, nuts, leaves, trees, grapes, beer, mead, wine, cider, persimmons, pomegranate, antlers, seed pods, and pinecones. onions, potato, carrots, barley, sage, thyme, rosemary, calendula, dahlias, and chrysanthemums.
The incense that resonates with the season includes pine, cedar, juniper, and sage.
Gourds are protective. Place one gourd at each corner of your home for protection. Make gourds into birdhouses, bird feeders, and rattles. Try growing and drying some gourds. Clean and decorate a gourd and hang it over your front door for protection.
Frankincense is a powerful tool for purification and protection eliminating destructive energy.
Cedar attracts beneficial energies.
All migratory birds. If you have an unusual encounter with one it may have a message for you.
Front Porch Decorations
A charming display for your front entrance starts with a hay bale as a base. Purchase a bale of hay at a farm feed store. You can combine this with dried corn stalks purchased from a nursery and a scarecrow you can make yourself. Fill in around them with gourds, pumpkins, and various colored pots of chrysanthemums. An artificial garland of Fall leaves placed around your front door adds the perfect touch. Finish it off with a decorated grapevine wreath or a group of dried ornamental corn for the front door.
Dining room or coffee table Centerpiece
A lovely centerpiece for a dining room or coffee table is easy to make with a few items. You will use a shallow flat tray. Line the bottom with silk Fall leaves. Place a white pillar candle and a gold pillar candle or two orange pillar candles in the center of your tray. Arrange mini gourds, mini corn ears, mini pumpkins, pinecones, and acorns or other nuts around the tray. Finish the tray by weaving a string of mini fairy lights in and out around your decorations.
The Cornucopia
The shape of the cornucopia attracts abundance. It is the one decoration you can’t do without. Each year your horn of plenty will appear different as your choice of produce and arrangement will vary. I have mine on the breakfast room table as a centerpiece. Your choice for produce includes Mini Indian corn, mini gourds, apple, shelled nuts, persimmon, pomegranate, grapes, chestnuts, mini white pumpkins, and anything else that appeals to you.
Activities
Embrace each season’s unique and native energies.
Attend a Harvest Festival & Hay Ride
Few things are more fun for the kids and adults as well. Look into making a day of it at a Farm Harvest Festival. Enjoy hayrides, pig catching, getting lost in the corn maze, pressing cider to take home, corn grinding, a farm animal petting zoo, climbing a hay tower, choosing the perfect pumpkin out of a field to take home, and perhaps the grand finale of pumpkin pitching.
Pagan Pride Days
These festivals take place in the last week of September and the first two weeks of October. Do a search at Pagan Pride to find one near you and make some new friends.
Putting the Garden to bed
Time to clean up your garden. Gather the last of your harvest. Remove any debris and weed your garden. Collect seeds to plant and share with friends. Lift and divide any perennials which have become overgrown. Plant bulbs in anticipation of Spring. Mulch your garden. Plant fruit and nut trees to harvest and support your local wildlife. Add flowering shrubs such as lilac, azalea, rhododendron, viburnum, and daphne. Plant a honeysuckle vine for the hummingbirds. Be sure to keep a hummingbird feeder full through the Fall and Winter to support the varieties that don’t migrate.
Preserve the harvest
The race is on to can, pickle, freeze, and dry the harvest. If you have never done canning before, you need the gold standard, “The Ball Book of Canning & Preserving,” to guide you. I included the link to it on Amazon.
My favorite thing to can is applesauce. Store-bought can’t compare. If you don’t have an apple tree check the newspaper for ads for U-Pick fruit farms. If that doesn’t work out, visit your local farmers’ markets.
Second to applesauce is a grape jam. Absolutely nothing goes better with a peanut butter sandwich than homemade grape jam. Apple butter is a popular choice as well.
If you have never made wine try your hand at it. Years ago I tried it using elderberries I picked in the wild. I still remember how delicious it was and the brilliant purple color.
How to make Instapot Homemade Wine
Vineyards and Microbrewery
For those who enjoy beer plant some hops and give it a try next season.
Depending on where you live you may be able to enjoy visiting a vineyard or microbrewery on a day or evening when they are hosting a special dinner with musical entertainment.
Align with Nature
Plan a day for a nature walk. You can do this on your land if you live in the country as I do. Alternatively, you can pack a picnic and drive to a local, State, or National park. Go for a long walk and pay attention to all your senses. Hear the birds, feel the wind on your face, smell the grass, and notice the smallest details.
Make your experience a nature treasure hunt by collecting colorful leaves, nuts, seedpods, pinecones, bird feathers, moss, and whatever else catches your fancy to make your Mabon grapevine door a blessing.
crafts
Door Blessing Wreath
The materials you will need are a grapevine wreath, florist wire, hot glue gun, corn husks (available in the Hispanic food area of the grocery store), herbs such as rosemary, thyme, and sage (also available at your grocer in the produce section), a mini pumpkin in white or orange along with your nature walk treasures that you collected.
Start by laying out your materials and planning the way you would like them arranged on your wreath. Begin by attaching a foundation around your grapevine wreath with corn husk, moss, and/or herbs. I use the hot glue gun for this part.
After you are satisfied with your base, add fallen leaves, nuts, crab apples, seed pods, pinecones, bird feathers, and mini pumpkins around your wreath. Use a hot glue gun or florist wire to attach your treasures, whichever seems to be appropriate. At the bottom of your wreath tie a handful of corn husk as a finishing touch.
Dried bean painting
The materials you will need for this project are an artist’s canvas or a sturdy piece of cardboard.
Decorating materials can include dried black, kidney, navy beans, dried peas, dried corn kernels, dried lentils, nuts, sunflower seeds, and cracked corn. A hot glue gun and/or Elmers Craft Glue. Krylon Clear Gloss spray.
Examples of fabulous dried bean art
Place the glue on your board in small sections and add your desired materials to form your picture or mosaic pattern. Allow drying overnight. Spray with clear gloss spray to finish.
A Harvest Scarecrow
Small tables size, porch size, or big field size scarecrows are fairly straightforward to fashion.
Porch Scarecrow video
Full-Size Scarecrow video
Mabon Corn Necklace
A simple great craft for kids about seven years old and up: you will need corn kernels from popping corn, a needle, and thread to complete your necklace.
Soak your corn kernels in water for approximately 15 minutes to soften them up. In the meantime, measure your thread, making sure that the length of your necklace is adequate. Use a strand of thread that is double to ensure the proper strength.
With your softened kernels, begin threading them onto the needle. Orient you’re needle to insert it crosswise through the kernel. Stringing corn kernels is similar to stringing popcorn and cranberry garlands for the Yule tree.
Once the string is almost complete, tie a double knot and set it aside to dry overnight.
Recipes
Pumpkin Spice Bars for Mabon
This is the best recipe I have ever had for pumpkin bars. It was given to me by a friend. They are absolutely delicious..
Grease a jelly roll pan. 15 1/2 by 10 1/2 by 1-inch Preheat oven to 350 degrees
4 eggs
2 cups sugar
1 cup vegetable oil
1 can 16oz pumpkin
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
2 teaspoons cinnamon
1 teaspoon baking soda
3/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon ginger
1/4 teaspoon cloves
Beat eggs, sugar, oil, and pumpkin. Stir in flour, baking powder, cinnamon, baking soda, salt, ginger, and cloves. Pour batter into pan. Bake until light brown…25 – 30 minutes. Cool before frosting. Sprinkle with 1/2 cup chopped nuts if desired.
Cream Cheese Frosting
Mix one 3oz package softened cream cheese, 1/4 cup plus two tablespoons butter, and 1 teaspoon vanilla. Gradually beat in 2 cups powdered sugar until smooth and of spreading consistency.
Killer Mabon Chili con Carne
4 lbs. ground beef
4 tsp. salt
1 tsp. pepper
1 tsp. canola oil
6 cloves garlic, minced
2 large onions, chopped
2 green peppers, chopped
2 cans diced tomatoes, 15oz.
1 can 6 oz. tomato paste
1/4 cup chili powder
1 Tbs. cumin
2 cans of kidney beans, rinsed, drained
Heat a large pot over medium-high heat, and add beef. Stir in 2 tsp. salt and 1/2 tsp. pepper. Remove from heat and drain, set aside meat. Reduce heat to medium. In the same pot heat oil. Add garlic. Cook for 30 seconds. Add onions and green pepper, and cook, stirring often until softened, 7 minutes.
Add 5 cups water, tomatoes with juice, tomato paste, chili powder, cumin, meat, and remaining salt and pepper. Increase heat and bring to a boil. Reduce heat. Simmer, stirring occasionally for 45 minutes. Add beans and cook for 15 minutes.
Serve with rice, shredded cheese, sour cream, chopped onion, jalapeno, and cilantro on the side if desired.
Conclusion
I have really enjoyed putting together this post for you. I hope you enjoy it as well, if so, please post and share it with your friends.
Bright Blessings