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Saturday, July 30, 2011

Lughnasa

Today is Lughnasa. It is a harvest festival and dedicated to the sun god Lugh. Ever seen the film Dancing at Lughnasa? That’s set around this time.

I don’t grow my own food, I barely garden. The boyfriend gardens a bit, and we tend to have lots of flowering plants (for the bees, everyone loves bees), but we have given up growing our own veg. After a couple of years where we were overrun with tomatoes and the courgettes turned into marrows we gave up and now I just buy all our veg. I try to buy stuff that’s in season, and that’s been grown in this country, in winter that gets a bit harder and we end up eating a lot of cabbage and cauliflower. Since about May more UK grown stuff is available, which makes me a bit confused. As I’m not exactly au fait with the crop cycle I have no idea what’s meant to be in season now that wasn’t in season a month ago. There’s been loads of UK grown fruit around f’rinstance.

Anyway, that’s not going to stop me acknowledging today. I shall be baking a cake (lemon and poppy seed since you ask), but not doing a fancy meal. There must be something about this time of year because last year I completely missed Lughnasa and this year I’ve been struggling to find appropriate decorations. Hence why my only real effort will be in baking a cake (type of cake determined by the boyfriend’s request). We are also going out to a friend’s housewarming in the evening, which I think is a nice way to spend a harvest festival – thinking along the lines of gaining fruits for your efforts, abundance etc. It’s a sort of loose farming analogy. Very loose. Anyway it’ll be a celebration, and a good way to relax after a week where it seems that loads of people I know have ended up in hospital, with things of varying degrees of seriousness. Gah.


Anyway, enjoy your day everybody and I hope the sun shines for you!

2 comments:

  1. Happy Lughnasa! Your plans for celebrating sound great to me. We are having a please-take-away-our-stuff party tomorrow because we're moving (the opposite of a housewarming!) but also pulling up our garlic and some potatoes if they're ready.

    I hope all the people you know in hospital get better quickly and nothing is too serious.

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  2. Thanks Rachel! I hope the house move goes well for you :)

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