Tag Archives: Spring

Happy Equinox and Supermoon!

Posted on March 19, 2011 | 2 comments

Ready for a change of season? The March Equinox will occur on Sunday, March 20th this year, marking the beginning of spring in the northern hemisphere and fall in the southern hemisphere. The exact time is 23:21 (or 11:21 p.m.) at Coordinated Universal Time (UTC), which is 4:21 p.m. Pacific Daylight Time, 7:21 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time).

“Equinox” means “equal night” in Latin and, twice a year (in March and September), the sun shines directly on the equator, and the length of day and night are nearly equal in all parts of the world.

In addition, the full moon that heralds the Equinox on the night of March 19th will appear especially large and bright, due to its closer-than-usual relation to Earth. This supermoon, or perigee moon, is due to rise in the east and be the biggest in almost 20 years. If you are blessed with clear skies tonight, you will probably want to have a look.

The Farmers Almanac calls the March full moon the Full Worm Moon and notes: “As the temperature begins to warm and the ground begins to thaw, earthworm casts appear, heralding the return of the robins.”

Northern Native American tribes knew this moon as the Full Crow Moon, when the cawing of crows signaled the end of winter. They also used Full Crust Moon because the snow cover became crusted from thawing by day and freezing at night.

The Dakota Sioux named it the especially poetic Moon When Eyes Are Sore From Bright Snow. The Full Sap Moon, marking the time of tapping maple trees, is a Colonial American variation. More than one other culture calls it the Windy Moon. In Medieval England it was known as the Chaste Moon.

I’ve long been quite entranced with the full moon names and their variations. Of course, they reflect both the need to mark passing time and the way that time was experienced by people who were living close to the land. Lunar time-keeping pre-dated our modern calendars (and some calendars, like the Jewish and Chinese calendars, are still lunar-based.) The Farmer’s Almanac has a good list of Native American full moon names and how each came to be.

Other, even older, cultures have had moon naming traditions, too. This site lists full moon names from Chinese, Celtic, Pacific Island, Native American, Pagan, and other cultures.

Lots of people garden using the phases of the moon. The good news is that there isn’t one best time to plant — Each aspect of planting has an associated moon phase, based on how much moisture is pulled up through the soil by the monthly pull of the moon (much the way the moon influences the tides.)

The time just after the full moon is an especially good time for planting root crops, as the gravitational pull is high (adding more moisture to the soil) and the moonlight is decreasing, contributing energy to the roots. For this reason, the waning moon is also a good time to plant bulbs and transplants.

The Farmer’s Almanac offers a wonderful moon phase calendar for the U.S. that allows you to plug in your location and get the exact time of your local full moon.

Enjoy the new season and the supermoon!

Photos: NASA (Moon), Susan Sachs Lipman

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Posted in Deck Garden, Nature, Porch Swing, Seasons, The Great Outdoors

Tagged Autumnal Equinox, Equinox, Fall, Full Moon, Gardening, Moon, Moon Gardening, Moon Lore, Moon Names, Night Sky, Perigree Moon, Planting by the Moon, Seasons, Spring, Supermoon, Vernal Equinox

Photo Friday: Signs of Spring

Posted on March 18, 2011 | 1 comment

Wherever you look in Amsterdam in late winter, there is something .. well, cute. Picturesque. A harbinger of the Spring season to come. The first tulips appear on corners and in big flower markets, their heads still tightly closed. At the same time tulip bulbs are available for sale for those who still wish to get them into the ground.

And of course there are the bikes — flower- and basket- and sometimes person-bedecked. Whizzing by and parked, sometimes two and three deep, in all weather, on the bridges that rise gently over the lovely canals.

Have you seen and photographed something unusual, whimsical, beautiful, or otherwise interesting in your travels? Has anything surprised you or caused you to pause? Or have you simply experienced a small, lovely moment that you wanted to capture? If so, I hope you’ll share with us by leaving a comment with a link to your photo. I look forward to seeing it!

Photo by Susan Sachs Lipman

Spring Ahead! Daylight Saving Time Begins Tonight for Many

Posted on March 12, 2011 | 1 comment

When Benjamin Franklin wrote An Economical Project, his 1794 discourse in which he proposed the idea that would become our current Daylight Saving Time, it probably didn’t occur to him that the world would be using his system of adjusting human activities to maximize natural daylight more than 200 years later.

It also probably didn’t occur to him that others would take so long to embrace it. Attempts to legislate Daylight Saving were still widely ridiculed at the beginning of the 20th century. (It took the energy needs of WWI for many to finally enact them.) Standard times, brought about in the U.S. and Canada by the needs of the railways, which straddled various locales, also took a few decades to eventually pass into law.

This is a wonderful article on the history of Daylight Saving Time and time zones, which includes all kinds of quirkiness and variations. (One year, 23 different pairs of DST start and end dates were used in Iowa alone.) Indeed, cities and countries around the world begin, end and practice Daylight Savings at a variety of times and in a variety of ways.

Most of the U.S. begins Daylight Saving Time at 2:00 a.m. (local time) on the second Sunday in March and reverts to standard time at 2:00 a.m. on the first Sunday in November.

How does Daylight Savings Time impact safety, particularly on the roads? Apparently the first dark evenings in Fall, when the time changes back, see an increase in pedestrian and auto accidents, as some people readjust to driving in darkness. In 2007, Daylight Saving Time in the U.S. was moved to the first weekend in November, in the hopes of getting more Halloween Trick-or-Treaters out during daylight and presumed safety, which may be good for the youngest Trick-or-Treaters.

Sleep deprivation is an issue that can affect people just after Daylight Saving Time kicks in in Spring. Cows, too, can be a little flummoxed, say Indiana dairy farmers — to the degree that their milk production suffers. Interestingly, Indiana only adopted Daylight Saving Time in 2006. Arizona is the only state that currently opts out of Daylight Savings, although the Navajo nations within it opt in — are you confused yet? In addition some Amish communities, particularly in Ohio, remain on Standard Time, which they (wonderfully) call Slow Time.

Here’s hoping you enjoy your Slow Time, your sunlight, and the wonder of time in general, whether you practice Daylight Savings or not.

Photos by Susan Sachs Lipman

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Posted in Seasons

Tagged Amish, Arizona, Autumn, Clocks, Daylight Saving, Daylight Saving Accidents, Daylight Saving History, Daylight Saving Sleep, Daylight Saving Time, Daylight Savings, Daylight Savings Time, Fall, Farming, History, Indiana, Slow Time, Spring, Standard Time, Time, Time Zones

Photo Friday: Between Seasons

Posted on February 11, 2011 | 3 comments

Last weekend, where I live, the temperature seemed to boost about 40 degrees. Sun and warm winds suddenly replaced the frigid air. Overnight, it seemed, fruit trees burst into blossom — nothing subtle or slow — and I could smell wild onions and grasses and the sorts of shoots that signal spring. One front yard on my street, however, is having trouble letting go of the last leaves of fall even as they’re being eclipsed by a splashy early spring show.

Photo by Susan Sachs Lipman

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Photo Friday: San Francisco Storefront

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Posted in Nature, Seasons, Snapshot, The Great Outdoors

Tagged Cherry Blossoms, Fall, Fall Leaves, Flowering Trees, Flowers, Fruit Trees, Nature Photography, Photography, Spring, Trees

Groundhog Day: Punxsutawney Phil Predicts Early Spring

Posted on February 2, 2011 | 75 comments

Groundhog Day, February 2, has basically everything going for it that I love in a holiday — It marks a point in a season; it’s full of folklore and wisdom, superstition, ceremony, civic charm, mystery, agrarian history, and weather — and it was featured in perhaps my all-time favorite movie of the same name, which itself is a study in acceptance and inner calm while being outright hilarious in nearly every frame.

Altogether now: It’s Groundhog Day!

In an early morning ceremony today, groundhog Punxsutawney Phil rose from his heated burrow at Gobbler’s Knob, PA, and signaled to his handlers that he saw no shadow today and accordingly foretold an early end to winter. Over the 125 years that the ceremony has taken place, Phil has seen his shadow 98 times and not seen it only 16, counting today. (Records don’t exist for every year.) The last time he didn’t see a shadow was in 2007. In 2008, the crowd booed the prospect of “six more weeks of winter”, as they no doubt would have today, when a smaller than usual crowd stood in the freezing rain to watch the ceremony.

The same article also notes that Phil’s “handlers” make the prediction for him. What do we think of that?

How did the groundhog tradition get started?

According to this excellent Groundhog Day site, German settlers arrived in the 1700s in the area of Pennsylvania, northeast of Pittsburgh, which had been previously settled by the Delaware Native Americans. The Germans celebrated Candlemas Day, originally a Medieval Catholic holiday to mark the mid-point between the Winter Solstice and the Spring Equinox in the Northern Hemisphere. The holiday also has roots in Celtic-Gaelic and Pagan cultures, where it is celebrated as St. Brigid’s Day and Imbolc, and is a time of festival, feasting, parades, and weather prediction, as well as candles and even bonfires to mark the sun’s return.

According to Wikipedia, the origin of the word “Imbolc” is “in the belly”, and among agrarian people, Imbolc was associated with the onset of lactation of ewes, which would soon give birth to lambs in the spring.

The German settlers of Pennsylvania put candles in their windows and believed that if the weather was fair on Candlemas Day, then the second half of winter would be stormy and cold. While this has always seemed counter-intuitive to me, this site explains the science of Groundhog Day and that cloudy weather is actually more mild than clear and cold. It makes sense, then, that the shadow would portend six more weeks of winter. (A lifelong mystery is solved.)

The English and Scottish had wonderful sayings to mark this occasion:

The serpent will come from the hole
On the brown Day of Bride,
Though there should be three feet of snow
On the flat surface of the ground.

— Scottish saying
(Note the serpent instead of the groundhog.)

If Candlemas be fair and bright,
Winter has another flight.
If Candlemas brings clouds and rain,
Winter will not come again.

— English saying

Punxsutawney’s first Groundhog Day celebration was in 1886, and though other towns, particularly in the eastern U.S., have Groundhog Day ceremonies, none is nearly as famous as Punsxutawney’s. Some of this may lie with the groundhog’s official name, “Punxsutawney Phil, Seer of Seers, Sage of Sages, Prognosticator of Prognosticators, and Weather Prophet Extraordinary”. Still more popularity, and tourists, have come as a result of the movie Groundhog Day. The first official Groundhog Day prediction in Punxsutawney? No shadow – early Spring.

This site has more information about the groundhog itself and about the filming of the movie.

If you are a Groundhog Day movie obsessive like me, you will enjoy this site that breaks down exactly how long Bill Murray’s character, Phil the Weatherman, experiences Groundhog Day in Gobbler’s Knob.

Shadow or no, here’s wishing you a happy remainder of the winter, a ceremony or two, a dash of lore and wonder, and a fruitful spring.

Photos: Aaron Silvers, Creative Commons

Try it yourself: Do you see your shadow on Groundhog Day?

Read: Happy New Year! Celebrate with Traditions from Around the World and at Home.

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Posted in Field Trip, Holidays, Odes, Seasons

Tagged Agrarian Holidays, Bill Murray, Calendar, Candlemas, German, Groundhog Day, Groundhog Day Movie, Groundhog Day Science, Pennsylvania, Punxatawney, Punxatawney Phil, Punxsutawney, Punxsutawney Phil, Solstice, Spring, St. Brigid's Day, Traditions, Weather, Winter

Happy New Year: Celebrate with Traditions from Around the World and at Home

Posted on December 30, 2010 | 7 comments

In Denmark, the New Year may be marked by breaking dishes on friends’ doorways. In Swaziland, tradition has it that people celebrate a long harvest season and bring their king back into the community from a brief seclusion.

Japanese families may celebrate the New Year for two weeks of “firsts” including “first writing”, in which family members inscribe favorite poems or sayings with fresh ink. In the Philippines, wearing polka dots and eating round fruit is said to attract prosperity and luck.

Traditional Hmong people, pictured above, thoroughly clean their houses and place the dirt outside near a loop of rope that has been tied to a tree. Children jump in an out of a loop to confuse the dirt spirits. The Dutch, pictured below, make doughnuts, called oliebols, which are only eaten at the New Year, have great firework shows, and often celebrate the day as many seaside dwellers do, by running into the sometimes freezing water — here, with the New Years Dive. at Scheveningen, in Amsterdam.

All over the world, people celebrate the New Year — often at the turning of the Julian calendar on January 1, but sometimes not — and do so with a wide variety of traditions, celebrations and rituals.

This is a wonderful list of New Years celebrations from around the world. Many traditions have to do with driving away evil spirits and ringing in the new.

The New Year used to coincide with Spring (which makes sense in agrarian societies and perhaps even today), until Julius Caesar’s Julian calendar was created in 46 B.C. and declared the New Year to begin January 1. Many Europeans held firm to their Spring celebrations all the way until the 1560s, when France’s King Charles IX finally decreed that the year should officially begin on January 1. It still took Pope Gregory in Rome a full 18 years to follow suit, and some Europeans even longer. Those who continued to celebrate the New Year in April were considered fools — yes, April Fools.

More New Year Traditions

Do you make resolutions? Irresistible to those of us who like an occasional “fresh start”, New Years resolutions are said to go back 4,000 years, all the way to ancient Babylonia. Because the New Year occurred at the Vernal Equinox, many Babylonians resolved to make good on their word and return borrowed farm equipment, so their neighbors could begin the new year of farming.

How about Auld Lang Syne? If you sing Auld Lang Syne on New Year’s Eve, you’re like much of the English-speaking world, who brings out this maudlin Scottish tune each new year at the stroke of midnight. “Auld Lang Syne” means “old long ago” or the “good old days”. The song as we know it was penned in the 1700s from an older traditional tune.

Then, there’s the New Years Baby. This symbolism is said to go back to ancient Greece, where parading a baby in a basket represented the rebirth of Dionysus, the God of Wine and symbol of fertility.

From ancient times, the New Year has been an occasion for contemplation and celebration. Happy and Healthy New Year to you and yours. Please let me know if you wear polka dots, break dishes, run into the ocean, or enjoy another or your own New Year tradition.

Images: PTD Phonsavan, Lybil BER, J.C. Leyendecker, Michael Lipman

Celebrate May’s Full Moon

Posted on May 27, 2010 | 3 comments

According to the Old Farmer’s Almanac, today is the night and day of May’s full moon. The May Moon is known as the Full Flower Moon, in the moon naming tradition that was used by the Native Americans, largely Algonquins, who lived in the Northeast U.S., from New England to Lake Superior in the Midwest.

The Full Flower Moon received its name because of the abundant flowers that carpeted the land during its time. It’s also been called the Full Corn Planting Moon and the Milk Moon.

Other, even older, cultures have had moon naming traditions, too. This site lists full moon names from Chinese, Celtic, Pacific Island, Native American, Pagan, and other cultures.

One great moon is known to all farmers, late September or early October’s Harvest Moon (also known as the Blood Moon, Blackberry Moon, or Hunter’s Moon), which traditionally shines its all-night beacon to help farmers gather their crops. In the Northern Hemisphere, it happens to be an especially close, bright moon, in addition to sometimes lighting up the sky for days. I wrote about the Harvest Moon here.

The Farmer’s Almanac offers a wonderful moon phase calendar for the U.S. that allows you to plug in your location and get the exact time of your local full moon.

Enjoy the Full Flower Moon!

Photo: Matthias Kobel

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Posted in Deck Garden, Holidays, Nature, Seasons, The Great Outdoors

Tagged Astronomy, Fall, Farming, Full Moon, Gardening, Gardening by the Moon, Harvest Moon, May, Moon, Moon Lore, Moon Names, Moon Phases, Night Sky, Planting by the Moon, Spring

Happy May Day! Dance Around a Maypole

Posted on April 29, 2010 | 5 comments

The first maypoles were humble pine trees, which were carried in processions to Ancient Roman temples to honor the goddess Flora and celebrate spring. In Pagan Medieval Europe — especially Germany and England, but also parts of Scandinavia and the Slavic countries — a tree would be cut down and brought from the woods into the village by a procession at sunrise, while horns and flutes played. The tree, a maypole, would be festooned with ribbons, garlands, flowers, wreaths, and other decorations to celebrate Beltane.

The Roman Floralia festivals lasted up to a week and featured games, theatrical presentations, and floral-wreath adornments. During the early Floralias animals were set free and beans were scattered to encourage fertility. At different times in history, Floralias and May Day celebrations were fairly bawdy affairs.

The holiday has always featured feasting and dancing, and often the crowning of a May Queen and King. In large cities like London, maypoles would stay up permanently. (For some time, May 1st was considered the first day of summer– and Midsummer was on our current summer solstice in June.)

In parts of England, and then in Puritanical America, leaders tried to do away with the Pagan holiday, but the charming, gentle celebration of spring had a way of staying appealing.

The maypole dance can be quite elaborate, as the dancers holding ribbons weave in and out of each other’s steps systematically, until the ribbon-covered pole is left with a specific pattern.

These celebrants in Glastonbury, England, look like they know what they’re doing and are having fun doing it.

This site tells you how to create a maypole and do a maypole dance.

See my earlier May Day post for instructions for making floral wreaths.

Happy May Day!

Photos by Susan Sachs Lipman

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Posted in Community, Crafts, Holidays, Lost Arts, Nature, Play, Seasons

Tagged How to do a Maypole Dance, May Day, May Day History, May Pole, Maypole, Maypole Dance, Maypole History, Spring

Celebrate May Day with Floral Wreaths, Crowns and Baskets

Posted on April 28, 2010 | 7 comments

The earliest May Day celebrations commemorated Flora (above), the Roman goddess of flowers and spring. So it’s fitting that May 1st, which marks the mid-point between the Spring Equinox and the Summer Solstice, be celebrated with flowers in baskets and in pretty wreaths around the head.

Wreaths can be made with real or synthetic flowers, and simple crowns can be made with construction paper. To make a floral wreath, make a circular form out of a coat hanger or other wire and make sure it fits the intended head. Wrap the ends of the wire tightly around the main circle to secure it. Tape each flower on by the stem with floral or a dark-colored masking tape wound around the base a couple of times.

Wind one or more colors of ribbon around the wreath. Ribbons can also be tied on to hang at intervals. To do this, cut and double a length of ribbon, so that each side is as long as you want it to hang. Make a loop at the top. Place the loop against the wire with a couple of inches to spare at the top and pull the two ends through the loop to secure the the ribbon. Knot the ends, if desired, to prevent from fraying.

May baskets are another tradition from a bygone time. They summon an era when children filled baskets or other containers (even simple paper cones) with freshly picked flowers and left them on neighbors’ doorknobs or doorsteps as a surprise. Since May Day often falls on a school day, we varied the tradition by bringing a basket of flowers to school and giving the basket or individual flowers to Anna’s teachers. Some people fill May baskets with candy.

In Hawaii, May Day is also known as Lei Day.

This delightful video comes from Kari at Active Kids Club and features children making a fresh crown of dandelions. This joyful activity is perfect for May Day or any day when the spring, the outside, and a mood of celebration beckons.

See also: Dance Around a Maypole for May Day.

Painting: Flora, by Louise Abbéma, 1913. In Public Domain. May Day Photos: Susan Sachs Lipman. Video: Kari Svenneby

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Posted in Crafts, Holidays, Lost Arts, Nature, Seasons

Tagged Crowns, Dandelion Crown, Flora, Floral Wreaths, Flowers, May Basket, May Day, May Day Basket, May Day Celebrations, May Day Customs, May Day History, May Day Traditions, May Flowers, Maypole, Paper Crowns, Spring, Wreaths

Tulipmania 2010, Part 2

Posted on April 13, 2010 | 7 comments

In my last post on tulips, I featured the Parade and Apeldoorn tulips and gave some background on the Tulipmania that gripped otherwise sensible people in 17th century Netherlands. This post will continue to highlight the beauties that graced my spring container garden.

I highly recommend planting tulips, as an easy individual or family project. It’s one that will bring you a lot of joy for relatively little effort.

Apricot Beauty

I love apricot-sherbet colored tulips, and the early-blooming Apricot Beauty did not disappoint. A single tulip with a nice classic shape on an 18″ stem, the Apricot Beauty looked great with its companion flowers, the Beau Monde and the Negrita, and, in particular, really helped welcome Spring.

Beau Monde

I find the delicate, bi-color Beau Monde to be very painterly. An early Triumph, with a pleasing shape on an 18″ stem, it featured wonderful blush-colored swipes on bright white petals.

Negrita

Accompanying the prior two in their early spring box was the Negrita, which, interestingly, lasted much longer than the other two. This is a beautiful Triumph tulip, with a great shape and distinct deep magenta color. It’s a good performer, and stands 22″ high, with a wonderful drama and color to it that allows it to mix well with lots of different flowers or stand on its own.

White Parrot

The lovely White Parrot tulips were the last of all the tulips to come up. This is a great, late-season creamy white tulip with varying brushes of grass green traveling from stem to flower. Fairly large flowers sit on 20-22″ stems. Though I found the typical parrot “frills” to be a bit more subtle than they are on other types, this is just a very pretty flower.

Until next year!

Photos by Susan Sachs Lipman

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Posted in Deck Garden, Nature, Porch Swing, Seasons, Tulipmania

Tagged Apricot Beauty, Beau Monde, Container Gardening, Flower Photography, Flowers, Gardening, Negrita, Negrita Tulip, Photography, Spring, Triumph Tulips, Tulip Photography, Tulips, White Parrot

Tag Archives: Spring

Happy Equinox and Supermoon!

Photo Friday: Signs of Spring

Spring Ahead! Daylight Saving Time Begins Tonight for Many

Photo Friday: Between Seasons

Groundhog Day: Punxsutawney Phil Predicts Early Spring

Happy New Year: Celebrate with Traditions from Around the World and at Home

Celebrate May’s Full Moon

Happy May Day! Dance Around a Maypole

Celebrate May Day with Floral Wreaths, Crowns and Baskets