Leaves are slowly changing colour, the wind is crispier and a light sweater is a must to pretty much any outfit. Fall has begun. Mabon, also known as the autumnal equinox is a time where day and night are balanced, making it a time for balance and harmony. It’s the second of the harvest festivals.
Mabon occurs between the 21st and 24th of September. We enter the darker part of the year, we go inwards. It’s a great time to explore our psychic powers. As the trees shed their leaves, we too can let go of what no longer serves us. Pumpkin spice season is not quite started yet but apple sure is. Baked apple goods such as pies, custards and apple sauce are in. Apple is a symbol of love, lust, luck and prosperity. Often referred to as the fruit of the dead, the apple is a great offering during spooky season. Baking with cinnamon is also great to bring in abundance in love and in finance.
How to celebrate:
Get inspired by mother earth and go out looking for snacks.
Wander the woods and collect berries, rose hips, blackberries, elderberries… *be sure to be able to identify your stash before eating anything found in the wilderness*. Collect pine cones, colourful leaves and thing that catch your eye, thank nature for it’s generosity. Once you get back home, place your treasures in a bol or any dish and display it on your table or altar to be reminded of the abundance you already have and keep bringing in more positive energies.
Craft protection charms using hazelnuts strung on a red piece of thread.
Hang dried earns of corn near your doors to attract abundance.
Have a Mabon feast with seasonal ingredients, wine from the God, beans and squashes from the Goddess. Soups, stews and other warm and comfort foods always do the trick.
Collect milkweed pods to decorate at Yule and attract fairies.
How to decorate your altar:
The perfect candle colour are brown-cinnamony and orange. You can burn pine, sage, sweetgrass and myrrh incense. Corn, autumn flowers, acorns, gourds and fall leaves are great decorations for your sacred space. Have nutbread in a dish as an offering on your altar. Amber, tiger’s eye, citrine, peridot, topaz, ruby and garnet can adorn your magic area adding a touch of autumnal colours. The herbs associated with the celebration icludes: thyme, rue, rose hips, marigolds, saffron, dried apples and oak moss. Bones, sunflowers, pine cones, balance scales and cornucopias are also welcome.
Apple leaves;
Burying 13 apple leaves in the garden after harvest is said to ensure a bountiful harvest the following year.
Apple home protection charm;
Create a small protective bundle to prepare for the darker half of the year.
You’ll need an apple, a clove of garlic, sage leaves and basil.
The apple represent the elements with its pentagram arranged seeds, garlic wards off evil, sage dispells negative energies and basil is used for protection.
Peel the apple, keeping the peel intact as one long ribbon. Bundle your herbs together around the clove of garlic and wrap the apple peel around them creating a sort of swaddle for the herbs (bonus points if you can create tightly formed ball- spheres can amplify the charm). While you do so repeat the following incantation:
“I bind together this simple charm to keep our home from harm.”
Take your twine and tightly wrap it around your bundle to secure the elements of your charm. Hang your bundles on the four corners of your home, in your front entry, or hidden among your holiday wreath on the front door (my preferred method). Renew or replace these charms during Ostara.
Letting go ritual:
Gather a few friends and light a bonfire( or a black candle depending on the space available to you). Everyone writes a letter to the universe mentioning what they want to release. Fold the piece of paper away from you symbolizing you letting it go. Throw the letters in the fire or hold them above the flame and place them in a fire safe dish. It’s time to say goodbye to those patterns, thoughts or situations holding you back.
Thank the universe and enjoy a cozy time with your friends.
Bibliography;
Alison Davies, Mystical Year, London, Quadrille, 2020.
Ann Mouriel, Green witchcraft, St. Paul: Llewellyn Publications, 1996.
Semra Haksever, Mama moon’s book of magic, London, Hardie Grant Books, 2020
https://greenmanmeadows.com/apple-magic/
1 comment
I love this!! I try to go apple picking on my birthday every year so I have a ton of apples for Spooky season up until the Holidays. Thanks for explaining what Mabon is and for reminding me I’m way overdue for a letting go ceremony 🔥