Calendar

Monday, December 19, 2016

Calendar Updates

This is just a quick note to let our readers know that we have updated as much of 2017s schedule of holidays and events as we can think of at present. If no specific event information is given for a holiday, then no event has been planned for it... yet.

Friday, December 16, 2016

Post-Fest Debriefing for Frost Fest 2016

If I hadn't had a cold-weather sleeping bag I'd have woken up with frostbite.

The cold kept many away who had previously expressed interest in attending the Fest. You were missed, but I completely understand. Overnight temperatures in the mid twenties are no joke, and without the right gear sleeping in that is dangerous. Most of the crowd chose to come by during the day and evening to spend time around the fire, engage in conversation, drink homebrew, eat epic chili, and tell stories around the late fire. It wasn't too bad, next to the fire. We cleaned up a lot of the site's dead-fall for them. (Many thanks to those who helped drag and cut up dead-fall for the fire. You kept us warm clear through midnight with that fire.) At least the Fest was accurately and descriptively named. The frost formed thick and sparkling white under the waxing moon. The air smelled of ice. Beautiful and intense.

The small turnout had the effect of creating a very different atmosphere than our larger and more structured Midsummer Festival, not the least of which was how much more food there was per person when we all cooked for a crowd. (If you missed out on the chili, you really missed out. Or the potato soup. Delicious.) We pulled our circle tight around the fire as we pulled stories from all over and drafts from the keg. The group bonding was for real, tempered in ice and fire and frozen stops at the port-a-john. (Still less unpleasant than a port-a-john in the heat of summer, though.)

Speaking of port-a-johns (might be the only time I've ever used that segue...) the site has had some updates since our last visit. The composting toilet is almost finished. We will still need a port-a-john for Midsummer, seeing as it's a larger event than a single composting head can handle, but there is a toilet at drum circles now, and for smaller events.

The only real downside to having the event turn out more like an extended Fire Circle than an organized Fest is that we're pretty much certain that not everyone who came through paid in. This is not to say that people didn't contribute in other ways, but the folks running Historic St Mary's City do expect to be paid, and the port-a-john wasn't free. We knew that with such a small crowd we wouldn't recoup everything, but we weren't expecting to come up quite that short.

More organization on our part, next time.

I have zero complaints about the Fest itself. Everything that went went well, even if the perchten only had a few people to watch their parade of spooky glory (and faceplants...frost that heavy is super slippery and guess who couldn't see sh*t out of their mask...)

Next year, more perchten! With bells and drums and some folks dressed as beautiful perchten to bring in the good luck after the ugly perchen have chased the evil spirits/bad luck away!

Next year more people, hopefully, to share the fire and the food and the stories.

Next year... well... what else next year? We'll be at coffee this Sunday (our usual time and place- 10AM at Coffee Quarter in San Souci Plaza) to talk about what we liked and what we'd like to do better. We'll also be talking about trying to get some folks together specifically for Yule/Solstice (No pressure, we all know that scheduling anything around the hooplah of X-Mas is insane.) and also a little bit about what we'd like to get on the schedule for next year. If you can make it out for this one, that would be great. If you can't, then I wish you a blessed Yule, a very Merry Solstice, and a Happy Christmas to the Christian allies we've got out there. May the New Year bring you prosperity, peace, and joy.

Tuesday, December 6, 2016

Frost Fest! Plus some fun :)

Are you ready? It's this weekend! That's right, Frost Fest!

There will be cold. There will be fire. There will be ritual. There will be food. There might even be a mini-parade of perchten roaming through to drive away evil spirits and carry off naughty children... what?

Remember that all information about the schedule and site can be found here:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1wJTryngIknjFfnthox-U18Mf82qy12HONhIUGhHlYmc/edit?usp=sharing

Registration happens here (please remember there is a $10 fee per person over 12 to offset the costs of port-o-let and fuel):
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1HxTtPMWzKMfnBi9RWbfTn9XmPFMbxLkrwcc2U4llkKQ/edit?usp=sharing


And questions can be answered by contacting us here, via email (smcpagans@gmail.com), or on our Facebook page.

And while we're in the holiday mood, here's a fun one for your enjoyment:

Haa-aa-aappy Holidays!


Tuesday, November 22, 2016

Admin Notes- November 2016

Phew, let's give this thing a whirl, shall we?

All posts will be cross listed in the following locations:
SMCP's Facebook Page
Owl Hill Kindred's Facebook page
Owl Hill Farm's Wordpress blog
Wherever you decide to share it!

It's our hope that by expanding to this platform we can make our events more available to local Pagans, Wiccans, Heathens, Druids, and so on and so forth since we know that not everyone uses or relies on Facebook for their information. In fairness, those people have been spared the worst of the fake news and nastiness from all sides lately. Moving on.

So yes, the biggest thing on our list of notes this time around is Frost Fest. Say it again but with more happy, Frost Fest! Coming up very, very soon (as in, the 9th through the 11th of December!!) after the Thanksgiving holiday, we'll be hanging out at Chancellor's Point in St Mary's City around a fire with a bunch of food and homebrew (for those of legal drinking age) and drums and stories. Come and join the fun. All persons over the age of 12 are asked to pay $10 to cover the cost of renting a port-o-let and buying some essentials like paper to print schedules and waivers, as well as a mess of plates and silverware for the pot luck on Saturday. By the way, there's a potluck on Saturday. One of the admins is bringing something featuring goat- three guesses which one. Come for the discussions, stay for the ritual, food, and epic Story Fire. Fair warning, there may be perchten parading through at some point.

Any and all further information can be discovered in the following ways:
Check out the schedule for this year's Frost Fest at this link and, if you're up for the cold weather camping, sign up at this link. Be aware that there will be the small fee previously mentioned and a waiver/hold harmless agreement that you have to sign. You will also note that there is a column for folks willing to help out with some aspect of the Fest's operations. We'll need a few volunteers to manage the fire, set up for the main meal, help with check in, and that sort of thing. If you are camping overnight, please please please plan on arriving well before sunset to set up camp. Admin will be on site around noon and check in will begin at 1300hrs. Seriously consider being there before 1500 if you can. There are all of ZERO artificial lights to help you after dark. It's part of why we like the place so much. For any and all questions not answered by this post or those links you can seek out more information in any of the following ways:
Comment here
Contact us via our Facebook page- link at the top of the post
Contact us via email at smcpagans@gmail.com


Alright moving on from the EPICNESS that will be Frost Fest 2016, there are some notes about other upcoming events.

Our regular bi-weekly coffee meetups are continuing as planned after last time's most excellent and well-received Crash The UU Service event. Our next coffee meetup is Sunday, the 4th of December, from 1000 to 1200 hrs at the Coffee Quarter in San Souci Plaza. We take up half the establishment most weeks, so we're hard to miss.

It should be noted by all that Frost Fest is taking up our usual monthly drum circle night. Also: DRUM CIRCLE FOR JANUARY AND FEBRUARY WILL BE IN AN ALTERNATE LOCATION DUE TO THE TYPICALLY AWFUL WEATHER THAT TIME OF YEAR. Drum Circle MIGHT return to Chancellor's Point in March (March weather can be pretty iffy around here, too) but WILL be back in April. I'm 99% sure of our alternate site, but will wait for the 100% before I give out the wrong directions. Stay tuned.

I think that about sums it up for things happening in the next few weeks.

Everyone I've met has a slightly different feeling about Thanksgiving this week. Me, I'm just happy to take the opportunity for some time off and the excuse for some extra good food. It's the simple things in life, after all. Or is it? We're going into the season of great contrasts- cold darkness and sparkling lights, long nights and thrilling tales of magic. Stick with us if you've already been, and welcome if you're new. I think it will be a worthy journey.