Happy Michaelmas!

St. Michael and All Angels
“Ye that excel in strength”

Service and strength, God’s Angels and Archangels;
His Seraphs fires, and lamps his Cherubim:
Glory to God from highest and from lowest,
Glory to God in everlasting hymn
From all his creatures.

Princes that serve, and Powers that work his pleasure,
Heights that soar toward him, Depths that sink toward him;
Flames fire out-flaming, chill beside his Essence;
Insight all-probing, save where scant and dim
Toward its Creator.

Sacred and free exultant in God’s pleasure,
His will their solace, thus they wait on him;
And shout their shout of ecstasy eternal,
And trim their splendours that they burn not dim
Toward their Creator.

Wherefore with Angels, wherefore with Archangels,
With lofty Cherubs, loftier Seraphim,
We laud and magnify our God Almighty,
And veil our faces rendering love to him
With all his creatures.

~ Christina Rossetti

Today, we celebrate Michaelmas - the slaying of the dragon, representative of the dark and the letting in of the Light of God. The fall brings a wonderful slow-down as we begin to prepare for the birth of Christ in a few short months.

I love my copy of "All Year Round". It keeps me prepared for the festivals and I turned to it again today.

We purchased some decorating beeswax this year.


The colors were so vibrant on each thin sheet.



The girls constructed our own dragon to celebrate the Feast of Saint Michael.


I helped a little bit...


Meanwhile, while they were creating, I was preparing dough for our dragon bread...

While it rose, the girls finished the dragon candle. We smoothed the edges and tried it out. Charley decided to add the moon, some stars and a fairy flying around the dragon's fire. We will burn it every night at dinner until the dragon has been destroyed, symbolically.

The girls shaped their dragon bread (we ended up with one bird, one dragon and a bunch of hearts)...

And I told them the story of "The Kite" from Wynstone Press' Autumn book.

And we'll be reading John Henry the rest of the day...

For a wonderful Michaelmas story, check out one of my very favorite blogs (OK my favorite one...I admit it...) Our Little Nature Nest here. And also, her activities for Michaelmas from last year here.

And finally, from another one of my favorite blogs, Parenting Passageway, check out Carrie's post last year in preparation of Michaelmas here.

We're continuing the amazing story of "The Dragon Boy", which I hope to review on Friday! The girls can't get enough of it! It has been a perfect read aloud for the beginning of autumn as we happened to read the two chapters about the autumn solstice on the actual autumn solstice! I love it when things fall into place like that!

Hope you are having a fun, festive day!