The Spring Equinox marks the midway point between the shortest day of the year (feast:Midwinter) and the longest day of the year (feast:Midsummer). It is still quite chilly, even snowy, and we certainly haven't seen the last of winter, but the promise of spring is on the horizon just like the faint glow of dawn after dark, dark night. This may be why I have always felt compelled to honor my tutelary Goddess, Eos, the Greek Goddess of Dawn on this day and I tend to call it Eosia, or Eostre. (See: Vernal Equinox Devotion to Eos)

In my house, the Spring Equinox marks an increasing supply of eggs. Right now we're very excited by our bounty, but we know we'll soon have more than we can use! Throughout the winter, we used eggs sparingly, but now we will use them with abandon, not only for cooking the many traditional egg dishes of the season but also for decorating and egg hunts and for props for games, such as egg races and egg rolling.

For more details, visit Spring Equinox Rituals with the Kids)

It's still too chilly to risk baby chicks, but we'll be setting eggs in the next few days and we'll have them in a month! Baby rabbits are much more tolerant of the cold, and our bunny barn is lively with them.

The Spring Equinox is also our traditional target date to get our spring planting done. Cool weather crops like peas, lettuces, beets, spinach, cabbages and their close relatives, kale, broccoli, turnips and cauliflower can all go right in the garden now. We'll cover them if the temperature drops too much and continue replanting every two weeks until June to get a continuous harvest of these crops. The heat of July will wilt them, but we'll start succession planting them again in August so they can grow again in the cool of autumn. Our summer garden plants, like tomatoes and peppers would die quickly if we tried to plant them outdoors now, but we'll plant them indoors now to give them a head start on the season and plant them outside when we do our summer planting the last week of May/first week of June.

For the Feast of Spring

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