a blessing for mama and babe

Which mama and babe? Yes, yes, its this one again! Almost nine months ago another little soul chose my lovely girl as its earth mother and she's been carefully nurturing it close to her heart for all that time. I just recently realised that I haven't even mentioned that there is another tiny one coming to our family - I remembered around the time that I started preparing for the Blessingway we were holding to give her strength for this rite of passage. I spent quite some time preparing a meaningful ceremony and I was very happy with how the day flowed. She had several friends, quite a few sisters and sisters in law and four wise women to honour and encourage her and we spent a delightful afternoon creating, chatting and reminiscing.

This card from my Druid Craft Tarot deck has always been one of my favourites and when I snapped the top pic of my girl, it reminded me of it. Don't you think there's a resemblance?

So, we started the afternoon with soup and bread - this was intentional because the babe will be born in the late autumn month of June, when it is almost winter and there's a drawing in of energy. A nice hearty lentil and veg soup with sourdough bread was just right to complement the sleety rain and wind outdoors! After lunch we sat in circle, I said a few words regarding the intention of the ceremony, lit a candle, then Nina began and spoke of her thoughts and feelings with this, her second pregnancy, and of the changes that were to come. As she finished speaking she passed on a ball of gorgeous homespun wool and as each woman there received the wool, they too spoke some wise words, encouraging thoughts or offered a blessing for the birthing and each of us added a bead to a small felt basket. Nina has since turned them into a birthing necklace which she will wear until baby is here and then later, she'll incorporate them into a dreamcatcher, as a symbol of all the hopes and dreams for this babes new life.

I had organised some arty, painty creative bits (of course!) and spent a few minutes explaining what I had provided and how to do the activities. My Golden Girl wanted a small book to record babys firsts, so with watercolour, pencils and pre cut pages ready, the girls decorated and conversed to their hearts delight.

I'd spent the previous week designing and drawing up a mandala on a large piece of canvas with the intention of sewing up a cushion. The plan was to get everyone to paint a round, although the larger rounds were done by two or three at a time! It was interesting to hear some women saying they hadn't painted for years and being quite reluctant to try, although when they did they realised how soothing and enjoyable wielding a paintbrush could be! Hearing that, makes me more determined to encourage women to express themselves with paint, paper and glue through classes and workshops. I have a plan!!!

There was also going to be another mandala done in henna on the beautiful round belly but sadly the henna needed a few hours to be ready and we hadn't realised that before. We made do with some lovely ripe chocolate cervixes complete with emerging jelly babies!!

There was a lot of eating and chatting and sharing of birthing stories and babyhood and, I think, all the lovely women in our life went home a little richer in spirit. A friend shared how much more meaningful she felt this was, compared to a regular type of baby shower and its given me a nudge to offer to organise something like this for other expecting mamas. We'll see.

At the end of the day, we waved them all good-bye - mamas, babies, children, grandmamas - cleaned up a little, rehashed some extra good bits, wondered at the beautiful pages that had been made and washed up paint brushes. My girl was feeling so special, loved and vibrant and all set for another birthing and I felt relieved that it had all gone so well, been so well received.

Each of us went home with a piece of the birthing wool wrapped around our wrist - a symbol of our support for her during labour, which will be removed when bub has arrived. Interestingly, I have two - the green one and that pink one which was from an April womens circle held with my beautiful friends in NSW, honouring my transition to MidWoman or Maga. Two quite different stages of life and two which most women will enter and travel through, with varying degrees of equanimity.

Now, to wait.


Edited to add - here is a link to the first Blessingway we had for my girl. A different one, seeing as she was having a summer baby. And I just noticed that we had jellybabies then too ;)