Happy Lughnasadh! (Or Lammas if Prefered)

     Yes today is the first of the the 3 harvest festivals. Pronounced (Loo-nah-sah), if you go with the celtic ways or also called Lammas. The element "nasadh" relates to the Gaelic, "to give in marriage," and so would mean the "Marriage of Lug," rather than Lugh's Mass, which is a common interpretation. There is also some debate as to who the bride is, if there is one. Some authorities favor Tailltiu (Lugh's foster mother) and others favor Eriu, i.e., Ireland, herself. One clue to the identity of this particular bride may be that "handfastings" (marriage for a year and a day) are still called "Taillten Marriage", and many are performed at Lammas Fairs.
     The Lammas festival was adopted by the Christian Church in 1843, and today, in England, people decorate churches with sheaves and corn dollies, celebrating the old Pagan holiday, as they sing "Bringing in the Sheaves" and make offerings of corn to the Church. In some areas, Lammas was a time of sacrifice. Sacrifices at Lammas were made to thank the Deities for the First Fruits and to guarantee an abundant Harvest. The victim was often the king, who was God Incarnate to his people. Sometimes a substitute king, a fool or "scapegoat", was sacrificed in the king's stead.
     For myself, I always do a small ritual with bread and wine since I know several "Queens" but no Kings to sacrifice this is how I give thanks for the harvest and in hopes that the larder never run dry. It will be interesting since South Beach is few carbs but I am on Phase 2 so whole grains will work well tonight. I have some wine in the fridge (Its white so thats okay LOL) that will be there as well . hehehe
     So back into the swing of things today and had a good breakfast and a huge salad with grilled chicken for lunch. Despit the bites of dessert this weekend the scale was nice to me and said another 2 pounds gone. So thats a total of 22 pounds. The 5th of August wil be one month on this new eating regime as I like to call it. I am still not missing the bread at all, now I will say that the sliver of cheescake I had was simply divine. First let me say I adore a rich creamy rice pudding for dessert its a first choice (all puddings and custards really) and then cheescake is second. This was so good it would give the pudding a run for first place. It was perfct I now had some real sweet treat and I am serious enoigh to know that today just be really good about what i eat and keep going. It was not a setback, I mean how can that be a setback when this is your life. I chose to have it but I also choose NOT to have it every day not do I choose to have a serving that would feed a small village in Somalia somewhere ( I have no idea how big those villages are - it was just to make the point) 
     So getting back to my original post, Happy Lughnasadh/Lammas to you and yours, may you alwasy have plenty in your larders and may you have sun to warm you always.  Ciao for now peeps!