Welcome to Earth Weavers Collective
Celebrating Imbolc with an invitation to collaborate and imagine a more beautiful future that weaves ancient ways of being with technologies of present times
It’s fitting that at Imbolc, a new baby is born.
This baby is called Earth Weavers Collective, and I’m delighted to share her with you.
This is a project that has been brewing in my consciousness for years now, and I’m excited to bring her into the world and introduce you to her.
Imbolc is a seasonal festivity from the Celtic wheel of the year, a modern interpretation of ancient Celtic practices of seasonality. It’s a time that marks the sun’s halfway point between winter solstice and spring equinox. 6 weeks from the darkest days of the year, and 6 weeks to the official start of spring, known as Ostara (the pagan origin of the word “Easter”). Imbolc means “in the belly”, and is signified by pregnant ewes and baby lambs, traditionally a time that the milk began to flow and the people were nourished once again, after their winter food stores began to run low. Verdant greens start popping up, rich with nutrients, ready to replenish our bodies after a hard winter.
This morning, I’m feeling so grateful (as I often am) that I live in a place that has seasonal shifts to experience. I so appreciate the warming weather of spring… those first shimmers of green in a grey-brown landscape light me up with joy. The heat of summer brings on the sweat, and the long days that feel endless with possibility, and ripe as peaches and cherries and plums. Oh yummm, I love summer fruits. And autumn…. We are gifted such a stunning show of an array of colours (my personal favourite colour palettes), as our deciduous kin allow their leaves to take a break, stop working so hard to produce chlorophyll, and show us their true colours underneath their mighty green powerhouses. It’s a beautiful chance to learn from nature and shed what is taking too much from us, to let go, release, and allow those things to become compost to fertilize what comes next. And winter… soup season, sweater season, a chance to remind ourselves to stay home more, to light a fire, to tend to our inner hearth fires, to rest, to hibernate, to get cozy, invite in the Danish concept of hygge (the warm contentment of cozy comfort), to gather with loved ones and share stories and dreams and the food that we stored through the rest of the year.
I’m grateful to have these cycles to attune to, and I’ll spend the rest of my life going deeper into each of their lessons.
Earth Weavers Collective is a product of this reverence for our Earth Mother and her cycles. It’s a nest, or a basket, for us to forage, collect, and share the teachings of nature reconnection, herbal medicine practices, growing food, ancestral ways of being, building community, dreaming new futures, tending grief and darkness, healing, play, and embodiment. I hope that you’ll feel woven into this basket, and perhaps you want to become part of this in some way. I truly hope it will become a collective, not only a space for me to share my thoughts in these “muse-letters”, but for others to feel called to share some of their own teachings through this channel as well. I love what emerges from co-creation.
This baby basket nest we’re weaving together wouldn’t be here in this way without my dear sister Kaija, who shares my inspiration and wild curiosity about everything we’ll be sharing about. (Also a fellow Projector in Human Design and 7 in Numerology.) We met in the mountains years ago through a mutual friend, and each separately kept each other in mind as someone we could collaborate with as teachers. Kaija has helped stoke my inner fire and clarify how I want the journey of this project to fit into my life, and I’m forever grateful for it. She’s taking some time to tend her own hearth, and look forward to her weaving more of herself back into this in the future, because Earth Weavers will always be our baby.
We’ve dreamt this up as a space that can sometimes be in person, but will mostly be in the digital realm, as we can reach and connect with more people from across the world. We want it to be a learning space, a community space, and a space where we can feel some belonging with like-minded folks. Our world is increasingly disconnected, as we drift further from other relatives in the natural world and from each other, and we intend to rebuild those meaningful relationships. Our offerings over time will change, but will include digital downloadables like eBooks, reference pages, teaching materials about gardening and nature reconnection for kids, perhaps monthly Zoom gatherings if there’s interest (is there interest? Let me know!), maybe reading groups, someday some cohort and self-paced digital courses, and for now, at least this humble muse-letter (because I won’t be sharing “news”, but I will be sharing what’s inspiring me). Like any natural system, Earth Weavers will evolve over time.
And it is already shifting. As Kaija takes a step back to nourish herself, I get the joy of inviting in my beloved partner Chris. In about 10 weeks’ time, we begin our journey to explore the lands of our ancestors, and this will be one of the main channels we use to share about our experiences. We’ll be travelling in a way that neither of us has ever really travelled before… with an intention of giving back to the lands where our ancestors are from, learning about traditional foods and medicines, learning from farmers, land tenders, and story keepers… and we’ll also be staying connected to the interwebs to be able to continue generating resources to fund our travels. We’ll be in Europe for at least 7 months, and longer as our funds allow. You’ll hear more about our intentions for this trip soon.
I’m so thankful to have you here, reading these words, and weaving yourself in in some small way. I feel delighted to share about my inspiration for nature reconnection and Earth healing. My life has unquestionably been shifted by floral, fungal, and faunal medicines. I’m humbled to offer some of their teachings back, because learning is meant to be shared, and passed on for the benefit of future generations.
Thanks for being here. :)
In gratitude and reverence,
Anna Maria
“The human mind is like a fertile ground where seeds are continually being planted. The seeds are opinions, ideas, and concepts. You plant a seed, a thought, and it grows. The word is like a seed, and the human mind is so fertile! … What is important is to see which kind of seeds our mind is fertile for, and to prepare it to receive the seeds of love.”
–Don Miguel Ruiz, The Four Agreements
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