My Blissful Blessingway

One month and one day before my first child was born we had a blessingway to celebrate my journey from maiden to mother, and it was divine.

We started off by sitting in a circle in the lounge room and all my friends and family introduced themselves. My friend who volunteered to host the formal part of the gathering welcomed everyone and explained why we were gathered together. She said

"Through our circle of support and strength we hope to provide you with positive and vibrant energy and wisdom of the collective feminine spirit."

She then read some messages that had been sent by friends who couldn't make it. Then we went around the circle and each of my guests presented me with a candle (or candles) for me to light when I'm in labour, and a bead (or beads) to contribute to making me a birth necklace. I ended up with so many beautiful and meaningful beads from everyone that my friends had enough to make me a long necklace, a bracelet and a bracelet for my parnter!

Each guest explained the significance of the beads for them. The heart-felt thought that each person had put into choosing a bead for the necklace was incredibly touching and I was almost moved to tears by the emotion of it all.

After the formal part of the day's festivities we spent the afternoon eating tons of yummy food, including "yoni cakes" which my partner and I made the night before. They were choc-chip cupcakes which I iced with chocolate ganache and then decorated with red coloured yoni shapes. It was my first attempt at decorative icing so I was quite proud of myself.

Our kitchen table was covered in stationery and arts and crafts supplies and a number of my guests hand made me cards with blessings for me to read during labour. It was amazing to see the products of these women's creative genius. So many pieces of paper, lettering, decorations that I had seen thousands of times as I scrapbooked, but never known what to do with them! It was wonderful to see the unique ways each guest decided to use these old familiar pieces.

After grabbing some food I set myself up on the couch and my sister in law began painting my belly with henna. I asked her to do it because she has amazing natural artistic talent, and also because a couple of years ago she went to India for a friend's wedding where henna tattooing is an important part of the festivities, so she had some familiarity with the medium atop of her gift. As she painted away various guests took turns to massage my feet, hands and arms. It was heavenly!

My sister in law did a gorgeous picture on my belly. As requested she drew a fertile looking tree with winding roots, but she also drew a large figure sitting beside the tree. She told me that the figure was Shakti, the Hindu manifestation of the divine mother. She said she wanted to do something to recognise that henna tattooing is an Indian artform and Shakti seemed the most fitting.

While I kicked back and received the pampering of a life time (and it truly was, it was so exquisite that I felt like I was floating above and outside of my body!) my friends took stock of all the beads I had received and began crafting my birth necklace. I am in awe of the amazing job they did.

The necklace is amazing. Every single piece of it was hand picked by those who love me, to bless me, to send their best wishes for my first birth experience. I have to say that when I put it on for the first time I could feel the weight of all that meaning! I felt as if I were wearing love, life and birth around my neck, swamped in it!

It was also wonderful just to have a house full of women, to talk all things-female, and to top it all off to have so many homebirthers in our home.The entire occasion was accompanied by the soundtrack I made with the birth and blessingway in mind weeks ago, lots of great feminine power music, like Tori and Ani Di Franco. It was such an incredible day, surrounded by so much love and excitement - just as pregnancy should be! I truly felt like a pregnant goddess who had been sufficiently worshipped.