February 19-20, 2005

The weekend activities got under way Saturday evening at Herb and Suzanne’s homestead. Members and friends started to arrive around 5:00 p.m. bearing snack foods and beverages in preparation for the evening’s sumbel.

All visited, snacked and caught up on recent events until right before sundown when everyone gathered outdoors in the yard for a fireside sumbel. It was the inaugural lighting of Herb and Suzanne’s new fire pit, which was built especially with sumbels in mind.

Once the fire got going, sumbel commenced. Sumbel lasted well past the three standard rounds and was wrapped up with a very powerful mead offering to the Gods and Goddesses. Steve uncorked a bottle of his home-brewed mead as the kindred members each stood in a circle around the fire. Each participant then honored a God or Goddess of their choosing pouring a portion of the mead from the bottle into the fire. The bottle was passed from person to person around the circle until the bottle was emptied. It was an intensely powerful ritual, and right at the conclusion, the moon broke through a small hole in the clouds long enough to shine brightly upon us.

After sitting around the fire for a bit after sumbel, folks made their ways indoors to warm up and snack some more before eventually heading home for some rest.

Sunday, rather than having the usual Charming of the Plow blót, Thruðheim members once again gathered at Herb and Suzanne’s to hold a Thing where important kindred business was discussed. All members agreed that it was a successful Thing. Of course, as always at one of our gatherings, there were lots of tasty dishes brought for the feast. This time the fare included ravioli casserole, salmon balls, sausage and sauerkraut, casseroleR a la Bernhard, oriental salad, chicken, and much more.

Proceedings lasted until the early evening when members began their journeys home.