The Whistle Pig's Shadow

Yesterday's weather report (5o degress! coming soon) has gotten me contemplating the arrival of spring. The Vernal Equiqnox will soon be on the horizon, followed by the first Sunday after the first full moon.

That got me to thinking about Whistle Pigs and Shadows. Where I live, he ALWAYS sees his shadow and we ALWAYS get AT LEAST six more weeks of winter. It suddently occured to me how convenient it was that about six weeks from Groundhog Day was the Spring Equinox! Could this be a coinsidence? No!

Way back when, around the fifth century, the European Celts believed that animals had certain supernatural powers on special days that were half-way between the Winter Solstice and Spring Equinox.

Add to this, folklore from Germany and France that said when marmots and bears came out of their winter dens too early, they were frightened by their shadow and retreated back inside for four to six weeks.

End result: Groundhog's day (but I prefer to call them Whistle Pigs). Don't you just love it? You can find other interesting facts about the origin of GHD is at Wikipeida.

Above is my tribute to spring, something I'm stitching for an Prairie Schooler exchange. The stitching is done, but not the finishing.