Honey Moon and Autumn Sun

We had the absolute honour of being the place Zainab and Paddy chose to celebrate their honeymoon in September!

Having had their ceremony in Manchester, and living in Belfast they came to us for a week of relaxing. Of course we also got them involved in a bit of dinner prep and fermenting!

Paddy is quite the chief, so we were exchanging ideas along the way.

Since the couple have mediation practices and are linked to the Plum Village community, it was wonderful to spend the autumn equinox together.

We got up while it was still dark and drove to a neighbouring project in silence. We were Marcia, Alex, Zainab, Paddy and me. Nick and Chloe, guardians of Kayalani Nada welcomed us to join in a beautiful silent mediation while we watched the sun rise. Then a beautiful gentle set of asanas led by Nick to salute the autumn sun.

Afterwards Chloe invited us all to chose a ribbon to tie on the wishing tree…

And we processed, still in silence to the special tree…

where we tied them and made our intentions.

What a precious morning, with precious people! We were also joined by

local friends Laura and Cali.Thanks for having us Nick and Chloe! Hope to make this an annual gathering.

Paddy and Zainab stayed a few more days and then had the final days before flying to Dublin by the beach. We look forward to seeing them again at the Mount of Oaks.

Special thanks to Nick Upton for several of the snaps in this piece. x

2018