Happy New Year!



As we prepare to ring in 2014, I thought it would be appropriate to have an old-fashioned Hogmanay celebration, as they might have celebrated it on Fraser's Ridge two hundred years ago.



This picture shows a cabin built around 1820 near Grandfather Mountain, NC (very close to where Fraser's Ridge is supposed to be located). I think this might look something like Bree and Roger's cabin, perhaps?
A firstfoot was to bring gifts to the house: an egg, a faggot of wood, a bit of salt--and a bit of whisky, thus insuring that the household would not lack for the necessities during the coming year.

(From THE FIERY CROSS by Diana Gabaldon, chapter 35, "Hogmanay". Copyright© 2001 by Diana Gabaldon. All rights reserved.)
I can't participate in a first-footing myself, even if I lived in Scotland (redheads being considered extremely bad luck on such an occasion), but I'd like to share these small tokens with you anyway.






Here's an article I found about Hogmanay Traditions in Scotland.  From what I can tell, the Hogmanay celebrations in Edinburgh are an even bigger deal than New Year's Eve in New York's Times Square!

Happy New Year, and best wishes to all of you in 2014!

3 comments

Sandra Gaskell said...

2014 definitly a good year with Moby being published and the series Outlander being aired . thats a good start

Diane Overcash said...

I am looking forward to the First Foot and Hogmanay celebration at Rural Hill farm in Huntersville, NC. tomorrow. We bring an ingredient for Stone Soup for lunch and walk the perimeter of the farm. Good friendships renewed each year.

Nenya said...

Happy New Year, Karen. :)

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