Winter Solstice Traditions

Tomorrow is the winter solstice, the shortest day of the year. In my Season Avatars world, it's also the birthday of Kay, the Winter Avatar, and an eventful day in Summon the Seasons. It's also a pretty eventful day in our world. Here are some traditions associated with the winter solstice:

1. Sharing food
2. Burning a Yule log
3. Visiting Stonehenge
4. Staying up all night to protect your family from evil.

(Source)

A local museum has a special winter solstice program where you can learn about some of the ancient legends surrounding the day while drinking cider around a fire.

Iceland has a cozy tradition of exchanging books, and reading them in bed all night while eating chocolate. Although this is a Christmas Eve tradition, it sounds like something I would do any night of the year.

Do you have any traditions for the solstice? If so, feel free to share them in the comments.

Happy Summer Solstice!

The summer solstice was technically last night in the Northern Hemisphere, but I figure it's not too late to celebrate with some music, both really old:



and a little newer:



Also, happy birthday to Jenna, the Summer Avatar and heroine of Chaos Season!

Seasonal Stories on the Sagan Now Out

This year, I managed to write not just one, but two seasonal science fiction stories set on the spaceship Sagan (which is part of my Catalyst Chronicles universe). I bundled them together under the title "Seasonal Stories from the Sagan."  Here are the story descriptions:

"A Solstice in Space"--Cass wants to celebrate the winter solstice with her friends and family, but they don't share her pagan beliefs. Can they create a ceremony that respects everyone's beliefs, or will she have to observe the solstice by herself? And how can you celebrate a solstice when you're not even on a planet?

"Snowballs in Space"--Paul's plans to have a snowball fight with his friends may land him in hot water with the Sagan's officers when he "borrows" a lot of materials to make fake snow.

There are spoilers for Twinned Universes in the stories, but I tried to make them able to stand on their own.

This bundle is available for $0.99 on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, iTunes, Kobo, Scribd, and Inktera. I hope you check it out!

P.S. This was my first time publishing through Draft2Digitial, and it was a very quick and easy process. It doesn't have all the features of Smashwords, but I will definitely use them again.