A Blessingway is a ceremonial gathering intended on adorning the expecting mama with love and positivity before she welcomes her new baby. Friends and family hear and share prayers, blessing the unborn child spiritually and emotionally. It’s an over pouring of goodness, and it’s exactly what I knew was right for Baby Morris!
I wanted something really intimate as opposed to the more lavish baby sprinkles I hosted for my first two children at Cafe Cortina. For baby #3, I invited my closest loved ones to my home on a Friday afternoon where we served food catered from Papa Joe’s. Our officiant DeAnnah from Boston Tea Room in Ferndale led the Blessingway, having everyone congregate in a circle while she cleansed the room with sage, waving a feather.
Every friend and family member anointed the candle I’ll light during labor, and also the candles they’ll individually light while I’m in labor. The candles sprinkled with herbs were all blessed with good luck and love, bonding us together. I wore a flower crown and white dress, barefoot. While in circle, everyone also shared how they knew me and some even read poems.
DeAnnah read this poem:
The most beautiful word on the lips of mankind is the word Mother, and the most beautiful call is the call of My mother. It is a word full of hope and love, a sweet and kind word coming from the depths of the heart. The mother is everything — she is our consolation in sorrow, our hope in misery, and our strength in weakness. She is the source of love, mercy, sympathy, and forgiveness. Everything in nature bespeaks her. The sun in the mother of earth and gives it its nourishment of heart; it never leaves the universe at night until it has put the earth to sleep to the son of the sea and the hymn of birds and brooks. And this earth is the mother of trees and flowers. It produces them, nurses them, and weans them. The trees and flowers become kind mothers of their great fruits and seeds. And the mother, the prototype of all existence, is the eternal spirit, full of beauty and love.
My Blessingway really emphasized the power of the circle, the cycle of life, of bringing women together. The afternoon was incredibly uplifting and meaningful. I didn’t want the focus on gifts but instead on the connection I feel to those in my life and my new baby.
If interested in hosting your own Blessingway and you’re in the Detroit Metro area, reach out to Boston Tea Room.