Lupa
Imbolc has a variety of symbols associated with it besides sheep: fire, white and red, and the goddess Brigid. If you so choose, decorate your ritual area with these colors and symbols. You might drape your altar with red and white cloth; some may even wish to use a sheepskin. Candles, of course, are quite appropriate, though keep them away from the aforementioned sheepskin! If you wish to honor Brigid or other deities, include statues or other depictions of them.
Sheep Ritual
This ritual is centered on the spirit of Domestic Sheep, and so it’s a good idea to make her presence particularly prominent. While you can certainly include nice paintings and statues of sheep, nothing says you can’t also have an adorable stuffed toy lamb in attendance; just use whatever you have on hand. Some may choose to also have a sheep skull in addition to or instead of the sheepskin. Lamb or mutton is an appropriate food, especially with an evergreen herb like rosemary, and all prepared with great respect and gratitude. (You may wish to purchase the meat a few months in advance and keep it in the freezer, as it may be easier to find in the summer and fall when many sheep farmers are processing lambs.) For those of a vegetarian or vegan sort, or who don’t care for mutton, a “bread lamb” is also a perfectly good substitute, and there are lamb-shaped baking tins perfect for the job.
You will also want to have warm winter clothes in the circle with you. These can be ritual-only or your everyday cold weather gear, so long as they are clean. Have a warm, sweet (but not alcoholic) drink as well, preferably in an insulated container. Hot chocolate made with real milk is a particularly good option if resources and dietary restrictions allow.
Begin the ritual indoors. Do not light the candles yet; use an artificial light instead—the dimmer, the better. Cast your circle and invoke whatever entities you prefer in whatever manner you normally do so. Call on Sheep to join you:
I invite you, Ovis aries, she who has walked beside humans for thousands of years, to join me today (or tonight). Be with me, with your rounded belly and your warm wool and your nourishing milk, and be honored in this place.
Then curl up on the floor (you can add a cushion or fluffy blanket to make it more comfortable). As you feel Sheep arrive in your ritual area, imagine that you are a tiny lamb curled up within her womb, safe and warm. If you are celebrating alone, imagine these words, or if you are in a group, have one person say the following:
Greetings and joy to you, for this is a time of new life! But be wary as well, for safety is not assured. Let us go out to greet the world and see what it offers us. As I give my lambs warm wool to keep them safe, so now shall you don your own warm layers.
Get up and put on your winter clothing and pick up your warm drink. Go outside, whether that is into your yard or to walk around your neighborhood. As you cross the threshold from the warm indoors to the chilly outdoors, imagine that you are embracing this world for the very first time. Pay attention to how the cold air feels on your skin and how, even with the warm clothing you wear, you may still feel the chill. Imagine what it must be like to be a tiny newborn lamb being born into a day or night like this, or perhaps even colder, with only its mother to protect it.
Now, take a sip of your warm drink, and as you do, imagine these words or have someone in your group say them:
Blessings, little one, and welcome to the world! Though it be harsh, there is still much good in it. Feel the warmth of my milk and the nourishment it offers. Know that even in these cold times the spark of life still burns.
Head back indoors to your ritual area. Light the candles and let that be your only light, if practical. As you warm up again, continue to sip your drink, feeling the heat from within and without chase away the chill. Imagine that you are that tiny lamb curled up against the warm side of its mother, belly full of milk, and ready for a well-earned nap. (Be careful not to actually doze off—the ritual’s not quite done yet!)
Imagine or say these words:
All of life is like this, a blend of the cold and the warm, the safe and the dangerous, the joy and the sorrow. Today (or tonight) we stand on the precipice of change, and ahead we can smell the sweet flowers of spring, even as the chill of winter still nips at our heels. We ask you, Sheep, to guide us through these times, to show us that even those who are most taken for granted may yet have much strength and resilience to offer, and to let us always look at the world with clear eyes so we may truly appreciate what is there. We thank you, Sheep, for your time with us tonight, and we honor you this Imbolc!
Close the circle and see the deities and spirits off as you will, then extinguish the candles and finish that drink before it gets cold.