IRISH TO THE CORE

Join us for a LIVE Wild Geese Community Chat session centered around the intriguing possibility that "good ol' St. Nick" is actually buried on the grounds of Jerpoint Abbey in County Kilkenny . Our special guest for this chat will be Maeve O'Connell from …

In the spirit of giving, The Wild Geese community has adopted an Irish-American family from the Aisling Irish Community Center in metro New York. The family that we have chosen consists of a 13-year-old girl, an 11-year-old boy, and a 9-year-old boy, and mother and…

Join us for a LIVE Wild Geese Community Chat session all about the American Civil War at Christmastime. Battlefield behavior during the holidays is a fascinating subject, so this should make for quite the educational evening. Our special guest for this chat will be historian and…

Join us for a LIVE Wild Geese Community Chat session on Irish Christmas traditions.  Our special guest for this chat will be author and historian, Joe McGowan of County…

Christmas whitewashing: Around Christmastime, you’ll still find the odd farm building out in the Irish countryside that looks like it’s just been whitewashed. Long ago, farm families cleaned and then whitewashed every building on the farm in December. They were covered in…

I'll sing you home with me tonight

To Galway Bay & the old Hook Light

"O'Carolan's Lament" sung in harmony

I will sing you all home with me

It's Christmas in Montana, to be sure, draped in her mantle of white

Though I am here with the rest of the crew, my heart is lonely tonight

The rancher & his wife they take good care of the rest of the crew & me

The wife, she prepared a great feast…

Celtic myth had it that the robin that was suppose to represent the New Year killed the wren which represented the Old Year,  During this time Wren Boys blacken their faces and go from house to house asking for money to bury the wren. The money they collect is used to buy food and drink for the "wren dance" held…

IRISH TO THE CORE

I recently discovered the word "hiraeth" (HEER-eyeth) and the definition explained why I'd been feeling a bit lost these past months.  Do any of you know the word, and perhaps the feelings?

"(n.) a homesickness for a home to which you cannot return, a home which maybe never was; the nostalgia, the yearning, the grief for the lost places of your past."

This isn't just the holiday blues; I've felt like this for months, and this particular year was consistently stress-filled…