May 1st often called May Day is a day to celebrate spring. Many countries and cultures celebrate with special significance, in some it’s a day off or labor day some of the celebrations are reminiscent of fertility festivals of the ancient Germanic and Roman Civilizations.
Here are some suggestions to get your May Day celebration off to the right start!
This is usually either a young tree or a very high pole with a wreath of greens hung from the top, encircling it. Typically, long pieces of colored ribbon are attached to the top. A group of people will each grasp a piece of ribbon and dance in a circle around it, interweaving the ribbons to form a pattern around the pole. In the case of a May tree, the branches are decorated with colored ribbon.
Find a long pole or piece of wood/branch, around 10 feet or 3 meters tall. Attach ribbons at the top using a staple gun, hammer and nails or similar. One ribbon per dancer is adequate although a spare few can be helpful if you expect extra people to turn up. The ribbons should be about three quarters the length of the pole, long enough for the dancers to grab hold of but not so long they’re tripping over them.
If you can’t find a May Pole you can always make a May Pole cake like this one from marthastewart.com. All directions can be found on the link above or by clicking the image.
May Day Flowers Basket
Another May Day custom is the May Day flower basket. This is a celebration of spring after all! Getting a basket and filling it with flowers is easy! But something that a lot of people seem to like to do to help decorate for may day is to create May Day flower door hanging baskets.
Here are a few examples
Check out babble.com for a tutorial on how to build your own door hanger. You can click the link above or the image below.
