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How to prepare home for summer

Weekly Topic: How to prepare your home for summer

May 30, 2023

How to decorate the house before summer?

Ukraine has a wonderful holiday for this. This is Trinity or "Green Sunday". We will celebrate this holiday this Sunday.
Our ancestors believed that the souls of the dead wake up on Green Week (before the Trinity). Not all of them have good intentions. And therefore, in order to drive evil spirits away from their homes, it was customary to decorate the house, the yard in front of it, and each room with different greenery, which scares away stray souls with its aroma. The floor was often covered with plantain, thyme, and wormwood, and a maple branch was placed outside.
 
The custom of decorating houses with greenery among Christians existed even in the times of the Old Testament Church when green twigs were placed near the houses at Pentecost in memory of the fact that on Mount Sinai, where Moses received the tablets with the Ten Commandments, everything blossomed and turned green.
Houses, gates, and even fences on the Trinity are decorated with various herbs. Commonly used: lemon balm, mint, cornflower, sedge, thyme, etc. It is customary to collect them the day before in order to bring them to the church in the morning for the service and consecrate them. Then these herbs are dried and kept in the house as a charm.
 
Sprigs of trees are suitable for decorating the house: maple, oak, linden, and birch. But it is forbidden to use willow and aspen. You can't decorate your home with aspen because, according to legend, Judas hanged himself on this tree. The willow is not broken because it has already given its branches on Palm Sunday.


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