Jim: Happy birthday to ya. We're talking about birthdays this week on Knit A Spell!
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Jim: Is it your birthday? Are you a Virgo?
Katie: It was my birthday yesterday.
Jim: What?
Jim: Wait, I thought you, weren't gonna be out about when your birthday is. Aren't you a, don't make a big deal about my birthday person?
Katie: Yeah. There's a lot of people out there who love to celebrate a birthday, Jim.
Jim: Hello? I'm here.
Katie: That's right. Yep. I don't know if that's like a fire sign thing. But for me, I could just see it as another day that goes by without doing anything outta the ordinary.
Jim: And all of us who like big birthdays are like, oh no, we have to send you like a balloon gram and 18 people dancing on your porch and like a surprise birthday party.
Katie: Yes. The thing of nightmares for me. You're gonna surprise something on me. Oh, good. Virgos. Love to be surprised.
Jim: Yeah. I've learned from my husband, give them the birthday that they want. Not the birthday that you want.
Katie: There you go. Yes, exactly.
Katie: I prefer just like a nice meal and that's about it. But for others, it's a whole thing. Jim, what do you like to do for your birthday? I said as if I wasn't aware.
Jim: So I like to have a great big party on my birthday, and I always like the party to have some kind of fun theme that makes it fun for everyone attending.
Jim: And I like to adjust the party so that it's kind to both the introvert and the extrovert, for all the different ranges fabulous and interesting friends that I have.
Jim: I also love the party and I mix everyone together. So I mix my witchy friends and my muggle friends and my corporate friends and the neighbors and everyone together into the dish into our home. And I love watching people interact and it's gives me no end of delight.
Jim: And what happens is people always say, I meet the most fascinating people at your party, or that was the most interesting conversation. It's just a lot of fun.
Katie: I can vouch for that. It's true.
Jim: I like big parties with big themes and lots of fun for everybody. That's my favorite birthday party.
Katie: I will happily attend something like that. So I'm down for helping you celebrate and getting everything together to make it as awesome for you as you want. Yeah. I love that. Yes.
Katie: Are you a birthday magic practicer? I was reflecting on this earlier and I was like, I have only blown out birthday candles and I didn't even think that was magical at the time. Even though it was literally make a wish.
Jim: You gotta be real careful about, my Aquarius husband on how birthdays are done. We've gotten some fun birthdays in though with him. He has this cute little way about his traditions and if you're not gonna have the birthday cake and blow out the candles, then it isn't really your birthday. You haven't completed the ritual.
Jim: At first I'm like, it's such a cute little tradition. But it's more than that because it really is the ritual. He refers to it as the birthday ritual for the magic of it.
Jim: It is almost like you haven't turned the age or you haven't completed that ritual.
Jim: I think that in our north American culture, that idea of having a candle, blowing out a candle, having some kind of fire, making a wish, those things are so iconic.
Jim: So part of the meaning of your birthday, that it becomes a ritual and we can put magic to that. That can actually be candle magic that we're doing. And then we're eating that intention as we eat that slice of cake, even if it's just a bite.
Katie: Oh yeah. Duh, again, like these so obvious things that I didn't quite put the connections together. And it's funny because in our second half, we're gonna go over a bunch of superstitions and rituals and traditions for birthdays. But one of which I feel like is probably appropriate just to mention now is how some cultures will put things in the cake to be eaten too, or found maybe not to be eaten, but as like a treasure, I think right away to king cake.
Jim: Around Mardi gras. You find the little golden baby in your king cake.
Jim: One of the other ways that birthdays are magical is what is an actual birthday represent?
Jim: Something called your solar return.
Katie: I've heard this term before. What is that exactly?
Jim: What does that mean? So this is what's happening. Your birthday is on what was yesterday? September 13th. Now everyone knows. Oh no. Cards can be sent to Knit A Spell, PO Box... Money can be sent to... I'm kidding.
Jim: Join our Patreon.
Katie: That's the that's even better.
Jim: Yes. That's what Katie wants.
Katie: I actually would enjoy that, yes.
Jim: So we look at what are we doing? We're doing something annually. Everything has an annual anniversary, an annual time when, oh, if we do something every year on September 13th, that is the annual date.
Jim: What happens? How do we measure the year? We measure the year with the sun. So the sun is returning to the same spot it was on that day. So it's the return. We talk about, your Saturn return. That's when the Saturn is in the same position, it was when you were born, you have a return of all the planets and celestial bodies.
Jim: Your lunar return happens like every 28 days, all the time. It's always going through your sign that you were born. I'm a Taurus moon. So moon is in Taurus every month. That happens quite often, but the solar return happens annually happens once a year.
Katie: And this is the sun sign then?
Jim: Yeah, this is when the sun is back in the Virgo on September 13th. And for me, it's March 29th. And for everyone it's on your birthday, the sun has returned to where it was when you were born. And so we talk about this as your solar return and your solar return is going to be the exact moment the sun was when you were born and you can figure out when your exact solar return, all the planetary stuff will be different from when you were born, but the sun will be in that same degree and minute, and you can look at that and you can look at that chart for that moment and do a reading astrologically on what's happening. And it's always very interesting to look at your solar returns for each of the years and what's happening. So that's another thing to do for your birthday astrology for your solar return.
Katie: As a planner, I love that idea, because then that's you're jumping off point for having what you want your upcoming year to be or the energy. Yeah.
Jim: It can set the tone. It can be a jumping off point. It can be a things to reflect on for the year. Some fabulous ideas there.
Katie: Similar to that, I also slightly familiar with the numerology side of things, where we come to like things like the life path number. That's yet another layer of how you could break down your personality type and what maybe you're here for and all of that sort of thing.
Jim: So remind everyone, how do you calculate your life path number again?
Katie: You just break down your birth date into numbers and then add up each one individually.
Katie: And if it adds up to a two digit number, you add those together to reduce down to the final number. So for example, I would add nine plus one plus three plus one plus nine plus eight plus five to get the total number, which I think was 36, which then reduces down to nine.
Katie: So my life path number is nine.
Jim: Okay. And then the number nine has a meaning in numerology as a life path number. Which means things like...
Katie: Generally numerology nine is completion. It's learning all of the lessons and a culmination before adding on another layer on top.
Jim: If I do the same with mine, I'm a life path five. So I think that's when I look it up, it's resourceful, ambitious, focused on objectives, putting heart and energy into work and personal projects. But also I can be unpredictable, find it hard to commit things I can be easily bored and distracted.
Katie: Do you find that kind of rings true for you?
Jim: It seems to ring true.
Jim: Some people also connect those numbers with the tarot cards. I know that the five is the hierophant and the nine what's the nine card?
Katie: This won't come as a shock. It's the hermit
Jim: oh, gee, of course the hermit.
Katie: I'm just drowning and energy of the Virgo-ness.
Jim: Yeah. That's where we get the term Light From Lantern from your company, right?
Katie: That's it. Yep.
Jim: So this is really interesting that you've really embraced that hermit. And does the hermit and the life path nine seem to connect for you?
Katie: I would say so. I always feel like I'm trying to put things together. If I'm learning something, it always seems like I have to do it the hard way in order to learn it all. Some of the like lesser good characteristics are more jaded qualities, which I certainly have a tendency to go towards that initially.
Jim: It sounds actually one of my favorite qualities about you. Thanks. The girl can cast some shade. It's fun.
Jim: I just like the game of it.
Jim: Super fun. Yeah. I love that. So for me, the hierophant as the teacher, but also the learner in that I don't like the necessarily the Christianized version of that, but I like other sort of versions of the hierophant as the one who shares and learns wisdom.
Katie: More like the guru energy that Linda had in her deck with the secondary h ierophant card.
Jim: In the Northern Animal Tarot. I resist the term guru, but I like the idea of one who is both the student and the teacher at the same time. How it's that reciprocal sort of cyclical pre slash accolade.
Katie: I would say that suits you.
Jim: I love these ideas around birthdays. I wonder if people have their own association with birthdays? And I think along with this background of birthdays, we also have a lot of really fun and creative crafts and there's also little traditions and little things people do.
Jim: I can think of some of them right off the top of the bat candles and gifts and cakes and little things we do. Is that what we wanna talk about after the break?
Jim: Yes. It will
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Katie: Happy birthday. You're 16 years old and you know what that means. You can legally get your driver's license now. Yay.
Jim: I've been driving for six months with my permit, so whatever.
Katie: Now you don't have to have your dad in the car with you anymore. So score.
Jim: Yay. I've already crashed the car twice.
Katie: Ah so birthday freedom sometimes comes at a cost.
Jim: If my parents are listening, they're having flashbacks.
Katie: If mine are listening, they're like, you didn't do anything anyway. So we were never worried. Remember the hermit? That was me.
Jim: It's interesting because that's right. In this country, in North America and many other countries, why birthdays become important is there are legal ramifications of when you actually turn a specific age. So at 11:59 or midnight, you turn an age. You go from 15 to 16 years old and you're legal to drive.
Jim: In the United States you go from 20 to 21, you're legal to drink. You go from 17 to 18, you become legally an adult . Are 18 year olds actually adults? The jury's out. But in this country, we look at these legal definitions of a minor to an adult, all these things.
Jim: And legal definitions matter with age. And so I think that's also a foundational definition in different countries and different countries have different drinking ages, different ages for driving. You can drink at age 21, but you can't rent a car.
Katie: You can join the army at age 18, but you can't drink until 21.
Katie: Makes sense.
Jim: Very odd nonsensical rules. But it's interesting to think of coming of age rituals in other cultures, and you looked up some of those too. Some of them are very interesting.
Katie: Oh yes. You might be aware of quinceañera, when you turn 15, you become a woman in Hispanic cultures.
Jim: In Jewish cultures, you have your bar mitzvah bat mitzvah at age 13.
Katie: Even here you have a sweet 16 party. I didn't have one, but I remember that was very popular.
Jim: In Japan, a coming of age day is when you turn 20 far more reasonable.
Katie: I saw like for example, in Irish tradition, you are given the keys to the house when you turn 21. I'm guessing that is also like a similar coming of age, like adulthood?
Katie: And I saw that in a couple of other cultures too. And again, it's interesting that it's keys, right?
Jim: It reminds me of how people jump the broom over the door or the lintel of the house, or some of those sort of symbolism when you get married.
Jim: And how when you turn of age, you are given responsibility for the home you live in probably still with your parents. But you're given that responsibility. I think of when I was finally cognitively able to make better adult decisions, and those two years between age 18 and 20 or 21, 3 years, those were really important.
Jim: And I think I was a much more mature person at age 21 than I was at 18. So I think that it makes sense to me. I start to think of my adulthood beginning at around age 20 ish, more than around age 18. Even though it's only two years, I think it made a big difference. Graduating from high school, getting out in the world, having a job.
Jim: Which also makes me think, gosh, I've only been an adult for 30 years. So give myself a break.
Katie: Yeah, come on. You have plenty of time to figure it out.
Jim: That's right.
Katie: And also nobody ever figures it out, so don't worry about it.
Jim: Well around birthdays, we have a lot of really fun traditions and little things that are done in different cultures. Here in north America, we know a lot of the traditional things. It's a very funny, the things that are important, like you're not supposed to know what I'm doing in the kitchen.
Jim: As I'm sneaking around getting the cake ready, getting the candles ready, and then sneaking around the corner, turning out the lights. You know what I'm doing. But it's supposed to be a little bit of a I appear around the corner with a cake all aflamed with candles, and the lights are out and we are all gonna sing the durge.
Jim: But it's so funny because when I get up to do that and it's anyone's birthday and our lovely Michael is there, he's: here it comes the birthday. And I'm like, hey, be quiet. Come on.
Jim: He's just saying what's actually going to happen. It's not like anyone doesn't know what's happening, but you're not supposed to say. It's very funny to me.
Katie: Birthday timing is a thing. In some cultures, like Germany, if you wish someone happy birthday before it's their actual birthday, bad luck. Don't do.
Jim: Yeah. It's so fascinating. All the little things that go around it, we know there's cake and candles in many cultures. There's not in all cultures. And there's other little things around that. Do you talk about it? Do you tell people what your wish is? Do you blow out all the candles in one breath or two?
Jim: Yeah. Wishing someone a happy birthday before their birthday. I didn't know that about Germany. Do you give gifts and do you open the gifts before or after the cake? You can't open the presents until after the cake or you can open the presents before the cake.
Jim: And gift giving at birthday time. Is it a big deal or a small deal?
Katie: And is it important when you give, like before, after, on? All magical timing.
Jim: And there's like we said, hiding objects in the cake, choking objects, choking hazard.
Katie: Yes. Whether it's little babies or coins or other lucky bobbles and charms, because anything can be a magical item if you want it to be. Or a little present. If you don't choke on it, you can wear it. Wonderful.
Jim: I think that birthdays can be a source of good luck.
Jim: When we talk about the astrology, we talk about bringing people together, wishing us love knowing that, we're still here. I know there's some traditions where people have thanked their parents for life. That there's this idea of respecting their parents and just saying you're the source of me, so thank you.
Jim: Which I think could also be problematic for some people that have a terrible relationship with their parents. Also thank ing maybe the earth or their friends or other people around them, so I can see how coming together, bringing everyone together as good luck and as good fortune can be a really fun thing.
Jim: As I get older, we have birthday parties for kids. I have birthday parties cuz I don't care.
Katie: Yeah. You just like to party.
Jim: Like to party. You found this cool thing about coming of age in Japan.
Katie: Oh yes. It turns out at certain age you become an adult. However, when you hit 61 in Japan, you get your second childhood. For that first year you wear a red hat and vest to symbolize your return to childhood. And from that point on all of your past troubles are forgotten and you're given the gift of a clean slate, sort of a rebirth of the soul.
Katie: And in Korea, it happens at age 60. So if you go to Korea, you can celebrate it at 60. Then you go back to Japan and you can do it at 61. You can have two years of child bliss.
Jim: I see that this is called kanreki in Japanese. I am 100% doing this. This is my conki.
Katie: I will make the hat and vest to make sure it is up to the level of your satisfaction. Cuz it
Katie: must be fabulous.
Jim: Yeah, my new childhood. I am going to just be a baby from then on.
Katie: Wonderful.
Jim: That's not a good idea.
Katie: What other things do we have?
Jim: There's the thing that I hate, which is the torture. So birthdays and torture. The Italian earlobe pulling or the American birthday spanking or like the punching of the arm.
Jim: You're 40 years old. I'm gonna punch you 40 times. I think that there is this sort of origin, like the Italian earlobe pulling is this idea that it's to strengthen you or this idea that it is to give you vim and vigor.
Katie: Like a reflection of wisdom.
Jim: Yeah. Or to toughen you up or to get, or wake you up, like slap you across the face. And so I think that these probably come from the desire to invigorate a human. I think that they have devolved in some cases into hazing or how come it's your birthday and not mine type of jealousy, frat boy, dude, bro, toxic bullshit. I'm not really a fan of these sorts of things. What do you think about these things?
Katie: As a person who doesn't like much of a birthday celebration to begin with, this is not my favorite aspect of it either. Keep it off of my person. Thanks.
Jim: I think consent would be important in this arena.
Katie: Consent continues to be cool.
Jim: Funny, how consent continues to have it's day in the sun.
Katie: Yeah, it like may never get old.
Jim: There's all kinds of other things like superstitions. Some people have unfortunate birthdays, like leap-year birthdays.
Katie: Okay. You are gonna out me on this too.
Jim: What?
Katie: I was born on a Friday the 13th.
Jim: Yes. That's like the best day to be born on.
Katie: I've never considered it to be bad luck.
Katie: If anything, I've maybe thought maybe this is my only good luck day is on a Friday the 13th. So yes, I embrace it.
Jim: On Friday, the 13th. That is so freaking awesome. That is so badass.
Katie: A new moon Friday the 13th.
Jim: Friday the 13th on a dark moon. You are witchy AF.
Katie: Yeah. I brought a lot over.
Jim: Welcome to the dark side.
Katie: I like it here.
Jim: You seem so sweet. And you look at her whole like aesthetic and it's hi, welcome to the woods. I'm Katie Rempe. Welcome to the dark.
Katie: Yes. So things like that. Yes. A leap year. Gosh, to be born on a leap year.
Katie: Do you ever only get to be like 14 years old by the time you die?
Jim: Yeah, you're only one fourth, your age.
Katie: Oh, interesting.
Jim: Or your birthday is Christmas Eve. That's my dad. My dad's birthday is Christmas Eve. So we had the house decorated for birthday with balloons and streamers.
Jim: And then Christmas Eve, we decorate for Christmas. My mom was very, it is dad's birthday. And then yes, now it's Jesus's birthday.
Katie: You know what? That's nice.
Jim: Completely different vibes.
Katie: I'm sure that was a fun day for your mom.
Jim: We all celebrate christmas after Christmas for 12 days. Old fashioned Christmas. Unlike every other American.
Katie: Fun way to celebrate.
Katie: Yeah. It was not fun.
Jim: It was opposite everyone else. So was pain.
Jim: So I think there's some unlucky birthday. I wanna know if you have an unlucky birthday, like a day that you're like, I wish my birthday was on a different day because of this reason I would love to know what's the lousiest day or the best day to have your birthday.
Jim: Yeah. My birthday always falls on this particular day and here's why you wouldn't think it's a bummer, but it is. I totally wanna know that. Wouldn't that be fun for listeners to write us?
Katie: I can share one more. So my brother, his birthday is Valentine's day. Talk about struggle. He is not the romantic type.
Jim: What if there's a listener that had that one? Yes, I would love that.
Katie: But maybe for someone else it's like the best day to have their birthday.
Jim: Maybe it's a good day. If your birthday's on a holiday or on some event.
Katie: What if your birthday was on Halloween? I would love that, but other people would probably totally freaked.
Jim: My sister-in-law's birthday is on Halloween.
Katie: See, so cool.
Jim: That would make you a total Scorpio.
Katie: I love Scorpio. So I'm down.
Jim: If you were born before 2001, and you had this wonderful Virgo with a beautiful early, very early, late summer birthday of September 11th. That would suck.
Katie: The woman I used to babysit for her birthday was September 11th. And that always was a tough day after that for quite a while.
Katie: Now I'm really dying to know. So please let us know if you have an interesting birth date for whatever the reason may be. Whether it's positive or a negative or neither, just an interesting date. We would like to know, so drop us, email, knitaspellpodcast@ gmail.com. Or you can drop us a DM on our Instagram.
Katie: Join our Patreon and join the conversation there. We'd love to have you.
Jim: And our Patreon will have extended comments. We often get into really cool conversations. Our Paton is so much fun.
Jim: Let's end with some other little things. There's all kinds of interesting things in China. There's a new year's tradition that has also done, my understanding is at birthdays. Which is a lot of sympathetic magic around what you eat. So if you eat something long, like long noodles, it's often associated with long life. So eating super long noodles is associated with long life.
Jim: You might have a bowl that looks like it's full of the noodle soup, but it's really just one noodle and you just keep eating it.
Katie: Slur it up. In Australia we found that children will eat a dish called fairy bread. It's popular snack with bread and butter that's covered with tiny sprinkles, known as hundreds and thousands. And they're also usually given a key to the house when they turn 21. So they're the keys to the house again.
Jim: I want fairy bread.
Katie: I'll make it for you next year. Maybe that's the theme fairy bread. It's back bitches.
Katie: In India, you can give people a cake shaped like a peach. It's a lucky symbol.
Katie: In Pennsylvania, you can get a donut for your birthday, which is like you're gonna live another year. I wonder if that's because of its little round shape or something.
Katie: So many delicious traditions. I want them all.
Jim: I know now I'm hungry for cake.
Katie: Yeah, exactly.
Jim: Let's go get a donut.
Katie: Okay. Actually one year for my birthday, we did do a donut crawl in Tacoma. I think we went to five different independently owned donut locations. And let me tell you, don't get a dozen donuts at every place you go to. If you plan to go to more than one donut place, that was a lesson I learned that year.
Jim: Pro tip for your donut crawl on your birthday.
Katie: If you wanna live to see the next birthday, maybe spread it out a little.
Jim: So funny. Happy birthday to all the Virgos and to you, Katie, this has been a lot of fun.
Jim: Do magic with your birthday. Think about how your cake can have herbs, how every herb you put in your cake, every spice, every ingredient, the candles, can be magical. The astrology of your date of birth and your solar return can be magical. You can use these in you're crafting. You can craft and bake and deliver a magical birthday.
Jim: And I wish you a magical birthday this year, every year. And we'll see you next time on Knit A Spell.
Katie: See you then everyone.
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