May Flowers

Talking today my mum bemoaned the youth for forgetting old traditions. She told us that when she was a wee lass on May Day all doorsteps would be covered with flowers. We asked her why this was done but she didn't know just that back in the 40s and 50s in small town Ireland everybody collected wild flowers and laid them on their doorsteps. Doing a little searching I found out that this came from a mixture of Celtic traditions of celebrating Bealtaine (May) and Roman celebrations of the goddess of Flowers. The flowers were to keep all evil spirits from the house and more specifically in Ireland to keep the pesky fairies from the door. I don't know about the fairies but I really like the idea of celebrating spring and bringing some colour and new life to the house. I might just revive this tradition next month and see of any of my neighbours follow suit?