My new favorite artist!

Okay, so I'm fickle. But my newest favorite artist is SJ Tucker. I was introduced to her via the Wigglian Way podcast, and I absolutely LOVE her- check her out at http://www.last.fm/music/S.J.+Tucker.

Here comes the festival of lights!

Every week, on Wednesday, I go to my parents' house and visit with my sister, mom, granny and cousins. It's a nice break in the week. I'll be heading out pretty soon, here.

I'm excited about Imbolc. I think I might try my hand at a "tablescape" and make dinner for my husband and I on Monday night. Originally, I wanted to do it on Imbolc eve, since in Celtic culture, celebrations lasted from sundown the previous day until sundown the day of the holiday. But, the superbowl is interfering with my plan! I'm planning on making potato skins to take to my in-laws for the game, and I'll be able to use the potato leftovers in my (infamous) potato soup! That's what I'll be serving for Imbolc. Potato soup- I'm going to try to get some bread bowls, or make biscuits, and we'll have salad and soup. Ben is a veggie, so I'll have some substitutions, but it still tastes pretty good. Pretty fitting for the feast day of an Irish goddess, methinks.

My groups Imbolc celebration is the following Saturday evening. Tomorrow night I get together with my right-hand woman to nail down the deets for this circle. I have a bunch of ideas, but it might lead to a somewhat complex celebration. One of my personal goals this year is to let the celebration spill over from circle into activities preceding or following the actual rite. We used to sort of do this, but have gotten away from it in months past. I'll post pictures at the coven blog at http://twilightmooncoven.blogspot.com/ and possibly cross-post them here, too. I'm a big fan of Brighid (and her sister hearth goddess Hestia), and so this day is pretty important to me, and it has been in the past. My meditations have been leading me back to my heritage, and the Celtic pantheon, which is frustrating, because I'm consciously drawn to the path of the Greeks.

I have a new EMF meter, which is interesting and exciting. I have an investigation or two lined up in the near future, and I'll post my findings on http://paranormalproject.blogspot.com/ of course. Could I have ANY more blogs? Course I could - I also have one dedicated to the advertising industry from the viewpoint of a peon, but I'll wait until I have a bit of content before I share that one with anyone.

I hope everyone is blessed on this cool winters evening.

Great Lady Brighid!
Daughter of the Dagda,
Wife to Bres,
Exalted One,
She who makes her home at Kildare,
Bright Fiery Power!
She who inspires poets and writers, hearth Mother,
She who honors, Heals and promotes the family,
Patronness of the arts, and smithcraft,
Bright Maiden!
Come to us tonight!
As we honor you on your festival day!

Things that have made my day recently.

Well, I've been going through a pretty tough time lately, living on PB&J and Ben living on ramen. Having help from our families isn't easy for me, either, though I am desperately appreciative. So, these things, said from my students in my online class make me feel as though I'm really making a difference and helping some other people. These quotes are from students in my second lesson where we analyze spells as they relate to Issac Bonewits' Laws of Magic.

I like it that way (difficult), if it is too easy, I'm not challenged, if I'm not challenged, I don't have to think and if I don't have to think, I don't learn anything I like this course very much so far. ~ Morred

This one (lesson) kind of drained me. LOL! It was fun though. ~ Michelle

I agree it was alot to work with. But I learned ALOT. ~Viviane

I'm also enjoying this class a lot! ~ Cara

Both assignments took me a couple hours to do, so I'm not sure if it was difficult or just was long to do. But I loved it cause I found that breaking down a spell can help you see where you went wrong or left something out if it didn't work or it backfired. ~Willow

I thought the lesson was kinda hard (my dad teaches me and he tends to go easy) but overall I really enjoyed learning it and working on it. ~Cara

I decided to instead use one of my spells that I had messed up on caused havock for the whole family, and I'm 99.9% that I figured out the problem after breaking it down! This doesn't mean I'm ever going to try it again, but it's cool to see what I did wrong and know that I shouldn't do that next time! ~Cara

I like it that way, if it is too easy, I'm not challenged, if I'm not challenged, I don't have to think and if I don't have to think, I don't learn anything I like this course very much so far. ~Morred

I'm really enjoying this class so far. I agree that breaking down the spells was a challenge but that's what made it great! ~ Willow

I agree it was alot to work with. But I learned ALOT. I realize how much I don't know. ~Viviane

I am so blessed to have such insightful and interested and interesting students. :) Enrollment is still open for the class, we are only on week 2 if you are interested. :) http://www.circleofteaching.org .

Possible Menu for Imbolc (01/12/09)

I've been thinking about what to make for Imbolc. I want to make the holidays special and important at home, so I'm thinking about creating a yummy menu and leaving work early that day to prepare. I'm gonna post recipes that I'm thinking of making...

Savory Cheese Biscuits
Ingredients
2 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1 1/2 cups (3 sticks) butter, cut into small pieces and chilled
1/4 pound Jarlsberg cheese, shredded (1 cup)
1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese
1 tsp fresh rosemary, chopped
1 tsp fresh thyme, chopped
1/2 tsp garlic salt
1/8 tsp ground nutmeg
1/8 tsp cayenne pepper
1 large egg yolk
1 tbsp cold water
1 tbsp coarse sea salt

Directions
1. Heat oven to 350.
2. In food processor, pulse together with on-and-off motion flour, butter, Jarlsberg, Parmesan, rosemary, thyme, garlic salt, nutmeg and cayenne pepper until combined and mixture resembles small peas. Add egg yolk and water. Pulse until ball forms. If mixture is too dry, add 1 tsp water and pulse until dough comes together. Turn out onto lightly floured work surface; knead a few times to blend, if necessary. Divide dough in half.
3. On floured surface, roll out each half of dough to 1/4-inch thickness. Cut into star shapes using 2 1/2-inch star cookie cutter, flouring cutters well to avoid dough sticking to cutter. Place stars on ungreased baking sheet. Gather scraps together, reroll and cut out more stars for a total of 48. Sprinkle tops with coarse salt.
4. Bake in 350 oven for 18 minutes or until firm and lightly browned around edges. Let biscuits cool on baking sheets on wire racks for 2 minutes. Transfer biscuits to racks; let cool completely.
5. Lightly sprinkle paprika over biscuits, if desired. Store in airtight container at room temperature for up to 1 week.

Change (01/11/09)

Change can be a good thing, as well as a bad thing. This weekend it's a good thing. Saturday I spent unfocused. Esbat ritual was bad, as I made at least 5 mistakes. I'm disappointed in myself, but I know in my brain that everyone has those days, even those who are high priestesses.
On a positive note, I've reconciled my issue with eclecticism and my coven practice. I need to build an individual practice. So, thats my plan.

On another positive note, a spell I did following my circles esbat rite seems to have really changed me. I've had a different midset since I woke up this morning. Clarity. And a hyperawareness I haven't had in years. I don't know if its because of my spellwork, or what- but I'll take it.

We aren't doing well, financially (like the rest of the nation), my husband has been out of a job for almost 2 years now. Trying and trying and trying. He hates being home- he hates me working and him staying home. In his mind, he'd like me to be able to stay home. I've done much spellwork toward our financial stability. I don't know what else to do now, but I must trust in the Goddess, as I've learned many lessons in this tough time, and I now know that my husband and I can survive something like this.

Struggle (01/07/09)

So, originally I wanted to blog about the lack of good teen-oriented Pagan books, specifically citing SRW's Teen Witch. And I'll have to save that for later.

I'm having some internal issues. If you are of the witchy perspective, remember when you first discovered the path? The excitement and how everything was just. so. fascinating? And there was SO much to learn. So, what happens 12 years later, once you've learned a lot, put it into practice, experienced much? An abrupt change can happen. Something that shakes your faith up a bit. You can tell in my previous blog post that I'm having issues with the eclecticism of my path. I believe in eclecticism, but I feel like personally, its gone to far for me. Planning circles for my group is difficult, because its different every single time. And my group is very small, so although rituals are planned and written by the whole group, its still a lot of work. I feel as though if we focused on simply Celtic, Greek, Roman, Egyptian, Sumerian pantheons, that we'd be able to focus more. I feel unrooted. I honor who I honor, but my practices are so varied. And it puts me in a shitty place.

And so I meditated. I did a visualization pathworking, where I chose between the goddess that I know, and the unknown. The path I walked was to the unknown. It took me to a mirror, and looped me back on the path right back to the goddess. The Goddess threw back her cloak and it fell to the floor with nothing/no one underneath. Just a puddle of cloak on the floor. I asked for a sign, to help. I got a small box, inside was a music note, a harp, and a feeling of kinship. Which might lead me to the Celtic pantheon- which is interesting, because while I know they are the Gods of my ancestors, I've been drawn lately to the Greek Gods. So, I have a mirror- to look inside myself (or maybe AT myself, again the Celtic Gods), and allusions to the Celts (specifically Irish). *sigh* So, maybe thats what I need to do, even though I still am SO interested in the Greek pantheon, especially Artemis. Shit.

And all of this leads to the question- what of the group. If I am to immerse myself in Celtic culture, how am I to find time to devote to the group, and my studies? So much time is already taken up with the group.

On another note:I was on another forum tonight. I don't believe people who say that there isn't enough time to devote to their witchcraft studies. It's really a pet peeve of mine. Really? You don't have time? Take a book and put it by the toilet. That's something you can do and multi task. Make flash cards- I found an app for my ipod and created flash cards to learn the magickal properties of herbs and crystals. Its interesting to me, so I find time. Don't tell me that you went out last night and partied, but you don't have time to devote to your studies? Prioritize! I'm not saying that you MUST STUDY. But if you are interested, and want to learn something, don't bitch about the lack of time. Make flash cards and keep them in your purse. Make. The. Time.
Anyway, back to my issue. So, what can I do? Can't change the group- its not fair to them. Do I leave the group? It's so small as it is, I don't know what might happen.

Group Eclecticism can be Difficult. (12/29/08)

I am an eclectic Wiccan. My group honors deities from many pantheons. As the wheel turns, we have many different ways we can celebrate, as we honor many cultures and pantheons. This is wonderful, as some of us feel closer to Celtic gods, and others- Roman or Egyptian. While we stick with a Wiccan ritual format, we are able to play and explore many different cultures, and techniques. Coming up on our sixth year as a group, I feel as though this has been good for us. However, it's sometimes really difficult. As we have honored many different Gods, we've had to research so many god/desses and traditions. Sometimes I feel that it would be nice to be part of a tradition. One with a pantheon that I could become familiar with, and feel as though I 'know' more than just an acquaintance. I still love the idea of experimental ritual, but by getting to know the deities deeply, and using that culture as the basis for Sabbat circles, I feel as though we wouldn't have to reinvent the wheel every single month.

I've mentioned this to other witches before, and they say- well, why don't you change it? Well, its not "my" coven to change, first of all. Just because I'm the leader, it doesn't mean that I get to change things willy nilly. Its not mine to change. It belongs to all the sisters. And what pantheon would we change it to? The one that I want? We are separate people with separate personal deities. I'm drawn to Greek Gods, others Celtic, Roman or Egyptian. Who gets to make that choice? The eclecticism is one of the reasons we all chose our coven, that we'll be able to honor deities of our chosen pantheon at one time or another. It's been suggested (more than once) that we focus on one pantheon per quarter. But is that really enough time to establish a relationship with the Gods, to immerse ourselves in the culture and flavor of those ancient people? 3 esbats, 3 gatherings, 2 sabbats? And then what? We drop the Gods we've fostered this relationship with to start over? If its was simply reading and discussion, it would be different. But we are witches. We practice, we learn, we get hands on in the dirt, we try new things, we commune and pray and interact. And so, 3 months, or 6 months, or even a year seems noncommittal when it comes to deity.

Talk about being stuck between a rock and a hard place.