spinning spinning

And my thoughts they spinand I am left off balance, gasping waiting for the room to stillall those moments dancing by. lightning fast too swift to seeall jumbled. separate. melted. apart. turning ever more inwards towards that still. quiet. center towards the raucous celebration

The wheel keeps turning on and on and waits for no one to get their act together no matter what may be causing the detours. Looking back at the last year it's all a blur. but that's how it goes when you introduce a new human into the family they take up time and attention and then before you know it the harvest is in the days grow shorter and Samhain passes with the barest of attention and then it's Yule and time once again to plan for the future.

Once again I head into the lengthening days with the best of intentions and the knowledge that I will approach them with an open heart and mind. 

The above is an Etsy Treasury that I've just made. It illustrates how this year has seemed to go for me. The verse is my own also a little bit about how I've felt over the last twelve months. A little muddled, ecstatic, in control, out of control, loud, quiet, dancing, singing, crying; for there has been loss (I will miss you terribly Gran, every time I think to reach for the phone to have a visit the loss hits again) and laughter; for life goes on and it is impossible nit to laugh with two funny girls in my care.

On this longest darkest night I bend my thoughts to what I want to discard, burn in the flames that will light the dark tonight:

my tendency to over analyze and talk myself out of opportunity

And what I want to get out of the coming days:

a garden more abundant than last year, more art, more singing, more dancing, a re-entry into employment...

Magick Everyday, Everywhere

Over at the Balanced Witch, the second assignment (for lack of a better word) is to consider supposed “coincidences” and to try to look at it from a magickal point of view. I've written about my views of magick here, and here and I still believe that our intentions, the energy that we put out into the world we live in comes back to us. This is magick. Like quantum it's all around us.

I've been pummeling my poor little brain to think of other examples of how magickal energy works. My introduction to both my daughters jumped to mind but at first thought, both of those seemed to me to be less about active energy than passive.

For the Peanut I "met" her spirit on a Summer Land meditation during Samhain. As I was getting ready to leave that place I felt a hand resting in my right hand a sensation that has repeated over and over since she became a part of our little family. During the Summer Land meditation we meet with our beloved dead and the spirits of those who are meant to be in our lives in the future can introduce themselves. At the end of the journey they sometimes follow us back. The Peanut followed me back and I invited her to stay.

Before the Bean made her presence known last year (with a combination upset stomach and an uncontrollable desire for frosted croissants and poutine with dill pickles) we had come to the conclusion that the Peanut was going to be an only child. We'd been not not trying for a second child for three years and with no signs of pregnancy, we reluctantly decided it wasn't to be. Both the husband and I felt that if we were meant to have a second child it would happen, if not it wouldn't, no pressure.

It hadn't happened and we had no sooner acknowledged this to each other when I dreamed one night of kicks in my belly. I took this dream as my subconscious' way of mourning the loss of a second child; I'd mentioned to the husband that I would miss feeling the quickening of pregnancy. Little did I know, that the Bean was and is a real kicker. She spent a good portion on the inside working her leg muscles into the big juicy dumplings that still kick out at all hours of the day and night. Once we learned that we had a bean the dream took on a whole new meaning.

Both of those experiences were amazing and magickal, but not based in any overt active pursuit of a goal. As I mentioned, even though we had made the decision to have a child (and once the Peanut was thriving; children) we didn't do much more than stop practicing to have a baby. We weren't not trying to get pregnant. Of course we put our intentions out into the universe but only in as much as we wanted it to happen if it was supposed to happen.

Intention

I'm back at it, but taking a simpler route. Gone are the grandest of plans but not my desire to fulfill them (visions of copperplate handwriting with gorgeous Pre-Raphaelite like images in a hand bound book of shadows anyone?) I will one day create a book of shadows to rival any movie art department creation but to try to do so now is just asking for a project that will never be finished.

So I'm starting along my path again traveling towards the divine. I've got my stack of books, my reference web pages and it's a full moon what better time to begin? You know other than in November? But I'm impatient to get going so...

One of the web pages I'm using to follow on this path is The Balanced Witch she has a section titled 366 days of Magick which is exactly the type of book I was looking for when I decided to travel the road to dedication last year. I'm following along there and will be linking there as often as I can.

I know that keeping focused is going to be a challenge (for example: with my Momma brain I just spent three minutes trying to remember that "challenge" was the word I was thinking of there) I've got the Jelly Bean taking up a lot of time and energy on one side, The Peanut is on another side with her needs (she's starting school in the fall and she's been very gracious about the whole new little sister thing). Getting the time to study and put in the amount of work that this path requires in order to make it worthwhile will mean that I'll be going slowly. The wonderful thing about connecting with the divine is that it is always there, waiting for you. So step one is a statement of intention:

I am entering into a period of learning (and refreshing my knowledge) about witchcraft and connecting with the Goddess and the God through this period of re/education with the creation of a Book of Shadows in blog form. At the end of this journey I want to feel more in touch with deity and the faith that feels right to me; to have built a foundation on which I can make my faith an integral piece of my daily life.

Restart

It's nearing a year since I began doing a year and a day's worth of study. Of course that journey was derailed by the simultaneous journey of welcoming the Jelly Bean into our lives. For whatever reason the Bean was conceived in the same week that I started my studies and as the pregnancy went on with the morning sickness and tiredness and then the uncomfortableness of carrying a lot of extra weight and the aches and pains on top of all the extra appointments with doctors and specialists and personal emotional and family dramas; study took a backseat and then just exited the car all together.

While I'm not looking to take a year and a day (more like as long as it takes to get it done) I'm going to restart the journey. Fortunately for me there are a few more online resources to help out and I'm going to take full advantage of them. My goals are still the same, I'm looking to incorporate creativity into my practice and with my hands full of Peanut and Bean things I can't be doing things with hard and fast deadlines. I'm just looking to get it done in my own time.

Now, working without a specific deadline will be a challenge. I'm hoping that sharing my journey here will help spur me on.

So here's to a new beginning and many more posts to come. Soon.

dark days

Hormones are playing a big part in my day to day lately. Tears seem to be the norm and at least I know that they are being triggered and are not coming from out of left field because that would be bad. We're in the home stretch with the Bean and I'm not comfortable and I'm not able to focus on the things I'd like to do for Yule, and getting ready for the rest of the holidays just seems like too much work so I'm taking the pressure off.

Last year I packed one or three fun holiday related activities in each week leading up to Yule and christmas, this year we've managed one fun thing each week and this weeks was wrapped up with the hospital tour; we rode the bus home and looked at all the holiday lights on the bus route home.

I'd feel guilty about my lack of activity on this blog too, except that, again; I'm taking the pressure off. What I am doing is taking some time here and there, as things allow for it, to think forward to what I want to accomplish as the wheel of the year travels back towards longer days. I'm also considering all the things that I had put ahead of me over this last year. During the Yule ritual last year I put my intentions out for growth. Growth in my garden, growth in my creative life, growth in my spiritual path. Over all growth has been decidedly achieved, our family will grow by one in the new year. Our first garden was both a learning experience and a success. I'm looking forward to this year's planting. Over the last year I've made time to be creative more consistently and I've seen the benefits in both my personal life and in my spiritually.

So as the days become shorter, I hope to collect my thoughts about what I want for the next year.

Let it begin with each step we take

Sunday night I attended the 18th annual Vancouver Reclaiming Spiral Dance. I've gone to this public ritual on and off for the last 11 years and I always get something out of it.

The first year I went was especially powerful for me because during the meditation portion of the ritual I was able to connect to my Dad, who had passed on 12 years before. It was a very healing and cathartic experience and I look forward each year to passing through the thinning veil to connect with my beloved dead.

This year was the first time I've participated in the Spiral Dance while pregnant; with the Peanut I was out of town for the ritual and held a private ritual where I felt and welcomed her spirit into my life. I can still sometimes feel her spectral hand inside mine; a sensation that stuck with me as I traveled back through the veil after my visit to the Summerland that year. At the time I thought I was welcoming her spirit to come within the new year; little did I know she was already nestled inside and her hand was there in mine to tell that secret instead. My trip to the Summerland wasn't as specific this year as with the Peanut or my first trip. I felt the pull of more than one spirit when I stepped onto the shore and instead of a one on one or small gathering I felt enveloped in joy which was exactly what I needed.

The spiral this year was very energized and energizing; our intentions as well as the greater work of bringing healing to our earth fed into the cone and I could feel the room vibrating at the end with the energy and joy that the dance had built up.

I'll be keeping my personal work simple as usual. I'll take a moment to honour my beloved dead again on Samhain night and I'll be working some divination to see what's ahead this coming year. I like to use the time between Samhain and Yule to consider what seeds and goals I want to give birth to over the new year. One of those goals is to start incorporating a permanent altar space. How do you celebrate the new year of the Witches?

Alive and Thankful

If you read my other blog you know that I've been super busy launching a new product line for one of my Etsy shops. I don't like to spend a lot of time on the Etsy stuff with this blog; mainly because this blog isn't about pushing my art. But that's what's been taking up my time lately. Well that and the whole building a whole new little person. My focus has been a little scattered lately.

But it's Mabon and I wanted to mark the day.

Last Yule I planted a few seeds for the coming year; the year that is coming closer to it's end now. Since Mabon is all about thanksgiving and the harvest, I've decided to take stock of the seeds that I planted last December; the ones that are ripening and the ones that have come to fruition.

This year we planted our first garden. We've started to reap the benefits of growing our own food and already have plans to expand, dig out more space, grow more next year.

I have put more focus on being creative; hence the new product line and a steady (for the most part) stream of projects ranging from photography to painting and glass work and also some embroidered mixed media. Of course with the Bean making an appearance the steadiness has met a few bumps. Of course it could be said that baking the Bean is another type of creative act.

As for thanksgiving I have so much to be thankful for; The Peanut and the coming Bean and the health and happiness of both (as far as I know the Bean is both). The strength of my relationship with the Husband over the last year and how close we have grown. It has not been a simple as pie year but compared to 2009 we're sailing.

As is the case with most of the Sabbats and Esbats we celebrated simply. Dinner was a simple vegetable based soup made with some of the herbs from our garden served with corn muffins. Had Gestational Diabetes not been a factor I would have added a baked apple dessert to the feast as it is next year will see one on the table. The Peanut and I went for an after dinner walk and talked about what we are thankful for; her list of thanksgiving included dinosaurs and recycling.

How has your harvest been? What did you do to observe Mabon?