Ambergris: Lust, sex Anemone - health, protection, healing
Angelica: Protection, exorcism, remove curses and hexes, healing, visions, wards off negativity when sprinkled around the house, increases life energy bringing warmth of Fire element, wards off negativity when sprinkled around the houseĀ Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā
Anise: Divination, psychic awareness, joy, dreams, luck, love, enthusiasm, Winter Solstice, entices the spirits to aid in spells
Apple: Love, healing, garden blessing, buried in the garden on Samhain as food for the departing spirits, to be shared with one you love,Ā immortality, happiness, luck, broken heart, spirit food, the goddessĀ
Betony: Love, healing, burn at Litha for purification, protection; place under pillow to be rid of nightmares; sprinkle around doors to ward off despair, psychic awareness
Burdock: Protection, healing, wards off negativity, purifies, protects (washing floors or dried root on red string around the neck), happy home, clears space & holds the space safe, spirit of north
Comfrey: (TOXIC) Money, root or leaves for healing, carry for safe travel, protection, stress management, safe Journeys (Worldly or through Meditation) , Winter SolsticeĀ
Copal: Love, purification, exorcism, protection, spirituality, earth element, sets sacred space, allows guides and guidance to come
Dill: Love, lust, seeds draw money, leaves for protection, flowers for love
Dittany of Crete: Manifestations, astral projection
Dock: Money, healing, fertility
Dodder: Love divination, knot magic
Dogbane: Love
Dogwood: Protection, wishes
Dong Quai, Slices: Health, vitality, fire element rituals
Dragons Blood: Power, protection, exorcism, potency, love, courage, fortune, catalyst, magick power, strength, purification, stimulates action of other herbs in incense blend, stimulates movement of energy
Dulse: Harmony, lust
Dutchman's Breeches: Love
E
Ebony: Protection, power
Echinacea: Strengthening spells, health, strength, wards off negativity or undesirable energies
Edelweiss: Invisibility, bullet-proofing
Elder: (CAUTION: SEEDS ARE POISONOUS, TOXIC)Ā Money, wishes, theft protection, exorcism, healing, prosperity, sleep, wards negative thoughts when used as wind chimes, blessings, do not burn the wood of elder for it is sacred to Hecate, see fairies in the trees at Litha, flowers used as an alter offering, berries for esbat wine, flowers added to candle spells directed at hecate during the new moon, cleansing, offering
Foxglove: (CAUTION: POISONOUS, TOXIC) Faeries and elves, lust, grow in garden for protection of the house and yard
Fragrant Bedstraw: Love
Frankincense: Exorcism, purification, protection, spirituality, power, meditation, blessing, concentration, banishing, courage, divination, healing, love, purification, consecration, sets sacred space, sets safe space for guides to come in, spirit of east or north
Fumitory: Money, exorcism
Furz/egorse: Burn at Ostara for protection and as a preparation for any conflict
Ginger: Love, money, success, power, aphrodisiac, psychic ability, apathy, lust, good health, magickal power, fire element rituals, brings into existence, bringer of the manifestation, 3rd chakra vitality, inner strength, stimulates flow of energy, spirit of south
Ginseng: Longevity, sexual potency, protection, healing, love, lust, wishes, beauty, vitality, fertility, desire, encourages a long lasting affect, strength
Goat's Rue: Healing, health
Goldenrod: Prosperity, money, divination, luck
Goldenseal: Money, healing
Gorse: Protection, money
Gotu Kola: Meditation
Gourd: Protection
Grain: Protection
Grains of Paradise: Love, lust, luck, money, wishes
Hawthorne Berries: 4th chakra strength and vitality, love, contentment
Hazel: Luck, fertility, protection, wishes, nuts strung on cord in house or ritual room to invite the help of plant fairies, used for wands, healing, anti-lightning, love, aphrodisiac, wisdom, divination, mental powers, intelligence, inspiration
Heather: Luck, protection, red to start or end an affair, white for protection, purple for spiritual development, use at samhain to invite spirits to visit, rain making, spirituality
Hops: Healing, sleep, stress management, opens the channel in and out of the body in relationship with the universeĀ
Horehound: Exorcism, healing, purification, protection, mental clarity, balance, banishing, opens air element within body & in the world, opens channel for clear communication
Juniper: Protection, love, exorcism, health, anti-theft, banishing, peace, wishes, aphrodisiacs, sets sacred space, spirit of north
K
Kava Kava: Lust, protection while traveling, astral projection, visions, luck, visions, protection, love, opens one to receiving guidance and guides
Kelp: Wind spells, psychic powers, protection, connection to divine source through the physical and spiritual, unity, life-force strengthening, spirit of center
Knotweed: Health, binding spells, protection
L
Lady's Mantle: Love, self control
Lady's Slipper: Protection
Larch: Protection, anti-theft
Larkspur: Protection, health
Lavender: Protection, call in good spirits, love, sleep, longevity, happiness, peace, healing, burn for purification, peace, use in bath for purification, burn at Litha as an offering, psychic awareness, chastity, liberation, menopause, childbirth, grief or loss, youthful vigor, stress management, travel, anger management, attracts elves
Magnolia: Fidelity, past lives, peace, sex, broken heart, beauty, wisdom
Mahogany, Mountain: Anti-lightningĀ
Maidenhair: Beauty, love
Male Fern: Luck, love
Mallow: Love, protection, exorcism
Mandrake: (TOXIC) potency, exorcism, protection, fertility, money, love, health, protection, catalyst, prosperity, divination, increase psychic powers, aphrodisiacs, cursing enemies, building, banishing, protection in the subconscious, unconscious and underworld,
Maple: Money, longevity, love
Marigold: Prophetic dreams, protection, legal matters, marriage spells, enhanced psychic powers, pick in full sun, business and legal matters, clairvoyant dreams, mixed with water and rubbed on the eyelids to see fairies
Motherwort: Balances within, self empowerment, 2nd chakra
Mugwort: Astral projection, strength, psychic powers, protection, prophetic dreams, healing, divination, rub fresh herb on crystal balls and magick mirrors to increase their strength, pick on full moon night, clairvoyance, purification, sex, renewal, fertility, clearing, sleep, visions, opens one to the teachings of the subconscious and unconscious self, 6th and 7th chakras
Mulberry: Protection, strength
Mullein: Exorcism, health, protection, courage, love divination, calling spirits, dreams, opens life energy flow through the body
Persimmon: Healing, luck, changing sex, insight into others
Petitgrain: Protection
Pilot Weed: Protection
Pimento: Love
Pimpernel: Protection, health
Pine: (TOXIC) Protection, exorcism, money, healing, fertility, brush outdoor ritual area with a branch to purify and sanctify, burn for cleansing, needles in money spells, spirituality, gambling, dreams, cleansing, banishing, purification, prosperity, employment, birth, rebirth, strength, life and immortalityĀ
Rowan: Protection, success, psychic powers, healing, power, wands and amulets for knowledge, incense of leaves and berries for divination, fires to call upon spirits for help, grow for protection of the home, inspiration, wisdom,Ā enhances magic,Ā attracts faeriesĀ
Rue: Exorcism, protection, purification, break hexes, health, mental clarity, healing, blessing, consecration, use in altar oil, love, money and wealth, gossip managementĀ
St. John's Wort: (TOXIC) Exorcism, protection, courage, strength, happiness, health, love divination, burn at Litha to send away negativity, wear for invincibility, willpower, gathered at Litha, power, stress management
Star Anise: Psychic powers, luck, good fortune, spiritual powers
Stephanotis: Lust
Stillengia: Psychic powers
Straw: Luck, attracts fairies, do not burn magik infused straw, it will bring ill-fortune, used as an image to protect an area, image magick, fertilityĀ
Strawberry: Love, luck, joy, broken heart
Sugar Cane: Love, lust, prosperity, sympathy
Sumbul: Psychic powers, love, luck, health
Summer Savory: Mental clarity and strength, mental powers
Woodruff: Protection, money, victory, add to Beltane wine to clear away barriers, success, changes, psychic awareness, prosperityĀ
Wormwood: (CAUTION: POISONOUS, BURN IN WELL VENTILATED AREA, PREFERABLY OUTDOORS TOXIC) Exorcism, protection, love, psychic powers, calling spirits, protection while traveling, evocation, divination, scrying (stronger when combined with Mugwort) at Samhain, sacred to the moon, good luck, clairvoyance, divination, safety in cars
Y
Yarrow: Hhealing, divination, exorcism, protection, courage, love, psychic powers, happy marriage (wedding bouquet), wards negativity, defense, protection, gather at Litha, happiness, fidelity, broken heart, prophetic dreams, spirit of south, clears, stimulates movement
I will go dressed and armed with the weapons of Saint George so that my enemies, having feet will not reach me; having hands will not trap me; having eyes will not see me, neither with thought can they cause me harm.
Firearms will not reach my body; knives and swords will break without touching my body, ropes and chains will break without tying my body.
Jesus Christ protects and defends me with the power of His Holy and Divine Grace.
The Virgin of Nazareth covers me with her sacred and divine mantle, protecting me in all my dolors and afflictions.
And God, with His Divine Mercy and great power, is my defender against the evils and persecutions of my enemies.
Glorious Saint George, in the name of God, extend to me your shield and your powerful arms, defending me with your strength and your greatness; and may my enemies underneath your feet become humble and submissive to you.
So Be it in the Power of God, of Jesus Christ and of the Divine Holy Spirit. Amen.
ā Prayer to Saint George for Strong Protection Against Enemies
Loving this prayer to Sviatyj Yuri [Saint George] āfor strong protection against enemiesā enough to incorporate an adaptation into my annual Ash Wednesday cleansing ritual where St. George, as a radiant solar-spirit, āburnsā away impurities and harm.
What Iām reading and what Iām knitting. This blue is the beginning of a funky little gnome doorstopper friend. I am making a servitor out of him. His function will be to act like a mushroom, taking in negative energies around the house, breaking them down and digesting them, and putting those energies into a house ward to strengthen it.
Recently I was asked by wrecklessheartofg0ld and devinaswitchyhaven to describe my personal method of grounding because I donāt use the āgrowing rootsā method that I see a lot of people using. The way I describe my method would be more along the lines of āequalising myselfā and āconnecting to the webā.
The reason I describe my method of grounding in this way is because, for me, grounding is a lot like equalising the pressure when you go scuba diving. Ā And you do this by āconnecting to the webā and letting yourself āequalise the pressureā you feel from spellcasting or energy work.
If my analogy doesnāt make sense at the moment I promise Iāll go into greater detail later but first I should probably explain what grounding is and why you should do it for the people who have never come across the term.
Alright. So the term Grounding actually comes from the process of electrical grounding in which an object is allowed to discharge (get rid of its excess charge). If an object is negatively charged, grounding lets excess electrons to flow from the object into the earth, and if an object is positively charged, electrons flow from the earth into the object.
Within the magical community, this process of electrical grounding has been applied to create the witchy equivalent (though really itās almost the same process and itās called the same name).
This is based on the theory that magic is a form of energy and when a witch casts spells or practices energy work, itās likely that theyāll end up with either too much or not enough personal energy. For a witch this can be an extremely uncomfortable experience especially if you are close to either side of the spectrum (i.e. very little personal energy or way too much personal energy).
Unfortunately there are also physical symptoms which usually accompany being unequalised such as headaches, migraines, uncomfortable buzzing sensations under the skin, nausea, vomiting, pain, irritability, insomnia and exhaustion. The symptoms are typically worse the further out of alignment you are.
Grounding also helps people who practice astral travel, dreamwork, journeying, and hedge hopping with reconnecting with ārealityā and feeling like youāre āin the nowā and present in the world.
Overall, grounding serves two purposes:
It stabilises and equalises your personal energy
It reconnects you with the earth and itās systems (what I like to call āthe webā) and helps you focus on reality and being āin the nowā
In a perfect world, witches would learn how to ground before attempting to perform any magic or energy work, but unfortunately I see a lot of witches jump straight into casting spells without thinking of what it can to them. Ā Grounding really is an essential skill for any witch who wants to keep practicing witchcraft without horrible side effects.
So while there are many grounding techniques available, this one is my personal method. If this method does not work for you I would recommend looking at the classic āgrowing rootsā method. Ā
Connecting to the Web
Everything has its own energy/frequency/vibration/magic. Whatever you want to call it ā everything has it. To ground effectively you need to be able to connect to this mass of energy and equalise your own personal energy.
For me, I visualise all of this energy as an intricately interwoven web (like a spiderās web or the internet); a mass of connections each transmitting their own energy and connecting to the whole. This is why I call it connecting to the web. Because for me, it is a web.
I developed this method of grounding because I found that I didnāt always have the time to sit down on the ground outside and sometimes itās not appropriate (for example: At work or in the middle of class. Really whenever you feel that you need to equalise the pressure of either too much energy or not enough).
1)Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā First you have to visualise your own energy. You can do this sitting down, standing up, listening to a lecture, watching tv, sitting at your computer ā ANYWHERE. You can close your eyes if that helps you however if you close your eyes for a long time in a public place this will become quite noticeable. The more you practice the faster you will be.
2)Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Then you need to visualise āthe webā. You wonāt see all of it. You should be able to see the energy of the world around you and how it connects to each other. You wonāt see the whole web. Maybe if you were out in space you could, but down here on earth you can only see the bits around you.
3)Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Youāre already connected to the web. Thatās the best part. As a living, breathing organism which has its own personal energy; you are already connected. You just needed to be able to see it so you can get yourself back into alignment again. You should see a little tendril of energy coming from you and connecting to the web. You need to reinforce that connection.
Iām not gonna lie; grounding is hundred times easier if you can stand barefoot on the ground or sit outside with your palms resting on the ground. However, like I said earlier, thatās not always an option.
4)Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Now for the equalising process. Like with scuba diving, I found the best way to equalise the pressure from either too much energy or not enough is to breathe. I know this may sound ridiculously simple ā but it works. Take deep breaths and as you breathe in, draw in energy from the web. As you breathe out, send out your own energy to mingle with the web.
5)Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā It may take a few repetitions but you should feel settled once you finish. That buzzing under your skin will be gone and you will feel lighter and refreshed.
And thatās my method. Now I know some people recommend grounding every month or every week but really you should ground every day. I know that may seem like way too much work, but it really isnāt. The more you ground the faster and better youāll be at it, so if you do it every day it becomes second nature. The second you start to feel off or out of alignment ā equalise.
Mustard Seed ~ the seed of strife and discord. Leave it at oneās doorstep, particularly black mustard seed. This seed sprinkled around the trunk of a fruit tree on the first evening of the full moon will cause the tree to bear no fruit.
Onion ~ can cause strife in an enemyās life.Ā
Poppy Seed ~ Causes couples to argue.
Sumac ~ for curses, hexing, bringing bad luck
GrapefruitĀ - causes enemy sour start, but leaves a good ending
peppers - great for those spreading lies and talking general shit. Ā The hotter the pepper (vegetable or spice) the more intense the curse.
saltĀ - to repel someone from reentering your life and home.
vinegarĀ - to make someone eat their words or to stop running their mouth.
basilĀ - for someone who owes you money.
mintĀ - to cool someoneās anger or hatred toward you.
potatoĀ - for someone standing in your way. Ā carve someoneās name into the potato (or initials) and then cut it up/cook as normal.
having a wooden spoon you use ONLY for cursing magic within the kitchen. Ā You can inscribe/woodburn sigils and words to your liking. This is VERY useful. Ā Just be sure you ONLY use it for cursing and hexing for foods.
lemon/lime/any tart fruitĀ - to stop someoneās slander, lies, and general cursing
Black pepper or ginger - add in baking mix if you want to cause the target anger.
Grated lemon - add in baking mix if you want to cause the target to be sour to others.
Black icing - colour correspondence for hexes and curses.
Stirring counter clockwise is good for undoing the actions or intent of the person you are cursing.
Stirring clockwise is for sealing/bringing to fruition.
You can do cursing/hexing in your kitchen. Ā Write someoneās name on a slip of paper (or take their picture) and put it in your pot and add vinegar, oils, needles/nails and herbs on the stove, intending your hex on that person. Ā Toss out like (preferably off your property) when done. Ā
Most kitchen witches, myself included, keep glass jars and bottles around. Ā You can take a piece of paper with the personās name or their picture, put in a jar with oil and herbs and shake it up each time you focus your hexing intent. Obviously the more shaking you do the more intense. Ā Do till you feel the hexing is done and theyāve stopped their shit.
When cursing/hexing food (or doing the pot trick like I mentioned above), you can also say (from Dorothy Morrisonās Utterly Wicked, pg. 66):
The magic thatās within this dish is meant for (name of target), as is my wish.
On others who may hear its call it shall not have any effect at all.
Pure delight is all theyāll feel as they fill their plates and eat this meal.
The center of a personās life is their home. From the transient domicile of the college dorm room, to the trans-generational legacy of an ancestral home passed down through a family, the places where we sleep, eat, and live become steeped in memories and mementos that bond them to us, making them fundamentally ours.
The sanctuary of the home has a profound impact on a practitioner. Our homes become filled with not only our possessions, but our energy, seeping into the walls and floors, protecting our homes, even as our homes protect us. Many practitioners find their home to be the place where their power is strongest, filled with their tools and vested in their authority.
I have chosen to honor the Roman goddess Vesta, known to the Greeks as Hestia, Goddess of the hearth and home, during her traditional festival week of Vestalia, from June 7th to the 15th. As a modern follower of Vesta, living far from Rome, I am choosing to honor the goddess by filling my week with baking, as well as some much needed, intestine maintenance and cleaning around my home. As the home is central to my life, and the kitchen is central to my sense of home, I can use cleaning and caring for my home as a spiritual activity, to strengthen my threshold, and better attune the space to my authority.
As mentioned above, our homes tend to become steeped in our energy, both the good, and the bad. Over the past year my home has known exquisite joy, love and companionship. It has been a place of growth, triumph, and healing. It has also known sorrow, despair, rage, and frustration. All of these things have left their mark, filling the space with a miasma of muddy emotion and stale energy. Consequentially, for the health of those living here, the cleaning must extend beyond mere straightening up. Every act of cleaning becomes a piece of a simultaneous ritual to wipe clear the pain and misery of past days, and leave the space clean, fresh, and ready for making new, happier memories.
For me, Vestalia starts and ends with the kitchen. What portions of the house get cleaned each day isnāt as important as the intention behind it. I start with the kitchen because it is the most critical part of the house for my practice, and because it gives me a positive space in which to bake offerings. This year, after cleaning my kitchen, stove and oven, and baking a loaf of cranberry bread to share with my friends, I hung a piece of devotional art Iād commissioned from the amazing Karen Gosselin, depicting Vesta, to watch over my kitchen. Iāve wanted a kitchen alter space for years, and hanging artwork of my goddess seems like a good beginning.
While I wish I could just spend the entire week cleaning my home and baking, rent requires me to go to work and earn my living. While my job takes me out of the house 12 hours a day, four days a week (10.5 hour shifts and 45 minute commute) I work in an office, and have chosen to honor the goddess on my work days by cleaning and improving on my work station. Scrubbing my desk and computer station, cleaning my monitors, and bringing in decorations that Iāve neglected in the effort of making the place I give 40+ hours of my week to feel a little more like mine.
While I do this to honor Vesta, there are non-religious advantages for the industrious practitioner who wants to incorporate cleaning and baking into their practice.
The first, and most obvious advantage is clearing away stale or negative energy. Weāre all familiar with the idea of cleansing crystals before and after use, and sanctifying tools before use, but cleansing our work spaces and homes is a part of the equation that is often overlooked. While some witches use a Besom, a specifically blessed hand broom, to cleanse their altars, it can be beneficial to do likewise to the rest of the room your altar is in, and indeed in the whole of your home.
Another advantage is lowering your stress and improving your mental and physical health in the long term. Living in a cluttered mess can often cause tension and strained relationships among family and roommates. Psychology tells us that living in a cluttered and messy environment increases anxiety and can contribute significantly to the stress in a personās life.
Thirdly, magic is about transformation and change. Doing a deep clean of your home is a good opportunity to look at the things in your life and lifestyle and make decisions on what you want to change or transform about yourself or your environment. By manually sorting, organizing and cleaning your possessions you can get a sort of snapshot of whatās important to you, and what parts of your life you may have been neglecting. This can lead to renewing old commitments that had fallen by the wayside in the chaos of life, or starting down the road of breaking habits and dependencies that are making your life harder.
I recommend starting at the top of the room and working your way downward, dusting off shelves, tools and decorations. Few things make a tool or decoration seem unloved and unimportant like a thick layer of dust building up on them from lack of handling, and in this case, perception is reality. Cleaning off your statues, symbols, and books can be an act of reverence, reaffirming their place in your life and practice, and reminding you why you valued them in the first place. I recommend starting in one corner and going counter-clockwise around the room in several passes. As it was explained to me you go clockwise to build things up, and counter clockwise to undo them. Cleansing is about undoing the effects of time and use, disrupting and disbursing energy to the earth and wind. Some objects may require more in-depth cleaning. While lunar water can be prepared in advance, Iāve had success with blessing water on the spot.
Another option you may find value in is blessing soaps, by pressing or carving symbols such as a pentacle or triple goddess symbol into your soap you can sanctify it in preparation for use around your home. You may also want to try blessing bottles of glass or window cleaner for use on clear objects. Alternatively, a blessed cloth with a symbol painted or embroidered into it can serve well with whatever cleaning solutions you might require.
Some of you may find value in cleansing a space by smoke, sound, or both. The burning of incense or sage, the ringing of bells and sounding of singing bowls, the blowing of horns, even clanging pots and pans can be useful for shaking lose and banishing the energy clinging to the space. Many cultures and traditions around the world have variations on these methods, with a great deal of overlap in methods and materials. I wonāt go into proscribing specific methods as not all may be appropriate for your path and cultural heritage. I will recommend opening your windows before burning anything in your home and taking all the appropriate safety precautions, including having something to catch burning embers and ashes in. Sound may make a good tool for cleansing an area, but my experience is that fire alarms tend to just add anxiety and frustration to the space.
Once youāve cleaned the air and the surfaces of your space, Taking your broom in hand bless it as you would any other tool you intend to consecrate, charging it with energy and purpose, then begin at the corners of your room. You may find sweeping to clean the energy as well as the physical room more strenuous than normal cleaning, but Iāve found it to be intensely valuable to keeping my home feeling welcoming and healthy.
For those who find themselves overwhelmed by cleaning a single room, one method Iāve found useful is to clean a room until it begins to overwhelm, then ask the house to guide you to your next mess. Look around until you find an object in the room which is out of place. This can be as simple as a piece of jewelry that needs to be returned to the bedroom, or a book that must be returned to a shelf in the living room. Let the house direct you in this way. Bring whatever object is out of place to its proper home, then clean that room until you begin to lose momentum. Then repeat your request, and find another object. This technique takes longer to see results, as you are continually half cleaning rooms then moving on, but slowly the whole house becomes cleaner, and you arenāt as likely to become discouraged working in the same negative space for hours on end. This is a technique Iāve used several times over the years to good success.
Because I am an adherent of Vesta, and this guide is being written as part of my Vestalia observations, Iāll share a few of my more kitchen witch based tricks. The first is to start by baking bread. By starting with bread youāll accomplish a few things. First, youāll have to clear off counter space to use, which overcomes the challenge of not knowing where to start. Second, running your oven will heat up the stove top without reaching a point where it will burn you, this makes cleaning away built up grease and oil so much easier and more pleasant. Third, the timer you run for your baking will give you a sense of time, itās surprising how much you can get done in the hour it takes to bake your bread, and it provides you a set point in time to take a break. Fourth, the smell of baking bread will help cover the smell of any unpleasant surprises you find in the back of the fridge or bottom of the sink. Ā Finally, it provides you with bread, which can be used as a tasty treat for yourself, a gift for your family or roommates, or given as an offering to your deity of choice. Depending on your practice, it may be all three. If you use a boxed mix for the sort of bread you bake in a loaf pan rather than on a flat stone, you can make it while generating fairly little mess in the process.
Another trick I picked up a while back was to brew a concoction of herbs for cleansing a space. Lemon, Coriander, clove, sandalwood, and yarrow are all particularly good for this use and can be used whole, ground, or as oils. Beginning with clean water, bless it by whatever means you prefer, lunar and solar water are both good for this purpose, as is rain water. Ā Add your herbs and oils and allow to steep, you may wish to warm the water on a stove or over a candle to facilitate steeping. If youāve used solid herbs you may wish to remove them from before moving to the next step. Once the water is cool, add it to a spray bottle. Spray it into the corners of your room, again going counter clockwise around the room. This can be used to quickly cleans an area when you lack the energy, time, or spoons to do a more elaborate cleaning. I know this helped when I dealt with depression a few years back. Because once brewed it took only a few seconds to use the spray bottle, and the simple act of cleansing my space helped me feel less trapped and smothered by the energy I was creating at the time. For those of us who struggle with not having the emotional or physical capacity to practice our craft, having a small, simple ritual that can be prepared in advance and done in seconds with little effort goes a long way. You will want to keep an eye on your bottle, as it can grow mold if left too long without refreshing. The inclusion of alcohol in place of water may slow this process, but I find itās best to replace the mixture every few weeks anyway.
Finally, donāt be afraid to use modern cleaning materials. I know thereās a lot of push in our community toward simpler tools and more natural materials, and there are some wonderful options available for going that rout, but at the same time, one should not, in my opinion, abandon the good for lack of being perfect. Sometimes a vacuum, or a modern cleaning solution is whatās needed to clean part of your home. Just because your cleaning with intention and magical purpose doesnāt mean you should eschew the use of modern conveniences to get the job done.
When I visited Salem last year (like a madwoman) I purchased a jet black corn doll sold in one of their museums as a souvenir. Though I believe these are more popular to make for Lughnasadh, I'm entranced with the idea of making a version for Samhain by dyeing corn husks (sold on the international food aisle in most grocery stores) black (or orange if you prefer) during the preparatory soak. Perhaps they will take the place of a wax doll, or function as temporary watch guards in my windows. Presuming my cats don't carry them off.
Courtesy of the NC museum of history Colonial History in a box kitĀ
This was a short story originally written by @batneko ! You can read the original post here: https://batneko.tumblr.com/post/171036276147/cinderella-marries-the-prince-and-its-fine-the
Thank you for reading āŗļø
cinderella marries the prince
and it's... fine. The prince is great! They're in love, he's very sweet and passionate, writing her poems and
