When I was young, the guy that taught me to make my first Mojo Hand told me that the ingredients form a sentence, its not just about a bunch of herbs that fall under the header of “love” or “protection”, its about weaving a sentence” what herb is the noun that is the subject, what is the verb that rolls it into action? What are the adjectives and adverbs that modify those? Another teacher taught me that it was like making a living thing: what was the heart? The brain? the limbs?

And when I say symbolism, I’m not talking about triquetras or pentagrams or spirals, I’m talking about the symbolic associations you make in your mind to certain things. Let me explain.

A while back I was trying to write a spell for family unity. We were a little more disjointed and dysfunctional than normal, and I felt the need to perk things up. I researched and found a few spells that fit my needs, but knowing that the most powerful magic is often the most personal, I wanted to add my own punch to things. I thought back on the some of the best family times we’d spent, and it was often at my Grandmother’s place in the mountains at Christmas and Easter and such, with the entire extended family gathered around. Even writing this now brings a nostalgic smile to my face. Grandma’s place had dozens of wind chimes throughout the back porch, and large terracotta pots that we’re constantly overflowing with fresh strawberries. So I formulated a spell that included eating fresh strawberries outside while a wind chime serenaded us. The spell worked like a charm, pun intended.

The reason the spell worked as well as it did was because the wind chime and the strawberries resonated with me deeply, and I’m sure they had the same effect on my family, albeit perhaps subconsciously. They stirred memories deep within me, memories of love and laughter and family, and those memories provided me with fuel for my magical fire. That same spell might not work for someone else as well as it did for me, not because it’s a bad spell, but because those symbols might not scream “family” to someone else as they do for me.

When it comes to finding correspondences for your magic, there are nearly an infinite amount of books and resources that you can peruse to find what herb has what effect, and all of these are great, but just as often your own instincts and your own intuitions are as powerful, if not more so. Want to use a green candle for a love spell instead of a red one because green was the main colour of your parents’ wedding? Go for it! More power to you, literally.

Today is December 1st, 2015, and that means that Witchy Wishlists has officially begun!

If you’re not familiar with this project, here’s the gist of it:

Make a wishlist! Search the wishlists! Spread joy and cheer!

But make sure you follow the…

Rules!

Just to make things a bit more spooky this December, I’m upping the wishlist limit from ten items to thirteen! This means you can include thirteen slots on your list! (Or fewer, if that’s your thing!) 

Fill the slots wisely, because deleting them and adding something else once the wish has been granted goes against the spirit of the season!

Your wishlist can only be posted to the #witchy wishlists tag ONCE. Feel free to reblog it as many times as you wish (reblogs do not show up on tag or search pages!), but you can only create the post once. (At least until next year’s round!) Also note that if you’re posting from a brand new tumblr, your wishlist won’t show up in the search results at first.

Include the country you live in when you make your list, either in the title or in the contact section of the post. It would be a terrible disappointment to offer to send something to someone only to find out the shipping costs are prohibitive, or that what you want to send may not be something you CAN send to that location! Also, be sure to either provide an email address or leave your ask box open if you’re requesting things that will require some type of contact information in order to deliver them to you!

Once the event is over on January 13th, 2016, you stop posting your wishlists!

Here are some important statements:

You do not have to be a witch to participate in Witchy Wishlists.

“Witchy” is vague, and purposefully so. If you feel like it applies, then it does!

Witchy Wishlists is NOT an exchange!

There are no assigned partners. You are not obligated to gift to anyone who gifts to you. I would strongly prefer that you not include a list of items you can send back in exchange. This creates an unfair expectation of everyone else in the event and makes a lot of people feel like they can’t participate!

If you want to send something in exchange, check their wishlist or ask them privately if they’re interested in what you have to offer, but avoid confusing other participants in your wishlist please!

You can STILL participate in Witchy Wishlists even if you live in another country, or you don’t have any money!

Not only can you make your own wishlist, keep in mind that many people ask for things that are not material or for things that have no monetary value. 

People ask for friendship, for advice, for music and recommendations. Maybe someone wants an old tarot deck that you’re not using anymore, or maybe they want someone to talk to and you can listen, or maybe they just want to know your favourite recipes or your favourite books. 

You’ll never know unless you check the tag!

Witchy Wishlists will run from December 1st, 2015 to January 13th, 2016

Yes, it ends on my birthday. And it will begin again on December 1st, 2016. Try not to post your wishlists between then, or you may end up breaking the next round’s rules! Speaking of!

If you see someone breaking the rules…

Well, ultimately there’s nothing we can do about it. I chose to run the event this way because I feel like over-managing leads to the death of a lot of otherwise fun things we do in the witchy community.

All we can really do is make sure that people know the rules, and if they break them, then you can decide if you want to still give them something anyway or not! Try not to sweat it either way, as long as you’re following them.

What is this?! Where did this come from?

And more importantly…. CAN I CATCH IT?

The answer to that is YES!

The New XKit Team proudly presents: Pokés.

Browse your dash, find and collect these little cuties by clicking on them!

Want to see your hardly earned Pokémon? Go to your XKit Control Panel and check Pokés’ settings page!

I won’t ask you if you’re a boy or a girl, but I will go and tell you: Gotta catch ‘em all! Be the first to finish the pokédex! (And don’t forget to show us once you managed to capture them all!)

We have a lot planned for this extension, so be hype!

It feels like the sausage and onion will burn when you add the cabbage without more liquid, but they won’t.

If you’re vegetarian, use some combination of chopped carrots, cubed potatoes, and cubed turnips in place of the pork, and vegetable broth in place of the chicken broth.

I know I’m not the only one. There are other witches who hide their mental illness on their witchcraft blog. I’ve never personally seen hostility towards the mentally ill in the witchcraft community here, but I still made a whole separate blog for my craft out of fear of judgment.

I have seen other witches vaguely mention their mental health, so I know I am not alone here. I don’t want my personal blog and my witchcraft blog to be separate anymore. My practice IS personal, and keeping them separate takes too much energy. I have already begun posting witchcraft related things on this blog, but I still hesitate reaching out to other witches from this blog.

PLEASE REBLOG if you are a witch who has or is supportive of serious mental illnesses (including but not limited to Dissociative Identity Disorder, Schizophrenia, Borderline Personality Disorder, Bi-polar Disorder, etc.) I want to know who I can safely reach out to.

I’m putting in a cut because my images are fucking huge. Oops!

like, people want to be aesthetically pleasing to the eye, and seem radical and spiritually free and interesting but at the end of the day those same people will jump through a thousand hoops and then some to tell you their racist images and words aren’t actually racist! lol 

white pagans will tell you constantly with their ignorance about how they should be allowed to say g*psy, or why it’s okay for them to have dream catches and to smudge. or how it’s fine that they can worship Hindu Gods and Goddesses even if they are the farthest thing from Hindu in the world. How they think they know what Karma actually is, or that it’s fine for them to butcher the meaning and religious significance of chakras, reiki, and feng shui.

don’t even get me started on the white washing of god/dess imagery.

they don’t care that PoC literally die and suffer through out history to keep their religions and cultures from dying out because of the hands of white people, but here come white pagans thinking they are entitled to anything and everything because of their craft. 

Some of you have asked about the bitters I showed earlier. There are some things within my work that I choose to keep secret, but herbal recipes generally aren’t one of those things. Freely learned, freely given is the way I look at it. So here you go! 

(NOTE: these recipes appear in Day 47 of my Folk Magic 365 series, but this batch have a few changes which are reflected below.)

It should also be noted that both of these recipes makes a strong bitters, so you should only use about 30-60 drops mixed with 12-16 ounces of hot water. 

Herbal Bitters: good for colds, fevers, headaches, stomach complaints, and can be used as a general tonic. 1 Liter Vodka ½ c. dried hyssop ½ c. oregano ½ c. thyme ½ c. fresh ginger ¼ c. dried wormwood ¼ c. horehound 1 tbsp. allspice berries whole 1 tbsp. cloves 1 large cinnamon stick, broken up

Combine all of the ingredients in the mason jar then fill with vodka or if you don’t want an alcohol based bitters you can use apple cider vinegar. Let sit for 1-2 months if you’re using alcohol, or 2-3 months if you’re using vinegar. Shake jar once a day. Strain and bottle. This makes a strong bitters, so it’s advised to my 30-60 drops in with an herbal tisane. Please note that although we’re not using a lot of wormwood or oregano for this recipe they both do contain trace amounts of thujone and may cause drowsiness. Both can be omitted if you are sensitive to thujone. 

Dandelion Root Bitters: good for stomach complaints and as a general tonic. 1 Liter Vodka ½ c. dried dandelion root ¼ c. fennel seed ¼ c. fresh ginger ¼ c. dried peppermint leaves

S. carolinense with fruit. 

When I say that a plant contains a number I don’t mean what I think most people mean. I’m not talking about a “vibration”, but a form. This particular Carolina Nightshade is bringing the “three” pretty hard.