still steeping

Greek lemon chicken rice bowl

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Start with the gaze, because this is where most of it goes wrong. You are not staring. A hard stare fights you, your eyes water, you blink, you reset, and you never settle. What you want is a soft, slightly unfocused gaze that looks through the surface rather than at it, the way your eyes drift past a window to the street beyond the glass. The surface should lose its hard edge and go a little vague.

Then the surface starts to change, and beginners almost always misread what happens next. Within a few minutes it tends to cloud, go smoky, darken, or seem to breathe. People take that as their eyes playing tricks, snap back to a sharp focus to check, and that ends it. The clouding is the doorway, not a glitch. Part of it is simply your vision softening on a featureless field, and that softening is the exact state you are trying to reach. Let it fog over and keep your attention loose inside the fog.

It also helps to know what a vision is actually like, because the expectation is the thing that blinds you. It is almost never a clear picture floating in the glass. It is shifting shapes, a color that was not there a second ago, a shadow moving against the grain, a face that assembles for a moment and dissolves. Sometimes it is not visual at all, just a feeling, a word in the mind, or a flat knowing. If you are holding out for a sharp image, you will look straight past the real signal, which tends to be quiet and partial.

A lot of what people call a block is really the setup. Work in low light with a single candle placed behind you or off to the side, never throwing a bright reflection straight into the surface. Use a black mirror or a dark bowl of water set on a dark cloth. Sit so you cannot see your own face clearly in the surface, because a sharp reflection of yourself locks your eyes at the glass instead of through it. Fix the light and the angle and half the I cannot scry problem tends to disappear.

On patience, the honest number is that most people need somewhere between five and twenty sessions before a first real impression. The early sittings where nothing happened are not failures. They are you teaching your eyes and your attention to hold the soft state without bailing out the moment it gets strange. Ten quiet minutes a few times a week will take you further than one heroic hour.

There is a discernment line worth holding too. Not everything you see is a message. Floaters, the afterimage of the candle, the surface graying out, that is ordinary eye behavior and it is the doorway, not the content. The scried material is what comes through that state, the shape that carries meaning, the word, the pull toward something. You learn the difference by keeping a log and only trusting what recurs or genuinely lands.

Correct, you did not need to feed it before. And yet behold, it is now starving.

You know?

Safe corral (protection for that thing)

Veterinary care (healing for that thing)

Home care (washing, polishing, and mending that thing)

Feedstock (energizing and feeding that thing)

Enrichment (drawing in new experiences that make the thing happier and healthier)

Getting rid of snakes (banishing things harmful to the thing)

Cute outfit for that thing (altar aesthetics matter and I don't mind saying it)

In such a style, any given altar should have a representation of the Creature and then protection for it, things to uplift it and help it to thrive, care and healing, very good source of nutrition for it to feed on, and depending on need some surrounding work put into the environment (getting rid of snakes) so that your thing is highly protected, as befitting such a cherished Creature.

You can indeed reach much greater heights of wellness and success with a domesticated thing, but then that requires all the care that homesteaders are already familiar with. And I think it's likely that to corral a Creature and then neglect puts you much worse off, because the Creature is of course ultimately something from your life important to you, that you are seeking to take direct control over.

2. The Delectable Negro: Human Consumption and Homoeroticism Within US Slave Culture by Vincent Woodard

3. "Abolitionists turned the tables on Europeans by accusing them of being cannibals when they ate sugar tainted with the flesh and blood of slaves."

here's the intro

Washi tape!

Are you in a dorm or other place where you can’t burn candles, but the healing spell asks for a blue candle? Use washi tape to turn your electric candle into a blue one! Do you want to burn a rose candle on your Aphrodite altar but you’re not allowed an open flame? Well, it doesn’t smell like roses but it’s pretty and has pink flowers!

Do you want the tealight in forest-themed travel altar to match the rest of the aesthetic? Washi tape!

Washi tape is removable, so you can keep changing the colour to whatever you need. And you can write on it, so instead of carving candles, you can draw your sigils or runes on the tape!

for anyone who wants to use it in their own cakes (oh man i bet it would go great as a syrup on strawberry short cake) what you want to do is take 2 cups rose petals and the interior bits of two cardamom pods. add to 2 cups water and bring to a boil. boil for 5 minutes. strain out the roses and cardamom then return to the pan. add two cups sugar and simmer stirring constantly until sugar dissolves.

This is a historical charm from Manuscript KU3335 from Lakbäck, Hälsingland (in central Sweden). It is included in Dr. Thomas K. Johnson's Svartkonstböcker as MS 5 in its English translation. It is also included in the earlier version of this dissertation (Tidebast och Vändelrot) in its original Swedish, which is where I initially found its attestation. KU3335 was cataloged by the Royal Library. It belonged to the father of the man who lent it to the library (J. Arboren). According to the owner of the book, his father was a fisherman, farmer, and cunningman who copied the book from a cunningman's manuscript (which he had borrowed from the man's wife). Because the original book had been taken without the owner's permission, Aboren's father had only one day to copy all from the Black Book that he could manage, and must return the book before its owner came home the next day.

Swedish Charm: Blod mot blod. Hud mot hud, kött mot kott [.] Sen mot sen, Ben mot ben och Blod mot blod. Satt du onda blod, satt du goda blod. [Här] skall du stå och intet rinna du skall wara så sen till att rinna, lika så som Jesum Christum när han bar sitt kors i Örtagården till att springa. Statt du blod här skall du stå och der skall du Stanna så säkert som den själ som e Helwettt står och Stannar.

Working on my shorthand grimoire with spells , sigils, talismans that will be my pocket travelers. Those papers will be torn, burned, swallowed, given, hidden, used in rituals, in any kind of situation. I made 8 main sections with a sigil that describes it : Protection talisman magick, space blessing & banishment, self enchantment (I call it Buff magic), object enchantment , Spirits & God summons, War magick, Demon summoning, Chaos magick.

Papers include various things from various cultures or self inspired , written or drawn sigils, void evocation stuff. It’s awesome being chaos magickian right ; )

On one side of paper is a sigil, on the other side is written short explanation of what sigil does. It’s helpful and also it sets in stone what is expected from it.

Section papers have a big sigil in corresponding color with corresponding numbers on the other side for extra power. Sides of this flashcards have a golden yellow and purple paper, I will draw extra golden sigils into it.

After finishing everything, it’s time to make a special ritual of bonding with grimoire and giving it extra magickal fuel ;)

Alright witches, webring be upon ye! If you're a witch with a personal, handmade website where you talk about witchcraft in any capacity, click here to join the Witching Hour Webring!

What's a webring?: A webring is a network of websites that link to each other in one big circle. I link to the site before me and to you; you link to me and the site after you; that site links to you and the site after them... and so on! If you click through the carousel on each website, you'll eventually end up back where you started. We use them to help site visitors find more websites in a similar theme.

How to join: Click the link above or below or right here, read the guidelines, and read the instructions.

Once I check your site and add you to the webring list, you're all set! Yippee! Now we're holding hands and spinning off into the world wide web together, like the internet was meant to be.

So this is alittle unorthodox but I've been keeping/tending an Altar specifically for my current Herbal Ally, atleast for the duration of my active devotional to that Plant Spirit (my post about Plant Spirit Devotionals). Currently my altar is set up for Rosemary pictured below. The Purpose of these altars is not to worship or revere the Spirit in the same way that my Persephone Altar exists to venerate the goddess. In my mind a Herbal Altar exists as a dedicated space for the spirit which acts as a reminder of the spirit throughout the day, while the aromatics of the Herbs themselves and the general energy of the Plant is allowed to suffuse the area.

My Rosemary Altar pictured above contains the following:

Fresh Rosemary: Personally I think the most important thing on a Herbal Altar should be the plant itself, ideally a living plant but when that is unavailable the best alternative is fresh plant matter.

Dried Rosemary: Failing fresh plant matter, dried herbs can work just as well.

Rosemary Essential Oil: An essential oil or similar product made using the plant represents the myriad forms the Herbal Ally can take in your Practice.

A Herbal Flash card for Rosemary: This card not only has beautiful artwork depicting the Herb but on the opposite side contains information revolving around Rosemary's mundane and magical properties allow with a short botanical dossier. This is a representation of the Plants properties and what you can learn from it.

An associated Tarot/Oracle card: In My case I like to have a representative Tarot card for my Herbal Allies, I use the Bottanical Deck by Jessica Bott which happens to have a Card for Rosemary.

A tea light candle dressed in Rosemary oil and dried Rosemary: A representative of the Herb role in rituals, and in my broader practice. I plan on burning this on the last day of my devotional.