Samhain: A Time to Remember My Fallen Leaves

October has always been my favorite month, my most loved time of year, and Samhain my favorite of the sabbats. Perhaps it is because I am an October baby. Yet I think it is more so because of the month itself, the mystery of this turn of the wheel, all of the beauty amongst all the decay, and a time to remember my fallen leaves.

Mother Earth, weak and tired from the weight of ripened fruits and vegetables and branches of abundant leaves and flowers, is lightening her load, sending leaves from the trees in a flourish of gold, yellow, orange and red. The sun is warm yet the breezes are cool and crisp and the rich earthy scents of wood smoke and decaying leaves linger on the currents. Hearty and sweet aromas of beef stews, candied apples, and cinnamon waft from kitchen windows and transport me back to autumns of yesteryear. Patios, porches, doorsteps and yards are adorned in symbols of the final harvest like hay bales, cornstalks, gourds, pumpkins, and the jeweled colors of chrysanthemums, breathtaking against the skeletal remains of summer gardens. Everywhere there is magic, an electrical charge of power rippling around me. The veil is thinning. Sometimes I think I can see it, a dark violet shimmer and wave in the night sky behind the stars, like a curtain on the stage of the universe. At times, I feel it, a gentle tug at my soul, nudging me to fly free into the dark. Samhain is near.

I spend most of October with death and decay as I put my garden to rest for the winter. The once bursting garden beds are now full of withered and brown branches, dried seedpods, and spent blossoms. I layer them with fallen autumn leaves, burying them to be reborn in spring. In whispers, I thank each plant for their beauty and abundance as I cover them for another year and wish them a safe and peaceful slumber through the ice, snow and harsh winter winds. I harvest the last of the herbs, bringing them indoors for drying, my kitchen becoming a fragrant final resting place for hanging bunches of herbs and a reminder of the life that was, just a short time ago, growing all around me. Most of my summer visitors have flown south for the winter. Those that remain find shelter in bird houses, wood piles, and mounds of twigs and fallen leaves. After all my plants and shrubs are safely laid to rest for the year and my feathered and furried friends have settled in for the dark time of the year, I leave gifts of thanks to the spirits of nature, to Mother Earth, and to the flora and fauna throughout the garden.

Indoors, I prepare my home to welcome the dead, my beloved dead, my fallen leaves. In and around the usual autumn and Samhain décor upon my altar, I place a garland of autumn leaves and to it I pin the pictures of the family and friends, the people and pets, who slipped beyond the veil. The pictures have become too recent, no longer the faded sepia or black and white photos of great-grandparents or grandparents but the colorful images of parents, cousins, aunts, uncles and childhood friends, bringing tears to my eyes and a heart-wrenching sob to my throat as I place them on the altar, hardly believing that they are no longer only a phone call away. I spend many moments just staring at their faces smiling out at me from among the brightly colored autumn leaves, speaking to them, hoping for a reply, sometimes imagining that they wave back at me like the photographs in the Harry Potter movies. Perhaps it is my old Catholic upbringing but I leave the pictures there through November 2^nd, All Souls Day. There are some people in those pictures who would appreciate that.

Samhain arrives and I let the magic of the day take over. The pumpkins are carved with jagged smiles and triangular eyes and noses and then lit. The soul cakes are made and set aside for later in the evening. I cleanse and bless the house and gardens, clearing the way for those people in the pictures to drop by for a bit, even if it is for a minute. The dining room table is set for the Ancestor Feast, the traditional meal my mother used to make at Halloween – beef stew, biscuits, and a sweet treat, usually an apple crisp. As always, there is one empty seat at the table with a full place setting for whoever wishes to slip back through the veil and join us. Family and friends gather around the table and stories are told, laughter is heard, and tears are shed through dinner. We remember all of those moments captured in the colorful pictures on the altar and many more moments frozen in time in our memories. Yes, they are here at the table, laughing with us, crying with us, missing us like we miss them. As dinner is cleared away, I quietly mourn the fact that my son is “too old” to trick-or-treat now and page through my mental photo album of every Halloween costume he wore through the years.

As the night winds down, I head outside to my patio to light the Samhain fire pit into which are thrown bunches of dried herbs from my garden and slips of paper on which are written the things I wish to leave behind me now. I mourn what once was and embrace what will be. I celebrate who I was (because we all change with each turn of the wheel) and lay the old me to rest. I rededicate myself to my ever-twisting Pagan path and welcome the new me. I sit under the night sky and the parted veil and talk to my fallen leaves, sharing with them just as I would if they were still just that phone call away. The fire dies down to glowing embers, the ashes of which I will scatter in the garden, and I head indoors for another piece of apple crisp and some spiced apple wine in a spot close to my altar. The Jack O’Lantern smiles down at me from there as I look down the road a bit, with tarot cards or runes, at what may lie ahead.

Yet, where there is death there is also life. I look around at all those who gather at the Ancestor Feast table and see my beloved dead in their faces, their habits, and their mannerisms, hear them in their voices and their laughter, and feel them pulsing in my veins. Many of them are present in the image I see in my mirror each day. I stroll around my garden and see the leaves mulching down to nourish the life that will grow in spring. The seed pods of this year’s plants will become next year’s plants. The costumes my son once wore may someday be worn again by his children. Parts of me fall way like the autumn leaves so that I may continue to grow. The wheel turns, the leaves fall, and life goes on.

The Magic of Wildwood Days

Long before I was a village wise woman, long before I was a witch, a Master Gardener, or a wife or mom, I was a beach bum. From the age of 8 months until my late teens, I spent every summer, all summer, at the Jersey shore in Wildwood Crest, New Jersey. This came at the privilege of being the daughter of a teacher and a stay-at-home mom and having a longtime family summer residence. With Memorial Day just passing and with the fast-approaching end of the school year and Summer Solstice, I have been traveling down memory lane often, longing for those Wildwood days again. (Before I continue, I must ask you, my reader, to please excuse me should my writing take on a stream-of-consciousness style. Wildwood does that to me sometimes.)

It started the Friday morning before Memorial Day on my way to work. As I got to the Wawa for my morning coffee, there were the cars loaded up with bags, beach chairs, boogie boards, and smiling people wearing sunglasses, sun hats and flip-flops, all ready for the long summer-opening weekend at the beach. Completely jealous, I muttered under my breath, "Bastards!" and threw open the store door. And the flood of memories began, in snap shots and slow motion film in my head.

Packing up the car at an unheard of 4:00 in the morning, Locking up our little row home for the summer and checking the door what seemed like a million times before leaving. My parents, me and my then only younger sister piling into the small yellow Toyota Corolla and getting on the road before the sun rose on the eastern horizon. Traveling exactly at or under the speed limit, back roads only because my dad could never tolerate the main highways to the shore. My mother passing orange slices to me and my sister in the back seat and lighting my dad's pipe for him because he had to concentrate on the road. Giggling with my sister as quietly as we could so as not to distract Dad. More orange slices from Mom to keep us quiet. Stopping along the way, several times, so my mom could pick some reeds and wildflowers from back bay marshes or so my dad could could check out an odd gravestone jutting out at the roadside where my mom would place a wildflower. Oh what a strange trip it always was and a very long one at that!

We would arrive at the family seaside residence somewhere in the mid-morning. Oh that old beautiful house! It was built by my paternal great-grandfather and other relatives, I believe, in the 1920's. Six bedrooms, one and a half baths. A huge side lot full of plants and mimosa trees. Open front porch, screened back porch. Small laundry room. Outside shower. An old wooden garage that, as I recall, only housed cars in the event of a tropical storm or hurricane and served mainly as my dad's study during the summer as well as containing all the beach gear, the bikes, and the garden tools. And there we would stay, from the last day of school until Labor Day. Hours upon hours on the beach, playing in the sand, splashing around in the ocean, eating bologna sandwiches and sipping warm iced tea from a thermos. Nights either on the porches or under the mimosa trees in the yard or taking long walks along the bay to see the boats go out for night fishing and to watch the sun go down over Sunset Lake. Rainy days were spent at the library or in Cape May, going from antique store to book store to the lighthouse at the Point.

Weekends were most always a full house. On Fridays, my great Aunt Elanor and Great uncle Salvie, would arrive for the weekend, car packed with bags from what they called the American Store (in today's lingo - the Acme). My sis and I would  help haul the bags inside where we would unload the canned tomatoes, olive oil, paper goods and meats from the butcher. Uncle Salvie would take us to the fish market to get the flounder for the Friday evening meal (because in those days you could not eat meat in Fridays if you were Catholic which they all were). Then, later in the day, my great Aunt would arrive on the express bus from Philadelphia, She always had treats - jellied fruit slices and chocolates - for me and my sister, We'd shove what we could into our mouths before anyone noticed and help her get bags settled in her room. Friends of my parents would drop by. Eleanor and Salvie's son, and my dad's cousin, Fran, often came. It was a weekend of fun, family and good food. There were afternoon gin and tonics on the porches for the adults before dinner while my sis and I played in the yard after the beach.

And this went on, day in, day out, week after week, until Labor Day. It was life at the shore. Okay, it wasn't all good. There was arguing, there were frustrations, there was chaos sometimes. But we were at the shore. The sand, the sea, the sun, the salt air. Ah, yes, the shore! Confession: I cry every time Bruce sings that line, " 'Coz down the shore everything's all right".

Years later, when my parents divorced, job situations changed, and my great aunts and uncles passed away, the house passed, by way of screwed up last wills and testaments, to Fran and that was the end of those idyllic summers in Wildwood Crest. Although my dad's mom, who died when he was 5, was once part owner of the house, a portion of ownership never passed into my dad's hands. He still went to the house though, spending about six weeks every summer with his new wife. By then I was dating my later-to-be husband and he and I would pack up the car every Friday night after work and speed down the Atlantic City Expressway and the Garden State Parkway in a 1980 V8 Ford Thunderbird, taking an amazing 70 minutes even in all that weekend traffic to get there, spend the weekend sitting on the beach and frolicking in the ocean, only to race back to the city in crazy traffic on Sunday evenings. My husband proposed to me at Sunset Lake. My son went there for the first few years of his life, every weekend of the summer. Life got in the way, life changed, circumstances changed, and we stopped going.

That house in the Crest was my dad's peace and solace. It was the place he went every summer of his life from birth to the year before he died. It was the last place he saw his mother alive. It was where he met my mom, where he met my stepmom. It was part of his very being, part of his life. It was his life. The night my dad passed away, I knew where he wanted to be, where he needed to go. As he took his last breaths, I told him to go there, that his mother waited for him there. And that is where I know he is now, spending every second of eternity at the Jersey Shore in Wildwood Crest. That house is his Summerland.

I haven't been in Wildwood for a while now. It's just a bit too hard for me still. I'll get there eventually. But, when I want to feel like my old beach bum self, like I did over the Memorial Day weekend, I just put on some suntan lotion so the scent of coconut, sand and salt envelops me, throw on my tankini under my favorite broken-in denim jeans or capris with a tank top and my oldest pair of flip-flops so I feel like I am at the beach, sip a gin and tonic outside on the patio pretending that I am under a mimosa tree or on that front porch, close my eyes, and imagine I hear the roar of the ocean, the boat horns sounding on departure, and the call of the gulls in the distance. I am transported back to the magic of those Wildwood days.

Light Rekindled

It is Imbolc eve. My altar is ready, full of candles to light the way through the day and night tomorrow, a couple pots full of soil awaiting the planting of seeds, and all the needed items for magic and ritual. I had all sorts of plans for tonight and tomorrow. But something happened today. Something that shook me to my core, changed me forever, and, in a strange way, brought the meaning of Imbolc to the forefront of my mind.

Today, someone very near and exquisitely dear to my heart, a wee someone, a child, became ill. I will not/cannot tell the full story here for the privacy of the people involved. The child was fine this morning except for a runny nose, a bit of a cough, and a slight fever. At some point today though, the wee one's fever spiked and caused a febrile seizure. Being so close to the family and their home, the little one's mother, scared out of her mind, ran the child to me for help. Now in retrospect, I am amazed at how calm I remained. I placed the call to 911, got the mother calmed down, and gathered all the needed items for the trip to the hospital. Everything happened very fast. After poking, prodding, x-rays, some fever reducers, and some tender loving care, the wee one is now fine, tucked safe and sound in bed, and fever-free. Blessed Be!

Yes, children get sick. Yes, some of them may experience a febrile seizure. Yes, a mother going through this with their child is scared beyond rational thought by something like this. But, I am sure you are asking, how did this affect me so strongly? I have never witnessed a child having a seizure. The sight of this small helpless being's body in the grip of a seizure is frightening beyond imagination. The fact that their eyes roll back is terrifying. Even more frightening is that it takes some time for the brain to, for lack of a better word, reset after an event like that. So, after the seizure was over and the little one cried uncontrollably for a while, every single person in that little exam room who had an attachment to that child was sort of holding their breath to see how she would bounce back from it. When she looked at me finally and said my name through tears, my whole heart and soul leapt within me. The light in her eyes, in her body and in her spirit was rekindled and it took all the strength I had in me to keep from falling into my usual post-stress reaction of crying. I saved that until I knew mother and baby were home with all the needed items and I got back into my own home. Then I went upstairs to my bathroom, shut the door, sat on the cold tile floor, and commenced sobbing.

As I sat there crying and blowing my nose, my mind kept switching from the sight of that child having the seizure to a snapshot of those big brown beautiful eyes with the light rekindled in them. Light rekindled. Light rekindled. It repeated in my head with each time my brain snapped from each picture and back again, like the old childhood Viewmaster toy. Picture to picture. Snap! Snap! Light rekindled. Light rekindled. It was then that I remembered that it was Imbolc eve (because that went completely out of mind at the beginning of this whole ordeal) and my tears stopped.

The child is fine, will continue to be fine. Spring will be here soon. Tomorrow the light of rebirth and regeneration is rekindled deep in the earth and soon the world will be full of the sights and sounds of renewed life, like the light returning to that wee one's eyes today and the sound of that little sweet voice saying my name. The grip of winter is slowly loosening, like the grip of that seizure slowly letting go of that child. I breathed a sigh of relief, thanked the Goddess several times, dried my tears, got up off the floor, and, finally composed, headed back downstairs to the kitchen where I caught my own child, my almost grown up son, in a huge and extra tight hug.

Now here I am, watching the snow fall outside my window and feeling the warmth of relief in my heart and soul. Light is rekindled, for that child, for the mother, for all of us who love that child, for the earth. Blessed Be!

With a Little Help From My Friends

On Sunday, I fell. It was a nasty fall, in a public place, a store, and was one of the most embarrassing moments of my life. As shoppers and clerks rushed to my aid, I blew them off with brisk replies of "I'm okay. Really, I'm fine." But I wasn't. I knew I wasn't fine or okay. There was an awful pain in my ribs on the left side and a burning throbbing pain in my right shin. I went about shopping, realizing that with each passing minute it was becoming more difficult to take a deep breath and that, when I attempted to breathe deeply, the pain gripped my chest. By the time I got home about an hour later, I was in bad shape. In my line of typing medical reports, I would note that my pain was "10 out of 10 on a visual analog scale". Also, being in the medical business, I knew this subjective complaint translates to "head to the ER".

There I sat in the emergency room for two hours, waiting to be seen, with a sea of flu patients around me. My husband kept making me laugh, the kind of laugh that required a lot of lung and chest movement, Not good! But it lifted my spirits and made me tune out the illness and injuries around me. After a quick exam, a few x-rays, a pain pill and some more hysterically witty comments from my hubby, the doctor came in and told me that, "although fractures could not be visualized on the x-rays as rib fractures so often are not", he was convinced that I had fractured a rib or two but had not punctured a lung. The shin was "no biggie" and just needed some cleaning up and a few ice applications. I was sent home with a prescription for pain meds and instructions to rest, apply ice frequently, and an apparatus to exercise my lungs so pneumonia would not set in.

Back home I went and, as news of my injury got around either through me, the hubby or other family and friends, offers of help, prayers, meals, you name it, started coming in. The house phone rang all evening. My cell phone buzzed with text messages every few minutes, and my Facebook page filled with well wishes and intentions of healing energy coming my way. I was so touched by the outpouring of love and positive energy being sent to me. And with all of that, I settled into healing and recovery.

By Tuesday, I was in a complete fog from the pain killers. I could not move off the sofa, could not speak right, and could not focus on anything. To be completely candid, I was stoned off my ass! I had never reacted to pain meds like this before! As I lay there, trying not to move too fast for fear of hurting my ribs or making myself dizzy, I realized that the reaction I was having was probably my body's way of saying, "Okay, Woman! That's enough! You don't need this crap anymore! Get back to nature!" No more pain killers for me! I started a regimen of a tea for respiratory health, slathering on a mixture of arnica gel and Biofreeze, healing meditations, eating calcium-rich foods, and gently pushing myself to move more, to breathe deeper.

Wednesday I awoke with less pain. I could cough, yawn, sneeze, and laugh without that sharp pain shooting through my chest. I set about my day slowly, carefully. I smudged the house with sage, ridding it of the negative, icky energies of illness and pain and replacing it with the white and blue lights of healing. I played with my store of herbs at the kitchen table, mixing up a bath soak of epsom salts, dead sea salts, essential oils, and some lavender buds, as well as an herbal bath soak of healing and relaxing flowers and herbs. I refreshed the vases in my home with fresh pine branches cut from our Yule tree. I tended to my houseplants, picking out dead leaves and dried up flowers, gently talking to each one of them. At the end of the day, I realized that all of these actions, all of these herbs and plants, had helped to make me feel even better.

On Thursday, I was up at four in the morning, restless, unable to sleep, my mind racing through all sorts of thoughts, from finances to herbal blends for teas to upcoming obligations and back to finances. I got out of bed and struck out on another day of recovery. Being cooped up in the house for the past four days had created this restlessness. I was sure of it. So, I got outside, pushed myself to walk to the local convenience store three blocks away and back. It was cold and slow-going, painful at times and easy at others, but I did it, taking in deep achy breaths of fresh air, filling my lungs with the crisp scent of winter, letting the low-lying sun shine what beams it could upon my face. I strolled along in my best grippy sneakers, chest bundled from the chills of January, taking slow deliberate steps, conscious of every crack in the sidewalk, menacing patch of ice, and sneaky branch in my path. But I did it. I came home to a restful day of watching old movies, reading up on soap-making, paging through gardening catalogs, and chatting online with Facebook and Master Gardener friends, all still offering help, love and, what else, plants to cheer me up! More tea, more arnica gel and Biofreeze, more healthy foods, and a handful of different vitamins and supplements were had throughout the day. By bedtime, I was exhausted and had a really hard time finding a comfortable sleeping position (which for the past few nights since my fall had been propped up with pillows, nearly seated!) but I finally found it and, somewhat snuggled up with my hubby, I fell into a deep, sound, dreamless sleep.

Now here I am today, still a bit sore and stiff but definitely on the mend. I took another walk this morning, this time with a bit more pep in my step. Today is a day of studying and preparation. I am reading up on some more soap-making hints and ideas, making lists of ingredients and techniques. I have another notebook open to a blank page to be filled with incense blends to create. My Book of Shadows is nearby for reference and inspiration. I'll spend the coming weekend making soaps, mixing up incenses for the year, and crafting a few other herbal products. A load of laundry awaits folding and the bird feeders call to be filled again but I am waiting for the hubby to come home from work to help with those chores. Yes, I am beginning to feel much like myself again.

Through all of this, I have discovered the depth and diversity of my friends. They are not only human beings, those people in and around my life, my family, people I have known for years or those whom I have never met face-to-face. My friends are many more! They are the plants in my life - my houseplants, the herbs I grew, harvested and stored, and the botanical sources for my healing. They are my books, those that bring me comfort, knowledge, and new worlds. They are the elements - the warmth of the sun's fire, the breath of fresh air, the healing waters in which I soak, earth's botanical bounty, and the spirit of love and caring that surrounds me. All of these people and things are my friends. Without them and their help, I don't think I would be healing so quickly. I am truly blessed!

Sacred Spaces

"My next house will have an office!" I yelled from my spot at the kitchen table where I tapped away at the keys of my laptop as my son and husband talked right behind my chair, getting themselves drinks and snacks, as I desperately tried to find the right words for what I wanted to say next in an article.

This has been par for the course here in my house for, oh, maybe a year. I abandoned my old work space, a desk in my dining room but a very peaceful spot, when I got the lap top. My desktop just was not working well for me anymore but is the "storage" space for all of my family's cyber-life. It holds years of pictures, old but maybe eventually needed e-mails, some of my writing, several school reports, and a library of music, none of which, may I add, has been accessed in a very long time. I used to love writing the day away at my desk, surrounded by my bookcases of magical books, my altar a few steps away, with candles lit and emanating positive and creative energies. So there sat my desk, the old desktop and all of that energy in my dining room, unused and untapped, until Sunday night.

The full moon rose that night, although the clouds obscured it from full view, and I set about my usual January full moon ritual, working to bring renewed creativity for my writing, financial recovery after the holidays, and good energy for the second half of the school year for my son. As I created the sacred space for my ritual, something began to nag at my brain. I kept hearing the words "sacred space" echoing in my head, calling to me. asking me to look at it more closely. It dawned on me about half way through my magical workings. Sacred space is everywhere, all around me, within me and without, wherever I am and whatever I do.

Sacred space, for me, is so much more than just a circle cast for magic, that place in between worlds, in between time. It is a feeling generated by a place, by a time, by an action. It is that feeling of peace, acceptance, safety and love I get when I walk through the door of my home at the end of a long day. I am home. It is that leap of joy my spirit does when I am in the garden, planting, sitting, strolling or harvesting. I am one with Mother Earth. It is there when I am curled up with a good book on the sofa, all sense of my own world drifting away as I enter another world. I am living a different life. Sacred space is created when I draw that hot bath and slip into the lavender-scented water to soothe my aching bones on a cold night. I am at peace. It is there when I cook a meal, adding a dash of this or spoonful of that to the simmering pot on the stove, for my family. I am brewing up love. It is there when I am wrapped in my husband's arms. I am one with him. It is around me when I am writing, deep in thought and typing away at the keys. I am in my mind. Sacred space is there around me at all times. I am.

My sacred spaces have just been a bit cluttered, a little frustrating, and a little less energetic lately. They needed some tweaking, some fine-tuning, and some clearing. Last night, I asked my husband to clear off the desktop monitor, speakers, and mouse. After he did that, I dusted, straightened up, and smudged the room. I placed a few crystals and a jar with two feathers - a crow's and a hawk's - on my desk, to help the creative energies to flow. My sacred writing space is now back up and running smoothly. Ahhh, that feels so much better! Soon the holiday decorations will be down and away, which will restore the balance of my home's energies and will make things around here feel less cluttered. Slowly but surely, my husband is working his way through the basement, organizing, repurposing, recycling, or trashing, section by section, shelf by shelf. Just knowing how much stuff is in the basement throws off the sacred space of my house for me! We are back to healthy eating and exercising after all the sweets and carb-loaded foods that were synonymous with the holiday season. That will make the sacred space that is my body feel less bloated, less achy, and more energetic. I have started making herbal products, like teas, facial toners, aftershaves and bath salts, as a test run for a possible future home business. This has allowed me to continue working with the herbs from my garden in these colder darker days of winter, restoring my connection with the earth until spring arrives. I am back to a decent schedule of writing obligations, creating a sacred space of my time too.

So sacred space is more than a circle cast for magic. It is there always, just waiting to be cleaned up a bit to feel sacred and empowered again. Make this month about clearing up all of your sacred spaces, whether it be your home, your office, your body, your mind or your spirit. All of it can use a good cleaning out, a smudging and a little attention. It's made everything around me feel sacred again!

Happy New Year and blessings!

Walking in the Magical Garden with Mom and Dad

This piece was originally published in my column, The Magical Gardener, in today's Samhain edition of the Sunday Stew. Please be sure to head on over and read the entire edition, a delicious blend of spiritual flavors and nourishment for the soul.

Samhain is nearly here and I find myself thinking of my mom and dad more and more with each passing day. Most of my thoughts are just memories, some vivid in detail like reliving a few moments in time and others are dull, just a flash that leaves me struggling to place it in the timeline of my life. Some thoughts are directed tight at them. Daddy, you would be so proud of your grandson right now. Mommy, you would have loved this Sweet Pea (my niece). How do I make that beef stew again, Mom? I wish you could have seen that concert with me, Dad! And then there are the thoughts that are just wonderings. Would Mommy read this book? Would Daddy buy this album? The odd one that keeps creeping into my mind is if they would have loved my garden.

Both of my parents were avid gardeners. They started as summer-gardeners at our seashore home where we went from the end of school to Labor Day each year, planting tomatoes and other vegetables and tending to the flowering plants and shrubs that grew their every year. Later in life, after they divorced, my dad continued his love of gardening in the courtyard of his city apartment and my mom created a sprawling garden at her new suburban home. Both had different styles of gardening. My mom gravitated towards the English cottage style, planting herbs, roses and other flowering, healing perennial plants, informal and wild-looking. My dad, on the other hand, liked a lot of texture and depth, a more landscaped look and design, using ornamental grasses and lilies. My own garden is more like my mother’s as far as plantings but has many textures like my father’s gardens, a blend of both, just like I am.

Mommy passed away before I became an avid gardener. She gave me a few flowering shrubs when my hubby and I moved into our first home, which I planted in our small backyard and tended to lovingly because she gave them to me. After she died, I realized that caring for these shrubs made me feel closer to her. At that same time, I fell in love with herbs, all that they are, all that they do, for cooking, for magic, for healing. I planted a small herb garden and, only a few years later, I had dug up most of my backyard, pulled out every bit of grass I could, to create larger garden beds full of flowering perennials, herbs and vegetables.

My father was still here then and overjoyed at this change. When at my home for holidays or other events, he would take his pipe outside to sit among the plants and peace in my yard, constantly marveling at the transformation. He was even more pleased when I announced that I was going to school to become a Master Gardener. He had just undergone brain surgery to remove a tumor and I told him the news of my acceptance to the program as he was recovering in the hospital. He thought it was marvelous and was so excited to share in all the knowledge I would gain from it. We made plans for him to come to my house and spend the day in my garden, just spending time with me and my plants. But then, he took a turn for the worst and, just as I was starting my classes, he passed away.

So would they love my garden now? Oh, I think so. In fact, I know so. I have many of the plants they loved there – lilac, rosemary, yarrow, grasses, day lilies, and roses. It’s wild yet full of color and texture, full of sweet scents and joyful sights. Some days, as I am working among the plants and digging in the dirt, I can feel them there, peering over my shoulders, curious to see what is being planted next. Sometimes I envision them there, huddled together on the patio, discussing the garden, pointing at this or that, praising the herbs or marveling at the goldfinches nibbling the coneflowers. Sometimes I spy them from my kitchen window, strolling around the yard, my dad with one hand in his pocket and the other on his pipe clenched between his teeth, and my mother next to him, her hair caught by the breeze and her face lit up with her smile, autumn leaves floating to the ground around them. I want to walk with them for a while. I slip on my old canvas gardening shoes and head out the back door to be in the magic of that moment.

Waiting for First Frost

This piece was originally published in my column, The magical Gardener, in today's edition of the Sunday Stew. Please be sure to head on over and read the entire edition, a delicious blend of spiritual flavors and nourishment for the soul.

Autumn is settling in now. There may still yet be a few warm days on the horizon but, as each day of October passes, the chances are slimmer. It is all about clean-up now in the magical garden and time is running out. Very soon, the first frosty tendrils of winter will begin to creep through the the last of the green leaves and final flowers, the trees will be bare, and we will turn our attention inwards, take ourselves and a few plants indoors, away from the cold to dream up and plan next year’s garden. Here in my magical garden, it is time to make the final preparations for the coming winter before that frost or freeze comes knocking.

First frost should arrive almost certainly by November 1^st but has been known to suddenly make an appearance here in southeastern Pennsylvania in mid-October. The next week or so will find me and the magical gardening hubby feverishly working in the yard. I will put him in charge of building up the compost pile with the spent perennials and annuals and the growing piles of fallen autumn leaves while I harvest the last of the herbs and flowers to be put up for drying. He will also be the master hole-digger so that I can sink a few container plants, small shrubs and tiny trees, pots and all, into the soil to keep them warm and protected through the winter. The goal is to keep them out of the line of biting and damaging northern winter winds. We will both tackle the job of cleaning up the patio, putting away or securing chairs, grilling paraphernalia, and assorted empty unused pots and containers. As I work on trimming back the honeysuckle, I will praise his skill with the hedge-trimmer. We will both tackle the monster that is the wisteria and hope that it is the last time until April or May.

There are the garden inhabitants to worry about too. Every bird feeder and bath needs to be scrubbed clean before it gets too cold. New suet feeders will be hung here and there around the yard for easy winter feeding for all of our feathered friends. There is a bit of bird house cleaning to do, removing old nesting materials and securing them for new winter residents. A pile or two of old branches and small wood logs will be built up at the back of our property so that small critters, low-dwelling birds, or some over-wintering pollinators will have shelter. Even the garden fairy house will be spruced up for the winter.

I will also drag the hubby to the nursery or garden center for one more shopping spree before the cold sets in. There are last-minute deals on bulbs, perennials, and garden décor to be found out there! He will follow me through the aisles, arms laden with items that I place there as I reassure him. “Don’t worry, honey. It’s all on sale. Plus, you can consider this all part of my birthday present.” (My birthday is in mid-October and I tend to celebrate it all month long!) I will pat his arm lovingly and continue to the next garden find.

With the garden ready for the coming cold, the birds and critters all tucked in, the faeries warm and cozy in their home, the herbs all hanging in beautiful fragrant bunches in the kitchen, and all of my “birthday” purchases either planted or stowed away for spring, the magical gardening hubby and I will steal the last few moments we can outdoors on the patio. He will kindle the fire of sweet-smelling wood and dried herbs in the celestial cauldron fire pit while I light a few candles and pop open a few pumpkin beers to toast to a job well done. And we will wait, together, for first frost.

Happy Little Trees

This piece was originally published in my column, The Magical Gardener, in today's edition of the Sunday Stew. Please be sure to head on over and read the entire edition, a delicious blend of spiritual flavors and nourishment for the soul.

Autumn has only just begun and here, on the east coast, we are in the midst of our first Nor’Easter of the season. Classically, a Nor’Easter can bring high winds and heavy rain or, in the winter months, snow. This storm pales in comparison to others I have experienced in my past 46 years. Yet, I still find myself periodically heading to the windows around my house to see how the trees are faring in the storm. I worry about them and do not want to see any of them injured or, worse, brought down. I cried for days when the old oak tree that stood guard in front of my house had to be taken down, after being damaged in Hurricane Irene, Superstorm Sandy, several Nor’Easters, and, the final insult, a blow from its neighboring tree falling directly into it. If I only knew then what I know now, the grand old oak may have been saved.  But perhaps I can help others to continue to have, as Bob Ross used to call them, happy little trees.

Ensuring the long, healthy and happy life of a tree begins at the moment you decide to plant a tree. A tree should not be planted on or around your property just because it will look pretty in the fall. The local weather and soil conditions, its mature size, its proximity to a structure, and its maintenance and care requirements all must be considered first. Contact your local county cooperative extension office for a list of trees that are well-adapted for your specific location and conditions before considering the aesthetic properties you are searching for in a tree. Doing this may narrow the number of choices you have but it will save damage to the tree, your property and possibly a life down the road.

Many trees are not planted properly, leading to diseases, infestations, nutrient deficiencies and, eventually, death. You cannot just dig a hole and plop it in the ground. There is a method to planting a tree that allows for proper root, trunk and canopy growth and reduces the stress of the environment and weather on it. If it is not followed, the health and safety of the tree can, and most likely will, be compromised. Again, contact your local county extension office for information on how to do this.

Now, I am going to tell you something very important about tree planting and care, something that you must never forget. Do not volcano mulch a tree! What is volcano mulching? I know you have all seen it before in shopping centers or housing developments or even a neighbor’s front lawn. It is a horrible practice of piling inches and inches of mulch high up around and against the trunk of a tree, in what looks very much like a volcano. This can lead to improper root growth, decay and pests.  I cannot tell you how many times I have wanted to go around the local shopping center pulling all the mulch away from these poor trees. I have some thoughts on why commercial landscapers practice this murderous technique but those are probably better left for another day. So please, please, I beg of you, do not volcano mulch!

An excellent habit to get into is that of inspecting your trees after storms, like Nor’Easters, hurricanes, or even powerful thunderstorms, pass through your area. Now you may not think that a branch breaking off during a storm can do much damage to the health of a tree but it can, and often does. This is the mistake I made with my own old oak. A broken branch is like an open wound. Diseases can find their way into the tree through a broken branch or a damaged trunk. Pruning or other “medical” attention may be required. Remember your friends at the extension office and ask them how best to proceed. In many cases, especially if the tree is very large or if personal safety is in question, you may need to contact a reputable tree service to address the injuries. Also, regular pruning can lessen breakage during storms as well as aid the tree in its overall health and growth.

If you live on the coast, your trees are faced with a unique issue not known to their inland friends, that of salt. Coastal storms, like hurricanes, bring salt spray on the wind and flooding surges of ocean water. Many trees on the Jersey shore were damaged during Superstorm Sandy by salt water. Salt, when in the soil, prevents the tree from taking up water and, when in the air, burns branches, needles and leaves. To lessen the damage done by salt, fresh water irrigation is required. Hose the whole tree and soil around it with fresh water thoroughly and often in the first days after the salt exposure. Now this may not be possible right after a major storm. Securing life and property is always the top priority! But when, and if, life begins to return to normal, you can turn some attention to your poor salt-laden trees.

Do not forget a little magic goes a long way. When planting a tree, hold a welcoming ritual for it. Bless it for a long, healthy and happy life. When pruning it, talk to the tree, comfort it, and let it know why. Trees are proud beings and sometimes they cannot understand why the simple human is cutting away a majestic branch. Just ask it. It will tell you! When storms are approaching, go to each tree, place your hands on it, and tell it to stand tall through the storm. I often did this for my ailing oak, calling upon deities of earth and sky to protect it and keep it from further harm, to keep it standing. It worked for the most part but finally, sadly, it became clear that it probably would not stand through another onslaught of wind, rain, ice or snow and my oak was taken down.

In true Nor’Easter fashion, the rain is slowing down now but the winds have picked up slightly. Again, I am at my windows checking the trees. They are swaying under its chilly breath. I am keeping an especially close eye on an old oak in my neighbor’s yard, one that is showing some signs of neglect. I will have to either talk to the neighbor or sneak into their yard with pruners in hand and magic in my heart. I just want happy little trees.

Embracing The Dark

This piece was originally published in my column, The Magical Gardener, in today's Autumn Equinox edition of the Sunday Stew. Please be sure to head on over and read the entire edition, a fantastic blend of Autumn flavors and nourishment for the soul.

The wheel of the year is turning to autumn and the sunset of the year is upon us. The dark will soon overpower the light. The time of growth and abundance in the garden is waning and the season of darkness will soon blossom to fullness, allowing nature to slumber, to rest for awhile until the light returns. Light and dark, day and night, will briefly and gently balance at Mabon in a delicate dance of life and death before letting go of the vibrancy of youth to make way for the wisdom and decay of old age. We, as witches and as magical gardeners, embrace the coming dark by preparing our gardens to go to their deaths, to slip back beneath the blankets of soil to sleep in the arms of Mother Earth until the next spring when life returns.

Welcoming autumn is also saying goodbye to our plant friends for a while. The process of doing this is a ritual for gardeners and is done with as much love and sympathy as the ritual of saying goodbye to an ailing loved one. We experience the death of the garden through the tasks we perform to prepare it for the cold darkening days. We have been with our gardens through their conception, infancy, adolescence, and adulthood. It is the natural course of life to see them through to their very end, to be with our plants and trees in their final moments, to watch the wheel turning to the end of the year in a final bow of gold, yellow orange and red before the curtain closes. It is time to put the garden’s affairs in order before the end.

The tasks of pruning and raking may seem simple and meaningless but are meditative and allow us the time to say goodbye and to tune into the coming dark. Harvesting the herbs and flowers for drying, we should give thanks to the life of each plant and for the magic and healing it will bring to our lives. Adding leaves to the compost pile is a funeral rite as we bid farewell to the fertile days of the year and turn to embrace the barren season. As garden beds are mulched or cover crops are planted, a blanket of warmth and nourishment is wrapping Mother Earth and all those plants will rest safely deep within the soil until their return in spring.

Autumn is also a time to put our own affairs in order. Time spent working on the final tasks of the garden is also time for contemplation of our own unfinished business. Identify negative thoughts, habits and cycles, the things or people that impede our journeys in this life and cast shadows in it and on those around us. Embrace them in a final goodbye. Write each one to be put to rest or to be released on a fallen autumn leaf and burn them in a fire pit or a bonfire at Mabon. Send them away from you to make way for new growth, new beginnings, and to make way for the returning light.

As gardeners, we often tend to focus on spring and summer, reveling in the growth, but as witches we embrace the dark as we would the light. Both are necessary in order for growth to occur. We celebrate the dark time of our gardens because we know the magic of new life that sleeps in the earth. It is only a few turns of the wheel away. The second harvest has come. It is a time of darkness, a time of endings. It is autumn, Mabon. Embrace the dark.

The Last Days of Summer

Tonight, as I stood in my sister's kitchen, chatting about this and that, a scent of wood burning came through the screen door, carried on a chilly damp wind. I closed my eyes and breathed it in deeply, my mind flooding with images of Fall, craving the sweetness of apple cider on my tongue and the warmth of worn jeans and an old sweat jacket on a cool crisp evening. I was keenly aware in that moment that Summer's days are numbered and, while I long for those blue and gold days and chilly nights scented with wood smoke, I need to revel in these last days of fun in the sun.

In a few days, I will be heading to my beloved seashore, to reconnect with my beach bum self. Days will be spent on the beach - lounging in my chair with a book, basking in the sun, my skin lathered with a #30 and stained with salt, my toes digging into cool wet sand, taking the hourly dip in the sacred waters of the Atlantic Ocean. The nights will be spent on the beach too - taking strolls under the stars by the crashing waves with my hubby, laughing, talking, or even just silently enjoying the walk together. Dawn may find me meditating on a beach towel on the sand while dusk may find me collecting seashells with my nieces. One evening I may stand by the water's edge listening to my son playing his guitar from his perch on a lifeguard stand, while on another I may walk to the jetty at the end of the island for a bit of exercise.

The shore is where I go to regenerate, to die a little death and be reborn for another year. I throw myself in the ocean, abandoning all I am to the surf, letting go of everything the past year has thrown at me, my cares, worries and fears floating away. The salt cleanses every bit of muck and mire from me, rejuvenating my heart and spirit, taking away the aches and pains of my aging body. Somewhere in my head a bit of a song echoes. "'Cause down the shore everything's all right..."

And it truly is all right! Sure, being with a large familial crowd, as I will be, may have its frustrations or moments of head-butting. But mainly there will be lots of laughter to the point of tears, story telling of past seashore days, card playing over frosty White Russians and Mudslides, gathering around the table for yummy meals and tasty snacks, missing those who are no longer there with us, and staying up late giggling with the kids, who mostly aren't really kids anymore but nearly adults themselves. Sad. I still can see them all as little ones, running all over the beach with buckets, shovels, boogie boards and sunburns. For a few, we are nearing their time to leave the nest. Who knows if this may be the last Summer with the family at the shore for one or two of them. All the more reason to savor every moment!

And then, before I know it, I'll be in the car, traveling over the bridge away from the island, in tears that another vacation is over and wondering when I'll be able to see the shore again. I'll get home, back to the regularly scheduled program of my life and daydream. What if I just sold our little house in the suburbs with the beautiful garden and moved us to the shore, forever? What if I could create a gorgeous abundant Village Wise Woman garden at a little house at the shore? What if the hubby and I waited another couple of years when our son is settled in college and made the big move? What would it be like to be able to walk on the beach every night, in every season? Aye, I could do that.

Then Autumn will be here in all of its rich earthy scents, bold beautiful color, cooler days and colder nights, and I will settle in to my life again with the seashore tucked away in my heart and on a "To Do In The Future" list in my head. I'll put my garden to sleep for the year, work a bit of prosperity magic under an October Full Moon, and keep making my way back to the shore, whether for another week come Summer or for the rest of my days.

Gathering Garden Faeries for the Summer Solstice

For me, the Summer Solstice has always been a time of celebrating my garden. I take time to sit back and revel in the fruits of my labor. The long hours and days of digging in the dirt, planting, weeding, and pruning are behind me and I turn my attention to just watching and waiting for everything to grow, until the next round of planting. Right now, with the first day of Summer only two days away, the garden is lush and green with bursts of color from newly blossoming day lilies, coneflowers, verbena, nasturtiums and herbs. The tomatoes plants grow taller each and every day and are already showing small green fruits. So, with a lull in the gardening tasks, I decided that I wanted to do something special out in my garden for the Solstice - make a garden faerie house.

I have written of my experiences with garden faeries over the years, both here and in other blogs to which I contribute, most recently in the Sunday Stew. I have also played with making faerie houses in the garden over the past couple of years but never really thought it out properly or made it turn out as I envisioned. This year, I started my planning at the end of May, gathered all my items, and worked on it bit by bit. As I worked on it, I mentioned it several times on Facebook and friends began telling me that I should do a blog post about how I made it. Hence this piece. The faerie house is now complete and I will be "presenting" it to my resident garden faeries officially on the Summer Solstice. But, I wanted my readers to see it before then. Maybe a few of you would like to make something similar in your gardens in the days to come.

It all started with an interesting log my husband brought home from one of his firewood-hunting trips. He pulled the car up in the driveway, popped open the trunk, and announced, "I think I found the perfect tree stump for a faerie house." He showed me where he thought the door should go and how it fit perfectly and snugly beneath the lilac bush. And there it sat under the lilac bush in my patio garden bed for the past couple of years, waiting for me to turn it into a faerie house.

I spent countless hours out on my patio since the day my hubby brought this beautiful piece of tree home contemplating how to make it a faerie house. I surfed the net seeing what other people did and what items I could make or buy to do it. I finally just went with the vision that kept occupying my mind time and time again, a mix of creativity and a few store-bought items.

First, I took an old basket, cut the handle off, filled it with soil and planted some trailing plants, Lanai Red Verbena and Ramblin Petunia, and a mounding plant, Techno Heat Lobelia. I placed it on top of the tree stump (more like a piece of a very large branch from an old tree). The colors were subtle but very beautiful with the aged bark of the wood.

Next I put down some of the left over soil from the plant pots in front of the door and made a path with some beautiful stones I found at the local craft store.

As you can see from the pictures so far, there is a natural arch at the front of the log that already looks like a doorway. Instead of making or buying a door and attaching it there, I just made that arch look like a real door. I took some thin pliable cedar branches and braided them together, with the help of some floral wire, and then tacked it around that arch to make the doorway. I found an old clip-on earring that had no match (it actually belonged to my mother) in my jewelry box that I thought would make a really pretty doorknob. To put this on, I tapped a nail into the area where I thought a doorknob should be and then bent the nail with the hammer, just clipping the earring on to it. Then I tucked some moss in and around the arch.

A faerie house needs a few windows too! To make those, I used some pieces of that basket I cut up for the flowers, some pieces of plastic milk jugs and a glue gun. I assembled them first and then tacked them on to the log, making sure the tacks were hidden from view by putting them through at the very corners of the windows. I added a few tuffs of moss around them too.

Over the next couple of days, I worked on getting a few items to add to the house - a broom, a watering can, a birdbath, an arbor and a bench. During this time, I noticed that the stone path kept shifting. Whether it was from the rain we had all week or from birds or squirrels romping around in the garden bed, I was not sure but I knew I had to do something to prevent it from happening again. Luckily, the items I bought for the faerie house came as a kit and, with it, there was a fence. I put this into the landscape, bending it here and there to make a winding path from the front door out into my garden.

And finally, I added a small strand of warm white battery-operated LED twinkle lights into the basket of flowers.

My faerie house is complete!

I hope you all have a beautiful and blessed Litha/Summer Solstice! To my friends in the southern hemisphere, Winter Solstice Blessings!

A Late April Stroll Through the Village Wise Woman Gardens

If you were to take a stroll through my gardens right now, today, you would find the sage, lemon balm, cat mint, bee balm, yarrow, chives and oregano returning in the herb garden along side newly planted (I just did it this afternoon after work) rosemary, lavender, parsley, basil, cilantro, pineapple sage and chamomile. Subtle herbal scents would greet you on the breeze, like a Spring incense. It's positively divine. Behind the row of herbs, you would see a white fabric hoop tunnel. Lifting the fabric a bit and peaking under, you would be greeted by an abundance of growing radishes and, I am sorry to say, only a few very small seedlings of kale, broccoli and brussel sprouts. Next time, I will not direct sow seed but start them all indoors or in my mini-greenhouse. The rest of the veggie garden bed lies in wait for tomatoes, eggplants and some other warm crop veggies.

Moving on to my rock garden, hostas are really coming in now, the spikes of leaves unfurling to show off the varying shades of green. The yuccas have been thinned out and are ready to send out their long flower stalks once Summer has arrived. The butterfly bush, which I know is not a native plant and is invasive but which I cannot bring myself to remove, is beginning to show new leaves all along the lengths of its branches. The daffodils and tulips are fading now but the forsythia continues with its brilliant yellow flowers and bright green leaves. At the center of the rock garden, still stands the skeletal remains of my Burkwood's Broom, the victim of Winter's wrath. I just purchased its replacement, a Lena's Broom. Gone may be the beautiful cream and crimson flowers of the Burkwood's May show but we will now have Lena's gorgeous bright red and yellow blooms in the Mays to come. My husband and I will carefully cut down the old Broom in order to keep several branches intact for making - what else -a broom! (More on that another day.)

The patio is a wondrous place to just sit a while right now. The lilac is in full bloom, its flowers changing from deep purple to a very pale lavender as each petal opens. The purple coneflowers are in varying degrees of growth, some several inches above the soil and some just poking through. Calendula is sprouting from the seeds I planted a few weeks ago. I still see no signs of my black-eye susans but there is still time. The day lilies are almost at full size but their bright orange trumpet-like flowers will not appear until the end of May. The first buds have just emerged on the sweetspire and, by June, it will be full of white flowers surrounded by several different species of bees and wasps, attracted by its strong sweet scent. Come mid-Summer, the entire patio garden will be popping with colors - purple and pink (coneflowers), orange and yellow (calendula and day lilies), deep red and orange (nasturtiums and cardinal flowers), fuschia (bee balm), white (moon flowers), and, of course, all the shades of green possible. The patio is also the place where my plants await transplanting in the garden beds. So, right now, you will find pots of Lena's Broom and spirea. The mini-greenhouse holds my current seedlings - tomatoes, cardinal flower, red twig dogwood, and more basil. 

Throughout the backyard I have nasturtiums, in baskets and tucked into almost every garden bed, just emerging from seeds I planted two weeks ago. There are several bird houses, feeders, and baths for all of my feathered friends. Soon the hummingbird feeders will be hung too! This year I am trying to attract Baltimore Orioles so you will often find oranges (their favorite) hanging around the yard. As more butterflies emerge and come to the garden, I will also set up a feeding station for them. It's a simple shallow bowl filled with aging berries, oranges and bananas. The bees are already beginning to arrive. Carpenters, masons, yellow jackets, and bumbles are flitting in and around every plant in the garden, looking for blossoms. In just a couple of weeks, these bees will be "bar-hopping" from flower to flower, taking all the nectar they can. The whole garden will be buzzing and singing in the warmer days to come.

The front yard is a bit less magical. I am still trying to figure out what would be best to do there. Right now, we have ivy, a huge yew shrub, day lilies, hostas, a rose bush, and goldenrod. A few hyacinths and tulips are there too. My husband and I plan to take out all of the ivy and the yew but it will be back-breaking work and we haven't felt up to the task as of yet. I will also remove most of the hostas and day lilies and give them away to a good home in a plant swap. I would like to make it as pollinator friendly as possible, with native plants and a few showy shrubs, and with as much color through all the seasons as I can find. My sun porch looks out over the front yard so I want to be able to see all the same beautiful sights - the bees, the butterflies, the birds, and the colorful flowers - that I see in the backyard. I dream of sitting in my wicker chair, reading a gardening book and sipping herbal tea, and glancing out the huge windows on that porch to see butterflies frolicking among the blooms and birds drinking from the small cauldron fountain (which, note to self, the hubby has to fix).

As April draws to a close, I find myself busier than ever in the garden. So much is done already but there is still so much more to do. There is still planting to be done, new plant friends to be found, a tree or two to replace, and new homes to be added for birds, bees and butterflies. As always, a garden is a constant work in progress. I don't mind though. I revel in the work. I get to be outdoors every day, rain or shine, spending time with Mother Earth. All is turning lush and green, vibrant colors are bursting all around me, and surprises greet me almost every morning. Magic is happening all around me. I am a happy witch in a beautiful, peaceful and magical place.

Every Day Should Be Earth Day

The world is changed. I feel it in the water. I feel in it the earth. I smell it in the air. Much that once was is lost, for none now live who remember it. (from Galadriel’s monologue in The Lord of The Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring)

Today, April 22^nd, is Earth Day. This is a day set aside for planting trees, cleaning up parks, forests and beaches, for teaching people to plant gardens and not lawns, and for healing Mother Earth. For me, as a witch and pagan, as a gardener, and just as a human being, every day is Earth Day and I find it very sad, dare I say offensive, that there is only one day in a year dedicated to caring for, tending to, and protecting our planet, our collective home.

Earth is a living thing. Carbon, the building block of life, is found in not only humans but in animals, plants, the air, the oceans, rocks, and soil. This means that we humans and the animals are not the only things alive on Earth. That rock you toss aside, that soil you turn for planting, that ocean you dive into each Summer, that tree you are cutting down - all hold the elements of life. As Earth is made up of rock, soil and water, the argument could be made that the planet Earth itself is alive. Earth, Mother Earth, Mother to us all, home to us all. And we are killing Her.

Each year, we humans spend tons of money, and time, on protecting the inner sanctum of our homes from things like carbon monoxide, asbestos, and lead, on air filtration systems to clean the air we breathe in our houses, and on water filtration systems for our drinking and bathing water. Yet, most of us cannot stop to pick up trash on the ground when we see it, cannot stop pouring fertilizers and pesticides on our lawns and gardens, and cannot stop filling landfills with every item we wish gone from our life, only to replace it with something “new and improved”. Our oceans are filled with tons of plastic and other waste, none of it good and all of it deadly. We are killing our home. Mother Earth is fighting for Her life. We, the people, can help heal Her, not just one day a year, but every day of our entire lifetime, for generations to come.

Saving our planet begins with education. Educate yourself. Understand how all life on this planet in interconnected. Learn the facts about climate change, pollution, and the importance of maintaining local native habitats and ecosystems. Learn how to compost, how to collect rain water, and how to recycle, repurpose, and reuse items in and around your home. Understand the chemicals we use in our lives, our homes and our gardens and the damage they can cause to humans, animals and plants. Know their dangers and how to either use, store and dispose of them properly and safely, or rid your life of them completely. Take that knowledge, make changes to your daily living, and lead by example. Then educate your kids, your family, your friends, and anyone willing to listen and empower them all to do the same.

Community service should not be reserved for just Earth Day. Volunteer to help clean up local parks, forests, creek beds, or beaches regularly. In Spring, consult with your child’s school administration about planting raised garden beds as part of science classes. In Autumn, help your elderly neighbors clean up the fallen leaves. Save them for your compost pile or show your neighbors how those leaves can be used to mulch gardens. Spread the word on your block of upcoming local shredding events, hazardous waste collections, or electronics recycling programs. Offer help in getting to those events. Simply just picking up trash you see in your travels and disposing of it properly is community service. On a larger scale, join an organization that protects wildlife and volunteer for their events as often as you can. Work with your local government to begin greener practices or to restore local habitats. I could list out hundreds of ideas and suggestions but I think you get the gist of it.

As Galadriel said, “The world is changed.” From all the scientific data I have seen and heard, it has changed for the worse. Mother Earth is being destroyed and we may not be able to reverse it. But I am going to go down trying! It starts with one person. I truly believe that one person can change the course of events. That change begins with me, with us. We are all part of this ever-turning interconnected orb of life. Perhaps our leaders will finally understand it and begin to change as well. So, of course, participate in as many events this Earth Day as you wish. But if you do anything this Earth Day, make the commitment to make every day of your life Mother Earth Day.

Full Moons, Lunar Eclipses and a Garden Full of Magic

There is something so beautiful, so special, and so magical about the first Full Moon in a new season. The world seems to revel in all the colors, scents, and sounds of the reborn season. We are keenly aware of the changes happening in nature and the continually spinning of the wheel of the year. For me, the first Full Moon of Spring is even more magical. All life is reawakening. My small part of the world is transforming from the dull grays of Winter to the lush green shades of Spring. Last year’s plant friends are returning and new ones are starting to take root in the rich dark soil. Birds are returning from points South to take up Summer residence and the groundhog appears out of the Winter slumber to see what I may be growing this year that will tantalize his or her taste buds. As the Full Moon of Spring arrives, I take a break from the regularly scheduled program of gardening to give the garden a magical boost and to just be a while with Spring.

The first Full Moon of Spring is on its way this week, April 15^th to be exact. A Full Moon brings increased magical power and energy and is an excellent time for blessing the garden. The way in which you do this is entirely up to you. My usual blessing ritual is a three-fold process. First, I walk the length of each garden bed, smudging and clearing the area first with some sage as I go. I then walk the beds again, sprinkling salt water this time. My third time around I hold my hands over each and every plant and say a charm to bless that plant with abundance in the coming growing season and charging it with its magical, healing, nourishing or even aesthetic properties. I spend time with each plant and meditate on its life cycle, on its purpose(s), and on keeping it healthy and happy. And, yes, I talk to each and every plant, shrub or tree. I also bless the areas of the garden where I know the birds and critters inhabit, gather nourishment, and congregate.

When all this is done, I just sit on my patio, beneath those silvery Moon beams (even when it’s cloudy those beams are still there), and soak them in as I listen to my garden grow. Have you ever listened to your garden grow? It is a truly magical experience in and unto itself. It can be done whether you have a sprawling yard or a small patio garden. Ground and center yourself. Try using a tree of life meditation, becoming a tree to commune with your plant friends. As your “roots” take hold and your “branches” reach out, the ambient noise of your local environment – the cars, people, planes – will slip away and you will begin to hear the subtle sounds of plants growing, moving, unfurling, rooting, and blossoming. You will hear birds ruffling their feathers as they settle in for the night, bugs moving along stems and leaves hunting for food, earthworms burrowing through soil, or the flutter of moth wings as they move among the plants. You will feel yourself deeply rooted in the earth yet feel the gentle sway of reaching out and up toward the sky. Open your eyes for a few minutes and look around. Your garden will seem to glow and shimmer with the spark of life. Just stay in that moment for a bit. Close your eyes again and slowly begin to bring those roots and branches back in to yourself and ground the remaining energy. Open your eyes again. You will never look at your garden and plants the same way again after doing this. Believe me!

The Full Moon of the 15th will be even more powerful because there will be a total lunar eclipse. For those of you in North America, it will be visible! According to the Old Farmer’s Almanac 2014, the Moon will enter the penumbra (the outer shadows of the Earth) at 12:52 a.m. EDT, reach totality at 3:06 a.m., and leave the penumbra at 6:39 a.m. I urge you to take the time to watch it. It is a truly wondrous and magical sight. I liken it much to seeing the triple goddess before my very eyes, watching the Moon go through all of Her cycles – waxing, full and waning, Maiden, Mother and Crone – in only a few hours. This cyclical energy and the combined feminine energy of both the Moon and Earth will only enhance the cyclical energy of nature, the fertile energy of your growing garden, and your magical work.

There are other magical things you can do for and in your garden during the coming Full Moon. Plant a magical herb for use in spells, potions and healing in the days to come or flowers that correspond to the moon such as moonflower, gardenia, or jasmine. Add a statue of a Moon goddess, a gazing globe, or an image of the Moon to your garden. In honor of the Full Moon, the lunar eclipse and all that feminine fertile energy, I will be planting my moonflower seeds on the 15^th.

Happy Magical Gardening and Full Moon Blessings!

Review: Eliora's Enchanting Elegance

Many years ago, when I first became a witch, many of my ritual and magickal tools were given to me as gifts. They were all appreciated. But at that time, witchcraft was not as out of the broom closet as it is today. There were only a handful of stores in my area that catered to the needs of pagans and witches. There was no Amazon, no Etsy, and no Facebook pages to like, follow, and discover new and exciting tools. My athame was a plain, black-handled knife. My wand was a simple oak smoothed and carved oak branch. My chalice was a simple black goblet with a pentacle on it. My cauldron was a simple black clay pot. All very simple and they all served me well over the years. But, over the years, as I grew into my pagan skin and continued along my pagan path, these tools no longer spoke to me. They no longer felt like extensions of myself and my spirit, like they should. Just then I met Lorelei Eliora through Facebook and discovered her Etsy shop, Eliora's Enchanting Elegance. Enchanting indeed!

Lorelei has been crafting ritual tools, magickal items and decor art for over 15 years but, as she says, she's been "crafty since childhood". As her Etsy shop notes, she is a "pagan artisan creating enchanting elegance for your magickal life". She creates her enchanting items in a magical workroom in her home, surrounded by old tall protective oak trees. All of her items are handcrafted, hand-embellished, and infused with love, blessings and magick. Her inventory is extensive, offering witches and pagans items like athames, wands, bolines, chalices, jewelry, divining boards, glass art, and charm clips, among many other things. She offers everything you need for your altar and pagan practices. She takes custom orders for whatever type of witch you are - from the garden witch, like me, to the witch devoted to a particular goddess.

Very early into our online friendship, I asked Lorelei to make me an athame, one that spoke to the gardening, herb-loving, tree-hugging witch in me. For a very reasonable price, Lorelei made me a beautiful athame. The handle is wrapped in a pale green suede cord and gold-link chain. It is embellished with gold, green and amber leaves, glass beads with acorn caps on them, small pine cones, tiny glass flowers of pale orange and yellow, and pentacles. As soon as I saw it, I knew it was the athame for me. It fits perfectly in my hand and with my magick.

A few months later, I asked her to craft a wand for me. She went into the woods around her home, found a lovely branch of oak and embellished it to match my athame. It feels so natural and so powerful. It is perfect for this gardening witch.

When I received both items, it felt like Lorelei had known me for years. She knew the colors that spoke to me. She knew what the items should feel like in my hands. She knew me, knew my spirit, knew my magick. How could she know me that well? How could she craft the items I had longed for? She just knew.

Perhaps you are new to the craft or the pagan path, just getting started, and in need of all the ritual tools and magickal items. Lorelei has exactly what you are looking for - a complete altar set, customized to your magickal path! It is a cabinet or box in your choice of theme or color and charm elements of your choice. It includes Goddess and God tea light candles, elemental quarter tealights, a candle snuffer, water bowl, altar cloth, a small bell, small embellished jars filled with sea salt and sand, a mini-besom, a mini-wand, a mini-athame, a small altar box in the them of your choice, a ceramic cauldron, mini-chalice, a pair of potion bottles, charcoal, cone incense, and an altar plate, again in your theme. All of this for $200!

Lorelei is a joy to know and a pleasure to work with. She has a beautiful soul and it shines through her work. Your items arrive quickly (but don't forget that handcrafting, hand-embellishing, and customizing can take some time) and carefully packaged.

Head on over to Eliora's Enchanting Elegance and check out all of her lovely items. If you don't find what you are looking for there, contact Lorelei and request a custom piece (or two or three). You can also follow her Facebook page, Eliora, and see what she's working on now. Prepare to be elegantly enchanted!

Spring Has Sprung

It has finally arrived! Spring is here and I feel like a weight has been lifted from me. Winter is fading into the shadows. My heart and spirit are light and my mind is rolling through all of the plans, ideas and dreams for my garden. I am spending the day planting the seeds of new beginnings, letting go of the past year, the past harsh Winter, emerging from my cocoon and letting the wings of my spirit flap in the gentle warming breeze.

My altar is decked in fresh cut flowers, forsythia branches in bloom, seed packets, beautifully painted eggs in a birds nest, floral scented candles, bunnies, a flower fairy, and all the needed items for a bit of Ostara magic later today. I have brought all the items I need to plant my seeds today and to transplant a few houseplants to my kitchen to do a bit of indoor gardening. Hard-boiled eggs are awaiting some decorating. I have a lovely dinner planned - a quiche, some fresh greens tossed in a light herbal and citrus vinaigrette, and some treats for dessert. The music is on, the candles are lit, and the whole house smells like, sounds like, feels like Spring.

I've been out in the garden this morning and Spring has most definitely sprung. Tulips, daffodils, hyacinths and day lilies are breaking the ground. The forsythia is beginning to bloom. The buds on the lilac are swelling. A few trees have started to show small bursts of green. The birds are dancing around the feeders and checking out the nesting huts I have hung for them. Robins are pecking at the thawed ground hunting for juicy worms. The squirrels are busily nibbling on the bits of apples and nuts I put out for them this morning. Maybe even our resident groundhog will make an appearance today! My little part of the world has awakened and come alive!

Tonight, we'll eat, drink, make merry, and release wishes for new beginnings into the Spring breeze and send out blessings over the garden for the coming growing season. We'll welcome all our feathered and furried friends back for another year and send out callings to those we wish to grace us with their presence. We'll give thanks to Mother Earth for making it through an extremely harsh Winter and for being granted the return of lengthening warmer days, for the beauty, wonder and magic of Spring.

Oh joy! Spring has sprung! I wish you all a blessed, beautiful and magical Ostara!