October 31, 2011

Tonight is not only Samhain but at midnight, in one hour from when I am writing this in fact I will do my ritual to start my year and a day. I am nervous but excited at the same time. Things didnt go as planned today but that wont stop me from enjoying my ritual tonight.

I do have a couple things planned but for the most part I am just going to wing it. Reason is that once I get outside and start the ritual everything that I have planned with go out the window I'm sure.

I have taken my ritual shower already with a wonderful bar of soap in the shape of the Goddess. It was amazing!

I am going to do my Samhain ritual before I do my year and a day ritual since I will be doing these outside. I thought about doing my Samhain ritual earlier in the night but thought why not have both outside. Its 46 degrees as I write this, much warmer then most years. Normally we have either snow, ice or a cold wind. Tonight we have neither. The wind is blowing some but its not as cold as most years, that is why I will be doing my ritual outside. This is the first time ever I am doing a ritual outside!!!

Plans are right now to blog about my ritual once I come inside. I have fully decided on it but I will be taking some video and maybe even a few pictures of the fire and such. I have made some incense and also offering stones for both rituals tonight.

My thoughts are scattered right now so I am going to post this and be off. I need to finish getting ready.

Many blessings to you all on this wonderful night!!!!

October 18, 2011

Today it only got up to about 50!! Wow what happened the 70s we had last week!! They say we are going to have a low of about 29 tonight, below freezing! With the temps being so cold I went out into the garden tonight and picked all veggies that were ready or almost ready so they wouldnt freeze. There wasnt much but my Swiss Chard is still going strong and so were some of my peppers and squash. The tomatoes were mostly green but I picked some to stick in the window to see if they would ripen any. I figure if they do it at the store then why not me too right?

I have noticed something with tomatoes that I will keep in mind for next year. Dont plant them to late in the year! I planted some in middle to late July and even though it sounded like a good idea they just didnt have the heat to ripen any of the tomatoes. I have lots of little cherry tomatoes that would have been great but the temps this fall just wasnt hot enough. So note to self, late June is the latest to plant tomatoes.

On another note, today was my weigh in at Weight Watchers. I lost 1.2 lbs which was good but I keep losing and gaining the same 5lbs. Its frustrating!! I know what I need to do but when I get a craving for bread I eat it, and I eat to much of it! Also I really need to cut out the soda of any kind. Bread and soda, bad bad things for me.

I ordered a couple herb books tonight from Amazon, I cant wait to get them. Also got a book on making lotions and bath salts and such. Oh and a good friend and sister of mine told me to get Hem Dragon's Blood incense so I checked it out and bought some. Can't wait to get that too! She got a witches brew candle from Yankee Candle, I have a couple bids on ebay for the 12.5oz candles. I hope I get them but I have a day to find out!

That's all for today. Going to bed early tonight and also hoping that it doesnt freeze like they say but if it does I will be taking pictures for sure!!

A beautiful witchie day!

October 17, 2011

I have decided that my journal entries will start with the date at the top of the page. Yes I know the date will be posted when I am finally done with the blog but since this is my journal I want to write it the way I would any other journal.

Today, I have the day off from work. I have been needing a 3 day weekend and it came at just the right time! It is a beautiful witchie fall day! Now what I mean is that as I am writing this it is almost 11am, and it looks more like 7am and it feels like it should be 5am, a very chily 45 degreesF right now. Its cloudy and gloomy, there is no wind, a perfect day for me. The ground is covered with the browns and golds of the fallen leaves. The leaves that slowly fall to the earth reminds me of snow falling, something that will be here before we know it! I wish I bottle this type of day up and save it for those cold winter nights ahead!!

My day will be spent inside mostly. I do plan to let the cats roams some later so I will be sitting outside enjoying the weather. The cats love to explore and they have been really good lately when I let them outside. I wonder what they will think once the snow has arrived. They normally run out the door and down the steps when I let them outside, so cute. Once that snow comes and we have a few inches on the ground I wonder if they will look up at me and say, WTF?

But since I do have the day off, besides the normal Monday cleaning jobs around the house, I want to be a little crafty today. I cant be to crafty without the supplies that I need but there are a few things around here that I can do. Painting is one of them. I have been working on the 4 elements for the past 2 months now. I have air, water and fire done, earth is the last one and I have been stuggling with this one. I like how its coming out so far but it needs something more still. Maybe I will get that finished today. I am also starting the 4 seasons paintings. At the moment I am working on Autumn. So far so good, maybe once everything is finished I will post a photo of them.

The rest of my crafty projects have to wait. I ordered a few items on Friday and some yesterday. Now I just have to wait for the mail to arrive. One project I cant share with you because its for a friend and even though this blog wont go public until I start my year and a day I dont want to take the chance of it not being done or her not getting it until a few weeks later. But I can say that I am excited for it!!

Also I am doing research on some items for my family and friends for Christmas. I have already made one batch of bath salts but I am trying out a couple different recipes so I have to wait for those supplies too. I have a couple friends that will be testing them for me. I have been thinking about asking a couple others that I know around here too. I will be also making sugar scrubs, soaps, lotions and much more. I am also researching making my own incense and candles. Yes I know that is a lot of crafty items to make but I have been wanting to do this for a very long time now. I have also thought about opening a Etsy shop. Now this wouldnt be open for many months if I do open one but if anyone that reads this and has any thoughts on it I am open to hear them.

Well enough blogging for now. I need to be productive. All I have done today is read emails and play my favorite games on facebook, Sims and Bubble Witch Saga. I am stuck on level 41 on the Bubble Witch game. I am sure I will keep going back to that until I beat it!

On to other things now!!!

A New Soup, at least to me

Yesterday I woke up feeling stuffy and achy, the early signs of a cold. Now I get this way whenever the temperature changes. Lately it has been in the 70s during the day and the 50s and sometimes even 40s during the night. Windows open during the day and space heater on at night. With those changes anyone can get sick. I got out my eucalyptus oil and rubbed some on my chest and breathed that in deeply. I love that smell!

So when I was thinking about what I wanted for lunch I figured I would make some kind of soup or stew. Perfect for when you are a little under the weather and when its a little chilly out like it was yesterday. This week I really need to watch my spending so even though I wanted a chicken soup, I had to use what I had in the fridge and pantry.

So into the fridge I went and I found some great items to make a soup with. I had some fresh mushrooms that I needed to use up and a leftover beef roast from a few days before. Perfect for making a soup!

In a large pan I put the rest of my olive oil (remember to buy more) and some coconut oil. To that I added some minced garlic, diced onion and the mushrooms. I also added a little bit of sea salt to draw out the moisture of the mushrooms. Even though I cooked all the mushrooms I didnt want to use them all in the soup so I took out half of them. I then diced up 3 medium size red potatoes and added them to the mixture. The container that had the beef in it had some of the dripping in there so I added some water to it and swished it around, that was my broth. I added that to the pot so the potatoes could cook up and become tender.

Once the potatoes were tender I then added chunks of the beef. I also added some flour to thicken the soup. I personally perfer thick soups then thin but you wouldnt have to add the flour. The beef already had greek seasoning on it from cooking it the first time so I didnt want to add much to it. Once everything was cooked and thick I tasted it, added some pepper and sea salt to it. It still was missing something so I added some garlic powder with parsley to it. It was awesome! Just what it needed.

I have never combined these ingredients together before like this. I am sure there is a recipe somewhere like this but I just made it up as I went. Something we all need to remember is we need to use what we have. So many times we will waste leftovers because we dont want the same thing twice. But if we use our leftovers in a different way we dont waste anything and we also get a great meal out of it. The mushrooms and onions I didnt use will be added to some eggs for my supper tonight, nothing will go to waste.

If anyone tries this recipe let me know what you think. If you think adding another spice to it would help let me know please. Even though it was a great soup it was still missing something, just not sure what it was.

Many Blessings to you!