Book learnin'

Two posts in one day. Had some catching up to do!

My first book of 6 for my IDGAF initiation is Norse Mythology by John Lindow.

I'm not quite halfway through. It's slow going. It's a very dry, scholarly book. After a 45 page introductory section, everything is in alphabetical order: deities and figures from the mythology, events, places, etc. There is a fair bit of overlap, and some sections with overlapping info seem to be verbatim repeated from multiple places.

I am enjoying how much I am learning; Norse mythology was probably one for the "least versed in" category for me. Before I was approached by one of the Norse gods and started learning in earnest, I more or less knew that Thor had a hammer, Odin had a horse with too many legs, and Loki caused shit to go down. There was something about a giant serpent, and a big tree, and Ragnarok is the end of the world.  For a mythology/archaeology nerd, pretty sad really.

I should mention though, if you're looking for pagan-specific information, this is not a good book to grab. The book states directly, in the introduction, that this is a book of myths, not religion. Everything is in a historical context. There's a lot of focus on the historical side of the mythology, the skalds and poets who left most of it behind, the various scholarly interpretations of translations and references and kennings; and a lot of the information contradicts--because it does. There is no reference to modern pagan practice or Asatru that I've come across yet. If you're looking for information on working with the Norse gods, and not so much on the mythology itself,  again, probably not a book for you. It is good for a newbie to the mythology however, because I am starting to understand things now, and can recognize various deities and the stories associated with them. Reading reviews, a lot of people sum up my thoughts pretty well: this is more of an encyclopedia or textbook, than a collection of narratives.

I read this after reading a very short book with a lot of the actual stories in it: Norse Mythology: Great Stories from the Eddas and I would recommend doing the same--pair this book up with another book with the actual stories, laid out as stories rather than an encyclopaedia. I think I'm following it better for at least having had a brief intro to the "characters" I'm now reading about.

I'm pretty confident I will not be done this book by next week, because reading it isn't as easy as I'd like, but if I go a bit late on finishing, I'll just pick a somewhat lighter book for next month to give my brain a rest.

Ostara

A little late, I know.

We held our Ostara ritual on Sunday afternoon. We wanted to plant herbs, with the intention that they would represent things we wanted to see "grow" in the new season. We bought seeds, pots and soil.

We went out to the woods, to our spot there. We started a fire in the cauldron, and took turns writing on pieces of parchment paper our "wish" for the new season to come; then burning them.

While we were out in the woods, we noticed a LOT of tree branches were knocked down from the crazy amount of wind and heavy snow we've had this year. A whole tree trunk by our altar was downed, and there was a long branch from another tree laying on the ground. I was reminded that I want to make a staff, and that I was "instructed"--not sure by whom--that the bough I used for the staff should have enough extra wood at the end to make a set of runes. This had that and more. I got permission from the woods to take it, and we broke some of it off (because it was every bit of 10-12 feet long probably) and I carried it back.

We kept the ashes from our ritual fire, and I ground them in our mortal and pestle, to add to the soil we were going to plant the herbs in.

Grindin'

My pot with the ashes at the bottom.

I am growing peppermint, Amy lavender, Drew thyme and Renee is growing anise. It's too early to see signs of life yet I think, but I hope they all grow. (And only partly because I want fresh peppermint leaves for tea.)

Here's to spring, and new growth. I have empty places to fill.

(We are currently getting a severe blizzard. I was sent home early from work, and only avoided being stranded because someone gave me a drive. They pulled the buses. Irony.)

My Altar

Wooo, first post! As part of a project involving some friends of ours, I started this blog. It's going to basically be a journaling of my witchcraft/pagan learnings,  and a record of my growth.

I thought a nice first post would be to show off my current altar. It's tucked neatly in the corner of the bedroom, and above and to the right are two corner shelves, one of which is another altar of mine (That's currently mostly empty) and the one below it belongs to my wife.

As of yesterday, my altar looked like this:

I moved things around a bit. I also (tried) to redye my altar cloth. It's literally just a piece of cut broadcloth which I dyed once already with old tea bags to make it more of an off-white colour with a mottled pattern. I was trying to dye it blue, using dark blue food colouring...

And now it's pink. (It's much more vibrant in person.) Urk. Not terribly pleased. Not sure how blue dye turned something pink, but I guess it's at least a nice colour for spring. I'm not finished; it's "missing" something. But what I have on there right now:

-my athame
-my bell rattle. The wooden handle used to be the end of my old wand. I use it as a "smokeless smudge" when burning sage is either unavailable, or I want something more physical. (I can shake the rattle harder for emphasis.)
-shells, moon snails, and sand dollars in a big mussel shell (to represent water)
-a wooden sculpture of three birds, and
-a tiny wooden owl (to represent air, and also birds in general)
-a teeny little dragon (fire, and dragons)
-The pale green up with the red ribbon, to the left of the black bowl, is full of forest things-it has an acorn, several chestnuts, and a piece of bark.  (earth and forest)
-the black and red bowl is used for offerings, or placing stones, or anything where I need a shallow container
-the wooden plaque is painted with a pentacle in the centre, and with representations of all four seasons around it.
-the blue and white candle holder is handmade, and is supposed to be a wave (I guess...)
-there's a little owl shaker, sitting in an owl candle holder. He serves the same purpose as my bell rattle.

It's still a work in progress. But it's a start!