Peaceful Home Tea-tini

It's getting to be the steamy part of the year and when we're unwinding at night we could use something calming and refreshing.  This Lavender, Vanilla and Chamomile tea blends nicely with a quality vodka.

http://blackthornhoodooblends.com/collections/frontpage/products/peaceful-home

Time: 3 minutes
Yield: 1 Cocktail
Ingredients:
2 oz quality vodka
1 1/2 oz sweetened Peaceful Home iced tea
Splash fresh lemon juice
Sprig Lemon Balm for garnish
Sugar for rimming

Preparation: Pour the ingredients into a cocktail shaker with ice cubes. Shake well. Strain into a chilled cocktail glass rimmed with sugar. Garnish with the lemon balm.

Florida Water Wheel Cocktail

Florida Water Wheel Cocktail

Let the smooth sultry blend of Blood Orange peel, warm cinnamon and spices and a hint of lavender warm and soothe this cocktail into your evening.  Amaretto adds just enough sweetness to your tea and reminds you of happy times and fresh breezes.

Prep Time: 5 minutes
Total Time: 5 minutes
Yield: 1 Cocktail

Ingredients:
3/4 oz Grand Marnier orange liqueur
3/4 oz amaretto liqueur
Florida Water Blood Orange tea
Orange wheel for garnish

http://blackthornhoodooblends.com/collections/frontpage/products/florida-water-tea

Updated Tea Flavors

Presented in a 6 fl oz tin.  Roughly 14 cups of tea depending on preparation strength.

-Van Van Tea: The most popular Hoodoo oil in a Tea form.  Lemongrass tea removes Obstacles with just a hint of cinnamon and caffeine. Defeat Mercury Retrograde! Purification.  Banishing.  Ritual Preparation. 

-Fiery Wall of Protection: Surround yourself with this caffeinated, protective fire. Reading the 23rd Psalm over your tea, optional.  This cinnamon and ginger blend helps fill in the gaps in your defenses.  

-Come to Me: This spicy milk and honey flavored tea is a love drawing blend to bring the right lover your way.  Just a hint of cinnamon flavor means it is good with or without sugar and the rooibos base means no caffeine. 

-Peaceful Home: This comforting, caffeine free blend of vanilla, lavender and peppermint will help you focus on the path you need to get your house in order.  Bring peace back into your home with this comforting blend.  It’s your favorite cardigan with a hint of lavender. 

-Helping Hand: Feeling hit from all sides?  Get a leg up with this caffeine free blend.  Energetically promote healing, calm and boost your luck too! Soft mint and vanilla lifts you over the hurdles life brings your way. 

-Meditation: This fulfilling, herbal blend of herbs will  get you to the right state of mind.  Calm a racing mind and unwind.

-The All Seeing Eye: Boost your intuition with nutty flavors of wisdom and higher self.  Caffeine free blend turns your third eye into a magnifying glass.

-Gossip Stop: Others using their words against you? This Lemony fresh blend includes slippery elm to let their words pass you by and Burdock will keep their mud from sticking to your good name. It’s caffeine free too!

-Crown of Success: You deserve Success!  All your hard work is paying off with this soft and spicy blend of citrus and delicate florals will have you in the right frame of mind to get out of your own way and a bit of caffeine to help you achieve your goals. (Color Purple and Gold)

-Adam and Eve: This sultry black tea blend is perfect for all matters of love, faithful partnership and attraction.  This mildly caffeinated blend has enough vibrancy to keep you and your special someone up until the job is done! 

-Florida Water Tea: This blend of Clove, Orange and a hint of lavender will leave you energetically cleansed, lightly caffeinated and ready to take on the world!  Great with or without sugar!

-Triple Fast Luck: This light mint and vanilla blend paves the way and cinnamon brings your good luck on in a hurry.  Lightly caffeinated and great for a gentle morning ritual, brings good luck all day.   

-Holy Spirit: A lightly floral and green tea base with a soft, soul quenching taste.  Cleanse your space and yourself with this blessing tea.

-My-Tea Tea:  This mighty blend boosts inner strength with an empowering (and caffeinated) blend of Chai, cinnamon, ginger and lemongrass.  Instead of leaping tall buildings with a single bound, you’ll be picking them up to walk under them.  


http://blackthornhoodooblends.com

Of Green and Glass: After the 101 phase

Of Green and Glass:

Where Down to Earth Solutions and a Glass Edge Meet

By Goewin GreenWitch

Dear Goewin,

            I feel like I’m drowning.  I go to the bookstore and all I see are Wicca 101 books!  I’ve read most of them and own about half.  I get it already.  Earth is green, Air in the East, think before you cast a spell.  Where are the books for the “next step”?  I think I’m interested in Green Magic, but how do I know what’s good and what’s crap?  Seeing as you use GreenWitch as your last name, I figured I could ask you.    How do I know if this is really for me if I can’t find the right books?

-Next Not New

Dear Next,

            It’s okay, it’s not just you.  I’m pretty sure many people have a bone to pick with the publishing industry.  Authors get paid squat, and publishing companies can only produce what has already sold.  This is especially true when you are talking about a “specialty” topic like a non-mainstream religion.  They need to publish books on advanced topics, but they have to concentrate on what sells to make money.  Wicca, Witchcraft and Paganism are a small enough minority, and when you factor the number of newbies versus the number of experienced practitioners of any given form or Tradition, the seekers are going to outnumber us at any given point.  Is it fair?  No, but I never promised things would be fair, just correct.

 So, how do you know if a book is right for you?  Just because a book calls itself “everything you could ever want to know”, doesn’t mean it is.  Progressing past “101” to individual paths, practices and traditions is just natural.  Some great Authors of Green Magic themed books are Ann Murphy–Hiscock,  Judika Illes (Judika doesn’t get billed as “green magic” but she has a fantastic connection with plants and their uses, Ellen Dugan (who also happens to be a Master Gardener, by the way),  Scott Cunningham, Lexa Rosean, and Poppy Palin also have several books on Herb uses, in spell work.

Keep in mind, that no matter how much you read, nothing will take the place of real world experience.  Jump online and see if there are any shops around you, check out some Open circles!  If you’re out in the middle of nowhere, there are plenty of correspondence courses for things you can learn from home.  Susun Weed offers correspondence courses as do many other famous, ‘green’ authors.  I would however caution you against joining ‘online schools’ because there is no real way of checking credentials, much of that information is available in books.  You need to be able to see what you’re paying for.

            I know it can be hard to find the next step in your faith and your practice, but please don’t let this frustration take you away from your true purpose.  Besides, let’s face it.  If you can be pulled away from a religion by one bump in the road, it must not really be for you.

Of Green and Glass: Make (Martial) Arts, not War

Dear Goewin,

            I’ve been on the Wiccan path for quite a few years now, and recently started attending Tae Kwon Do classes with my kids.  It’s fun for us, and I like being able to do something with them, instead of dropping them off somewhere.  How do I reconcile my enjoyment of martial arts with what I have been taught about the Rede and rules governing “harm none”?
                                                                                                            -Martial, not Mean

Dear Martial,

            Doing things with your kids is not wrong.  Enjoying activities that get them out of the house, away from TV and video games is not wrong.  While we’re at it, protecting yourself is not wrong!  

What is wrong is the people in the world that think it’s  okay to get what they want in the world by taking it from other people.  Every day I see it.  Even in this “small town”.  On the news each night, I see people kicking in doors on other people’s homes, to steal and do whatever they like to get whatever they like.  

That does not mean that you are somehow a “bad” person for wanting to protect you and yours!  The Rede may say “Harm None” but allowing someone to come into your home to hurt you, or your family, steal from you and abuse you and then to walk away unscathed?  That’s harm.  That person is going to go do it to someone else, and then their harm is on you as well because you allowed this person to continue harming others.  Let's not forget, there are plenty of Wiccans who don't even follow the Rede, but that's a topic for another day.

Does this make you a “mean” person?  No.  You are not going around kicking puppies, right?  Then to Tartarus with them.  Does this mean that you are looking to get into a fight “just so you can use what you know”?  Absolutely not.  I’m sure that by now you have gotten that from your instructor. The aim of martial arts is not to start fights, but to be able to avoid them. 

            

            I’m sure you have no moral objection to carrying an umbrella in case of rain, am I right?  I look at martial arts in the same way. What you learn in the dojo and its real world application is a tool.  You have it in case you need it, not so you can use it every day.  I feel the same way about responsible gun ownership, but that’s a different topic.  

The bottom line here is, don’t ever let anyone tell you that it is not okay to protect your family in the way you see fit, as long as it is responsible and legally protected.  They don’t have to live your life, or protect your family, that’s your job.  If it feels right to you, go for it. If it bothers them that much, they don’t need to be your friend. 

‘Juju’, Creepy Crawlies and Bad Omens

‘Juju’, Creepy Crawlies and Bad Omens:

 the Realities of Feelings

Black Salt, Good for Banishing Spirits & Protecting a Home

 
     A friend and former coworker tagged me in a comment on Facebook sometime during the night. I rolled over and checked my email as I wake up, the way I do every morning. (Hey, some people drink coffee, I read my email to get my brain in gear.) He had encountered an animal on his way home from work late and it left him with a feeling of foreboding. The discussion progressed to supernatural reasons for seeing such a thing. Without something to add, I moved about my morning.

     Once I’m at my office and settled in, I pulled up Facebook. Right now, my job involves a lot of hurry up and wait. So they allow me to occupy my brain, as long as I make sure the customers are taken care of. So, back to Facebook, I’m looking through my feed when I see an update from the same friend.

     “So update to last night's story- I had a flat tire this morning and I'm just waiting for something bad to happen. Creepy, eh?”

     I told this friend I’d be writing a blog post about our interaction because this is something I’ve seen more than once and it’s something I wanted to discuss.

     Amy Blackthorn: Fuck that waiting around shit. Don't allow it into your space. Do something. Dump a McDonald’s packet of salt into a cup of water and anoint yourself. Say a prayer. Say, "Fuck off!" Light a birthday candle. Cast a circle. Cast a Square. Don't just sit and wait for bad shit to happen. Well protected is good. Just remember what they say in martial arts, "No matter how good you are, somewhere there's someone better." We have those senses for a reason. Any time I've had that sense and didn't do something about it,

BAD SHIT happened.

(Hello Tractor trailer, 27 broken bones, 72 pins and years in a wheelchair).

     I’m trying to figure out where we are in our personal evolutions. Go to a gathering of Pagans or Witchy folk and you’ll likely hear a mention at some point about feelings, ‘juju’, or the like. Most people are quick to jump in with their experience, but that’s usually where it ends. People want to talk and share their experiences and occasionally they’ll ask for opinions, personal revelations or simply validation of their feelings on the subject.

     I’ve noticed this outside of our little world in one place in particular, “Reality” ghost hunting television shows. People hear something go bump in the night, and the next thing you know, you’ve got a bunch of yahoos in fatigues running around your house with night vision cameras strapped to their heads. Viewers see people attempting to antagonize the dead, using dramatic pauses and fervent “Did you hear that?” questioning. One of the issues I have with shows of this ilk is If they find something they feel is compelling evidence, they show the owner of the property, and then pack up and go home. “Yup, it’s haunted. Bye!” Wait. What just happened?

     Why do we stop there? Why acknowledge the fact that you feel something bad is going to happen, only to sit around and wait for the other shoe to drop? Magic is supposed to be a last resort, after all of the ‘real world’ things have been ruled out. That doesn’t mean we have to sit idly by and wonder at our fate. If it really is fate, that the other shoe drops, it will. However, if taking a step out of the way saves your bacon, I’d take that step. Wouldn’t you?

     If we accept that we have developed these feelings for a purpose, then it stands to reason that we were meant to DO something with them. So do it. Rearrange the furniture so that energy doesn’t have a place to lie. Smudge the house. Open the windows and let the fresh air in. Get rid of your clutter. Just do Something.

Aromatherapy for Religion and Ritual

Aromatherapy for Ritual and Religion Saturday October 14, 2009
1:00 pm - 4:00 pm Instructor: Rev. Amy Blackthorn AKA Goewin GreenWitch from Thorn Magazine!

Registration Required, $40/person

In this offering from Herbal and Aromatic practitioner Rev.Amy Blackthorn, we explore the Ritual and aromatic applications for Essential Oils and Aromatic plants in our religious practice. All faith paths are welcome to explore the hidden potential in their hearts and noses. Rose scented Rosaries, the lingering odor of Frankincense, the smell of Sweet Grass, or the Ritual energy of White Sage, all scent triggers explored will help the student delve into the hidden realms of scent in Prayer, Meditation, Shamanic Journeying and Rituals of allkinds. Also included in this course will be a practical demonstration on how to test the quality of oil using household items, to know you are getting your money’s worth.

This class is being held at Mystickal Voyage please call to register! 410-663-8333

Mystickal Voyage
8601 Walter Blvd
Nottingham, Maryland 21234

www.mystickalvoyage.com

Wicca A La Carte

Click on flier for details