This past weekend I participated for the first time in relay for life.  I had reservations, it seemed like a lot of work, I was concerned with how helpful Relay would be for me, for my family, for my grove and for the community as a whole. Relay was in full swing when I arrived to be greeted by the sound of loudspeakers blaring the old tune Lollipop Lollipop, Oh Lolli Lolli.  It didn’t bode well.  There was a carnival... Read more

A lot of people are thanking their deities of choice for the Supreme Court decision on DOMA, otherwise known as the Defense of Marriage Act.  In case you don’t know, it’s about treating gay marriage as a second class sort of marriage, and about the federal government making laws about things that state governments should control.  Personally I am deeply happy about the decision to overturn it.  I am pro LGBT in every way.  I don’t talk about that sort... Read more

I’m deep into harvest time. Usually we think of late summer and fall as the harvest season around here.  That’s when tomatoes are ripe on the vine and if you’re into that sort of thing, the canning jars and dehydrators come out for the preserving of produce for the winter. violets But we often forget that there are other harvests to be had when you are talking about herbs.  So far I’ve harvested violet blossoms for tea and incense.  Motherwort... Read more

New projects in the making: Organic plant dyed cotton and recycled leather recycled silk and embroidery Organic plant dyed cotton I’ve been experimenting with plant dying and loving it!  All these and more will be up in my etsy store soon.  I’m also looking forward to sharing some new techniques with you all.  I recently was gifted with some woad which is really really exciting for me!  To dye with it you have to change the chemical structure of the... Read more

A couple of days ago I heard the bird song change. The winter song they sing is thin and small. It’s as if they can barely bring themselves to sing in the dawn.  This week it changed.  The birds know more than we do.  They are ancient beings, descendants of the giant lizards that roamed the earth so long ago.  A couple of days ago, I went outside in the morning to sing with them, like I do every morning.... Read more

Ritual is a mixed media art form. It is a combination of word and song, smell and sight to create a sense of the extraordinary.  Or maybe more accurately it is to create a heightened sense of what the ordinary really is. To vault the ordinary into the sacred, or to notice that it was already there.  Emotional sleight of hand if you will. We can do this by ourselves and it can be a powerful experience.  A feather that... Read more

I’ve found out that painting is a difficult thing.  It tires me physically and emotionally.  I’ve only been at it seriously for a month now. I’ve set aside one day a week for my painting.  I’m delving into my art in a way I’ve never had the discipline and will to do before.  I’ve had the time, I’ve even had times where I had more money than I do now to throw at it.  I’ve found something out: The creation... Read more

As a pagan, ritual is my way of connecting with the greater powers, my way of meditating, of communing.  It is a form of prayer and also a form of art.  One of the things I love about creating ritual is how it combines different forms of artistic expression.  Of course there’s the verbal arts: song, poetry, and invocation woven together to create the framework for the process.  But there’s also movement and the visual arts adding substance and depth... Read more

Moonlit Night(In Progress) by Melissa Hill I don’t have a fancy word this year. Last year my word was Grow and the year before that it was Incite. I don’t know if I really did grow or not. I did a lot of things. I helped my kids continue to grow. I helped my garden to grow, and worked on Three Brothers Farm. Definitely helped things grow there. I worked hard on my clergy training for ADF and completed a... Read more

Life continues to be busy. I wish I had more time to post and share things with you. I’ve been working on a lot of cool stuff.  I wish I had more time, but time escapes me.  Like trying to sculpt with sand. Maybe it’s my lack of willpower to resist pinterest and facebook.Maybe it’s just the dissonance created by the messy, shrieking, please-excuse-the-mess realities of life. It’s hard to be creative, it’s even harder to share that creativity. So... Read more