A Child's Magical Library 2

This article is part of Kallan's wonderful Sunday Stew. Please hop on over and read all the different flavors added by each chef. I know that you will love it!

This past week I have been super busy with some art orders and I have also been trying to make some new things to sell in my shop. However, it's all getting sold before I actually get to put it in my shop or it is getting sold as soon as I put it in. ........I am not complaining AT ALL. This actually makes me quite happy. I am a very happy artist.

With all this painting, I didn't really have time to come up with a craft. I did remember that it has been a while since I've done a book review. I collect books and one of the things that I love are magical books, fiction or non-fiction, they all make me happy.

Today will be a review of a few books and maybe they will give you some ideas with your purchases when buying for your own little ones or grand-little ones. Also since this is back-to-school time and if you homeschool, consider adding these to your yearly read.

The first book is "THE WIDOWS BROOM" by Chris Van Allsburg. Oh my, how I love this book. I first encountered this book when my daughter was in Kindergarten. She is 25 now. I purchased it through the Scholastic magazine that gets sent home with your kids. Everyone needs this book, whether they are magical families or not. It is a book about someone being different and the fear that people have over those differences. It is a book of tolerance. The artwork is beautiful, as always, with Allsburg books.

A witch falls from the sky into a lonely widow's garden. The widow finds the witch and nurses her back to health. The witch is gone by the next morning and she has taken the widow's broom and leaving her own in its stead. The widow soon finds that the magical broom is very helpful with her chores and is also good company, but her neighbors are horrified and view it as an evil thing. The children taunt the broom and cause it to have to protect itself. What happens to the widow and her broom when the neighbors catch it?

The next book is "The Wise Woman and Her Secret" by Eve Merriam. A group of villagers travel a long distance to the wise woman's home to find out her secret. How is it that a young girl discovers it before the adults? Again, this has beautiful illustrations to go with the wonderful story.

Up next, "The Last Wild Witch" by Starhawk. This is a beautiful eco-fable. And yes, this is the same wonderful author of "The Spiral Dance". The heart of the story is to have a bit of wildness in your heart and not be so close-minded and to respect nature and to not fear the unknown.

The next books are from the same place, with W. Lyon Martin being the author for two and the illustrator for one. All of these are part of The Magical Child Story Collection. There are more in the collection than what I am showing you. I just don't have them all yet. Their web page and their facebook page.

"Aidan's First Full Moon Circle" written and illustrated by W. Lyon Martin. Aidan and his parents are solitary. They decide to join in the local pagan community for a full moon celebration. This tells the story from Aidan's perspective.

"Watchers" written and illustrated by W. Lyon Martin. Again, this is written from a child's perspective and it helps to handle bedtime fears.

"Smoky and the Feast of Mabon" by Catherynne M. Valente and illustrated by W. Lyon Martin. It looks like this one is on sale through their website right now for 6.85! That's a good deal! Smoky discovers the meaning of Mabon in the woods behind her house.

I hope you enjoyed my list and I also hope I have inspired you to try a couple of these wonderful books!

Brightest Blessings,
Saga

August Full Red Moon Rune Craft For Success

This article is part of Kallan's wonderful Sunday Stew. Please hop on over and read all the different flavors added by each chef. I know that you will love it!

When I started on my endeavor of a Full Moon Project, I thought that it wouldn't be too hard to come up with things to go with each moon. I mean after all there are several names for each moon to choose from. Boy, was I wrong. This month I was again semi-stumped. I am not keen on the name Sturgeon Moon. I have already created a craft for one fish moon after all, so I don't want another. Fish things for me are "meh".

However, this month I am combining two of the names. I have decided to combine the names lightning moon and red moon with a rune sequence to bring some triumph, victory, and passion to my life. Everyone can use that in their life, for sure. Red is the color of life, our blood, vitality. Lightning is a symbolism of power. August is a hot month with summer storms and lightning, so let's take advantage of the red moon and bring ourselves prosperity and success.

This project will be made like the project from the Wolf Moon. We will be using felt and herbs and gemstones to go inside the full moon shape. We will also be putting a rune sequence on the back.

The stones I've chosen that you can use (and you can use them all, or a combination, or just one, it will be up to you).


Hematite: This stone deflects negativity while encouraging you to reach your goals.
Amethyst: This one helps you to focus on your endeavors to bring success. It also give you an inner strength.
Malachite: Gives you emotional stability and bring success in business.
Citrine: This is the best one, make sure you have one of these. This one manifest prosperity and abundance. It is known as the success stone. So, this one is definitely needed for your red moon.
Agate: Protection for endeavors, while attracting good luck and awakening your talents.
Carnelian: This one also brings good luck and success.

The herbs that I have chosen (again, pick and choose, or use all)

Bay leaf:  This is the herb of victory and accomplishments, it is used for money and prosperity.
High John the Conqueror: Draws success
Cinnamon: used for business and money

I have chosen 3 runes. The 3 that I have chosen are:

Jera- To promote change for the better, successful endeavors, and finally seeing reward for your past efforts.
Fehu- To attract wealth and prosperity and to circulate abundance
and finally
Berkano- New beginnings and ideas, more business

Please remember:

You can also change this spell to your liking and your wording. I just come up with the ideas and I like to share. Remember, your magic is what you yourself muster.

Cut 2 circles from the red felt, the size that you want it. I used a ribbon spool to measure out mine.

My lightning bolt is freehand. If you need you can print this picture to use as a pattern.

You want your bolt to fit your moon like so.

Apply hot glue like so. You want to leave a space open so that you can fill your moon with your herbs and gemstones.

 

Apply the glue to the back of your bolt, then quickly lay it on the front of the moon. 

 


Hold the herbs and gemstones in your hand and charge them with thoughts of victory and prosperity and triumph.

                                           Stuff in your herbs  and gemstones and glue the hole shut.

If you want to razzle dazzle the moon, use some decorative glitter on the front.

Use the same glitter pen to mark out the runes on the back of the moon.

Charge a red candle the same way, with thoughts of victory, prosperity, and triumph in your life. 

Please edit to fit your needs, but remember to be specific. Runes like it when you are specific.

As you pass the front and back over the lit candle (not too close, you don't want a fire), say:

"With fire, the magic and power of the herbs, gemstones, and runes are activated and will work together

to bring victory to me in my job, my money, and my home life. This will be done immediately with no harm to me, my family, my pets, my property, or my possessions."

 

I like to take an offering of a beer to Odin afterward. I also like to put a few drops of my blood into my beer, for a power punch. But again, this is up to you. 

I hope you enjoyed this edition of the full moon craft.

Brightest Blessings,

Saga

Leather Bindrune Bracelet for Wisdom and Insight

This article is part of Kallan's wonderful Sunday Stew. Please hop on over and read all the           different flavors added by each chef. I know that you will love it!

Today while I was thinking about what to make for the Stew craft, I realized that I had not made a bindrune craft in a while and I thought that it would be a fun thing to make. Just the other day I had picked up a couple of cheap leather crafting bracelets thinking that I could find something fun to make with them.

Since we can all use wisdom and insight (the more the merrier, right?), I'll create a simple bindrune to help bring those.

This will be a simple and quick craft with simple activation incantation.
You will need.

A simple leather bracelet for crafting
A blade tool & remodeling spoon for leather
A small bit of red paint

I've picked the following runes:

Tiwaz- this one is for personal goal realization
Ansuz- for wisdom
Ingwaz-for common sense (the best type of wisdom)

Leather bracelet and leather tool

All you have to do to use the tool is press. Don't do like me and use your leg for your desk. It almost messed up my line. Use a table so that you can keep your line straight and have something hard to press against.

   

To make it pop, add some red paint.

Then make a design to go on the top and the bottom of the band. I'm using a simple dash dot design.

Fill the dot dash design in with red paint.

 

And here is the finished product! Now you just want to activate it!

For knowledge, you use air, so we will activate this bindrune with our breath. With runes you have to be specific with your requests.

"With my breath, the power and magic of these runes are activated and will work together to help me make wise decisions in my daily life. This will be done immediately with no harm to my family, property, possessions, and pets." 

I like to take Odin a beer, mead, or ale and pour it under the tree for him as a thank you for the use of the runes.

I hope you enjoyed this craft!

Brightest Blessings, 

Saga

Lughnasadh Altar Wreath Craft

This article is part of Kallan's wonderful Sunday Stew. Please hop on over and read all the different flavors added by each chef. I know that you will love it!

Last year I made a nice Lughnasadh banner craft, if you haven't seen it, it's here. It's a great craft to help kids learn symbolism of the Sabbat.

I'm still in the process of trying to use all of my current stock of craft supplies. I dug through my items and slowly put together a craft in my mind to make for Lughnasadh. I found a grapevine that I had forgotten about. I found some corn husks from a couple of years ago that were left over from other Lughnasadh crafts. I looked at my clay and came up with a way to use it. I found some material that I cut into strips.

I went on a morning walk and found some gorgeous sunflowers. This would be the only thing that I didn't have. I tried using a kitty litter method to quickly dry the sunflowers, it ended up being a big NO NO. I then ended up running back up the hill in the rain, laughing, with scissors in one hand and a bag in the other, to get some more sunflowers. I hope that the flowers dry nicely, but if they don't I have more to replace them that are currently hanging to dry. So I've made this with my fresh sunflowers, but you can use fake or dried, if you would like.

My process for making the wreath was in this order:

1. I made my clay decoration.

I used Original Sculpey clay. I remembered a Lugh bread tutorial from a couple of years ago and I translated  it to my clay. I want to make it look like wheat. Here are my steps:

I made a base for the wheat. It is 5 1/2 inches tall by 3 1/2 inches at the widest top part:

I rolled out another bit of clay and using scissors I cut it into strips. I laid the strips on the base like so. (ignore my nasty clay baking pan)

Next, I rolled out lots of little balls around this size, flattened slightly. This will be the wheat tops.

With a pair of small sharp scissors I cut down the middle, without cutting in half, I stopped just short of the end.

On each side of the middle cut, I cut small slits. You don't want to cut all the way to the middle cut and again, stop just short of the bottom.

Place them all over the top of the base, covering the ends of the strips.

Now roll out three skinny strips and braid them.

Place the braided strips like so. Now your wheat is ready for baking. I baked at 275 for 30 minutes. 

When it comes out of the oven and cools, paint it all over with an off white color. I used Apple Barrel English Lace acrylic.

When the base coat has dried, give it some highlight color......like it is baked bread. I used burnt sienna mixed with king's gold.

While the wheat baked, I formed the grapevine into a wreath.

I took the fabric that I found, cut it in half down the middle, and then tied it together, making one long piece to wrap around the wreath.


I also had a small piece of the fabric and made a small bow to place on the knot at the bottom. You'll see it in a later pic.


The next step is making corn dollies for your wreath. I'm going to make a boy and a girl.

First you take two husks and place back to back.

Take a third husk and wrap around the top of the two.

Separate the two husks upside down over the wrapped part.

Tie them down with a string.

Separate one husk into 3 pieces. This will be the arms.

 Tie together at one end, and then braid.

Slide between the husks. Place so that you have an even amount of arms on each side.

I wrapped and tied another husk for her waist.

Then I shredded the skirt.

For the boy, you follow the same process as above, but after you tie his waist. You separate the bottom part of the husks into to legs and tie them off at the knee and the feet. I also did not braid his arms, I just tied them off.

When you are finished making all the parts of the assemble your wreath as you want it. To attach the sunflowers you can hot glue or you poke a wire through the base of the sunflower and then tie it to the wreath. Sunflowers have a good sized base so this makes it easy for attachment. I glued my corn dollies and clay wheat and wire attached my flowers.

That's it for this craft. I hope you like it and make one of your own!

Brightest Blessings,

Saga