Midsummer celebrations vary a great deal. In the Sakha Republic, they tie a horse to a pole and dance around it, or bet on reindeer races. In Portugal, you can hit your neighbour on the head with a plastic hammer, which amusing habit I think should be much more widely practised generally. In Norway children…
Category: rituals
Dream A Little Dream of Me
“Is all that we see or seem, but a dream within a dream?” – Edgar Allan Poe “I love sleep. My life has the tendency to fall apart when I’m awake, you know?” – Ernest Hemingway Hey there all you cool cats and kittens – let’s make a Love Dream! This is a spell to…
A Frigga Blót with Runes & Lagoons
Today is the day of Frigga’s Blot – much more than just the wife of the All-Father Odin, she is the goddess of prophecy & silence, wifehood & motherhood. She is a sky goddess, responsible for spinning and weaving the fates. To celebrate Frigga this Friday, a domestic setting is appropriate, as she is closely…
Magic Tonka Beans: Illicitly Delicious
The fragrant tonka bean is a native of South America, a product of the cumaru tree (dipteryx odorata). They have a lovely vanilla-almond-slightly fruity aroma, and in hoodoo traditions these sweet-smelling beans are used for love and money magic. It’s said that you should work with them in only in odd numbers. They can be…
Revels with the devils on Walpurgis Night
Ever dance with the devil in the pale moonlight? At Samhain AKA Halloween every October, the boundary between our world and that of the spirits becomes thinner and often breaks, allowing supernatural forces to hold sway for the night. At the exact opposite side of the year, on April 30th, the same is true of…
Nice Weather For Ducks
It’s raining a lot in London at the moment. I don’t know why anybody would be surprised by this, because April is famous for April showers. But people constantly comment and complain about it, and quite honestly, as you prepare to leave for work to the sound of gusts of wet wind crashing against the…
The Divine Fool: Zero & Hero
The Fool is many things and none. The Fool is the jester, the joker, the trickster, the clown, the simpleton, the naïf, the hero. The first card in the tarot deck, the Fool’s number is zero. A blank slate.
The Golden Lamb AKA The Sweetest Sacrifice
This Easter holiday when making your ritual offering to the gods of Spring, why not create a golden lamb in effigy, and eat it? I’m sure the deities involved would be pleased with this sweet sacrifice. Eating a lamb cake is perfectly in line with the traditional method of distributing edible portions of sacrificial animals…
Shoot a Flaming Dragon Bomb
The Chinese Dragon is the highest-ranking creature in the Chinese god/animal hierarchy, representing power, majesty, dignity, fertility and wisdom. When he makes his appearance in effigy during Chinese New Year, he symbolizes the spiritual aspect of our existence and brings good fortune to all aspects of our lives. To celebrate the dragon at this time…
Giving Parties For Pets
Since the Early Times, familiar creatures were accepted as quasi-supernatural entities who would assist witches and the Cunning Folk in their magical practices. Documents of that era described them as appearing in numerous guises – usually as an animal, and most commonly as a cat, or cat-demon. Unlike ghosts or otherworldly spirits, they were described…
The New City Witches Cocktail Coven 