My garden is growing beautifully. This weekend, I direct seeded echinacea, poppies, foxglove and root veggies seeds – beets, radish and turnip. Some of the root veggie seeds have germinated which is so cool. I had planted garlic originally in that box but they never came up. The garlic is growing fine in the garden but not in the box. I also transplanted Solomon’s seal and pretty blue bachelor’s buttons in the garden from my Mom’s garden. I planted my green and purple beans and nasturtium seeds, mugwort and more calendula. I love summer. It is not even spring yet. My pumpkin vine flowered this morning!
I hope that my elecampane flowers this year. The garden is so beautiful. The air is still cold here. I have no idea why. I love my garden, it’s so beautiful. The bleeding hearts plant is bigger this year. I am so glad it survived being trampled. My herbs are growing well – sage, lavender, lemon balm, mint, chives, lovage, comfrey and now rosemary.
I’m still studying at the Herbal Academy. This summer, I’m studying a mini course about flower pressing. I get a flower press to use with the course. I really really wanted one. I am so happy about that.
I binge watched all the awesome Stranger Things episodes. I love that show. I want more, lots more Stranger Things. This season was darker than the previous ones.
Oh and I want to issue a warning here: Pretty Litter is the biggest scam EVER. They sell cat litter online. Well I just got ripped off. Don’t ever buy their cat litter from them. My Mom emailed me some cash for something and before I could blink, the money was withdrawn from my account. I knew immediately who stole it. Yup Pretty Litter- the worst scam ever. They refuse to refund my Mom too. Worst scam ever. I will never buy cat litter from them again.
I will post more later. This is a quick post here today. Don’t trap your pooches in hot cars. Wear a mask and be safe, everyone.
Tomorrow is October 1st. I have a new rolling cart to store my multiple jars of herbs. By. herbs, I mean of course seeds, bark, leaves, flowers. I had to assemble the cart and that was a nightmare. Are you all getting ready for Samhain? I am! I am also preparing for the Materia Medica course I am taking at the Herbal Academy in addition to the Introductory Herbal course I am already taking. That does involve getting more organized, which is why I bought the cart.
I ordered seeds from a company on Etsy. They are as follows; German chamomile, black swan poppy, Scott bonnet pepper, black cumin, purple echinacea, halloween calendula, Howdenpumpkin, borage, sunflower, black tar poppy, chef’s pick parsley, Larkspur, anise, purple echinacea, purple salsify, Vietnamese cilantro, and foxglove blend. Next spring, I will be having fun planting all that! I gathered the Chinese lanterns, burdock seeds, mullein seeds, and I will soon gather the nasturtium seeds from my garden. I gathered mullein in an empty field and it also grows on the nature trail. A witch hazel grows on the trail too!
A materia medica means healing materials. It basically means a book about herbal profiles. The profiles are called monographs. I plan to have the most amazing material media by the time I am done studying. The material media course teaches you how to complete a herbal profile. I have access to the Herbarium. I can download any herb monograph I choose to. I ordered a herb journal – titled My Herbology journal, A Green Witch Journal from Amazon. I also ordered a paper making screen deckle and mold!
Several herbs that I need for the course grow on the nature trail. Goldenrod, burdock, mullein, asters, raspberry, elderberry, chokeberry, coltsfoot, queen Anne’s lace, black elderberry, staghorn sumac, creeping juniper, perennial sow thistle, red clover, and thistle all grow on the trail. I may have already mentioned this. I have an app on my phone that helps me identify plants. If you want to forage in the wild, bring gloves to protect you, a charged cellphone that has an app for identifying plants, wear something to protect you from bug bites and poisonous plants, a water bottle to stay hydrated, and scissors. It helps to carry a big plastic bag or cloth bag to hold the herbs you gather. Don’t consume anything if you are not sure. You could make yourself sick. I want to gather goldenrod next summer to dye a piece of fabric yellow. I just want to try it. !!!
I still have to dehydrate the elderberries. I brewed a jar of elderberry, rhubarb and blueberry am. I should added cinnamon and clove. I am making a jar of elderberry tincture. The berries were dried and I added vodka. I labeled the jar and also lined the top of the jar with natural waxed paper. The metal can’t contaminate the mixture. I can’t wait to try it. But I do want to caution: elderberries contain cyanide, so please if you make a remedy using elderberries, use black or purple berries – not green, and be careful. I will make the tincture last a long time. I don’t plan to consume it every day. The berries are not cooked for making a tincture. Some cyanide could still be present in the berries. Everything in moderation.
I gathered herbs for my first lesson in the materia medica course. They were lemon balm, goldenrod, thyme, lavender, mint and chamomile. It grows in the garden and on the nature trail.I need to study the herbs for the courses. (What a hardship, eh?) There are so many herbs to learn about and I live in the right environment. Fall is here. Many of the plants are winding down for the long cold rest. The nature trial is now full of the thistles, queen Anne’s lace, burdock, goldenrod all going to seed. The queen Anne’s lace seedbeds resemble bird’s nests.
I have to collect the raspberries from my garden. The tomatoes are still ripening. The pumpkin patch is growing! I have tried for 11 years to grow a pumpkin patch and now I have! Hopefully the frost will hold off! I pickled my own cucumbers. The flavour is truly divine. I stored two jars of applesauce in the freezer too. I am well stocked. I have to puree the pumpkin. So much to do, so little time.
I am enjoying my studies at the Herbal Academy. Well obviously right? I decorate my binder with butterfly stickers, protect the notes and printouts in sheet protectors, and do my best to keep it organized. I want to be a herbalist and work in a trade that involves herbs. It will be a long road but an interesting one!!
The link to the Herbal Academy- in case you want to study there!!
The raccoons- those daring masked thieves invaded my garden. I thought they wanted the apples but they were on another prize. I had a compost bucket, a bird feeder, and – potatoes! Yes I grew potatoes this summer. I cleaned up the apples to toss in the compost bin and found small brown things on the ground. The raccoons were more interested in the taters that grew in pots on the back step. I have since tossed the contents of the compost bucket into the green bin ( a feat in itself), emptied the bird feeder and relegated the plant pots to my Mom’s place. The pots are up high on her deck. Let em try. They can sniff all they want. The prized food is gone.
Potatoes grew in my compost bucket! I. harvested 3 pounds of potatoes- so far! I was growing the spuds in a big wooden box. I shoveled all the soil out and searched for potatoes. Nothing. There were a few tiny potatoes, that was all. The healthiest strongest best ever stalks grew in the box but no taters. I was so disheartened. That was weird. The taters in the compost bucket grew much better. There were more nutrients in the compost perhaps which may explain why they grew like taters should. I’m planting garlic in the woodn box. I will wait a few weeks till it’s cold to grow them though until the raccoons to move on.
Penny hissed at them from her high point on her scratching post. They hissed at each other. But now that there is no food – or, should I say, no five finger discount, they will likely move on. I will harvest the tomatoes and remaining pickling cucumbers in a few weeks. Then the frost hits. Pickling brine can be bought at your local grocery but I made my own mixture. It makes me feel more like a real kitchen witch that way.
Here is a recipe for to make your own brine. It is affordable and simple to do. The taste of the pickled cucumbers is amazing. You may never go back to eating the store bought kind.
Master Pickle Brine Recipe
You only need four ingredients and 20 minutes of hands-on time to turn yourself into a master pickler. Vinegar combines with sugar and salt to create this basic pickling brine that can be used for any of your seasonal fruits and vegetables. With pickling, you can transform fresh summer produce, such as small cherry tomatoes, cucumber and zucchini spears, okra, and red onions, into lip-smacking sides. Or use them as garnishes to top pulled pork sliders or hotdogs. Prepare your canning containers by sterilizing the jars and lids. Since you will be storing these pickles in the refrigerator, you won’t need to bother with a water bath. Wash and cut (if needed) your produce, then pack into your pickling jar. In a medium saucepan, stir together water and the four ingredients, boiling and stirring until the sugar has dissolved. Remove the mixture from the heat and let cool, then pour over the produce into the pickling jar. Seal tightly and refrigerate for up to 2 months. Pickling and freezing are popular methods of preserving seasonal produce so that you can enjoy the tastes of summer all year long. Some vegetables, including corn on the cob and sugar snap peas, can be blanched and frozen whole. Tomatoes can be stewed, then frozen or canned, to be used later in meat sauces, soups and stews, or even Bloody Mary drinks. If you want to freeze blueberries, don’t wash them. Instead, lay them out on a baking sheet and pop them in the freezer; once berries are frozen, you can then store them in freezer-safe baggies.
Active:
10 mins
Cook:
48 hrs
Total:
20 mins
Yield:
4 cups (1 [32-oz.] mason jar)
Ingredients
1 1/3 cup white vinegar
1/3 cup granulated sugar
2 tablespoons kosher salt
1 cup water
Directions
Stir together 1 cup water and all ingredients in a medium saucepan. Bring to a boil over high, stirring until sugar dissolves. Remove from heat; cool 10 minutes. Pour over vegetables or fruits. Cover with a tight-fitting lid; chill 2 days. Store, covered, in refrigerator up to 2 months.
That’s all for today. I shall post more soon. Stay safe and be well
The early frost hit Halifax. I laid a frost blanket over my beans last night. This morning, I saw my breath. I stored the summer dresses in the drawer and pulled out the winter woollies. It is that time. It is our time. The Witch season has arrived. Pumpkins fill the shelves at the supermarket to adorn front porches. The leaves turn and that magical feeling/ chill is in the air. Toss your Witch hats!!! Enjoy the link to an awesome witchy song!!
The image above is a photo of my scrying mirror. Cool isn’t it?
I harvested my tomatoes, forty one in total. The tomatoes are ripening near a windowsill. I harvested the catnip. I put the plant and roots in the soil. I don’t see why I should buy a new catnip every year. The cats can’t tear it up because I set a cloche around the plant. Now the plant is sheltered from the cold while it adjusts. Later, I will lift the cloche and mulch. The plant will grow again next year. I will put it up and hang it in the planter next summer for Penny.
I read Rosemary Ellen Guiley’s book about mirror scrying. I own a scrying mirror. I am eager to begin mirror scrying. Here is an article that tells you about an ancient method of divination that is changing the way people view the world and -the dead.
The Psychomanteum: How an Ancient Tool for Contacting the Dead is Making Breakthroughs in Paranormal Investigation
On the latest episode of Travel Channel’s Kindred Spirits, Amy Bruni & Adam Berry investigate a mysterious haunted mirror in Gettysburg’s famed Farnsworth House. With help from haunted object experts Greg & Dana Newkirk, the paranormal investigators use the object to construct an ancient device meant to contact the dead: the psychomanteum.
Whether using tarot during investigations, performing classic seances, or making use of the Estes Method, sometimes its the most unique tools which provide the most intriguing responses. On Thursday’s episode of Kindred Spirits, Greg & Dana Newkirk, curators of the Traveling Museum of of the Paranormal & Occult, are drawn to construct a psychomanteum, a method of summoning the dead which has been all-but-forgotten by today’s paranormal investigators. But what exactly is a psychomanteum, and how does it work?
The Nekromenteion in Epiros, Greece | via Shutterstock
Stemming from the Greek “nekromanteion”, which translates to “oracle of the dead”, the psychomanteum was such a popular method of spirit contact that they’re made reference to in the epic Homer’s Odyssey, where Odysseus speaks with his dead mother by gazing into a pit of blood. It wasn’t until the 1950s that archaeologists actually excavated one of the devices in Epiros, officially pulling the psychomanteum out of legend and into reality.
While crystal balls, mirror scrying, and other forms of chiromancy remained popular throughout the years, it wasn’t until 1993 when Dr. Raymond Moody, a researcher of near death experiences, published the book Reunions: Visionary Encounters With Departed Loved Ones and brought the psychomanteum back to life. In his book, Moody recounts how he took inspiration from Greek nekromanteions and other shamanic mirror-gazing traditions from around the world, constructing his own psychomanteum, and documenting some three-hundred individuals’ experiences with the method.
In a room blocked of all sunlight, Moody placed a chair in front of a large mirror hung on a wall which was tilted forward at a 45 degree angle, so as to obscure the gazer’s own reflection. Behind the chair was placed a low wattage lamp, meant to replicate the soft glow of a single candle. Before seating themselves in the psychomanteum, subjects were asked to focus on a loved one who had since passed. Then, the gazing session would begin. The results were astounding.
Out of the subjects, a quarter of them stated that they had made contact with the dead, seeing and even speaking with their loved ones in the mirror’s reflection. About ten percent of these subjects even said the spirits actually came out of the mirrors and touched them. In nearly a quarter of the cases, the contact with the dead didn’t occur immediately, but within 24 hours of the psychomanteum session. Even more startling, nearly every single subject strongly stated that their reunions were not fantasies or dreams, but insisted they were real events with elements of physicality.
Dr. Raymond Moody wrote that the sessions with his modern day psychomanteum weren’t just an effective method of contact with the dead, they quite literally changed the lives of the users, healing wounded relationships with the deceased and reshaping the way they saw the world.
With such a powerful tool so easy to create, why aren’t more paranormal investigators using the psychomanteum? Mostly because they don’t know the method even exists. Like many traditional methods of spirit communication, they’ve been forgotten, replaced with fancy gadgets as seen on television, or branded as “dangerous occult practices”. For this reason, The Traveling Museum of the Paranormal & Occult has spent the last several years roaming the country with a portable psychomanteum, swapping a quiet room for headphones and white noise, and educating the public on the history and practice of therapeutic mirror gazing. On the the third season three episode of Travel Channel’s Kindred Spirits, that lesson will be shared with an even wider audience.
Of course, things are bound to get even stranger when you build your psychomanteum out of a gigantic haunted mirror in one of the most paranormally-active locations in the world.
The psychomanteum as seen in Travel Channel’s Kindred Spirits | via Greg Newkirk
“When Amy Bruni and Adam Berry phoned us a few months ago and asked us to get our butts to Pennsylvania, we were actually on the road to the Appalachian Mountains for Operation: Return the Crone,” Greg says. “Fortunately, a pit stop in Gettysburg was right along the way. When we arrived, they told us that they were dealing with a very old, and potentially very haunted mirror that the owners claimed could have been the source of the aggressive paranormal activity in their building. We already knew it was going to be a unique case, but we didn’t realize how strange it was about to get.”
With only a few days left to shoot the case, Amy & Adam were looking for a way to investigate the mirror that would yield the best results. The team immediately got to work building what might be the largest modern psychomanteum ever.
Haunted object expert Greg Newkirk peers into the haunted mirror | via Greg Newkirk
In the episode, the group heads to the basement, which the owners had styled to represent a traditional Civil War era funeral, and gingerly began to tilt the massive mirror to a 45-degree angle. Once it was safe and secure, Greg placed a bowl of water beneath the mirror – a step that Dr. Raymond Moody had left out of his modern psychomanteum (the Greeks would often gaze into the water’s reflection in the place where the mirror made contact with the water). Once everything was secure, he lit a single candle behind the designated gazing seat, and hit the lights.
Adding one more twist to contraption, it was decided that both Dana and Amy would use the psychomanteum at the same time. Not only was it big enough, but having two gazers would help confirm or negate the visions presented in the mirror as merely hallucinations… or something more.
Amy Bruni & Dana Matthews gaze into the psychomanteum | via Greg Newkirk
We won’t spoil the episode for you, except to say you’ll be shocked at the outcome.
My favorite time of year is almost here! Autumn is a time of harvesting and the magic of Halloween. It’s hard to believe Halloween is 2 months away.
Now is the time to plant garlic to harvest next late summer. It’s so easy. It’s better to plant organic garlic cloves than nonorganic. Organic cloves don’t have the germination inhibitors sprayed on them. Plant the cloves with the tip pointing up a few inches from each other. Cover with soil and water lightly. Next year, you can harvest fresh garlic. The garlic you grow in your garden tastes way better than the store bought garlic.
Get some squash (it’s okay if it’s from the store and not your garden), and other autumnal decorations from a local craft shop. I don’t know about any of you but I can’t wait to make my abode look more festive. I love autumn. It truly is a magickal season. Make a pot of wholesome nutritious squash soup to enjoy while you conjure awesome fall decor in your home!
You can also go out on a nature walk for findings. Acorns are everywhere now and flowers are withering. They sometimes dry and their colors change to gorgeous reds and browns. I want to make a harvest doll and hang it in my garden to symbolize my gratitude for the bounty from my garden.
Gather crab apples and bake an apple crisp. Rhubarb is done for the season now. Rhubarb crisp is delicious. Add garden grown strawberries for more flavor. Hang Indian corn in your apartment. Decorate with gourds, apples and orange candles.
Now you have a festive theme! Mix and match it anyway you like. Add in incense and you’re all set. Nothing screams Witch more than autumn. This is our time. This is our power.
Oh the heat. If only it would rain. I know I would love it. I want to dance in the rain, my arms outstretched, dancing to a weather spell. The heat right now is inescapable, and so tiring.
I just watered my parched garden. I am sure my garden appreciates the water quenching the roots and leaves. If I were a plant, I would. If gardens aren’t watered each day, then the roots are forced to reach down deeper for water. As a result, they suffer. It is better to water a garden regularly. That way, the roots are moist, and the plants like those conditions. Then plants are less stressed.
Speaking of plants, Lughnasadh is almost here! This is my favorite time of year. It reminds me that time changes. I mean it is cruelly baking hot right now here but eventually autumn will arrive. (It could hurry up and bring the cooler temperatures with it, I would not object.)
CELEBRATING LAMMAS
A few ways to celebrate Lammas/ Lughnasadh are:
bake bread, enjoy wine, harvest from your garden or indoor garden or container garden, enjoy a special dinner or do a ritual at your altar. The ritual can be either solitary or with a coven.
Now’s the time to gather berries, an extra bag of flour, fresh herbs and cheese. They add flavor and spice to any meal. Focus on abundance and what you reaped during this time.
Please do not steal or copy from this blog. If you do, be prepared to be stomped on by the Fates and karma for your bad character. I can be reached at :
heddyjohannesen @ gmail.com
The Nekromenteion in Epiros, Greece | via Shutterstock
The psychomanteum as seen in Travel Channel’s Kindred Spirits | via Greg Newkirk
Haunted object expert Greg Newkirk peers into the haunted mirror | via Greg Newkirk
Amy Bruni & Dana Matthews gaze into the psychomanteum | via Greg Newkirk
