Moving

No, not me personally. I’ve decided to make the jump from Blogger, which has served me well over the years, to WordPress, which has some features I really like if I’m going to do anything more serious than keep an erratic journal.

I’ve kept the separation between my crafting, writing and ‘regular’ journals, as well as adding in a spiritual one for my explorations in that avenue of my life. I may soon add in a photo journal, if I can actually discipline myself to keeping up with it for more than a couple of weeks.  Please bear with me as I work through the process of adjusting things across all my blogs.

Personal: http://knowledgeyesterdayarrived.wordpress.com/
Poetry: http://mywordsarealive.wordpress.com/
Crafting: http://sublimecreation.wordpress.com/
Photos: http://athousandwordsinpictures.wordpress.com/

New Beginnings

If Candlemas day be sunny and bright, Winter again will show its might.
If Candlemas day be cloudy and grey, Winter soon will pass away.

We all know the 'rule' about Groundhog Day- If the groundhog sees his shadow, then we get 6 more weeks of winter but if not, then spring is soon to come.  I find that whole thing a tiny bit odd. I mean .. I know where the 'official' groundhog is, he didn't see his shadow .. but here, it's bright an sunny and bordering on warm, so here, a groundhog certainly would. So how does that account for different parts of the country, much less the world?

Groundhog Day (or Candlemas, or Imbolc) for me is instead about new beginnings. It seems to happen that around this time every year, something new begins for me. last year, I left a job that was causing me stress and not paying me enough to even make traveling worth it.  I wish that the job at the yarn shop had lasted longer after that, but Sheri wasn't happy running the place, and it was becoming an unfun place to work.

With that in mind, I have chosen to take this Imbolc as a time to begin actively working on the School of the Season's New Year's Wishes workbook. It's something I wanted to start last year, but school and work and everything got in the way. I'll be posting my exercises here, both as a way to share my explorations, and because I don't really like writing things longhand anymore.

Fifty Questions: Number One

1. How old would you be if you didn’t know how old you are?

Recently someone online asked me how old I was. This isn't new, and it's not something I particularly mind, though I usually counter it with "How old do you think I am?"  In this case the person responded with 'No more than 27 ..." That made me think about this question.

Apparently, I don't 'act my age' - whatever that means. After all, what does it mean to act a particular age?  How should a twenty-something act? How should a forty-something act? I complain a lot that I'm 'old' .. but I'm kidding most of the time. Nevermind the fact that I sometimes think about the fact that I am older now than my mother was when she had my baby brother. I don't really think that I'm old.

Why should I?  True, my husband and I lead pretty dull lives compared to others. The height of excitement for us this past weekend was driving around to junk stores, and sitting down together and enjoying a night of crafty fun.  but does that make me old? No, it just makes me dull.  It also is what I really enjoy. Sure, I might talk big game about the life I used to lead .. but honestly, I don't think that life is sustainable.

So how old would I be if I didn't know how old I was? I would have to go with what that person guessed. I feel .. most of the time .. like I'm a twenty-something, just getting started on the real journey of her life. Add to that the fact that despite being married for almost 10 years hubby and I still act playful and silly an awful lot, It's like we're still both very young.

Now, if I could just get back the body I had at 27.

Saturday Fun

Yesterday I woke up in terrible pain thanks to Mother Nature's little joke and after having been unable to sleep well.  Jason was planning to go troll the junk stores, and I decided that I would go with him. We drove around and found several old books good for my mixed media crafts, and a candlestick and a little frame for my make-do project, and some ABC blocks I plan to use to make another make-do base. I usually avoid going to the junk/antique stores because he often goes with his parents, and they'll spend -hours- talking to the shop owners, and honestly, that's just not enjoyable to me. But with just my honey, it was kinda fun. I ended up with a bunch of books for like $2, and all I'm gonna do with them is tear the pages up for decoupage and art journalling, plus half a dozen small bottles destined to be made far prettier than they are right now, a little baggie of old-style ABC blocks I'll turn into something for Brittany and her baby.

Somewhere along the way we were treated to the most amusing sight; a snowman made of hay rolls.

This is how you know you live in the south.  Come fall, we see these hay rolls everywhere, dotting fields as they're left to try, piled on the edges of fields and in barns. But I have never before seen them fashioned into a giant ... I'd say at least 15'-tall.  While I was taking this picture, there was a dog barking at the house you can see in the background. He wasn't on a chain or lead or anything, but he didn't come after me. just barkbarkbarked until I got back in the car and we left. Just warning me 'don't come closer, this is my house!'

We had dinner at a place in Bessemer City (which is not a city) called The Gondola (pronounced gone-DOUGH-luh here, not GONE-dough-luh as you would think).  I was gonna get a steak, to reinforce my iron levels, but instead got the Butterfields Chicken. And it was a good choice.  It's chicken, sauteed onions and mushrooms and ham (or pancetta, I'm not sure which it was) in an alfredo sauce over spaghetti. I ended up only able to eat a bite or four before getting a to-go box, so Jason and I could share dessert, which was Peanut-butter Thunder cake. And oh, was it good!

We ended the day with two trips to Hobby Lobby. One in Gastonia .. which ended up with us walking out without purchasing anything because they were -rude- .. after which we went to the store in Rock Hill and ended up getting everything we needed there, and a little more, including the lined clear stamp Jason's been wanting badly. Yay!

I never did post pictures from the snow day we had this month.

We don't get a lot of snow, but this 'storm' kept honey home for a couple of days. It was nice .. even if we were sick for it.

The Christians & The Pagans

Last week's Pagan Blog Prompt was:

Do you have any experience with Christian Pagan(ism)s? Or perhaps you yourself fall into this category? Please, enlighten us with your thoughts on this seemingly oxymoron combination.

It so happens that I have had experience with individuals that called themselves 'Judeo-Pagan', which I really consider a bit of a made-up word that means 'I want to be cool but can't abandon my upbringing because my family might disown me'.  Perhaps it's not so for all individuals that attempt to blend Christianity and Paganism, but I think in general, calling oneself a Christian Pagan is a lot like saying you're a violent pacifist.

After all, if you are a follower of the Christian faith .. a 'true' follower .. then you have to adhere to the dogma of that faith, which insists that there is one single deity, that he created the earth barely over two-thousand years ago, that there are simply no other valid truths no matter what. For me, that flies in the face of what we as pagans believe, that ultimately the reality of the Divine is how the individual perceives it, that there is no one exact truth.

Dueling Cellos

For some reason, this both delights and amazes me to an extreme I hadn't expected.

Best Crock-pot Beef Stew Ever

I love my crock pot. It's my best friend, especially in the winter time. I can cook without having to babysit dinner, and normally, it's amazingly good food.  Yesterday, for example, I was able to cook a dozen chicken thighs, which I later boned and skinned so that I could make another batch of chicken stock.

Today, I made beef stew. I make it often, but this particular match was the best ever.

Ingredients:
1 package Hidden Valley Ranch dressing mix
1 can cream of mushroom  & roasted garlic soup
2 cans water
1-1.5 lbs stew beef
2lbs carrots, peeled and cut
2lbs potatoes (red, white or yellow), chunked
1lb parsnips, peeled and cut

Directions:
Put beef, dressing mix, soup and water in crock pot and turn on low. Cook for about 3 hours.
Add potatoes, carrots and parsnips and cook for another 5 hours.
Serve and enjoy!

Life ... organized?

LIfe has been a little crazy around here since the new year. Jason and I were both sick .. and it keeps threatening to return, a state I deny with copious doses of vitamin C, tea, and chicken soup.  Being the kitchen witch that I am, I tend to treat with love .. though when I get sick it's a whole different story. Then the whole house suffers. Which is where we are coming back from now.

In addition to this, both Jason and I really needed some form of storage for our various crafts; his including bookbinding, spinning, weaving and knitting, mine including knitting, spinning, sewing and mixed media crafts. So a trip to IKEA was made, and after much waffling .. along with him laughing at me for being excited to be in IKEA (it really is one of my favorite places for some reason) .. we decided on an irregular EXPEDIT unit like this one:

Let me tell you .. this 90-pounds of bookcase is a very sturdy unit. We have them turned on their sides instead of upright, which suits our needs much better. In addition to this, we picked up some of their KASSETT boxes:

The small ones I have in green and white, and the long flatter ones in black and white. The small ones I keep inks, stamps, paints and colored pencils and crayons in, and the long flat ones store my papers and ephemera right now. The unit has plenty of space for everything, in fact, though I'd like a few more boxes and baskets to store things like ribbon (of which I have a ton) and fabric scraps and current projects.

I'm still job-hunting, and have pretty much decided that if I can't find something soon, I'll be working with a staffing agency for a while, just to have some money coming in. It's getting to where we're stressing overmuch about money, and that makes tensions high around here. I discovered a man I used to work with when I was working at Best buy for Mosaic is apparently the manager at the local Staples, so I put in my application and need to probably call to check on it Monday.

Now that we have our storage, the house is starting to get a little more organized, post-holiday. It usually takes me a month or so to get everything dealt with, decorations put up, etc. I'm well on track this year. Just have to take down the snowflakes in the windows (reluctantly) and get the tree over to my in-laws' house, since they keep it for us for the year. Our attics just down have the space to store the tree, sadly. I'm working hard to keep the kitchen straight and clean too, because as I well know, if my kitchen's not tidy, I'm frazzled and my whole life is a mess.

Spiritual: God, Goddess & Spirit

Inspired by another dear pagan housewife, I have decided that as part of my blogging, I'm going to try to answer the prompts found at the Pagan Blog Prompt site. The most recent one is this:

A lot of Pagan paths are Goddess-centered, sometimes seen as a rebuttal against the God-centered churches. But as Pagans, we also understand that balance in all areas of our life is important, and even necessary to our personal growth.

Today’s topic is the balance between the God and Goddess in our own journey. Are you more attuned with the Lord or Lady? Do you follow a path that focuses on one more than the other? Or have you found a good balance between the ‘two halves’?

I self-identify as pagan because I do not believe it is possible for there to be only one 'right' way. I do not believe Christianity, or Buddhism, or Judaism, or Wicca, or Jainism, or Islam, or any of the hundreds of faiths that exist can claim to be the only right wait for an individual to find meaning in their life. And that really is what religion is all about, it's about finding meaning in ones existence. Edie Brickell probably summed it up for me in the song What I Am: "Religion is the smile on a dog."

Some time ago, on a website I no longer follow but I found to be a very good resource, I discovered that I am at heart an Animist. I see Spirit in all things. No, I don't go around assuming that my water bottle has a soul, and I don't not eat something because I'm afraid to hurt it, even if it's an apple or a breast of chicken. but I do thank the things that I consume for their sacrifice. My father in law has a particular way of blessing the food at family meals which says in part 'bless this food for the nourishment of our bodies', and that's sort of how I feel when I consume something.

Getting around to the point of the prompt, while I see all things as having a spirit, I do have a believe in a greater power, what I tend to call the Divine. I can't always define it, and my eloquence fails me when I try. I typically express it as the Lord and Lady, the God and Goddess, but beyond that, I fail to be able to explain what it is I believe they are. They simply are the guiding force that exists for all persons. For Christians, it's God and Jesus Christ, for me, it's the God and Goddess. Certainly, I envision them with different names, depending on the particular purpose. If I'm working in the home, I seek Hestia's guidance. If I am looking to honor the dead, I ask for Cernunnos' blessing. When I sit down to write, I try to ask Thoth for his wisdom. I work with many different pantheons, sometimes for the same aspect of my life, though typically I stick with Celtic, Egyptian and Greek.

I am not terribly balanced when it comes to honoring both, however. I am distinctly skewed toward the feminine. Sometimes, I think that's only natural; I am a woman, after all. I'm bound to be more aligned with the feminine force of the Divine. I call myself a Hearth Witch after all, and much of my 'magic' has to do with the home, so I think maybe it is only natural for me that I lean towards the Goddess more often. Maybe it would serve me to find a little more balance in my life when it comes to that. Perhaps if I spent a little more time listening to the masculine forces around me, I'd feel more balance in my life.

Conversations with my Vagus Nerve

So. For the last week, I have been sick. It started Monday really, though I wasn't that bad until Tuesday or Wednesday.  I was utterly miserable there for a few days. And then it was just the coughing.  Constantly.. Endlessly. Repeatedly coughing. So much it made me gag, and grow dizzy.

I have done my usual research to avoid going to the doctor, because if I can fix this myself it makes me better than the doctors, and I have decided that I do not have whooping cough, or bronchitis, or pneumonia. I have a cough. Which is triggered by a stimulated vagus nerve. I have tried -everything- to get this cough under control. I thought it was being caused by congestion .. but I am not coughing up anything, and I can .. when the tickle in the back of my throat doesn't cause another coughing fit .. take deep breaths unhindered as far as I can tell. I don't -feel- congested. So it can't be congestion.

The only symptom is the nigh-constant tickle at the back of my throat. And I do mean constant. It feels like I have hairs growing in my throat.  Yes, a very gross mental image, but that's what it feels like. No amount of coughing, gargling, clearing my throat or hacking so violently it makes my arms tingle has ejected the phantom hairs, so I can only conclude they are not really there.

My husband has threatened with the Husbandly Glare of Doom that if I'm not 'better' by tonight, I must hie myself to the doctor; that is to say to the Urgent Care facility.  A trip which we cannot afford, and I really do not wish to take. It took three days of serious agony when my Eustachian tubes were locked closed for me to go about a year and a half ago. We're talking agony. While the frequent barking sound in the house is annoying as anything .. and the feeling of hair growing in my throat is not the most pleasant thing either .. I'm fairly certain I'm neither turning into a dog nor growing hair in my throat. My chin, sure. But not inside my throat.

So. Vagus nerve. Enough already, okay? You've had your fun. I'm sure the constant sneezing is what sent you into this tizzy, but you do not need to repay the favor this way. You don't need to repay the favor at all, really.  I'm sorry I irritated you. Can we be friends again? I would like to sleep, and to not be forced into a visit to the Doc-in-a-Box.

PS: I'm out of underwear to wear thanks to the the coughing. It sucks getting old. How about you do my laundry for me, so I can rest?