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Foggy, fall on the path.  Image made with a Nikon d7200.

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autumn in Vermont

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More cat tarot by popular request

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this new moon is really here for me: i am cleaning the fuck out of my house and setting up a new altar space 

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I made this for my zine but now i want to use it for other stuff.

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The Self-Exploration Tarot Spread

Who I Am Right Now

My Short Term Goals

My Interests and Passions

My Emotions

My Inner Demons

My Fears

My Drive

My Long Term Goals

My Future Self

I recommend not using reversals for this particular spread, but you can still use them if you prefer to do so. 

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Disposing of Spell Materials

sometimes after performing a spell, you find yourself wondering, hmm, what do i do with these ingredients? the way you clean up or put away your materials can be its own step in the ritual, and affect the spell. here are some suggestions for the different ways to end rituals or properly dispose of the materials 

consider first:

📦keep it - consider if the spell seems like something you could ever possible need to reverse later. that love-attraction jar may invite people you don’t like, and need to be ended, but it’s more difficult without the original materials. keep the ingredients in a jar, box, or something, (maybe label it too) so you can easily nullify the spell if you need to.

✉wrap it up - in a jar or a pouch, if it is a spell you want to last a long time, gather the ingredients you won’t be reusing and keep them in a place you

🏺jar spells - just keep the materials in the sealed jar. this is the sort of spell that can be reused simply by shaking the jar, lighting a new candle for it or recharging its energy. 

🔔cleanse and reuse - obviously you don’t want to throw your crystals or jars out after a single spell. separate the materials used and cleanse them individually, cutting the ties to the spell. 

now what do i do with it?

🔥it’s been burned to ash - for banishing place it on the back doorstep and sweep it out into the wind. for releasing its energies and inviting influence, release the ashes into running water, given it is safe to return to nature (non glass, nonplastic nontoxic, biodegradable etc)

🕸bound objects - bury or keep in a box somewhere, burial for spells you will never remove, hiding for things you may undo one day. 

🛡protective spells - best hung up or hidden in a corner of the house, or place over the front door of the residence. 

☣non-biodegradable materials - if its something you can’t safely return to nature, and it can’t be reused because it was burned or broken, use the acting of burning or breaking to move the spell’s energies into the world. properly throw out or recycle the objects.

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Laughter-loving Aphrodite crowned in roses, myrtle, and apple blossoms for Valentine’s Day. 

Aphrodite has always been my favorite Olympian (with Hera and Hermes occupying the other top spots) and I don’t know why. I like to think it’s because she’s the most feared… 

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I’ve got another quick and easy tarot trick for y’all! The featured card for this one is The Hermit because I always associate it with taking time to care for yourself. 1. Find The Hermit in your deck. 2. The card below is what’s stressing or draining you. 3. The card above is something you can do for yourself.

hope it helps make somebody’s day a bit better!

[friendly-neighborhood-witch]

Character Development Tarot Spread

I didn’t see any of these, so I guessed I should make one! The cards can be drawn at random or you can meditate on them, you an draw as many cards for position as you want, you can se any kind of cards, runes, stones, cristals, whatever you want.This serves more as an inspiration than anything else.

Character Traits: Literally what it says. Draw as many cards as you want. You can select them yourself, if you want. Here, the traits can go from physical appearence, to personality, to behavior, to all of them.

Background: What happened to the character before the story began What’s their history? And most importantly: was parts of their past is still haunting them today?

Mental: What is the character’s mental state? You can draw one card for how they are at the begining and another one for how they are at the end, or draw multiple cards. It’s important that you link their state to the things that have happened to them. If they watched their whole family get killed, as part of their background, I doubt they will be the happiest person on earth at the begining of the story.

Emotional: Same, but with their emotional state.

Psychological: This can be a little more tricky if you don’t know lots about psychology, but some research will do.

Character Arc: What is the Character’s Arc? What is it about? What do they go through? What do they learn? How do they change? More detail in the following cards.

Begining: Strongly linked to their Backstory. How are they at the begining of the story? How is their life? How does their world work?

Journey: What makes them start their journey? How does it go? Is it freeing? Is it painful? Do they chose to start their journey, or are they thrown into it by the circumstances? What do they learn? How does it take them to the Ending?

Ending: After the journey, what are they like in the end? What has changed them? How dod they change? Do they feel better than they did in the beginig? Or worse? Or somewhere in between?

Philosophy: This is very complex, so you should probably draw many cards. Like, at least three cards for each stage the character is in (Begining, Journey, Ending). This refers to the way they see the world, the way they think. What they think is fair, what they think is right, how they see themselves in relationship to the world, etc. It depends on the personality of the character. For example, a philosophy teacher in an university won’t have the same complexity of thought as a withe cishet fuckboy.

Want: What does the character want? Will that REALLY make them happy? What are they going to do to achieve it?

Need: What does the character actually need? Do they want it too, or does it repulse them? How do they realize this is what they really need?

Lie: What is the lie that the character believes? What is keeping them back from being happy?

Truth: What truth does the character need to learn? What do they need to be happy? Do they get it in the end? It is Pretty? Is it Ugly?

Inner Conflict: What’s the character’s inner conflict about? What torments them?

Goal: What is the character’s goal through the story?

Obstacle(s): What is stopping them from achieving said goal?

Hopes: What are the character’s hopes? What are the character’s fears?

Strenght: What are the character’s strong traits? What are they good at?

Weaknesses: What does your character fail to do? Do they overcome their weaknesses? Do they (learn to) accept them? How do they feel about them?

Inspiration: A random card(s) you can draw to get inspired, for anything you need.

[friendly-neighborhood-witch]

Rest stops on highways are liminal spaces where the veil is thin and nobody can tell me differently

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Botanical Witches, by Djamila Knopf on Instagram

More Djamila Knopf Botanical Witches

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Storytelling Through Tarot

I’ve noticed that a lot of other witches also enjoy fiction and writing! Tarot itself tells a story, and you can do so much with using tarot to outline your story and characters! So here’s a 13 card spread that can be shortened down to six if you need to. The order in which you lay them really depends on if you’d rather do a six or thirteen card spread. 

1-6 are the main points of the story. 

Beginning - What are things like at the beginning of the narrative? Where do your characters start?

Climax of Act One - Something has drastically changed in your MC’s life. What is it? What do they need to do now?

Midpoint: big twist! - Need a plot twist? Someone is hiding a secret? Things aren’t going as planned? This is where something unexpected happens.

Climax of Act Two - It looks like the bad guy is winning, nothing is going right. What does the most intense part of your story look like?

Wrap up - What loose ends need tied up?

End - Where are things now at the end of the story?

Now, the other cards go in between those main six points. 

Beginning

Inciting Incident - What happens that shakes up the status quo?

Second Thoughts - What’s your character thinking now with these events looming on the horizon?

Climax of Act One

Obstacle - No one said this journey was easy

Obstacle - Yup, more things to keep your hero from meeting their goal

Midpoint

Obstacle - Getting frustrated? Good.

Disaster - The “oh shit” moment

Crisis - The “no no no no no this isn’t happening” moment

Climax of Act Two

Wrap up

End

And there you go! Hope this helps!

[friendly-neighborhood-witch]

RGB mushroom lamp in lantern by TheSnowmade - https://www.etsy.com/shop/TheSnowmade

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Don’t have any little jars for spell bottles?

Allow me to present...

GRAPHITE CONTAINERS!

They’re super cheap and can be found at basically any grocery store. If you’re a student you’ll likely have a ton of these lying around.

You can empty them, clean them out (I used a toothpick with some tissue paper on the end to whipe off some of the graphite smudges) and fill them with your hearts desire!

Not only all that, but also they’re super portable with how compact they are.

(Ft. an anti-anxiety spell bottle)

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Sunflowers and Ferns

Gouache on paper, 2019

by Kelly Louise Judd

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Moonlight Spell, Janaina Medeiros