sophia-the-green-witch - Tumblr blog

[sophia-the-green-witch]

Question for fellow pagans

My cat sometimes likes to get on the Loki altar.. Should I do something? I think it is kinda cute he likes to rest there! But I've never practiced in a home with cats so I am in doubt!!

[sophia-the-green-witch]

Sigyn by Dionycia

Among the many artists I met at the London comic con, I was lucky enough to cross path with the amazing Dionycia. A few times I admired her art before I got the nerve to talk to her XD But with her talent and her amazing artistic style, I knew I had to commission her for a Sigyn portrait.

Looking at the result, I am just in awe and have no regrets!

Thanks again!!! :D

[sophia-the-green-witch]

I want to do more landscape studies from the pacific northwest <3 I miss home

[sophia-the-green-witch]

I originally put this in the tags, but I ended up rambling quite a bit and it felt like too much for the tags. I just wanted to share a bit about my feelings about the association of mustard with Tyr.

When I first started working with Tyr I had looked into what plants were associated with him and I remember not really feeling like the mustard association fit, but I still picked up some mustard seed to keep on my herb shelf. Though, for the first year or so I never touched it. But, over time it felt more and more fitting to Tyr. not because it's "warlike" or "extremely masculine," in fact it was those descriptors that originally made it hard for me to associate mustard with Tyr because the way he presented to me in my practice was never that way. His energy was always very masculine but it was the more quiet patient kind he always felt like a protector not an aggressor (not like the times I've interacted with Aries lol), but I've always had a hard time seeing Tyr as a "war god" and actually, there is very little evidence in any text or artifacts that he was ever treated as such. He's more of a god of victory not a god of war. To me, he's a god who is very concerned with karmic balance and therefore lends his victory to those with righteous cause who seek to restore that balance. He's a god of fairness and moral justice. And there's something to mustard seed, a seed that's so mundane yet so important. It's simple and complex. You must grind it down through patience and hard work. There is a give and a take to it, yet it's so quiet and unassuming. Mustard has a special fiery bite to it that's a bit unexpected and all of those things are what make it feel "right" for Tyr to me.

Mustard is associated with the norse god Tyr. Mustard is a fiery, solar, warlike plantspirit with extremely masculine characteristics.

Source: The Northern Shamanic Herbal by Raven Kaldera, Asphodel Press 2010

[sophia-the-green-witch]

#julyforloki So I splattered the art journal painting I was working on for Loki. I included a bit of color variation and am really excited about how the detail work turned out. I am including a photo of the painting as well as a few detail shots.

Hail Loki! I love You!

[sophia-the-green-witch]

For Thor 🧡

[sophia-the-green-witch]

I feel like some people take diety worship way too seriously, like i offer Thor goldfish all the time and he fucking loves them

[sophia-the-green-witch]

December woods (12/26/23)

[sophia-the-green-witch]

I was looking into when the heliacal rising of Sirius would be for my location because, while I'll probably do something on the "general day" for Lokabrenna this year (everywhere I've seen puts it as July 13th), I wanted to do my own special Lokabrenna during the actual heliacal rising of Sirius for where I live. But when I looked it up, my personal Lokabrenna should be on August 4th, so instead of being in July, my Lokabrenna will be in August. I couldn't help but feel like this was significant since my birthday is in August and August 4th happens to be a new moon, the moon phase I associate most with Loki! It kind of felt like him yelling at me lol When I realized this it was almost like I could feel him behind me smirking at me in that cocky way is does~

I still plan to dedicate a lot of work to Loki in July as it still feels very much like "his time." Not to mention, I've been feeling his impatience and slight jealousy as I've been working with Thor a lot this month. But don't worry Loki, I see you, you won't be forgotten! For anyone who's interested in finding their personal date for Lokabrenna, I used the info from this post from the Lokean reddit thread. I'll also post the important instructions from the post below the cut.

https://in-the-sky.org/ephemeris.php - set type to Any and Object to Sirius and make sure it has your area or a town/city within 50miles/80km of where you live, then find when it changes from "Not observable" -> a time, meaning its observable, e.g. for me it says "05:48 until 05:49", since the heliacal rising is when the star is finally visible after being hidden by the sun for a season, we want the first day it is visible. i set the date for somewhere in July and then selected 100 rows of days and scrolled until i found a time in the "observable" column as mentioned above.

-r/lokean

[sophia-the-green-witch]

House Spirits

I finally got a chance to set up a space dedicated to my house spirits on my altar.

More on my work with House Spirits below!

My History Working With House Spirits

When I was a kid, I was introduced to the concept of English/Scottish Brownies through the Spiderwick Chronicles and quickly became obsessed with trying to attract a brownie to my own home. I took one of my small miniature tea cups, filled it with half n' half and set it in a place in the house that I was sure wouldn't be seen by my parents or disturbed by my cats. I did this for quite a long time and even, as per the advice of the Spiderwick Field Guide, occasionally scattered flour on the ground as a way to try to see evidence of little brownie footprints. Brownies weren't the only Fae that I tried to make contact with when I was younger, but they were the ones that I was most persistent with. I loved the idea of a little creature making a home within my own home and living with my family and I. I never got the tangible "evidence" I was looking for as a kid, but I undoubtedly felt a presence. So, looking back, I most certainly succeed in attracting a brownie (or at least a house spirit) and it wasn't until recently that I came to the realization that I may have done so by giving the spirit offerings, even if I didn't call it that at the time. It's things like this that make me feel like I was destined to be a witch and a pagan~

Inspiration

Since I started walking a bit more of a Pagan path in my witchcraft, specifically since I started venerating the Norse gods, I have been feeling an urge to return to my work with land and house spirits. I've always felt their presence and feel that I should honor that presence. I'm not sure why it took me so long to actually start, but since coming back to my practice, I've been feeling that need to honor the land and house spirits around me even stronger than before. One of the final pushes was actually from when I was going through the back-log of videos I hadn't watched from Jacob Toddson. He's one of my favorite Norse Pagan creators I found very early into my own path venerating the Norse gods. About a year ago, he made a video about house spirits and after watching it, it truly inspired me to actually take the steps to honor my own house spirits.

I do intend to do some work work with the land spirits around my home as well, but I want to do more research into the beliefs of the local indigenous tribes of the area before I do so.

Making a Space for My House Spirits

In making a space for my house spirits, I knew that I wanted to do it in a way that was reminiscent of the way I interacted with them as a child. Having lost my original miniature porcelain tea set from when I was a kid (it's probably floating around somewhere in the depths of my parents' house lol), I started looking online for anyone selling a set like the one I used to use. After a bit of searching, I found a set that was just like one of the ones I had. It even had the same pattern! So, I ordered it. In the mean time, I started making my house spirit a little home. I bought and modified a birdhouse, painting it a dark wood color and mounting some moss on the roof. Then while looking for stuff to make flower crowns for midsummer, I stumbled across a little gnome statue that felt perfect as an idol of my house spirit. Once I received the tea set, I was ready to welcome in my house spirit. I reorganized my altar, making space for him, and set everything up, complete with an offering of heavy cream. I invited the spirit to make a home and told him that I hope he feels welcome in his new space. The experience and the energy felt nice and familiar and I'm happy to have a little space on my altar for my house sprit to call home~

I plan to continue to give small offerings and light a candle for my house spirit. I want to to become an everyday practice if I can manage it and have been thinking of maybe giving him offerings in other ways besides food. Maybe little trinkets to keep in his house~

[sophia-the-green-witch]

Loki is chaos, yes, but there is comfort in chaos. There is comfort in change. Change can be terrifying, but embracing that fear is so freeing. Embracing the newness of it all, the rebirth. If we stayed the same, we would never grow or learn. Life would become too stagnant, too boring. There would be no sense of adventure. There would be nothing new. Change is required, even if it is chaos. Loki is chaos, yes, but there is comfort in chaos.

[sophia-the-green-witch]

Happy Midsummer

[sophia-the-green-witch]

☀️ Midsummer (2024)

This midsummer was a particularly good one for me. I felt called back to my practice by Thor just in time to celebrate midsummer and so, I dedicated my celebration to him!

Midsummer's Eve

I spent midsummer's eve with my sister and our close friends because we wouldn't be able to celebrate together on the day of Midsummer. We made a lemon based pasta dish, did a small informal dedication to our deities, made flower crowns, and ate mini sponge cakes with strawberries and whip. It was fun and simple and during our little dedication the presence of our deities was felt very strongly. I took some videos (something I want to get back into along side my practice), but only really took one quick picture of our little sweet treat~

Midsummer's Day

For Midsummer's day I knew that I wanted to dedicate the day and time to Thor. He was the deity that called me back to my practice and he was the one I've been feeling the most lately with all the rain we've been having. I bought some beer (for me it seems that Thor has a liking for Guinness) and gave it to him as an offering, while I was doing this, I felt this nagging in the back of my mind as if Loki were saying "I want some too." So, I asked Thor if it were okay for me to share a small amount with Loki. I got the sense that it was fine by him and gave a small offering to Loki as well. The funny thing was, when I stopped and thought about it again for a moment, on midsummers eve at the beginning of the day when we sat down for dinner I had noticed and commented on some crows collecting on my friend's neighbor's roof. They were acting a bit odd and there were three, then four of them. I mentioned that Loki tended to come to me in crows and grackles. I had always intended to honor Thor for Midsummer, but I couldn't help but get the feeling that Loki felt left out. While Thor seemed okay with sharing some of his offering, I did tell Loki that he needed to be patient because next month is his month. After giving my offering, I sat out on my balcony and enjoyed the sun of the late day and did a reading with my new Gjallarhorn deck. I did a reading with just the Gods portion of the deck and pulled a rune for myself. I was mostly looking for guidance/insight into the rest of the year from midsummer. After soaking up some more sun and meditating on my readings I went down to give Thor the rest of his offering by hailing him and pouring out the remainder of the beer to him. As I did this the wind kicked up out of nowhere. I wasn't a violent wind, but just pleasant. It came with a friendly energy that I knew was Thor. I had a good small midsummer with the people I was close with and on my own. It helped me feel closer to the gods and closer to my practice. ☀️ ᚦ Hail Thor! ᚦ ☀️

[sophia-the-green-witch]

Sigyn, Norse Goddess of Victory, by Elora Sperber

Two weeks ago I went to the Comic Con in s Hertogenbosch and I got the chance to meet Elora Sperber, a very talented artist. Check her arts on Instagram, they are AMAZING.

@elorasperber (on Instagram & twitter)

I commissioned her for a portrait of Sigyn, and she sent me today this beautiful masterpiece!! :D

If you can, do commission her, she's lovely and very talented ;)

[sophia-the-green-witch]

Reminded by someone else's post so here are some pictures from Glastonbury Tor in 2015. The Tor is often associated with summer solstice and the 3rd photo is from the midsummer gathering of a druid organization called OBOD. The horn player turned and played in the 4 directions calling the opening of the ceremony. Happy solstice, everyone!

[sophia-the-green-witch]

Getting back into practice

I never stopped practicing, I sort of just fell out of doing it with any regularity.

I found myself too busy with life to even have the brain space to stop and think to give an offering or even appreciate the beauty of nature. The gods never left, they just got a bit quieter, noticing my lack of engagement, but not giving up on me by any means.

Then there was a small, unexpected catalyst. A spark the reignited a flame, that reminded me that I shouldn't neglect my practice because it does make me very happy and help me feel connected to others and the world around me.

Oddly enough that catalyst was the migration of the Wisdom of Odin discord server over to The Fellowship of Northern Traditions server.

I had been relatively inactive in the server for a few months (not that I had ever been too visibly active as a professional lurker lol) but I kept up with server announcements at a minimum because I cared about what was happening in the community. I saw the announcement that the WoO server was going to be deactivated with the hope/expectation that those who wanted to continue to support the community would move over to the FoNT server in order to bring funding to The Fellowship. I thought this was a great idea and as someone who had supported both Jacob and The Fellowship since the beginning (even when I didn't really have the money to be doing so), I didn't hesitate to move over. It was strange because the new server space felt like a new beginning. The energy felt clearer there and I felt far less intimidated by it and as a result, the new server encouraged me to re-engage with the community and, in turn, my practice.

Right as this all happened out of no where we got two months worth of rain in two days. It was storming like crazy with a constant thunderous downpour. Some areas flooded and some were hit by tornados, but my home and work place remained safe. During these storms I could feel Thor. He was jubilant! He was excited and thrilled with the fact that I had started to notice the gods more clearly again.

It was then that I decided that I needed to go back to my practice. I started physically journaling a bit more. writing down my thoughts on the gods and spirits. I started diving back into witch/pagan content that needed to be caught up on (this meant bulk watching/listening to a lot of Jacob Toddson's stuff lol). I also decided I wanted to revisit the Havamal. Studying it a few stanza at a time and seeing how it applies to my life as well as reflecting on Odin's wisdom and applying it where I can. It's a more mindful practice than simply reading the words on the page.

I started to make goals for my self: I want to bring small things that have to do with my practice to work. I want to start working (or resume I guess given my history that I'll explain in a full post about it) with house spirits. I want to get back into gardening. I want to interact with the gods more. I want to spend more time outside, appreciating nature. I wan to start learning more about Celtic Paganism. I want to journal more. I want to return to my practice... and I want to do it with my sister and my friend if I can. And lastly I wanted to try to use this blog a bit more

I created this blog to sort of supplement my grimoire. To be an online source for some of the stuff I did. And I never really did that. It was almost as if I was afraid to use this space for what I had intended it for I felt a weird pressure to make everything pretty and perfect, to only share spells that looked good on camera, but I hate that I hate aesthetic witchcraft. While I do like to make pretty spells and alters, not all witchcraft has to be pretty and perfect and ceremonial. Not all of it has to be this big thing and planned out. The "showy" witchcraft that you often see on tumblr and instagram and tiktok is the type I hate because it's not real and it's not realistic. I have to remind myself that there are people like Scott Cunningham, who work I love and respect so much, who see the simple witchcraft in making a sandwich and scattering leaves to the wind. As long as there is intention, that is witchcraft, however it looks. And knowing that is so validating. Sometimes I would doubt myself and my craft, but as I started updating my about page and my new page on the gods I realized how comfortable and knowledgeable I actually am in my craft.

So, I want to try to use this blog more. I want to post more of my spells. I want to document my work and my practice. But most of all I want to do it for me and if someone choses to come along for the ride then they can feel free! And I hope that maybe posting my practice here might help someone else~

that being said,

Skål!

[sophia-the-green-witch]

The Gods are not detached, locked away in their temples like crypts. They walk in the world with us. They know us. When you open yourself up to them you will find them in the strangest places.