Home Again!

Hi and Merry Meet,
I'm back home! We had a great time with family for Thanksgiving. My uncle and I ran in this year's Turkey Trot. That meant that I didn't have to help prep the turkey. I did help with everything else once I got home and had a shower.

I love being able to spend some time at home and relax with my family. For Thanksgiving, my mom hosts both my family and my in-laws. My husband and I are from the same hometown (we were high school sweeties). For Christmas, my in-laws host their family and my family. It makes it easy on us so that we don't have to eat two dinners! My mom and I spend some time just hanging out and it was great!

I drove home yesterday so that I could go to my Wicca 1 class. We are half way though now and I love my class! I have learned a lot and I feel like I have sooooooooo much more to learn! I don't think I'll ever know everything!

I hope that everyone had a good weekend!
Blessed be,
Autumn

Happy Thanksgiving!

Hi and Merry Meet,
I'm driving to my hometown today for a family filled Thanksgiving! My husband will drive in tomorrow since he has to work tonight. Also, I'm running a Turkey Trot tomorrow morning, and he's not sure that he can get out of work and get me to my race on time!

I hope that everyone has a safe and happy Thanksgiving!
Blessed be,
Autumn

Busy Busy

Hi and Merry Meet,
Sorry I haven't posted in a while. This week I got some wonderful news... I got a full time job! I am so excited about it. I will start on my birthday. That is the best gift ever!!!!

Tomorrow is my next Wicca class. I'm a little behind on my homework this week. It's due tomorrow and I haven't started it yet. I'll do it after this post so that I'm ready for class. My tarot class finished up this week. I'm sad that that class is over. I loved working with those women. Our instructor said that she would like to offer another session in the spring.

Husband took me out to dinner tonight to celebrate that I got a job! It was so nice to go out and not have to worry about dishes!! :)
Blessed be,
Autumn

Classes

Hi and Merry Meet,
I had my second Wicca 1 class today. I am the only original member. My classmates dropped out for various reasons. I do have a new classmate who is really cool. I'm excited about getting to know her. I think that she will stay in class.

This weeks assignment is to look at one pantheon in depth. This week, I got my first choice. My classmate and I are interested in different pantheons, so it works out really well! My choice was the Celtic pantheon and hers was Greek.

I gave my presentation on Reclaiming tradition today. It went well and now my classmate also has to give hers next week. I'm excited to hear about Scared Wheel tradition.

I hope that everyone had a great weekend! :)
Blessed be,
Autumn

Crazy!

Hi and Merry Meet,
This week has flown by for me! I had my tarot class Wednesday night and I have a homework assignment from that too! I'm almost ready with my assignment for my Wicca class tomorrow afternoon.

I love my grandmother. She is crazy. She is 83, active and feisty. She volunteers at a local hospital. Not the hospital on her retirement campus, but the large ER local one. Nana is very special. She swears like a sailor, knows her Jack Daniels, and loves to play cards. I think she is amazing and I hope that I have that much love of life when I am her age.

I asked her once why she can't work at the hospital that is walking distance from her apartment. Her answer: "The people there are old! They just shuffle along. I did it for five minutes and I started to feel old." OK, so she drives herself (yes, she drives) to the big ER to work two days a week. She loves it! Nana always loves to tell the bloody, or gross, or weird stories. What I love about it is that since she works there, she gets free flu shots! This is a good thing for her.

When she found out that the hospital had H1N1 vaccines, she decided she had to have one. Once her mind is made up, it is a done deal. So, off she went to find a vaccines. The hospital staff told her they were only giving them out to pregnant women. Nana, being Nana, told them that she was pregnant.

After a good hearty laugh they gave it to her.

I swear, when I'm that age I wonder what I'll come up with to get my way?
Blessed be,
Autumn

My Photo Tarot Deck

Hi and Merry Meet,

I had to get out of the house today. It was warm, sunny, and just the perfect day for a walk! My neighborhood is more on the urban side, so talking a nice nature walk is not something I can just set out of my door and do. I drove over to one of the larger cemeteries in the city.

I love walking here. It is quite, peaceful, and there are lots of trees! The cemetery itself is very old. It is a Catholic cemetery so there are lots of angels and huge statues of crosses. I took my camera with me today. Here is one of the paths that I walked down:A tree in full fall foliage:This tree had amazing energy! It just radiated happiness!

As I was strolling along I got the idea that I could find images that remind me of the major arcana from the tarot deck. I found quite a few! Here's what I found:

The fool:The Magician:The High Priestess:The Empress:The Emperor:The Hierophant:The Lovers:

The Chariot:Strength:The Hermit:Wheel Of Fortune:Justice:The Hanging Man: Death:Temperance:

The Devil: The Tower: The Star:The Moon:The Sun:Judgement:

The World:I have to say, I'm pretty happy with how this came out. It was so spur of the moment and just felt like the prefect project for me today. I feel so much more relaxed and happy now that I've taken my walk and reconnected with nature.

Blessed be,

Autumn

Wicca Class

Hi and Merry Meet,
I've had a great weekend so far! Our jewelry show was the best we've had so far. It was huge and there were so many vendors. I was happy with how we did. Most of the booths were selling Christmas stuff. It was so mammoth that if people told you that they would come back later they wouldn't be able to find that vendor again!

We were able to come back early so I could attend the Wicca 1 class. I was so excited to go and meet other people who are learning about this path!! There are three of us learning. I'm excited to get to know my classmates over the next seven weeks. Today was just a get to know you and see what you know about Wicca, Witchcraft, Pagans, and Witches. It was cool to go over our definitions with the instructor. I think that helped her see what our ideas where and what ideas we already have about these words. I was even given homework!

One of my classmates did not know what a tradition is yet. So, since we both wanted Celtic tradition, I was asked to be flexible and learn about something new. I'm happy with that. My instructor asked me to find out about Reclaiming Tradition. Before today, I had never heard of this. See, I'm already learning new things!!

I have to do a short presentation about it next week. My plan is to look it up tonight and then over the week craft my answer to one question each day. I need to find out where it start? Who started it? When it started? Why and how? I also have to find out if they have a pantheon associated with them. I think this is cool because then I can learn about Reclaiming, but I can also learn about two more. One is doing Norse and the other is doing the Celts.

Each week I will have to give a presentation. I'm ok with public speaking, so it should be alright. Besides, it's only three other people listening! :)

Hope you all had a great weekend!
Blessed be,
Autumn

Tarot Class and Other Stuff

Hi and Merry Meet,

The past few days have been kind of crazy here! Yesterday, I woke up to find that someone had rammed their car into the fire hydrant outside my house during the night. I heard it happen, but just thought someone had hit a semi, or a bus... not the hydrant!! It shook my house and all the water pipes reverberated for a minute after. Seriously, I had no idea what really happened! So, when I got up this is what I saw:Yup, that's the hydrant lying on it's side knocked completely off the water pipe. Crazy... I want to know what their car looked like after that! Husband called the city and today they are replacing it.

Last night was my intermediate tarot class!!! I'm so happy that it is back in session. I really missed it. I'm the only one from the original class, but that's cool because the new women in my class are just as amazing! Our instructor encourages us to pick a card and see if we can find that energy in our daily life somewhere. Today my card is The Moon. For the next three weeks I'll pick a daily card and take notes at the end of the day to see where this energy has manifested. She has us do it last go around of classes, but I wasn't so serious about it. I admit, I didn't think it was cool. However, I've been working with one card at a time in meditations and now I'm finding that I do enjoy looking for that energy. It has also helped me connect with my decks more than I thought I could. I'm also trying to rotate though my decks so I'm not dependent on the one that I use for readings with others.

The last time we had classes, our instructor used different decks and asked us to read with them. I found this very difficult as I was stuck on the pictures from my one deck. I've been working with three different decks now so that I can look at them and feel what they mean instead of memorizing what I was taught. This is hard for me! I'm putting in effort and slowly I feel like my effort is paying off. Last night my partner for reading practice used a deck I have never seen. I was able to do a reading and I was pretty accurate with it. It was a cool feeling!

We also learned a few new spreads. This one that I did today is for seeing how to overcome an obstacle:You spread it out in a crossroads patten to see what you direction you want to take. From there, you build the path that you are on. Then you have a mountain and the cards tell you how to approach the problem. I really liked this one. I usually do a very simple daily spread to just get a feel for my day. This one was cool for long range planing.

In addition to the intermediate tarot class, I found out that they are offering a Wicca I course for the next 7 Sundays. I really want to go to a.) learn and b.) meet other people in my area! I think it would be good for me to go. I don't know if I can make the first one as I have a jewelry show this Saturday in another town. I'm not sure if we'll be back in time for me to attend the class. The shop owner told me that if I have to miss the first one, it's ok. I'm going to try to make it back for class! I am so excited to meet and talk with others who are just starting out on this path! :)

Hope everyone has a great day!

Blessed be,

Autumn

The Sleepy Card- 4 of Swords

Hi and Merry Meet,

I hope that everyone had a wonderful Samhain!! Mine was amazing! I had such a great day and a very special evening. I just did a very small ritual but it seemed like that was all I needed for that night. I love when you are doing something and you just know that it is the right thing. That's how I felt.

Yesterday was a bit rough, so before bed I pulled the 4 of swords card. I like to think of it as my sleepy card. I find that nights were I feel like I will toss and turn to review the whole days events are the nights that I use this card the most. I just place it under my pillow, ask the Lord and Lady to bless my sleep/dreams, and I find that I can drift off no matter what is gnawing at my conscience. I learned this trick from a women in one of my tarot classes. She said that she didn't want to become dependent on sleeping aids, so she was looking for alternative ways to fall asleep. She came to this conclusion to use the 4 of swords after a meditation on her cards. She asked that all of us in the class try and sleep with this card under our pillows to see what we found. We all had a similar reaction... full night of peaceful sleep. It's kind of funny since before that class I never felt a strong connection to this card. Now, I see it in a new way. I'm glad that she shared this with us as I found it opened my eyes to how I can look at the cards in different ways. I only use it however, when I'm really fretting about something big and yesterday I felt I bombed an interview... so, needless to say I didn't want to toss and turn and think about what I should have said!

My 4 of swords card from my "Divine Tarot" deck.

Do you use your tarot decks in other ways besides just reading the cards?

Blessed be,

Autumn