Category: Sabbats, etc.

Celebrating halfway to Spring, and the Day of Bridget!

Well, here we are…8 days after Imbolc, and I am finally uploading my cover photo for the Sabbat. Typical! And how is your Winter Season holding up? We’re halfway through it!

As always, Imbolc is a very special Sabbat for me. It was my name that lead me to read up on this particular Sabbat, which lead me to realize that all the organic thoughts I’d had about spirituality aligned so very closely with modern paganism and modern witchcraft.

This year, I channeled the healing spirit of Brigid to help during a health emergency a stranger was going through at a restaurant I was having dinner at with my mother. I stayed on the line with 9-1-1 and helped the father and son with taking care of the mother until the ambulance came.

I do not know what it is, but somehow during an emergency I get a calmness-rush. Things for me get very steady, clear, slow, deliberate, and decisiove, and I manage everything within me and around me until the situation is under control.

Then I crash and I’m all kinds of freaked out and buzzed after the fact, but that’s a different story.

In this year’s Imbolc graphic, I’ve included the Sun & Moon at the center, a corn doll, a cross of St Brigid, a candle, a crocus, a bonfire, and sunbeams.

Stay warm with the rest of the season, Northern Hemisphere friends. 

I’m a bit late with my traditional Sabbat Graphic, but I made a Beltane one, finally. This holiday comes at the second busiest time of year at work, so my celebration is usually delayed, and this year was no exception.

This weekend I will start what I am hoping becomes a long-standing tradition, where two of my friends from high school and I get together at each other’s houses for the sabbat to talk witch-y stuff, and life stuff.

We have gone out to events and such, but we wanted to start going to each other’s houses, so that we don’t have to spend and arm and a leg to do witchy things. Plus, I have so much stuff at home–crystal ball, crystals, tarot, books, tea, plants, decos. I just want to be able to appreciate all that I already possess, and share it with my dear friends.

I am looking forward to the weekend celebration. I hope your Beltane has been a good one!

Happy Ostara!

I hope your first few days of Spring are going well.

The blustery wind actually blew my storm door open until it broke  Guess we’re still in the “lion” portion of March — I’m ready for som lamby weather! How about ewe? (Ah but I love a terrible good bad dad joke.)

Ostara Blessing for the start of this new season  

Happy Equinox to all!

Imbolc Is My Favorite Sabbat, and It IS Because I Am Named Bridget — Sort Of

Imbolc is my favorite Sabbat, and it IS because it’s in honor of the deity I was (in a sense) named for—but there’s more to it than that. The bigger story is that because I am a Bridget, I learned about modern and Celtic paganism, the alleged syncretism of Brigid/ Bridget, and the feast day/ goddess day in honor of this Celtic figure when my friend wished me a Happy Bridget Day on February 1, 2011.

After Kara did that, I went down a Wikipedia click-hole while working at the library that night, and the more I learned about modern paganism, the sabbats and modern witchcraft, the more I said to myself, “Yes! Exactly! This is what I have always thought!”

Whether about reincarnation; the fact that sexuality in absolute terms has no morality tied to it; the sacredness of nature; the connection of spirituality and smashing the MFing patriarchy/ kyriarchy; the prevalence of pantheism; and many more aspects that fall under the umbrella terms of modern pagan and modern witch, I found myself finding myself with each new click and read through.

Within a year, I had come to wholly embrace this identity. A year after that, by summer of 2013, I was fully out of the proverbial broom closet and openly expressing my modern paganism.

And today, lucky number 13 years later? I have this project: this slow-growing blog. Writing is how I process my thoughts and express myself. I do a lot by long hand, hence the moniker “Notebook Witch.”

I’m also grateful that I have made more friends in the witch community, and become closer to existing friends, knowing we share similar witchy ideas. And I am a Unitarian Universalist witch, so I have that community as well.

Happy Imbolc to all who celebrate. May the spirit of Bridget and Brigid be infused with this wintry time and the fire of the goddess bring hope for community, communion, and connection for us all. 

Ostara sabbat graphic for Facebook cover, Twitter post, and other social media. Feel free to use on your social media as well! Please credit NotebookWitch.com.

Spring Is Here

Happy Spring Equinox, northern hemisphere friends! Hope you’re having a lovely early autumn, southern hemisphere folks.

I felt like making a sabbat banner with a vintage vibe this year, for no particular reason.

It was a relatively mild winter in southeast New England. How about you? What things are you excited for, for Spring?

My Spring Plans

I’m looking forward to planting a stellar, burgeoning herb garden this year.

I’ve got ideas in mind for my container garden: LOTS of lemon balm, since Sweet Melissa is good for so many things but can really overtake a garden, trustly old chive and scallion since they’re first to arrive to the party and one of the last to leave, and low maintenance.

And then I hope to do a raised bed in the side yard, with a lot of different varieties of herbal plants. I was looking at past photos from my patio garden in Federal Hill Providence, and it was so abundant! I want that again.

We shall see! Happy planting and planning, gardeners! Spring is here!