Essential Oils

Good Witches Homestead

If you pass through the natural health aisles of your local grocery store, you’re likely to see small glass bottles of curious liquids with poignant aromas that could fill a room. Scents like lavender, eucalyptus, tea tree oil and orange line the shelves next to oil blends with promising labels like Anxiety Release, Detoxification Aide, Energize, Immune Support, Meditative Mood, and more. While some modern shoppers may be speculative of these products, ancient homemade versions of these single note essential oils and essential oil blends have been used for nearly 6,000 years for everything from traditional medical practices to spiritual rituals.

What are Essential Oils?

Essential oils are highly concentrated fragrant essences extracted from herbs, flowers, fruits, and other plants that give them their unique aromas. They are commonly used in perfume, food flavoring, medicine, massage therapy, and aromatherapy to support a general feeling of well-being. Essential oils also “have a potential…

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Reasons for the Season

A Little Yuletide Crystal Magic

By Krista Mitchell

Yuletide Blessings & Season’s Greetings!

We’ve made it through the darkest time, and longest night, of the year.
Slowly but surely the sun will begin to wax, and while they still feel far away, the warm days will come again.

We’re moving into a potent phase of intention setting and manifestation magic from the 25th to the 6th (the original 12 days of Yuletide or Christmas), when our thoughts and hopes will look to a fresh start at the new year.

According to the ancient Celtic and Druidic calendars, the month of Birch begins today. The birch tree symbolizes new beginnings, rebirth, and resurrection. In the runic language of the old Norse, it symbolizes fertility, healing, prosperity, and the feminine mysteries.

A Little Yuletide Crystal Magic

To consciously welcome in the magic, healing, and blessings this time brings:

Place a candle in your window at twilight, the magical “between and betwixt time” revered by the Druids. (An LED candle is fine, safety first!)
Using your saliva (or a sacred oil) and your index finger, draw the runic Berkana symbol (meaning “birch”, pictured above) on your window.
Hold a piece of quartz and whisper your desires for healing, renewal, fertility or prosperity into the quartz.
Leave the quartz beside your candle throughout the night, symbolizing the light of your dreams blazing through the darkness.
Keep the quartz with you, place it on your altar, or bury it in your garden after the Spring thaw.

May magic, healing, love and hope bless you and yours this holiday season!

Warmest wishes,

Krista

The Mind

Making A Yule Log/Having A Old Fashioned Christmas

Good Witches Homestead

Make this Yule Log use as a handcrafted herbal gift for family and friends this holiday season.

Yule Log Recipe

The Yule log is traditionally burned on New Year’s Eve to usher in good fortune for the coming year. It is created in the spirit of prayer or ritual for the fulfilment of dreams, hopes, and wishes for prosperity, happiness, peace, or whatever you want the New Year to bring. As you create the log, perform each action with intention for your dreams to come true.

1. Start by tying a red ribbon around the middle of a large piece of firewood. There are many items that can be used to decorate the log such as moss, rosemary sprigs, cinnamon sticks, whole nutmeg, rose hips, frankincense resin, fir branches, pinecones, or prayers written down, rolled up, and tied with pieces of string.

2. Attach all of the ornaments with drippings…

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BLM Ely District to also “zero out” all wild horses on the Caliente Herd Area Complex

Straight from the Horse's Heart

by Debbie Coffey, V.P. & Dir. of Wild Horse Affairs, Wild Horse Freedom Federation

ACTION ALERT! Public comments are due Jan. 5, 2018.

In the BLM’s rush to drive wild horses to extinction, the BLM plans to remove ALL wild horses from the Caliente Herd Area Complex. The BLM claims that the Caliente Herd Area Complex has an estimated population of 1,744 wild horses (including the 2017 foal crop).

The Caliente Herd Complex Area consists of nine herd areas; Applewhite, Blue Nose Peak, Clover Creek, Clover Mountains, Delamar Mountains, Little Mountain, Meadow Valley Mountains, Miller Flat, and Mormon Mountains.

The 30-day public comment period concludes Jan. 5, 2018.

Please be sure to mail or email your written comments to:

Bureau of Land Management Ely District Office
Attention: Ben Noyes, Wild Horse and Burro Specialist
702 N. Industrial Way
Ely, NV 89301

Comments can also be submitted electronically…

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BLM plans to “zero out” Seaman & White River Herd Areas, while digging in heels to keep privately owned livestock grazing on these public lands

Straight from the Horse's Heart

ACTION ALERT!

by Debbie Coffey, V.P. & Dir. of Wild Horse Affairs, Wild Horse Freedom Federation

The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) changed the Seaman and White River HerdManagementAreas into Herd Areas in 2008. Now, this proposed BLM Environmental Assessment (EA) is a 10 year plan for the BLM to “zero out” (remove ALL wild horses and leave “0” as the population) the Seaman and White River Herd Areas in Nevada.

Please be sure to send your personal comments to the BLM about their plans to remove the last, remaining wild horses from these two Herd Areas. (DO NOT JUST SIGN A FORM LETTER PROPOSED BY ANY ADVOCACY GROUP.) Write comments in your own words and email, mail or fax them to the BLM.

Comment submissions will be accepted until 4:30 p.m. Pacific Daylight Time on Monday, Jan. 22, 2018. All comments received during…

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The Dreamer’s Path, School of Nahualismo with Sergio Magaña Ocelocoyotl

Wildcrafted Winter Solstice Decorations with Conifers, Holly, Ivy, Bittersweet, and More

The Druid's Garden

Decorated mantle with greenery, ribbon, and a nice candelabra

Part of the fun of the holiday season is “decking the halls” and decorating for the season. By bringing the symbols of the season into our homes, for festivity and communion, we are able to deeply align with the living earth and her turning seasons. And the symbols of this particular season, at the winter solstice, span back millennia: deep red berries and dark green conifers, trails of ivy, mistletoe, and other evergreens. Adding to this, the symbols of the season are also reflected in mythology, such as the battle between the Oak and Holly king and the Goddess Frigga’s wheel of the year. These symbols have been with us for centuries in one form or another, and weaving in and out of whatever dominant tradition that is present. And so, in this post, I will explore how we might…

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Donkey Sanctuary UK convinces ebay to stop selling ejiao (a traditional Chinese medicine) due to animal welfare disaster and health risks

Straight from the Horse's Heart

Workers lay the skins of freshly killed donkeys out to dry in Dong’e, northeast China, where they will later be boiled to produce gelatin sold as a fad health and beauty tonic (Photo: George Knowles)

Source: Indyonline.co.uk

Ebay bows to West charity pressure

Global giant eBay has bowed to pressure from a West Country charity and agreed to stop selling a controversial Chinese medicine.

The largest equine welfare charity in the world, The Donkey Sanctuary, based in Sidmouth, has persuaded the trading site to stop selling the Chinese medicine ejiao, which contains gelatin from donkey skin and is alleged to offer anti-ageing properties.

The Donkey Sanctuary’s chief executive, Mike Baker, wrote to eBay’s President earlier this month.

His letter highlighted the unfolding livelihood crisis, animal welfare disaster and potential consumer health risks associated with the unregulated ‘health’ product.

The Donkey Sanctuary said there were shocking consequences to the global donkey…

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