Guest Post- Amanda S.

Meditation with Fire Spell "Cast the spell in the fire, Cast it well, weave it higher. None shall come to hurt or maim. None shall pass this firey wall, None shall pass, no none at all." I hope this spell brings you closer to the realm in which it has brought me. The feeling afterwards is incredible. -Amanda S.

I'm back! Part Deux

Sorry for my absence! I had to take awhile to work on myself and health. I hope you all have been well. A guest post will be coming soon.  Take care, and blessed be!

I'm back!

Sorry I've been absent for the past few weeks, I spent some time in the hospital working on my health. But I'm feeling better and happy to be home now. Tonight I had a wonderful conversation with one of my best friends (S) and her girlfriend (A). S and I do rituals together sometimes and recently A has been interested in paganism and showed me a spell she does for fire meditation. Tomorrow night we will cast a circle and do the fire spell all together. I'm going to ask her to do a guest posting of it soon, so hopefully you guys will be able to see it and perhaps try it for yourselves. Also, I plan on doing a Part Two of my Q&A- so if any of you have any more questions please send them to themuellercoven@ymail.com. Take care and blessed be!

Q&A Part One

1.     So who do you worship and what are your beliefs?

a.     Paganism is an earth based religion dating back to the ancient Greeks, Egyptians, Celts, etc. I believe that god has no gender so we say Lord and Lady, but in paganism we honor the goddess more because women give life. The goddess has three stages: maiden mother and crone, and each pagan woman goes through those stages as well. I just started a new book of shadows (basically a book that I write my beliefs and rituals in that will be passed down to my children) because I just entered a new stage of life by entering motherhood. We do not believe in a he'll or a devil, and my belief is that there is a "heaven" but it's different than the Christian view of it. I believe it is a waiting place for your soul and that when your soul has met up with the other souls it needs to be complete that you are reincarnated. The faith is a lot about energy and how to use it.

2.     Do you guys have a church and how does one enter into the religion. I love the fact that you worship a god that does not have a gender and doesn't preach about hell. If you are reincarnated do you ever reach heaven? Do you ever get to see dead love ones?

a.     All pagans believe different things, there is no book or church. But I believe there is a waiting place for your soul. And after you have waited in that place for those you loved then you are sent back to earth. During Samhain the veil between the living and dead is the thinnest and I speak to those who have passed. My best friend was killed in a gun accident and I know he sees me because I feel him then.

3.     What sort of holidays do you have? How exactly do you celebrate?

a.     Basically, for each sabbat we have a circle/ritual. These can be done either alone at your own personal altar or with others in a larger circle. The rituals are to honor the gods and goddesses that the ritual is for (like Ostara is a fertility ritual, so you’d honor the goddess of fertility). My friend K. honors the Egyptian gods, while I stick to Greek and Norse typically. It’s just a preference thing

·         YULE: Dec. 21

·         IMBOLC: February 2

·         OSTARA: March 20

·         BELTANE: May 1

·         LITHA: June 21

·         LUGHNASSADH: August 1

·         MABON: Sept. 21

·         SAMHAIN: October 31- November 1

4.     In order to "be" Pagan I guess by birth... is it your mom or your dad who needs to be? I mean like for Muslims, and the dad technically has to be... in the Jewish faith, it's the mom. Is there anything like that with you? Did you make the decision to be Pagan on your own without your family having those specific beliefs?

a.     There's nothing like that in Paganism, it's either what you chose to believe (like I converted) or something your family believes. I had a friend who's mom was Pagan and so therefor she was, but with me I was raised Catholic and converted when I was 14.

5.     How did your family take it at first? And what all is involved with the conversion process? Is there a ritual/ceremony type deal, or just certain words you have to say and believe?

a.     My family thought I was worshipping the devil at first. Then they asked me if I sacrificed animals. Then they made it a joke. And now they accept it as my spirituality and will attend some ceremonies (my very Christian father and step mother even came to my handfasting, which was awesome to have that kind of support). My mother is agnostic so she comes to rituals sometimes too. AS for converting, I did a ritual that was a dedication to the Goddess (much like confirmation in Catholicism).

6.     How do you cast a circle?

a.     Everyone casts their circles different, but for me I use salt around the perimeter of the circle to banish negativity, say something about how we are no longer a part of the outside world, and then call the quarters (while touching the corresponding elements on my altar)

7.     Do you connect with any deities?

Hestia is my patron goddess. I usually use the Greek deities. Hestia is goddess of the hearth (home) and now as a mother I feel even more connected t

Q&A?

I'm thinking of doing a Q&A. A lot of people ask me about my beliefs and I thought I'd share them. So if you have questions, either comment here or email me at themuellercoven@ymail.com and I'll post the questions (anonymously) with my answers. Can't wait to here from you guys! Take care and blessed be!

The Beauty Riot

A friend of mine, Alahna Marie, recently did a guest post on her thoughts on god. Well, she is also the founder of The Beauty Riot, and I just wanted to share what they’re about with you guys:

Don't be a wallflower. | tbR is a community of men & women who have chosen to artistically challenge the societal standard of beauty.

We aspire to help individuals embrace their healthy, personal & natural stamp of beauty regardless of their colour, shape or size. We hope to make people aware of the unrealistic brand of beauty we are fed at a young age, and we hope to empower people to see past it.

This is a call to arms – a scream to a generation of men & women who want to stand up and define beauty as something expansive, internal & all-encompassing. We are here to challenge comfort zones and ways of thinking – often times, this means our own.

Please check us out & get involved. Feel free to criticize, encourage or comment by going to our website. We look forward to working with you & spreading the word: Don’t be a wallflower. Define yourself. As ever, with love – A.

Check them out on their site: thebeautyriot.com or on facebook: facebook.com/thebeautyriot

Like their page and let them know I sent you J

Here are some of their photos:

Three Handfastings?

In Paganism there are three types of handfastings. The first is some what like an engagemet: you bind yourself for a year and a day. The next: you bind yourself for life. And lastly: you bind your souls. My husband and I did not do the first since we were already legally married. We did the handfasting for life though. Here's a photo of the altar:

Now we are discussing if we want to bind our souls. I'm not sure if we should only because what if in the next life I come back as a cat and he as a human? He'd search his whole life to find a person that didn't exist. I don't know, we'll see.

Take care and blessed be!

Products

The Mueller Coven

The Mueller Coven is a place to purchase kits with rituals for the different Sabbats and Rites of Passages. Making merry the Earth’s changes throughout the year and celebrating the Lord and Lady whom we adore is a magickal experience. We also offer Altar starter kits to begin your journey down the Goddess’ path. Also, here at The Mueller Coven, I will blog about what it’s like raising our daughter Pagan and what living in a Pagan/Catholic household is like. If you have any questions or comments on our kits or blog, please feel free to contact us.

Blessed Be!

Contact Us

·         themuellercoven@ymail.com

·         Facebook.com/TheMuellerCoven

·         Themuellercoven.blogspot.com

·         Twitter.com/TheMuellerCoven

Kits

 All kits include the elemental representations, a handmade and unique altar cloth, a ritual that my family uses for the sabbat, altar, or rite of passage.

All altar cloths can be custom made to fit your needs- any colors you’d like!

o   Altar Kit

o   Samhain (All Hallow’s Eve) Ritual Kit

§  Black candle

§  Small notebook

§  Dia De Los Muertos Skull

o   Yule (Winter Solstice) Ritual Kit

§  Yule log favor

o   Imbolc (Candlemas) Ritual Kit

§  Candlemas Doll

o   Ostara  (Spring Equinox) Ritual Kit

o   Beltaine Ritual Kit

o   Midsummer (Summer Solstice) Ritual Kit

o   Lammas Ritual Kit

o   Mabon (Autumn Equinox) Ritual Kit

§  Leaf lanterm

o   Handfasting Ritual Kit

o   Saining Ritual Kit

Email us to place order: themuellercoven@ymail.com

Example of the Handfasting Kit

Take Care and Blessed Be!

May Day at Blackberry Circle

The Beltaine festival I attended was beautiful. So many people attended with their children, over 110! I was not able to stay for the ritual since it started late, but I did get to join in on the May pole festivities! The Blackberry Circle hosted the event and their circle is beautiful. I absolutely loved the area and the people there were very sweet. It was so exciting for me to have Julie celebrate May Day. I really want her to understand and grow to love these celebrations. I would have loved to be raised in the goddess path and I hope she enjoys it. I have a lot of little coloring sheets for her when shes older that incorporates the sabbats and I will do other crafts with her as well. We do the daily devotion almost every day and she seems so calm during those times, which I hope is a sign. But she seemed to enjoy being there and meeting all the sweet people. Also, a local pagan shop asked me to sell my products in their store! I went today to check out the shop and pretty much fell in love. It is small but full of energy and in an area where I think a good amount of people will go. I am so thankful for the opportunity!

It's blurry, but here is a photo of some of the group around the May pole! :) 

Take care and blessed be!

Guest post- Alahna Marie on "God"

I believe God is good, I believe he exists… but I am beginning to question religions, even the one that claims me. We are all products of our upbringing – each culture started as a tribe or by some chance migratory route, a slip in the foundation of the earth. The God I worship is above and beyond limitations – whether language barrier, culture, understanding. He is bigger, and better.

That gods – or false idols – have human attributes shows our egotism, our eagerness to subject our beliefs. An attempt to bed them into our believing, some kind of tangible grounding – their personification. But the God I believe in has no sex, no gender. Plays no favourites to people born in more forgiving countries or cultures. He (for the sake of a pronoun) is more.

We are all worshipping a central idea, or another deity. Maybe the false idols we should not worship are other men. The God I believe in would not be so cruel as to favour a continent – damning an entire nation because mere chance.

He is better.

Translations and generation – things are lost in history that your descendents cannot unravel or find. We are instead subjected to what is passed down to us… Are you to tell me that you believe so whole-heartedly that your way is right because of a culture inclination, when another man with a different way of living, will swear the same for the same reason?

He has been kind to give us so many differences, but even kinder to make us the same.

Human. How dare we paint him with features that are our own? 

-Alahna Marie

Cinco de Mayfest prep

Today is the Beltaine festival I'm attending called Cinco de Mayfest! I'm so excited that I barely slept! I've been working on the magical kits and am printing up business cards in a little bit. I am so excited to celebrate with others who have similar beliefs! And tonight will be the largest, brightest full moon of 2012 they're predicting. How perfect is that? The only thing I haven't prepared is the food item for the potluck meal after the ritual- guess I'll pick one up from the grocery store? My family (husband, bumble bee, and myself) will be going along with a close friend of mine. S. has always been interested in paganism and I'm really excited she'll be coming with us! Well, time to wash my vendor table and take a shower! I'm so excited/nervous! I'll be sure to post tomorrow about how it went. Take care and blessed be!

Kits and Shirts

This week I'm making cords and altar cloths with my mother in law! We're putting together sample kits that can be purchased since I'm going to be a vendor at the may day festival I'm going to. I'm so excited! I'm going to have kits for all sabbats and rites of passages but for the festival I'm only show casing an al tar kit and a handfasting kit. I think my mother in law and three friends are coming with me along with my husband and the bumble bee! It'll be so much fun to get together with people and celebrate such a beautiful ritual! If anyone reading this is interested in kits with rituals in them, let me know! Also, my brother in law's company (MCV) is designing shirts with pagan images and quotes on them for us- I'll post images when the mock ups are ready :) Take care and blessed be!

Finding myself and finding god(dess)

I'm feeling very self reflective right now so I thought I'd give you a little history about me and also how I found my faith! I mentioned before that I live with two mental illnesses, but didn't explain how the diagnosis has effected my life. I was going down a very scary road before, full of self harm, sex, drugs, and anything reckless I could do (shop lifting, spending sprees, etc). I was first diagnosed with borderline at nineteen after a suicide attempt while I was away in college. I spent a little over a week in a mental health hospital and then did out patient hospitalization after that. This didn't really help much, other than making me feel less crazy because now I could put a reason to some of my behaviors. The reason it didn't help was I still had an untreated chemical imbalance that I was later diagnosed with once I came back home and was sent to another hospital. Bipolar disorder runs in my family on my father's side and once they figure out that I had it things started making even more sense.  I went through a year of trig different Meds and doctors before we finally figured out what worked. My life is so much better now that I got the help I needed. If any of you have a problem, I strongly encourage you to seek help. But as for my faith, well it kind of just fell into my lap. I was thirteen when I first heard of a form of paganism called Wicca. I had been living with my dad and a girl at school brought a book about it. It really interested me so I did some research and a year later started seriously practicing. I was fourteen when I did my dedication to the goddess and it has positively influenced my life ever since. I was raised catholic and never once did I feel a connection to god, but a few months before my dedication I was doing a ritual and felt... It was almost like an out of body experience. And somehow I knew, it was god. Ever since then, even when my life was falling apart, it was the only thing that's ever totally made sense. That's my story of finding faith, what's yours? I'd love to hear what you have to say! Take care and blessed be!

Becoming a vendor?

So at the Beltaine festival I'm attending next month they're letting vendors show case their items an I'm trying to decide if I should make a mock up of a simple altar kit or handfasting kit to show and sell. I really want to start selling them so that people can use. Hmmm, I suppose I'll make a mock up and see how it goes :) also, if you are in the Houston area the ritual will be in Conroe and I can send you the info if you want to attend. Take care and blessed be!

May Day excitement

Sorry I've been absent these past few days- the bumble bee and I went to visit my grandparents in another state and I didn't have time to update. Beltaine (May Day) is coming up and I am very excited! I found a local pagan group to celebrate with, it'll be the first time I celebrate a holiday with a group of other people who share the same beliefs (other than when I do circle with K). Beltaine is a cross-quarter day, marking the midpoint in the Sun's progress between the spring equinox and summer solstice. It's a day to celebrate fertility ad that's where the may pole comes from. I'm very excited to take my family and celebrate with others. I hope it goes well! I think fertility rituals are very important to me because while my husband and I were trying to conceive I did a small circle with a fertility ritual and a month later we found out we were expecting! We tried for half a year to get pregnant and I feel like the Lord and Lady blessed us with our bumble bee when we were ready to have her. If anyone is trying to conceive and would like the fertility spell I used, just let me know :) Take care and blessed be!

Magickal Names

Many modern pagans choose a separate name to use during ritual. As sort of a name that only the Lord and Lady will know them as. WHen I was fourteen and did my dedication to the goddess, I chose the name Dierdre. It's Celtic for "young girl, one who rages, broken hearted". I was a very rage-full adolescent, which (I didn't know at the time) was attributed to my illness. I live with bipolar disorder type 1 with psychosis and borderline personality disorder. Since being diagnosed and treated my demeanor has changed, but I keep the name as a reminder. When my daughter was born I chose a name for her as well. I actually gave her two middle names, so that her pagan name could be a part of her legal name too. I chose for her, Lynnette. It's Welsh for "beautiful one". And that's what my daughter's life has been so far- beautiful. She brings out the best in those close to her, including myself. If you identify as pagan and have given yourself a name, please share it! I'd love to know :) Take care and blessed be!

Daily Devotion

I'm not sure where I got this daily devotion, but I've been using it since I was fourteen and thought I'd share it :) Blessed Be my feet, which walk the path of the Lord and Lady Blessed Be my knees, which kneel at the sacred altar, Blessed Be my heart, may it beat the drum of compassion, Blessed Be my lips, may they always speak the truth, Blessed Be my eyes, may they see the wisdom of the Spirit, May the love of the Lord and Lady be within and around me as I continue my journey through life this day. So Mote It Be  Take care and blessed be!

Paganism and catholicism :)

My husband and I have decided to raise our daughter (and future children) to know and practice both paganism and Catholicism. I worry that it might be confusing for them but he has been so supportive of my spirituality and I of his faith as well. He embraces us performing circles for the Sabbats and I encourage him to start regularly going to church (something he is dragging his feet about, actually). We've decided that once he starts going to church regularly, the whole family will attend. And that once a week we will also do rituals at home so that both faiths are equally represented. We want our children to understand that there are many different ways to love god and that no way is wrong, as long as it's not hurting anyone (and if ye harm none, do what ye will). We both feel that if our children learn to love god, then we have done a good job. And I use the name god when I mean the Lord and Lady. It's just easier and more socially acceptable to say "god" so I have gotten in the habit of it. and as for daily practice, he will say nightly prayers with the bumble bee while I do daily blessings. It's all very equal and I love that he understands how important my faith/spirituality is to me :) If you have any questions on us raising our family in both faiths, please feel free to comment. I'd love opinions too!

Handfasting

My husband is at work and the bumble bee is sleeping so I thought I'd share more about our life!  I met my husband in May of 2010 and six months later married him (November 11th). He is my best friend and I am lucky to have found such an amazing man. Usually what happens in my spirituality is a handfasting for a year and a day before the wedding. Well, we did it backwards! A year and a day after our wedding, we were handfasted. A handfasting is a binding of cords, each symbolizing a different aspect of the union. Examples would be strength or honor. My friend K, who is also the bumble bee's Mentor, performed the ritual in our backyard with our friends and family present. It was lovely and we had a party afterward, which I couldn't drink at since I was seven months pregnant. Next month will be two years since I've been with my husband and I have come to realize that marriage is very different than what I believed it would be. It's not all about romance 24/7, it's about driving around and missing your exit because you're laughing so hard, it's about holding your child for the first time, an it's about getting to have a sleep over with your best friend every night of the week. At least, that's what it's about to us. It can be difficult at times, but it's family. And that's what's important. I guess I've rambled on enough about my marriage, haha. If you have any questions about a handfasting or are thinking of having your own- let me know! I'm building a ready-made kit for purchase so people can have the cords, ritual, and other tools needed to perform their own ceremony. Take care and blessed be!

Getting Started!

I wanted to start a blog to talk about and discuss my faith and what it is like raising a family pagan (well, for the most part. My husband is catholic so we will also be practicing Catholicism with our children so they grow to understand both paths). To me paganism is this: an earth based religion centering on honoring both the Lord and Lady. I believe god has no gender, but that it is easier for us to think of god as we see ourselves- human. So we honor both male and female aspects of this being. The main focus is on the female counterpart since females are the bearer and giver of life. The Goddess has three stages: maiden, mother, and crone. I just started a new book of shadows (a journal of my journey through the pagan path that will be passed down to my children to read and understand as they grow older) because I just entered a new stage of life- motherhood. I gave birth to my daughter December 27, 2011 here in Houston. She weighed six pounds and two ounces and is the most amazing thing I have yet to do in my life. She challenges me to be a better person, to take care of my illness and become well, and shows me a type of love I never knew existed. She quite literally is my world and I love involving her in my spirituality. February 4, 2012 we celebrated my bumble bee's (a nick name I have given my daughter) saining. A saining (or paganing) is the ceremony of naming and presenting a child to the Lord and Lady. To promise to care for that child until he or she is able to do for themselves, and to ask them to protect the child from harm. The ritual itself was simple and beautiful. She looked absolutely precious in her dress and her Mentor (a pagan friend who has taken my bumble bee under his wing and will be her spiritual guide through this life) gave her a stuffed Teddy bear that was his for years. He had put his energy into it to protect her, a very sweet gesture. From us, her parents, we presented her with a pentacle necklace that had been purified with silvered water.  I think I'd like to start making kits for rites of passages and sabbats. I will eventually start selling them and can add in whatever the buyer would like to personalize them. They would include ritual tools and the rituals that my family (the mueller coven) uses in practice. If you would like to talk to me about them, you can contact us at TheMuellerCoven@ymail.com. I'd love to hear feedback here- questions, comments, concerns, etc! Feel free to let us know what you think and I will be updating here as frequently as I can. Take care and blessed be! :)