My spiritual journey has led me to absolutely LOVE Fairies. I wrote a blog here a few months back about a review I had done for Facing North on a book pertaining to all things Fairy that you need to know. That book review done nothing but further my interest. I love the folk lore and the mystery. I love finding fairy items in the stores that are true to their mischievous nature. Often we see things, especially in the spring, for our gardens that are “cute” in relation to Fairies. In all the research I have done, Fairies may be “cute” in terms of their small size but they are not those angelic creatures that are commercialized. That reminds me of Hollywood and Disney’s Tinkerbelle and not the powerfully magickal creatures of nature that Fairies are. I decided I want to create a Fairy garden!!! I have found some amazing things at the craft stores for this purpose but in completed form they are too fake and just miss the mark of what I want to do. I want something that is realistically appealing to the Fae. Somewhere that they would find homey and inviting if they chose to use it. So, this is the very preliminary stages of what I am looking to do this summer and I am hoping you all will follow along. First, I have decided its central location needs to be in the front yard. I have dogs that own the backyard a lot during nice weather and that doesn’t seem ideal. I have also decided to make this 3 tier fountain part of the set up. I am not into a bunch of trinkets in the front yard. Small, clutter stuff outside sends me into O.C.D. overdrive so I need to figure out a way to make this practical. Although, above I shared pictures of a couple pieces that were absolutely too cute to pass up and might get included. I think it would also be neat if it also served the purpose as a good place to leave some of the offerings that I place outside after rituals. One important piece of this project will be for me to include flowers, plants, herbs, etc. that Fairies are drawn to and love. Close to the spot I chose is already a honeysuckle. To this I would like to add some Thyme, Daisies and Forget Me Not’s. I have some Ever Living plants close by that the butterflies and bees seem to love so I think that would be good to keep close also. Creating something for the Fae isn’t for everyone. But for me, it is no different than sitting out birdhouses, hummingbird feeders, etc. No harm can be done by gaining the favor of the Fae for those who believe in them and their magick. And if they don’t come, I will have a beautiful new garden in my yard filled with fragrant plants that will attract pollinators to my yard. I would love to hear any of your ideas, experiences and suggestions on this…..
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When we are growing into what we want to become and what we want to do, the most important thing is to believe in ourselves. We have to know our self-worth and our own ability to finish a task and see it through. I want to encourage all our Cynnamon Charmed followers to take charge and become leaders of their own future. Don’t be a spectator to your dreams. If this is in career, family, etc. than that is fine too. BUT right now I am going to talk about being a leader in your own spirituality. As a pagan community we get a lot of criticism, a lot of nay sayers and a lot of people thinking they need to save our souls. I want you to take control of your own soul. Don’t be a spectator to the wonderful work others are doing to grow spiritually, make it your mission to grow yourself. Most of the time people are only spectators because they are scared of taking that next step. I was one of those people for a long time. And just because you do take that step doesn’t mean you will stop hearing the words of those spectators. They will probably get even louder but guess what they were always there anyways. When you are being your authentic self you are stronger and you are capable of unbelievable growth in your life. Your first steps may not be coming out publically about your spiritual beliefs and that is okay. Everyone’s journey is different and rightfully so. I am just encouraging you to actually begin your journey. If, for you, that looks like reading books or privately educating yourself than do it. If it means setting up an inconspicuous altar in your home, yard or even closet than that’s great too. Maybe it just means mumbling spells and blessings into your family’s dinner as you stir the pot…. DO IT. All these things are steps to growth. As you grow, your courage and your conviction to your beliefs will grow as well. You will no longer listen to those people in your ear whispering negative feedback. NOTICE I said you will not listen, you will hear them, you will pity them for their spectator ways and their inability to be a leader in their own life but you will NOT listen. You will have a spiritual shield around your body, Mother Earth’s hug embracing you so snuggly that this negative energy will bounce off of your radiating flesh. You will be too busy growing into your best authentic self to allow those kinds of liabilities to restrain you any longer. This is the season of NEW BEGINNINGS! It is Spring! Take a refreshing breath, examine your life and plant the seeds you need to grow this year. Love and Light ~ Keri Photo Credit: https://www.flickr.com/photos/cimmyt/8208415000/ With Spring here and Summer just around the corner, I am really craving those fresh herbs and vegetables straight from the garden. Months of Winter has us serving up lots of comfort foods and subpar veggies shipped into the grocery stores leave us wanting. After all these months of several pasta days my ass ( in reference to size at this point) really needs to get back to the basics and all natural eating. Soooo…. I thought I would share a favorite recipe that I happen to be preparing for my family tonight. Now these aren’t veggies straight from the garden just yet but most of them soon will be. I am going to share this a couple ways. One is with the veggies only and would be great paired with a meat protein or as a stand-alone salad for a lunch. Since my family is vegetarian, I like to add quinoa to this for a little more protein. It is one of the most protein rich foods that we can eat and contains more fiber than other grains. And, since I am really obsessed with using my InstantPot right now….it’s really fast.
For a family of five, I diced (and I don’t spend time dicing them perfect…just dice them the way you want to eat them) and added the following: 8- Roma Tomatoes 1- Red Onion 4- Avocado Bunch of cilantro 2- English cucumber Then I add: 3 tsp Black Pepper 3 tsp course Sea Salt 2- Lemons juiced approx. 4 TBSP 3- TBSP Olive Oil Mix all this together really well. Now I cook my quinoa. Cook yours however you want to but I use the InstantPot. I add 2 cups rinsed quinoa to 3 3/4c water in the InstantPot. I set the manual high pressure setting for 1 min. and turn pressure valve to SEAL. Allow it to come to pressure and cook for the 1 min. When it beeps several times it is done. DO NOT OPEN LID! Allow it to vent by itself for 4 min. and then turn the pressure valve to VENT and let it sit until completely vented. I usually give it at least 8-10 min. just to be safe. I have a 6qt InstantPot so I like to cook my quinoa in a min. of this size batch. It seems to overcook when I do smaller sizes. So at this point you should cool your quinoa and when it is cooled add as much to your salad as you’d like. We usually add at least half. The other half you can freeze or use for another recipe or side dish the next night. We eat a lot of quinoa since it is so versatile and healthy so it doesn’t last long in the refrigerator. I have heard that cilantro can be substituted in this recipe for dill and that it tastes delicious also. I have not yet tried that but I am sure I will this Summer. I hope you all enjoy this recipe as much as we do. This is going to be in regular rotation in our home these next several months and I am really excited to make it using some of the fresh veggies from the garden in another couple months. I am not too sure about in everyone else’s neck of the woods, but here in Missouri Spring has been very strange. We have gone from temps in the teens to temps at almost 80 degrees within a matter a few days. Ostara is always a draw here but normally we only worry about whether it will be a nice warm day or windy, chilly and rainy. This year we had a snow storm on Easter. I was headed to my Aunts house for a family dinner and there were cars in the ditches and wrecks everywhere. Since we get a mix of all the seasons, people in Missouri didn’t seem to master driving in ANY of them so give us a little snow, ice or rain and it’s Armageddon on the roads.
This past Sunday we awoke to a little layer of snow on everything and yet as I write this on a Tuesday evening it is sunny and 65 degrees. As confused as we humans are, I know things in nature are even more confused. Normally we will see our first hummingbirds in April. I put out and filled up my feeders last week so that I didn’t miss them. Now I worry about them freezing and breaking. I am seeing plants peeking through the Earth by a few inches, but they seem to have halted their growth. They saw that 70 degree day a few weeks ago and decided to spring from the Earth to get the big APRIL FOOLS thrown at them and now they regret their decision. I am fortunate the freezing temps haven’t harmed what is already up. It all seems like a big tease of the warm weather to come. It’s a state of flux that is driving me crazy and yet I think that it may be a sort of blessing. I sit here in this damned walking boot counting my weeks down until I can pull it off and be free of it. It will be much easier to walk the fields and woods searching out my wild flowers for this year’s harvest without it weighing me down and throwing me off balance. The cold has Mother Nature halted and yet I am still healing. Maybe it’s giving my recovery a head start on the season. I am absolutely itching to plant something. I went out and purchased a good potting soil and some organic annual seeds at Natures Pantry a few weeks ago. The first nice day I had dug out all my pots from the garage and filled them with dirt. Then I sadly stacked them by inside of the garage door realizing it was still too early to plant anything in them. My son and I planted our first small garden of the year right before I re-fractured my foot a few weeks ago. It was just cold crops but we enjoyed every second of it. We put in some spinach, mixed greens, radishes and carrots back behind the chicken coop. Every thing seems to grow really well there and they would be out of the way. That is where we keep our strawberry patch and normally we plant the corn every year. Last weekend I hobbled around on this walking boot and with my daughters help we got our big garden fenced off…..well mostly. Of course, I was about 5 food short of fence so I need to go get more before I till it up. I have a 3 year old, going on 6 month old, boxer that makes it her mission to destroy all plant life that is not thoroughly protected by fencing. The dogs never bothered that piece of the yard until I fenced it off. Now they act like it was created for their play yard. They will be heart broken when I finish the fence here soon. I am fully intending on wrapping this boot with a trash bag and duck tape and tilling my garden as soon as it is nice enough. Well, that and when I have the fence finished. The dogs would love to get muddy in a freshly tilled garden. I am thinking I will wait until the end of May to get in my vegetable garden. The weather is just too unpredictable until then. I am going to be adding more herbs and wildflowers to our own yard this year. I am hoping to add more and more every year so that eventually I can supply ALL of Cynnamon Charmed’s herbs off my OWN land but that is a big goal. Right now we do grow several of them but others come off of the land that I can harvest from in our area such as local parks, wooded areas and the Lake of Ozarks, etc. Just like last year, stay tuned to the Charmed Daily Blog this summer while we bring you pictures of our wild crafting journeys, show you exactly where this year’s herbs and flowers are coming from and the process we take through the season to bring them directly to you. We will also continue sharing different ideas on how you may choose to use these pieces of nature in your own daily living. We will start with our foundation. As with the construction of anything, a good strong and stable foundation is key to success. Naturally this would seem to be the case in our chakras as well. Our root chakra deals with our survival instincts, stability and security. It corresponds to things like the bones in our body, our feet and legs, our stomach, the colors of red and pink, masculinity and the Earth Element. At its core, it is life itself. It is the thing from which all life comes from and so it involves our family and our When someone’s root chakra is out of balance they will notice things like over eating, or eating disorders, leg or feet pain, troubles with keeping basic necessities like food and shelter. They may have issues with their families. They may also have issue with finances or jobs which are both things that are essential to providing basic necessities. A healthy chakra in person will look like a person with a stable job, steady housing and healthy eating habits. They are very intelligent, inventive and capable of self-motivation and independent. These people normally have a either a healthy relationship with their extended family or they have decided to move on with live without them and they are fine with that. They don’t have any unfinished business when it comes to childhood relationships that are holding them back. Obviously, these are examples of a healthy and unhealthy root chakra…basically one extreme to the other. Most people will fall in between and will come in and out of balance. This is perfectly normal and can happen at any given time. What is important is the ability to identify the imbalance and then to take steps to put them back in balance before it disturbs all the other chakras making alignment more difficult. For me, I was very balance several months back and then something was a turning point for me. I am sure it was mixture of quitting smoking, family issues and other things. For me the first sign of imbalance is always displayed in my eating habits first. I will gain weight and start feeling blah and from there things start compounding if not corrected quickly. Although I recognized the imbalance and I am trying to balance it now, I am struggling more than usual and couldn’t figure it out until about a week ago. Then it hit me, duhhhhh, I broke my foot. I need to find a way of grounding and healing without the broken foot hindering me. I feel that I am now making some progress. I haven’t completely turned things around for this chakra yet but I am making the turn. I am wearing Carnelian, and I am finally taking the steps to take care of my broken foot. I am also doing my best to be conscious of what I am eating. I am vegetarian so this means eating more plant based rather than pastas, rice or breads. It also helps to resolve family issues with your family or within yourself. Some tools that I find useful in helping to balance this chakra is to ground yourself. I like to do this by walking barefoot outside and allowing my feet to come into contact with the earth. However, with my broken foot in a walking boot, I am unable to do that with both feet. So, the sitting position works just as well and can be done outside or inside. Practice shielding yourself if you are affected by negative energy at family gatherings. There are lots of different methods for shielding and or grounding found online. Find the method that works best for you. I may post some blogs in the future for specific ways that I use. However, no one way is right. It can be a very unique and individualized thing. Photo Credits: www.buildingbeautifulsouls.com Every morning I begin my day with a Facebook “live” pep talk from Rusty Lackey. He is this entrepreneur who has lost over 500 lbs over the course of 12 years and has made millions of dollars by investing in himself, his motivational speaking and many other business ventures. He is obviously a Christian man and that doesn’t stop me from listening to him. I am used to altering what people say to fit the situation I am in because, as a religious minority, Christianity is everywhere I look and listen. I think the ability to do this shows that I have a lot of respect and understanding for the diverse religious groups and that we can work together without being in complete agreement. It’s about having compassion for others and respecting their rights to religion. Anyways, I get a lot out of these morning pep talks and today’s was particularly great. It was basically telling us to get off our asses and stop making excuses why we can’t do something. We tend to use everything under the sun as excuses for obstacles, our jobs, need of money, our children, our health, ect. However, all these can be turned into the reason TO go for it. They can be our motivation if we allow them. All that really stands in our way of success is ourselves. As a small business owner, I don’t get daily “thatagirls” or immediate gratification from much of anything. When I create a new piece for the shop, I never know how it will be taken by the public. I don’t know if people will love it the way I do or not. Sometimes it can be difficult to put a piece out there that I worked REALLY hard on and get no response in return. Some would say no response is better than a negative one and that is true but what I am saying is that there are times that it is VERY difficult to stay motivated. There are times that you wonder if you should be doing something else. There are normally more people within your close circle questioning your decisions, thinking you’re crazy, only seeing the bottom dollar, criticizing all they don’t understand and pressuring you (intentional or not) to just give up on your dream. Rusty calls these people liabilities and urges us to let them go. I love this analogy he uses calling them chickens. He says that we are eagles, we were born to fly. These people are chickens, they are fat and fed from a farmer who will eventually turn them into food. Eagles shouldn’t waste their time trying to convince a chicken that they can fly. We don’t need them and they will only hold us down. An eagle can conquer the world, find his own means of food and well-being, where a chicken will rely on the one who will eventually be its demise. I have a few chickens in my life! Although Rusty is very right about them being liabilities and me needing to let them go, I still really hope that they see this eagle soar before they wind up on the dinner table. I will release them as a liability and hopefully I will even turn them into future motivation. Sometimes we all need a pep talk. Someone who doesn’t tell us that we can’t do something, but rather gives us that jump starting kick in the ass once in a while. These “LIVE”’s by Rusty Lackey are mine and I hope all you find yours too. Photo Credit: https://www.flickr.com/photos/12859567@N06/2133965053/ In case you want to look for it....The Rusty Lackey Facebook Live post I am referring to in this post was posted on his page on 4/17/18 at about 8 am central time. Lately, I have been learning and working more and more with Chakras. I have always possessed an interest in Chakras but was a little intimidated by the subject. I dabbled a little here and there in classes, books, internet searches, etc. but didn’t have a thorough understanding of how it all worked together. One of the first books that I reviewed for Facing North was one on Chakras. It was an introduction book but this book really connected the dots for me. It allowed me to put together the pieces of knowledge that I had gained over the years into something that was understandable and really very interesting. The past few months I have been really looking more at MY chakras and how they affect my overall wellbeing. I decided that I would blog here about some of my gained knowledge and findings so that I may help others or at least encourage them to find a good resource that will help them to explore how their chakras could be affecting their lives. So let’s begin with some basic information on chakras. These are specific energy points that each person contains within their bodies. Everyone’s are in the same location and there are seven of them. Each chakra has its own associations/correspondences. Each one will work with different organ groups within the body, with different mental and emotional areas as well. The chakras are located in a line up our spine and we will go through each one specifically later on but this is a brief overview. The chakras are said to swirl with energy and they need to be balanced to create a healthy individual. When one of the chakras are out of balance it can and will affect the other chakras within the body. Root Chakra- base of spine and deals with things having to do with our foundation, feeling of security, grounded, or overall wellbeing. Sacral Chakra- stomach area just about our base chakra and deals with things having to do with relationships and pleasure. Solar Plexus Chakra- just above the sacral chakra, it can be found at the bottom of the rib cage and deals with all things pertaining to self perception Heart Chakra- just above the solar plexus chakra in the mid chest, this chakra deals with all things love and peace Throat Chakra- found in the throat and dealing with things said and unsaid, communication and expressing ones self Brow Chakra- or also known as the third eye chakra this is located in the center of the forehead and deals with all things in our mind like imagination, wisdom, and intuition Crown Chakra- is at the very top of the head and deals with our connection to the divine and our spirituality Here is a link to a great website to get some really good additional information on chakras from Jaguarmoon: http://jaguarmoon.org/book-of-light-shadows/chakras Here you will find information on meditations to help with recharging and cleansing the chakras which is vital to their health in many instances. Over the next several months you will find additional blogs on my work with the Chakras and I hope you all follow along and comment with your own experiences or advice. Photo Credit: http://centerforpersonalevolution.com/event/the-chakras-know-clear-heal-your-energy-centers-3/ Small energy catchers are now in the shop! These are perfect for hanging in the rear view mirror of your car, in the window of the house, or anywhere else that you don't have room from our large energy catchers. These are priced very low at $13 each and are each very unique. See their product descriptions in the store to get each specific details, including their herbal blend, gemstone, adornments, etc.
Shop Now You can find these in the "Energy Catcher" category at the store! We just crossed 500 "Likes" on Facebook and we want to give back to our customers. For the next 2 days we are offering everyone 20% OFF ANY PURCHASE. That's right.....no minimum. Rather than doing a giveaway drawing, we wanted everyone to get a chance to save some money and take advantage of this offer. Thank you all for your continuous support of Cynnamon Charmed. We appreciate every single one of you, all your kind words, inspiration, shares, participation and feedback. ~Keri
Promo: FACEBOOK500 VALID 4/16/18-4/17/18 only SHOP NOW These past couple weeks have been pretty interesting here at Cynnamon Charmed and in case you wondered where we've been….
A few months ago I was rearranging the Cynnamon Charmed office and I dropped a shelf on my foot. It was very painful and I was pretty positive I broke my pinkie toe but I figured there wasn’t much a doctor could do about that so I chose not to go have it looked at. It was pretty ugly, black and blue and swollen and I hobbled around for a couple months. But these past few weeks I began to brag to my daughter and my husband about how I think it was finally beginning to heal. I could finally get my boots back on my foot, I could go out shopping at the store without limping my way out, and I was walking around the house without babying it like I had the past few months. Now to be honest, it didn’t just hurt in my toe. It hurt down the whole outside of my foot. It was just the pinkie toe that was super colorful and swollen. I have always been incredibly good at pushing my limits and not stopping when I should and so this whole series of events were just classic ME. So, a couple weeks ago, we had a company cut a dangerous tree down in our front yard before storm season. We just had them drop the tree and leave all the limbs and everything for us to cut up and get rid of. It was a super nice day, 65 degrees, and I had been working in my office all day. I had finished up all the large energy catchers and was ready for a break. It was a Thursday, and we had a completely full weekend ahead of us. Friday night helping set up for my sons karate competition, Saturday’s all day karate competition and then my daughters all day Sunday Japanese competition. In addition, there was a crazy winter storm moving in (yes! In April) and was supposed to arrive Friday evening so I wanted to get a head start clearing the yard of the tree debris before my husband got home from work. I was afraid we wouldn’t have time with all that was going on to get it done before a complaining neighbor would have us turned in to the city….so out I went. I slipped on my “chicken” boots, foot felt pretty good and I went to work. Five hours later I knew I had over done it because my foot was pretty sore but when I went to get cleaned up to take my son to his karate practice that night I couldn’t get my boot off my swollen foot. Well…..long story short…. I had re-fractured my healing foot not realizing I also had a jones fracture and really shouldn’t have even been walking on that foot for several weeks. So here I am now in a walking boot trying to figure out how I am going to wild craft this Spring when I am stuck in this thing until mid June to the first of July. In all seriousness though, I am going to stick to the boot since the other option will be having a pin put in my foot if I can’t get it to heal on its own. However, Cynnamon Charm customers have nothing to worry about because all will be done!!! I have lots of helping hands, and a 4x4 truck to get me into the fields if need be. If all else fails, anyone that knows me well enough, knows I will wrap a trash bag around this boot and go anyways. However, I wanted to touch base with all my followers and customers since this was the first time we have had a week and a half absence with no posts. So….although I may be a tad slower, I am back in business on the Charmed blog!! |
Keri Nichol
Founder, Artist, Herbalist, and Writer Archives
August 2018
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