I found this very nice online source for free affirmations, just click to shuffle, and then click on a card -

Positive Affirmations

We can all use a little positive pick me up, especially on a Monday.

Bright Blessings, Lady Rose

Written by Lady RoseTags:affirmations

Its been a rough couple of weeks and I have been lax about blogging as a result.  My depression has been in another spike and I was in a “if I can’t say anything nice why say anything at all” kind of place.  Anyhow, I finished up my antibiotics and while I feel much much better I still have an earache.  So it looks like I will have to go back to the doctor on Monday.

Miss Artistic has been a bit better in terms of homework. We went to her psychologist on Thursday who reiterated that even if he and I agree with her that an assignment is “stupid”, that she still has to do it. Additionally, he is less concerned about depression which was our primary reason for starting therapy in the first place and we go back in 4 weeks instead of 2.

Both girls were over friends houses Fri.  PrincessNibbles was picked up from school at 2 for a playdate ending at 7pm, MissArtistic was dropped off at a friend’s birthday party at 5:30 with a scheduled pickup time of 9:30.  Translation, we suddenly had about 90 minutes without any children.  So we went out to eat.

We shared an appetizer, each had an entree and a drink. GamerDude had a Mango Mohito and I ordered a Raspberry Lemon Icetini which was as big as my head. The first few sips were delightful, but as most of the glass was crushed ice it quickly became watery and flavorless.

The girls had good times overall. The birthday girl at Miss Artistic’s party spent part of the evening vomiting (hopefully from a non-contagious cause) and my daughter called out “Bloody Mary” 3 times in a darkened bathroom and screamed when she saw a face reflected back that wasn’t her own.

Saturday wound up being a “do nothing” kind of day.  Originally the plan had been to go to the Mid-Altantic Pagan Alliance Beltane event.  To our shock we found that it had been cancelled last minute.  More information is expected to come soon to explain why.  I just hope that everything is ok with the organizers.

Since we had nowhere to go and nothing to do, I slept late, unfortunately not well, and spent much of the day on blog updates.  I defrosted some salmon, and some other seafood, and made a nice concoction for dinner. Afterwards we hit Sam’s Club and filled in some blanks in my pantry. Today I have to work from about 12-8pm. I work the same hours next Sunday and then I am taking off Mother’s Day because by then I’ll need a break from working 47 hours/6 days a week. Also, my 7-year-old would be devastated if I wasn’t home that day.

In other news, it seems our tenant will be renewing her lease which takes one worry off my head. As a result, I am hoping to be able to pull back a bit on the OT and spend time with my girls over the summer. Additionally, I am a little less fearful of the fall school semester and the juggling I will have to do to keep up with school, work, and 60 hours of classroom observation.

My presentation was last week and I hope to have pulled an A on it. My final is Wednesday. I am looking forward to 3 weeks of no classes.

The diet is at a standstill as I haved been heavily self-medicating with food. I am hoping to pull myself back on track starting today as I gained back about 2 lbs. I have a few months to lose a “noticable” amount of weight. I have to be in a classroom setting as of September and my 20th high school reuinion is in October. That gives me 4 to 5 months, and even with a small gradual weight loss of 1 lb a week/5 lbs a month I can lose 20-25 lbs. which is enough to make a real difference in my appearance, and I hope, how I feel.

I am in a pretty dark place. But, I expect to pull back out of it.

Hope everyone is well!!!

Blessings

Mama Kelly

Written by Mama Kelly

Beltane Rituals – Group, Coven, Solitary

A nice collection of Beltane Rituals from around the Web:

Outdoor Beltane Ritual for the Solitary

Outdoor Beltane Ritual for a Group

Beltane Ritual for a Coven

Solitary Ribbon Beltane Ritual

A Group Betane Ritual

Written by Mama KellyTags:beltane, ritual

This essay was written October 28, 2003, way before I knew about computers or blogs (found it in my old word doc files). It was written as I was beginning to recover from several years of extreme stress and life changing and often painful events that had happened. Reading it over – I still agree with it, in essence thoughts alone will do nothing, its positive thinking combined with positive action that will make changes – which for me is the basis for all magic (a.k.a. prayer; focused thought-emotion-intent). I am sharing it here, with very little editing, as an historical record of who I was back then and how I was thinking, and because I feel it is still relevant

**********************

No amount of positive thinking is going to change your life or the world. I am sure that many believers in “positive thinking” are shocked and perhaps even horrified by this statement.

I agree that our thoughts have a great impact on who we are, what we become, and how our life manifests. However, thoughts alone cannot make the changes and overcome obstacles simply by being thought. Also our thoughts often are at odds with other aspects of ourselves, such as engrained habits, childhood hurts, unconscious motivations, addictions, and all the many facets of mind and emotions.

What does work is aligning your thinking, your heart, and your spirit as one in order to acquire the knowledge needed and put into motion actions that will bring your life’s dreams and goals into reality and to make a positive impact on the world around you.

Most of my life as I struggled through some pretty tough obstacles people would try to tell me to look on the bright side, think positive, there is always a light at the end of the tunnel, every cloud has a silver lining. On bad days I would agree with them – positive thinking works — I was positive my physical pain would last all day, I was positive I would be as poor today as I was yesterday. On good days, I would simply roll my eyes and nod. Then there were the occasional days when I would actually be able and willing to give “positive thinking” a try. But as weeks and months, and sometimes years would go by and life continued to pass me by and the obstacles continued to get bigger and bigger, I decided there had to be a better way.

The first thing I decided to do was to simply accept that life was hard (sometimes so hard it takes all your energy to just keep breathing when you wake up in the morning), and to stop waiting to live life until things got better – to just start “living” regardless of the circumstances. After accepting and accessing where I was at the moment, I then went in search of information and every available source of knowledge I could find in order to improve my current situation, primarily my health and finances but overall I wanted to experience the joy in life. As I learned I formed a plan, laying out the steps necessary to reach my overall goals. I had to look deep within myself and answer a lot of questions to find what was truly important to me, what did I really want to accomplish, how did I want my daily life to be, and many more. I had to spend time getting to know who I was, in order to eliminate or at least lessen the restrictions I placed on myself. I needed to discover what my true desires were in life, not what society said I should be, or what my parents thought was best for me, or what I thought I was limited to be. Once I had a plan outlined, I had to be willing to adapt and adjust to circumstances and allow for flexibility because life is never a smooth journey.

The next step was finding ways to put the plan into action. This is not always easy depending on what your current circumstances are and how far the road is to your overall goal. But it is important to set small achievable steps and to get started — even if you think it’s impossible, even if you feel so tired you can barely get out from under the covers — it is absolutely necessary to move forward regardless of the internal war that may rage as you begin the journey.

In time, as the small steps are accomplished, the incentive to keep going increases and you can find other ways to keep yourself motivated. Your thoughts and emotions stop fighting each other and you have more energy and awareness, which often results in seeing opportunities that you might otherwise have missed. Allowing your true inner spirit to guide your life, your thoughts and emotions will over time become more positive and in tune with your plans.

The key to finding the energy and willpower to take action and keep motivated is aligning your spirit, your thoughts, and your heart. When you uncover what it is you truly want out of life — you will find a way to accomplish it – through knowledge and actions you can empower your life, accomplish your goals, and create your dreams.

********************

Bright Blessings, Lady Rose

Written by Lady RoseTags:magic, positive thinking

The pentacle has been added to a list of 38 emblems allowed in national cemeteries and on government-issued headstones of fallen soldiers, according to a settlement announced Monday.

While the first applications for the symbol were sent to the VA a decade ago, it wasn’t until the death of Patrick D. Stewart, 113th Aviation, D company, Mustangs, of the Nevada National Guard, that the story drew national attention. He was killed in action in Operation Enduring Freedom and his widow was denied the right to have the symbol of her and her husband’s faith applied to his memorial marker.

Finally 21 months later approval has finally been won.

You can see the updated list of emblems at the VA web site.

Missed all the fuss?

Decade of Disregard, Delay, & Discrimination by the VA:
Summary Reports by Rev. Selena Fox of Circle Sanctuary
The Story of the Veteran Pentacle Quest: July 1997- August 2006
The Veteran Pentacle Quest Continues: August 2006 – March 2007 

All I can say is :

Finally!

Blessed be!

Mama Kelly

Written by Mama Kelly

Wiccan Handfasting – Wedding Ceremony

18:11

Wiccan Handfasting on Wikipedia: Handfasting

NOTE: This is a video from YouTube, neither Lady Rose nor Mama Kelly knows this couple personally. It is here for referance purposes.

Written by Mama KellyTags:handfasting, pagan ritual

I woke up about 30 minutes ago in the throes of an anxiety riddled dream.  I’ve been dreaming about car crashes, missing children, and the like the past few nights.  So, I woke up (yet again) gasping for breath, heart racing, the whole nine yards.  There’s many reasons, but let’s leave it as I have too much on my plate, and too many worries pressing on my mind.

I tried to just “let it go” and go back to sleep but it was a no go.  Which is a shame as I have to work today and probably won’t be home till 8pm. A little extra sleep would’ve been nice.

We got the kids’ report cards.  PrincessNibbles’s was nearly perfect.  The only areas she needs to work on are: handwriting, neatness, and sentence structure (remembering capitalization and punctuation, etc).  MissArtistic’s was …. not as terrible as we had feared.  While 1 grade went down … she brought 3 grades back up.  In short it shows effort.  So we took them out for ice cream after dinner to “celebrate”.

I got my presentation done for school.  It’s not overly exciting, but it should be sufficient for the grade I need.  Next week is my final and then I’m done till the summer semester.  I am already panicking about staying on top of three classes.  At least for most of it, my homework will be the only homework I have to worry about.

I’m still not feeling all that hot.  The fevers are gone as is much of the throat pain, but the ear pain is still hanging around.  Which makes for a grumpy mama.

Well I’m off to start my day.  PrincessNibbles and I are watching the tail end of “Jack Frost” and then I’m going to hop in my shower.

Blessings

Mama Kelly

Written by Mama Kelly

Well, at least that is what some folks would say. I don’t think I’m going to Hell, but then again I don’t have all the answers either. The reasons I chose my spiritual path (wicca) are many but for the purpose of this post I am focusing on just a few aspects of how my choice came about. I chose to be a wiccan\pagan because it was the path that resonated with my soul from a very young age (I read my first book by Gardner, Witchcraft Today at age 13).

My father was Seventh Day Adventist (a bit of a zealot to say the least) and my mom a protestant (but rarely went to church). My father would tell me often that I was going to hell for wearing makeup, smoking, and various other minor teenage acts of rebellion. At about age 12, I began searching for a spiritual path that made sense to me because the Christian paths I had seen so far were too cruel and peculiar for me. For one thing, if my father was going to heaven, I definitely did NOT want to be there. He was a child molester. In my young brain it made no sense to me that a man who would sexual assault young girls (from the age of 2 through about 8 or so) could make it into any kind of heaven (just because he went to church and donated all his money) – and if so, then heaven was definitely not a place I was going to try to get into.

I attended a state run Catholic boarding school from 8th grade through 12th, so I had first hand (often seen with my own eyes) exposure to how many nuns one priest can keep happy – in the woods, in their rooms, and well you get the picture. So if the priests and nuns were going to heaven, (not that sex is a bad thing) – it just didn’t make sense to me that if the Church could lie to the world about sex being evil, do it in secret, and still get into heaven – then why would I be going to hell just because I chose a different path? The fact that the church did not allow women to have any positions of authority also played a role in my scratching off any Christian religion as a possible choice.

As I explored various religious paths, wicca was the one I found to be the most soothing to my soul. The individual was responsible for their own actions and would reap the karma from those actions. Women were priestesses and leaders within the Circles, representing the Goddess (an entity of compassion, forgiveness, love, sensuality, death, rebirth – and NOT some male authority who punished on a whim). Wicca respected the laws of nature and honored all living things, believed in being a part of the web of life. These were all concepts I felt to the core of my being and felt were true, and didn’t need a religion to teach them to me, but just felt “right,” so following a path that also honored those ideas was very appealing to me. The wiccan\pagan path is also one that is open to many ideas and encourages the individual to find their connection directly to the Universe\Goddess\God (or what ever name you chose) so there was no one human person trying to cram down any one’s throat their interpretation of the written words that were also written by humans (thousands of years ago in another language that could be interpreted in many ways).

As I grew older and wiser and more exposed to a variety of things in life, I also felt that the teachings of the Native American and Buddhists were wonderful and I could have been very happy following similar paths.

Perhaps it was past life experience on a wiccan\pagan path that also contributed to my choice, or some other reasons, who knows. Now at age 51, I follow a very eclectic spiritual path, which is still mostly wiccan\pagan in nature, and I am very comfortable with who I am, how I live my life, and very certain down to the essence of my soul that I will NOT be going to Hell (but should I be wrong, if I do, as I used to tell my father, “It’s ok cause all my friends will be there too!).

Bright blessings, Lady Rose

Written by Lady RoseTags:about Lady Rose, christianity, wicca

So last night was the concert .  First and foremost let me restate my heartfelt thanks to Lady Rose and TeacherMan for my early birthday present!!!!

There was much silliness before and after the show - put Lady Rose and I together for any length of time and it is bound to happen.  I laughed a lot, which given my mood upon arriving at Lady Rose’s door is nothing short of a miracle.  I met “the other Kelly”, who needs a better blogonym, and who is a co-worker and friend of Lady Rose’s  and enjoyed making her aquaintance.  I look forward to seeing her again at Lady Rose’s Harry Potter Party Pallooza in late May.  She seems very sweet and has the same quirky sense of humor as the rest of us and by the night’s end it felt like I’d known her longer than just the couple of hours in reality.

But the reason you’re here reading this is to hear about Ms. McKennitt’s performance.  I was enthralled, I was enraptured. 

It was quite simply put one of the most memorable and beautiful evenings of my life.  It is hard to compare to last year’s concert gift, where we saw Bruce Springsteen.  Totally different venues, totally different music.  Let me just say it was AWESOME.

First of all The Academy of Music is a gorgeous theatre.  It is an older building with wonderful acoustics (as in I could feel the music through my feet and skin) and opulent decor.  It was a perfect pairing with the tone of the evening.

– photo borrowed from philorch.org

Ms. Mckennitt’s musicians are nothing short of masters.  The percussionists, the strings, the various other instruments (and yes there were MANY) were all played not only with great skill, but with obvious pleasure.  There appeared to be a great camraderie among the group and it was impossible to avoid catching a bit of their good spirits.

As for Ms. McKennitt herself?  She is even more impressive in concert as she is on CD.  Her voice is totally unique and it flowed through the room like perfumed honey.  Her transitions from one instrument to another were flawless.  Her little tidbits and stories shared between songs were enlightening and showed a great sense of humor.  Forgive me if I gush, I am a little star-struck. 

Favorite Moments (in no particular order)

Dante’s Prayer (from The Book of Secrets )

“Cast your eyes on the ocean, cast your soul to the sea
When the dark night seems endless, please remember me”

I did not get teary eyed during this song, I quite simply sobbed, but in a good way (I think).

Beneath A Phrygian Sky (from An Ancient Muse)

One of her new songs and I loved it. With such a large gap inbetween recordings and the reasons for that gap one had to expect a change in her music … and it did change … it grew, it evolved and it GOT EVEN BETTER.

“We wondered where our God was in the face of so much pain
And I looked up to the stars above to find you once again”

“And a voice from down the ages, so haunting in its song
These ancient stones will tell us our love will make us strong”

The Lady of Shallott (from The Visit)

This is a favorite song of mine and I hoped to hear it played live and I was not disappointed! Compare her lyrics to the original poem by Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Never-ending Road (from An Ancient Muse)

I dedicate this to my hubby GamerDude. We have had our fair share of challenges, and it seems that they will be continuing into the forseeable future. We are for some reason destined to walk a rocky road I guess. I am hopeful that we will find ourselves in a better place eventually and while things aren’t perfect I still choose him walk by my side on the road we call life.

“The road now leads onward I know not where
I feel in my heart that you will be there
Whenever a storm comes, whatever our fears
The journey goes on as your love ever nears

Here is my heart and I give it to you
Take me with you across this land
These are my dreams, so simple and few
Dreams we hold in the palm of our hands”

On a final note, while I am still not well, I am happy to report that the fever(s) and related night sweats may finally be behind me even if the throat and ear pain are still hanging around.  I am glad of this because waking up in a puddle was getting redundant. 

As of yesterday morning hubby was still advising me to stay home from the concert as I was running a fever and felt awful.  I feel better today, though it would’ve been worth it even if I got worse which is what he and I had feared.

I get sick alot, and I will admit to ignoring and poorly self-treating signs of a sinus infection for several weeks now.  But I really thought that I’d be feeling much better by now, I feel better than I did but still lousy.  These antibiotics better kick in soon or I’m writing a complaint letter to Bayer.

The plan for today and tomorrow is to do homework (mine, not the children’s), bringing MissArtistic to get a haircut/trim, to catch up on some household duty stuff, and to cook.  Sunday I will be working till 7:30 or 8pm and then it is back to my usual grind.  But on the bright side I only have 2 more classes to get through and then I have a 3 week break before the new semester!  One step closer to my own small dreams.

May each of you find your way to your own dreams

Mama Kelly

Written by Mama Kelly

Self Dedication – Solitary Rite

“You will need to decide on a place where you will not be disturbed. It is best to come to this place after a purification bath and a time of silent contemplation. This will release incorrect energies and set up the correct ritual attitude.”

Link to the Ritual: A Self Dedication Ritual
By Rev. Cheryl Sulyma-Masson

Written by Mama KellyTags:ritual, self dedication