Kitty George says, “Soon as no one’s looking, I’m destroying that tree.”
Wanted to add a bit of holiday humor to your Yule season.
Blessed be, from my heart to yours.
And blessed be my cat and all our mischievous pets who inspire laughter.
Updated 2021.
This post was written in the mythopoetic realm that I’m always building, that I might continue to inhabit it happily. It’s a lighthearted post overall, in hopes it helps keep our spirits bright during wintry days. Included are some more serious thoughts—which I believe also can keep life bright. Let me know what you think.
Isn’t it amazing how someone can spot a wonderful part of you that you’ve overlooked? William Dreamdancer, an online friend who is an astute fellow, noticed that I’m a snow faerie.
Here I am, one of Santa’s Yule elves, but I never noticed I was a snow faerie. How could I have missed that? . . . I mean, you don’t have to be a snow faerie to be a Yule elf. Santa gives different jobs to different elves. But still …
Informed of William’s insight, Santa made me one of his official Snow Fairies this year. That is the job title for elves who tend the snow. (If you wonder why I’ve spelled it Faeries earlier in the post, and now I’m spelling it Fairies, check out this post:
https://stardrenched.com/2020/09/08/fairy-faerie-faery-fey-fay/)
My job as a Snow Fairy is creating snowflakes. I’ve gotten to make a lot of them. Making them makes me very happy.
Some Snow Fairies fashion snowflakes, and other Snow Fairies tend the snow in different ways, e.g., ensuring snowflakes don’t melt before they have a chance to fall from the sky. (I love making up the facts of my mythopoetic realm. And once I make them up, they’re true.)
On the mundane plane: I did a series of paintings that involved my drawing approximately one-hundred unique snowflakes. This post has three of those paintings.
A single snowfall uses up a lot of snowflakes. However, as I said, I’m not the only one of Santa’s elves who creates snowflakes.
In fact, every time you create paper cuttings of snowflakes to adorn a Yule tree, tape to a window, or otherwise decorate your home, you’re automatically one of the Yule elves helping make snow. Ditto your children when they start cutting the paper.
During a snowfall, I love watching Wind Fairies blow my snowflakes hither and thither.
Wind Fairies also make snowflakes drift lazily down. When they fall on you, look carefully and remember that Snow Fairies make each snowflake unique, especially for you.
Drawing snowflakes is a meditation that centers me into sanity and sacredness, which keeps me from going down the rabbit hole of dysfunction aka America’s holiday craziness. One of many perks of working for Santa is getting to do jobs that maintain joy, not only mine but that of others.
Popular culture, which as a whole considers magic nonsense, embraces it this time of year.
For one thing, during winter, many people who would humbug magic the rest of the year become open to miracle transforming their lives.
Also, the population as a whole becomes more open to extravagant decor. They forsake bourgeois restraint and the bland decor that results, replacing it with sparkling lights, bright red clothing, and gaudy displays. Typical holiday decor, with its exuberant fun, fills the air with magic. (Christmas decor is Pagan at heart and often has Pagan roots historically.)
Plus every year, folks everywhere are excited about a jolly elf who flies through the air, mysteriously managing to give gifts all over the world in a single night. If he isn’t wondrous and magical, nothing is, and I love seeing people suspend their disbelief (even if it’s only long enough to watch a Santa Claus movie).
Popular culture’s indulgence in magic this time of year is such happy, satisfying fun for me.
There will be two rites. Attend one or both. One ceremony will meet in person in the San Francisco Bay Area. The other will meet worldwide via teleseminar aka group phone call.
We’ll drink in the season’s wonders, enchantments, and joys that they may lift our spirits and transform our lives. This will include an imaginary visit with Santa, to foster our happiness, joyfulness, and transformation even further.
Full details will be in my newsletter. Click the banner below to subscribe.
Faerie tale, mystic art, and bedtime story for Pagan children of all ages. Do you drink moon tea? I wanted star tea, so made up a recipe for it.
Once upon a time, two people went on a picnic. After a yummy meal, they noticed: They were falling in love! Mooning into each other’s eyes, they wiled away the afternoon, talking about butterflies, truth, moonlight, the meaning of life, and other important topics.
When it started to get dark, they packed up the picnic. Captured by each other’s eyes, they overlooked a teacup and saucer.
Love enchants everything it touches. So the tea cup and saucer were now magic. Stars came down from the sky to dance in and around the forsaken china.
Faeries joined in, because they are the stars’ best friends—not to mention close relatives.
And that would end the story of a Faerie tea party, except all good fairy tales have a warning: Don’t ever boil stars in water to make star tea. You’ll hurt the stars. And make them angry. You don’t want to know what happens when stars get angry at you. Instead, here’s my personal recipe for star tea:
When it gets dark, I put room temperature water in a jar, outside if possible. Then I say, “Stars in the sky, please bless this tea tonight.” Then I let the water sit for at least an hour. The stars will happily fill the water with starlight for you. This makes very yummy tea that fills you with magic.
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Limited first edition prints of the painting in this story are available at https://www.etsy.com/listing/171580248/faerie-tea-party-limited-first-edition
Fellow Star-dusted Traveler,
Please join me for a Yule ritual on Thursday December 19, from noon to 1:00 EST.
We will celebrate the birth of the Sun King and our own rebirth with Him. We will celebrate the Winter Goddess’ rich and immense mother-love for us. Heck, we will just celebrate!
The event is a group phone call. Free and open to all. (Your usual long-distance charges apply, and appear on your phone bill). No experience needed.
To participate, call 1-712-775-7000. When prompted, enter 1095248#. Dial three to five minutes before noon; it can take a bit to connect, and latecomers are not allowed.
I hope you come, truly! We have a great time.
Francesca De Grandis
I can’t always post announcements for my free monthly rituals here. There is no one place I announce all my events bc I do a lot of projects and do not want to bombard anyone. But I announce a good many of my goings-on in my newsletter. I hope you sign up for it because I am all about sharing the journey with fellow star-dusted travelers. Yes!
Want support for a joyful serene winter? Check out http://www.outlawbunny.com/2013/11/30/winter-joy/
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Text of the poem, in case you cannot view the graphic:
Sink into Winter’s quiet darkness,
to enjoy peace, healing, and luxurious days.
Revel in Winter’s light:
Snow flooded by moonlight on a crisp dark night;
or lights on a Yule tree
in a dark room smelling of woodfire and popcorn.
Or the bright thrills of raucous fellowship,
children’s laughter, and holiday songs.
And sparks of inspiration
that burst into flames of joy
when we allow ourselves
to relax and revel in winter quiet.
Turning the Wheel through Personal Myth
Santa, Squirrels, and More
Backstory: I live in faerie tales. This lifetime, I’ve never heard of turning the year wheel with one’s personal myth (in this context, I mean a myth of one’s own making or a myth not generally perceived as related to the year wheel). I remember it from past lives.
Below, you will not find a theoretical exposition on turning the year wheel with one’s personal myth. I prefer to live in my faerie tales, not in my (albeit fabulous) theories. So, I share a little piece of my myth here. You mystics are smart—you don’t need someone lecturing theory at you from on high; mystics usually learn more watching—and feeling—how people actually embody their theories. Equally important, when I talk about my adventures, some people join me in them—I long for shared escapades.
Telling my own myth is no suggestion that it is the best one for you, or the right way for you to turn the wheel. End of backstory.
I blog about Yule starting in September. It is not the crass commercialism of stores that promote Christmas items way too early. It’s actually the opposite; it rescues me from holiday madness.
In Autumn, squirrels gather nuts to store for the winter. In the same vein, I plan my dark months in Sept or Oct. (I have been planning my dark months in the autumn for decades, so cannot remember whether I made the practice up or was taught it.)
According to Chinese philosophy, unresolved issues are more likely to bubble up from the subconscious in the winter. Experience has taught me that, if I do not plan my dark months before they start, I lose my mooring, and easily sink into holiday frenzy, codependent gift-giving, etc.
Every September or October, I get in touch with what I truly want for the fall and winter this year. Eg, Do I need to focus on a major inner healing? If so, is there a theme I can use for the healing rituals? Do I want to decorate the house for the holidays? If so, a little or a lot? Which holidays do I want to celebrate? Do I have the time to cook for the holidays? And so on.
It’s not that I stick to these plans rigidly. But when I lose my center, the plans helps me regain it. Then I can make sane decisions.
An additional piece of my process is relevant to why I blog about Yule so early. As I said, I live in Faerie tales. They are often myths of my own creation. One is that I am a Yule elf. Come autumn, Santa’s elves are very busy planning what’s going to happen over the next few months.
This planning, including what I’ll craft the next few months to put in Santa’s bag, aka my Etsy shop, is part of my turning the wheel of my personal year. I am an artisan, not a manufacturer, so fall—at latest!—is when I need to start planning and making the handful of items I will add to my shop before Yule.
I blog from the heart. I start blogging and posting from the North Pole as early as September. I want to share my real life—the day-to-day of my myths.
I am also spared holiday madness because, being one of Santa’s elf, I instead can spend the dark time focusing on service: I focus on the joy of crafting goods in the North Pole’s elven workshop, high quality craftsmanship, purposeful creativity, and Yule elf tweets/blogs/posts that help people smile during holiday grumpiness. I also get true holiday joy from my absurdly happy Yule elf meditations and costumes. I am turning my personal year wheel, connecting with the season of Mama Earth.
(I mentioned being a Yule elf as a myth of my own creation. I do not have space in this post to thoroughly portray what I’ve created about Yule elves. Nor could a library of printed word hold it because 1) some things can only be conveyed in oral tradition and 2) some things are so integrated into one’s life that they become too extensive to thoroughly share in words alone. But a lot of what I created plays out in my meditations, which feels important to say because, when we take time to really sink into our mythic stories meditatively, we can live them the rest of the day.)
More of how my myth turns the wheel:
Most of the year, I am in my tinker’s wagon, traveling between the worlds. I am a shut-in but my wheelchair has wings, and so do I. Astrally-traveling shamanic guide and fey artisan.
When weather gets cold, I retreat to Santa’s warm, cozy workshop. I still counsel and teach, from my snug Arctic home.
Claus is in my pantheon. So I pray to him any month. One way I turn the wheel through myth is, the past few years, I’ve made my winter plans by writing a letter to Santa in September about what I want for the dark months.
Every year, I have new elven adventures. And my other myths grow a bit. All my faerie tales are more extensive than this post. And are deeply personal. But I risk posting bits online for two reasons.
Telling my myth is a fun way for this shut-in to share her wanderings.
I am dedicating to helping my students find and/or further evolve personal myths, and live them fully to connect with Mama Earth and Divinity. I posted today in hopes I might do that a bit for my dear site visitors. For one thing, I believe that speaking my life supports starry-eyed seekers to trust their own unique mythic being.
Fellow Seeker,
It is easy to be overwhelmed by holiday responsibilities and anxiety. Ritual and simple plans, followed by self awareness, can help make the dark time of year peaceful, joyful, and blessed by camaraderie.
I am leading a ritual on the above theme. Please join me in ceremony, Friday Nov 22, from 3 to 4:00 PM EST.
No experience needed.
The event is a group phone call. Free and open to all. (You might pay long-distance charges, depending on your long-distance plan. They appear on your phone bill.)
To participate, call 1-712-775-7000. When prompted, enter 1095248#. Dial a few minutes before 3:00; it can take a bit to connect, and latecomers are not allowed.
The two long vertical visuals on the side are details from a painting I just finished. The painting is about the fecundity of darkness, so I wanted it to adorn this particular ritual’s announcement.
The ritual includes a guided, meditative planning for your dark time of year. If possible, bring something with which you can jot down any thoughts inspired by the meditation.
I hope you come. We’ll create a great fall and winter for ourselves.
I can’t always post announcements for my free monthly rituals here. There is no one place I announce all my events bc I do a lot of projects and do not want to bombard anyone. But I announce a good many of my goings-on in my newsletter. I hope you sign up for it because I am all about sharing the journey with fellow travelers.
The Unseelie Queen and her pawns would have us give our anger supremacy: They would have us fuel our anger with pseudo-morality, the same angry false righteousness that makes pseudo-Christians betray Christ’s message of love.
Anger has its place. It should not be suppressed. Nor should its good power be ignored.
But it too often permeates, perhaps subconsciously, many a pagan’s being, many a pagan tradition. It corrodes their magic, until there is none left—none—and they are left only with the pretense of it and childish boasts of power.
I train my students rigorously in magical technique, but it is not enough in itself. I received impeccable magical training, but my magic could not withstand my anger if it were made supreme.
But we have a choice. We can acknowledge and honor our anger, then let it go. Because when we do, we become sure in our guts that we deserve a place with the Faerie Queen and Seelie Court. It cannot be an intellectual exercise—you have to experience letting go of anger to have gut knowledge of the following:
Anger made supreme is a trap the Unseelie set us. When we release anger, to make love supreme, supreme in our cells, the Faerie Queen’s magic and innocence and love flood us. All our green fantasies, and wishes to see the unseen, come true. We feel, feel, note the word “feel,” we will feel the magic that most people can only imagine as part of a dream. Feel it in our waking hours. We will walk the path through enchanted woods. We will feel the World Tree as our safe home.
In other words, we will be magic. That is what happens when a pagan soul relinquishes anger and owns the love in their heart.
Footnote: This material came to me, right before bedtime, day #1 of the Hundred People direct spiritual transmission. But “material” is an insufficient word because, along with insight, was a breathtaking breakthrough experience, more transformative than any realization.
Giving the weeklong transmission caused me many beautiful learning experiences. Posting about only one of them might make that one incorrectly seem more pivotal than the others. But this is the only one I felt guided by my Gods to discuss at length online, thus far.
Have you had a magical Fey experience that substantiates mine or is otherwise relevant? Please post it below. I’d love to read it. And it will support other site visitors.
I finished a fantasy portrait. I call it The Faerie Future.
I was so happy with how this came out, I’ve been dying to post it.
It’s a painting of one of my caretakers. She’s been generous and kind to me, and this was a birthday present to her. I secretly waited till I had a chance to paint it. It was fun to surprise her with it.
Here is the photo I worked from. (If the style of her clothing looks familiar: She’s wearing a scarf and dress I hand-painted. (Ahem, my original designs.)
Usually people give me photos to work from when they hire me as their portraitist. But she kindly modeled my wearable art for a blog, and I used a photo from that session so that her portrait could be a surprise.
I was put on this planet to mirror back—and strengthen—the beauty and power I see in people. I do this as a shamanic guide, but I also do it through my spirit paintings, which I create while in trance. (So I guess my painting is another way of being a guide. Wow, there are so many ways that we can empower each other.)
When I see someone’s reaction to my painting of them, it is a gift to me. Portraying the unique spirit in someone makes me happy.
I Carry Fey Magic Within, Fey Magic is Within All that Surrounds Me
Wholeness within and all around me.
Beauty within and all around me.
Joy within and all around me.
The Fey touch all I do.
The Fey touch all I do.
Struggle gone within and all around me.
Fear gone within and all around me.
Scarcity gone within and all around me.
Wholeness within and all around me.
Beauty within and all around me.
Joy within and all around me.
The Fey touch all I do.
There is no “other,”
within or without.
The struggle is gone.
There is only ease,
love,
a laughing fearless child,
a garden of flawed flowers and fruits,
vegetables and insects,
all beautiful, all needed, all God.
The Fey touch all I do.
A Good Fortune is within and around me. It is not one thing or another but is a simple all-encompassing pure Fey beauty and luck empowering any spell I do or making my day more fluid.
The Fey touch all I do.
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And here is a short version of my above piece: Good Fortune blesses every area of my life.
I wrote this post in April, 2012. Let me know if you are like me—taking forever to post something, because of a bad habit of constantly writing too much to fit in books or blogs.
