This month has been full of woodworking for me. I made more pieces over a period of a week than I’ve made in a year. It felt really good to dive into it again, this time with confidence knowing which woods I could safely work with without any allergic reactions. Long sleeves, tough jeans, and a face mask for the dust are essential. Antihistamines are also my friend. It has inspired me to do more and more woodwork especially after spending so much time with a friend at the conference who was a cabinet-maker, carpenter, and carver for decades. He gave me advice on making a range of pieces from simply to complexly carved and gave me a good lecture on actually keeping some of my pieces for myself. I plan on carving a set of henbane prayer beads and two staffs for myself for my own magical work this year.
The Poisoner’s Wand
This is a piece I carved a year ago and kept for myself, but in a full year I never used it once in my own magic using my plain rowan wand or yew drum beater instead, and so I released it for sale at the GFLOE Festival and it has found a very good home. It is Pacific Yew wood carved with bittersweet nightshade, a skull, a serpent, and my world tree sigil. I painted the carvings with eco-friendly wood stains and natural red ochre.
The Chieftain’s Beads
This necklace was a gift for a friend of mine who was just initiated this month. The beads are carved from the woods of the sacred Irish chieftain trees – the holiest of holies. The toggle clasp is Alder and Yew woods. The pendant is an owl skull carved from deer antler, I wish I had carved myself but didn’t (but should), which I found at Bead Freaks on Main St. after the very magical owner Kayla sent me a note that she had more skulls in for my spirit bottles crafted by one of the most talented carvers who works for her. This set of beads took about three days worth of work and were well-received.
After the conference it was time to get ready crafting stock for the GFLOE Festival. I selected some pieces of wood from my collection that had been cured for 1-3 years and went mad de-barking, shaping, carving, and sanding them into wands of twisted hazel, crooked rosemary, lightning-struck maple, rowan, blackthorn, elder, and yew. The spiralling hazel wand I sold at the GFLOE Festival and didn’t have a chance to take pictures of the finished result carved with ogham runes spelling “great wisdom” in Scots Gaelic.
I turned a thin oak branch into half a dozen runestave pendants (of which I forgot to take pictures of all of them) and some larger pieces of split wood into big runestaves. I’d always wanted to make the dream and sleep runestaves and finally had some perfectly cured and split Red Alder for them.
The forked wand is a gorgeous Elder stang with a perfect nubby end. The super-long white wand is lightning-struck Black Maple from an old growth tree on my parents’ farm. The long three-tined wand is a Rowan tree that grew from another tree and has never touched the earth. Each tine is one of the three roots – very Yggdrasil, I know! Such “aerial” wood has long been sought after as one of the most potently powerful woods for magical wands, staffs, and charms.
I found the best and most twisty pieces of the ancient Rosemary bush a lovely lady witch had gifted me from her garden and turned them into sturdy tough wands perfect for Green and Kitchen Witches or for some powerful protection magic.
If you’re looking for a wand, they are available for sale at Stang & Cauldron.
I spent hours hunched over my work table with my tiniest carving knife crafting the detailed runestaves with woods of alder, birch, and oak. I blended natural red ochre with sacred flaxseed oil and painted all the complex carved symbols. Then they were cured with more flaxseed oil and then polished with beeswax and allowed to dry. The beauty of Icelandic runestaves is that they are for magic both sacred and profane – one helping you to fall asleep or to get a good catch when fishing and another to protect your home from all evil or alternately to curse.
From the top left going clockwise: runestave against bad dreams and sleeplessness (Alder), runestave to cause your enemies to fear you (Oak), runestave to Fjölnir (Odin as “Multiplier” – Oak), runestave to Thundur (Odin as seeker of wisdom hanging from Yggdrasil – Oak), runestave to cause one to sleep soundly (Alder), and runestave against evil (Birch).
This week is for writing, professionally and for pleasure, and then I’m off for Ontario for my Grandfather’s birthday and to visit my parents’ at their farm. When I return in the middle of June I hope to do even more woodwork alongside crafting new batches of all my flying ointments.
