Yesterday my lovely witches came over for some witchcrafting after fasting and bathing. We consecrated protective talismans in ritual using an altar I’d set up on my grandmother’s old table inside a sigil drawn with white cornmeal. We consecrated them by spring and rain water, by rich black earth, by the fire of the candles, by air of the smoke from the burning of fragrant mercurial herbs and lastly when reborn as talismans we anointed our objects with holy oil I made from a recipe from the Old Testament (it smells divine).
Then after copious amounts of tea, I set them to work crafting witch bottles for protection. The purpose of a witch bottle is serve as a decoy for deception. If any evil magic, the evil eye, or curses of illness is sent your way, a witch bottle buried on your property with draw it and take it in instead of you. So of course it must be checked once or twice a year to make sure it hasn’t broken and needs to be replaced to continue protecting you. For this reason one should not make a witch bottle with a beloved jar or glass bottle! Newer versions are just vinegar, pins, and herbs, but the ones we made were, how shall I say this delicately… less pleasant.
Here they are above finished – the bottles sealed with candle wax and then bound with read wool and bound again around the neck, and then sealed again with wax so the wool doesn’t unravel. They are ready to be buried Afterward we created herbal sachets to protect our homes using red linen cloth and red wool, a drop of blood, and a blend of organic herbs. They are to be hung over the front door and replaced every year.
When the ladies had to leave, the Wigglians (Sparrow and Mojo) arrived to record a new episode of the Wigglian Way Podcast. But first, the three of us went out to hunt craft supplies and hit a few stores. I’m glad I went with them as one store was having a bead sale and I found a cimaruta and red coral! I remember thinking of looking for a cimaruta a couple days ago and lo and behold here was everything I needed to make one! The charm was traditionally strung with red coral so I got two different sizes for some variation and the cirmaruta had extra links to hang more charms from so I went though my collection of beads at home and found three appropriate charms – a five-petaled flower, a silver moon, and a skeleton key.
