I went for a brief walk across campus on my lunch hour. It’s so nice this time of year when the heat has gone, at least today, and the students haven’t arrived. I noticed that there were a lot of women my age out and about. Women I don’t usually see. It made me smile. I’m at the beginning edges of Crone time in my life and in nature.
Like my mother and her mother before me I gathered nature’s bounty. I have a couple of stealth altars in my office, one is a statue of Hebe, nectar bearer to the Gods, another is a green mug full of pine cones and feathers between two Pacific Northwest Native drawings of the sun and moon.
On my desk I have one of those Asian cats, the ones with the paws in the air. Can’t think of their name at the moment but they are for prosperity and protection I think. At any rate, I took a picture and this is another thing that makes me smile. Chestnuts, acorns, the last of the hydrangea and star jasmine.
Edit: the cat is a stylized Maneki Neko – Beckoning Cat – The most prevalent tale involves a poor temple in the woods: A traveler takes shelter under a nearby tree during a storm. A cat appears and beckons the traveler to follow it to avoid the storm in the temple. As soon as the traveler follows the cat, the tree and the spot he had been in are struck by lightning. Because the cat has saved him and brought him to the temple, the traveler and his family become patrons of the temple and bring it fame and wealth.
I also took some better pictures of some of my pouches and checkbook covers. They are behind the cut. Click to enlarge.
Stitch Witch Cottage 
Lol, that’s awesome. I hadn’t thought of it directly in that way but I’ve got a little pile of acorns on my desk I was collecting on the way too and from the gym.
Then again I’ve also got my great psychologists finger puppets, my madam alexander wizard of oz mini witches and my kinderegg vikings decorating my desk (oh and a picture of one of my doctor’s ’cause I rarely see him and was starting to think he’s a myth). I was told (jokingly) that some of the faculty might think that the
finger puppets were here for them, especially Freud.
oh & btw those are gorgous. There are at least two that I’m coveting bigtime, the two middle ones mostly and especially the wheel of the year.
I have to say that the wheel is making me drool too. That one happened so suddenly too. The pentagram started out as a aubergine wool applique. But it just wasn’t working for me and I put it aside. Then I thought, I wonder if I can take off the applique and embroider something else. And it just peeled off (wasn’t stitched down yet). But because of the way it was ironed on, it left an indentation of the pent so I stitched it in. The rest of it happened in the course of one evening. Extremely organic process and before I went to bed I just had to say Ooooohhhhhh
😉
Patrick wants the stag more than he can stand.
I started all of them with the intention of giving to Gaia’s Temple as a donation. I haven’t actually told them that I have this for me but it seems a little wrong to keep them. heh.
I had to go look all that up! I do love that mini witch…
I’ve had some kind of stealth altar at work since 1992 or so. Seed pods, postcards, greeting cards, crystals, just a hodge podge to the random person but I knew it was an altar and I treated it as such when I had time to breathe.