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Posts Tagged ‘frige’

The Birth of UPG

Posted in Cat Vacuuming, frige, Seasonal Things, tagged , , , , , , , on July 5, 2017| Leave a Comment »

Decided to take the advice of a friend (regarding my current deity quandary), and make a special offering to Frige. After all, as associated as She is with Divine Queenship, She’s gotta be familiar with the whole divorce thing? Germanic women could (and did) get divorced. And it’s not like I’m not still industriously running a household, it’s just a household of one (plus two cats) and all my responsibilities to my extended family and grove.

When I offer things, I typically like to share them, and it’s been the kind of day that’s called for white sangria, so I made a glass for me, and a glass for Her. I took some time on my lunch break to just sit and share it in silence, in a quiet apartment which is darkened by shades but clearly fighting off the summer heat (the heat index here today is 113F).

I can not shake the immediate feeling that she is very pleased with this offering (which has peaches and strawberries in it, and is very good for a hot summer day). I have it sitting on my altar, and every time I walk by, I get the good tinglies on the back of my neck.

Thus is born new UPG, I guess?

***

White Sangria for Two

  • 1 oz vodka (peach is nice, plain is fine)
  • 1 oz orange liquor
  • 3 oz white zinfandel
  • 3 oz cranberry juice cocktail (I don’t actually measure this)
  • sliced strawberries and peaches (can be frozen)
  • 2 glasses with lots of ice

Mix all ingredients except fruit in a cocktail shaker. Shake gently with ice, then pour into glasses filled with ice and fruit. Serves 2.

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Deities and Relationships: LP1 Week 7 (June 26, 2017)

Posted in Clergy Training Program, Ing Frea, Liturgy Journal 1, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on June 29, 2017| 1 Comment »

I’ve started and stopped this post three or four times today, so I’m going to give it one more go and see how it turns out. If it’s terrible, I’ll just delete back to this point and say “yup, still trying to do this stuff” and post it.

So I’ve been in this rebuilding phase, and it’s worked out pretty well for me. I’ve done some magical work, plus some ritual work, and all told I feel like I’m a little better grounded than I have been in awhile. (Which is good, because this is week seven of practice, and I only have to journal for four months, so it’d be a real shame if I got through all four months and never figured out my practice.)

This week was my lunar retreat week, and I got the following runes:

  • Eoh – the Yew: something reliable, but that is easily overlooked. (All that is gold does not glitter)
  • Mann – Man/Mankind/Humanity: Community, other people, support and strength in numbers, relationships (can be positive or negative)
  • Rad – the Journey: the journey is always hardest when you’re actually doing it, and seems easy to the people who are not actually there with you

I haven’t put them in my spreadsheet yet, but I’m feeling like they’re pretty pertinent to where I am on this spiritual journey right now. I do know that my tribe has been a huge source of strength, and that this does feel like a journey.

Part of me wonders if the overlooked part of this has been my relationship with my gods – while I’ve done some small things for them, I haven’t been nearly as connected as I was in the past. Some of this is due to not really knowing how my relationship with them will continue to work, especially Frige. As a goddess of hearth and home, it’s weird to be living in an apartment I don’t own, as well as to be in the process of getting divorced. It’s an odd dichotomy to the life I used to live, and I’m finding that I don’t know how to relate to her like I did when I was “running a home”. (Even though I still work from home, it doesn’t feel the same as it did when I was more domestically focused.)

Same goes, to some extent, for Ing-Frea, though he has seemed closer lately. Without my garden, it’s harder to connect to the earth (and I’m on the third floor, so pots on the porch are literally the best I can do). He was the first deity to “knock on my door”, so to speak, and so it’s always easy to just lay things out for him, but it doesn’t feel the same after all that I’ve been through.

My relationship with Hela has been very much an as-needed one, unlike the other two, and I have not felt called to her work so much lately – which is odd, as you would think she would welcome this level of life transformation. But the connection is not really there either.

The change doesn’t seem to be on *their* parts so much as it is on mine though, hence my thinking this is the part of my practice that I’ve overlooked. Hopefully I can begin working on that over the next few weeks, add some meditation back into my weekly routine, and see whether those relationships are going to continue or if that aspect of my life is going to change again.

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F is for Freo and Frige

Posted in Freyja, tagged , , , , , , , , on April 2, 2014| Leave a Comment »

(Catching up on the Pagan Blog Project – it’s been a rough few weeks in the Swamp, so I’m a bit behind. I’ll be trying to get caught up to the G’s this week, so you’ll be seeing several posts, hopefully!)

Since I only have two F entries, I’m combining these two goddesses into one post. They are closely tied in the Anglo-Saxon practice, but generally different (as Freyja and Frigga) in the Scandinavian sources. Whether this is from linguistic changes happening in different places, or simply because their worship shifted strongly, or just because we have so few real sources on Anglo-Saxon paganism (and the names are linguistically similar, making it difficult to discern from place-names), I don’t know. However, I definitely address them as two separate goddesses, and I take from both sources for my personal practice.

Freo is a goddess of war, sexuality, magic, and fertility. As one of the Wanes/Vanir, she is closely tied to the land and its fertility, though she is not a typical “fertility” goddess in the way most Neopagans approach fertility (nor is she a typical “love” goddess either, though approaching her for help with love and sexuality would not be inappropriate by any stretch). She’s a complicated character, who knows her own worth and does powerful magic in support of those she loves. She may also be related to sovereignty (especially as it relates to sacred kingship and the land.) She is said to have taught seidhr to Odin, and to take the first choice of those slain in battle to her hall. In her honor, I have a “feather cloak” – a shawl painted with amber colored wings – that I wear when I’m doing particular kinds of trance journeys, patterned after Freyja’s traveling via her feather cloak to search for her husband Odr.

To quote from The Pagan Grove again:

It is my impression that Fréo is a Goddess of the land, but not as much so as Her mother [Nerthus] or Her brother, Ing Fréa. She is associated with those parts of our lives that are still very much tied to our animal instincts: sexuality, hunger, etc. And yet She also calls us to the mystery that lies behind these seemingly simple pleasures, the mystical experience of otherworldly trance and magic that stems from that which is green and growing.

I don’t have a ton of experience with Freo, though I do honor her regularly as part of my practice. She has not made herself directly known to me, but I hope that by continuing my practice I will deepen that relationship. I am also hoping that my work with the ADF Order of the Dead will coincide nicely with Freo’s role in choosing the slain to go to her hall, at least where it concerns my ancient ancestors.

Frige is the goddess I go to for hearth and home. She is a spinner, wife of Woden and queen of Asgard/Ases, and it is said that she sees all the possibilities and futures before her with her gift of prophecy, but chooses to be silent about them. She is represented on my altar with a drop spindle filled with my own handspun wool. She is queenly, but not distant, and I see in my ancestor practice many women who remind me of qualities of Frige. I honor her specifically on Modranicht, just before Yule, with the rest of the female ancestors, when I do a special cleaning and then put aside all housework in honor of the Idesa and Frige, giving them (and myself) a rest from our domestic duties.

Frige/Frigg is the basis for our English word Friday, and she may be related to Frau Holda in the Germanic folklore tradition as well (which makes for yet another F-entry that I should really write).

The stars we know as “Orion’s Belt” were known to the Norse as Frigga’s Distaff or Spinning Wheel (or possibly Freyja’s, though Freyja usually is not usually associated with spinning). As a spinner and fiber artist (I spin, knit, and sew), she is something of a patron of the arts that I follow, and so I try to make appropriate offerings in that vein.

As with Freo, I haven’t had much direct experience with Frige – I make offerings to her, so I feel like I am building a relationship, but I wouldn’t consider it a particularly deep or expressive one. With both of these goddesses, I am hoping that my connection deepens over time.

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12 Days of Yule

Posted in Seasonal Things, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on December 19, 2013| Leave a Comment »

This year, in addition to the Yule ritual we’ll be doing tomorrow night with our little study group, I’m planning to loosely follow along with Three Cranes Grove for their “Yule Along”. It’s a set of 12 “feasts” between the solstice and the new year, intended to bring reflection and celebration of the season. I like the idea a lot, and though I’ll be traveling for part of it, I definitely want to do some of these activities.

This is what they have suggested, as well as my plans for each day:

  • 12/19 Greeting the winter wanderer (Woden) – I’ll do an offering to the Wild Hunt (mostly propitiatory – while I honor the Hunt, I don’t want them hanging around my house!)
  • 12/20 Mother’s night/Idesa/Solstice vigil (to be posted that day) – Yule Ritual to the Idesa and Frige, with bonus Solstice Vigil Candles lit from the setting sun, to be burned throughout Yule. Opportunity for oathmaking here; I am considering an oath towards this new study group, to solidify my commitment to them.
  • 12/21 Solstice Day – Baking! Lighting candles! Hooray for the Sun!
  • 12/22 Nature Spirits – Offerings to the nature spirits
  • 12/23 Feast of Fools – Not sure yet what to do here. This is typically about role reversal, but I may just do something silly with my husband/friends.
  • 12/24 Alfar and housewights – housecleaning and offerings to the spirits of my home
  • 12/25 Spirit of hospitality and gifting – Presents! Hooray!
  • 12/26 Celebrations of winter/snow – Celebrating being warm with my family.
  • 12/27 Celebration of the evergreen – More presents, this time with extended family. I need to figure out how to work evergreens into this.
  • 12/28 God/desses of the household (Frige) – Knitting! Lots of knitting, as I’m working on two big projects right now.
  • 12/29 Shining ones – Offerings to Thunor, Frige, and Ing Frea
  • 12/30 Bringing in the boar (Ing Frea, deities/spirits concerning oaths) – Roast beast! (Roast beast is a feast I don’t mind in the least!) I’ll make pot roast and consider my new year’s resolutions and any oaths I am considering making.
  • 12/31 Twelfth Night — Resolutions, divination, remembrances, gratitudes – Party! Big party at my house, with friends and games and fun and champagne. I’ll initiate a conversation about resolutions, and maybe do some divination regarding the new year.
  • 1/1 New Year’s Day — Returning the home to regular time – Clean up, take down, and put away all the holiday stuffs. Get ready to go back to work, cook lunches, and make some pre-prepared meals. Basically return to the normal routine.

Some of these will be a little difficult, but I think planning for them in advance will make sure I stick to it. I love the idea of making Yule a “season” – a time of feasting, sacrifice, and honoring the various Gods and spirits of my path. I think this is a fun way to do it, and it means a little bit of sacred time each day, instead of trying to cram it all into one day and getting burnt out.

What are you doing to celebrate the Solstice/Yule? Any family traditions you have that you’d like to share? I’m always looking for new traditions to borrow and try out!

Blessed Yule!

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More Waiting and Thinking

Posted in General Things, Initiate's Path, tagged , , , , , , , , , , on October 25, 2013| 3 Comments »

I submitted my Initiates Path Intention Letter a few weeks ago, and it has passed from “discussion” into “voting” at this point. I’m trying to take this waiting in stride (though it was hard to have my DP go through review again, this time to see if my work was deemed adequate for the greater work of the Initiate’s Path).  There is a chance I could be denied entry into the program, but I’m trying not to think about that too much.

Over the last few weeks I’ve done a lot of thinking about what kinds of things I want to get out of the IP going forward, about what my expectations are going in. It’s hard, since I have to define my own level of service to the ADF community, but I think I’d like to be part of the web-presence of ADF (since I’m primarily solitary) and possibly work as a mentor for Dedicants as well.

I have also done a lot of book buying, purchasing Anglo-Saxon texts and reference material, with the goal of completing my Indo-European Language course before I start any of the other courses. There isn’t currently an ADF approved list for using Anglo-Saxon for the IP, but since it’s an accepted ADF Hearth Culture, I guess I’m going to forge new ground in that regard.

As well, my good pagan friend here (who is of the Vanatru persuasion, which would probably be where I’d end up without ADF) has joined up with ADF and will be starting on his Dedicant Path work, which is exciting.  We’ll be able to support each other as we go through these classes and challenges.

If I’m quite frank, the Trance I and Trance II requirements of the IP are quite terrifying for me. Meditation I can do, but trance work has always been beyond me. I know part of the process is learning to do it, and learning different methods and what works for you for achieving trance states. As practice for that requirement, I’ve re-upped my Mental Grove practice, and am beginning to build around that hallows towards the outer edges of the low-hanging tree branches, placing doors and arches and entryways into a mist-filled beyond that space.

IE Language will be hopefully fun (I love languages) and allow me to start using Anglo-Saxon phrases in my rituals, a goal I’ve had for awhile. I’m also going to use the Wheel of the Year format followed by Cranberry Protogrove, since it works well, and will honor the biggest patron of my path (Ing Frea) as part of the high days in Autumn. I like the balance it provides, and intend to use this next year’s ritual observances to really get to know these new aspects of the Gods. (I am especially interested in getting to know Frige – she strikes me as a fairly differently aspected Goddess as either Freyja or Frigg, and I’d like to work with her and see if she has guidance for me in the part of my life where I’m responsible for a home).

What purpose this blog will serve in my further studies I don’t yet know. I’ll be posting my Initiates Intention Letter for sure, but I don’t know if I’ll post all of my coursework – but perhaps just reflections on it as I’m progressing. I don’t expect to move through the IP particularly quickly, as it’s much more in-depth and requires a lot more reading and study than did the DP. Plus there’s a good bit more work that I don’t know I’ll be okay talking about until it’s been well past (namely the Magic 1 and Magic 2 work). Some of the classes are extremely scholarly, and I’m already collecting those books as I can find them at my local used bookstore. My “to read” pile is growing at an astounding rate.

It feels good, again, to be (hopefully) starting on this new journey around Samhain – regardless of how long it takes me, I think I will want to finish my studies (and hopefully be accepted as an Initiation candidate) in the fall. It always feels like a time of beginnings and endings to me.

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