My Book of Shadows

I've sort of finished my Book of Shadows.  There's still quite a bit I'd like to add, but for now, I've got the basics.  I haven't decided what, if anything, will go on my title page.  Right now there's nothing on it.  I may leave it that way until I'm ready to do my self-dedication rite.  Then I'll put my Craft name on it and perhaps something else.

I have lots of reference-type information I've gathered recently that I'm going to add to my journal/mirror book.  That's stuff like magical associations with days of the week, information about the Elements, meditation techniques, etc.  It's all the information that I need as background information for my BOS stuff to be effective.  I know a lot of people keep all that stuff with their spells and rituals in the BOS, but for my purposes, especially right now, it will be good to keep things organized like that.  Especially since, once I'm more familiar with all that background stuff, I won't need to refer to it as much.

My next step for my BOS is to start adding recipes, herb lore, runic alphabet, and things like that.  I may get a full astrology chart made and include that, as well.  I also have some quotes, poetry, and songs I'd like to add, but I know I'll need to stop by a scrapbooking store to get more pages for that, and I'd rather get the recipes and things in my BOS first.

It was suggested to me that I should include information for adding people to my circle or coven information "just in case," but I haven't decided if I want to do that or not.  Sometime down the road maybe I will find like-minded people to join with me in circle and/or start a coven, but for right now, I'm happy to be learning as a solitary Witch.  I don't want to get too ahead of myself and start a coven on a power trip or something like that.  That's not why I'm studying.

Book of Shadows

I'm working on pretty-ing up my Book of Shadows.

I knew I wanted to use a scrapbook for my BOS, and originally, I simply wrote everything out and put it in so I could have everything together.  Now that I have a framework of my BOS, though, I'd like to make it prettier, so I'm making it look more like a scrapbook than it originally looked.  It's going quickly, and the embellishment papers I got go well with the album's cover design, as well as with what I want to do with the pages.  It's very earthy-looking, and I'm able to use colors and design to suggest what the page is about (for example, the page that tells how to cast a circle has circle designs on it).  I think it's working well.

The great thing about the scrapbook album I'm using is that it'll be very easy to add pages, as well as rearrange things if I need to as I continue to practice, deepen my spiritual beliefs, and share information with fellow Pagans/Wiccans.

I'm also thinking about adding a section in which to put poems, quotes, stories, etc.  I know lots of people have little tidbits in their Books of Shadows of things that are important to them, things they've read that struck them and they want to remember.  So I'm going to do the same.  I love reading, so I think I'll need a whole section for quotes and stuff in my Book of Shadows.

I'll post pictures of my BOS when I've finished with the pages I'm working on this week.  It's already turning out beautifully, and I think personalizing it like this will help me have an even stronger connection to my Book than simply hand writing it.

Blessed Be!