Recipe Of The Week

Pumpkin Roll Out Cookies

Ingredients:
3/4 cups unsalted butter, softened
1/2 cup brown sugar, firmly packed
1 tbsp orange zest
1/2 cup canned or fresh cooked pumpkin
1 egg yolk
1 tsp pure vanilla
2-1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp ground ginger
1/4 tsp ground nutmeg
pinch Salt


Preparation Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.
2. In a large mixing bowl, combine with electric mixer the butter, brown sugar and orange zest.
3.Add the pumpkin, egg yolk, and vanilla.
4. Gradually add the flour and spices.
5. Mix with your hands to create a soft dough.
6. Wrap in plastic and refrigerate for 30 minutes.
7. Divide dough into two pieces.
8. Roll out each piece to 1/8-inch thickness on a floured surface.
9. Cut into shapes with cookie cutters.
10. Place on ungreased cookie sheet and bake for 10-15 minutes.
11. Decorate with favorite frosting and candies.

Lizzie's Award Of Shame

I've always considered myself a pretty tolerant individual...it usually takes a lot to really tick me off but this was so huge on the scale of ticked off I just had to write a post about it and this is how this little story goes....

I was hanging out on FaceBook yesterday afternoon and one of my favorite podcasters, Feithline Stuart with SpiritsCast  popped in with a status update and link that I truly had to read twice (okay, it was more like four or five times) anyhow, it was so outlandish... so ridiculous that I wasn't really sure that the author was in complete ownership of  all of her marbles...

And I quote...

"...The word "holiday" means "holy day." But there is nothing holy about Halloween. The root word of Halloween is "hallow," which means "holy, consecrated and set apart for service." If this holiday is hallowed, whose service is it set apart for? The answer to that question is very easy—Lucifer's!....

Really now...  Halloween (Samhain) is holy to me and wouldn't that just make it a perspective issue ... but no, she goes on... Kimberly, Kimberly, Kimberly...hun you really have a terrible case of the "I has a dumb"  going on and if you were in the least bit informed you would realize that one can only worship Lucifer (satan, devil, etc...) if one actually believes he exists. To be completely acurate, the devil is a misleading and false christian idea introduced long ago in order to maintain control over the peasantry and people of the "old ways" had absolutely no such concept of this creature in their belief system. 

How sad that many "christians" are running about spouting such  uneducated, misinformed nonsense ...  it's giving their god a bad name. If I were their deity I would surely hang my head in shame for creating such poorly educated folks...yes, ignorance is a choice in my opinion. ( doesn't the good book say  "made in his image")...  is that the sound of  laughter I hear coming from the heavens?

And again I quote

"....During this period demons are assigned against those who participate in the rituals and festivities. These demons are automatically drawn to the fetishes that open doors for them to come into the lives of human beings. For example, most of the candy sold during this season has been dedicated and prayed over by witches..."

Seriously folks, I'm not sure about you... but I'm usually way too busy scarfing down said candy to be letting it go to waste ...while trying to come up with an astoundingly good ditty that'll really put a whammy on those christian kids...(now their parents are another story... ah-hem, just kidding folks)  Anyway, I've put the article link below and I hope it will at least inspire fits of humor among my readers. I'm not sure if this will be a regular part of my blog because I really hate to think this type of mindset really exists out there!

The Dangers Of Celebrating Halloween

*If you would like to host your own Award of Shame, please feel free to grab the nun!*

(UPDATE- strangely enough the article I was referring to has magically disappeared, I cannot find just where they "moved" it to but I'm sure it could not have been it's inflammatory content...)

Tarot Tuesday

This morning, I drew an excellent card to represent this week with all the activities and preparations leading up to Samhain or Halloween. The World card tells us of completion, of everything coming together in fruitation. It represents reaching the goal, completing the journey..we have come to the end of one cycle and we are now ready for the next cycle.

The World represents  balance.. where all is right with the world... all is as it should be and everything has come together, in the right place.. doing the right thing... completing what we have envisioned and feeling fulfilled and complete. 

In this sense the World card also heralds new beginnings that naturally emerge out of the completion cycle. The "Old" date for Samhain occurs when the sun has reached 15 degrees Scorpio but most of us celebrate  Samhain (the witches New Year) on October 31st. This is a good time for us to look at wrapping up the old and preparing for the new in our lives. Think about the things we have done in the last twelve months.

Have you left anything unresolved...? What blessings have you harvested..?What do you need to thresh (leave behind) and start fresh...?. Once we've  gotten that  cleared away and out of our lives then we can begin to focus on  the next year and what we want to accomplish.