The Crafts: Wixes, Spells, and the Weaponized Placebo Effect

for fabric suggestions I'd say buy linen for the drawstring bag :P I'm always partial to that!

 

Totally understandable. I do use leather sometimes, mostly the type they make jackets out of, because it used to be alive and imo it remembers that. I have a lot of leather jackets (I snag them from thrift stores for dirt cheap because $300 jacket for six bucks? Hell fucking yes) and I've wixed all of them for protection and emotional comfort; we know those are both things animals understand so they're feelings likely to stick around in the material. And having a protective comforting jacket that's nice and heavy and feels like a hug is soooo nice. (Also wixed my flats and both pairs of boots. That's a little more sideways thinking since it's for good journeys and in this case it's more because I think the material holds magic well because it used to be alive instead of using the the actual imprint of life.)

But I stay away from the stuff that looks/feels native-american-y even though I've got some in me and one of my various wixy friends/teachers was one. I'd have to do some serious talking to people who know what they're talking about to feel comfortable with it. I've got some stuff he gave me that I use, but that's because it was a gift and so Acceptable.

I wouldn't use leather for holding divination tools though. Life tends to come with biases and that's a little too much personality for my tools. I keep my stones in a silk pouch I picked up at Ren Faire just 'cause I thought it was pretty, and I made my card bag from a particularly large scrap leftover from a sewing project. (Clutter wix chaote, remember.) I'd definitely look into cloth dice bags and the like or make one like suggested. Bags are really easy to make so all you need is something for the cord and a fabric you like. (+sewing stuff, natch.)

 

Ooh actually silk could be the best thing. Not sure how much this is SciFi/Fantasy Fiction memory talking, but 85% sure silk acts as insulation for/from magic? Could be good to keep them from picking up randomness from around the environment.

You could prolly find silk handkerchiefs at a thrift store.

And now I need to find my leather jacket, because @Lazarae is a genius.

 

@Aviari actually thank my mom! She had her woobie (her thoroughly wixed riding leathers) since I was a kid. On stressful days she'd let me wear it around the house but she relied on them pretty hard so I couldn't borrow them once we were removed. But when I got older she told me how she did it and her reasoning and I made my own. They don't feel as nice as hers, but that's nearly 20 years of "happy thoughts, safe warm place" and the association with mom against my attempts. They still feel nice (on bad days I'd use the oversized one as kind of a blanket when I napped so they definitely work) but not as nice as Mom Magic.

Same thing happens with incense/scented oils. Those are my dad's Things, and I use some stuff I get from elsewhere (I love BPA) that I like and fits me well and some even smell like things he's made... but they don't have that same warm fuzzy feeling as what I get from him.

 

@Lazarae thats brilliant, ive never thought of doing spellwork on clothes and those intentions sound right up my alley. How did you do it?

 

Mostly the same thing I do for my jewelry with similar intentions with some changes. It kind of varies every time depending on what's at hand. I like to use oils more for the leather than my jewelry because it holds the scent really well. I'd have to ask dad what he puts in them besides the obvious but he's got blends for just about everything. It's only recently that I've been branching out from borrowing stuff from him and I haven't acquired a new jacket since.

I line the inside with Comforting Stuff (usually dad's personal blend 'cause it smells like childhood and dad magic. Now I'd probably use BPA's The Raven 'cause it's a little more me) and let it sit/sink in while I wash my hands (soap to prevent cross-contamination of scents, salt to prevent the same but of energy). For the outside I rub it into the leather in places I touch a lot and places that I associate with vulnerability: the collar, down the center of the back, if I wear the jacket closed then over the heart, and then at the edges of of the pockets if there are any and the end of the sleeves. The last two are mostly so I get a whiff of it often when I'm wearing it and can be skipped. Scent is just a huge thing for me so I like being able to smell the reminder that I'm safe and I stop actively smelling what's at my collar after a few minutes of wearing it.

Usually do it during the waxing moon, preferably the night before full or the night it turns full. I'm lucky and my window gets a good view of the moon for a few hours at night, so I leave it on the desk right in front of the window with the curtains open overnight. Sometimes for an extra boost when I let it soak up moonlight I'll line the desk with happy/protective stones. (I'm a fan of amethyst for ALL of the things and have an abundance of it so if you're not an amethyst hoarder like me you should probably ask someone else what would go there. :P)

Mom did it with herbs and some things that mostly make sense to her. It's pretty much "stuff that's comforting on the inside, stuff that's protective on the outside." On my own woobie I also drew in a personal sigil on the inside of the back, just a black sharpie on the (also black) lining. I can't find it most the time even when I'm looking for it but I know it's there. It's a combo of dad's "everything FUCK OFF" ward circle and my signature. Because that jacket is extra important and I was already using it as a security blanket during several shit+fan incidents, so most of my leathers are equivalent to light mail armor-wise but this one is more "walking fortress."

 

That is very cool. :)

 

I think we have quite a few amethyst hoarders in our number, really.

(I'm a tanzanite hoarder which is the more expensive variation in some ways.)

 

Spoiler: rocks

I used to collect quartz and mica whenever I could. I put my best piece on one of our cat's graves and the rest is still saved with all my other rocks. I live in a desert so quartz is everywhere. And I found a nice green stone (they're rare where I am) and our neighbor made it into a necklace and I gave it to my sister. I like rocks.

 

I think I'll have to resign myself to the fact that I'm a lapis lazuli hoarder in making. It's always the stone I'm drawn to in shops heh. Not like I'll complain, lapis is beautiful and feels very happygoodsafe. Until my last lapis ring broke I wore it to bed because I'm a big dweeb like that. I should probably look for my necklace with the rounded beads though, I think it'd be ncie to go back to my highschool necklace arrangement of Fenrir's pendant + lapis-bead-necklace

 

90% of the stones in my area are flint.
I kind of really like flint, conveniently.

 

I miss the massive chunks of flint out back at the farm...

 

Does anyone remember those rock stores they had in the early 2000s? I used to go there with my mom. I guess rock collections were big back then? You could get a little velvet pouch and fill it with polished, pretty rocks. To four/five year old me they were the best place on earth.

 

Nevermind, they were gem and mineral shows, but they were/are the best and i need to have more spending money the next time I get the chance to go because rocks. Pretty rocks.

 

I remember that at a Discovery store or something it was so great, I still have those stones :3

 

My stepmom gave me a display shelf years ago, she keeps action figures in hers, I keep rocks in mine XD

 

Gave dad the squicks by accident. We were talking about accidental scrying (I used to scry the ceiling without knowing that was what I was doing) and I mentioned I'd intentionally scried my noodles before. We're both having a giggle over his response, which was pretty much "don't do that, you have to eat those. Or planned on eating them, I hope. Don't tell me you made noodles just to scry them." (context: we've both got poverty damage. Making food without intending for it to get eaten is a Horrible Thing Done By Horrible People.)

 

HEY FOLKS I made a topic that some of you may be interested in/have stuff to add to! It's about animal ghosts!

 

Today's Crafty Thing: runes on the ends of the new floorboards. I can't reach all of them so I went with an assortment. I feel accomplished!

 

Today in witchy things I am trying: I've been drawing some sigils on the back of my hand/my wrist on particularly bad/alarming days and charging them using, well, clear statements of intention and my my breath.
So I've got, on the back of my hand, anti-anxiety and calmness (particularly sigils for these which I found on tumblr and were drawn to) and on my wrist another sigil from another tumblr to denote agenderness. That one I charged with "goddess help me be secure in who I am", today, though how I charge it varies on what aspect of my id I'm worried about/need help with for the day.
Hopefully, this will all help me get through my class presentation on Darwin's notebooks without too much trouble/yelling at the professor when he inevitably tries to make Darwin's imperialist, racist, and sexist attitudes seem insignificant.