Weekend Recap

Card of the Week, Currently Reading, and Praxis Roots

Ok, so I only planned to post once a week but like I said, I’m a Gemini who always has too many things running through my head. So welcome to my “Weekend Recap” where I chat about some highlights from my weekend and a few other topics. First, let’s pull a card for the week ahead before I dive in!

Card of the Week: 4 of Pentacles

I’m a big fan of pulling a card for the week ahead and seeing how it sprinkles about through the next seven days. Today I’m using the Mushroom Tarot for a little advice for the week ahead.

The 4 of Pentacles won’t leave me alone, it came up for me multiple times last week. In this deck, it speaks about finding a sense of security and creating a strong rooted foundation. This card doesn’t always have to lean towards hoarding or being miserly, it can be a signal that maybe you need to water your own seeds instead of watering the seeds of others… Not that there’s anything wrong with helping out your fellow neighbor, it’s when we stop helping ourselves is when it because a problem.

Even just looking at the imagery on this card, you have two Earthstar fungi on the ground and two floating above, it gives me that “As Above, So Below” type of vibe. It’s searching for that connection while putting down some boundaries while doing so.

Weekend Recap

This weekend wasn’t hugely eventful but my Saturday was pretty full. On Friday our friend came over for dinner and her husband repaired our faucet in the backyard, so no more hauling three 5-gallon buckets of water from the front yard to the back and having to hand water a large garden with a watering can! Woohoo! It made my year, seriously. We’ve gone without water in the backyard since we moved here in 2020.

Saturday was our leaderboard chapter meeting of the Az Native Plant Society. I always look forward to our meetings at our local coffee shop around the corner from our house. My go-to is always a large iced caramel macchiato, unless their iced chai is calling out to me. I spent the rest of the day setting up our newsletter, Instagram account and emailing local members about our upcoming native plant identification walk next Saturday. I run the social media and email accounts for our chapter, but we all spread other tasks around as well. I’m about to kickstart two new things this week: plant of the week and a local plant ID help thread for each week.

Currently Reading

Last week I received a new book in the mail by Lupa Greenwolf and after only 4 pages read, I was completely hooked. The book is called Nature Spirituality from the ground up and it’s written in a way to help you tap into your own bioregion and connect with the plants, fungi and animals in your area. It’s even great for those who live in urban settings.

Already there was a great exercise to do, where you make two columns in your journal or a piece of paper and label each column as “Values” and “Sacred”. You’re asked to write down core things that are important to you, then narrow down that list to your top 10 then narrow down to top 5 and then finally, top 3. I’m doing this today and at the top of my head I have a few “sacred” things to list such as native plants, my own garden, Billy Creek (my favorite local trail), the ravens that greet me with their laugh every morning… etc.

Lupa is a member of the Atheopagan group on FB and I’ve only heard great things about her writing. She has several other books as well and I just ordered her Plant and Fungus Spirits book that I’m beyond excited to dive into next when it arrives.

Psst: There are two versions of this book. The newest printing has a different cover and I didn’t realize that at the time. Oop’s!

Praxis Roots: Native Plant Society

The one question I see pop up a lot in pagan circles and other spiritual groups is “What are ways I can build a foundation in my praxis?” so I’m going to share my foundations or core parts to my Atheopagan praxis under the subtitle “Praxis Roots”.

Earlier this year I joined the Arizona Native Plant Society and helped create our local White Mountain chapter with several others and it’s been growing organically. There are five us on the chapter leaderboard and we’re all great friends who all share one big love, plants. I’ve learned a lot about myself through the plants I meet along the trails and in the parks, as well as through the free classes and plant identification walks we host. Plants are by far the most patient and best teachers I’ve come across. Between being immersed in my bioregion and learning so much about what grows under my feet is my vision of what magic is. This native plant society chapter has shifted into a core foundation in my praxis as an Atheopagan.

There’s a special connection that this chapter has helped me form when it comes to the plant life in my area. When I first moved to the mountains in 2020 after having lived in the Phoenix valley for almost 30 years, I was on sensory overload… in the best way possible. I came across so many plants that I’ve only seen pictures of in books and medicinal guides, it was so much to take in. I wanted to learn everything about my bioregion and the Native Plant Society has helped me do just that.

If you’re looking to deepen your connection to the land, I highly recommend checking out your local Native Plant Society chapter in your area. While you are recommended to become a member, our local chapter offers all classes and plant walks free to the local public since we don’t like to put a paywall when it comes to education.

If you don’t have a NPS chapter near you, reach out to other local nature groups in your area or even join your local community garden! The community aspect of these groups are amazing, you learn so much from one another. I just recently connected with the Arizona Mushroom Society so that I can try and learn more about the fungi in my area.