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Whoo hoo! I can finally share some great news I've been sitting on for a while. (It's a little squished, but still fun.) I'm going to be a cover model!

No, not on the cover of one of my books (although there are folks who think that the picture of Barbara Yager, my first Baba Yaga, looks a bit like me on the cover of Wickedly Dangerous -- yes, my abs look *just* like that...snort). And not on the cover of Time Magazine as Witch of the Year, although really, I'm not sure why not.

Life is uncertain. If you turn on the news, you will be subjected to a constant barrage of All the Horrible Things. But even beyond that, there are always things that can harm us, whether they are acts of nature, acts of man, or just bad luck. There is no way we can keep bad stuff from happening once in a while, but it never hurts to do a little protection work to give yourself and your loved ones a bit of a boost in that direction.

I try to do serious protection work for my house and property at least once a year, in the fall as I am shutting things down and closing up the house for the winter. The coming week, leading up to Samhain on the 31st, is a perfect time for these kinds of rituals and spells (although they will work any time, of course). The darkness is closing in as the days grow shorter, and with the veil becoming thinner, it is always a good idea to reinforce your defenses.

 It is definitely autumn here in upstate NY. The trees are changing color, the garden is dying back, and we had our first frost the other morning. Days are shorter and colder, and I can feel the energy slowing from the hectic pace of summer.

We are in the midst of harvest season now. The Fall Equinox (also known as Mabon, and the 2nd of 3 harvest festivals on the Wiccan Wheel of the Year) is either the 22nd or the 23rd, depending on which calendar you look at. Either way, in most parts of the country, the harvest is in full swing, and most gardens are beginning to slow down as the nights grow cooler and the days grow shorter.

One of my favorite things to harvest at this time of year are herbs, so I've going to do a short series on a few of the ones I use the most. I tend to grow herbs that have multiple purposes: culinary, medicinal, and/or magical. Many herbs fall under this category, and they often have lovely flowers that attract bees and other beneficial insects. They're usually easy to grow, and you can harvest smaller pieces all through the growing season simply by snipping off the amount you need.

 As some of you know, I have written a series (a novella and two novels so far) about an updated version of the Baba Yaga tales. The novella came out recently, and the first book will be released on September 2^nd. But not everyone is familiar with Baba Yaga, so I thought I would introduce her to you. Here—let me fill up the samovar with tea, and we call gather around the hearth fire while I tell you a story…

Most people are familiar with the standard fairy tales (many of which were written down by the Brothers Grimm, and then prettied up into the versions we know today…the earlier stories were, well, grim). You know Snow White, and Sleeping Beauty, and Cinderella, of course. But when I set out to write an updated fairy tale, I wanted to use a story that hadn’t been done quite so many times. There are some fabulous modern rewrites of all those classics, as well as things like Beauty and the Beast, but I wanted something completely different. I wanted, as it turned out, Baba Yaga.

As you probably already know, the full moon this Sunday (August 10th) is going to be what they call a "Supermoon." A Supermoon occurs when a full moon coincides with the time in the moon's orbit when it is closest to the Earth. This makes for a full moon that looks larger than usual--and the one this coming Sunday is going to be that biggest Supermoon this year.

Beyond the fact that it will be pretty glorious to look upon, you might wonder if a Supermoon is more powerful for doing magical work than any old regular full moon. I'm going to go with: yes.