September 11, 2025 • 35 mins
Cawnawyn Mor interviews Aura, an experienced birth doula and devout Pagan mother from Tacoma, Washington. Aura shares her personal journey with Paganism, how she integrates her beliefs into raising her children, and the importance of rituals and deities in her family's life. They discuss practical ways for Pagan parents to navigate spirituality with their children and how to handle societal perceptions. Aura also offers advice for new moms on balancing spirituality with the demands of motherhood. Stay tuned for part two (Oct. 2025), where Aura delves into her work as a doula and supporting mothers through childbirth with Pagan spirituality.
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00:00 Welcome to Stars and Sprouts
00:30 Meet Aura: A Pagan Birth Doula
01:04 Aura's Journey into Paganism
04:05 Parenting with Pagan Beliefs
07:11 Creating a Pagan Family Culture
17:53 Navigating Paganism in a Non-Pagan World
21:43 Advice for New Pagan Parents
25:20 Resources for Pagan Parenting
33:28 Conclusion and Upcoming Episode
Stay tuned for educational episodes every three weeks, alternating between celebrations of Sabbats and enriching interviews with industry professionals.
Questions, comments, and suggestions can be addressed to starsandsproutspodcast@gmail.com.
Follow Cawnawyn on Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok @cawnawynmor for more music, astrology, and witchcraft. Astrology classes, new podcast episodes, the Dark Moon Chronicle Blog, and music releases on cawnawynmor.com.
Music by C. A. Worden ©️ Smashing Ivory Productions LLC 2025 Violin - Jean-Philippe de Passos (via Musiversal)
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Welcome to Stars and Sprouts,a Pagan parenting podcast
where magic meets motherhood.
I'm your host, Cawnawyn Mor, here toexplore the sacred, the cyclical, and
the soulful path of raising childrenin rhythm with the earth and stars.
(00:30):
Today we have a special episode withour guest, Aura, a dear friend of
mine, and experienced birth doulawho shares a wealth of insights from
her journey as a devout pagan livingin the Tacoma, Washington area.
Throughout this two part episode, wewill explore how she integrates her pagan
beliefs into nurturing her children,the rituals, shaping her parenting
journey, and the wisdom she offersfellow pagan mothers preparing for birth.
(00:52):
It is so great to have you here, Aura,and we're gonna dive into all things
that make up this colorful journeyof motherhood, which, how many years
now have you been on this journey?
Thank you so much.
16 years now.
So let's dive into first yourjourney of paganism, witchcraft and
spirituality, how has it startedfor you and when did it start?
How, how has it been going?
(01:13):
How's it going for you being a witch?
Well, right now it's going great.
I am really loving where I am inmy life and where I am in my craft.
As far as how long I've been on thisjourney, I would say ever since I
fully understood what religion wasI have considered myself pagan.
My mom raised me pagan, but it wasmostly kind of under the table pagan.
(01:38):
She had us go to a Catholic churchbecause she believed that Catholicism
was the closest thing to Paganism.
That's hilarious.
Which, I mean, you've got the incense,you've got the goddess worship, you've
got like all the saints and everything.
So she felt like we would fit in there.
And this was in the early nineties,so there certainly wasn't any
(02:00):
pagan covens or anything likethat for us to attend at the time.
And we were limited to whatwas in our neighborhood.
When I was in about thirdgrade, my class did a mythology
lesson on Egyptian mythology.
I just immediately connected withthe gods that my teacher was talking
(02:20):
about, and she was referring to themas if they were made up stories.
But I immediately started substitutingthe names for the deities into my Catholic
prayers in my head, and felt like adeep connection to the goddess Isis and
Bast both and got a statue of Bast inmy room and a statue of Isis, and that
(02:43):
was kind of, I just took off from there.
Are there any other Pantheons ordeities or other forms of pagan worship
that you dove into along the way?
Over the years, it's definitely increased.
It was just them for a long time andthen when I was around 16, Pan showed
up and by showed up, I mean like heliterally kind of just showed up.
Oh my God, isn't that so Pan?
(03:05):
I guess I did technically invitehim, but then he just never left.
I asked him for a favor duringa spell, and I don't know why I
thought to call on Pan, but forsome reason that was my thought.
Even though before then I had neverreally called on deities in my spell work.
He came through in a big wayand I have enjoyed a interesting
(03:27):
relationship with him.
There have been other deities thatdidn't answer that were very much
like, Nope, we're not interestedin working with you, Aphrodite.
Yeah.
She was the one who was like, no, we're,I'm not interested in working with you.
Oh my.
It was very clear to me, you know, youdon't love everybody you meet right away.
So I'm not that surprisedthat they wouldn't all wanna
work with little old me.
(03:48):
You know i'm sure it's likeyou have work that you're doing
with these other deities, right.
And so seeing like, okay, she's on thispath that's not going to intersect with
a path of working with me right now.
I don't think that I had anythingthat she was able to help with
or that she was interested in,so that just wasn't my path.
But later when I became a mother.
(04:08):
I had my son, my studies and my magickind of went by the wayside for a while
because I was a mom and I was dealing witha new baby and other than praying, when I
started labor, I did pray to the goddessBast because she is the goddess of mothers
children's and parades interestinglyenough, she's also a party goddess, but
(04:31):
it's not in the same way of like Pan.
It's more in the way of like, we cancelebrate together as a family and we
shouldn't all just be moping around.
So I did call out to her but duringmy years when my children were young,
I was just deep into motherhood anddidn't get to explore quite as much, so
(04:53):
I just stuck with my deities that I had.
Later on, Pele came through reallystrongly and interestingly not through me.
I did not call her or think about her.
But I had two very close people to me oneof them was my mother who came to me and
said, Pele really wants to work with you.
You need to connect with her.
(05:14):
I set her up a space on myaltar with Bast and Isis.
Pan, of course, has a space outsidebecause that is where he prefers to be.
And the ladies don't wanna sharea space with a wild goat man.
So I wanted to join a coven.
That, for me, was like the nextstep on my spiritual journey.
And it took me a while becauseI, I had little kids, so I
(05:36):
couldn't just join a coven.
I actually, I had to waittill my kids were older.
Because I didn't have any kind ofreliable babysitting and my husband
wanted to join the coven with me.
He, in his words, to make sure that theyweren't scary, creepy people eventually
settled on one coven, and my mom was ableto watch the kids, so I was able to join
(05:56):
them for a while, and that did improvemy spiritual awareness, not because they
had us doing things that were spirituallyimportant, but because I realized
the gaps in my knowledge and starteddiving into my own knowledge even more.
I started reading like the ChristopherPenza started meditating and doing all
(06:17):
these other things that I had neverdone before, and things got really
deep and that was very exciting.
And then later I leftand created my own coven.
You lead your own covennow, which is amazing.
Yeah, so I call myself the high hostess.
We do not practice a hierarchicalstyle of coven magic.
(06:37):
We're eclectic.
I believe that we do much betterwhen we're all working together.
When we're on the same level.
Nobody is elevated above any one person.
At least that's been my personalexperience and it's been a
really beautiful, we've beentogether now for three years.
My mom and I decidedto create it together.
(06:58):
We have eight members right now, andthe ladies who are with us have been,
you know, various ages, various skilllevels, but we all have such a great time.
It's been just an amazing experience.
So how do you intersect your Paganbeliefs and your religion with
parenting and being a mother?
I can't take those two things apartbecause I am very deeply pagan and
(07:23):
I have spiritual experiences, andI just could never even conceive
of like separating the two.
When I became pregnant with my son,like I knew right away I could feel that
he had this like very earthy energy.
When I was going into labor with him,of course, I called out to my deities
to be there for me and please makesure that this birth goes well, which
(07:48):
I'm so glad I felt their energy whenI was getting ready to start pushing.
I was really, really tired.
It had been a long, long labor and Iwas like, oh, I think I'm ready to quit.
And I heard them say, Nope, nope.
You've got more work to do.
You need to suck it up.
We'll help you with the energyand you can get this done.
(08:10):
And thankfully he was able to be born.
And when he was born, even though Ididn't have time for like big rituals
or anything like that, I knew from thebeginning that I wanted to incorporate
a pagan lifestyle for him so that hewould have some culture of his own.
While my mom was really pagan andcertainly communicated ideas to
(08:34):
me and her beliefs, we never didanything pagan together growing up.
We just celebrated the standardholidays and that was the end of that.
My mom and I are really closeand she was working like so much
and commuting and I don't knowhow she would've even done that.
So I have nothing against her.
She was doing the very best that she couldand I had a great childhood, but for my
(08:56):
kids I was a stay at home mom and I reallywanted to incorporate at least a little
bit of the Pagan holidays with them.
I was like taking them out on nature walksand talking to them about the Earth as
kind of a living being rather than justbeing like this rock that we live on.
They even went to Nature Preschool,which is the closest thing at
(09:17):
the time to Pagan preschool.
It was not a religious preschool at all,but it was very much nature based play.
And my husband and I were so happythey were able to get that start and
really understand from a young agethe importance of being careful with
nature and of also just being out init, like it makes you feel better.
(09:39):
And then when they were a littlebit older, I would start having them
do little rituals with me and byrituals I mean like five minutes.
Mm-hmm.
I'm not talking like complex,like we might be in a circle and
we call out the elements and thenwe'd put our hands up and say, yay.
And then that was it.
Oh, that's so good.
(09:59):
Like I just wanted to get themunderstanding the concept of like
sometimes we gather in order tocelebrate nature, to celebrate the gods.
I didn't really talk that muchabout the gods with them, but
I did mention it sometimes.
I might point out a statue.
I like to read their stories to them.
We'd watch things on TV and you know,when we were watching stories like Frozen
(10:23):
or Moana, like I would point out like,oh, there's this goddess and there's
that and one of my favorite princessstories is the princess and the frog.
That's my favorite.
And I love how like they show thatyou mess around with these like evil
deities and then he gets in trouble.
But there's also magic that's beneficial,like the lady who lives in the swamp.
(10:46):
Mm-hmm.
She's not evil, even though shelooks a little bit creepy, but she's
actually like this magical wise woman.
Totally.
And so I loved being able to likepoint out the differences in that
for the kids and they just ate it up.
There are some things that I did a littlecontroversially, according to my friends.
(11:06):
We did not do Santa Claus, you wouldnot believe how controversial that
is when you have little kids andyou decide not to do Santa Claus.
And the reason why I didn't wanna dothat is because I actually do believe
in the Faye and these gods and goddessesand spirits and things like that.
So it seemed weird to me to make oneup and then to blame everything on him
(11:28):
and then to later when they're older,be like, I was just lying to you.
Right.
Because then like how are my kidsgonna believe me on the other things
that I really do truly believe exists?
And then they're gonna belike, mom's this ridiculous.
But we would do a dark party on Yuleevery year and it was so much fun.
(11:50):
We adjust it to the age of the child,of course, like when my kids were
really little, it was very, very simple.
We'd just put on some music,danced around the living room.
I'd have candles everywhere.
We wouldn't have any lights on.
That's why we call it a darkparty, just the candles.
And of course we use electric candles,especially when the kids were little
so they don't burn the house down.
(12:11):
And we'd have the tree lit up theyule tree so that it was just a
really beautiful, dark ambiance.
And then we'd have cookies and a story.
We'd read the story of the Yule fairies,which is online, and then I would tuck
them into bed and that would be that.
And over the years it got a little bitmore complicated, but not very much.
(12:34):
We've always just kept it really simple.
It's just family annualwith our little dark party.
Now that they're older, I would usuallydo like tarot card readings with them.
Mm-hmm.
Because they don't.
So much care about hearing storiesabout the Yule fairy, although
sometimes they get nostalgicand want me to read it to them.
But it was just a beautiful memoryevery year to do, and to me, a
(12:57):
more poignant than Christmas.
What we would do for Christmas, becausewe do have family that's not Pagan, is we
would just open presents, like Christmasto us was a very secular holiday.
Mm-hmm.
Open presents, hang out with somefamily and that was the end of that.
But Yule, I wanted to kindaseparate it from presents.
Sometimes I'd give the kids homemadepresents on that day, but they knew they
(13:18):
weren't gonna get like a bunch of toys andknickknacks and whatever else they wanted.
On Samhain, we like topractice the ancestor meal.
Now, of course, Samhain, mykids wanna go trick or treating,
which yes, of course we do that.
Yes.
For sure.
So when, I mean like ancestor meal, I'mtalking really, really quick and small.
(13:42):
Like the key is with kids, yougotta adjust your expectations.
Totally.
So I would tell a few storiesabout some people who passed before
they were really aware of it.
Some people from our family, and thenwe would generally have like a cup
and a food set out for the ancestorsand then they would go off and do
their trick or treating and you thinkthat they're not paying attention.
(14:04):
But I swear later onthese things come back up.
Mm-hmm.
And that was another thing, pointing outmovies like Coco and the Book of Life.
I would say, look, theyalso do what we do.
They pay attention to theirancestors around this time of year.
They just call it something differentand look at the ancestors have this
afterlife and if they're paid attentionto, then they can kind of help the
(14:28):
characters in the movie and you know,just pointing out those similarities.
It gave them a deeper understanding.
Thank you.
Disney.
You know, I was gonna say, it's sogreat, there are so many current day
forms of media that we can draw onand use as like a great visual now.
Because I know when we weregrowing up, you had like.
You know, the Craft, which you couldkind of stretch a little bit and
(14:50):
be like, this is similar to a partof religion, but let's maybe not
show this to our young kids, right?
Where now it's like these very clear,family friendly examples that you can sh
use as like a cornerstone of your faith.
Okay, so we have these supportive mediaexamples, which have been great for you.
As you're rearing your kids, arethere any other specific deities or
(15:10):
practices or energies that you alsofind supportive as your role as a
parent, as you're working with them?
Well, as I mentioned before, Bast forme has been very much a constant in my
life because she is this like goddessof mothers and children specifically.
I felt like she's been veryprotective of our family.
Also, the ancestors, like I can'tunderstate how much they really, at
(15:36):
least in my family, want to help.
Like they are your ancestors.
Like they care about your kidsbecause they are their ancestors.
And so I have called upon theirhelp many times and prayed to them.
You don't wanna just always pray to them.
You wanna tell 'em what's going on too.
You treat the ancestorslike you would a grandma.
(15:57):
You don't just show up at grandma's houseand ask her to do things constantly.
You sit down, you have somecookies, you drink some tea.
You tell her what's going on, andthen maybe you could ask for help.
And that's how I treat the ancestors, andthey've been so, so helpful in showing
me some really deep insights about mychildren that have helped me understand
(16:21):
some of the challenging situationsthat I've had to deal with as a parent.
And I've always told my kids too,that they can, if they want to,
they can reach out to differentdeities and see if they answer back.
I also told them though, if theydon't answer back, if you don't hear
anything, don't work with that deity.
I'm not one of those people that's willingto work with a cold and distant God.
(16:45):
That's just not interesting to me.
You know, I feel like we can applythose same rules to like rules
and relationships with people too.
Like it's all one big lesson here,and I love how you really solidify
these holidays and then you're veryopen and free about letting them
pursue whatever path they want.
You know, you're, you're justthere to guide them or maybe point
them in the right direction, butthere's no pushing your kids.
(17:09):
I feel like I'm alwaystaking notes from you also.
I'm like, wait, how are you doing this?
And you know, it's.
It's helped, I'll be honest tohear that at the beginning for you.
Because that's, you know, where I amstill in my own journey, it's okay to
just kind of focus on prayer, right?
Yeah.
Like when they're little, maybe somethinglike egg dying or something that's kind
of fun and appropriate for little ones,but just like with every single project
(17:33):
that you're doing with a little one anykind of project, expect mess, expect them
to have about five minutes of attentionand then wanna move on to something else.
Unless you have like a really focusedchild, sometimes they're really
into it and they surprise you.
But most of the time I set myexpectations really low and
it's like, oh, that was fun.
Now we're moving on.
So I wanted to ask, how do you navigatesharing your beliefs with others who
(17:57):
may not understand or share your Paganpractices and may even have like an
aversion to them in our community?
What's interesting is when we movedinto this recent house, I was able
to set up a permanent altar, which Iloved, but then I realized now you're
really out in front of anybody who comesover this house is gonna see like your
altar, your deities, everything's there.
It's actually right nextto the dining room table.
(18:19):
So even at like Thanksgiving,they're gonna see it.
And what I practice is just the wholeidea of if they ask about it, I'm
gonna be totally honest and open.
If they don't ask about it,I'm not gonna talk about it.
Kind of a don't ask, don'ttell sort of a thing.
But if they do ask, and some of my friendshave asked, some of them knew me for
years without knowing that I was Pagan.
(18:41):
And then they were like, oh, I seethat you have these deities over here.
What's up with that?
And I was happy to explain it to themand they said, oh, okay, that's great.
And now they know andit's never been an issue.
I am very blessed that I livein the Pacific Northwest and
we are really chill over here.
We pretty much accept most anything,as long as it's not hurting anybody.
(19:06):
So I am very grateful that I do live in aplace where it is safe for me to do that,
but I haven't had any issues with it.
With my kids, they didn'treally talk about it.
My son never spoke about it.
He somehow got this idea that everythingneeds to be a secret, which I have
a feeling as just his personality.
(19:27):
I never told him that we need tobe secretive about what we do.
My daughter would actually, there wasone time when she was probably four or
five, and she was staying the night overat her grandparents' house and she wanted
to bring her mini altar that she created.
She had created an altar out ofa piece of cardboard and had put
like little stones and drawn on it.
(19:49):
And she said, this is my altar.
Oh my God.
And she wanted to bring it withher when she went to their house.
And I had to stop myself becausepart of me was like, oh no, we
don't like take those things out.
But I realized to her thisis like a form of play.
Yeah.
And it should be.
And why should I tell hernot to bring that out?
(20:12):
Just because my in-laws might beslightly uncomfortable with it.
They never said anything about it.
And that was the end of that.
We do occasionally run into situationswhere my kids don't understand
generic cultural biblical references.
'cause they just don't, they didn'tgrow up hearing those stories.
They do not know the story of Noah and theArc. They don't know about Adam and Eve.
(20:35):
They don't know those becauseI just never brought them up.
They're not interesting to me.
It wasn't that I hid them fromthem, but it never came up on their
shows or what they were watching.
Later on, we were watchingsomething on tv, a show where
there was an Adam and Eve scene.
In the very beginning of it, they justkind of went into it that there were
(20:55):
naked people in a garden and they weretalking to a snake and there was an
apple, and my kids were so confused.
They were like, mom, what are we watching?
They were scandalized and like I hadto pause the show and explain to them.
And they were like, thatis such a weird story.
(21:17):
And they were like, why arethey talking to a snake?
Yeah.
And what's the big deal about this apple?
And the biggest thingwas that they were naked.
Like that was like
scandalous,
super scandalous to my kids.
So even though it was funny 'causethey're pagan, but they decided to
be prude very early on and they werethe ones who told, my husband and I,
they were like, we're gonna shut thedoor, we gonna go to the bathroom and
(21:38):
there's no more nakedness in this house.
And so my husband and Iwere like, oh, okay, fine.
So, do you have any advice for, youknow, us young moms that just passed
from the maiden into the motherhood era?
I think my biggestadvice would be to relax.
I, so I guess maybe this is a blessing.
Pinterest and Instagram and allof that wasn't really a thing
(22:01):
when I was having my kids.
So I had no framework for likethis beautiful scripted parenthood
that apparently people areshowing now all the time online.
And I do see it, like I'm not completelyblind to it, but I also think it's
a bunch of nonsense for most of us.
I mean, if you want to do thosekind of big, beautiful grand things
(22:24):
and take pictures of it, likeabsolutely, if that feeds your soul.
But I would say please, please be easy onyourself and if you want to do something
by yourself don't think you have toinclude your kids in on everything.
I actually do most ofmy ritual work alone.
That's my preference.
I either do it with mycoven or I do it alone.
(22:45):
I just, I don't feel comfortable havingmy kids or even my husband, like there
when I'm doing deep ritual work and Idon't find it because I'm an introvert I
do need that time to kind of decompress.
So when your kids are reallyyoung, you wanna just make
time for your mental health.
And if that means putting everythingto the side for a few years,
(23:08):
there is nothing wrong with that.
It'll come back you,you can come back to it.
Your tarot cards are not gonna explode.
The covens you may or may not have wantedto join If they're not in existence
in a couple of years, they probablyweren't that great to begin with.
So it is totally fine to justput a pin in it for a while.
But if you do want to do somethingmetaphysical, there's nothing
(23:31):
wrong with doing it by yourselfif that's how you prefer to do it,
and if you do wanna include yourchildren, please do, do not feel like
you're forcing them to do anything.
They will not do it if they don't want to,
right.
At least that's been my experience.
If you have to meditate while you'rein the shower, because that's the only
time that everybody leaves you alone.
(23:51):
That's also fine.
Yeah, like having the grace aroundit's okay to set my religion
aside for a moment while you'rekind of in this survival mode.
I think what's helpful to realizetoo, and now with a little bit of time
I see this, but also talking to youand talking to other parents of older
kids, it's like you do get time back.
In a way it becomes a little easier tohave a shower where you're not watching
(24:14):
an infant at the same time when there'sno one to help you and you're just
like, okay, well I gotta get clean.
You know?
So I've been finding that I havethese pockets of private time that are
coming back, and I think it's worthremembering even now where I'm at I'm
really starting to see these glimmersof actual opportunity where I'm able
to go out with friends and go to aritual, and I don't have to be the one
(24:35):
running it, you know, necessarily, butI can actually participate further in
my religious activities when I want to,when I have the capacity to, and those
opportunities are coming up for me more.
But it really just takes time becausethose really, really young infant
years, I feel like for me personally,I really struggled with this is
how it's gonna be forever and it.
(24:57):
It's so not, but it just, it goes so fast.
But I know that having just beenin that feeling, it felt like, when
will I ever get the chance again?
So I also just wanna encourageanybody out there listening who's
a new parent, like it will come.
If you're at the very beginningof this journey, you will find the
time and allowing yourself, justlike the five minutes of grace in
this survival mode is so important.
(25:20):
So I wanna just sort of wrap this upwith like, do you have any resources
or recommendations for Pagan parentsin terms of books or websites or blogs
and anything you've used to deepen thespiritual connection for your children
and with your children as they're growing?
There's quite a few that I puttogether over the years, but many
of them maybe weren't like intendedspecifically for Pagan parents.
(25:41):
We used to go, to be honest, like wespent a lot of time at the library
when the kids were young, and I lovedpicking up the books on mythology.
Like I said, the ones that were funstories to me gave the kids a way
to introduce them to these deities,to their general personality.
Not saying that I take those storiesliterally, but it does often give us
kernels of their personality and injust a fun way that they could enjoy.
(26:06):
And then of course, moviesand Disney, but I loved Pooka
pages, which is generally free.
I think they have a book now throughAmazon that you can get, and it has every
single Sabbat, they come out with likea story and then there's a little like
game and there's some ideas for a ritualand it's aimed at youngish children.
(26:29):
Not super young, but likeelementary school age children.
And my kids did enjoy reading thePooka pages for the different Sabbats.
That was fun.
And it was a free resource, whichwas awesome, especially at the time.
And then mostly just enjoying theSabbats and making them your own.
The Circle round bookthat I told you about.
(26:50):
Yes.
We Love,
which I read.
It's wonderful.
Yeah, that was fun.
And the music that wentwith it was really fun.
We love to go to like pagan camp outsand stuff like that, so if you have
them in your area and they're all overthe country, so I know that they're in
like Britain and UK and some places too.
So if you find those, manyof them are child friendly.
(27:12):
And I would encourage you if your kidsaren't too young and don't get up too
early in the morning, 'cause we hadto put off camping for a few years.
Once we were able to bring them backcamping when they were around five years
old, five and three, then it was amazing.
It was so much fun to like just havethem play with other Pagan kids,
like there was activities, even ifit's really unorganized, you're still
(27:34):
camping and you're just out therewith other people who are also pagan,
and the kids can talk about thingsthat they may not feel comfortable
talking about with regular kids.
It was just such a blessing, even thoughit was never a consistent group of people.
It was nice to just go be withthose people for a little while.
And remember that I'm notthe only Pagan family.
(27:55):
Right.
In the entire universe.
And also along the same vein, whatare your hopes for the Pagan parenting
community as a whole and our future?
I really do hope, my biggest hopeis that at least when my kids were
young and I spoke to a lot of otherPagan parents, they told me that
they were not going to tell theirkids anything about religion at all.
(28:16):
And they weren't gonna share any oftheir practices or beliefs or anything.
And I really hope that that is changing.
'cause even at the time.
My mom has a saying, and I reallyalways felt like this was true.
She said, if you have no religion, shesaid you're more likely later on to
convert to something that's extremebecause you're kind of a sitting duck.
(28:41):
You have like nothing.
If you're just this emptyvessel of nothing, then anybody
can go along and fill it up.
I just believe that that's such adisservice to not share anything
about what you believe with yourchildren, they're not going to take
everything you say and run with it.
Some kids may for a while, but manytimes they will come to their own
(29:04):
beliefs and their own conclusions, andmost of us pagans are fine with that.
I don't know any that are not,and the truth is their child's
being influenced all the time,and yet they're still themselves.
Like I am a person who is, you know,cisgendered and I'm in a monogamous
relationship with my husband.
Does that mean that my childrenare gonna automatically grow
(29:26):
up and do that themselves?
No.
Like, but I'm not gonna hidemy relationship from them.
I don't tell them that that's what theyhave to do, but it's just how I live.
I also dress in vintage clothing.
Do my kids dress in vintageclothing now that they're teenagers?
No, not at all.
Just share what you'redoing with your kids.
Even if you never do a ritual with'em, you don't have to, that's fine.
(29:50):
But if you're doing tarot byyourself or something and they
come up upon you, you know?
Tell 'em what's going on, at leastwhatever it is that you believe.
If you are just earth-based, if youbelieve in nothing, if you believe that
Gods are just archetypes, that's fine too.
Just tell them.
Tell them what you believe sothat they can think about it.
That's part of our job as parents, is toeducate our kids, and by educate, I don't
(30:14):
mean make them think something, but Iwant them to be at least exposed to it.
I want to expose them to my paganismso that they know that that is a thing,
and then they can go out in the worldand expose themselves to other things
and decide what they think about it.
So far, both of my kids are stillpagan, but they are very different
pagan than me and it's fine.
(30:36):
Well, thank you so much, Aura.
How can people find out more aboutyou, about Wildroot Coven, as
well as I wanted to highlight yourbeautiful work, which I've used
every year now from Wildroot Press.
Where can people find you?
I am not that great about updating myInstagram page, but we are on Instagram at
Wildroot Coven and I also have a website,www.wildrootcoven.com, and that's where
(31:00):
you will find out more about my coven.
It is located in Tacoma, Washington,and we are a local coven.
We don't do anything online, butI always welcome any questions if
you have questions about Paganismor pagan parenting or if you wanna
know about starting your own coven.
I also encourage people to do that.
I am not all about that gatekeepernonsense about only this or
(31:24):
that degree can start a coven.
I just think that that'sa load of nonsense.
If you want to and have any questions, Iam happy to sit down and talk with you.
I also have my planner, theWorking Witches Planner,
which is available on Amazon.
My planner is for witches who have abusy lifestyle and cannot be confined
(31:48):
to the teeny weeny little witchplanners that are mostly on the market.
I needed a planner that didn't havetiny little boxes to write my life
into, because I have teenagers, I havea husband, I have multiple businesses.
I cannot fit my life into aone by one box in a calendar.
(32:11):
So I created my planner because I alsowanted to have a space for tarot spreads.
I have monthly tarot spreads inthere, there's some basic astrology.
It notes the full moons,the new moons, the eclipses.
But it's large enough that you canwrite in everything you need to write.
There's like to-do lists on the side.
(32:33):
There's a habit tracker.
It's made for practical witches,but the practical witches
planner was already taken.
Personally, I loveworking with your planner.
It is so great.
I love that it's got theastrology right there.
I've totally used it to likeplan out my whole week and I
love how much room you provide.
That's so nice but it's not overwhelming.
(32:55):
Right.
I I really appreciate that itI don't feel like pressured
into doing like a daily tarot.
Not that I think other planners aredoing that, but just it feels very
practical, like you said, like I canfit it into my day to work with this
and it's a useful tool as well askind of like a meditative spiritual
guide for me where I can just kind oftap back into that world as a parent
(33:16):
and feel like connected to something.
Bigger than just likewhat my to-do list is.
I'm also keeping these things in mind'cause we're well-rounded, full people and
so anyway, I just, I so appreciate yourplanner and I wanted to highlight that.
So Aura, it has been lovely talking withyou this afternoon about all things pagan
parenting, as well as Wildroot Coven.
But I'm so excited to say in our nextepisode, we're gonna dive into your work
(33:38):
as a doula in the Tacoma, Washington area.
So for any of you out there whoare new mothers, or going to be new
mothers, or even just thinking aboutbecoming a Pagan parent right now,
or also fathers listening partnerslistening, significant others listening,
whoever out there is listening.
I cannot wait for you guys to hear Aura'sfabulous insights into all things into
the world of being a doula, childbirth.
(33:59):
What an incredible passage oftransformation this is that we all go
through when we're having children.
It's amazing.
It's profound.
So join us for part two.
We're gonna shift our focus to her roleas a doula and explore how Aura channels
her pagan spirituality into her supportfor mothers through childbirth, as well as
birth partners and the whole family.
(34:21):
So stay tuned as we continuethis enriching conversation.
Thank you so much for joining me onthis episode of Stars and Sprouts.
New episodes Bloom with the wheel, everySabbat and in between to explore more of
my music, astrology and magic and morevisit cawnawynmor.com and until next time,
keep growing wild rooted and radiant.
Welcome to Stars and Sprouts,a Pagan parenting podcast
where magic meets motherhood.
I'm your host, Cawnawyn Mor, here toexplore the sacred, the cyclical, and
the soulful path of raising childrenin rhythm with the earth and stars.
(00:30):
Today we have a special episode withour guest, Aura, a dear friend of
mine, and experienced birth doulawho shares a wealth of insights from
her journey as a devout pagan livingin the Tacoma, Washington area.
Throughout this two part episode, wewill explore how she integrates her pagan
beliefs into nurturing her children,the rituals, shaping her parenting
journey, and the wisdom she offersfellow pagan mothers preparing for birth.
(00:52):
It is so great to have you here, Aura,and we're gonna dive into all things
that make up this colorful journeyof motherhood, which, how many years
now have you been on this journey?
Thank you so much.
16 years now.
So let's dive into first yourjourney of paganism, witchcraft and
spirituality, how has it startedfor you and when did it start?
How, how has it been going?
(01:13):
How's it going for you being a witch?
Well, right now it's going great.
I am really loving where I am inmy life and where I am in my craft.
As far as how long I've been on thisjourney, I would say ever since I
fully understood what religion wasI have considered myself pagan.
My mom raised me pagan, but it wasmostly kind of under the table pagan.
(01:38):
She had us go to a Catholic churchbecause she believed that Catholicism
was the closest thing to Paganism.
That's hilarious.
Which, I mean, you've got the incense,you've got the goddess worship, you've
got like all the saints and everything.
So she felt like we would fit in there.
And this was in the early nineties,so there certainly wasn't any
(02:00):
pagan covens or anything likethat for us to attend at the time.
And we were limited to whatwas in our neighborhood.
When I was in about thirdgrade, my class did a mythology
lesson on Egyptian mythology.
I just immediately connected withthe gods that my teacher was talking
(02:20):
about, and she was referring to themas if they were made up stories.
But I immediately started substitutingthe names for the deities into my Catholic
prayers in my head, and felt like adeep connection to the goddess Isis and
Bast both and got a statue of Bast inmy room and a statue of Isis, and that
(02:43):
was kind of, I just took off from there.
Are there any other Pantheons ordeities or other forms of pagan worship
that you dove into along the way?
Over the years, it's definitely increased.
It was just them for a long time andthen when I was around 16, Pan showed
up and by showed up, I mean like heliterally kind of just showed up.
Oh my God, isn't that so Pan?
(03:05):
I guess I did technically invitehim, but then he just never left.
I asked him for a favor duringa spell, and I don't know why I
thought to call on Pan, but forsome reason that was my thought.
Even though before then I had neverreally called on deities in my spell work.
He came through in a big wayand I have enjoyed a interesting
(03:27):
relationship with him.
There have been other deities thatdidn't answer that were very much
like, Nope, we're not interestedin working with you, Aphrodite.
Yeah.
She was the one who was like, no, we're,I'm not interested in working with you.
Oh my.
It was very clear to me, you know, youdon't love everybody you meet right away.
So I'm not that surprisedthat they wouldn't all wanna
work with little old me.
(03:48):
You know i'm sure it's likeyou have work that you're doing
with these other deities, right.
And so seeing like, okay, she's on thispath that's not going to intersect with
a path of working with me right now.
I don't think that I had anythingthat she was able to help with
or that she was interested in,so that just wasn't my path.
But later when I became a mother.
(04:08):
I had my son, my studies and my magickind of went by the wayside for a while
because I was a mom and I was dealing witha new baby and other than praying, when I
started labor, I did pray to the goddessBast because she is the goddess of mothers
children's and parades interestinglyenough, she's also a party goddess, but
(04:31):
it's not in the same way of like Pan.
It's more in the way of like, we cancelebrate together as a family and we
shouldn't all just be moping around.
So I did call out to her but duringmy years when my children were young,
I was just deep into motherhood anddidn't get to explore quite as much, so
(04:53):
I just stuck with my deities that I had.
Later on, Pele came through reallystrongly and interestingly not through me.
I did not call her or think about her.
But I had two very close people to me oneof them was my mother who came to me and
said, Pele really wants to work with you.
You need to connect with her.
(05:14):
I set her up a space on myaltar with Bast and Isis.
Pan, of course, has a space outsidebecause that is where he prefers to be.
And the ladies don't wanna sharea space with a wild goat man.
So I wanted to join a coven.
That, for me, was like the nextstep on my spiritual journey.
And it took me a while becauseI, I had little kids, so I
(05:36):
couldn't just join a coven.
I actually, I had to waittill my kids were older.
Because I didn't have any kind ofreliable babysitting and my husband
wanted to join the coven with me.
He, in his words, to make sure that theyweren't scary, creepy people eventually
settled on one coven, and my mom was ableto watch the kids, so I was able to join
(05:56):
them for a while, and that did improvemy spiritual awareness, not because they
had us doing things that were spirituallyimportant, but because I realized
the gaps in my knowledge and starteddiving into my own knowledge even more.
I started reading like the ChristopherPenza started meditating and doing all
(06:17):
these other things that I had neverdone before, and things got really
deep and that was very exciting.
And then later I leftand created my own coven.
You lead your own covennow, which is amazing.
Yeah, so I call myself the high hostess.
We do not practice a hierarchicalstyle of coven magic.
(06:37):
We're eclectic.
I believe that we do much betterwhen we're all working together.
When we're on the same level.
Nobody is elevated above any one person.
At least that's been my personalexperience and it's been a
really beautiful, we've beentogether now for three years.
My mom and I decidedto create it together.
(06:58):
We have eight members right now, andthe ladies who are with us have been,
you know, various ages, various skilllevels, but we all have such a great time.
It's been just an amazing experience.
So how do you intersect your Paganbeliefs and your religion with
parenting and being a mother?
I can't take those two things apartbecause I am very deeply pagan and
(07:23):
I have spiritual experiences, andI just could never even conceive
of like separating the two.
When I became pregnant with my son,like I knew right away I could feel that
he had this like very earthy energy.
When I was going into labor with him,of course, I called out to my deities
to be there for me and please makesure that this birth goes well, which
(07:48):
I'm so glad I felt their energy whenI was getting ready to start pushing.
I was really, really tired.
It had been a long, long labor and Iwas like, oh, I think I'm ready to quit.
And I heard them say, Nope, nope.
You've got more work to do.
You need to suck it up.
We'll help you with the energyand you can get this done.
(08:10):
And thankfully he was able to be born.
And when he was born, even though Ididn't have time for like big rituals
or anything like that, I knew from thebeginning that I wanted to incorporate
a pagan lifestyle for him so that hewould have some culture of his own.
While my mom was really pagan andcertainly communicated ideas to
(08:34):
me and her beliefs, we never didanything pagan together growing up.
We just celebrated the standardholidays and that was the end of that.
My mom and I are really closeand she was working like so much
and commuting and I don't knowhow she would've even done that.
So I have nothing against her.
She was doing the very best that she couldand I had a great childhood, but for my
(08:56):
kids I was a stay at home mom and I reallywanted to incorporate at least a little
bit of the Pagan holidays with them.
I was like taking them out on nature walksand talking to them about the Earth as
kind of a living being rather than justbeing like this rock that we live on.
They even went to Nature Preschool,which is the closest thing at
(09:17):
the time to Pagan preschool.
It was not a religious preschool at all,but it was very much nature based play.
And my husband and I were so happythey were able to get that start and
really understand from a young agethe importance of being careful with
nature and of also just being out init, like it makes you feel better.
(09:39):
And then when they were a littlebit older, I would start having them
do little rituals with me and byrituals I mean like five minutes.
Mm-hmm.
I'm not talking like complex,like we might be in a circle and
we call out the elements and thenwe'd put our hands up and say, yay.
And then that was it.
Oh, that's so good.
(09:59):
Like I just wanted to get themunderstanding the concept of like
sometimes we gather in order tocelebrate nature, to celebrate the gods.
I didn't really talk that muchabout the gods with them, but
I did mention it sometimes.
I might point out a statue.
I like to read their stories to them.
We'd watch things on TV and you know,when we were watching stories like Frozen
(10:23):
or Moana, like I would point out like,oh, there's this goddess and there's
that and one of my favorite princessstories is the princess and the frog.
That's my favorite.
And I love how like they show thatyou mess around with these like evil
deities and then he gets in trouble.
But there's also magic that's beneficial,like the lady who lives in the swamp.
(10:46):
Mm-hmm.
She's not evil, even though shelooks a little bit creepy, but she's
actually like this magical wise woman.
Totally.
And so I loved being able to likepoint out the differences in that
for the kids and they just ate it up.
There are some things that I did a littlecontroversially, according to my friends.
(11:06):
We did not do Santa Claus, you wouldnot believe how controversial that
is when you have little kids andyou decide not to do Santa Claus.
And the reason why I didn't wanna dothat is because I actually do believe
in the Faye and these gods and goddessesand spirits and things like that.
So it seemed weird to me to make oneup and then to blame everything on him
(11:28):
and then to later when they're older,be like, I was just lying to you.
Right.
Because then like how are my kidsgonna believe me on the other things
that I really do truly believe exists?
And then they're gonna belike, mom's this ridiculous.
But we would do a dark party on Yuleevery year and it was so much fun.
(11:50):
We adjust it to the age of the child,of course, like when my kids were
really little, it was very, very simple.
We'd just put on some music,danced around the living room.
I'd have candles everywhere.
We wouldn't have any lights on.
That's why we call it a darkparty, just the candles.
And of course we use electric candles,especially when the kids were little
so they don't burn the house down.
(12:11):
And we'd have the tree lit up theyule tree so that it was just a
really beautiful, dark ambiance.
And then we'd have cookies and a story.
We'd read the story of the Yule fairies,which is online, and then I would tuck
them into bed and that would be that.
And over the years it got a little bitmore complicated, but not very much.
(12:34):
We've always just kept it really simple.
It's just family annualwith our little dark party.
Now that they're older, I would usuallydo like tarot card readings with them.
Mm-hmm.
Because they don't.
So much care about hearing storiesabout the Yule fairy, although
sometimes they get nostalgicand want me to read it to them.
But it was just a beautiful memoryevery year to do, and to me, a
(12:57):
more poignant than Christmas.
What we would do for Christmas, becausewe do have family that's not Pagan, is we
would just open presents, like Christmasto us was a very secular holiday.
Mm-hmm.
Open presents, hang out with somefamily and that was the end of that.
But Yule, I wanted to kindaseparate it from presents.
Sometimes I'd give the kids homemadepresents on that day, but they knew they
(13:18):
weren't gonna get like a bunch of toys andknickknacks and whatever else they wanted.
On Samhain, we like topractice the ancestor meal.
Now, of course, Samhain, mykids wanna go trick or treating,
which yes, of course we do that.
Yes.
For sure.
So when, I mean like ancestor meal, I'mtalking really, really quick and small.
(13:42):
Like the key is with kids, yougotta adjust your expectations.
Totally.
So I would tell a few storiesabout some people who passed before
they were really aware of it.
Some people from our family, and thenwe would generally have like a cup
and a food set out for the ancestorsand then they would go off and do
their trick or treating and you thinkthat they're not paying attention.
(14:04):
But I swear later onthese things come back up.
Mm-hmm.
And that was another thing, pointing outmovies like Coco and the Book of Life.
I would say, look, theyalso do what we do.
They pay attention to theirancestors around this time of year.
They just call it something differentand look at the ancestors have this
afterlife and if they're paid attentionto, then they can kind of help the
(14:28):
characters in the movie and you know,just pointing out those similarities.
It gave them a deeper understanding.
Thank you.
Disney.
You know, I was gonna say, it's sogreat, there are so many current day
forms of media that we can draw onand use as like a great visual now.
Because I know when we weregrowing up, you had like.
You know, the Craft, which you couldkind of stretch a little bit and
(14:50):
be like, this is similar to a partof religion, but let's maybe not
show this to our young kids, right?
Where now it's like these very clear,family friendly examples that you can sh
use as like a cornerstone of your faith.
Okay, so we have these supportive mediaexamples, which have been great for you.
As you're rearing your kids, arethere any other specific deities or
(15:10):
practices or energies that you alsofind supportive as your role as a
parent, as you're working with them?
Well, as I mentioned before, Bast forme has been very much a constant in my
life because she is this like goddessof mothers and children specifically.
I felt like she's been veryprotective of our family.
Also, the ancestors, like I can'tunderstate how much they really, at
(15:36):
least in my family, want to help.
Like they are your ancestors.
Like they care about your kidsbecause they are their ancestors.
And so I have called upon theirhelp many times and prayed to them.
You don't wanna just always pray to them.
You wanna tell 'em what's going on too.
You treat the ancestorslike you would a grandma.
(15:57):
You don't just show up at grandma's houseand ask her to do things constantly.
You sit down, you have somecookies, you drink some tea.
You tell her what's going on, andthen maybe you could ask for help.
And that's how I treat the ancestors, andthey've been so, so helpful in showing
me some really deep insights about mychildren that have helped me understand
(16:21):
some of the challenging situationsthat I've had to deal with as a parent.
And I've always told my kids too,that they can, if they want to,
they can reach out to differentdeities and see if they answer back.
I also told them though, if theydon't answer back, if you don't hear
anything, don't work with that deity.
I'm not one of those people that's willingto work with a cold and distant God.
(16:45):
That's just not interesting to me.
You know, I feel like we can applythose same rules to like rules
and relationships with people too.
Like it's all one big lesson here,and I love how you really solidify
these holidays and then you're veryopen and free about letting them
pursue whatever path they want.
You know, you're, you're justthere to guide them or maybe point
them in the right direction, butthere's no pushing your kids.
(17:09):
I feel like I'm alwaystaking notes from you also.
I'm like, wait, how are you doing this?
And you know, it's.
It's helped, I'll be honest tohear that at the beginning for you.
Because that's, you know, where I amstill in my own journey, it's okay to
just kind of focus on prayer, right?
Yeah.
Like when they're little, maybe somethinglike egg dying or something that's kind
of fun and appropriate for little ones,but just like with every single project
(17:33):
that you're doing with a little one anykind of project, expect mess, expect them
to have about five minutes of attentionand then wanna move on to something else.
Unless you have like a really focusedchild, sometimes they're really
into it and they surprise you.
But most of the time I set myexpectations really low and
it's like, oh, that was fun.
Now we're moving on.
So I wanted to ask, how do you navigatesharing your beliefs with others who
(17:57):
may not understand or share your Paganpractices and may even have like an
aversion to them in our community?
What's interesting is when we movedinto this recent house, I was able
to set up a permanent altar, which Iloved, but then I realized now you're
really out in front of anybody who comesover this house is gonna see like your
altar, your deities, everything's there.
It's actually right nextto the dining room table.
(18:19):
So even at like Thanksgiving,they're gonna see it.
And what I practice is just the wholeidea of if they ask about it, I'm
gonna be totally honest and open.
If they don't ask about it,I'm not gonna talk about it.
Kind of a don't ask, don'ttell sort of a thing.
But if they do ask, and some of my friendshave asked, some of them knew me for
years without knowing that I was Pagan.
(18:41):
And then they were like, oh, I seethat you have these deities over here.
What's up with that?
And I was happy to explain it to themand they said, oh, okay, that's great.
And now they know andit's never been an issue.
I am very blessed that I livein the Pacific Northwest and
we are really chill over here.
We pretty much accept most anything,as long as it's not hurting anybody.
(19:06):
So I am very grateful that I do live in aplace where it is safe for me to do that,
but I haven't had any issues with it.
With my kids, they didn'treally talk about it.
My son never spoke about it.
He somehow got this idea that everythingneeds to be a secret, which I have
a feeling as just his personality.
(19:27):
I never told him that we need tobe secretive about what we do.
My daughter would actually, there wasone time when she was probably four or
five, and she was staying the night overat her grandparents' house and she wanted
to bring her mini altar that she created.
She had created an altar out ofa piece of cardboard and had put
like little stones and drawn on it.
(19:49):
And she said, this is my altar.
Oh my God.
And she wanted to bring it withher when she went to their house.
And I had to stop myself becausepart of me was like, oh no, we
don't like take those things out.
But I realized to her thisis like a form of play.
Yeah.
And it should be.
And why should I tell hernot to bring that out?
(20:12):
Just because my in-laws might beslightly uncomfortable with it.
They never said anything about it.
And that was the end of that.
We do occasionally run into situationswhere my kids don't understand
generic cultural biblical references.
'cause they just don't, they didn'tgrow up hearing those stories.
They do not know the story of Noah and theArc. They don't know about Adam and Eve.
(20:35):
They don't know those becauseI just never brought them up.
They're not interesting to me.
It wasn't that I hid them fromthem, but it never came up on their
shows or what they were watching.
Later on, we were watchingsomething on tv, a show where
there was an Adam and Eve scene.
In the very beginning of it, they justkind of went into it that there were
(20:55):
naked people in a garden and they weretalking to a snake and there was an
apple, and my kids were so confused.
They were like, mom, what are we watching?
They were scandalized and like I hadto pause the show and explain to them.
And they were like, thatis such a weird story.
(21:17):
And they were like, why arethey talking to a snake?
Yeah.
And what's the big deal about this apple?
And the biggest thingwas that they were naked.
Like that was like
scandalous,
super scandalous to my kids.
So even though it was funny 'causethey're pagan, but they decided to
be prude very early on and they werethe ones who told, my husband and I,
they were like, we're gonna shut thedoor, we gonna go to the bathroom and
(21:38):
there's no more nakedness in this house.
And so my husband and Iwere like, oh, okay, fine.
So, do you have any advice for, youknow, us young moms that just passed
from the maiden into the motherhood era?
I think my biggestadvice would be to relax.
I, so I guess maybe this is a blessing.
Pinterest and Instagram and allof that wasn't really a thing
(22:01):
when I was having my kids.
So I had no framework for likethis beautiful scripted parenthood
that apparently people areshowing now all the time online.
And I do see it, like I'm not completelyblind to it, but I also think it's
a bunch of nonsense for most of us.
I mean, if you want to do thosekind of big, beautiful grand things
(22:24):
and take pictures of it, likeabsolutely, if that feeds your soul.
But I would say please, please be easy onyourself and if you want to do something
by yourself don't think you have toinclude your kids in on everything.
I actually do most ofmy ritual work alone.
That's my preference.
I either do it with mycoven or I do it alone.
(22:45):
I just, I don't feel comfortable havingmy kids or even my husband, like there
when I'm doing deep ritual work and Idon't find it because I'm an introvert I
do need that time to kind of decompress.
So when your kids are reallyyoung, you wanna just make
time for your mental health.
And if that means putting everythingto the side for a few years,
(23:08):
there is nothing wrong with that.
It'll come back you,you can come back to it.
Your tarot cards are not gonna explode.
The covens you may or may not have wantedto join If they're not in existence
in a couple of years, they probablyweren't that great to begin with.
So it is totally fine to justput a pin in it for a while.
But if you do want to do somethingmetaphysical, there's nothing
(23:31):
wrong with doing it by yourselfif that's how you prefer to do it,
and if you do wanna include yourchildren, please do, do not feel like
you're forcing them to do anything.
They will not do it if they don't want to,
right.
At least that's been my experience.
If you have to meditate while you'rein the shower, because that's the only
time that everybody leaves you alone.
(23:51):
That's also fine.
Yeah, like having the grace aroundit's okay to set my religion
aside for a moment while you'rekind of in this survival mode.
I think what's helpful to realizetoo, and now with a little bit of time
I see this, but also talking to youand talking to other parents of older
kids, it's like you do get time back.
In a way it becomes a little easier tohave a shower where you're not watching
(24:14):
an infant at the same time when there'sno one to help you and you're just
like, okay, well I gotta get clean.
You know?
So I've been finding that I havethese pockets of private time that are
coming back, and I think it's worthremembering even now where I'm at I'm
really starting to see these glimmersof actual opportunity where I'm able
to go out with friends and go to aritual, and I don't have to be the one
(24:35):
running it, you know, necessarily, butI can actually participate further in
my religious activities when I want to,when I have the capacity to, and those
opportunities are coming up for me more.
But it really just takes time becausethose really, really young infant
years, I feel like for me personally,I really struggled with this is
how it's gonna be forever and it.
(24:57):
It's so not, but it just, it goes so fast.
But I know that having just beenin that feeling, it felt like, when
will I ever get the chance again?
So I also just wanna encourageanybody out there listening who's
a new parent, like it will come.
If you're at the very beginningof this journey, you will find the
time and allowing yourself, justlike the five minutes of grace in
this survival mode is so important.
(25:20):
So I wanna just sort of wrap this upwith like, do you have any resources
or recommendations for Pagan parentsin terms of books or websites or blogs
and anything you've used to deepen thespiritual connection for your children
and with your children as they're growing?
There's quite a few that I puttogether over the years, but many
of them maybe weren't like intendedspecifically for Pagan parents.
(25:41):
We used to go, to be honest, like wespent a lot of time at the library
when the kids were young, and I lovedpicking up the books on mythology.
Like I said, the ones that were funstories to me gave the kids a way
to introduce them to these deities,to their general personality.
Not saying that I take those storiesliterally, but it does often give us
kernels of their personality and injust a fun way that they could enjoy.
(26:06):
And then of course, moviesand Disney, but I loved Pooka
pages, which is generally free.
I think they have a book now throughAmazon that you can get, and it has every
single Sabbat, they come out with likea story and then there's a little like
game and there's some ideas for a ritualand it's aimed at youngish children.
(26:29):
Not super young, but likeelementary school age children.
And my kids did enjoy reading thePooka pages for the different Sabbats.
That was fun.
And it was a free resource, whichwas awesome, especially at the time.
And then mostly just enjoying theSabbats and making them your own.
The Circle round bookthat I told you about.
(26:50):
Yes.
We Love,
which I read.
It's wonderful.
Yeah, that was fun.
And the music that wentwith it was really fun.
We love to go to like pagan camp outsand stuff like that, so if you have
them in your area and they're all overthe country, so I know that they're in
like Britain and UK and some places too.
So if you find those, manyof them are child friendly.
(27:12):
And I would encourage you if your kidsaren't too young and don't get up too
early in the morning, 'cause we hadto put off camping for a few years.
Once we were able to bring them backcamping when they were around five years
old, five and three, then it was amazing.
It was so much fun to like just havethem play with other Pagan kids,
like there was activities, even ifit's really unorganized, you're still
(27:34):
camping and you're just out therewith other people who are also pagan,
and the kids can talk about thingsthat they may not feel comfortable
talking about with regular kids.
It was just such a blessing, even thoughit was never a consistent group of people.
It was nice to just go be withthose people for a little while.
And remember that I'm notthe only Pagan family.
(27:55):
Right.
In the entire universe.
And also along the same vein, whatare your hopes for the Pagan parenting
community as a whole and our future?
I really do hope, my biggest hopeis that at least when my kids were
young and I spoke to a lot of otherPagan parents, they told me that
they were not going to tell theirkids anything about religion at all.
(28:16):
And they weren't gonna share any oftheir practices or beliefs or anything.
And I really hope that that is changing.
'cause even at the time.
My mom has a saying, and I reallyalways felt like this was true.
She said, if you have no religion, shesaid you're more likely later on to
convert to something that's extremebecause you're kind of a sitting duck.
(28:41):
You have like nothing.
If you're just this emptyvessel of nothing, then anybody
can go along and fill it up.
I just believe that that's such adisservice to not share anything
about what you believe with yourchildren, they're not going to take
everything you say and run with it.
Some kids may for a while, but manytimes they will come to their own
(29:04):
beliefs and their own conclusions, andmost of us pagans are fine with that.
I don't know any that are not,and the truth is their child's
being influenced all the time,and yet they're still themselves.
Like I am a person who is, you know,cisgendered and I'm in a monogamous
relationship with my husband.
Does that mean that my childrenare gonna automatically grow
(29:26):
up and do that themselves?
No.
Like, but I'm not gonna hidemy relationship from them.
I don't tell them that that's what theyhave to do, but it's just how I live.
I also dress in vintage clothing.
Do my kids dress in vintageclothing now that they're teenagers?
No, not at all.
Just share what you'redoing with your kids.
Even if you never do a ritual with'em, you don't have to, that's fine.
(29:50):
But if you're doing tarot byyourself or something and they
come up upon you, you know?
Tell 'em what's going on, at leastwhatever it is that you believe.
If you are just earth-based, if youbelieve in nothing, if you believe that
Gods are just archetypes, that's fine too.
Just tell them.
Tell them what you believe sothat they can think about it.
That's part of our job as parents, is toeducate our kids, and by educate, I don't
(30:14):
mean make them think something, but Iwant them to be at least exposed to it.
I want to expose them to my paganismso that they know that that is a thing,
and then they can go out in the worldand expose themselves to other things
and decide what they think about it.
So far, both of my kids are stillpagan, but they are very different
pagan than me and it's fine.
(30:36):
Well, thank you so much, Aura.
How can people find out more aboutyou, about Wildroot Coven, as
well as I wanted to highlight yourbeautiful work, which I've used
every year now from Wildroot Press.
Where can people find you?
I am not that great about updating myInstagram page, but we are on Instagram at
Wildroot Coven and I also have a website,www.wildrootcoven.com, and that's where
(31:00):
you will find out more about my coven.
It is located in Tacoma, Washington,and we are a local coven.
We don't do anything online, butI always welcome any questions if
you have questions about Paganismor pagan parenting or if you wanna
know about starting your own coven.
I also encourage people to do that.
I am not all about that gatekeepernonsense about only this or
(31:24):
that degree can start a coven.
I just think that that'sa load of nonsense.
If you want to and have any questions, Iam happy to sit down and talk with you.
I also have my planner, theWorking Witches Planner,
which is available on Amazon.
My planner is for witches who have abusy lifestyle and cannot be confined
(31:48):
to the teeny weeny little witchplanners that are mostly on the market.
I needed a planner that didn't havetiny little boxes to write my life
into, because I have teenagers, I havea husband, I have multiple businesses.
I cannot fit my life into aone by one box in a calendar.
(32:11):
So I created my planner because I alsowanted to have a space for tarot spreads.
I have monthly tarot spreads inthere, there's some basic astrology.
It notes the full moons,the new moons, the eclipses.
But it's large enough that you canwrite in everything you need to write.
There's like to-do lists on the side.
(32:33):
There's a habit tracker.
It's made for practical witches,but the practical witches
planner was already taken.
Personally, I loveworking with your planner.
It is so great.
I love that it's got theastrology right there.
I've totally used it to likeplan out my whole week and I
love how much room you provide.
That's so nice but it's not overwhelming.
(32:55):
Right.
I I really appreciate that itI don't feel like pressured
into doing like a daily tarot.
Not that I think other planners aredoing that, but just it feels very
practical, like you said, like I canfit it into my day to work with this
and it's a useful tool as well askind of like a meditative spiritual
guide for me where I can just kind oftap back into that world as a parent
(33:16):
and feel like connected to something.
Bigger than just likewhat my to-do list is.
I'm also keeping these things in mind'cause we're well-rounded, full people and
so anyway, I just, I so appreciate yourplanner and I wanted to highlight that.
So Aura, it has been lovely talking withyou this afternoon about all things pagan
parenting, as well as Wildroot Coven.
But I'm so excited to say in our nextepisode, we're gonna dive into your work
(33:38):
as a doula in the Tacoma, Washington area.
So for any of you out there whoare new mothers, or going to be new
mothers, or even just thinking aboutbecoming a Pagan parent right now,
or also fathers listening partnerslistening, significant others listening,
whoever out there is listening.
I cannot wait for you guys to hear Aura'sfabulous insights into all things into
the world of being a doula, childbirth.
(33:59):
What an incredible passage oftransformation this is that we all go
through when we're having children.
It's amazing.
It's profound.
So join us for part two.
We're gonna shift our focus to her roleas a doula and explore how Aura channels
her pagan spirituality into her supportfor mothers through childbirth, as well as
birth partners and the whole family.
(34:21):
So stay tuned as we continuethis enriching conversation.
Thank you so much for joining me onthis episode of Stars and Sprouts.
New episodes Bloom with the wheel, everySabbat and in between to explore more of
my music, astrology and magic and morevisit cawnawynmor.com and until next time,
keep growing wild rooted and radiant.
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