Portland Maine Veg Fest 2013

Some of you may remember that Gwen, Autumn and I (Leslie) all went to VegFest last year. It hardly seems possible that another VegFest is here! Time flies! That means that Gwen and I took the vegan challenge over a year and a half ago!

This year I attended VegFest as a VegMe board member for the first time, also. I look forward to working with VegMe (www.vegme.org) on making vegan options and education available around the state.

Volunteer Angela did a great job on a hot day in the corn suit!

 Animal Rights Maine (ARM) had a Hawaiian themed party at their table, giving out vegan food samples.

 Our VegMe table was packed with resources about our Meatless Mainers veg meetup, veganism, and other vegan organizations around the state.

All we are saying is give peas a chance. :0)

Juice Feast a'la "Fat, Sick, & Nearly Dead" movie

I recently did a seven day juice feast (ingesting just water and fruit/veg juice) as inspired by the Australian movie. I felt great, was not hungry until the last day or so (which is why I decided to begin eating again), and my appetite has been for much healthier foods ever since. I did get myself ready by staying off caffiene and eating mostly whole foods (soups and salads, fruit, etc) for a week before doing it so I recommend that to avoid "detox" symptoms during the first few days. You can view the movie free on hulu and there are three, five, ten, etc. day programs on the movie's "reboot" website. Those programs include juicing AND eating if you are worried about doing a juice only regimine right off the bat.

This page links to the free movie on hulu and the reboot program:

http://www.fatsickandnearlydead.com/

veganic gardening

Well, Spring is here in Maine, tho things haven't yet gotten as warm as I would like. But you can really see the lush green coming out in the forests and fields. And to a lessar extent, the gardens. It is still seedling season and one sees mostly ploughed and rich, black dirt across the countryside - perhaps with a speckle of baby greens.

My mom is a consummate gardener. I'm more of a consummate eater. Therefore we partner in planting and cooking of local fresh produce. I buy a share in a CSA (community supported agriculture) also to support my raw food and juicing habits.

Working on getting the raised beds set back up this year, I helped mom do a run to Lowes to get soil and compost. Though we did buy organic, I became chagrined at how ALL the fertilizers were animal or animal feces based. Even the mushroom fertilizer is a mix of materials that mushrooms grow in, which includes animal products.

Next year I would like to get on the ball and really try to go veganic in the home garden. Veganic is, as it sounds, both organic and vegan. I do have a worm farm to compost my scraps and pulp from the aforementioned raw food and juicing. Therefore I have some veganic compost but not nearly enough for our crops. It will be a process and I'll let you know how I'm doing next year. For now, here is a link to veganic resources if you would like to learn along with me:

http://gentleworld.org/beginners-guide-to-veganic-gardening/

Volunteer Day at Peace Ridge Sanctuary

This weekend Gwen, her kids (Blade, Autumn, Azize), and I attended the volunteer orientation and project day at our local farmed animal sanctuary. Peace Ridge Sanctuary is only about a mile from my house and I am so happy about that!

Peace Ridge is a vegan sanctuary that follows the models of great farms like Catskill Farm Sanctuary or of course "the" Farm Sanctuary in New York and CA. Like these other organizations Peace Ridge shelters pigs, chickens, geese, turkeys, goats, sheep, rabbits, and probably some others I'm forgetting. They also rescue dogs and cats, expecially from kill shelters. In fact they bring dogs (I'm not sure about cats) here from gas chamber states in the American South.

We had a great day meeting all the animals, eating vegan lunch, and doing some work. We cleaned the goat barns and field and also painted a fence. It was a beautiful day and I highly recommend similar adventures if you can find a farm animal sanctuary anywhere near you! If there are none, you can at least support any of these programs online and get the feeling you are really helping the animals.

www.farmsanctuary.org
www.casanctuary.org
www.peaceridgesanctuary.org

Nibbles the goat (aptly named)!

geese and ducks raising the alarm

turkey sisters

fiona

cleaning the goat stalls

nice and clean!

...and being broken in again

Thanks!

Beltane, Temple Classes

Happy Spring everyone! Time is flying by and, while I'm glad winter is over, I wish the warm weather would go by a little more slowly.

Gwen and I (and her kiddos and my mom) had a great time at Maine's Beltane and the Beach (Popham Beach). Hopefully we will get some pics up soon.

 

In the meantime, our first cycle of classes for the Priestess/Priest in Training (PIT) program at Temple of the Feminine Divine is complete. Below is a quick newsletter article I wrote for the temple. I hope to post more soon. In the meantime, enjoy the sun where you can find it!

The PIT Class of 2015 has just completed our first, twelve week set of sessions. We are a big class (about fifteen people), so we have the pros and cons of that size group. On the one hand, there is always lively discussion and energy in the room. On the other hand, our check in’s and closings can take up a lot of time. We still enjoy this opportunity to hear from each other, but the challenges come in trying to fit in our sophias, goddesses, and experiential work while still leaving time for meaningful questions and discussions.

Partly due to blizzards which cancelled a couple of our sessions, we did double classes twice (six hour sessions). This had pros and cons as well. We had more time to get our whole agenda done on those days, but it was a long session and some of us found it draining. Either way you slice it the sessions passed very fast and we were sad to say good-bye to each other (at least in terms of our class sessions) so soon.

Over the twelve weeks we had many wonderful sophias. They included movement of energy, the meaning of the pentacle, drumming, chant/sound, and reiki. We discussed traditions like Native American, Wicca, Norse, and Green Wicca. For goddesses we discussed many including Isis, Artemis, Danu, Arachne, Yemaja, Kali, and Persephone. The people who did altars brought wonderful creativity to their designs.

Since our class is large, it is no surprise that there is diversity in the room. We are all different types and have all sorts of different ideas. Perhaps that is the most exciting part of the sessions, and the journey that we find still ahead of us in learning about our individual and collective spiritual paths together.

Temple of the Feminine Divine Classes

Imbolc is always an exciting time filled with new beginnings for me. It was last Imbolc that I dedicated myself to writing a vegan-pagan book of shadows (for public consumption) and I am about 100 pages into that exciting yet overwhelming work.

This Imbolc Gwen and I both joined the new class for priestesses/priests in training (yes, the PITS) at the Temple of the Feminine Divine (TOFD) in Bangor. This is a three year class that leads to ordaination. Moreover, it is a chance to work closely with other members of the temple, studying and doing rituals or other projects (like divination fairs, panel discussions, pagan pride contributions, etc).

I feel just as excited as I did before I went to study with Laurie Cabot last March. The thrill of that was to learn directly from such an influential pagan leader. The excitement I have about joining the PIT class is to make more deeper connections with pagans in my own community. This has already begun and I am so happy to be moving forward. We started with a class dedication and potluck on the day after Imbolc, and I am already enjoying the program immensely.

The group is respectful of vegetarians but I believe gwen and I are the only vegans in our class (of about 18 people). I am not sure how many vegans there are involved in the whole temple, but I look forward to writing newsletter articles, contributing vegan items to the potlucks, and sharing my own beliefs in whatever ways seem most comfortable and effective. Paganism is a diverse and opinionated community but that means there should be ample room for we vegans too!

TOFD is a branch of the Interntional Fellowship of Isis. Our Temple was founded by musician Kay Gardner as the Iseum Musicum and after her passing the temple's work has continued to develop. Kay also founded the women's spiritual singing circle Women With Wings, which is very connected to TOFD. Gwen and I sing with Wings whenever we can also.

I look forward to sharing my continued adventures, both as an individual vegan pagan and as part of a group. Blessed be and hang on; spring is coming!  - Leslie

www.templeofthefemininedivine.org

(this is the TOFD logo)

www.fellowshipofisis.com

vegan gift basket for local charity

Hi, all! Hope your winter is going great. Just wanted to share an idea in case you would like to replicate it for a local charity of your own.

I happen to work at a domestic violence shelter program and for the past two years I have put a "vegan starter kit" giftbasket in our annual charity auction. This year I did the same, and you can see the pics below.

What gwen and I also did this year, however, was to bake vegan goodies for the chocolate buffet at the event. Well, gwen baked (chocolate/chocolate chip cookies). I did dark chocolate dipped apricots, cherries, and dandies vegan marshmallows. Gwen did two wonderful gift baskets of homemade soaps, candles, and other personal products that she is so good at doing (the lib balm is the bomb!!)

I'm happy to report that ALL our vegan goodies were eaten up, even tho there were lots of leftovers from the buffet. And all our gift baskets sold too. I hope my copy of Main St Vegan and assorted kitchen staples found a good home. :0)