My Samhain Altar

[Iriseyes]

Samhain Altar
By: Iriseyes
My favorite Sabbat of the Wheel of the Year is Samhain. The colors are beautiful and the atmosphere is mystical and mysterious. The weather is changing and winter’s cold breath is breathing down our necks. The spirits are restless and the veil is thin, letting the spirits intertwine with our world and theirs allowing the spirits to come out and play.
Setting up the altar early is done for cosmetic purposes. I decorate my house and yard around the first of October if not sooner every year like clockwork. The window decals, the yard ornaments, cut outs of my favorite Halloween characters on stakes, the strings of Halloween lights and any other decorations that I can get my hands on goes up. Decorating is great fun and puts me in the mood for the season so why not decorate and set up my Samhain altar at the same time as I decorate my home and yard.
I start by removing everything on my altar and cleaning the items that has been sitting on it since the last Sabbat; I use my general things after each Sabbat is over. Everything must be cleansed of the previous workings and must be at their original strength with no reminisce of the workings that I have been doing. The candles must be replaced and stored if not set aside to remold to form new candles for use later.
I start by placing the black altar cloth on the altar then placing three candles on it, one white for the maiden one red for the mother and one black for the crone Goddess; this both signifies the Goddess in her three forms but also the fazes of the moon; this is placed in the center on the rear of my altar. On each side of the candles are my chalices one is my faery that is mine, one and the other is black and is used by my boyfriend as he does these rituals with me. I do the triple moon candles for her the mother, and for me to see the three all together. Normally I signify the elements on my regular altar. I do love my elements. I also place in front of my chalices one black votive and one orange votive as representation of the colors of Samhain. My caldron is placed in the center of the altar where it normally sets in a general Altar set up to me it feels right setting there. I use a Halloween candy dish as my offering plate to the Deities I call upon; it has dancing candy corns around the center of the dish. An image of The Morgana is present as it always is above my altar on the wall along with two witches brooms that hang, the Morgana seems to love to be in that area. I had moved her image and it kept falling and hitting things on my altar and until I found the place she hangs and now it has never fell since then. I have a dragon canister that holds my Dead Sea salts and a old antique small water pitcher for my water and it sits upon the altar both on the left hand side as they both represent the Goddess. I use several decorations of the season; a scarecrow beanie baby sits on the altar as does a black cat toy, a chunk of black obsidian, tiger’s eye, and a few other stones scattered about on the altar most of the stones signify earth and I have grown to love them on my altar. The obsidian is placed on the altar because of ancient times it was used to divinate and because divination is very strong on this Sabbat I feel it is necessary to place this on the altar as well. I also place a small crystal ball for divination as well as lay my tarot cards on the altar as well. I have a four inch mussel shell on my altar to burn powder incense in and a regular thurable to burn cone incense as well as a holder for stick incense. The stick incense burner has skulls on it for decoration purposes for Samhain. The mussel shell and the incense burners sit on the right hand side of my altar and are the fire and air of the altar. I have an hour glass that has a pentacle on it as well as my altar tile that is a pentacle as well that stays on my altar at all times. This gives me three pentacles on my altar and fulfills the three numbers; this was completely an accident as I didn’t notice till writing this paper.
Blessed Be