I’m getting excited about the new moon this coming Friday, July 9th at 09° Cancer. New Moon in Cancer is a moon homecoming, a peaceful pause after the intense energy of eclipse season. The energy is still high but what hangs in the air (our Saturn in Aquarius square to Uranus in Taurus) won’t even release until 2022 so we might as well get used to it. This Cancer new moon can be used as a cosmic pause, a tiny moment to retreat into ourselves and our homes.
Home can mean a lot of things to a lot of people. Cancer is represented by the crab who wears their home on their back and indeed I have known more than a few very nomadic Cancerian types. I’m a cottage witch though so my home is very literally my apartment and its tiny adjacent garden. I thought that in honor of one of my favorite lunar events of the year, I’d talk a little bit about the house magic that I do to keep in touch with the spirits of my home.
Really any of these things could be done anytime or amplified by all of the new moons, but the Cancer new moon is especially the right time to do old-fashioned house magic.
Cleansing magic
When is the last time that you cleaned your house? Did you clean it physically? Did you clean it energetically? When is the last time you opened your windows and doors and let the air in?
I want to be upfront: I’m not a neat freak and my partner leaves clutter behind him wherever he goes. That said, I can guarantee you that if the energy in my place feels “stuck” – those are exactly the things that I need to do.
I try to do a full physical clean of my house followed by a full elemental energy cleanse of my house at least once a year on either the Pisces or the Cancer new moon. I don’t do this all myself – my coven and I have a solid routine down where we each take one element and walk around the house signing in a round with each other – it’s really quite cute. More on that some other time, if you’d like.
In any case, if you’re behind on your cleaning – pick one room and really deep dive into cleaning it. I always start with my kitchen and work my way out from there. That also tends to take the least time since it gets cleaned daily and makes me feel like I’ve accomplished something. If I’m feeling ambitious, I might make a floor wash and wash the floors. Other times, I stick to my tried and true – the smoke cleanse.
Offerings
Once I have cleansed my space and cleared out the stagnant energy, I like to give some offerings to my apartment to encourage the type of energy that I would like to see in my space. I do this in a number of ways. I might light a soothing incense and carry it around my house. I often offer my house spirit a cup of tea on my kitchen table altar (I use a tea representative of the energy I’d like in the house). I tend my altar spaces and make sure that they are clean and have fresh flowers or other offerings. Then, I collect all of my offering bowls from around my house.
I keep an offering bowl at each of my altars. Each of these has a base mix of herbs, salt, and rice that I refresh periodically. I tailor my herb choice to the room and the type of energy that I would like to bring into each space. Though I use bowls, this could easily be done with sachet bags or in jars if you need to be more discrete but honestly, this looks a lot like potpourri and I suspect it’s one of the least overtly “witchy” things that I have in my house. I like to keep these open to the elements so if using a jar, I’d prefer an open lid – I want the energy of my space to comingle with the energy of the herbs.
My base recipe is one part rice for abundance, one part salt for cleansing, and one part lavender for calming (you could sub camomile or any other mild nervine here) for all of the altars except my ancestors because I don’t put salt on that altar.
From there, I use other herbals I have on hand to tailor my blend to how I’m feeling. (I work fairly intuitively here) I like to dry calendula and sunflower to add some sunshine energy for the dead of winter, as an example. Pink and white rose petals create sweet love. I use jasmine in the bedroom to help with sleep and mugwort on the moon altar to connect better with my psychicness. I suggest that you use herbs and flowers with which you are familiar and that you like the scent. (That’s why I stay away from camomile – I’m not fond of its smell/taste)
The big flex here is that if you are using all kitchen-safe botanicals, you can make this a tea offering that you get to drink and share with your space. I personally like to use plants that I have grown and/or harvested myself since I feel like it gives me a deeper connection to the plant’s energy.
Putting it all together
This kind of house magic is best done periodically – as witches, we often accumulate a lot of energetic “stuff”. Cleansing out what doesn’t serve you and bringing in what you would like to grow is an essential part of healthy house upkeep. If you are somebody who has a quiet home, you may want to do it three times a year – say around the water sign new moons, as I suggest here. If your home is much busier or full of really big personalities, you may need to perform this work more often.
After a while, you just get a feel for when your place needs cleansing. Sometimes I do one or part of this, but not both. I feed and tend my altars always and sometimes that involves refreshing their offering bowls. Sometimes I add in other items – candy for my grandmother, rose petals for Venus. Right now I have an offering bowl on my sun altar related to a spell that I’m continually working with.