Theme: Baba Yaga and the Oak-Hickory Forest
In 2025 our evening rituals will focus on Baba Yaga and the Oak-Hickory Forest. Our four paths are Encountering the Crone, Dancing with the Land, Elements of Magic, and Embodied Practices of the Justice Witch.
Intention
Our 2025 intention is Clouds are gathering. There’s thunder in the distance. In the heart of the Oak-Hickory Forest we water the seeds of revolution.
The Oak-Hickory Forest
One by one, and then many at once, the Witches came. They entered the forest, as they do year after year, with smiles and excitement to see one another again. The sun shone down upon them with warmth, and they were ready for the heat, knowing that cooling waters could be found just down the path to refresh and revive them. They came here for all that – soothing, refreshment, revival – and more. They came for connection. They came for magic. They came for joy.
At first they are all together, and soon they will move apart in groups. Some of them will gather under circles of Oak, others beneath boughs of Hickory. A number will frolic in open areas, under the Sun or Moon, and still others may recline indoors, looking out at the swaying branches that make a playground for squirrels. Perhaps they would sit on a bench near a stump, pondering the height of the tree no longer present. Perhaps they will light a fire. A small one, not like the large, controlled ones that people have used to support the forest throughout time. A celebratory one, they would light. A cleansing one. We suppose we all have that in common, for Fire as well as Water to cleanse us.
The Witches, they want to do big, important things, in all different sized ways. We hear them chatter and chant and cry and curse about the world they live in from day to day. At first, we are confused. Is this not the same world? Have they truly come in through some portal the Mycelia opened for them, without us also noticing? Did the birds miss their entrance, or the squirrels smuggle them in? But to hear them tell it, it is the same world, and not at all the same.
We do pretty well here, in our forest. Very few intruders get inside our boundaries who would threaten us. The ones that do come tend to follow the paths left by the more careless of humanity, those who corrupt the soil and the waters and dig paths among us without attention to what is coming along for the ride. We hear they do that, Humans. They come in and take over a place they think is theirs, and instead of becoming attuned to the rhythms, they attempt to enforce their own. The web becomes cacophonous. It does that here sometimes. But we are old, and young, and rooted. We can withstand much, and remain giving.
“And what do we have to give?” prompt the Hickories, coyly.
“What could they want from us?” chuckle the Oaks, knowingly.
“When will it be my turn?” teases Maple, impatiently.
“What do you need to cleanse?” challenges Fire.
“What do you need to soothe?” croons Water.
“Are you remembering to plant Joy?” titter the Squirrels.
“How are you going to change?” asks Caterpillar.
The Mycelia hum continuously in a language none speaks, but we feel.
After some time, they will go. The Witches will return through their portals to their worlds, to the forests and fields and deserts and waters that nourish them. They will laugh and cry and shout and dance and sing, and we will sing with them. Some of them will even hear it. They will take what they can to better their worlds, and leave the rest with us as compost. And they will come again.
Paths
In 2025 we will have four paths:
- Encountering the Crone in Folk- and Fairytale (by Baz, Forrestwoman, and Ostara Hollyoak). This path is a gateway into story. Each day we’ll hear, explore, and do magic around a different fairytale or folktale featuring a powerful crone figure.
- Dancing with the Land: Ritual Arts & Energetics (by Diana Love, Ember, and Sparrow). The Witches gather in ritual, weaving energy to shape and change the worlds. Those who gather here are Witches, and also Priestexes and ritualists, world-weavers and change-makers. You are all this, and more. We all are, so none of us need to do it alone.
- Elements of Magic: Survival and Resistance through Spellcraft (by Jon and Yarrow). Try out daily practices! Learn a spell of survival and resistance for each Element! Plan and carry out a ritual! Keep our connection alive after camp!
- Embodied Practices of the Justice Witch (by Juniper and Tere) Embodied Practices of the Justice Witch invites us to lean in. To deepen our collective capacity to not only imagine, but to make magic from what is unfathomable. To deepen our collective capacity to navigate the chaos of change. To discern, temper, and condition our collective bodymind. To find our edge and practice in that place.
Previous Stories and Themes
Witchcamps
1994 Baba Yaga
1995 Pentacle of Life
1996 Tam Lin
1997 Idun’s Apples
1998 Charge of the Goddess
1999 Into the Labyrinth
2000 Inanna and Ereshkigal
2001 The Storyteller
2002 Thomas the Rhymer
2003 Arachne and Athena
2004 Amaterasu
2005 Green Dragon and Phoenix
2006 La Llorona
2007 Krishna and the Gopis
2008 Lilith
2009 Brigid
2010 Isis and Osiris
2011 Feri Creation Myth
2012 Psyche and Eros
2013 Dragon and Hummingbird
2014 Qwan Yin
2015 Freya and the Brisingamen
2016 Medusa
2017 Tam Lin
2018 Cerridwen and the Pentacle of the Great Turning
2019 Ragnarok
2020 Lilith
2021 Breaking through Fear: Covid calls Us to Justice
2022 Revisiting Alice
2023 Inanna and the Seven Gates of Me
2024 The Pentacle of Pearl
Winter Convergence
2023: The Sacred River of Community
2024: Coming Into Balance
Wild Child
2009 Stone Soup 2010 Grandmother Spider 2011 Vasalisa 2012 Beauty and the Beast
Spiralheart Witchcamp 