Het-heret / Hathor's Shrine

As I mentioned in my last post, I am planning a shrine for Aphrodite. Part of that planning was figuring out the best location for it. It could go in a small corner of the front room, or it could go in the office room where I spend most of my day, and usually have a bit more privacy... but that's where Hathor's shrine is currently located.

I knew the second location would be much better, but of course it means moving or dismantling Hathor's shrine. After giving it a lot of thought, I've decided that for now it would be best to dismantle it. It is important to me that I still honor all the Egyptian gods who were a large part of my life for so long, but at this point it makes more sense to me to do that as an actual yearly festival of sorts, instead of keeping a more specific shrine that no longer sees a lot of use.

So that's on today's list of things to be done. It's a bit of a sad moment, it's the first time in many, many years that there will not be a shrine to one of the Egyptian deities in my home, but I know at this point it's the best course of action. An inactive shrine doesn't do anyone any good, after all...

Rearranging the Shrines

I've spent the past few weeks (yeah, weeks, it's been a slow process) trying to bring a bit of new life to my shrines. Either they'd grown a bit stagnant, were no longer relevant, or were just in bad locations which meant they weren't getting the proper attention. I've found that often shrines and altars grow and change on their own with use, but sometimes they just need a total overhaul.

This was all originally prompted by the changes I wrote about in my last post, About halfway through that whole process my hearth shrine just started to feel off. I decided to move it to a different place in the kitchen, and I tried a lot of different arrangements, worked with different materials and styles, and nothing was clicking for me. Eventually I realized what needed to be done, and it's coming along... okay. I'm having a hard time deciding exactly in which spot it would work best.

I've decided to move Artemis' shrine into the kitchen where most of the others are. Right now I'm looking at other statues of Artemis, and considering maybe using a framed picture instead, since the statue I have right now doesn't fit the space well. I'm also debating which of two spaces would make for a better hearth shrine and which a better shrine for Artemis. Unfortunately I only have one "large" spot, so I need to decide which requires more room.

I also felt it was time to establish a proper shrine to Hekate, rather than just setting up a temporary one when needed. That's coming along rather well, as it was really just a matter of clearing off a spot that wasn't really being used for anything, and putting the 'temporary' items up. Again the issue is that I only have one large spot, and I'm not sure the small shelf where I've decided to put Hekate's shrine into will be big enough for what I generally use it for... I may have to continue using part of the hearth altar for some of Hekate's festivals. For day to day use, though, the small area works well.

Last, but not least, I took away the pillar candles from my Hathor shine and added in some new tea light holders. Oh, and I bought a beautiful new offering dish! Still in the mail, but I'm excited to add it in. Hathor's shrine is by far always the easiest shrine to maintain, perhaps in part due to location, perhaps because out of the deities I currently honor regularly, Hathor has been around the longest. I've had many years to experiment and discover what is appreciated.