New Online Classes in the Works

Good Morning, I am in the process of setting up two new online classes. (This will take me a while because of the book project- but I am curious as to what everyone’s reaction will be to the new classes.) So here’s your big chance. I am going to do one new online class on the seven magickal days of the week- to tie in with the newest book, Book of Witchery.

 

The other class will be on hearth and home magick and will tie in with my popular book, Cottage Witchery: Natural Magick for Hearth and Home.

 

Which class will I offer first? Well that depends on the reactions I get here and on which class demands to be written down first. But either way BOTH of these online classes will be available within the next month and a half or so. Oh and yes, the Autumn Sabbats class is still available as is the The Four Elements of Witchcraft class and Advanced Natural Magick. As usual just hop over to my website for all the details.

At the moment it is interview season. You hit the month of October and suddenly everyone wants to talk to a Witch. So I am doing all that I can. Monday the 12 of October I have two radio interviews back-to-back. One is based out of Louisville and is a show called “Homegrown” that interview will be on Garden Witch’s Herbal. The other is CBS Psychic Radio and they’ll be interviewing me on Book of Witchery. You can link directly to the sites and listen over the internet bu going to my author’s website and clicking on the “Tour” page. www.ellendugan.com

Okay I’ve been up since 5:00 am doing the business side of things and now I need to go be a writer and I dont know… write or something.
Enjoy your weekend and Blessed be,
Ellen

Book of Witchery is released!

Good Morning,
Book of Witchery is out and doing well. I have several author events lined up in the nest few months to promote it- and here they are…

OCTOBER 2009
AUTHOR APPEARANCE & BOOKSIGNING at Barnes & Noble in MissouriSaturday, October 24th

Place: Barnes & Noble

Time: 2:00 – 4:00 pm.

Store address: 320 Mid Rivers Mall Drive

St. Peters, Missouri

Store Phone: 636-278-1118

Join award winning author Ellen Dugan as she signs her newest book, Book of Witchery at Barnes & Noble in St. Peters, Missouri. Ellen will be on hand Saturday afternoon to discuss and to sign her book. Come out to Barnes & Noble to meet Ellen, and find out the truth about Halloween, Witches and magick. Grab a coffee from the café and enjoy the event! Happy Halloween.
 

AUTHOR APPERANCE, LECTURE & BOOKSIGNING (Meet the Author Series- with the St. Charles County Library District)

Date: Thursday, October 29, 2009

Place: Kisker Road Library

Address: 1000 Kisker Road, St. Charles, MO.

Time: 7:00 pm

Lecture Topic: “The Tradition and Magick of Halloween”

Library Phone: 636-447-7323 or 636-926-7323

http://www.youranswerplace.org/information/programs_events.htm  

Award winning author Ellen Dugan, has been invited to be a part of the St. Charles County Library District’s Series, “Meet the Author”. Just in time for her newest book release, Book of Witchery.

The free lecture on the “Tradition and Magick of Halloween” begins at 7:00 pm and the book signing will be immediately following. Come on out to the library, get in the mood for Halloween, and learn the truth about real-life Witches, Halloween and magick.
 

 

 

 

 

 

In Studio Live Interview! Great Day Saint Louis KMOV TV
Friday October 30, 2009
10:00- 11:00 am CST
Ellen will be interviewed live in the studio on the morning talk show to discuss her newest book, Book of Witchery.
www.kmov.com/greatday/  

AUTHOR APPERANCE at the St. Louis Witches Ball!

 

 

4th Annual St. Louis Witches Ball & Masque

Friday, October 30, 2009

Place: Andres Banquet Center, St. Louis, Missouri

Time: 8:00pm – Midnight
www.stlwitchesball.org
 

 NOVEMBER 2009

AUTHOR APPERANCE & BOOKSIGNING with a CLASS to follow at Ostara* in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania

Saturday, November 7th

Place: Ostara Store

Meet and Greet 2:00 – 3:00 pm

Class Topic: Practical Magick and the Book of Witchery

Class Time: 5:00 – 6:30 pm.

Class Fee: $ 35.00

Store address: 521 Mani Street

Bethlehem, Pennsylvania

Store Phone: 610-866-5577

Join award winning author Ellen Dugan for an author event at the enchanting Ostara* store in downtown Bethlehem, PA. Ellen returns to her favorite Pennsylvanian store to discuss and sign her newest books Garden Witch’s Herbal and Book of Witchery, and to teach a class later in the evening on Practical Magick and the Book of Witchery. We look forward to seeing you there!  

 DECEMBER 2009

Author Appearance and Workshop Friday and Saturday, In Birmingham, Alabama!

 

 

 

 

Friday & Saturday, December 4th and 5th

Place: Books Beans & Candles Metaphysical Store

 

 

Friday, December 4th Author Meet & Greet

Time: Starting at 6:00 pm

 

Saturday, December 5th Class

Class Title: “The Book of Witchery, How Why and When Magick Works”

Time : To be finalized

Price: To be announced

Place: Books, Beans & Candles- Birmingham, Alabama.

Store Phone: 205-453-4636

http://www.bookbeancandle.com

 

So, things will be busy for a while and now that Im finally feeling better after all of the root canal and then tooth extraction drama– I can get back to business and work on book 12. Plus Im conjuring up a new online class to go along with Book of Witchery. The class will be on the magickal days of the week. I’ll post the information here just as soon as the class becomes available. Further along I will offer another new class based on one of my more my popular books, Cottage Witchery: Natural Magick for Hearth and Home.

Have a good week and Blessed be,
Ellen

Online Class Special

Hello,

To celebrate my birthday and the upcoming Sabbat of the Autumn Equinox, I decided to do something special.  

If you order any online class of mine by the 23rd of September you will also recieve a free extra spell.

What sort of spell you ask? “A Mercury Retrograde Spell”. One that diminshes the effects of Mercury Retrogrades. I thought this brand new spell would come in handy as we are in the middle of a retrograde right now. Just go to my website and click on the “Online classes” page to order a class.
www.ellendugan.com

 

At the moment I am back to work on the 12th book, and gearing up for the release of my next new book, Book of Witchery- which will be released in 2 weeks!

Blessed be, Ellen

The Harvest Moon- That wasn’t!

Good Morning,

Well crazy busy weekend. I celebrated the Esbat with my Coven and the rest of the holiday weekend was filled with BBQ’s and spending some quality romanitc time alone with the Hubs.

So I was looking at my facebook page on Sunday and noticed that I recived a condesending comment from someone who was thrilled to point out that the recent full moon on Friday, was NOT in fact the Harvest moon. (Some folks just LOVE to do the whole I’m smarter than the author schtick.) However, this one was just being snarky- not informative.

I rolled my eyes and started to email back politely, that the “Harvest Moon” is always the full moon closest to the Equinox, and that the way to correctly tell when that will occur is to count the days – starting at the equinox and then count back to the full moon in September and write down the number. Then you should begin at the equinox and count forward to the full moon in October and whichever has the smallest number IS in fact the Harvest moon.

So I go to count the days for myself to include in the email and…. Guess what? All of the magickal calendars that I have are in fact wrong and the snarky comment poster was right. I just had to laugh about it. What else can you do?
So for your information. I pulled this information off of the Space.com website yesterday morning….

“Sep. 4, 12:03 a.m. EDT 2009– Full Corn Moon.  Sometimes also called the Fruit Moon; such monikers were used for a full moon that occurs during the first week of September, so as to keep the Harvest Moon from coming too early in the calendar.
  

Oct. 4, 2:10 a.m. EDT 2009– Full Harvest Moon.  Traditionally, this designation goes to the full moon that occurs closest to the Autumnal (fall) Equinox.  The Harvest Moon usually comes in September, but sometimes it will fall in early October as is the case in 2009; the next time won’t come until 2017.  At the peak of the harvest, farmers can work into the night by the light of this moon.  Usually the full moon rises an average of 50 minutes later each night, but for the few nights around the Harvest Moon, the moon seems to rise at nearly the same time each night: just 25 to 30 minutes later across the U.S., and only 10 to 20 minutes later for much of Canada and Europe.”  

With this in mind I have corrected and updated the correct time of the Harvest moon information for 2009 to my online class file (so any new students who order the class have the correct information)– and I am posting it here for the current online students to see, so they will have the newly corrrected information too. If you are intersted in signing up for a class please visit my website at www.ellendugan.com Then click on the “Online classes” page for all of the different class information
 

 

So what will happen to your magick if you celebrated the Harvest Moon on Friday and it actually isn’t untill next month? Not a damn thing. The magick will still work, it was a full moon during harvest time, and the world will still go on spinning and there have been rumours of the sun still setting in the west…. yes, that was sarcasm.

It is the begining of the harvest season, the corn is ripe, the apples are ready to be picked and the grapes are being harvested for wine, I saw the beginings of that while I was in the Missouri wine country this weekend.

Every few years there is a full harvest moon, that will occur during the month of October, I wrote about that in my book Autumn Equinox, page 46. If you want to read more about it. So when this sort of thing happens, we laugh at ourselves, learn something new and add this information to the Craft that we practice. So anyway on we go and into the fray- also known as Mercury Retrograde! It started yesterday.

I refuse to get all wound up about Mercury retrogrades instead I batten down the hatches and double check all communication and travel stuff and then do the best I can. There is no point in freaking out about it. So smile and keep on practicing your Craft to the best of your ability. Embrace those lessons as they come your way and see what you can learn from them.
Blessed be, Ellen

P.S. Oh in other news I got a fun surprise this weekend. I recieved the Polish version of How to Enchant a Man in the mail. Its always cool to see your books in a foriegn language here is a picture I took of the cover. I think It’s supposed to be a hand with a sassy lipstick mark in the middle.

 

Ellen Dugan offers a new Online Class “The Autumn Sabbats”!

Hello!
Well inspiration hit me the other day and had me working like a maniac non stop for almost 20 hours straight. I am happy to announce that I have just made available a brand new online class, entitled  The Autumn Sabbats! I know you will love this class- and I’ve kept it very affordable!

Here is the class Description: Award winning author, Ellen Dugan is offering an new at home study course, “The Autumn Sabbats.”
This Course is only being offered online through her website at www.ellendugan.com and is available for purchase through PayPal. The class fee is $30.00 for the class, and will be emailed to you in Rich Text Format.

This enjoyable “The Autumn Sabbats” class covers the two Sabbats of the autumn season; the Autumn Equinox/ also called Mabon, and Samhain.
The class discusses some of the history and mythology of each Sabbat, and the class also includes homework and reading assignments, plus plenty of seasonal spells and rituals for the students to work.

The required text for this class is Autumn Equinox: The Enchantment of Mabon, by Ellen Dugan. Please note that the text does not come with the course and may be purchased at any major bookstore, or on line through Llewellyn Worldwide at www.llewelyn.com  or at Amazon.com www.amazon.com

This class is a stand alone class- it is not required to have taken any other of my online classes to take this one.  So far the feedback has been very poisitve and this class been very popular. I thought it would be fun to study the mysteries of these Sabbats, to work autumn theme spells, and to learn their folklore, and magick.

I hope that you will enjoy this new seasonal class, it will be available for order only through November 5th.

So embrace the Season of the Witch and whip up some new magick and witchery of your very own! Let’s celebrate the mystery and magick of the autumn season .

Blessed be, Ellen Dugan

Special Book Offer and Book News!

Hello,

I decided to try something a little different. I have been recieving requests for personalized copies of my books so I decided to try this with the Witchery Series and offer it through my website and see how it went. Here is the information.

 

These Award-winning, set of three Witchery Books are signed and personalized by Ellen and are available for sale only through Ellen’s website.
www.ellendugan.com and then click on the “Special Book Offer” tab.

There are only a few sets of these available and they will be offered for a limited time only. This set of three Witchery books includes: Garden Witchery, Cottage Witchery and Natural Witchery. As a bonus the set includes a handmade bookmark created by Ellen.

 

This special offer is availabe for purchase through Paypal. The total cost for all three books, plus shipping is $65.00.

Be sure to include in the “Special Instructions section” who you would like the books signed to. Expect 7-10 business days for delivery.
____________________________
Back to the Blog… Also the online Classes are still going strong. If you are intersted in the online classes please visit my website and click on the “Online Classes” tab and view the information. The classes can be ordered only through the website.

I think the classes are still popular because they are so affordable. Only 40.00 bucks for per class. And the first class, The Elements of Witchcraft is still the most popular one I have offered.  The second class, Advanced Natural Magick is more challenging and requires you to do more work on a personal level.

Okay I need to get back to work on book # 12. Its taking me for a hell of a ride. At the moment I am working on 3 different chapters at the same time! Which I NEVER do. I am a very organized, work-in-order-type of gal. But the last time I had a book grab me this hard and keep me so distracted was Cottage Witchery.

This newest book is challenging to me because I am well challenging a lot of preconcieved notions that people have about the Craft. It’s going to surprise some folks and a lot more will be saying, “Finally somebody actually tackled this topic honestly!”

Okay that’s as mysterious as I get. I won’t be announcing the topic or working title untill after I get it contracted and the release date is set. Looks like it would come out in Early 2011. To be fair Llewellyn offered me a contract sight unseen. Im the one who is taking her time and making sure I am happy with how the book comes together.

Oh also I got the first set of proof pages for Book of Witchery. The look fabulous. I’ll ask If I can post a few pages up for everyone to see- sort of a sneak peak… If I get approval I’ll let you all know. So yeah, 400 proof pages to do and writing a new book…. well I can’t say I’ll be bored.

Winding up the Garden Witch’s Herbal Tour

Hello,

Tomorrow on Saturday, July 11th I finish up my Garden Witch’s Herbal tour at ‘Inner Wisdom’ in Galesburg, Illinois. I will be doing a Meet and Greet at the book store and then teaching a class on “Green Magick”. I am really looking forward to the event. I have been traveling all over the place since May and am glad to finish up this leg of the tour. If you are curious to see where I am appearing please visit my website ay www.ellendugan.com and then click on the “Tour” tab at the top of the page.

I actually will be able to stay home and work on my next manuscript for a while…. as my next book, Book of Witchery, will be released in Mid-October 2009. Proof pages, all 400 of them will be arriving to my door for the Book of Witchery, (Its my largest book to date) so I’ll be a busy writer all summer long.

 I should probably clarify that previous statement about the next manuscript.. . When I say “next manuscript” I am referring to another book. Which I have yet to finish. (sigh) Oh well I have all summer and early fall to slave away. Once I get it contracted then I’ll announce the topic and working title of book number…. good grief what is it? …. Book number twelve.

Saw a personal trainer yesterday and she gave me a bunch of stretching and leg exercises to do to strengthen the muscles around my knees. I can workout/ walk for 30 minutes a day now but I have to walk on flat surfaces. I am banned from jogging or from walking up or down hills or slopes for a few months until my knee strain heals.  So I have been driving up to a park and walking the loop there. Its a half mile going around once so I can do 3 laps in 30 minutes so I’ve been doing that for the past 3 days. Next week I get to up the time to 45 minutes! Hurray. Once the track by my house is finished laying new AstroTurf it will be open again and I bet my knees are going to LOVE being on that cushioned track again.

That’s it from here. I need to go over my notes for the lecture tomorrow!  I’m going to be giving away a Garden Witch Tote bag to one lucky class attendee. Its one of the items from my Cafe press store. I love the totebag Its so pretty and very handy to have. If you’d like to see what other goodies are in the cafe press store hop over to the site at www.cafepress.com/ellendugan

Blessed be, Ellen

Radio Interviews and Photo Shoot

Hello,

Well it seems to be the season to get interview requests. Lately Ive been bombarded with them. So I have two radio interviews coming up. One in July and one in August.
Here is the information….

RADIO INTERVIEW

Saturday, July 18^th

Radio Show “Intuitive Perspective with Michael Dunlap

2:00-3:00 pm Central Standard Time

www.blogtalkradio.com/michael-dunlap

 

Ellen will be interviewed on the radio-blog show! Listen in and see what she has to say about magick, herbalism and her new book “Garden Witch’s Herbal”. 

 

AUGUST

RADIO INTERVIEW

Sunday, August 30

Radio Show: “Hex Education”

10:00 pm to Midnight Eastern Standard Time

www.blogtalkradio.com/hexeducation

 

Ellen will be interviewed on the radio show! Listen in and see what Ellen has to say about Witchery and Magick! She will also be discussing her newest book “Garden Witch’s Herbal” and her forthcoming title, “Book of Witchery
___________________________________

Still resting the knees. They are a little better today. I stayed off of my feet for 2 days I did NOT walk down to see the fireworks on the 4th. It seemed stupid to screw them up and besides Sunday morning I had a photo shoot for the cover of that magazine. I knew I’d be on my feet for an hour or so….. So, I rested them.
Sunday I shipped my men out of here (Hubs and 2 grown sons) to go on a camping/ fishing trip and then Mickie came over and I got all dressed up, yeah I went witchy…. and off we went to do the pictures at the park.

Mickie, while not only being a talented artist is also one hell of a photographer. She also works as a graphic artist so I knew she could take care of the requirements the magazine requested.  Plus I would not be nervous with her, and she looks at things with an artist’s eye so I knew we’d get some good shots.

It was a little misty but the light was beautiful so we schlepped ourselves off to the gardens in the park and I think we took about 100 pictures. Then we came home and did a few more in my gardens as well . Then I got changed into street clothes, wrapped up my knee, wiped off a bit of the makeup and took Mickie to lunch. We were good and had spinach salads. Then we were not so good, and split a homemade Blackberry cobbler ala mode. (Hey it’s a fruit) Thats not too bad. Now she is going to go do her magick and clean up the photos and do all that digital photographer stuff.

In a few weeks we will go over them again, and decide which ones to send in for the cover and which ones to send in for the interior article. (The magazine requested several of each, for them to choose from.) Oh, and before you ask, no. I will not be posting the pictures. AFTER the magazine picks out the shots they want- which probably will not be for several months- then I can post a few of the out takes.
Okay I need to go finish that article for the 2011 Witches’ calendar.
have a great week everyone!

Blessed be,
Ellen

Sign up for Ellen’s newsletter at her website. Visit www.ellendugan.com

Visit Ellen’s Cafe Press Store at www.cafepress.com/ellendugan

Hello world!

Good Morning,
At the urging of my fans and in the hopes to reach more readers…I decided to start another blog- besides my Myspace blog. So here goes!

I found out yesterday afternoon that my newest book, Garden Witch’s Herbal is going back for a second printing!  Hooray! What that means is the books first print run is almost sold out so- they are printing more. Thats not too shabby considering the book has only been out for about 6 or 7 weeks.

Oh and Garden Witch’s Herbal  is now also being sold through the One Spirit Book Club. Which is very cool. I was looking at their website yesterday and discovered that my other book that One Spirit sells, Natural Witchery,  is ranked number 7 in their top 100 selling books.  Sweet!

Also I have been doing a lot of interviews lately. So one of them should be appearing soon on line. As soon as I get the word that its posted I’ll let you all know.

Another future interview is a BIG one and I can drop a hint and say that I’ll be a “Cover Witch” next year for this publication.  I recieved a confirmation from the magazine’s editor, and their photo requirements,  so once things all get into place…. I’ll give you more details. 

So that means I’ll be getting my picture taken soon, once the posion ivy rash clears up, and thank goddess my photographer is also my close friend. I really don’t want to deal with a photographer who’s going to get all “twitchy” when they find out what the photos are for. We are going to have fun with the “photo shoot”.

My Coven Sister, Draco came over last night and we dove into my clothes and I started trying on different outfits- We finally came up with a few we both think would be appropriate. She’s going to lend me a few peices of jewelry (she has an impressive jewelry collection) for one of the outfits. Which is great because I need to be careful with my budget at the moment. Thank Goddess for my witch-sisters!

I also want to say thank you to those of you who commented on my last Myspace blog “Can you really be a Xian and a Witch at the same time?”.
There were over 50 very thoughtful, funny, wisely wonderful, and thought-provoking comments. I read every one of them and I have to say that last blog was probably my most viewed blog to date. We had over 400 hits on the blog in less than 8 hours.

Okay Im gonna go dig out my workout clothes lace up the walking shoes and go hit it while it’s still cool outside. I’ve been working on loosing another 5 pounds, and I was doing great untill I went on the east Coast tour- I gained 2 pounds back from eating all the seafood… lobster rolls… yummmm.

Wait where was I? Oh yeah weight loss.
Focus Ellen.
So anyway I’m back to my lowest weight in 27 years but I would like to loose at least 5 more pounds. So that means careful diet more fruits and veggies and working out. (Carefully- gotta take care of my knees!)

Then I need to dive into the annual articles for 2011. The first one is due in 2 weeks and its for the Witches Calendar. I went and loaded up on reference books at the library yesterday. So I can just start rocking on the calendar, the datebook and the Magical Alamanc and the Spell-a-Day for Llewellyn.

Then I am going to get back into writng that 12th book. Come hell or high water I have to get going on that manuscript again. Of course somewhere in all of this, the proof pages for Book of Witchery- should arrive withing the month…. 
Yeah okay, now Im stressing myself out.
Im going to go hit the pavement and work out. Send me some serenity will ya?
Blessed be,
Ellen

P.S. For more information on all of my books and tour dates please visit my author’s website at www.ellendugan.com