Hello everyone, I am unable to use candles and incense (it’s a personal decision) can I have a leadlight candle and if it is a specific color can I put a colored ribbon around the leadlight? with the incense burning could I use a Buddhist singing bowl or soft music relating to what I am doing or do other people have any other suggestions to my questions would be appreciated xx I do burn the incense outside and gather the ashes. Tonight is the new full moon in Melbourne Australia, I am putting out some water throughout the night and doing the ritual for the very first time YAH
Warm Regards
Sharon xx
Leadlight? As in stained glass? That would work.
Music is also a good representation of air, IMO. I mean, sound waves travel through air. You need to use whatever you feel comfortable with. If it’s ribbons and singing bowls, then use that. Whatever you feel comfortable with! It’s all good!
Hi Sharon,
Not using candles or incense for any reason is totally fine. Plenty of folks practice without using open flame or smoke. I second Amethyst’s suggestion of using sound/music to bring certain influences into your spellwork or help cleanse your space. Another popular option is to use spell ingredients that align with your intention, such as crystals, herbs, sigils, runes, etc. Using things that correspond with your intention can help boost the power and direction of the spell - you can check a correspondence list (like these ones here) to help align matching ingredients.
This is a great idea! Candles are popular for color magic, but as long as the color your wish to draw on is included somewhere in the spell ingredients, I personally believe it works just the same. A ribbon is a creative way to add color to your spells.
Blessed be and happy full moon! 
I’ve got another suggestion! I was looking on Amazon (dangerous words for me!), and I found a Mini Clothesline for a dollhouse! You could use that, or use the little clothesline to put itty bitty ribbons on it!
When I think of the Air element, I usually use a clothesline over birds or butterflies or whatever. The wind whipping the sheets and how the sheets smell afterwards is just such a good feeling! Maybe that will help you!
There are also a few magical properties of cotton! I got to looking this morning, and I got interested! LOL! It can be used for luck, protection, and, of course, in poppets for binding and healing rites. It’s very interesting!
Thank you for your great inspiration and ideas I haven’t tried singing bowls I believe there is an art to it but sounds great when I was in Tibet I should of brought one back with me xx Warm Regards Sharon
I to love Amazon I had a quick look on the site I understand what you mean I had a similar Idea with making a stick structure with the ribbons hanging of them xx I defiantly would be interested in making poppets as well I have made small rabbits and animals hand sewn before xx
In Ireland and other places, they use torn cloth, hopefully organic and biodegradable, and tie it to trees for Clooties. Or Ribbon Trees. Something like that may help you too!
Wow thankyou for that information when I was doing my Ancestry I have like 50% Irish heritage very connected to Irish traditions and as well as Scottish my other half xx
You’re welcome! I hope all this info I spammed you with will help you!
Some other considerations for ritual items:
Air: How do you feel about blowing bubbles? Some people don’t like the soapy residue indoors; others find cleanup to be minor.
Bells. These can be ceramic or glass in inspirational shapes or the holiday jingles in elemental colors.
Perfume or scented oil.
A CD player with your favorite music.
A computer or tablet displaying something like a mountain, birds, butterflies, or cloud formations.
Writing and language are themselves Air elementals.
All elements: I have sets of items in my travel altar which represent the elements purely by color. These have included small containers of colored sand from sand art kits, glowing “stones” in different shades, necklace charms, balls of clay, tiny dolls I made of embroidery floss, mini jingle bells, beads, glitter, paint, colored feathers from a craft, Smartees- style candy “pills,” candy straws, lego bricks, glass bud vases or perfume bottles, pens or markers of the elemental colors, slips of colored note paper, beans or seeds of different colors, bottles of colored sugar or Kool Aid, fabric flowers, bead necklaces sold at Mardi Gras (I hang these on my walls to make the whole room a giant altar), cocktail umbrellas, Christmas decorations, keys with different shaped handles, mini statues or kids toys of things which represent the elements to you- or if you’re a specializer like me, unicorns in different postures which remind me of the elements. You could even use pipe cleaners or popsicle sticks. If the rainbow colored popsicle sticks are too expensive, save and clean sticks from summer treats and draw on them with gel pens or markers. Colored ribbons and strings are great! I’ve even made bracelets of colored rubber bands in elemental colors and used matching hair ties.
A lot of spells are written to include candles and incense, but you can use anything around you to represent the elements in permanent or temporary forms. For example, I use fruit gummies as an edible altar each morning: if the packet doesn’t contain all the colors, I substitute with what I have. I bless each element representation with my intention before I eat it.
A lot of these items are purchased, but I have also used items I found on the ground and cleaned well before use. A simple washer can represent water as a play on words- or a wheel from a toy car for the act of movement; a bubblegum wrapper, a nail, a stick, or bit of cottonwood fluff for air; an ad for Big Red, a screw, a tiny wish bone, a used fuse, an old holiday lightbulb, or even a toy army character for fire. Earth can then be a bolt, a wheel’s balancing weight, or any stone you pick up along your path. Use your imagination and feel the meanings with your heart.
All this may be overwhelming. The possibilities are endless. Please don’t let another’s ideas of value sway you from casting any spell you wish. If I find a good spell and have nothing near me to use as a tool, I will simply close my eyes and imagine myself handling what the writer is describing. The spell is just as powerful simply because it means something to me, just because I took the words to heart.
A song I once heard equated the body with earth, the breath for air, the blood for water, and Spirit for fire, though you can easily substitute the mind for air and strength of will for fire among other things.
Nature provides all we need, too: sunshine for fire; water flowing in streams, lakes, or oceans; the breeze or a mountain for air; and rocks or plants for earth.
Need pictures? I don’t have them set up at the moment, but I’d be glad to just to show how easy it is. You got this!
Thoughtful Thursday Sharon,
I am thinking you meant to say LED lights. I see no reason why that would be a problem. The flame and candle is basically to represent the sun and actions, and I so agree with Amethyst about the sound. That takes the place of the incense, which is for the air element and sound does the same. Sounds good to me. I am a solar witch and I perform in the sunlight, so that is my flame also.
As always, do as you feel called and it is all good!!
Lady Gene 
Thank you so much for your fantastic reply I love how you spoke about nature I have a park nearby and will go and sit there for ages gazing and listening to the surroundings around me I would love to see pictures on how you set things up I have been feeling a little sad today but when I get onto this forum people here are so friendly and encouraging with the knowledge that you all bring xx Warm Regards Sharon xxx
Hi, please don’t worry that you cannot use a candle or incense in a spell just because it says so. My fellow Witches have come up with some wonderful ideas. I do have a few suggestions to add but any spell work is yours and you can adapt it to whatever you feel is right for you
You could draw on separate pieces of paper coloured candles and place it on your space and use which colour accordingly.
You can download on You Tube a roaring fire and have the sound.
You could use the Spells8 Virtual Altar and add candles, cauldron
I feel that a Cauldron itself represents fire 
The Sun is the natural element of fire so when the weather is good you can take advantage of it and cast outside and use all the elements
- Sun
- Air
- A crystal or a plant or whatever you think
- A glass of Water
- Yourself as the Fifth
If you want to a simple home clearing just open your windows and if you have a little bell they don’t cost much you can go into each room and at each corner ring the bell. 
or as you and others have said use a singing bowl whatever you wish.
If there is an ingredient in a spell that you don’t have I just change it.
Happy Casting 
Things went 52 Card Pickup on me all of a sudden. Sorry I took so long. I didn’t forget about you.
This is what I like putting on the walls- earth only, just for an example. Each wall is a different element, so the entire room becomes a walk-in altar. It is a cool feeling. I don’t have them up right now just because of cleaning and health issues. When I feel more “safe,” I plan on putting them up all around me. I used to have a Christmas ornament key for each element also, hung with the star. Those disappeared when I moved, a while ago and I have not found replacements for them as yet. Altars always seem to be in the process of creation.
The garlands are made from beads I bought online. I found bead necklaces at Dollar Tree which work as well, but I’d have to either cut the necklace to form a garland or give up the M shape, which I like. Personal preference, not a must. The rest of the items were Walmart, Dollar General, or wherever I could find them in the colors I wanted.
I was considering putting out every possible altar I have collected, but that would be messy and uninspiring. I’ll go through these one by one, just for the image, so you get a better collection of ideas from which you can develop your own.
Also, these are not necessarily set up the way I would use them: my practice is a little different from common practices. I tell you this to give you the freedom to create your own setup.
From the Dollar Tree summer collection, the plastic handles on the umbrellas are great for holding fruit for a tropical drink, but they don’t always stay open. The rainbow umbrella was from a parade- I don’t know where they found them, but I like!
This next set is a travel altar. The bag was made by a lady from Hawaii. It opens flat as an altar cloth. I made the dolls of friendship bracelet string on a fork.
I keep with them a medallion I’d made of seed beads. You’ll notice it is my avatar, here on the forum. This is the bag, closed. I could wear it while traveling, and no one would know anything.
This is another Dollar Tree find. They are battery operated tea lights! Unfortunately the lights change colors, so I don’t use the lights in my practice.
I usually hide these containers of colored sand around the apartment to guard the “quarters.”
Remember when I said I specialize in unicorns? These are keychain pill boxes I chanced to find online.
Glitter in glass: I tried to take this pic several times, but it came out blurry. Caffeine is hitting me.
Ok. My mother got me into this one by collecting memorabilia while traveling. She didn’t have space for much, so she used jewelry charms. The bracelet is itself an altar. I included spare charms which have not been added. Yes, the charms on the bracelet go clockwise from bottom: fire, air, earth, water, and Spirit, but would you have been able to tell if I hadn’t mentioned it? The topmost charm is a squirrel on a branch- hard to see. The bird got cut off- it holds a 4 leaf clover.
If you work at night, perhaps some glowing “stones?”
I mentioned using jingle bells. These are of differing sizes just because I was having difficulty finding all I wanted in one size.
Pony beads.
Miniature books which can be written in. They might be small, but they can hold a favorite spell. These were found in the dollhouse minis section of Hobby Lobby
Ok. You’ve noticed by now that I am a little free on colors. Hobby Lobby didn’t have yellow book covers. The pic makes the Air book look purple. That would work in a pinch. In real life, the book is brown, which could work for either Earth or Fire. I focus on it being Air, so it is Air for me.
Many times, I have two items in the middle. I work with seven elements when I can: Earth, Air, Water, Fire, Spirit Above, Spirit Below, and Spirit Within. This is simply how I roll.
Crystal altar- quartz point, rutilated quartz, raw ruby, lapis lazuli, boulder opal, and fluorite.
Unicorns horns for fun- green, blue, and violet were graduated colors, but they will work.
A varied travel altar. Odin is a bell. The crystals are herkimer diamonds for good dreams. I don’t have to burn the match in the bottle for it to represent fire. The lamp glows in the dark and really works! 
My bird, Albus, got all excited when I started pulling all this stuff out. We haven’t had anything set up all summer due to the desert heat. It makes for a good rest each year, and we are both happy to get back to decorating and working in the fall.
In the background, you can see my floral Lego altar in the black Unicorn vase.
He’s posing just for you!
Oh! I almost forgot. Last year, the winds came from every direction. I held out a bag for each direction, promised I didn’t want to keep the winds from doing their work, and asked the wind to grant me a blessing. I lived on the second floor, so the winds did actually follow the building to come from above and below. My wind bags can be used for an altar, too. Hmmm, I wonder if I could hang them on the walls, too…
My altar table is made of a bird cage stand with a piece of wood on top. Below is a handy shelf, where I keep my supplies in tins. The tin you see is shaped like a haunted house and contains candles and incense for the cooler months. The other is a cookie tin from Scotland, containing the rest of my witchy supplies, other than the wall decor, which is in a wooden box bearing a unicorn based on a tapestry.
I’d like to thank you for this opportunity. While taking pictures, I found items I no longer use or need- nothing I took pictures of. You helped me get organized and a bit simplified.
Now to see what a mess I could have made had I pulled everything out at once… 
Fanciful Friday Georgia,
Wow, all those goodies…can I play?
Welcome! Play Away!
@georgia thanks for the wonderful pictures your bird is so cute (Albus) my daughter had a cockatiel at one stage it loved going in the shower with her LOL Warm Regards xx Sharon xx 
I once had a cockatiel. Sugar was a very caring, motherly bird. I was very sick, and she came to tuck me into bed. Unfortunately, she caught my flu.
I have trouble with incense. It wrecks my sinus and I have not been able to use it (or sage or any burning material) for a couple of years. I started substituting pictures of candles. I can use fragrant oils but they also bother me so I limit them to bags or jars. It doesn’t stop me from any of my craft.
Here is an example, It is AI but I started with a picture I made and tweaked it..
I blow up the picture on my PC and concentrate on it while meditating. If you want to have fun, stare at the image and imagine it flickering. It is freaky.