Build-a-Broom Workshop

An evening of Halloween fun and learning to make your own besom, or witch’s broom

Date:
12pm, Saturday, October 31
Montgommery County, Maryland

To sign up, email moonbeamlaura.keel@gmail.com

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Besom Making

✨Handles✨

Choosing Your Besom Handle

Think about how you intend to use your broom. Will it be a fun prop or will it have magical uses? What will you do with your besom? Whatever your intention it helps to know before you begin building your broom.

Before selecting your handle, take a slow breath and let your attention drop into your heart. Each type of wood carries its own ancient wisdom and elemental spirit. Run your hand along the pieces before you, noticing which one seems to “speak” to you. You may feel warmth, tingling, or a quiet sense of rightness. Trust that feeling — it’s the tree’s way of greeting you. The wood that calls to you is the one that will best support your intention and weave your magic into the world.

🌿 Magical Properties of Besom Handle Woods

Maple Magic

The maple tree can symbolize life force, flow, beauty, and expansion. In Japan, it represents longevity, wisdom, and prosperity. Their magical properties are diverse, encompassing love, protection, strength, and wisdom. Maple leaves symbolize changes, fortune, and wisdom, and the tree as a whole represents life-force energy, endurance, and beauty.  

Symbolism & Elemental Associations

Love and abundance:

• Maple syrup or sugar is used in spells to attract love and bring sweetness to relationships.
• The tree is also associated with prosperity and abundance. 

Protection and strength:

• Maple wood is considered very protective and can be used for doorframes to ward off negative energies. 
• The tree symbolizes strength, endurance, and practicality. 
• In some Native American traditions, it is seen as a tree of protection against negative energies and spirits. 

Wisdom and guidance:

• The maple is linked to seeking wisdom and guidance through dreams. 
• Maple leaves can represent knowledge and wisdom gained over time. 
• The wood is used to create wands for working with the fairy realm or for protection spells. 

Magical properties

• Wands and tools: The wood is used for making wands and other magical tools. 
• Fairy connection: It is sometimes called a “fairy tree” and is associated with the fairy realm. 
• Healing: In traditional medicine, the sap and bark have been used for various ailments, and the leaves were applied as poultices to reduce pain. 


Shadow side• Over-giving or people-pleasing — offering sweetness to others while neglecting one’s own needs.

• Stagnation — becoming too comfortable or stuck, avoiding necessary change or challenge.

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Willow Magic

Willow trees possess diverse magical properties, symbolizing flexibility, renewal, luck, divination, protection, healing, and lunar or watery realms.

Magical Properties

• Flexibility and Resilience: The willow’s ability to bend and withstand strong winds symbolizes emotional strength and adaptability. 

• Renewal and Immortality: Due to its vigorous growth from cuttings and ability to sprout anew, the willow represents rebirth, vitality, and immortality, particularly in ancient Chinese tradition. 

• Water and Moon Connection: Its natural presence near water connects it to the feminine, intuition, dreams, and the moon. 

• Protection from Danger: Planting a willow near a home is thought to protect against storms, floods, and general danger. 

• Averting Bad Luck: Knocking on a willow trunk is a practice for bringing good fortune and sending away bad luck. 

• Healing Pain and Fever Relief: Willow bark contains salicylic acid, the ingredient in aspirin, and was traditionally used to alleviate pain, lower fevers, and treat rheumatism.

Divination & Dreams 

• Divination: Willow is sometimes considered an excellent divining rod.
• Dreaming: Placing a fallen willow branch under a pillow is believed to soothe stress and facilitate prophetic or sweet dreams.

Shadow side

• Emotional overwhelm — becoming overly absorbed in feelings, melancholy, or moodiness.

• Difficulty letting go — holding onto old wounds or patterns instead of flowing forward.

Other Magical Uses

• Magic Wands: The pliant wood of the willow makes it ideal for crafting magic wands. 
• Wishes: You can tell secrets to a willow tree and make wishes. 
• Protection Cord: In Scotland, a cord made from the wool of willow catkins was used for protection against unseen forces. 

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Poplar Magic

Poplar trees have magical properties associated with the afterlife, hope, protection, and healing. In European traditions, they are seen as a connection to the spirit world and carry the memories of the deceased. They also symbolize hope, revival, and the ability to start new chapters. 

Magical Properties

• Connection to the spirit world: Some European traditions view the poplar as a link to the afterlife. In Greek mythology, the White Poplar marks the entrance to the Realm of the Dead, and the Black Poplar was said to have transformed souls. 

Hope and new beginnings: Poplars represent hope and the promise of revival. Poplar can make a good gift for someone starting a new phase in their life. 

• Protection from evil: In some traditions, carrying a poplar branch was believed to ward off evil spirits. 
• Grounding and anchoring: The Black Poplar, in particular, is used to help ground chaotic energy and create a sense of peace and spaciousness for transformation. 
• Kindness and humility: The tree is said to teach openness, compassion, kindness, and humility. 
• Pain relief: Poplar buds contain salicin, a compound the body converts to salicylic acid, similar to aspirin, which helps with pain and inflammation.
• Healing balm: A Balm of Gilead salve made from poplar buds was traditionally used for muscle soreness, bruising, and inflammatory conditions. 



• Respiratory issues: The oil from the buds has been used for headaches, congestion, and earaches.

Shadow side

• Restlessness or instability — difficulty grounding, constantly shifting focus or direction.
• Avoidance of emotions — staying “light and airy” to escape deeper feelings or inner truth.

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Magnolia Magic

Magnolia carries rich symbolism across cultures, rooted in its ancient lineage and dramatic, fragrant blossoms. In Appalachian and southern U.S. folk magic, magnolia is seen as a guardian tree. Its leaves may be used in protection charms and blossoms are connected to love and gentleness. In China and Japan, Magnolia flowers are strongly linked with feminine beauty, purity, and nobility.

Magical Properties

• Grace & emotional gentleness — magnolia brings softness to the heart, encouraging compassion, patience, and deep inner calm.
• Feminine strength — often linked with quiet resilience, beauty, and the power of presence rather than force.
• Renewal & rebirth — magnolia blossoms symbolize fresh starts, healing from old wounds, and blooming after hardship.
• Dignity & self-worth — supports confidence, poise, and holding oneself with serene self-respect.
• Ancestral connection — magnolia trees are ancient, carrying energy of lineage, tradition, and timeless wisdom.

Shadow Side

• Over-sensitivity — taking things too personally or absorbing others’ emotional weight.
• Withholding — retreating inward, becoming guarded or distant when overwhelmed.

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Hickory Magic

Hickory has strong, grounded, resilient energy in folk-magic and symbolic traditions. Its qualities often connect to endurance, integrity, and the ability to weather storms.

Magical Properties

• Strength and stamina — hickory’s tough wood symbolizes endurance, courage, and the ability to persevere through challenges.
• Protection — traditionally seen as a guardian tree that creates a strong energetic boundary.
• Integrity and truth — associated with honesty, fairness, and standing firmly in one’s values.
• Manifestation through effort — supports determination, discipline, and follow-through on goals.
• Connecting to ancestral wisdom — its deep roots and sturdy presence make it symbolic of heritage and continuity.

Shadow Side

• Rigidity or stubbornness — holding too tightly to one’s beliefs or ways, resisting flexibility.
• Overemphasis on toughness — pushing through everything without rest, leading to burnout or emotional hardness.

✨Twine✨

Using hemp twine to bind a besom adds specific energetic, structural, and symbolic properties to the tool, rooted in the natural qualities of the hemp plant.

Magical and Energetic Properties

• Amplification and Manifestation: According to traditional craft lore, hemp possesses a high-energy vibration that closely mirrors clear quartz crystal because its microscopic fiber structure is hexagonal rather than circular. Using hemp twine helps magnify and manifest the intent woven into the broom or ritual work.
• Purification and Protection: Hemp fibers are frequently used in cleansing and protection blends to sweep away stagnant or negative energy, block unwanted influences, and ground a space.
• Strength and Binding: Because hemp is remarkably strong and durable, the twine is ideal for binding twigs, herbs, and the handle together in “harm-none” binding rituals, cord magic, and handfastings.
• Earth-Based Sustainability: As a natural, biodegradable plant fiber, hemp honors ecological alignment in pagan and witchcraft practices, avoiding synthetic plastics while anchoring the tool in the natural world.

✨Bristles✨

Pine Straw

Purification & Cleansing Pine energy clears stagnant energy, negativity, emotional heaviness, psychic residue

Protection Pine carries a hardy, resilient energy:

• strengthen boundaries
• guard the home
• disperse unwanted influences

Renew & Fresh Energy Pine is evergreen, so it symbolizes growth, continuity, fresh life-force, vitality

Healing & Emotional Release Its scent and presence encourage:

• emotional detox
• mood clearing
• soothing of grief or heaviness
• lightness of spirit

Longevity & Strength Pinewood is flexible, resilient, and long-lasting. This makes a broom sturdy, practical, symbolically strong

Willow Twigs

Willow trees possess diverse magical properties, symbolizing flexibility, renewal, healing, and lunar or watery realms. They are associated with good luck and protection.

• Flexibility and Resilience: The willow’s ability to bend and withstand strong winds symbolizes emotional strength and adaptability. 



• Renewal and Immortality: Due to its vigorous growth from cuttings and ability to sprout anew, the willow represents rebirth, vitality, and immortality, particularly in ancient Chinese tradition. 



• Water and Moon Connection: Its natural presence near water connects it to the feminine, intuition, dreams, and the moon. 



• Protection & Luck
• Healing:  Pain and Fever Relief
• Divination & Dreams 

Honeysuckle Magic

Honeysuckle is traditionally associated with “sweetening” situations, enhancing intuition, and attracting positive energy.

• Love & Relationships: Used to enhance romantic attraction, deepen commitment, and sustain long-term affection. Vines are sometimes twined together in binding or fidelity workings.
• Prosperity & Luck: Cultivated or placed around the home to draw wealth, good fortune, and financial abundance.
• Psychic Enhancement & Dreams: The sweet scent is believed to open the third eye, sharpen intuition, and encourage vivid or prophetic dreams. Fresh flowers are sometimes lightly crushed and rubbed on the forehead.
• Protection & Cleansing: Grown near doorways or burned in folk practices to ward off negative influences, protect the home, and purify spaces.
• Faerie Lore: Historically linked to the Fae, honeysuckle can be placed or grown near the home to attract their presence.

✨Nails✨

✨Accessories✨

Personalizing your besom: Included in the cost of the workshop are charms and essential oils.

Also, available for purchase at $2 each:
Witch’s bells
Ceramic charms, beads and buttons (handmade in my pottery studio)

Essential Oils at a Glance

Essential Oil	Core Energies / Magical Properties	When to Choose
Cinnamon	Passion, prosperity, warmth, protection	When you want to ignite motivation, attract abundance, or add fiery energy
Mint	Clarity, refreshment, energy, purification	When you need mental focus, upliftment, or clearing stagnant vibes
Neroli	Emotional healing, serenity, sensuality	When seeking calm, heart soothing, or gentle romantic energy
Sandalwood	Grounding, spiritual connection, meditation	When you want to deepen practice, stabilize emotions, or quiet the mind
Lavender	Peace, relaxation, cleansing, harmony	For calming stress, balancing energy, or creating a tranquil space
Lemon	Brightness, clarity, purification, positivity	When you need fresh starts, optimism, or energetic detox
Chamomile	Comfort, nurturing, sleep, emotional soothing	For rest, inner-child healing, or calming anxiety
Rosemary	Memory, protection, clarity, purification	Ideal for focus, psychic defense, and energy refreshing
Ylang Ylang	Sensuality, emotional release, self-love	When you want softness, intimacy, or heart-opening energy
Tea Tree	Healing, cleansing, energetic boundaries	For banishing negativity, strengthening immunity (physical and spiritual), and protection

Also, feel free to bring any items that are meaningful to you. We can figure out how to work them into the broom.

Magical properties of things you might wish to bring to add to your broom:

🌿 Sprigs of herbs

Rosemary • Purification • Memory and clarity • Strong warding energy
Perfect if you want a protective, uplifting presence at your door.

Lavender • Calming the space • Emotional healing • Inviting peaceful energy
Especially good for bedrooms, meditation rooms, or creative spaces.

Sage • Cleansing and clearing
Garden sage or culinary sage is symbolically powerful and less smoky than sage meant for smudging.

Thyme • Courage • Strengthening your space
Historically used for protection around doorways

Mugwort • Intuition • Dreamwork • Liminal guidance
Great if your doorway is a place of ritual or spiritual practice.

Mint • Freshness • Prosperity • Protection against unwanted energies
Also keeps the entryway smelling fresh.

Basil • Love and harmony • Prosperity • Welcoming energy

Chamomile • Peace and rest • Soothing the nervous system
Lovely in quiet, contemplative homes.

🌙 Symbolic Additions You Can Tuck In

These items add presence and intention without overwhelming the broom visually:

• Small crystals: black tourmaline (protection), amethyst (clarity), citrine (abundance)

• Ribbons and beads in meaningful colors:
red (strength)
blue (communication)
gold (success)
orange (creativity, vitality, success, enthusiasm, and the energy of the harvest season)
purple (intuition)
green (growth)
black (protection, the banishment of negative energy, and deep spiritual grounding)

• Charms: keys, bells, pentacle discs, small metal suns or moons

• Dried flowers for beauty and blessing

• Feathers (ethically sourced) for air element and movement of energy

✨Besom Song✨

Willow bend and straw to weave,
Bind this broom with bright moon’s leave.
Sweep away what must be gone,
Clear the path to carry on.

Twine and twist, now spirit flow,
Where I sweep, intentions grow.
Home and heart both bright and true,
Hardwood strength be carried through.

Repeat the song as you wrap the twine around your broom. Let your breath and motion fall into rhythm with the words.

✨Blessing✨

Sweep of Besom, soft and bright,
Carry calm through day and night.
From this heart let worries cease,
Every stroke be one of peace.
Round and round the still air turns,
Smoke and shadow, light returns.
Bless this space, both old and new,
With love in all we say and do.

✨Besom Magic✨

Besoms, are most traditionally used for clearing negative energy and reinforcing intentions.

• When sweeping with the besom, the bristles should not actually touch the ground. You are sweeping energy, not debris.
• Use clockwise movements to “raise” energy.
• Intent matters: Always focus on what you want to invite rather than what you want to banish. Keep your intentions clear; the broom amplifies what you focus on.
• Optional magical additions: Sprinkle salt for protection. Sprinkle dried lavender, rosemary, or bay leaves during sweeping for extra calming and protective properties.
• Combining willow for healing, intuition, emotional balance, and essential oils, such as cinnamon for prosperity, protection, energy, makes a broom ideal for rituals that invite peace, safety, and harmony into your home.

Working with your besom

✨ Sweep Away Negative Energy

Purpose: Remove tension, conflicts, or bad vibes

Steps:

Hold the broom and sweep your home’s entrance or main rooms from the outside in, imagining all negative energy being pulled out of the space.

Focus on peace and safety as you sweep:

“I sweep away fear and strife, and welcome love and calm into this home.”

For extra potency, do this on a waxing moon (to build positive energy) or at dawn, a time of renewal.

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✨ Protective Corners

Purpose: Create a protective energy barrier

Steps:

Place the broom in a corner of your home (pointing upward, hanging or leaning gently).

Visualize its fibers forming an invisible shield around the home.

You can enhance this by circling a candle in the area or sprinkling a little salt nearby for extra protection.

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✨ Peaceful Entrance Ritual

Purpose: Invite calm energy when entering your home

Steps:

Sweep the front doorstep lightly with the broom.

As you sweep, say aloud or in your mind:

“Only peace and safety enter here; all harm and discord stay away.”

Optional: Tie a blue ribbon to the broom handle—blue symbolizes serenity and protection.

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✨ Daily Calm Sweep

Purpose: Maintain harmony and balance

Steps:

At the end of the day, sweep high-traffic areas of your home (kitchen, living room, entrance).

Visualize tension leaving your space and energy being refreshed.

Focus on feelings of gratitude and calm to reinforce peaceful energy.

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✨ Willow & Cinnamon Blessing

Purpose: Ongoing home protection and emotional balance

Steps:

Hold the broom and walk through your home clockwise, lightly tapping or brushing the broom against corners.

Say:
“With Willow’s grace and Cinnamon’s power, this home is safe, calm, and full of harmony.”

Leave the broom leaning in a central room or near the entrance until the next week or moon cycle.

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✨ Ritual for Mounting a Besom with Intention

Cleanse the doorway. Sweep the area or brush your hand across it intentionally.

Hold the broom and name its purpose, For example, “May this besom sweep away harm and invite in peace.”

Hang it by the door in a way that resonates for you.

Take a breath of gratitude. Acknowledge your home as a living, energetic space.

Keeping a besom by a door is a common folk-magical and spiritual practice. Its purposes vary slightly by tradition, but the core meanings tend to include:

Besom placement

Protection
A besom hung horizontally over a doorway is often viewed in folk magic and Appalachian traditions as a neutral, steady shield of balanced protection that maintains peace in the household. It is also believed to act as a charm that wards off negative energies, unwanted spirits, or ill intent. The door, being a threshold, is symbolically a place where energies enter, so the broom serves as a guardian.

Cleansing
Placed horizontally above an entryway, anyone walking underneath passes through its energetic field, allowing the besom to “sweep away” or neutralize bad intentions and stagnant vibrations before they cross the threshold. Besoms are also strongly associated with sweeping away stagnant energy. Even when hung rather than used physically, the broom symbolically “sweeps” the threshold and keeps the space energetically fresh and clear.

Boundary Setting
In magical traditions, thresholds represent liminal spaces — places between worlds. Hanging a besom is a way of marking that transition and clarifying what is welcome to cross and what should remain outside.

Blessings and Good Fortune
Some folk practices say a broom over a door attracts good luck, invites harmonious energy, and encourages a sense of homey well-being.

Symbol of Hospitality
In certain traditions, it can also signal that the home is spiritually tended and that guests are entering a sacred, intentional space.

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✨ Seven-Day Peace and Prosperity Ritual


Here’s a 7-day “Peace & Protection Home Ritual” using your cinnamon and Willow broom. Each day builds on the previous, creating a week-long energetic reset to invite safety, calm, and harmony into your home. You might wish to repeat this 7-day ritual monthly or at each new moon to refresh protective energy.

Day 1 – Dedication & Clearing
Goal: Set your intention for the week
Steps:

• Hold your broom and walk clockwise through your home.
• Visualize a soft, protective light following the broom, sweeping away tension.
• Say aloud: “This broom is dedicated to peace and protection. All negativity leaves, all calm enters.”
• Leave the broom leaning in a central spot until tomorrow.

Day 2 – Entrance Blessing
Goal: Protect and calm the main entrance
Steps:

• Sweep your front doorstep lightly from outside to inside.
• Visualize any discord being replaced with serenity and safety.
• Optional: Tie a blue ribbon around the broom handle to symbolize peace.

Day 3 – Corner Shielding
Goal: Strengthen home protection
Steps

• Place the broom in each corner of your home (one at a time).
• Tap or brush the broom lightly against walls, saying: “With Willow’s healing and Cinnamon’s protection, this corner is safe and calm.”
• Leave the broom in the last corner overnight.

Day 4 – Emotional Harmony Sweep
Goal: Balance the energy of your living spaces
Steps:

• Sweep through the rooms you use most (kitchen, living room, bedroom, etc.).
• Focus on visualizing tension, anger, or stress leaving your home.
• End by inhaling deeply and imagining the space filled with peace.

Day 5 – Window & Door Protection
Goal: Shield your home’s entry points
Steps:

• Lightly sweep windowsills and door thresholds clockwise.
• Visualize a gentle protective barrier forming around these points.
• Say: “Only safety and calm may pass this threshold. All harm is blocked.”

Day 6 – Personal Blessing
Goal: Extend protection to everyone in your home
Steps:

• Hold the broom and walk clockwise around each family member or roommate (or your own living space if alone).
• Lightly brush the broom near them (no contact necessary), imagining peace enveloping them.
• Say aloud: “You are surrounded by safety, calm, and harmony.”

Day 7 – Gratitude & Reinforcement
Goal: Seal the week’s energy and maintain it long-term
Steps:

• Sweep your home clockwise as usual, visualizing calm and protection.
• Thank the broom, Willow, and Cinnamon for their energy.
• Place the broom in a central location or near the entrance for ongoing protection.