New Deck Interview (Robin Wood)

This is using FireRaven's spread and the Robin Wood deck. 

****** 5 ****** 6 ******
********** 4 **********
****** 3 ****** 2 ******
********** 1 **********

1. Tell me about yourself. What is your most important characteristic?

Knight of Cups - A light-hearted, playful take on a tarot deck. 

2. What are your strengths as a deck?

Temperance - It'll tell me what I need to know - but only what I need to know. Nothing in excess.

3. What are your limits as a deck?

King of Pentacles - It is an earthly object, nothing more - a tool towards the end.

4. What do you bring to the table -- what are you here to teach me?

The Sun - It is here to help illuminate my path, to ease my journey.

5. How can I best learn from and collaborate with you?

8 Cups - learn to rely on my own spiritual gifts more. Stop using books and other material things (although I'm pretty good at that already now) and trust myself (which I still don't do fully yet).

6. What is the potential outcome of our working relationship?

The Hierophant - I'll have greater control over my gifts - perhaps Tarot will form a greater part of my daily ritual than it currently does? (I've not been using the cards for a while...)

Robin Wood deck - first impressions.

OK, I'm typing this as I open the packaging, so this is my real first impression.  It's from Amazon, so off comes the basic Amazon cardboard outer.... to reveal the cards in their shrink-wrapped box.  I hate this sort of shrink-wrapping, it's a pain to get off.... a few minutes later, I'm in.  the box is nice and smooth, feels like it's good quality.  The box is nice one - front opening instead of top-opening, so it's easier to keep the cards inside that box.

Opening up, there's a small black-and-white leaflet as opposed to a book.  The meanings for each of the cards are laid out clearly, with singular keywords picked out in bold for the pips.  I tend to read through intuition alone, so I won't be referring to that very often, but it's useful to have anyway.  The back of the booklet contains three spreads - a 15 card, the CC, and a 5 card specific question spread.

The cards themselves are also wrapped, facing upwards with the fool on top.  The cards are a good size - a bit bigger than normal I think, but not too big that they can't be handled with ease.  Unwrapping them, the cardstock feels good and smooth, well printed and not too thick.  The quality of the drawing and printing is beautiful, and very typical of Robin Wood.  

Going through the deck there are some cards that jump out as my instant favourites (just from the majors) - The Magician, the High Priestess, The Lovers (I love the Yin and Yang of the male/female, moon/sun) Strength, The Hermit, Justice, Death (the most beautiful version of Death I have seen in a deck for a long time, and reminds me of my own name, Winter Rose) and The Star.  The minors are incredibly readable and beautiful - I think I might end up using this deck now as my main deck.  There are also two extra cards which have the 5-card spread and the 15 card.

As for the backs of the cards, although I'm not keen on the green, they're not as bad as some people make it out to be.  All in all, I'm impressed with the deck, and I'll be trying a reading with them later.

Waiting for Robin Wood

I've just ordered the Robin Wood Tarot deck from amazon, and it should be arriving today.  I've already got one deck, but another deck is always useful, and it does me good to change my decks every once in a while as it means I read more into the cards, I pick things up etc.  It does the decks good too to have a rest from being read.  Some people think that having more than one deck isn't a good idea - I used to read for others, so I had one deck for me and one deck for my clients, but I soon learned that it didn't really matter which deck I used, as long as the deck was readable and 'spoke' to me.  I've been using my old deck for quite a while now, and while I absolutely love it, I've used it so much that the images and meanings have started to get a bit muddy - not physically, it still looks as new as it did when I got it, but in my mind.  Rather than reading intuitively, I've found myself reading by habit, which doesn't give me as clear answers as it should.  I'll probably end up using the two decks interchangeably - whichever feels right for the question being asked.

Behind the Name - WinterRose Moon-Hawk

I don't claim to have had a tough life - I have a family who loves me, a roof over my head and food in my stomach, but I have had to deal with many Tower-like situations before. And from each of those ordeals, I've blossomed and grown.  People have likened me to the Phoenix, but I am drawn not to the power and majesty of that wonderful creature, but to the simple strength and determination of the Winter Rose.  This little plant blooms each year in the depths of winter, opening its delicate petals regardless of frost and snow.  I have proven many times that I have the same simple determination and inner strength to keep opening my petals after they've been bitten by frost and rebuild myself after a Tower-like event has taken place.

Moon-Hawk comes from the planet that rules my very being, and the creature that symobolises me.  In Tarot, the Moon is about psychic awareness and visions.  In Astrology, the moon symbolises the inner being that very few people get to see or experience - the ultimate private self.  It also represents psychic awareness and the instinctual self.  In essence, this name relates to my very inner being - my 'True Name' if you will.  Like the Winter Rose, the Hawk represents strength, as well as truth and intuition.  Interestingly, the Hawk is actually a solar animal, which balances out the lunar aspects to this name.

Both these names came through meditation and discussion with my guides and totem animals.