Happy Friday. I hope you’ve enjoyed a good week. We are coming out of our nth blizzard here in the Midwest. Just 10 days ago, some of the sights in our neck of the woods included…

frosty rooftops and cars buried in snow

… and an icy new look for our local park’s field house.

This week, in contrast, has seen us enter into a slow thaw. The thaw has its own qualities which I’ve been trying to observe. It’s a transitional time of drippy icicles (caution above!), slick sidewalks, muddied snow, and sock-soaking pavement pools of dark grey meltwater — a time both quiet and swishy, full of subtle movement. The windows come open to let in new light and new air, and in the mornings, prattles of birds (yes, inventing my own plural noun) commingle with the sound of shovel-scrapes. A few afternoons ago, that fearsome three story ice column came crashing down (we heard and felt it from a distance away). The sky is softening and blue-ening (verb?) again. Out of the ice comes a brightness.

Funnily, I think that the bullet journal spread that I drew a few weeks ago for this week captures the feeling above — not the usual confetti-throw of florals that I’ve enjoyed drawing all winter, but a slow bloom out of the greys and ice. I hope that you, too, are enjoying a bloom, in whatever form yours is taking.

And while we’re on this theme: As I’ve noted in the Saturday 27th slot above, we’re expecting a Full Moon tomorrow. It’s the first full moon of the lunar calendar — February’s Snow Moon (aptly named) or, in Chinese, the “Budding Moon.” It signals that a new cycle of inception and renewal is quietly brewing, and is on its way. I hope you can catch a glimpse of it! 🌕

Wishing you possibility and new energies!