Finding a place for the business of the modern season while also taking time for reflection and nature connections in long standing traditions.

These past few weeks have been filled with all things winter Christmas decorating, sugar cookie baking, and ginger bread house making. We have been sledding and ice skating on the pond by our house. Our local communities have also treated us to some extra special holiday memories - we spent the day making greenery bouquets at the Vergas Small Town Christmas, had an evening meeting Santa at Lights in the Pines (or as True calls it the North Pole), and filled up on cookies at St. Paul’s cookie walk (also referred to by True as the cookie factory).

While winter is technically the off season of a flower farmer, there is something I can’t resist about weaving wreaths and gathering greens in this winter season. Gathering bows and branches and all other foraged goods feels therapeutic. To me it’s a meditative reflection, a time to take note of all that has grown and bloomed and gone to seed in the past year. The whole Christmas season is also thick with traditions. On a personal scale every Christmas box I open reminds me of years past, as if the pure joy of childhood christmases got packed into the boxes right with the Christmas Village. The season also holds grand, long standing traditions across many cultures connecting us all the way back Ancient times . Conifers have served as symbol of protection and rebirth. The striking green of evergreens in the sea of white and gray and brown have been used for centuries to get us through the darkest days of the year and celebrate the rebirth of the sun during the winter solstice. Decorating their green bows with dried fruits and dried flowers is a way to mark the increase in daylight and movement back into the fertile and growing time of the year. Pine has also been used in across countless cultures for its medicinal properties - teas, steams, analgesics, and topicals. The ancient spirit of pine is thought to bring about confidence, it clears the mind and opens the chest. It leaves one with feelings of rejuvenations, inner strength, and a refreshed perspective. Bringing evergreen boughs in our homes is more than a “just because” - it is a way we as humans have brought hope, health and rejuvenation into our homes in the deepness of winter of nearly all of time.

Taking time to gather greens and weave boughs grounds me. It makes me feel like I’m part of something larger, something that goes back generations in a season where it is easy to become adrift in the fast paced comparison of gifts and lists. Merging the traditions of the past with some of our more modern traditions is the sweet spot I’m shooting for this winter.