A little while back, I scattered some poppy seeds at our local park.

I’m still choosing hope, just as I’m still looking forward to seeing those poppies bloom in our neighborhood. Some of the seeds will undoubtedly survive. Others won’t. Seeds don’t become gardens on their own. They need tending: attention, protection, and patience.

I’m entering this new year thinking about seeds, and about hope.

Hope, I’ve learned, isn’t something we either have or don’t have. It’s something we can cultivate. Something that grows slowly, often invisibly, and very often underground, just like the seeds we plant or the transplants we tuck into the garden, trusting that something is happening even when we can’t see it yet.

In a world that feels loud, rushed, and heavy, I find myself returning again and again to the same question:
How can we slow down long enough to notice what really matters?

My work has always been rooted in that longing. I create art to bring hope and healing into everyday life, art that invites us to pause, to look closely, and to reconnect with the natural world, the place we all come from.

It’s almost time for one of my most anticipated days of the year, and no, it’s not Christmas, and it’s not my birthday (which is the 20th). It’s the winter solstice, on the 21st.

What I love most about it is simple and profound: from that day forward, the light begins to return.

Winter is not my season. Everything in nature slows down, contracts, and goes dormant—and honestly, that sounds like the right idea. But modern life doesn’t allow for that kind of rhythm. Instead, we’re expected to keep running at full speed,