Wonderful words for winter

It's just past mid-winter

That heavy bleak "it's never going to end" feeling centred deep in your heart weighs down your very being....but there is hope.

We may be thinking longingly of spring, wondering when that's going to happen while temperatures drop, winds rage and the snow blows.

The white stuff building up even higher in the garden, but some wonderful winter words should help us get through this dark and gloomy season. So let's explore a few winter words to push those last days of the cold and dark well behind us.

All things relating to winter could be referred to as:

1. Hiemal

As in, it was a hiemal season the driveway needed to be plowed....again...... Or it feels very hiemal out there, so maybe I won't bother plowing but just sit here sipping my hot cocoa. I might even post it on Instagram, a steaming cup, snow covered windows all artistically arranged.

2. Subnivean 

Situated or under the snow....

Let's use this word in a gardening reference...I had some kale plants I was hoping to harvest leaves from all winter but unfortunately they are subnivean now...while that may not be the most exact reference for the word, it is the truth...my kale are well and truly buried after this last deep snowfall.


Take that you nasty aphids....

3. Apricity

The warmth of the sun in winter. This one is a favourite of mine, I'm happily using it whenever we are in the middle of a wintery hike, stopping to catch our breath on the trail...the weak winter sunshine warming our skin. It's a word that warms not only the skin, but the heart...I'd love to see it in use more often.

4. Crule

To crule can mean to shiver with cold—or to crouch by a fire to warm up, you might crule after foolishly venturing outside with your camera not wearing the proper clothes. All because you were excited to catch a little apricity from the sunshine despite the subzero temps.

The frozen fingers will thaw out...eventually. Just think of the pics you captured.

 5. Psychrotrophic

This one is a bit of a stretch but it will be included, you may have cruled unless you are psychrotrophic which means thriving at a low temperature. But you would most likely not be human, but bacterial...so it's unlikely that you are.

There are more words for Winter.....

And these are but a few of the words we can use to describe the chilly season...now if you'll excuse me, I must put my snow boots on and venture out in the hiemal weather to do some subnivean digging for my kale, and I hope that I can feel the apricity of the sun while I'm out there.

Jen @ Rural


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