By Cat Gina Cole
When I was young, my grandmother called what I now know as Imbolc the “Quickening,” It was not specific to a particular date but always occurred in February. We knew the quickening had arrived when Grandma would stop whatever she was doing, listen for a moment and say, “The quickening is here, do you feel it?” Sometimes, it would happen in the garden, sometimes not, but she could feel it. It was a noticeable shift in the energy of the earth and the plants that she could feel. What is the quickening you ask? Well, it is when the earth has warmed up just enough to trigger plants to shift from putting out roots to pushing out shoots.
