7 winter projects i’m using to distract me from seasonal affective disorder

and a master list of more project ideas to add to your personal winter toolkit

hello quiet readers, i hope you’re all well. i’m doing a 50% off black friday sale for yearly subscriptions (only £20 a year!) that will end next sunday. so if you’d like access to this extra-long post full of project ideas (+ master list at the end) to help you get through the winter, upgrade your subscription today! as well as that, you’ll get subscriber-only posts, access to the quiet notes from my journal series and the seasonal mini magazine! okay enough promo, enjoy the post! <33

---

there’s always an excuse for a hot chocolate. the way the sleeves of my jumpers stretch and cloak my hands. throwing a scarf over my shoulder. chelsea boots. seeing my breath evaporate in the air. the shade of blue that looks cold to the touch in the sky. bonfires and fireworks. chilly hands and runny noses. the feeling of stepping into a warm building after being outside, muscles relax, fingers brought back to life. favourite outfits and colour palettes. my long brown coat and chunky loafers. that one pair of pyjama bottoms that make me feel like i am wearing a cloud. the precious 15 minutes of wearing fluffy socks i can bear before i get overstimulated. fleeces. crunchy brown leaves on the ground, brilliantly orange leaves still hanging on to their mother.

autumn relaxes me, slows me down, reminds me that rest is important, that without rest, i cannot do all the things i want to do, go to all the places i want to go.

but when the clocks change and the sky really enjoys putting on its grey coat all day and when my eyes start to close at 7pm making the day feel five minutes long and when i start thinking that if the eyes are the windows to the soul then that means no light passes through me in between the months of october to march and that must mean my soul shrivels just a little more until i have just enough energy to get out of bed and that’s all sometimes, when winter arrives, it’s a little harder to romanticise.

because the leaves are dead and gone and the tree branches are bare and i haven’t seen the sunlight in seven days and my soul is starting to look like the plant i have neglected to water in a few weeks. my living room is dark, my skin is cold and i don’t feel like unwrapping myself from this blanket to go for a walk.

but i really want things to be different this year. i don’t want winter to feel like the longest season. i don’t want to wish three months of the year away. i want to be so busy that by the time i lift my head up from my desk, i start to see the tiny green buds of baby leaves poking out on tree branches again—one of my all-time favourite visions.

so here is what i am doing to keep busy this winter, to keep the grey thoughts at bay:

• a closer look at welcome to the hyunam-dong bookshop by hwang bo-reum

i know the year hasn’t finished yet, but this is already my favourite book of 2025. i think it’s such a rich piece of literature that gives you so much to think about, so i’m reading it again with pens, highlighters and a notebook at the ready to dive a little deeper into each character and their personal journeys.

is a good book always a good read? how do you recommend a good book to someone? why do we feel guilt over wanting to lead simple lives? what role should work really play in our lives, and why does it always have to take up such a huge portion of our lives? these are questions i feel like i could go on and on about and maybe learn some new things about myself in the process (and maybe some newsletters for you in the future!)

i also love annotating books in general. i love using highlighters and sticky tabs that match the colours of the cover, drawing little hearts next to passages i particularly love, having one-sided conversations with the author. i picture myself either finding a good, quiet seat in the library to delve into this book again, or sat at my desk at home, some gentle lo-fi in the background, a cup of tea in my favourite mug beside me.

• reviving my love of the library

speaking of libraries, i have discovered since moving that my local library is a beautiful one with books i never even thought a library would have. they’re going to get so sick of me in there.

borrowing books from the library will keep me very busy as there are so many books i’ve been meaning to read, but i simply can’t afford to buy them all. i suddenly have a very long borrowing list to get through. i also love that i have a deadline (i love a deadline) to read these in, so no more buying books just to have them sit on my shelf for months.

i currently have the third love and the nakano thrift shop by hiromi kawakami and the art of rest by claudia hammond on loan. i’m so excited to keep visiting and borrowing books as well as spend hours there writing for you, some short fiction and scribbling in notebooks about the books i’m reading.

• using my (neglected) reading journal for unfiltered bookish thoughts