We wanted to share some exciting news: The Cycles of Gaia Perpetual Nature Journal is live on Kickstarter as of Saturday.
Jon Schroth will write a longer reflection next week providing more of the story behind the journal’s development, including its unique design, but here’s the summary. It’s a journal made up of 52 double-sided cards bound by a ring and held snugly in a hardboard sleeve. There is no beginning or end, just like time. You fill a page. Next year you come back to that same week and write alongside what you wrote before. The season returns. So does the journal. And your observations grow in depth and insight.
At the top is a weekly segment of the Cycles of Gaia calendar, highlighting the leafing, flowering and fruiting cycles of 20 native trees and shrubs, drawn from 30 years of phenological records from southern New England. So when you sit down to write in late spring, the page already shows you what’s stirring around you: what’s leafing, what’s about to flower. You start reading the year the way the trees do.
At the bottom of each page is a short reflection from a nature writer, often penned in the same season and region the page covers. Your words in the middle. Theirs underneath. The land’s rhythm across the top.
We put it on Kickstarter both as a way to offer a first wave of discounted journals to supporters and to spread the word beyond our community to new individuals who will value this nature-connecting perpetual journal. We intentionally set a modest goal — $1,000 — as we wanted to reach that quickly and build the excitement across the Kickstarter platform. And we’re excited to report that we hit that goal in just one revolution of Earth, thanks to some generous supporters and those purchasing their Yuletide gifts early! So, we invite you to join in and back the journal on Kickstarter and spread the word to your journaling and nature-loving friends!
Thank you for moving through the year with us.
— Erik, Jon, and the Cycles of Gaia team
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