Depending where you live, you might get snow every Winter. You might love the snow or hate it. But one thing is for sure – snow is one of the gods’ most beautiful creations. Here we identify snow’s magic properties, hail and ice magic properties, and look at the many ways to cast snow spells for various intentions. Grab your mittens, your magical shovel, and dig in!

The Magick of Snow Days

Remember being a kid and having a snow day? It meant not going to school. It meant taking your sled to the tallest hill in your neighborhood and sledding down as fast as possible. Where I grew up in the Northeast, snow days were coveted by all the kids. I remember listening for our county’s school snow days to be announced on the radio and cheering with delight. And as soon as you were done making snow angels, sledding with your friends, and having snowball fights, you’d go inside and have a nice hot cup of cocoa.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I realize snow days for adults are quite a different matter. We have to shovel our driveways, brush the ice off windshields, pipes might burst, the salt sticks to our cars and many other wonderful things. But instead of complaining, why not use snow and ice to your magical advantage? Why not cast snow spells and make ice magick? In addition, take some time on snow days to rest and heal yourself. This is a great time to self-reflect and regenerate.

Let’s talk about the water element first…

Since snow is simply frosty water, we should discuss the properties and powers of the water element first. The water element is necessary for all life on this planet. For humans, animals, plants, trees, insects, and more. It’s linked to the moon, since the moon pulls on the ocean tides. Water is a solvent, it quenches our thirst, makes up our blood, and cleans away debris. Its properties are purification, intuition, dreams, emotions, love, rebirth, harmony, friendship, and connection to sea gods, spirits, and the Underworld. Therefore, all properties of water can technically be applied to snow magic.

Snow Magic Properties

Snow is essentially a frozen, crystallized form of water. It takes on the magic properties of the water element, which includes: intuition, emotion, dreams, purification, healing, creation and destruction. However, snow’s magic properties differ just a bit from water’s, because of its unique form. They include:

• Quiet/silence (think of how quiet it is after a snowfall)
• Solitude (aren’t we sort of holed up in our homes and granted solitude on those snowy days?)
• Peace and harmony
• Rest and regeneration (snow allows for rest when we need it most)
• Deep self healing
• Gentle purification
• Creation AND destruction (depending on the quantity of snow, mirroring the water element)
• Uniqueness (every snowflake is different from the next)
• Beauty
• Family matters
• Patience
• Goddess work
• Femininity

Snow Spells: Ways to Use Snow in Your Magick

Everyone’s magick is unique and beautiful. What you choose to do with snow in your practice is only limited by your imagination and drive. That being said, we’ve found some awesome ways to cast snow spells and use snow in one’s witchcraft practice. Here are just a few:

• Collect snow in a jar and save the snow water
• Snow water can be used to purify your altar, home, magic tools
• Snow can be added directly to ritual baths for snow spells of the healing, self-love, and cleansing kind
• Bury your petition in the snow to “cool off” a situation (a snow spell that is temporarily binding)
• Use snow as an offering to Winter deities like Holda, Berchta, Odin, La Befana, the Cailleach, etc.
• Use snow when working with Winter fairies and spirits: anoint your third eye with snow to “see” them, use as offerings, etc.
• Melt in a pot with herbs and other ingredients to make a simmering potpourri then bottle and spray around the house to purify and bring a time of peace
• Make an infusion of snow water and herbs for floor washes and front door washes for various intentions
• Go out into the snow and build a snowman as offering to the Winter deities and spirits
• Go sledding with a focus on healing your inner child and bringing joy to your life
• Have a snowball fight with your friends or family to cool off a hot situation (if there’s a lot of discord in the home, etc.) and “let off steam” with each other
• Snow spells using floating candles – float the candles in snow water to merge fire and water elements
• Draw/paint pictures of your intentions into the snow with natural objects OR use food dye (see Rita B’s pretty flower snow magick below! Rita decided she was tired of the snow and wanted to see Spring, so she painted flowers in the snow using food dye. This is called using your imagination and creativity in your snow spells.)
• Make paper snowflakes to put in your grimoire when recording your snow spells

Hail & Ice Magic Properties

Ice is a different matter from snow. While they go hand-in-hand, ice’s magic properties are unique to ice. When it rains down from the sky, it takes the form of sleet, freezing rain, or hail. Each are unique unto themselves. They all carry the magic properties of water, but also their own properties. Hail forms in thunderstorms that can happen in any season, while sleet happens mostly in Winter. Hail is often more destructive than sleet or freezing rain and because it comes from thunderstorms picks up the properties from thunderstorms. Though, as we’ve said before, the level of destruction depends on the quantity of hail, sleet, snow, etc. Interestingly, our Norse and Germanic ancestors felt so strongly about the power of Hail and Ice, there are two runes that correspond (listed below under their respective magic properties).

Hail’s Magic Properties:

• Abrupt change/transformation
• Survival
• Acceptance
• Crisis
• New Opportunity
• When you need to “Shake Things Up”
• Intense emotions
• The Rune: Hagalaz

Ice Magic Properties:

• Stillness
• Self-identity and self control
• Focus
• Concentration
• Stasis
• Pause
• Harsh conditions and survival
• Cooling “hot” situations off
• Self defense
• Purification
• The Rune: Isa

Hail and Ice Spells and Magical Uses

As with snow, hail and ice magick is up to your creativity. Keep in mind hail and ice magic properties are different than snow, so use it appropriately with your intentions. Collect hail and ice for ice spells, store in your freezer, or let it melt for ice or hail water. OR use ice from your freezer in your spells. Here’s some ways to do magick with ice and hail:

• Freeze a hot situation in the freezer to cool things off or to stop something or someone in their tracks
• Use hail water in the bath to supercharge yourself before rituals
• Freeze herbs or flowers in ice and use in kitchen magick
• Melt hail or ice water and make hot tea, potions, infusions, etc.
• Use ice water to purify altar space
• Offer hail or ice to Winter deities
• Draw the Hagalaz and/or Isa runes on candles, doorways, windows, or on body parts to invoke hail and ice magic properties
• Melt ice or hail water on the stove in a magical simmering potpourri in alignment with your intentions
• Collect hail or ice, let it melt and charge it in the moon to make moon water
• Take a home ice bath to “chill out” a hot attitude, connect with Northern ancestors, and more