January 18, 2026 - Capricorn New Moon at 28º43'

January 18, 2026 - Capricorn New Moon at 28º43'

Hello Moon Babes!

It has been awhile since I've written a New Moon article for you - I'll admit, writing has been a challenging concept for me the past few years.

It is a delicate dance to write about the astrology of our times - I began to feel like a fear-monger, especially after being accused of being one by people who (I thought) were important to me. I had a lot of relationships end during and since 2020, and the grief I experienced was incredibly overwhelming and oftentimes crippling. 

I went into a deep hermit-mode and almost solely focused on growing my reach through my candy and the mini-astro-guides I include with candy orders. It felt like the right move from a mental, spiritual and especially financial perspective.

As much as I love writing about my passion, I couldn't deny that it didn't pay my bills and I was beginning to drown in debt. I needed to collect myself and find a solid foundation before I could justify spending long hours every week writing. As an individual with a Sagittarius stellium and Jupiter in Pisces, I certainly have a tendency to bite off more than I can chew. I started to cut back on everything & simplify my day-to-day. I told myself, "Jilly, get your money right, your house in-order, then get back to writing."

So, here I am, in January 2026 after closing on an unbelievable record-breaking year of sales (seriously, I didn't think it could happen) - which also included me purchasing a car (I didn't have a reliable vehicle for many years!) - feeling ready to get back to my Astrology Blog. Also, side note: the Sagittarius New Moon on 12/19/25 started 2 minutes from an exact conjunction to my natal 3rd House Mars. I knew that Moon cycle would awaken my desire to communicate.

 

The Capricorn New Moon is our annual time to plant a seed of Discipline & Accountability into our garden of life. If you turn the wheel 90º from Capricorn, you arrive at Aries - a time when the Earth begins to awaken and we begin to feel a spring in our heels, arching ourselves forward, eager to experience life. Capricorn season is the build-up to Aries season - we must look ahead, be conservative with our resources, and begin planning for the spring and a new Astrological year. If you want a better Spring, Summer & Fall, the work begins now. Life is just an endless experience of overlapping cycles - getting into a flow with the Earth's spin is the 1st step towards living a better life.

And this is quite the year, Moon Babes; if you thought a lot happened in 2025, I'd like to introduce you to 2026 when:

Saturn & Neptune meet at the Aries Point (0º Aries)  in February...

Uranus moves into Gemini in April (& stays there until 2032)...

the North Node shifts into Aquarius in July

Pluto is also in Aquarius, which means this upcoming Aquarius North Node transit will be MEGA INTENSE...think back to 2010 & 1994, the last two times the North Node aligned with Pluto. Pluto won't connect with the North Node until 11/16/2027.

Chiron makes it's first dip into Taurus in June -

& this is all occurring during a midterm election year, which BTW, 

Mercury will be Retrograde in SCORPIO on election day.

There is no sugarcoating it: 2025 was a catastrophically horrific year for the collective - the current administration of the United States is extraordinarily depraved and immoral. I had a feeling going into it that it would be an extraordinarily hard year for the majority of humans - we started the year with Neptune & Saturn making conjunctions to the Pisces North Node. The deceptions and grifts from those in the highest positions of authority were clear as day, well documented, yet there was very little intervention because any steps that were made to check and balance the overreach, were quickly washed away. How many times did the administration blatantly ignore orders by the court? How many times did we witness the current administration dismiss the constitution and the constitutional rights of those in America?

This Capricorn New Moon is exact only 12 hours after the 3rd Mercury-Mars conjunction of the current cycle (with two more to go). And it is occurring less than 2º from both Mercury & Mars; meaning, this New Moon has the quality of the Mercury-Mars conjunction.


And what has the quality of the Mercury-Mars conjunction been like so far?

I've complied the major news stories for the US that broke around the same time as the exact Mercury-Mars conjunctions that we've already experienced (the Lourve Heist, while not a US story, was included because it was - and still is - so Mercury-Mars in Scorpio charged!), so you can decide for yourself how its been going:

During the 1st Mercury-Mars conjunction, at 19º Scorpio, exact on 10/20/2025:

Astrological chart of Mars conjunct Mercury on 10/20/2025

During the 2nd Mercury-Mars conjunction, at 6º of Sagittarius, exact on 11/12/2025 (while Mercury was Retrograde):

Astrological chart of Mars conjunct Mercury on 11/12/2025

3rd Mercury-Mars conjunction, at 26º Capricorn exact on 1/18/2026, so far we've seen: 

Astrological chart of Mars conjunct Mercury on 1/18/2026

We have two more Mercury-Mars conjunctions to experience within the current cycle - the next is on 3/15/2026 and the final conjunction on 4/20/2026.

 

Astrological chart of Mars conjunct Mercury on 3/15/2026
astrological chart of Mars conjunct Mercury on 4/20/2026