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This evening my mother-in-law and I were talking about the fact that there’s only a month and a half left in the year. I was sharing with her that I couldn’t remember what I’d set out to accomplish this year. I was sure I’d written my intentions down but couldn’t remember where. Then I visited my archive of all the weekly emails I’ve ever written and found last year’s thoughts about what I hoped 2025 would be.

Senator Cordell Cleare and I sat at the same table this past Friday as we were celebrating the 100th year anniversary of ESRA Realty, the oldest Black-owned real estate firm in New York State. ESRA Realty was responsible for me finding my first apartment in Harlem, Sugar Hill to be exact. It was that apartment that sparked the name of Sugar Hill Creamery.

Instead of goals, I like to pick a word to shape the flow of my year. While I enjoy goals, I prefer to work toward achievements in alignment with what my mind and body need and are telling me. Dare I speak too soon, but you won’t find me physically overextending myself to the point of harm because I set a goal. Finding a word to guide myself feels more intuitive and allows me to ebb and flow with life’s demands.

My word for 2025 was “receive.” I was looking to receive help, blessings, and my authentic self. If I’m looking back on the year, I feel satisfied with how it went through the filter of this word. I also shared in that email that I was hoping to make more of a home in our apartment. Now, we’re trying to sell it to make a new home in a larger unit in the building.

Me at this past week’s ConeCon conference flanked by two Ice Cream Baddies — Kari from Melt in Dallas/Fort Worth and Andia from Andia’s Ice Cream in North Carolina

I feel like 2026 is going to be one of new beginnings in more ways than one—from possibly living in a different apartment after 14 years in another to how we’re restructuring the company to build an operations team that will allow us to scale in the right ways. I’m hoping it will be a year of setting us up for the next chapter of Sugar Hill Creamery.

Have you started thinking about 2026? I mean, the Christmas decorations are out in every store I’ve gone to and we haven’t even cut any Thanksgiving turkeys. I wrote this letter to the graduating SHMOM cohort. If you’re thinking about 2026 and changing things up, give it a read. I’m meditating on the words as well even though I don’t plan on doing any 180s.

Let me know what you think and have a great week ahead!

Petrushka

P.S. If you’re in the market to purchase an apartment in Harlem, HMU!

P.P.S. Because we just started talking about Thanksgiving, you can grab a Thanksgiving ice cream pie to pick up at the stores or a mini, deep dish version on Goldbelly. And, if you’ve already skipped to Christmas, our peppermint bark cake is available on Golbelly, too!