I just received the best news! My app has made it to the finals of the prestigious Media Excellence Award, in several categories. Wow! Winners will be announced at the black tie, red carpet event in Los Angeles on January 18. I am so honored to have made it this far, and of course, I plan to go. I can’t wait to shop for my dress. No matter what happens, it is such an honor…

This is a big month that includes emphasis on all parts of your life: from career and love, to friendship, and money. Not everything will be easy this month because the planets are like little elves, cooking up mischief. You and the rest of us will have to stay alert and carefully chose days you want to make your initiations.

Mercury will be retrograde all month, from December 3 to 22, making it a bad time to make hard-and-fast decisions. You need time to mull over offers and developments, for this month, quick knee-jerk reactions will only lead you down the wrong path. Not everything that glitters this month will be real, so you will have to look closer and ask many questions. Mercury retrograde will bring cancellations, mix-ups, and the need to redo parts of projects. We are all in this together, dear Aquarius, so when it starts to happen, don’t feel singled out.

Mercury will mess up your holiday shopping, so it will be imperative to start early, and to ship quickly too. If you wait until the last minute, your holiday plans may fall like a china cup and break into a million pieces. Express mail services will not be able to meet an overwhelming demand this year (these companies are ruled by Mercury too), so you can’t depend on any of those companies to get your packages to your recipients on time. It’s going to be like the Winged Messenger (Mercury) lost all his wings, at least temporarily.

Don’t buy any electronic items this month even if you won’t technically receive it until after Mercury is finished retrograding. Mercury rules the moving parts as well as the spark of electronic components, the reason the product does not always function the way we had hoped. Our judgment is off too during these periods, so we often buy the wrong model or simply get a lemon. We become rushed, distracted, and forgetful during these phases, so you see why Mercury retrograde can be frustrating. If you are saying, “Oh no, this does not apply to me,” I will ask you again after you tell me you lost your cell phone in a taxi at night. I hope this does not happen, so be very deliberate about making sure you have everything with you and nothing is missing. Take cab receipts so you can call the cab driver should you leave something behind. Also tape your business card on the back of all your electronic treasures, and tuck your card into your eyeglass and sunglass cases.

If you didn’t shop last month, all you can do is bake cookies, send framed photos, wire money, or give a gift card – your choices are getting narrower by the minute. To learn more about Mercury retrograde, go to my website, Astrology Zone, to find my essay called All You Need to Know About Mercury Retrograde in the lower left hand side of my homepage. Or, go to the paid subscription version of my app, Susan Miller’s Astrology Zone Daily Horoscope, and look on the menu for the section called Life, Love + More. Under that section go to the top, Susan’s Essays, and see my piece on Mercury retrograde.

My paid subscriber version of my app will give you all my essays, and most importantly, my much longer daily horoscopes. On either my free or paid subscriber versions, you will always get my monthly forecast, too, complete and uncut. A subscription costs $4.99 for one month, and $12.99 for three months (the most popular selection) and $49.99 for a year (a great gift). Apple App Store and Google Play will be your retailer, and they take a deserved 30 percent of the cost.

Now let’s turn to the events of the month. On the full moon, December 3, in Gemini 12 degrees, operative for two days before and four days after, you may have an outstanding romantic episode. I feel you are most likely to experience this full moon over December 2, a Saturday night, for the full moon will arrive quickly the following day. This full moon will fall in your fifth house of true love, and it could bring a fateful first meeting. It will be time to decide where you want your dating relationship to go – if you are happy, you will want to grow closer, and if you are not happy, you may decide to leave. It looks like this will be a highly romantic time, so chances are, you will be happy.

If you are attached, you may be ordering little soft baby buntings, baby blankets, and booties very soon. This full moon will encourage conception, too, and if you are pregnant, birth. If you have had difficulties, try to make your appointment with a fertility specialist doctor for advice very early in the month, no later than December 7.

Neptune will have his fingerprints all over this full moon, December 3, so if you are in love, go slowly before making a commitment. Neptune will be in hard aspect to the Sun and full moon, veiling reality and making the world look magical in every way, but only time will tell if what you are seeing is real. When accepting a proposal for marriage, you need to be sure you know one another well. Neptune’s brother, Mercury, isn’t helping by creating an environment of smoke and mirrors, so you see the problem. By going slowly, you will protect your heart.

This same full moon, December 3, will be divine for expressing yourself artistically and for finishing up a creative project. In this case Neptune will add poetry, grace, and lyricism to all that you do.

If your birthday falls on January 31, plus or minus four days, you will notice the effects of the full moon, and benefit from it too. The same is true if you have Aquarius rising or the natal moon at 12 degrees, in all cases, plus or minus four degrees. If you have a natal planet in Aquarius, Gemini, Libra, Aries, Leo, or Sagittarius at 12 degrees (plus or minus four degrees), you too will feel the glow.

More social activity will come up at the full moon, December 18, in Sagittarius 27 degrees. This new moon will open opportunity in your friendship sector (eleventh house), so you may see a flurry or invitations to holiday parties. This same house is the house of charity and humanitarian efforts, so you may be giving a fundraiser dinner that would be quite beautiful and covered well by the press.

Saturn is conjunct the Sun and new moon, so your sweetheart or a friend may be going through a tough patch, and depend on you to offer emotional support in the days and weeks ahead. This is not the first time you’ve been there for a friend, for Saturn has asked you to be responsive to friends’ needs since moving into Sagittarius in December 2014. This month, the person who needs you may be your spouse, friend, person you are dating, co-worker, or one of your parents. Holiday time is always hectic, but you will need to be available to this person who needs you so much.

This phase is ending, so you won’t find this to be as prevalent in coming months and years. Saturn in this house opened your heart, and you may have worked for a charity or humanitarian cause as a result.

The new place Saturn will enter Capricorn, this month on December 19 for three years, is a milder place in the chart, and one where you will be highly productive when working alone. If you are a writer, researcher, or lab scientist, as three examples, you will show outstanding productivity under the coming trend.

If your birthday falls on February 15, plus or minus four days, you will feel this new moon directly and benefit from it. The same is true if you have Aquarius rising or the natal moon at 26 degrees, plus or minus four degrees. Also, if you know you have a natal planet in Aquarius, Gemini, Libra, Aries, Leo, or Sagittarius, 26 degrees, plus or minus four degrees, you too will have an eventful, positive experience from this new moon.

Last month, you and I spoke about how well your career is going, and this month, Mars will enter a very special place in your chart, your tenth house of honors, awards, and achievement. Mars will remain here from December 9 to January 26, enough time to make a name for yourself. This will be one of the most critical periods of the year for you to advance your reputation and to get your foot in the door of influential VIPs who can raise your profile in your industry. Mars only comes by your prestigious tenth house every two years, spending approximately six weeks in that solar house each time, so you need to make this rare transit of Mars work for your professional life now.

Here is an important date to use at month’s end to see progress in your career December 27, when Mars and Neptune will be in perfect sync. Mars is in your house of career advancement, and Neptune is in your second house of earned income, and on this day the two will work together on your behalf. Schedule an interview, give a presentation, or write a report and hand it in. If you are work in the arts or entertainment, you will get a double dip of luck on this magical date.

Here are two more important dates to watch for career success – they will occur next month: Friday, January 5, and Saturday, January 6 – when Jupiter will align with Mars to mathematical perfection in your tenth house of fame and honors, which has not occurred with Jupiter and Mars in Scorpio since August 8, 1982. Wow, this is going to be big. If you have to schedule an important interview or send in an application, you know when to do it now.

You seem to be working through the holiday season, for you seem to have a deadline to meet for a project due at the full moon near January 1, 2018. You will feel the strong energy of this full moon for several days before the year’s end. It appears this project will be due just before New Year’s Day or just after you get back to the office that week.

You will be pumping to finish up details, so make sure you do not run your resistance down. This same house covers not only work projects but also health matters, so you might see the end of a protocol, such as a finish to the length of time needed in physical therapy, or a finish to a certain drug trial. Mars will be nicely angled to this full moon and Sun, which will bring you energy and drive.

By month’s end, and New Year’s Eve, Mars will be orbiting very close to Jupiter, so you may be taking a short trip to see friends, or to connect with your sister, cousin, or business associate. You will be in the mood to treat yourself to a touch of luxury with fine accommodations. No matter the reason for your trip, you will come back happy that all your goals were met. If you travel for fun, with Mars so active, you may be hoping to do sports, such as skiing on the slopes or jet skiing in crystal blue waters.

Now that Jupiter, the great planet of good fortune, is firmly ensconced in your house of fame and honors, a place Jupiter took up on October 10, you are starting to see heartwarming progress in your career. Action Mars will enter your house of fame, to conjoin Jupiter next month on January 5 and January 6. You need not wait that long for results – as the two planets grow closer, you will feel the glow in the last week of December too.

It took Jupiter twelve years to get your tenth house of professional prestige, so now that Jupiter is there, make the most of this visit. He will stay with you for another ten months, until early November 2018. By that period’s end, you are likely to be in an entirely new level in your career and basking in the warm glow of success.

In the first days of December, Jupiter and Neptune will be in sync, indicating you may get a raise or bonus for the original approach you have taken to your work. These two planets will be in sync through much of next year too, so continue to voice your ideas to people in power. You are making a good impression – keep it up! The world runs on ideas. If you just switched jobs, then the paycheck you get in early December will reflect a more generous wage, based on your reputation for originality.

Another planet that is changing signs this season is Saturn, the planet that teaches us that the things we become proudest of in life are those that we worked the hardest to achieve. Saturn will move out of your friendship and group sector into Capricorn on December 19 or 20, depending on where you live, and fill your twelfth house of behind-the-scenes solitary study and research. If you are setting out to write a book or finish a thesis, you will have all the time and concentration you need to get it done.

This is a fairly easy place to host this tough teacher planet – Saturn – so the coming three years will be easier for you to navigate than the last three. While Saturn was in Sagittarius, over the past three years you may have taken on a responsible role in a group, such as to spearhead a charity benefit, or the neighborhood safety watch, as two of many possible examples. You may have served on the parent teacher’s committee, or worked on a humanitarian project overseas. Or, you may have had problems with mean people – haters and trolls – on social media, and you learned to ignore them, never an easy thing to do. If a friend was going through a rough patch, you were there to offer enormous compassion and wise advice.

Aquarius is the sign that is sensitive to society’s needs, so you may have been moved to help a segment of society that has been overlooked, or was in crisis, such as what happens when there is a natural disaster. You may have organized a volunteer group to shine greater awareness to these people’s plight, and also worked on raising funding.

You may have had times when you had to deal with political jockeying within the group you formed, or joined, and that may have caused you to be quite surprised –  you may have asked yourself, why all this drama? After all, you have been working to make the world a better place. Now your period of learning about human behavior is winding down, and there will be no more political moves within a group to upset you. You will feel released from any problems you may have felt while dealing with friends or groups.

Romantically, you will have plenty of invitations for holiday parties. First, if you have been dating, you will have a decision to make about the future of your closest romantic relationship, to happen over the full moon period of December 3, plus or minus four days. Neptune will throw a veil over reality, so it may be hard for you to be objective and to see the truth of the situation. Your partner may not have been fully honest with you, so you will have to move slowly, careful not to jump to conclusions either.

After that, invitations for holiday parties and get-togethers will proliferate once the new moon arrives on December 18. In the two weeks that follow, during some of the parties you attend you may make a new friend. Saturn will be conjunct the Sun and moon, a serious influence, indicating you may be concerned about the health or welfare of your spouse, established partner, parent, friend, or co-worker. Someone near you appears to be in distress, and when this happens, the person almost always will be too shy to ask for help Keep your eyes open – someone close needs you.

Next, Venus will receive a signal from surprise-planet Uranus, your ruler, on December 20, If you are single, you might meet someone interesting that you’d like to get to know better. This fateful meeting might happen while you are traveling to a nearby town, or even while you are doing quick errands around the neighborhood. It’s a busy time, but you will need to look your best.